From the last playtest 5e psionics seems to be a mashup of 2e and 3e psionics. I prefer 2e psionics over the too-close-to-magic 3e psionics but I can live with it.

I thought I read though that psionics won't be in this book, they want to keep tweaking it.

If I read things right, looks like a release of a product each month or so.

JUNE -- Dice in funky box (why they give four d6's and only one d20 is beyond me -- AL doesn't allow for rolling stats but all 5E uses the advantage mechanic)

JULY -- Minis

AUGUST -- Board game

SEPTEMBER -- Hardback module

OCTOBER -- Betrayal at Baldur's Gate (Avalon Hill game; reskinning of Betrayal of House on the Hill)

NOVEMBER -- Xanathar's Guide

I'm still out, I'm sure a copy will come my way but I'm not looking for more adventures or class expansion and I'm not likely to run a 5e game anytime soon. I am open to change my mind if both contain some good setting material, particularly the adventure but given my annoyance that we have acerak in FR it would need to be amazing.

Can anyone come up with a strategy to get Wizards to produce PDFs of their books. It's driving me nuts that they don't do this.

Quote from: PencilBoy99;966679Can anyone come up with a strategy to get Wizards to produce PDFs of their books. It's driving me nuts that they don't do this.

Yes! Official copies would be preferable to me to.

Well, WoTC is certainly getting smarter about its peripheral products.

Has anyone read ToA yet?

I'm starting to see it on store shelves.

Quote from: Voros;966598That descrpition doesn't match any of the WoTC 5e hardcover adventures, good (CoS and Out of the Abyss) or bad (Tyranny of the Dragon, uninspired but still lots of useable parts).

Out of the Abyss is good? I'm finding it just about unplayable by the end. It covers the same levels as Tyranny, but in half the page count, so the DM has to fill in many, many blank spots.

Do you know somewhere where someone has filled in the 200 or so pages that's needed, especially when the players are going back into the Abyss?

People complain about adventures being overwritten then complain that they're too sketchy. Many classic modules, The Lost City, Isle of Dread, Dwellers of the Forbidden City and the final section of Night's Dark Terror are similarly 'sketchy.' Do people need the writers to do every single thing for them?

Quote from: Just Another Snake Cult;994113Has anyone read ToA yet?

I'm starting to see it on store shelves.

Mine is in the mail due to arrive any day.

I've not really been gripped by the campaigns really (I prefer to make my own campaigns, preferably anyway), but I'll get the Guide book. I'm happy with the way D&D is supported currently.

Quote from: Voros;994134People complain about adventures being overwritten then complain that they're too sketchy. Many classic modules, The Lost City, Isle of Dread, Dwellers of the Forbidden City and the final section of Night's Dark Terror are similarly 'sketchy.' Do people need the writers to do every single thing for them?

And, of course, the truly execrable Temple of Elemental Evil was never completed before publication.

Nevertheless, if I buy something published as an adventure for levels x to y and then discover I have to create a chunk of that - a la the truly execrable and horribly overrated Temple of Elemental Evil - then I feel ripped off. However, if I buy something that specifically states, like a Savage World plot points campaign, that it is not a fully written adventure then I do not mind. I just like to get what I paid for.

Quote from: Voros;994134People complain about adventures being overwritten then complain that they're too sketchy. Many classic modules, The Lost City, Isle of Dread, Dwellers of the Forbidden City and the final section of Night's Dark Terror are similarly 'sketchy.' Do people need the writers to do every single thing for them?

There's no one 'right.' Some people want a module to be a series of maps and maybe a legend saying how many of what monsters are in room A3. Others feel that if they're going to bother paying cash money for an adventure, then by golly it should be an adventure in a can, so to speak.

Quote from: Scrivener of Doom;994213I just like to get what I paid for.

I feel that they've never been good about that (WotC or TSR, don't know about other companies). This new module is exactly what you need, regardless of what you need.

My group has gotten a copy of the book and one of us is running the rest of us through it. Pretty much what we expected-resurrected people are starting to weaken and die. Rich patron hires party to go to Chult and look for the macguffin. We get there, interact with a bunch of potential guides (some of whom are better than others, have their own motivations, etc.), and are now headed to a huge-but-reasonable-sized area that we think it is located in (i.e. we got a break, and that limited the field of investigation down to a manageable portion, instead of the whole island which is much more 'you will not find it in time'). The one thing our DM has said out-of-game is that our break was in fact lucky, and that it seems to him quite reasonable, in fact probable (given the %ages and # of options, that most parties who go through it will end up on one of the bunny trails and/or randomly poking through the jungle or following plot hooks well past the point where either your patron dies or some outside force intervenes (maybe an NPC party finds the macguffin). So, in his opinion, the adventure is designed such that the PCs have a significantly less than 50% of truly succeeding even if they do everything right. I'm not sure that that is a bad thing (saving your patron can be kind of a 'stretch goal' or something), but it does seem uncharacteristic of modern adventure design. I'd be interested in hearing what other DMs think once they run it.

I feel like the last several adventures put out by WoC failed badly on my main metric for such materials: the ratio of stuff you use at the table (maps, stats, location descriptions) to stuff you don't use at the table (back stories, metaplots, crappy fiction, regional histories, assorted blibber blubber) was just way, way too small. To me, an adventure module should look like the notes I would prepare myself before running a night's game. Who writes all this shit that clogs up all the hard back adventure tomes they are putting out? So, as cool as it sounds I'm not going to jump until I see evidence they are going to print a useful product.

What books do you mean Lardsdangly?

The description doesn't sound anything like Out of the Abyss or Curse of Strahd.

And your complaint directly contradicts Doom's complaint that they are too sketchy. Which is it, overwritten or sketchy?