I think I’m going to end up caving and getting a copy. I was skeptical of it after 4e went over so poorly, but it looks like there’s some really cool stuff in there. Do you get access to a PDF version when you purchase the physical book? Is there a way to get just a PDF?
No sign of a PDF yet. The book itself is gorgeous and I’m in love with almost everything about the system so far.
Hey dudes - by a random happening of events, myself and a pal are going to be interviewing Mike Mearls and Jeremy Crawford from the WotC R&D Team (they were the design leads for the new edition). Anyone got some cool questions or ideas for what we should ask ?
Digital is a big question. Between my order of FATE Core including a PDF, a .mobi Kindle file, and a generic .epub file–all properly formatted for their target devices, mind you–and stuff like the Pathfinder searchable SRD, plus small devs like the guys behind Dark Dungeons offering a well-formatted Printable edition of their digital book, I expect a high-quality digital experience from my RPG dollars these days. I love my hardcover PHB, but I want something bookmarked, cross-referenced, internet-friendly, multi-device supporting, and next-gen, too! So, what are the plans there, other than “Codename: Morningstar will do some things, someday, maybe” said in a conspiratorial tone?
Aside from that, I’m curious to see if they plan to introduce more base classes (e.g., Artificers, Summoners, Alchemists, Samurai, Warlords, etc.) in future books, and/or if they plan to introduce additional “kits” for their existing classes (I’m positive the answer to both is a resounding yes, but learning more about the details for that stuff–will they be tied to setting splatbooks? Additional PHBs? Softcover rags?–would be super awesome.
I agree, it has a lot of fun possibilities. I really like how they emphasize working with the DM to customize exactly how your character fits the class. I may roll up a fey warlock because I could see him being a Merlin type from the movie Excalibur: hermit background, lots of access to charm and disguise spells. I’d aim for learning a lot of divination spells and then try to convince the party fighter to become king.
The only complaint I’ve seen about classes is the beast master Ranger, because his pet can’t attack unless he uses one of his own actions. I guess this is done for balance and speed of play, but it does seem a little limiting. I’d feel really bad if another party member bought an attack dog that the DM allowed to attack every turn.
Well, once an animal has a high enough intelligence, it can act on it’s own, so you just need a high level transmuter (9th level) to cast Awaken on it, oh and hopefully you treat it well! My concern with beast master is how well the companions end up scaling. I love the thought of a beastmaster class, but the animal ends up being so useless in most every system I have ever played on in sadly.
I don’t think the animal will be useless. At ranger levels 3 and 4, it is mainly helpful for scouting, but it can also block or provide an alternate axis of attack. At levels 5 and 6, you can do one animal attack and one ranger attack (or one animal and two ranger attacks if TWF). At levels 7-10 it can do more things like give you advantage by helping, without sacrificing an attack. At 11th and up, sacrificing an attack gives two animal attacks. At 15th, you could both be hasted from the same spell.
That said, I don’t know that it keeps up in terms of damage with the hunter variant.
My questions would be about DMing. They have put a lot of work into character creation, and they have come up with a clean set of mechanics to run the system, but where are they innovating in the realm of the DM? Did any of their play testing target the DM specifically? How do they plan to keep DMs interested in running 5E?
Thanks!
Have they discussed the license situation yet? I’d love to hear more about whether or not 3rd parties can create content, e.g. apps and books.
It’s very vague and ill-defined at this point, with sort of hazy platitudes like “This first year we want to focus on providing the top quality content” and “more details to come!” It’s about as informative as their PR regarding Codename: Morningstar that I am shocked was not ready for release with the system itself. I mean, jeeze, they’ve had this thing in planning for a couple of years now :-/
Anyway, I’d strongly estimate a more open license than 4E and a less open license than 3/3.5. I can’t imagine they want another Pathfinder situation cropping up on 'em.
Goodman Games, the makers of DCC have already created some adventures for 5e, not sure if they are released yet or not. That said I don’t know the intricacies of licensing.
I can only hope the newly revealed TSI is making a Gold Box 5E RPG for pcs and tablets!!
If you want to throw in a curve ball, ask them if they noticed that a level 7 character can easily kill the Tarrasque without being threatened. I thought that was an amusing flub.
I’m not seeing a flub, I’m seeing the typical D&D forum wankery from people who spend too much time making bizarre assumptions like “Monsters can’t ever do anything that isn’t listed in their MM statblock.”
I can’t imagine any DM actually letting a player kill a tarrasque by kiting it like some poorly programmed MMO mob. Any decent DM would have it toss a house at the player for d50+50 damage and call it a day.
So, who here is going to run Hoard of the Dragon Queen? I am running the Phandelver adventure and so far it seems to be going along great. But there is this new, super shiny D&D module. Does anyone want to take up the challenge of running it for qt3 folks?
I am so leery about throwing my hat into the DM ring, I struggle with feeling like I am not a very good DM after a few failed campaigns. I do have Hoard of the Dragon Queen coming on the 19th, I also have Murder in Baldur’s Gate, Ghost of Dragonspear Castle, Dead in Thay and Scourge of the Sword Coast. If no one else wants to run stuff I would be willing to dip my toe into the waters.
It’s possible that at some point in the future I’d run something, although, to be honest, it’d probably be homebrew as much as anything. At the moment my RPG plate is very full, but time changes everything!
I don’t mind taking a turn behind the GM wheel for the group at some point as well.
The whole “can animalistic monsters throw things at people?” argument is hilariously silly, but the flub I mean is that they designed a super boss monster… and then forgot that everyone kites giant monsters if they can and didn’t give the tarrasque any ability to deal with that. I think in previous editions it’s had things like an aura that causes flyers to drop out of the sky and maybe a breath weapon to do just that, but in 5th they didn’t think of that at all apparently. So I mean everybody is obviously going to house rule something in so their epic battle isn’t neutered, but it’s just silly that the designers didn’t consider flying and how easy it is to get in the D&D world.
I suspect there is a third page to the Tarrasque. The description mentions a lair, yet we haven’t seen any of his lair powers, and there is also mention to legendary creatures having regional affects.