They have new books coming out: Player's Handbook due in a couple weeks, DMG later, Monster Manuel sometime next year. Is this a new edition? They say not; the 2024 - something - to D&D 5th edition. I guess. I don't really mean with make a lot of this - this has become something of a trend in the industry. Mongoose did it with Traveller - their 2nd edition rules came out I'm 2016, and they put out a revision in 2022 - a revision that was in fact pretty much the same book. Better art, better layout, some clean up here and there, a few changes to tables here and there, but nothing that changed the game. Transparently easy to play a game with both books at the table - the revision really is a revision top the look of the book, more than anything. And Paizo did something similar with Pathfinder 2nd Edition - their 2E came out in 2018, and a "remastered" edition came out in 2023. This had more changes than Traveller - including removing anything that could tie the books to WOTC's old OGL - but it's a similar idea. New books, same game.
That's what WOTC claims we will have. They tout its backward compatibility - they tout its improved look. Things like that. Will it be true? Have to have the things in hand, I suppose, to say. Now - there are a lot of the things out in the wild; people have been reviewing them. I have not seen one - I have watched some of the reviews, but not obsessively. This post is very definitely about the anticipation, and expectations. When the thing itself arrives (and I've put in a word at my FLGS for one) I will come back and see what I have to say about it. (I promise that post, is nothing else; hopefully before 7th edition comes out.) For now? What do I think is going to happen?
First: I will buy one. I would no matter what - I am a completist, I have the rest of the D&D versions (not true: I don't have ODD, Holmes Basic, Cook basic, or most of the 2E core books; I have access to most of them though), and would get this no matter what. I am curious, as well - what is in there? is it worth the hype? is there anything better in it? I want to know. I will probably get the DMG on those grounds alone - with curiosity maybe overcoming the completeness: can they make something of the DMG? the current one is a bit of a flop, I think. I want to see these books. There is that. And I have put in a word for one - the alt cover, specifically, since the alt PHB cover is just fantastic. I want to have one of these things.
Will I use it? I will certainly play around with it - make up characters, play some fights - try to play a couple adventures maybe - a starter set or something like the old adventures in the Infinite Staircase or Yawning Portal books. I expect the D&D games I am in will start using it - at least next year, or whenever we get out of the adventures we're in now - maybe sooner depending on what people think of it. So I will use them.
On the other hand, I doubt I will run anything with them. That doesn't have a lot to do with the editions - that has to do with D&D. I have kind of gotten tired of D&D. Again - not really because of anything wrong with D&D - because I am tired of level/class based games. I like skill based systems. I would much rather devote my time to something like Call of Cthulhu, Traveller, maybe Cyberpunk or try out Pendragon or Vaesen or something instead. But this is taste, and doesn't have much to do with the editions, and isn't enough to make me stop playing D&D if someone else is willing to run - so - just keep it in mind.
So - still anticipating this new version - what do I think, based on what I have seen so far? I think - it looks like it will be more or less easy to switch. I don't think it is exactly compatible with the 2014 version, the way Mongoose 22 is compatible with Mongoose 16. There are twists in character creation, in classes and subclasses, in abilities, attributes and so on that I think will make blending the systems a bit off. But it looks easy to switch, without wrecking what you have. (Unless you are playing a swashbuckler.)
From what I have seen - I like character creation - I think the redistribution of decision points among races, backgrounds and the like makes sense - makes the whole process easier, more rational, more modular. I like most of the specifics and I like the general al shape of it. Classes? seem fine - close enough to what they are to not require relearning anything; maybe simpler to explain to newbies - I think they have something in there warning new players about what classes are more work than others. Sounds good. The subclasses also seem fine - though a lot of the changes seem kind of fiddly. Just shifting things around in a maybe pointless effort to make everything sort of work the same. Most of the specifics seem fine - though there are a couple completely unexplainable decisions. Going from 567.5 cleric domains to 4 is going to be painful, especially since at least 6 of the 2014 cleric domains were absolute bangers, and only 2 of those bangers made the cut. (Light and Life; but Tempest might have been the best subclass in the game, and Grave, Forge, and Twilights are all monsters and - so are a bunch of others. Clerics were the boss class in 5e 2014.)
Worse: in 10 years of playing, I have seen people play 2 subclasses of rogue (other than a couple random thieves and multi class scouts and the like). Arcane Triocksters made the cut, as they should. But there is no excuse for not making the Swashbuckler a core rogue subclass. They gave us a psionic thief over the swashbuckler? they tried to fix the assassin, rather than just give us the swashbuckler? This is a failure off the worst kind. Swashbucklers are as fundamental to the class as it comes. It is certainly what people want to play. Just unbelievable.
The rest? Rangers still seem to suck. They've done a bunch of stuff with weapons and fighters to make them more complicated. They've allegedly improved monks and maybe warlocks, tried to gimp paladins, etc. The overall impression I get though is that things are roughly the same - but a lot more fiddly. In fac fiddly is the word I would use to describe almost all the changes I have seen. Fiddly in two senses. First - they've just fiddled around with all these things. Nothing is really different - but it is full of little differences that are mostly just going to confuse people who can't keep their editions straight. And second - they've added a lot of things - like weapon properties and masteries - that are fiddly in the sense of adding a bunch of little stuff to think about. Things to remember in a fight; things to keep track of; new ways of keeping track of things. Will it matter? I don't know, until we get it - maybe not in practice - but who knows? It does sound, from a lot of the online comments I've seen, that they have added a lot of fodder for the min-maxers among us. Is that good? if you're a min-maxer, I suppose. I don't know.
So - that is all I have for now. We're getting close: I do look forward to seeing this and playing with it. I hope it works, I hope it doesn't annoy me (and worse than not putting swashbucklers in the core book.) I do look forward to seeing the thing itself - the art looks - gorgeous, if maybe a bit off. Their recent pastel color palette is not encouraging - though all the art I have seen is really great looking. Who knows. I am looking forward to it, even if I am kind of sour on D&D.
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