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Any D&D players on here?
Hello all! Just trying to see if we have any RPG fans on Tildes.
Got into 5th edition in the last year and i've been a huge fan ever since.
Hello all! Just trying to see if we have any RPG fans on Tildes.
Got into 5th edition in the last year and i've been a huge fan ever since.
There are dozens of us here. ~games.tabletop is probably going to be one of the first sub-groups. I'm currently running a Deadlands Classic campaign and a 5e campaign for the same group of gamers, depends on what we're all in the mood for.
amazing! when are the sub groups rolling out ?
The short answer is 'when there's enough interest' they'll get created. However, Tildes doesn't actually have full sub-group mechanics yet, just some of the bare bones bits that system will eventually use to do the job. The idea is that if there's lots of posts in ~games with a D&D or tabletop tag, that's our cue to create the subgroup for it. That content would move there, and we'll have a super-upvote mechanic so the best threads from ~games.tabletop can level-up into ~games (probably only like 1 in 100 of them). That way the games crowd gets the best tabletop content without it seeming spammy, and the tabletop lovers get their own home for that content where they won't be bothered by the rest of the gaming group. It's kinda like creating a new subreddit, except it maintains a relationship with its parent community, sends its best stuff up to the larger gaming group, and someday it'll have its own children, ~games.tabletop.dnd etc.
Kinda hoping this system turns the 'defaults are crap' problem on its head. We won't know until we're busy enough to need that stuff, though. Hopefully by the end of the year!
That's how it works at the moment. ~tildes.official's post for example always show up in ~tildes as well. Someday when the subgroup system is more finished/polished, that'll change and the content will remain local to subgroups. Once this place starts to get really busy with a lot more submissions we'll probably focus on experimentation with various methods for managing content between groups and subgroups.
Savage, look forward to seeing it ! trying to get all my Reddit user friends onto this or a least make them aware of it.
I really like the idea of subgroups because right now ~games is overwhelmed with video gaming content and I've had quite enough of the commercial games industry's exploitative nonsense. I realize I can filter by tags, but having a specific subgroup would make it cleaner.
... and the oldschool Usenet nerd in me definitely approves of the dotted specifiers.
Oohhh I'd definitely be interested in a tabletop sub-group!
Cool, our campaign is moving from modules based to homebrew now and the group are pretty hyped about the world our DM hinted at so far. Two of our players like the role play element, the other three are more in for combat, so i find it creates a nice balance as the two handle the social element nicely.
Have you ever run a module? It seems most DM's (myself included) just jump straight into homebrew, which is kind of interesting. As a result I don't know many people who have done modules to see how they compare in terms of set up time, player satisfaction, balance, etc.
Personally, I don't regret worldbuilding for my homebrew campaign, but I think if I were to DM for the first time again, I would look into running a module first just to get a better idea of things.
Yeah sorry, "module" is the old term for what Wizards of the Coast now calls "adventures". Lost Mine of Phandelver is an example of what I was trying to say.
I ran a module for a single session when i first started, but I couldn't get the 'feel' of it at all. The characters, locations, and even plot all seemed to be just words on paper, and if the adventurers did something out of script, I was unable to adapt well enough. It's a failing on my part, so I tried homebrewing my own world, and it worked much better. Takes much longer, but I know how an NPC will react to a strange question, or what lies beyond the towns borders when the adventures are forced to flee the town because they were spotted setting fire to all nearby farms during the night (dont ask).
The key to getting good mileage out of modules is reading them first and internalizing it a bit. Once that's done, it's just a list of things-to-do places-to-visit for the players, and it's better to riff on the plot sometimes than try to railroad people through the modules. I look at them as a spark for when you're in a creative dry spell with your own content. I'll even use modules from different systems if I like the story/places. Not all modules are created equal either, some are terribad, some are exceptional - so if you aren't 'feeling' one, no worries, just move on to another.
I've run some modules and adventure paths which are Paizo's larger campaign-length modules. Specifically I've spent several sessions running Kingmaker and Rise of the Runelords (hereinafter RotRL), though both groups died before finishing. sigh.
The amount of prep for those two was drastically different: RotRL was more of a traditional campaign whereas Kingmaker was very sandboxy and easy to improvise, plus I could get my players to help me with the bookkeeping for Kingmaker since a lot of it was "have we been to this part of the map yet?" "oh yeah, this is where we tamed the owlbear" (druid + good rolls + rule of cool). I had some ideas for an additional "extracurricular" plot for Kingmaker that we just started to explore before the group died. The PCs found an amulet that was going to be tied to some other stuff that they'd find clues for as they explored the countryside; the idea was for them to go into the local major city to get the amulet appraised / examined and then that would start that side storyline.
I would say that RotRL was roughly comparable to a homebrew campaign if you had the material built already before starting the campaign. There's a lot of content developed for that part of the campaign world, as there have been numerous full (level 1-17 or so) campaigns set in that part of the world, so for a lore nerd player / DM like me, you really can invest as much time as you have into prepping. I ran RotRL fully online with roll20, and have the single volume special edition along with the PDF, so getting maps for combat / exploration set up was more tedious than challenging. And, of course, since I was playing online, it was trivial to keep a bunch of tabs open with stat blocks for all the NPCs I was running.
What pitfalls did you encounter at the beginning of your DM experience? Anything you would have liked to do differently? I'm currently preparing to run a short campaign for a couple of buddies who, like me, have no prior D&D experience. I'd love to make the experience as engaging and unobstructed with technical details as possible.
@deing already mentioned a few good points. I'd like to chime in with a few other pointers. I would also recommend using a pre-written adventure for your first adventure. Find a short one-episode adventure. Change and adapt it however you like, and make it your own thing.
Go with the flow. One of the most common mistakes is that fresh DMs consider their story as if it was a script to a play. When preparing, keep it light on details, and fill the details while playing games. Sometimes my most interesting experiences happened just randomly. If a players idea seems weird or unclear, have them explain to you what the plan is.
Common sense. I don't tell my players no, but I will sometimes remind them that their "common sense is tingling". Maybe storming a bunch of well trained guards is a very bad idea after all. If they still think they have a chance, it's up to the dice.
Failure, but progress. Sometimes players can't find a good solution or have really bad luck on rolls. They're stuck and could at best only repeat their tasks. Thats not fun. For instance, if a rogue tries to pick a lock but fails. Retrying again and again until the lock breaks is not that fun. So what I would do is that the failure does not lead to a broken lock, but that the rogue forgets time and fails to notice the footstep of guards. They can always return to the lock later, but for now they have to run and hide. It keeps things moving.
You can do the same in combat for instance. The archer missed the bandit, but the arrow knocks over a lamp. Now they have to deal with bandits and a burning building. This could turn both to advantage and disadvantage, maybe they figure out a good way to use the fire to get their goal.
Adapt all the time. Your players decided to go join the antagonist instead? Let the story play out as it should, but let the players see it from the other perspective. Got an important NPC that doesn't work? Demote him. Got a random NPC that works? Make her more important.
Write down details. Maybe a player did something earlier in their advantage, and it has consequences later in the game. What if the player helped a homeless man, and later when they meet him again they will help him. Or they created mayhem in town and now word have spread of their actions, making any innkeper take a very generous deposit. It makes it very clear to players that their actions have impacted the world in some way, but also means that their actions have consequences.
Combat in DnD takes way longer than the rules imply it to take. So I would keep the encounters few and short.
Thank you both for sharing your thoughts! Some points I hadn't considered, I especially like the one about making failures a part of the overall progress. I can imagine a lot of engaging situations springing up from various skill failures or the bad ideas on players' parts, but what about general stagnation? I suppose it's on the DM to prevent it from happening or introduce something to get the party moving.
Also, after a bit of googling, Lost Mines seems to be fairly universally regarded as a decent starting point. However, it isn't set in stone that we'll be playing for multiple sessions, so I want the first one to be self-contained. This way my players would have a taste of the basic game mechanics and hopefully get excited about rolling some dice and rescuing a damsel in distress/retrieving some unlucky merchant's valuables. So I've been on the lookout for some low-level one-shots. Can you recommend a specific adventure that is a good taste of what 'generic D&D' is? Is the idea of running a one-shot even a good one for 'testing the waters' and getting new people excited about the game?
It is a bit on both, but it's indeed mostly on the DM. The way I treat it, the players are not the only players. EVERYONE is a player. The farmers, the kings, the towns, the wolves, the countries, the seasons. They all have their own agenda, that will progress no matter what the players are doing.
If the players stay too long in a village, maybe other adventurers show up and are hired too because they players are too slow. That could start a rivalry. Or maybe tax collectors show up, confusing them as villagers? Maybe there's an uprising slowly unfurling itself in the kingdom they're visiting, with the players slowly noticing that its about time to get going or get involved? Maybe a festival is about to happen and everyone in town starts building stages.
You can also make time count. If they're standing around ingame, time passes. Mention how it is mid day, and how it slowly turns to night and it's time to find an inn.
If all else fails, there's always the "narrative hand grenade". In my game it usually is an actual hand grenade because they've been discovered by guards. In a fantasy setting, it could be something else. Maybe it's the one day of the month where Ch'zctl peers from the moon. A being so beyond human comprehension, just looking at it is slowly draining your sanity from you. You realize he is always there, always watching. And a small voice inside the players head is telling them its about to run. Screw this town, we're gonna save the day somewhere far far away from here.
Some things:
Also, consider using a pre-written adventure for your first campaign, we found LMoP to be pretty nice for starters.
Been DMing games for 20-odd years now! One of my highest voted comments on Tildes is about D&D ^^
Wow! got in there early!
I have played a lot of 5e over the last 3 years; I just left my old group mainly because we have one player who is kinda awful. He was the worst kind of rules lawyer, where he would argue with the DM over anything that hurt his character.
Other than the occasional annoying player, I love DND and tabletop games; I firmly believe they are some of the best ways to make friends, especially for the non-sports people.
Yeah ! I got into it as an alternate hobby that didn't involve sports or drinking
It is such a good way to make friends; you can have so many great inside jokes!
Hey! must look up Alternity. Yeah I quite like how you can get a character set up and run with it very quickly. bearing in mind i've not played any other system it seems like it has a good framework that is simple and plays well for new players & DMs. I have the 2E handbook & the Pathfinder Core book and 5E seems a lot more polished overall just from a readers perspective.
Been playing 5e myself for a few years now. Spent one and a half as a DM but eventually had to quit because of some group conflict and because I have a lot less time now that I've transferred to a different college.
I've spent the rest of my time as a player and I've had a blast though. Honestly being a DM was a lot of fun in its own way, but I was pretty green going in and made a lot of mistakes.
I'm in two campaigns. I have a Gnome Mystic in one and a Tabaxi Monk (Way of Shadow) in the other.
How are you enjoying the gnome mystic? I played one right when the second Unearthed Arcana dropped, and boy, was I overpowered. The scalable auto-damage skill / spell / trait has some bonkers power. Also, the sheer range of abilities you can get as a mystic is another problem area; my blaster mystic shouldn't also be able to cast resurrection with material components and teleport the party a mile.
Yeah, it can be kind of overpowered, at least in the early levels. It definitely needs to be tweaked to bring the power level down a bit. But I hope they don't end up destroying what makes it so fun to play. I like the fact that you can build it any way you want instead of being stuck on rails after third level.
My hope is that they will keep the ability to choose whatever you want to be, but have the sub-classes provide more effect on the abilities. It is definitely a lot of fun to play.
I'm not certain, but there is the opinion that even though it starts out overpowered, it levels off in the mid-levels and other classes start catching up. Your psi limit maxes out at level 9 and you never get the ability to attack more than once per round.
My mystic did cap out at level 9, so I can't speak from experience. However, at level 11, you get the ability to maintain multiple concentrations, which is very strong. As an example, wall of clouds and tremorsense combined means you can't be hit with anything but melee and huge AOEs. I will completely agree that after that level 11, it just gets more of old abilities, which isn't that strong. I really loved playing my mystic, but it definitely needs to be play tested more.
Here's the link for anyone who hasn't seen the class; https://media.wizards.com/2017/dnd/downloads/UAMystic3.pdf
Wait, you're talking about Psionic Mastery, right? That's the only thing Mystics get at level 11, but I don't see how you get simultaneous concentrations from that.
Here is the section I got it from: "If more than one of the disciplines you activate with these points require concentration, you can concentrate on all of them." It is a really weirdly written, but I think that is it.
I'm pretty sure when it says "all" it means "any" since the section right after that says that if you start a new one the previous one ends.
There are dozens of us. Dozens!
I started off playing, then DMing AD&D, briefly played 3.5, then DMed a years long campaign in 4e D&D. I've also DMed and played medium length campaigns in 5e, as well as a smattering of PbtA games that didn't last more than a few sessions.
I think my favorite edition was 4e but my group has been pretty happy with 5e, although life has made it difficult to get a regular game together lately. I definitely miss it, but with most of my group having small kids it's hard to get somebody to commit time to running a game.
I've played tons of 5e and a good bit of 3.5, but if I'm being honest, it's mostly because it's relatively hard to find DMs for the systems I'd rather be playing. I will say that I'm pretty impressed with what WoTC pulled off with 5e though, strikes a great balance between streamlining and depth. It's certainly a breath of fresh air to be able to build a character in five minutes or so, and significantly lowers the barrier to entry for new players.
Earthdawn. Man, that was the ultimate fantasy RPG. Took all of D&D's tropes and built a universe where they all made sense, and that game had some of the best world/history I've ever seen. I actually own a hard copy of every single book from first edition, all the box sets, and even had the Dragons book (which was finished but never made it past being a pdf file at the office) printed out to finish out the set.
In that system, everyone is a wizard. There are magical and physical ways to do everything. Magical usually wins, and there are ways to combine them. That solved the classic balance problem - your warrior is just as magical as your wizard, in very different but exceptionally deadly ways. The leveling system was the perfect blend of skill based progression and acquiring new abilities. XP was actual money you spent on upgrading your character, it was a completely points-build system. It'd take you literal years of gaming every weekend to get anywhere near max level, and multi-classing was a breeze.
It was crunchy as fuck, though. Steep learning curve, unclear how to progress your character if you weren't comfy with charts and lots of math. Once you got used to it, then it shined, but getting someone up to speed was work. Magic items were all like D&D artifacts - powerful, with a unique history, and you had to learn that history (and spend your experience points) to unlock those powers. Typical ones had ten levels and were as costly to fully unlock as one of the player's core skills was. That mechanic could solve mudflation problems in modern MMOs. :P
It's had several editions since then, every so often a game company wants to make a new edition and pays FASA for the rights to riff on the universe. Several of the new editions have changed many things about the classes, or altered the core mechanics. It's not to say there's no room for improvement, but I always felt like nobody managed to improve on 1st edition very much. They'd fix some things, break others.
Oh yeah, and in Earthdawn, the world was basically in the middle of being eaten by Cthulhu. It was also a high-horror fantasy. I'd wager it'd be a lot of fun if someone who loves Call of Cthulhu were to run an Earthdawn game. They'd feel right at home.
My other love is Continuum. Take two numbers from that game's mechanics and put them on any character sheet from any game, and bam, functional, simple, impeccable time travel mechanics. The rest of the system was a skill based one with three stats, incredibly simple... and your abilities just leveled up each time you used them in game, no xp. It was remarkably effective.
If you could get more than 40 pages into this book without bleeding from your eyes trying to play 4d chess with the authors, kudos. It was so dense, these guys really put some thought into how time travel works. It utterly changes the game by introducing an entire game of its own. This game is hard to run because the plot gets weird. All your characters will time travel off to do something, then realize they forgot to set a rendevouz time so they could all meet back up again afterwards, and are now scattered all over history having to find each other.
They had groovy paradox mechanics as well, incredible things like godlike augmented humans... it remains one of the most unashamedly creative game books I've ever read. Gun combat was so lethal in this game... time combat had its own rules like killing your enemy, traveling back to the start of the fight, and showing him his head so he knows he loses. In a D10 system you get a -2 for that. Everything in this game was a single D10 roll. Maybe one or two modifiers, that was it.
Continuum had two major drawbacks that made it daunting to play.
The first one was your GM had to learn how to think about time as a landscape. That meant a wide ranging campaign timeline, some form of time-traveling society which exists to protect that timeline, and another anarchist group of time travelers that change history for their own reasons.
The second one was that this game requires a mountain of record keeping. You need to write down everywhere and everywhen that your character goes and what he's doing there. You have a 'Yet' which is a list of things you haven't done yet but know you'll have to do at some point in the future.
The game is kinda cool because your character, who let's say finds himself in the position of having to save a 747 from crashing, can time-jump away from the plane, spend a few months at flight school, and time-jump right back to the plane again and save the day with his new piloting skills. The game let you just instantly acquire new skills like that, but you had to record the where/when/how of it all.
Many sessions later, another time traveler (perhaps the one that tried to change history by crashing that plane) might pay you a visit at the flight school and try to stop you or kill you. Now you have to time-jump back to the flight school, prevent him from fragging you out (destroying you by creating a paradox), and do it all without changing the events that happened at the flight school - a Back to the Future scenario.
Now let's get five players in the game and their record keeping. You can see how this sort of thing can snowball into a lot of work and also tie your brain in a knot trying to make sense of it all. It's a lot of fun, but you really need to learn how to play Continuum. The time travel meta-game can only be mastered with lots of practice/experience.
GURPS is actually the main one, I've DMed it quite a few times but never yet had the opportunity to be a player. As far as rules heaviness goes, it's only really as heavy as you make it. I'd certainly encourage giving it a try if your group is willing, the core rules are posted for free, are simpler than 3.5 IMO, and most of the really specific or crunchy stuff is strictly optional.
Other stuff I'd like to play includes apocalypse world and a few of the spinoffs like Dungeon World and Urban Shadows. Again, I've DMed at least dungeon world before (great first RPG by the way), but I've played all of two sessions.
And now that you mention it, Traveller is something I've wanted to play for a while, but more for the setting than necessarily the system.
I think its great, love 5E, it's got great bones as they say. However as a huge fan of Baldur's Gate i'd love to play a 2E game one day.
I'm a senior in highschool, and I've been DMing for my friends for about 1.5 months. We're all new to it, but it's a ton of fun. We started with the starter kit adventure (Lost Mines of Phandelver), and now we're running Waterdeep: Dragon Heist (I'm not yet confident enough to write my own). I have 4 players, two of them telecommuting from 1000 miles away, and we're trying to bring a few more people in. A lot of people say that they're interested in it, and a lot more people than I thought watch D&D videos or listen to podcasts.
Yeah! when I first got into it I went straight to Critical Role and The Glass Cannon podcast after getting the PHB. Still listen to them both today.
I've been playing D&D with my friends for a long time, we had some pretty nice campaigns. My favorite one was the one where we had to hurl a paladin that couldn't move because he got too much stuff on him around. I miss my uni days when I could just dedicate a whole day to a good campaign.
Not a player myself, but a big fan of tabletop RPGs and D&D in particular. Would like to play a session someday.
My latest experience with D&D was Neverwinter Nights 2, which used 3.5e. I've briefly acquainted myself with the sweeping changes in 4e and 5e, but still have no clue where they stand.
I recommend checking with your local comic shop to see if any places host games. If they host Adventure League games, they're sometimes have intro-to D&D that will help ease you into the game and explain the rules.
Adventure League games are basically stand alone episodes that only last a few hours.
That's my issue: I don't have any comic shops to check where I live. :(
My hope is with an online session, where the hours don't matter. I'll find one eventually.
I was always a big fan of Baldur's gate and I knew the system from there but for whatever reason i never made the connection of "Hey I could play this in real life" till recently. The the amount of fun I have with it now makes me wish I had started sooner.
Very much a player currently, but I'm keen to get into DM'ing. I've been thinking about running a campaign for colleagues after work, but I'm kind of nervous about the work required to DM (not to mention shepherd a whole group of newbies through the game!).
I'm playing in a party at the moment that's extremely light on combat (one of our more vocal players doesn't dig on the combat stuff, so it falls to the wayside quite a bit), and rather heavy on bumming about the town doing weird shit... Occasionally downright unpleasant shit. There was a gang-rape scene during a week that I missed :|
I'd Nope the fuck right out of that buddy.
One of the main culprits for that stuff left the group not long after, so it's gotten a lot better. The constant going to the brothels and fucking whores is now more of an afterthought than the entire focus of the sessions. Still considering bailing out and playing with people that want to get into the story and the combat though. Rather than let out their (apparently large amounts of) sexual repression and frustration.
If you want to be a DM, the most important part is knowing your players. For me, my players do wacky stuff I could never have predicted, so I go light on the story prep, heavier on the improv side. But you might have quiet players you have to really work to engage, then I'd go more combat heavy. The best way for new players to learn is to just play and answer questions as they come up.
I've been playing 5E for about a year now and really enjoying it.
For those that DM, whats the best way to make the transition from player to DM? Any recommendations on resources that would make it enjoyable for the players?
I had a mate from primary school message me last year asking if I would like to have a go, that was about 9 months ago and it's been an absolute blast. He started things off "by the book" but has since moved it into a semi homebrew.
We meet roughly every 3 weeks, that way everyone has plenty of time to get work off (two of us are nurses and work evenings) our group started with 4 people and ended up with another 3 along the way.
It's the first time playing for most of us so we have been learning all together. They all meet up tomorrow night but I unfortunately have to miss the night since its my birthday and my wife and kids booked a weekend away for us. They will update me on all the things they do to my character I'm sure...
Sounds class, and similar enough to how my group formed. lads work nights and stuff so we have to plan ahead, but it builds a bit of anticipation and we come to the game pretty excited to get stuck in.
it's a huge build up each time a few have been taking turns hosting (the childless ones) they also build up the dinner and snacks for the evening, my wife has a thing for making sweets so I've brought in cheesecakes for everyone. Its awesome that I've made new friends in my 30's
I’ve only played one D&D campaign so far (5e) and was a lot of fun. I’ve also played some Iron Kingdoms and Shinobigami.
I’m not currently in a group though I do plan on GMing The Wildlings rethemed with LEGO for my son and his friend :)
I've DMed for... many years now. Usually not so much DnD, have some rather hot opinions on that system. But yeah, you're far from the only one.
What's your opinion of 5E?
On 5e I don't have a big opinion as I have not used it myself. I primarily have experience with 3.5.
I have an issue with how seperated combat is from the rest of the game. I get it puts a large emphasis on combat, but with the amount of rolls, charts, tables and calculation, combat can really slow down to a crawl. I also find it a bummer that you don't have the same amount of nuance and variety to non-combat skills.
I absolutely think there's a place for DnD, but that needs the right type of DM and the right type of players. If you're having fun with it, then don't let me ruin that for you.
I do get what your saying about combat alright - I sometimes feel like there is a discord between combat & non-combat skills. I often have to make choices as a player - to pick spells that only have combat utility over others to make sure you'll survive - which then hamstring my character in the social RP side. I quite like the RP elements of the game so this can be frustrating.
Indeed. Thats pretty much my opinion on it too!
I don't use DnD any more. The system I'm currently working with just treats your combat related skills as any other skills. Skill names are more generic. You don't even need to know the skill to attempt it, though in that case you will have to use severely weaker dice. For instance if you know "one handed sword combat", you can attempt any trick in the book, but the skill dice available to you will influence your chance of succeeding and avoiding consequences. Exactly the same system as if you were for instance trying to repair your shoes. Two rolls, for everything.
All your skills also build into "concepts" which help define the character you are. So there's also a direct relationship between skills and roleplay.
I DM a group of 5 players in a Homebrewed world. It's been fun 90% of the time and the other 10% is scrambling to flesh out a world and creating an intriguing story. Of course my group is split betweening wanting to free roam and playing a railroady type game, so it's on me to find a balance. It can be stressful DMing but overall it's rewarding to see my players strategize against a situation I've created.
Have you had a look at the LazyDM? The Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master is a great guide for streamlining your work as a DM.
I started DMing a new 5e campaign this week with 4 guys from work. We're playing Waterdeep Dragon Heist, which seems like a very good adventure. The book also contains loads of lore and NPCs that can be useful for any campaign based in the city, plus a large lovely map.
One of the players is a veteran with whom I've played several campaigns before using Fantasy Grounds.
One is from my board game group, and we've played a few sessions of 3.5e before.
Two are completely new to tabletop RPGs.
They seem like a well-functioning group, and they all seemed to have lots of fun on the first game session, so I'm already looking forward to next time. :-) We're planning to do weekly game sessions. The adventure should take them all to level 5, after which I haven't yet decided what to do. The adventure Dungeon of the Mad Mage is suggested as a follow-up adventure, but I don't particularly want to do a mega-dungeon.
The dungeon of mad mage looks cool, If it's daunting as a whole i've heard it's relatively easy to adapt each dungeon into your own world.
Damn. It's on 5e now... If I had grandkids, they'd be you. Well, I'll just down my Geritol and curse the day WotC bought it. I've glanced at rules since and DoD just seems to be accumulating cruft with each successive edition. If you like it, have fun, but combat takes forever.
Did anyone muck about with Planescape? Great political options and worldbuilding, not to mention fantastic illustration in the manuals. I think that's the last DnD version/spin-off I got into.
However, I loved Feng Shui, a much simpler, trope-reliant character system which allowed collaborative story-telling and fast action.
Mostly, I had the benefit of great DMs.
I had that reaction to the idea of 5e, until my group convinced me to actually play it.
5e is actually 2nd edition reborn with a lot less crunch. It's not just good, it's great, took me completely by surprise, and it feels like 3e/4e never even happened. I was not expecting them to go back to the core roleplaying aspect of D&D but they did, and they nailed it. They even brought back wild magic. Reworked the planes, made them more immediate/intimate. They straight up stole Earthdawn's healing mechanics, which everyone should do since those are the best ever put on paper.
It's still Vancian casting (which I have always despised) but even there, it's better and much more flexible than it was in the past. Spell scaling is done much better now (caps are gone) and cantrips are now kickass tools even at level 20, so casters have a lot more to play with even if they hoard their other spells. Feats got chainsawed down to the barest of basics, no more massive feat trees (thank god). All those pages of +1/2/5/10 modifiers? Gone. You might manage one or two modifiers now tops on any roll, and advantage/disadvantage is so brilliant and simple everyone else should be ashamed they never thought of it for their own games in thirty years of designing systems.
Oh, and they flushed all the wargaming/miniature-based combat bullshit from 3e and 4e right into the gutter. In fact the combat rules are so sparse in 5e we had to house-rule in a few to give it a bit more clarity and depth. Combat is fast as hell again.
Read the players. It'll feel like coming home if you ever played 1st or 2nd edition. :)
I imported some old L20 characters from 2e into 5e. They not only got more awesome and varied, they got far more vulnerable. I was flabbergasted.
Sold! And thank you for the detailed response - you've touched on most of what I found bothersome. [The miniatures in combat seemed like DnD and Warhammer had an ugly baby for profit.]
Now I just need find a group again.
I don't know if you've tried 5e but its a pretty streamlined system, not much in the way of number crunching. I can only speak for myself but in our group combat is pretty snappy - though I think that is more on whether the individual knows their character well.
I do! I've been playing on and off since ~2002. :D
I'm playing in a game with most of my original group from high school, and we're going through Out of the Abyss. I just got invited to another game—don't know much about it yet, but I have an idea for a Warlock brewing in my head. I'm also a bit partial to the Old-School Renaissance, but there's room in my heart for both it and the more high-fantasy heroics of modern D&D. :) I'm even working on a few tweaks to 5e to mesh the awesome new bits with a little bit of the old-school D&D style of play.
(I'm also planning on running another game, but likely not D&D. City of Mist is currently the front runner. I love exploring and reading new rulesets, so I'm excited to actually get to play one!)
Started some 5e campaigns with some college friends last year. GMing one and playing in the other!
I'm really interested in getting started playing, but not enough people in my area and a good DM. I've heard of people playing over discord servers though, I'd be really interested in trying that!!
I'm a GM for a few games currently (Fate, Star Wars: Edge of the Empire, and Forbidden Lands), but I've not actually played a 5e session - yet. I actually own most of the books (non adventure publications) and I love the concepts. I think that 5e is one of the best systems for homebrew right now, simply because it's very easy to work with the relatively light systems.
Is it the best? No - but I haven't found a system that is yet. But it's very good.