So a 10 minute rest lets me spend out of a pool of daily healing, and a nightly rest lets me regain ALL HPs as well as regain all healing HD.
So...

A fighter with 8HD, gets nearly killed over a series of combats and ends up being at 1HP.  He then decides to roll his 8HD and gets a decent chunk of his HPs back.

Then he keeps adventuring and loses all but 1 HP again.  Now it's the end of the day and he sleeps for 8 hours and gets FULL hps and all those "rest dice" back.

At what part are you actually "hurt"?  Ever?  Looks like only at 0 hits are you actually injured.

Anyone see how falling damage works yet?

Liking the advantage/disadvantage mechanics thus far.  Rolling twice is much easier than applying modifiers.  Also liking the healing mechanics thus far--much improved over 4e's.  The fact that you need a healer's kit to expend HD is a step in the right direction.

Quote from: CRKrueger;541820So a 10 minute rest lets me spend out of a pool of daily healing, and a nightly rest lets me regain ALL HPs as well as regain all healing HD.
So...

A fighter with 8HD, gets nearly killed over a series of combats and ends up being at 1HP.  He then decides to roll his 8HD and gets a decent chunk of his HPs back.

Then he keeps adventuring and loses all but 1 HP again.  Now it's the end of the day and he sleeps for 8 hours and gets FULL hps and all those "rest dice" back.

At what part are you actually "hurt"?  Ever?

One day to heal completely would be too fast for my taste if that is what the new system does (at least for natural healing).

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;541822One day to heal completely would be too fast for my taste if that is what the new system does (at least for natural healing).

It is way too fast for me.

That seems like a mechanic tailored to a playstyle of constant combat.

I would prefer healing to be more like 1 Hit die for a day of rest.

Quote from: Bill;541823It is way too fast for me.

That seems like a mechanic tailored to a playstyle of constant combat.

I would prefer healing to be more like 1 Hit die for a day of rest.

Yeah. I just need there to be room for a really beaten down party to need a week or more to recover if they dont have access to magic. I do get it is inconvenient for some people, but for me this is the kind of thing I don't want handwaved.

They did open a playtest and a playtest packet feedback section on the wotc D&D forum. Strongly suggest people who have likes and dislikes make a point of sharing them there as well (if you want your opinions to be heard).

Looks like HP are constant gains, too.  It looks like the main thing that goes up when you level are attack, damage, and HP.  No boost to attack rolls or anything.  Not sure how I feel about that.  On one hand, it seems like a good idea to control the math; on the other, I would expect my guy to have more accurate attacks.

I do like how they are doing the dwarven fighter, though.  Looks fairly simple.  Cleric eventually gets an ability that lets him maximize healing, including that of his allies' HD, which I think is nifty but may defeat the purpose of HD.  Not fond of the rogues' daily abilities, though.

That sounds like way too fast for natural healing.

I'm tearing through it, now.

So far, the bestiary is cool (slim statblocks, grunt monsters don't have eleventy billion time-wasting abilities).  It's very interesting that they gave you KotB to play with (I have to wonder whether this is an actual shift in adventure focus away from Encount4rdization, or just a smokescreen to bamboozle the old-schoolers), and I like that orc wimminz and chillunz are in.    The rest/healing stuff may be a killer, but easily fixable.  And I'm honestly intrigued about the advantage mechanic - that may end up getting stolen.

Quote from: DestroyYouAlot;15449757I do wish they'd have scaled back ability mods to B/X level (+1 at 13, +2 at 16, +3 at 18), but whatevs.

Quote from: Melan;541829That sounds like way too fast for natural healing.

Who needs natural healing? That will be a factor for a few adventures at most.

Once the party has a bit of cash all they need is someone with the herbalist feat to crank out 24 1d8 healing potions per 8 hour workday for 600gp. :banghead:

On the other hand that makes it look more abstract--but its still called healing. They need to make up their minds someday if its health or abstract/skill/luck. If its one, cool. If its the other cool. Just make a decision and get mechanics around and use terms for that.

Quote from: B.T.;541821Liking the advantage/disadvantage mechanics thus far.  Rolling twice is much easier than applying modifiers.

Let's examine the numbers in rolling two d20's in the advantage case.  A success is when one or both of the d20 rolls are a success.

Let p = probability of success of a single d20 roll.

Let P2 = probability both or one of d20 rolls are a success.


The probability of the two d20's being failures = (1-p)^2

Probably of rolling a success P2 = 1 - (1-p)^2 = 2 p - p^2


Plugging in some numbers:

p = 0.95, P2 = 0.9975
p = 0.90, P2 = 0.99
p = 0.85, P2 = 0.9775
p = 0.80, P2 = 0.96
p = 0.75, P2 = 0.9375
p = 0.70, P2 = 0.91
p = 0.65, P2 = 0.8775
p = 0.60, P2 = 0.84
p = 0.55, P2 = 0.7975
p = 0.50, P2 = 0.75
p = 0.45, P2 = 0.6975
p = 0.40, P2 = 0.64
p = 0.35, P2 = 0.5775
p = 0.30, P2 = 0.51
p = 0.25, P2 = 0.4375
p = 0.20, P2 = 0.36
p = 0.15, P2 = 0.2775
p = 0.10, P2 = 0.19
p = 0.05, P2 = 0.0975

Some thoughts.

This is a role playing game system. By which I mean it does not come off as an hybrid, a board game, a video game, a story game, etc. It's a role playing game.

You could possibly play actual D&D with this. By which I mean "dungeons and dragons", i.e. explore the unknown, face various threats and challenges in so doing, with the promise of rewards or death.

This is not a game in the O/AD&D tradition. It is a game more in the tradition of 2nd edition AD&D and Rules Cyclopedia, with a rules mesh so to speak that is heavily borrowed from 3rd and 4th editions broken down to their barest expressions. It borrows from the old editions in terms of vibe, and you could run your game in such a way as to make it feel very much like a traditional version of the game (like you could run 2nd ed in a traditional way), but what I'm seeing in these playtest documents isn't 'old school'.

I like some things, dislike others, but in my mind, it's not because the game isn't 'old school' that it's automatically bad, or because it'd be 'old school' it'd be automatically good. These are different considerations to me.

The power curve is flatlined, the math of the game is greatly simplified. That is a good thing. There are still modifiers to deal with and "math going on," adding ability modifiers plus skill modifiers and whatnot. That is not so good.

The codification of the character sheets rubs me the wrong way. I get that these are introductory pieces to the game, but some of the tone and the wording of the features, feats etc. reminds me too much of 3rd/4th ed's nitpicky definition of terms. I don't like this.

Love the Backgrounds and their set of skills and particular thing that makes them stand apart: they're simple, straightforward, and can add a lot to a character.

I am FAR more ambivalent to the notion of Theme as expressed here in these documents, which to me look like a codification of 4e's notion of "Roles" in a metagame sense - the striker, the controller, etc. Fuck that.

I like advantages and disadvantages. They're relatively simple to use and adjudicate, their effect is simple (roll two dice and take the highest/lowest results and poof, done), that can be used with or without minis... it's good. Fine by me.

Skills as stuff you do that is expressed as a modifier as part of a class feature, background or whatnot is cool with me. Not having a laundry list of predetermined, edge-defined skills on the character sheet is a very good thing.

The concept of at-wills cantrips for Wizards gets a big "meh" from me.

Some abilities of classes rub me the wrong way, such as the fighter's surge, which is arbitrarily set at two times per day. Why? Fuck if I know. "It's just a game, forget about it." Meh.

Some feats showing up in Themes look very much like "feats" in a 3rd ed sense to me, and I do not like this at all.

I like the increase in damage output that meshes well with the changes in hit point determination. More HP, more damage output. I do agree that the death threshold is way too low, however. I would house rule that for my home campaign.

The hit points recuperation mechanics are made of suck. This is forcing a play style on me I don't necessarily want when I am playing D&D, which is basically that you manage your short rests between "encounters" until you reach the end of the day, at which point you regain all your hit points magically. I have to assume magically, because apparently the physical part of the hit point abstraction has been thrown out the window: it's ALL luck and skill and fatigue, and no actual health, unless of course all your wounds magically close up after a period of 24 hours? Now I like the *idea* of rolling the hit dice for HP recuperation and managing the number of dice somehow. I just know I would house rule the rests mechanics right out the gate were I to run my campaign with this set of rules.

The monster writeups are alright as far as I can tell, so far. EDIT - but some of their abilities feel "gamey", like they are just there for the sake of differenciating monsters from each other, rather than being descriptive elements tied to the game world.

EDIT - if the Enervation ability of the Wight (in the Bestiary) is anything to go by as far as level drain is concerned, this totally stinks, as far as I'm concerned. Everything seems to be short term, "until the next long rest". The basic unit of the game becomes "the next 24 hours". All the strategic aspects of game play seem to have been nuked beyond that. This totally blows.

EDIT - Some instances of dissociated mechanics, such as the fighter's surge, the dwarf fighter's ability do deal damage even when he doesn't hit his target, etc. I thought WotC had gotten the message on this one, but then again... maybe not.

EDIT - Individual initiative with different mods, I've done it with 3rd ed and 3.5, I'm not going back to it and the way it slows down combat considerably. I would house rule it using a Holmes/Moldvay round structure and group d6 rolls right out of the gate.

In the disadvantage case, the probability of a successful roll is when both d20's are a success is p^2.  (p is the probability of rolling a success on one d20).

Plugging in numbers.

p = 0.95, p^2 = 0.9025
p = 0.90, p^2 = 0.81
p = 0.85, p^2 = 0.7225
p = 0.80, p^2 = 0.64
p = 0.75, p^2 = 0.5625
p = 0.70, p^2 = 0.49
p = 0.65, p^2 = 0.4225
p = 0.60, p^2 = 0.36
p = 0.55, p^2 = 0.3025
p = 0.50, p^2 = 0.25
p = 0.45, p^2 = 0.2025
p = 0.40, p^2 = 0.16
p = 0.35, p^2 = 0.1225
p = 0.30, p^2 = 0.09
p = 0.25, p^2 = 0.0625
p = 0.20, p^2 = 0.04
p = 0.15, p^2 = 0.0225
p = 0.10, p^2 = 0.01
p = 0.05, p^2 = 0.0025

Quote from: DestroyYouAlot;541830The rest/healing stuff may be a killer, but easily fixable.

Oh, sure, it's not a deal-breaker by itself as long as the game is easy to customise and supports fast-and-loose adventure fantasy campaigns. I think I'll try it if someone starts a campaign in my area.