D&D 5e has failed

[virgil]

Those three options specifically were an RPS system built into the character classes, where a lone hero beats the monster, a monster beats the army, and the army beats the lone hero. Middle-Earth seems to work on the same logic. I'm honestly not sure how you'd actually model that without handing out arbitrary bonuses to attack/damage/AC if you happen to have one tag and be confronting an enemy with the other.

I think it's been posited that the way to strike such a balance is by giving monsters damage reduction and heroes armor class. Heroes in this model would overcome DR either through their individual attacks doing some multiple of damage compared to tiny men, or by having special abilities that allow them to circumvent the monster's damage reduction altogether. Meanwhile, the heroes have to worry about sufficiently large numbers of attacks regardless of how weak and inaccurate they are, because a natural-20 is still an auto-hit.

[Dogbert]

Every time someone uses shit-covered Tolkien bencharms in a zero-to-fucking-hero game, Trump sets an immigrant baby on fire.

Tolkienisms need to either die in a fire or move to Ass World and similar games where viking hats can enjoy their cast of perpetual underdogs add infinitum. Actually we do have now Shadow of the Demon Lord specifically for that purpose, don't we?

[Eikre]

It really is okay if 5E never penetrates the realms of Real Ultimate Power and remains a game about only modestly terrifying people who can only murder a half-dozen of us in one go.

Yeah, if it advertises Real Ultimate Power, then it can totally fail on those terms. But an otherwise coherent game that merely does not succeed at getting super crazy later on is still a coherent game... Maybe even the one that the greatest common denomination wants to play, judging by how poorly a lot of people seem to engage with Tome-style D&D.

So as long as we're constructing rhetoric for the sole purpose of telling people that their game is bad and that they should feel bad, perhaps a starting caveat is to lay of the chump aspects of the game until you know you're not talking to someone who genuinely appreciates that kind of thing.

[CapnTthePirateG]

But it's not coherent.

People are making builds with more AC then the system is allowed to hit.

Spellcasters can arbitrarily become immune to weapons.

The paradigm isn't internally consistent and doesn't hold.

[Eikre]

Yeah, fucking duh, you asshole. That's why you hammer on that shit instead of masturbating out a dribble of anti-Tolkienism.

EDIT: oh by the way:

The paradigm isn't internally consistent

My syllogism is untrue because of the non-factuality of one of its premises, not by refutation of the logical connection between said premises. The paradigm is only internally consistent.

[Chamomile]

Yeah, fucking duh, you asshole. That's why you hammer on that shit instead of masturbating out a dribble of anti-Tolkienism.

Ease up, buddy. Your post didn't indicate any of this, and Capn is not Dogbert and cannot be held responsible for Dogbert's crazy, irrational rant.

[RedstoneOrc]

Stuff of rage

Man that is what I was looking for. A good rage-y rant that shows people don't like 5e enough to write a several page essay on how it's crap for free.

Also question can we have a rage off? Where you den regulars try to one up yourselves in rage rants about how 5e fails at almost everything.

[Josh_Kablack]

If there was to be a big bad that can just waltz into the open immune to archer armies, then it would be a world very different from any fantasy worlds we know and love..

Beowulf’s warriors worked to defend

Their lord’s life, laying about them

As best they could with their ancestral blades.

Stalwart in action, they kept striking out

On every side, seeking to cut

Straight to the soul. When they joined the struggle

There was something they could have not known at the time, 800

That not blade on earth, no blacksmith’s art

Could ever damage their demon opponent.

He had conjured the harm from the cutting edge

Of every weapon. "

[Dogbert]

Also question can we have a rage off? Where you den regulars try to one up yourselves in rage rants about how 5e fails at almost everything.

We could start one, but then halfway through we'd eventually remember we're raging about the "meh, fuck it" edition, and it would all die out.

[RedstoneOrc]

Also question can we have a rage off? Where you den regulars try to one up yourselves in rage rants about how 5e fails at almost everything.

We could start one, but then halfway through we'd eventually remember we're raging about the "meh, fuck it" edition, and it would all die out.

Please?...

[erik]

Please?...

May I have your attention please
May I have your attention please
Will the real D&D please stand up
I repeat, will the real D&D please stand up

We're gonna have a problem here
Y'all act like you never seen a fantasy RPG before
Jaws all on the floor like TSR, like WotC just burst in the door
And started whoopin' some grognard ass worse than before
The first edition was a revolution, second an advance
And 3e "ah wait, no way, you're kidding
He didn't just say what I think he did, did he"
And Gary Gygax said... Nothin' you idiots
Gygax's dead, he's locked in my basement (ha ha)
Gamer women love 3e
Critta critta critta 3e, I'm sick of him
Look at him, walking around grabbing his playtest credits
Flipping the THACO, yeah, but he's got open SRD
Yeah, I probably got a couple of screws up in my head loose
But no worse than what's going on in your next editions.
Sometimes I wanna get on Roll20 and just let loose, but can't
But it's cool for Andy Collins to hump a dead moose
3.5's the greatest hits, 3.5's the greatest hits
And if I'm lucky, you might just get some crits
And that's the message that we deliver to little kids
And expect them not to know what a saving throw is
Of course they're gonna know what grapple check is
Until the time they hit 4th edition
But they've got the Pathfinder, don't they
We ain't nothing but copycats -- well, some of us, cruft loving pack rats
Who cut open 3.5 like catoblepas
But if we can run dungeons and ponies
Then there's no reason that a neckbeard and a pornstar can't make an edition
But if you feel like I feel, I got the antidote
Throw out your rules and get ready to MTP, sing the chorus and it goes

I'm D&D, yes I'm the real D&D
All you other D&Ds are just imitating
So won't the real D&D please stand up
Please stand up, please stand up

Monte don't gotta cuss in his rules to sell books
Well, I do; so fuck him and fuck you too
You think I give a damn about an Ennie
Half of you critics can't even stomach me, let alone stand me
But D&D, what if you win, wouldn't it be weird
Why, so you guys could just lie to get me here
So you can sit me here next to Palladium
Shit, World of Darkness better switch me chairs
So I can sit next to Earthdawn and Feng Shui
And hear 'em argue over who's the best
Little bitch put me on blast on TGD
Yeah he's good but he's bound by legacy mechanics
I should download an pdf on scribed
And show the whole world how you gave D&D
I'm sick of you little OSR heartbreakers, all you do is annoy me
So I have been sent here to destroy you
And there's a million of us just like me
Who cuss like 3e; who just don't give a fuck like 3e
Who roll like 3e; walk, talk and act like 3e
And just might be the next best thing but not quite 3e

I'm D&D, yes I'm the real D&D
All you other D&Ds are just imitating
So won't the real D&D please stand up
Please stand up, please stand up

I'm like a head trip to listen to, cause I'm only giving you
Things you joke about with your friends inside your living room
The only difference is I got the balls to say it
In front of y'all and I don't gotta be false or sugarcoat it at all
I just get on the mic and spit it
And whether you like to admit it, I just shit it
Better than 90% of you games out there
Then you wonder how can kids eat up the third edition's rules like candy
It's funny; cause at the rate I'm going, in 2030 I'll still be out-selling all the other editions
I'll be the only only open edition
Laughing at Mearls for faking innovation
And I'm jerking but this whole bag of d20s ain't working
And every single person is a TGD lurker
He could be working at Burger King, spittin' on your onion rings
Or in the parking lot, circling
Screaming I don't give a fuck
With his windows down and his system up
So, will the real D&D please stand up
And put one of those fingers on each hand up
And be proud to be outta your mind and outta control
And one more time, loud as you can, how does it go

I'm D&D, yes I'm the real D&D
All you other D&Ds are just imitating
So won't the real D&D please stand up
Please stand up, please stand up

Ha ha, I guess there’s a D&D in all of us
Fuck it, let’s all stand up

[maglag]

If there was to be a big bad that can just waltz into the open immune to archer armies, then it would be a world very different from any fantasy worlds we know and love..

Beowulf’s warriors worked to defend

Their lord’s life, laying about them

As best they could with their ancestral blades.

Stalwart in action, they kept striking out

On every side, seeking to cut

Straight to the soul. When they joined the struggle

There was something they could have not known at the time, 800

That not blade on earth, no blacksmith’s art

Could ever damage their demon opponent.

He had conjured the harm from the cutting edge

Of every weapon. "

Maybe you missed the "and love" bit of my post. I never saw anyone claim "Man, I sure would love to play a game in Beowulfverse". And the movie was kinda meh.

There are reason Tolkien's works spawned a giant and massively popular franchise while Beowulf's greatest title to fame is "oldest english fantasy". LOTRverse making armies of low level dudes always relevant was one of them. Because everybody loves armies getting shit done in their fantasy verse.

[DSMatticus]

Smaug is a Tolkein character. Smaug declares war on a kingdom of dwarves and wins, and is ultimately defeated by a single man's magical macguffin arrow. Smaug is not the most powerful Tolkein character, but is probably the most powerful whose ability to fuck shit up is so well documented, and also probably the most dangerous thing still running around in the third age. But he's there and armies of low-level characters do not even remotely scare him.

[angelfromanotherpin]

Maybe you missed the "and love" bit of my post. I never saw anyone claim "Man, I sure would love to play a game in Beowulfverse". And the movie was kinda meh.

Are you aware of the hole you're talking yourself into? Because even if we couldn't pull examples of peasant-archer-immune enemies from all corners of fantasy literature and actual myth, we can always point out fucking D&D, which had several popular worlds to game in, and until very recently all of them had enemies against which conscript armies were useless or even liabilities.

[deaddmwalking]

Iron Golem Special Defenses: An iron golem can be struck only by magical weapons of +3 or greater enchantment. Normal and magical weapons under +3 do no damage.

[Longes]

It seems like you're taking a very selective view of how things panned out in Tolkien's work, to characterize it that way.

Indeed. Smaug's backstory involves him slaughtering an entire mountain of dwarves and burning an incidental human town in the process. He was only defeated by a luminary using a legacy weapon. This is a common pattern for Tolkien dragons, who sweep aside armies like so much dust but are forced to retreat or are killed when they encounter somebody tough with magic assistance. Glaurung (the first dragon) was killed by Turin wielding a magic sword. Ancalagon (the strongest of the winged dragons) was killed by a half-elf who had a flying ship and a Silmaril. A few big bads aren't defeated by named good guys - Saruman gets gibbed by Wormtongue, Sauron was once killed by divine flood, it is unknown who exactly confronted Morgoth at the end of the War of Wrath, and Ungoliant might or might not have eaten herself - but they are exceptions.

It is true that named good guys are more fragile than their evil counterparts though. When a protagonist dies to generic archers it is tragic, when an antagonist does the same it is an anticlimax.

Saruman is defeated by a named good guy. Frodo and Co go through the hobbit lands purging them of his influence, and then Frodo makes a Diplomacy check on Grimma convincing him to kill Saruman while keeping Frodo's heroic hands clean of angel blood.

[Silent Wayfarer]

Please?...

snip

Okay, that was pretty funny.

[Whiysper]

Please?...

<snip>

Dude, that was awesome. Urge to dub that rising... .

[Ferret]

But it's not coherent.

People are making builds with more AC then the system is allowed to hit.

Spellcasters can arbitrarily become immune to weapons.

The paradigm isn't internally consistent and doesn't hold.

I know how to do the first, one, but how does the second one come about?

[pragma]

I think Magic Jar into a werewolf for the second.

I don't know how to do the first. Share the build?

[Ghremdal]

Basis is Life Cleric / Paladin / Fighter lvl 1 multiclass into Wizard /Sorcerer, for heavy armor and shield proficiency (and maybe fighting style). Add in a non concentration AC buff and the shield spell and you have a AC in the high 20's without any magic items.

[CapnTthePirateG]

Here's a barbarian I found through a few seconds of googling: http://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/ ... ossible-ac. You probably won't get that many magic items, ever.

The magic jar into a werewolf gets you immunity to nonmagic/silver weapons. Remember, magic items are rare enough that you are supposed to find like 3 ever, so peasant armies having them makes no damn sense. You can't even wish for the damn things. Then go on a crazy rampage with your armies of skeletons.

[Ghremdal]

So is there a upcoming product for 5e?

'Cause my theory is that WotC licensed out 5e to third party publisher, but each company that bought the rights made exactly one product. Almost as if they got burned by poor sales and don't want to make 5e shit anymore. The last adventure is a recycle of 4 editions of Ravenloft adventures and published in house.

I am not seeing any upcoming products from their already sparse schedule either. Almost like no one will touch 5e with a 10' pole and they don't have the in house talent to produce something original themselves. I think my theory will be confirmed if nothing comes out or if they do another adventure recycle.

[Chamomile]

5e has been releasing one new adventure path annually since its inception. Plus there was Sword Coast Adventures, their only for-real sourcebook. So they're producing like 1.25 books per year. Their latest adventure path just got released like a month ago, so I wouldn't expect anything new to be announced for at least a few months. I haven't actually checked, though.

[Prak]

I can say with some amount of certainty there is at least one thing in process for 5e. The game I mentioned playing in is a playtest of an AP my friend got tapped to write. So there is at least one AP in production.