Quote from: Saplatt;804525We're about one session away from completing HotDQ and, although I've been critical of it, the second half of the book turned out to be a lot more "robust" than I expected. By that, I mean that the party has made all kinds of choices and employed various strategies that I wouldn't have foreseen, and it certainly "feels" as though they've made the campaign their own. And yet, the parameters of the adventure are still in place, it has enough "depth" to allow all kinds of variations, and we haven't run into any fatal bottlenecks.

Despite the unpredictability, it's been fairly easy to DM and there's no doubt that the group is having a blast. All of the PCs seem to be developing their own shticks and there have been many bursts of laughter as well as a healthy amount of tension.

That's good to hear. I've long thought that adventures are where WOTC have really dropped the ball in their support of D&D, and that for new players and DMs, adventures are where they develop their ideas of how to actually run the game.

Quote from: Tommy Brownell;804544Sounds like a win to me. =)

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How did you guys handle character creation? Did you use the Background Templates from Hoard of the Dragon Queen?

Nope. Just standard backgrounds from the PH.

Honestly, no one is terribly committed to any of the factions. They've been cutting a lot of deals, though, mostly on an ad hoc basis.

I will not be getting anything that takes the format of a "splatbook".  I pray they don't fall back into that bullshit.  The plan is adventures and maybe settings, in terms of what WoTC ought to release now.

Can WoTC actually resist the urge to making massive rules-bloat?  I don't know, but having made the three core books all Optional is a huge step in the right direction, if they can keep to that, because it means splatbooks, even if they do exist, can be ignored.

Quote from: RPGPundit;805305I will not be getting anything that takes the format of a "splatbook".  I pray they don't fall back into that bullshit.  The plan is adventures and maybe settings, in terms of what WoTC ought to release now.

Can WoTC actually resist the urge to making massive rules-bloat?  I don't know, but having made the three core books all Optional is a huge step in the right direction, if they can keep to that, because it means splatbooks, even if they do exist, can be ignored.

Let's be honest: they won't resist the urge. Character "builds" are a part of the modern game (as is institutionalized snowflaking, really). There's $$ in them thare hills!

I want the basic packet to work well. If it's got enough to play a decent game, I'm in with that. Agreed that ability to ignore options and such is paramount (but then, I thought that was always the case?).

Quote from: cranebump;805316I want the basic packet to work well. If it's got enough to play a decent game, I'm in with that. Agreed that ability to ignore options and such is paramount (but then, I thought that was always the case?).

I'd hoped there'd be a stronger voice for playing with just the Basic elements... but from what I read it's almost as if those free files don't exist and it's full steam ahead with turning all possible switches to 'ON'.
Even if WOTC did resist the splatbloat the Players would be demanding it... someone like Goodman would provide it with the serial numbers filed off.

Vast quantities of GURPS are options too... but it still gets the reputation of being uber-crunchy because folks seemingly go buggy at the notion of ignoring big chunks of the rulebook.

Honestly, I'm not anti-splat, I'm just anti-splat BLOAT.

I could do with more backgrounds for instance. I could do with more class archetypes. I would hate too many more feats though because you get so few as it is, putting in too many turns into weirdness. I do think they could use a few more in the way of like, Actor/Alert/etc that are good noncombat feats, but not too many.

And I like more races. I know its not for everyone, but more races is cool.

But no more classes. The classes are good as is. (Exception: a Psionics book could add like, a pure psion class, and then a Fighter archetype and Rogue Archetype to cover the other psion type characters).

And yeah, I think there can be a problem when people are "EVERYTHING IS CORE, YOU HAVE TO USE EVERYTHING" but that is a player problem, not a system problem.

QuoteBut no more classes. The classes are good as is. (Exception: a Psionics book could add like, a pure psion class, and then a Fighter archetype and Rogue Archetype to cover the other psion type characters).

I would tend to agree with this except for a couple things, I would like to see some kind of Bladesinger subclass (similar to Eldritch Knight but built from the Wizard class instead of the Fighter class) and a few more Bard/Sorcerer subclasses. Also more backgrounds are never a bad thing.

Quote from: Marleycat;805340I would tend to agree with this except for a couple things, I would like to see some kind of Bladesinger subclass (similar to Eldritch Knight but built from the Wizard class instead of the Fighter class) and a few more Bard/Sorcerer subclasses. Also more backgrounds are never a bad thing.

You are agreeing with me. I said no more classes, but that I wanted more archetypes for the existing classes. Sorcerer is especially lacking.

I'm strongly tempted to do a near-zero magic game (no casters), but I want to play it 'straight' to get a feel for the system.

Quote from: Simlasa;805327I'd hoped there'd be a stronger voice for playing with just the Basic elements... but from what I read it's almost as if those free files don't exist and it's full steam ahead with turning all possible switches to 'ON'.
Even if WOTC did resist the splatbloat the Players would be demanding it... someone like Goodman would provide it with the serial numbers filed off.

Vast quantities of GURPS are options too... but it still gets the reputation of being uber-crunchy because folks seemingly go buggy at the notion of ignoring big chunks of the rulebook.

Outside the playtest, the only thing I've run is a 5E Basic one shot, mainly because we shifted to BFRPG for the current campaign. The characters still seemed pretty robust (we had Cleric, Fighter, Fighter, Wizard).

Quote from: Simlasa;805327I'd hoped there'd be a stronger voice for playing with just the Basic elements... but from what I read it's almost as if those free files don't exist and it's full steam ahead with turning all possible switches to 'ON'.

I noticed this too. But also noting that people are alot more open with dropping out classes and spells or feats they dont want. Not seeing as many that are gung-ho for everything on. Partially because you cant since some options replace other rules.

I was today discussing the possibility of doing a side adventure with a DM using just the Basic rules.

Quote from: Emperor Norton;805344You are agreeing with me. I said no more classes, but that I wanted more archetypes for the existing classes. Sorcerer is especially lacking.

Verily! I was hoping there would be more class paths in the DMG. But only got the Death path for Clerics and the Oathbreaker path for Paladins. Both meant for NPCs but useable for PCs.

Quote from: Will;805346I'm strongly tempted to do a near-zero magic game (no casters), but I want to play it 'straight' to get a feel for the system.

I was thinking the same thing, except making all spells Ritual-only and that anyone with Arcane skill proficiency can attempt to cast them from spellbooks, scrolls etc...

I like 5E a whole lot more than 4E and 3.X but it still doesn't do enough for me to get me to give up on 2E or HackMaster. Maybe a new BirthRight campaign setting would get me to run it.

Completed HotDQ yesterday ... well, except for one loose end the PCs want to attend to ... and all things considered, it went pretty well. I probably did a lot more substitution and hacking than I do with the average canned module, but, as I mentioned above, the adventure outline was strong enough to handle it.

Best news is that two of the younger players are starting up campaigns of their own (both will be using the starter set), so I'm seeing traces of a viral effect.

One thing I noticed is that while the characters don't gain quite as much per level, they definitely level up faster and we completed the first book in about ten 4-hour sessions. If Rise of Tiamat goes at anything near that pace, we should be done with the whole thing in March, which is about the time that the Princes of the Apocalypse is supposed to be released. So at this point, I'm leaning towards giving that a shot as well.

In terms of splats, I've only had one player complain about character options, but he's the only one who hasn't purchased the PHB and typically relies instead on SRDs. He's not thrilled with the options in the free Basic rules. But then he wouldn't actually buy a splat anyway.