I freaking love DnD 5E.

[Arya]

I remember back when I was five years old, and my mother introduced me to Dungeons & Dragons (yes, she was that sort).  When she introduced it to me, she told me to be careful about who knew of me playing it, because many in our area thought only devil worshipers played it.  At daycare, a friend of mine and I tried to start a session.  Then, after a small dispute, the principal interrogated us, and really asked more about the game than the dispute.  So, I remember back when it was -taboo- to play the game.  More questions about the game itself and less about little tykes having little tyke problems.  

When I entered college, I met some professors, and some college students, who were into it.  This would be -almost- twenty years after I started playing it.  So...I am afraid I have to say that I do notice more people playing the game than two decades ago. Granted, the Midwest is a -very- special place, as some people here know.

Sincerely,
Arya

[Fire Wraith]

They're both quite popular where I live.  There's a large game store that regularly hosts both Pathfinder/4e and more miniatures based stuff as well, Games Workshop stuff, and boardgames (Fantasy Flight, etc).  I used to go every saturday before I started having to work.

[Garage Trashcan]

I can also safely say that Western New York has a huge gaming community. Tons of 5e stuff starting up and even plenty of 4e stuff still going in the area.

Also, I don't know how anyone goes to the huge conventions. Running a convention with 2000 smelly nerds is more than enough for me

[Ogre Time Yay]

I can also safely say that here in Fayetteville, nightly knife fights out behind the Big Lots store is quite popular among the freaks of night inhabiting my fun little city. makes me look back on how things use to be and I remember the gas station gun fight that took place that ended with an explosion, 4 dead gangers, and a crashed car into a post. Now we moved on to participating and betting on knife fights, and it's pretty fuckin' cool man!

[Mystic Warden]

Aug 22, 2014 17:16:19 GMT -5 thorien said:

Meh, maybe we just have a different definition of tabletop RPG, or maybe I have ill luck for it. I'd agree with your statement about tabletops in general, but most of them are sold as RPG, but lack... roleplay.

Unfortunately, nowadays if a game (mostly computer games) has the element of improvable character via XP/levels/skill tree/whatnot it is marked as "RPG".

[gork]

Aug 22, 2014 17:16:19 GMT -5 thorien said:

Meh, maybe we just have a different definition of tabletop RPG, or maybe I have ill luck for it. I'd agree with your statement about tabletops in general, but most of them are sold as RPG, but lack... roleplay.

pnp game can't really lack role play, there is non there in the first place, what you get are set of rules, image of a setting. All else depends on the people playing it, you can have as much role play as you want even with D&D. You can use even first ed. of D&D for it, or anything else. You should know how much of a role play focused freak I am Thorien, so even if I had most fun playing around WoD and all the other things, I assure you I did also quite decent things in Cyberpunk with its flat black & white world - talking about rpg I also often refer it as to games of imagination, as that's the only thing that actually limits you and what you want to do with it. For example if you look on Legend of Five Rings there is not much there to 'support' role play, set of rules, some lore - only question is what and how you want to do it. So at the end its you who chose if RPG means Roll Playing Game or Role Playing. 

[thorien]

Aug 24, 2014 9:08:51 GMT -5 gork said:

Aug 22, 2014 17:16:19 GMT -5 thorien said:

Meh, maybe we just have a different definition of tabletop RPG, or maybe I have ill luck for it. I'd agree with your statement about tabletops in general, but most of them are sold as RPG, but lack... roleplay.

pnp game can't really lack role play, there is non there in the first place, what you get are set of rules, image of a setting. All else depends on the people playing it, you can have as much role play as you want even with D&D. You can use even first ed. of D&D for it, or anything else. You should know how much of a role play focused freak I am Thorien, so even if I had most fun playing around WoD and all the other things, I assure you I did also quite decent things in Cyberpunk with its flat black & white world - talking about rpg I also often refer it as to games of imagination, as that's the only thing that actually limits you and what you want to do with it. For example if you look on Legend of Five Rings there is not much there to 'support' role play, set of rules, some lore - only question is what and how you want to do it. So at the end its you who chose if RPG means Roll Playing Game or Role Playing. 

Wow, I think we talk about different things. My post you quoted refers to TABLETOP games, for example one of my friends called tabletop "Battlestar Galactica" RPG. I totaly agree that all P&P are roleplaying games, even ones focused on annihilating things and character development (My beloved Deathwatch for example.).

Mystic Warden pretty much explained my thoughts.  

[TheGuyThatPlaysAsJames]

I will freaking kill to get the 5.0 alignment rules for paladin put into CE.

Freaking.

Kill.

That honestly sounds a lot more dynamic and robust than "they need to stay lawful good."

[Garage Trashcan]

Isn't 5E just following 4E's trend of removing all alignment restrictions on paladins?

[darthweasel]

One thing holding back any tabletop RPG is that getting enough players together can be murder. And I am having trouble keeping the game I am running going.

[darthweasel]

Aug 24, 2014 21:54:34 GMT -5 Garage Trashcan said:

Isn't 5E just following 4E's trend of removing all alignment restrictions on paladins?

Yep.

[Nymera]

Aug 24, 2014 23:31:08 GMT -5 darthweasel said:

Aug 24, 2014 21:54:34 GMT -5 Garage Trashcan said:

Isn't 5E just following 4E's trend of removing all alignment restrictions on paladins?

Yep.

Yes.*

*You can be of any alignment, but you have to swear an Oath which has several roleplaying restrictions (and determines what spells you get).  There are four different oaths to choose from in the player's guide.

So while it's technically possible to start as an evil paladin, following your oath to not fall would eventually shift you away from evil.  The oaths are what determines if you fall or not.

[Deleted]

Picked up the PHB, have to admit I like it. I'd been following the playtesting and thought there was some reasonable potential there.



Likes:

• Backgrounds and that this is expandable
• Archetypes - also highly expandable sub-class system
• That you can make up a character without worrying about starting gold, that your combination of choices can generate a base set of gear.
  
  
• That feats are in exchange for ability score increases.
  
• The elimination of a separate save mechanic (Fort, Ref, Will) vs. the appropriate ability score.
  
• That proficiency drives so much.
  
• Rituals - I like that you can use a spell marked as a ritual out of combat without using a spell slot, opens up options for spellcasters to be useful situationally without having to guess ahead or waste a time sensitive rest.

Don't Know Enough Yet

• Classes relative contribution
  
• Multi-classing balance - Need to actually play a bit to see if this breaks like it did in 3.5. My initial read is that enough of the good stuff is back-ended AND sneak attack being limited to once per turn regardless of the number of attacks this might actually be not too bad.
  

Dislike

• Archetypes - While highly expandable, these are the primary point I see where power creep could slip in. So far didn't notice anything totally crazy but I see these as potentially an issue.

[Garage Trashcan]

I took a look at the PHB for the first time yesterday and I like what they've done with the classes. Everything seems very thematic to the classes and all the changes are interesting. I particularly like paladins being able to channel their spell slots into their weapon to do bonus radiant damage, as opposed to a crappy Smite Evil ability. HiPS for Rangers is a very RP ability and I like the flavor of it a lot. Other than that, rangers are basically rangers. Wild Magic Surge is by far one of my favorite things. Growing or shrinking several inches? Growing a massive beard of feathers that spray everywhere when you sneeze? Fucking fantastic.

Halflings are overpowered.

Rogues don't need to flank anymore to get sneak attack. Can also sneak attack from a range by hiding behind your buddies. Totally balanced in every way.

Things that amused me:

Barbarians can pick (A) A Greataxe or (B) Any Martial Melee weapon

Wizards, I hate to be the bearer of bad news... but a Greataxe IS a Martial Melee Weapon. I suppose it's just encouraged.

Rangers get A Longbow with 20 arrows.

Gee, thanks. I guess halflings and gnomes will have to ask their DM for permission to not get screwed over by their starting equipment.

[morwen]

Aug 21, 2014 8:47:30 GMT -5 gork said:

In defense of new edition. Never liked D&D... well maybe I did when I was 15, had to know it as RP Games are my hobby and were also part of my work, and I enjoyed few PC games made based on DnD - but whatever they did with it in 4th E made me overlook it - ignore - and erase it from my mind as something that never happened (did the same for 1,2,3rd episode of Star Wars). So it may be to soon, maybe they need money or they want to atone for what they did - either way I am fine with it as it'll be hard to do what they did once again.

And no - don't want to start discussion over how good/amazing/bad/crappy DnD is - it just my opinion of it and it'll not change, I am not thickheaded but I spent a lot of time with it and quite a few other pnp games and this is what I think of it.

Looking forward to 5th.

I'm in this camp. I loved AD&D back in 1980 but then I was 14. I like what I hear about 5th. I actually have the paperback rules (1 little book with all the rules for like $15) for 4th and despite all the hate showered onto it, it seemed like something I could enjoy. Is there something similar to that so that poor people can enjoy 5th D&D?