Quote from: Bren on September 26, 2020, 11:18:53 PMI always disliked "all options on" or kitchen sink settings because I strongly dislike inconsistent settings.

You can have a consistent kitchen sink setting though; it's just near impossible to do by accretion (ex. Forgotten Realms is a horrible kitchen sink because it started out a fairly Tolkien-isn fantasy setting and all the other stuff just sorta got stuck to that after the fact over the course of decades.

By contrast, Nerath (the 4E default setting) was built from the ground up to be a functional and consistent kitchen sink to the point that some of the less traditional races (tieflings and dragonborn) are almost better integrated into the setting's history than more traditional races like elves or dwarves.

A similar functional and consistent kitchen sink is Rifts.

The common element though is that they were BUILT to be kitchen sinks rather than becoming them.

For an interesting reference point in this; consider Eberron. It was built in the 3.5e era to be a kitchen sink. One of the tag lines for its promotion was that "everything in D&D has a place in Eberron."

Well, that is until 4E came along and they had to figure out how Dragonborn fit into the world. Now it wasn't as bad as 4E Forgotten Realms where they practically had to blow up the setting to get all the new parts to fit, but it was still quite obviously a retcon and therefore added some inconsistencies into the setting that weren't there before.

The above is one of the reasons I've worked so hard making sure all the parts of my own kitchen sink setting are coherent and work together.

For example, there is exactly ONE sapient species that is both natural and native to the campaign world (humans), one "natural" category of spiritual being that interacted with them (primal spirits), and all the beasts began as one natural to our own world. Every other species (sapient and non-sapient) is either created by or from those species for understandable reasons at different points in history.

Magic item attunement has done a pretty good job of keeping a lid on the proliferation of magic items per character. I'm not sure I like it as a mechanic, but it does work.

Quote from: mightybrain on September 27, 2020, 01:58:58 PM
Magic item attunement has done a pretty good job of keeping a lid on the proliferation of magic items per character. I'm not sure I like it as a mechanic, but it does work.

I first ran into "attunement" in the Arcanis RPG (Paradigm's attempt to escape WotC's licensing requirements before they realized Pathfinder would allow 3.5e to remain viable) which came out c. 2008.


They did it better there too. Attunement applied to nearly every magic item and had fluff elements related to how the overlapping magic fields caused issues. You started able to use only a few items at once, but as you gained experience you learned to better mitigate the effects of those fields and so could carry additional items.


There really isn't much of anything unique to 5e (even advantage, as has been mentioned, is just new to D&D not new to RPGs). The only really unique part is the particular combinations of the mechanics and fluff.

I thought the question was what are the best ideas, not what are the new or unique ideas.

Quote from: mightybrain on September 27, 2020, 06:16:41 PM
I thought the question was what are the best ideas, not what are the new or unique ideas.

5es best idea is being inoffensive. I think its very few peoples most favorite edition of D&D.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on September 27, 2020, 06:19:56 PM

5es best idea is being inoffensive. I think its very few peoples most favorite edition of D&D.

Based on its popularity, you are probably wrong.

The best thing about 5E is its status as a lingua franca for RPGs. It is beloved by many, but--more importantly--well liked by even more. It's easy enough to run and comes with many of the tropes D&D-fans enjoy. That just makes it easy to run and build a legacy, where you can share war stories of campaigns.


I just wish they would do single modules again. It's a shame that these are all 3rd party.

Quote from: Nerzenjäger on September 28, 2020, 02:23:34 AMBased on its popularity, you are probably wrong.

Mcdonalds is very popular. Very few people would say its their favorite source of meals. Serviceable, but largely bland. That's 5e. Those that do find it their favorite are those that haven't played many different RPGs.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on September 28, 2020, 08:11:07 AM
Mcdonalds is very popular. Very few people would say its their favorite source of meals. Serviceable, but largely bland. That's 5e. Those that do find it their favorite are those that haven't played many different RPGs.

That analogy doesn't apply here. McDonald's is nobody's only food source. D&D is many peoples' only game. And even then, there's nothing wrong with liking it the most. Even I did, and I have played pretty much everything under the sun. You live in a pretty fucked up world of ass-backwards assumptions.

Quote from: Nerzenjäger on September 28, 2020, 08:13:59 AMThat analogy doesn't apply here. McDonald's is nobody's only food source. D&D is.

Because new RPGS are expensive (In time, money, or both) to get into and require wrangling cats to get people to get into a new ruleset. Id say very few people get to play their fantastic but high quality RPG but more the one that's popular and marketable. This applies to D&D as a whole, where its power is largely marketing and establishment, moreso then anything uber unique it has done.


This serves more to support my argument further.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on September 28, 2020, 08:19:20 AM
Because new RPGS are expensive (In time, money, or both) to get into and require wrangling cats to get people to get into a new ruleset. Id say very few people get to play their fantastic but high quality RPG but more the one that's popular and marketable. This applies to D&D as a whole, where its power is largely marketing and establishment, moreso then anything uber unique it has done.


This serves more to support my argument further.

Again, no. If that were true, D&D4E should've been a massive success. You don't like 5E, that's fine. But what it does very well is being an accessible RPG. And being recognisably D&D.

Quote from: Nerzenjäger on September 28, 2020, 02:23:34 AM

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on September 27, 2020, 06:19:56 PM
5es best idea is being inoffensive. I think its very few peoples most favorite edition of D&D.

Based on its popularity, you are probably wrong.

No, it's pretty much on target. The best description of 5e I've heard is that its "everyone's second favorite edition of D&D" which means when you've got a group who doesn't agree on a favorite system its an easy default.

No role-playing is better than bad role-playing, but there's a LOT of mediocre and when you're hungry you'll settle for second best just to get some table time in.

That's 5e in a nutshell.

Bland, inoffensive fast food that you play because you can actually find 4-5 players at the FLGS in your small town to agree to it even though two would really rather be playing Pathfinder, one would prefer something OSR, one is a 4E fan who has given up on ever finding a group to play with, and one is a newbie who doesn't even realize there are other editions of D&D.

Quote from: Chris24601 on September 28, 2020, 08:57:14 AM
No, it's pretty much on target. The best description of 5e I've heard is that its "everyone's second favorite edition of D&D" which means when you've got a group who doesn't agree on a favorite system its an easy default.

Nobody cares what you have heard. We're not talking rpgsite members or grognards here, but the general gaming crowd.

The McDonald's analogy is, like all analogies, only useful up to a point.  5E is better than that, but the analogy isn't entirely wrong either.  McDonald's is in part bland because it is very regimented.  They are geared to get people who don't pay attention much to what they are doing to still produce food that follows a pattern.  Even so, a well-managed McDonald's is still superior to a poorly=managed one.  Not vastly so, because that's the limit to the formula, but notably so. 

It would be more accurate to say 5E is like D&D using the raw ingredients that arrive in McDonald's.  A smart GM is going to supplement with other stuff, but you can use what is coming in, especially if you don't stick to the formula. 

A different (but still flawed) analogy is that 5E is like renting a car in the 1980's and getting a Chevy.  Nothing special, but you could easily do a whole lot worse.  If you were really looking forward to cruising the interstate in a Mercedes or a BMW, you'll be disappointed.  If you just viewed it as vehicle to go somewhere and do what you want, it doesn't get in your way, and it's got AC and a radio.  And probably works.  And if you were doing something a little non-standard on back country roads, probably works better than one of the "better" options.

Quote from: Nerzenjäger on September 28, 2020, 08:59:12 AMNobody cares what you have heard. We're not talking rpgsite members or grognards here, but the general gaming crowd.

'Nobody cares for your anecdotal evidence! They care for MY anecdotal evidence!'

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on September 28, 2020, 09:13:13 AM
The McDonald's analogy is, like all analogies, only useful up to a point.  5E is better than that, but the analogy isn't entirely wrong either.  McDonald's is in part bland because it is very regimented.  They are geared to get people who don't pay attention much to what they are doing to still produce food that follows a pattern.  Even so, a well-managed McDonald's is still superior to a poorly=managed one.  Not vastly so, because that's the limit to the formula, but notably so.

As I said. Its executed 'well enough' largely through formula. And your right I might risk playing a 5e game more then some obscure indie thing because I know what it is and how it will be executed.


But your metaphor about MCdonalds materials doesn't really work in its favor because most Mcdonalds materials are largely preservatives or cost cutting measures. If you want to create a 'Mcdonalds' type meal, then its original type ingredients are much better (Real beef, real bread, real vegetables) then what you would get from Mcdonalds.


You can customize 5e, but I don't really see its raw materials as all that fantastic. I remember the edition Mearls wanted to make before 5e came out, which was supposed to be an awesome mix of all sorts of ingredients and options, but that edition never came to be and 5e is a pale shadow of what Next was supposed to be.