D&D Basic: I Told You So

Brad · May 27, 2014, 03:17:58 PM

Quote from: Exploderwizard;753011Why? As a living document its going to be edited, futzed with, re-edited, added to, etc. quite a bit. Might as well give it a few years for it to settle in in its final form before wasting ink .

Because some of us are Luddites and fucking hate reading PDFs. I print out every PDF I buy. True story.

Simlasa · May 27, 2014, 03:27:19 PM

Quote from: Brad;753102Because some of us are Luddites and fucking hate reading PDFs. I print out every PDF I buy. True story.

I have no issue with PDFs... but it's nice to also have a hardcopy, for a variety of reasons.
Also, I don't care much for having the internet at the table... because it just seems to invite the 'hey, lookit what this funny cat does!'... or the guy that plays Candycrush when it's not his turn.

Brad · May 27, 2014, 03:52:56 PM

Quote from: Simlasa;753108I have no issue with PDFs... but it's nice to also have a hardcopy, for a variety of reasons.
Also, I don't care much for having the internet at the table... because it just seems to invite the 'hey, lookit what this funny cat does!'... or the guy that plays Candycrush when it's not his turn.

I'm just waiting for this thread to devolve into "print vs. PDF" and being told I'm a narrow-minded bigot for preferring a wretched, environmentally unfriendly option.

Sacrosanct · May 27, 2014, 03:57:45 PM

I much prefer print over pdf. I can jot down notes, and flip though pages a whole lot faster than a pdf.

S'mon · May 27, 2014, 04:12:11 PM

Quote from: Bobloblah;753056I think this is a potentially poisonous mindset for RPGs. The idea that they need a constant stream of errata is borne out of online theorywank, not play. That's not to say that an RPG can't get something so wrong it deserves errata (see 4e Skill Challenges), but the idea that it needs endless official tinkering, and is somehow incomplete for the end user without it, is harmful.

Yeah, I agree. I've seen 4e errataphilia lead to pointless table arguments where a player insists that eg the healing rules have changed, and I can't just rely on my memory of what they said, because who knows if they might not just have been errata'd?

AaronBrown99 · May 27, 2014, 04:32:23 PM

Quote from: S'mon;753127Yeah, I agree. I've seen 4e errataphilia lead to pointless table arguments where a player insists that eg the healing rules have changed, and I can't just rely on my memory of what they said, because who knows if they might not just have been errata'd?

gives me nightmare flashbacks of Star Fleet Battles in the 90s...

RunningLaser · May 27, 2014, 04:33:15 PM

Quote from: RPGPundit;753000The basic version will be the default version of the D&D game, the one that all adventure products will use for their baseline.

sweet:)

mcbobbo · May 27, 2014, 05:02:44 PM

Quote from: Haffrung;753080Hopefully the concept that there is no One True Way to play 5E will disarm a lot of that RAW wankery, where the system is BROKEN if three rounds of a level 2 spell Burning Hands has a 60 per cent chance of doing 10 per cent more damage than two rounds of a level 3 spell Flames Strike.

I agree and hope you're right, but in your example one of those spells is pretty broken. Spell levels are an order of magnitude off from character levels.

Endless Flight · May 27, 2014, 05:14:16 PM

Quote from: Brad;753117I'm just waiting for this thread to devolve into "print vs. PDF" and being told I'm a narrow-minded bigot for preferring a wretched, environmentally unfriendly option.

I drive a gas-guzzling SUV and keep books in the car at the same time. It's a double whammy!

Fiasco · May 27, 2014, 05:21:06 PM

Hopefully they hyperlink the crap out of the PDF or also build an SRD equivalent. One real strength of PF is the organisation of the online rules ref that supports the hard copy.

One thing I find a bit odd is that the people absolutely lambasting WOTC for not including chargen in the starter are suddenly thrilled to have a non print core rules PDF made available. Odd.

Hopefully the PDF is supported by some sort of POD offering with the disclaimer that this is a living document. WOTC can make a couple of bucks off each copy printed and so much the better if fanatics do it yearly to get all the latest errata included :-)

Endless Flight · May 27, 2014, 05:22:48 PM

I don't understand the living document thing. Once the PHB goes to the press, why would they keep changing the basic game PDF. Won't that cause issues?

Sacrosanct · May 27, 2014, 05:24:54 PM

Quote from: Endless Flight;753153I don't understand the living document thing. Once the PHB goes to the press, why would they keep changing the basic game PDF. Won't that cause issues?

Honestly? My opinion is the reasons for a pdf instead of a hard copy has less to do with a living doc and more to do with costs of printing. After all, it's just the most basic core stuff in the pdf, right? That tells me that there won't be a whole lot of errata. Most errata is on the more complex rules, classes, races, spell workings, etc. Things you'll find in the big 3 books.

Dirk Remmecke · May 27, 2014, 05:30:17 PM

Quote from: Warthur;753081Looks like the post got yanked (or the link got mangled) - care to paraphrase?

That was the whole of it - the English words "This is MADNESS!", followed by a link to a German Cthulhu blog, with the two links to Drivethrough I posted.

Lynn · May 27, 2014, 05:35:20 PM

Quote from: Bobloblah;753061Same here, but I think that mindset changed with the proliferation of regularly updated software. People view errata very differently now.

There was a major downside though to downloadable updates - it made it less expensive to ship less stable, buggy products to begin with.

Lynn · May 27, 2014, 05:37:40 PM

Quote from: Endless Flight;753153I don't understand the living document thing. Once the PHB goes to the press, why would they keep changing the basic game PDF. Won't that cause issues?

They may not modify rules, but clarify the existing rules and also rewrite some uneven stuff. It is a very good direct marketing strategy to do that, if they tie it to a registration or mailing list.