I have the new edition of D&D

[Baz King]

I have the full playtest document packet in my possession. It has an adventure, a bestiary, 5 pregen characters, the rules, and DM guidance. And a nice letter from Mike Mearls.

I've just read through the whole thing in less than an hour. I like what I see. It really is like a greatest hits package from the previous 4 editions, but heavily informed by the Basic set from Moldvay. It doesn't contain char gen, it's still very bare bones. It goes to level 3.

I'm happy to answer any questions, so line em up and off we go.

[dpmcalister]

First question: Can you fix WotC's server so I can download my own copy?

[PaulBaldowski]

Yeah, fix it. I want me copy...

[Baz King]

EDIT: I've removed the link. It seems WotCs servers have started to catch up with demand now. And now I've seen the contract, I don't feel right about providing an open link. If you want in, just drop into the WotC site. It's free, but a contract is a contract so...

...having said that, they don't want me to run this over Hangouts which seems a peculiar caveat?

[Clanger1968]

Thanks for Mr King.

I think most of us are having server problems.

[thenovalord]

i like what they have done with 'energy drain'

everything looks so simple

and the 'background feature' is very good indeed

and 'Improvise'.

and charm person

and i dont see the word g-r-a-p-p-l-e anywhere!!

[Mick Red]

what have they taken from each edition that stands out?
do we still have world of warcraft style play with fighters casting healing waves?
does it still have the wargamey battlemat feel, with others telling you where to move for maximum bonus's?
does it feel anymore 'role'play than the current feel of 'roll'play?

[Orpheo]

My initial impressions of this are very positive. For me it has a very BECMI feel to it with value added from subsequent editions and that is right up my street. The vast majority of it I really like.

I have a couple of particular issues but I'll see how they pan out in play. One of these is the fact that characters heal to their full HP after a long rest (8 hrs), I'd be inclined to soften this by having them regain their Hit Dice after a long rest. Another is the fighter's "Reaper" feat which allows the fighter to always deal STR modifier damage on a miss. Also, I don't get the rogue's "Ambusher" feat that allows the rogue advantage when striking an unaware enemy from a hidden place. Surely anyone (whatever class/level) who strikes an unaware enemy from a hidden place should get advantage? If I is hiding in a shadowy underpass, init, and I ambush you and cut you, init, you is going down and I ain't no rogue. By all means make rogues better at it but don't make the act (and advantage of) ambushing exlusive to a particular feat. These things offend my old-school sensibilities.

Oh, and the equipment list prices are all over the place. Ladders (5cp) are cheaper than 10 foot poles (2sp), my character would quit adventuring, buy ladders and break them each into two 10 foot poles to sell on at an 87.5% margin. Holy water is 25gp - no baptism for me.

[Orpheo]

what have they taken from each edition that stands out?
do we still have world of warcraft style play with fighters casting healing waves?
does it still have the wargamey battlemat feel, with others telling you where to move for maximum bonus's?
does it feel anymore 'role'play than the current feel of 'roll'play?

1. Things from each edition but for me it has a feel of BECMI with a boost. More analysis is needed to answer this question better.
2. No.
3. No. Bonus collecting is out.
4. I hate the whole roleplay vs rollplay argument. But it does not appear to be a game that is about counting squares, character builds and stacking numbers.

[DigitalMage]

I have it also - but just a word of warning - if you signed up to the playtest and agreed to the Online Playtest Agreement you agreed not to distribute the material - so no file sharing. Now its free anyway, and people are having problems getting it, but I thought I would point that out.

Despite not having played any D&D prior to 3.5 other than a couple of sessions of AD&D (not sure 1st or 2nd) D&D Next does give me a big old school vibe - simple yet elegant without nailing rules down too tightly - leaving the GM more wiggle room as to decide certain stuff (rules lawyers may not like this).

It looks like the sort of simple system I was looking at in QUERP and the like, but with the potential to be much more with extra modules.

Yet I can still see signs of 4e in there which is good - short and long rests (short and extended rests), hit dice (healing surges), rituals (looking excellent as certain spells can be prepared or cast as rituals, the best of both 3.5 & 4e).

At wills spells such as Magic Missile (more than just the PF cantrips, more like 4e's At Will powers)

I love the fact that they have flattened the maths, so you don't get huge bonuses - a +2 is significant. The Advantage mechanic helps out with this by increasing the chances of success without actually increasing the max result you can get, though I am not sure I like the fact that once you have Advantages don't effectively stack, it is either on or off. I need to do some work on probabilities to see how Advantage compares to a +2 bonus.

The spell descriptions have flavour with the mechanics clearly spelt out, though I worry that without a template its not always easy to see what the duration is, or whether a save is allowed without reading it all.

I like the idea of Themes and Backgrounds, but the ones in the pre-gen characters don't seem to be anything more than re-iterating the class choice e.g. Fighter / Soldier / Slayer, Wizard / Sage / Magic User.

I agree about not liking healing everything all overnight, it was the main thing about 4e I didn't like. Hopefully a rule module for "gritty" play will allow for something like just recovering Hit Dice and not Hit Points.

As for the Ambusher Feat, this does indeed seem to do nothing as the core rules state you get advantage on attacks (see Advantage on Attacks on page 7 of How to Play).

[DigitalMage]

Doh! Double post!

[Our_Ged]

Im going to read through this all tonight, really looking forward to it.

[andreww]

I have it and am deeply dubious. It feels like the bastard love child of 1e and 3e and not in a good way. There are some elements which I do like. Divorcing skills from specific stats allows you a lot more fleixiblity, its much more like WW's Stat + Skill choice. However it contains a lot of warning signs for me:

1. The return of Vancian casting.
2. The dullness of the fighter who gets an almighty +2 damage at level 1 versus say the cleric and wizards whole range of interesting stuff.
3. Intemrinable lists of equipment which look like they were copy/pasted from an earlier edition.
4. Awful monster stat blocks. It looks like we are back to fighting dull bags of HP which dont do anything interesting.
5. The sample adventure is truly awful. Caves of Chaos was never much cop when it first came out but if you are going to use it as your playtest area you might make a bit of effort to spruce the damn thing up.
6. Armour is an amazing trainwreck of three different types with glaringly obvious maths issues.
7. Much of the system is defaulting to "GM arbitrarium"

[Evilgaz]

does it feel anymore 'role'play than the current feel of 'roll'play?

Can't answer any of the questions about the new D&D, but the new 13th Age currently in playtesting is possibly the sort of thing you're looking for. Its still d20 D&D, but with some hippy sensibilities. I'll run some at Continuum with any luck. Maybe Furnace too, although its a different crowd there.

[Orpheo]

I have it and am deeply dubious. It feels like the ******* love child of 1e and 3e and not in a good way. There are some elements which I do like. Divorcing skills from specific stats allows you a lot more fleixiblity, its much more like WW's Stat + Skill choice. However it contains a lot of warning signs for me:

1. The return of Vancian casting.
2. The dullness of the fighter who gets an almighty +2 damage at level 1 versus say the cleric and wizards whole range of interesting stuff.
3. Intemrinable lists of equipment which look like they were copy/pasted from an earlier edition.
4. Awful monster stat blocks. It looks like we are back to fighting dull bags of HP which dont do anything interesting.
5. The sample adventure is truly awful. Caves of Chaos was never much cop when it first came out but if you are going to use it as your playtest area you might make a bit of effort to spruce the damn thing up.
6. Armour is an amazing trainwreck of three different types with glaringly obvious maths issues.
7. Much of the system is defaulting to "GM arbitrarium"

1. I am happy about this.
2. The fighter deals a lot of damage, not compared to a 4E striker, but that's a good thing.
3. The equipment list is a mess, but that doesn't break a game and this is an early playtest document.
4. Monster stat blocks are great, they have the brevity of Basic D&D and all of the mosters are able to do something interesting.
5. I remember the Caves of Chaos from B2 Keep on the Borderlands, the first time round the adventure was awesome, it is one that particularly sticks in my memory. This time I think they've spruced it up well to fit the playtest. You do know that it's a rewrite, don't you?
6. Armour is very well done. I'm not seeing any maths issues. I am seeing that silly AC inflation is gone.
7. Right now there are rules where they need to be. I look forward to fast-paced games, where the rules don't get in the way and run by a DM that I trust. After all, you can't cure an asshole with rules.

YMMV