5e announced!

[alhoon]

As a note Mortavious, from what I gathered, Feywild will stop being a twisted-mirror plane.
It will be the boundary between Deep positive and Prime Material. So, unless the border plane of fire is also a twisted-mirror image of the prime material, like a volcano being where a mountain is, a lake of lava where a lake is etc, I believe the Feywild will be different, with its own geography.

Personally, I never really used the twisted-mirror thing for Feywild or Shadowfell. The Eladrin could teleport because they could teleport; not because they could step in Feywild, move 5' and that amounts to 25' in the prime Material.
I guess if I ever played high enough levels for me to throw in the equivalent of Shadow travel as a ritual, I would dip into the mirror thing... or not. Can't be sure.

Whenever I got my PCs in Feywild or Shadowfell in 4E, it was something different than the Prime Material.

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

Etherel.... isn't that the plane where ghosts are supposed to live yes?

Yup. In the 3e and earlier cosmologies, the ethereal linked the prime and the elemental and energy planes. The border ethereal was the close part that overlays with the prime, and that's where ghosts tend to hang out. The deep ethereal was beyond that and connected the border ethereals from different planes. Ravenloft is a demiplane, and was embedded in the deep ethereal.


Anyhoo, yeah, I guess I didn't consider the "mirror" aspect of the feywild and what that would mean for Ravenloft as a "dark mirror" of the primes. But Ravenloft does already have some of that. Some domains, (Barovia for one) exist in both Ravenloft and the prime. So you could handwave it and say that places where something bad enough happened to spawn a domain create a dark mirror in Ravenloft. The other places don't have a strongly copied dark mirror, so they have a shadowfell-like misty bleakness there instead. Now, that leaves the domains disconnected, but this is planar mechanics here. There's no need to be a slave to 3 dimensions. The darkpowers can stitch together the domains wherever they are and make them seem like a connected whole when you're in them. (Or they can choose not to, and keep them isolated.) There, you can have your cake and eat it too. 2e/3e style Ravenloft and 4e-style Shadowfell Domains of Dread can co-exist and "everyone" is happy. That's the 5e way, right?

[alhoon]

That's the 5e way, right?

I assumed I have grasped what was the "4e-way" in the past and I was wrong. I won't make the same mistake; I'll pass judgement when I see the final product.

For example, I hear too much about modability, and I so far I've seen "modability".
Like "you can use many or few magical items! We support magic-rich and magic-light campaigns!" = "The monsters stay the same, so the magic items are usually a blanket +1 from lvl 1 to lvl 20 with one brief mention that if you want, you can have +2 or higher but they're very rare"

[Mortavius]

So I've gone through my Ravenloft materials to find out that scale for Zilfer, and anyone else who's interested.

I chose the distance between Il Aluk/Necropolis and Viaki. It's relatively straight and I hoped that it wouldn't change much over the editions. I checked the distance and scale in the Black Box, Red Box, Domains of Dread, 3E Ravenloft, and finally the Gazetteer Volume II.

Black Box: 20 miles.
Red Box: It's either 100 miles or 6.25 miles. I'm not sure, as I'm not sure how to read the scale on that map. It looks kind of weird, and I'm not sure what it's referring to. If I have to choose one, I'm leaning towards the 6.25 miles, just because it's closer to the 20 miles that was previously published.
Domains of Dread: I couldn't actually find a scale on any map in this book.
Ravenloft 3E: Didn't see any scales in this book either...that's annoying.
Gaz 2: And a third candidate for no scales on the maps. I suspect that I could get a better idea if I read the gaz and saw how long it took S to travel from place to place, but I don't want to spend the time on it tonight.

It seems that in later years the authors wanted to avoid the scales on the maps in favor of letting the DM choose how long and such; a good call IMO, although perhaps having a scale somewhere (which I may have missed) just as a starting point wouldn't have been a bad idea.

[Zilfer]

So I've gone through my Ravenloft materials to find out that scale for Zilfer, and anyone else who's interested.

I chose the distance between Il Aluk/Necropolis and Viaki. It's relatively straight and I hoped that it wouldn't change much over the editions. I checked the distance and scale in the Black Box, Red Box, Domains of Dread, 3E Ravenloft, and finally the Gazetteer Volume II.

Black Box: 20 miles.
Red Box: It's either 100 miles or 6.25 miles. I'm not sure, as I'm not sure how to read the scale on that map. It looks kind of weird, and I'm not sure what it's referring to. If I have to choose one, I'm leaning towards the 6.25 miles, just because it's closer to the 20 miles that was previously published.
Domains of Dread: I couldn't actually find a scale on any map in this book.
Ravenloft 3E: Didn't see any scales in this book either...that's annoying.
Gaz 2: And a third candidate for no scales on the maps. I suspect that I could get a better idea if I read the gaz and saw how long it took S to travel from place to place, but I don't want to spend the time on it tonight.

It seems that in later years the authors wanted to avoid the scales on the maps in favor of letting the DM choose how long and such; a good call IMO, although perhaps having a scale somewhere (which I may have missed) just as a starting point wouldn't have been a bad idea.

Ah i see. So that's literally 1 days travel (if you travel a bit into the night and day....) But the first products I was seeing so sorry for the slight argumentative attitude, was the no scale. <.< I've always made it at least 2-3 days to travel to another town. Since in the Faerun maps that was about the time it took to get to most cities if not more. xD

[alhoon]

According to Azalin in the old SotK forums, the scale was left out on purpose. But he suggested that 25 miles/inch for the map in the RCSetting 3E book would be a good place to start.
I use double that.

[Mortavius]

I like that as a good starting point. As DM, I'm always going to alter the distance to complement what I need for the module, but it's always nice to have somewhere to begin, especially considering something like map scale.

[alhoon]

New playtest rules for 5th edition. I was... disappointed.
My main problems with this playtest are:
- The expertise dice of the fighter has been removed; no dice to add to damage or AC, One sub-class of the fighter gets some nifty maneuvers rolling a d6 (to trip etc) but it's not the main class feature of the fighter anymore. No extra damage for the fighter.
- Fewer feats = less customization available. Sure, there 3 subclasses to pick from, but I miss many of the features feats could give my chars. Now feats are BIG things, not quirks.
- Skills have been... nearly removed from the game. Only knowledge remains. A fighter or wizard can't add anything to stealth or perception etc. Just ability. No training.

All in all, I prefer the previous version of the playtest.

[alhoon]

"After the last playtest packet, we're almost done with the classes, races, and other core elements of the game. We haven't shown off multiclassing yet, but it will be in the next packet."



So, the worst IMO playtest, without expertise dice for the fighter, nearly no skills, and few superfeats instead of many feats is... the one that would stay?
Meh...

[Jester of the FoS]

The expertise dice of the fighter has been removed; no dice to add to damage or AC, One sub-class of the fighter gets some nifty maneuvers rolling a d6 (to trip etc) but it's not the main class feature of the fighter anymore. No extra damage for the fighter.

They certainly opted for varying complexity for the fighter. So you have the couple fighters that have something akin to maneuvers and then the super simple fighters.
I suppose I can see why they have both.

Skills have been... nearly removed from the game. Only knowledge remains. A fighter or wizard can't add anything to stealth or perception etc. Just ability. No training.

Skills were always going to be an optional thing. I think they pulled them out of this packaged to better test things without them and let the Lore options stand alone.

[Deewun]

So, the worst IMO playtest, without expertise dice for the fighter, nearly no skills, and few superfeats instead of many feats is... the one that would stay?
Meh...

And that is why we never throw away our old books, my fraternal brothers.

[alhoon]

Skills have been... nearly removed from the game. Only knowledge remains. A fighter or wizard can't add anything to stealth or perception etc. Just ability. No training.

Skills were always going to be an optional thing. I think they pulled them out of this packaged to better test things without them and let the Lore options stand alone.

The optional part was about feats. Skill dice determine the DC for things like perception and climb etc. If you take the skill dice out, that gave on average a +3 to +5 (d6 to d8), then the DCs set for climbing, breaking doors etc have to be more firm. Once skills are out, they're out for good because it's hard to have them as optional because of the DCs. Check the rogue and the knight. They get the equivalent of skills as part of the class but the "skills" they pick are chosen for them in advance.
A feat that allows you to roll +1d6 to lie, bargain and persuation checks will be a big thing now, because the DCs will be set assuming charisma alone. I.e. someone with that +1d6 (average 3.5) is like having +6 to +8 charisma for bargaining/bluffing/persuation.

I hope I'm wrong Jester, but the way things seem right now is that you can't have a wizard, fighter or cleric that can be trained to hide, pick locks, climb or lie like in 2nd edition. And like 2nd edition, they'll probably give a feat that allows you to pick a couple of skills, the equivalent of allowing skill training in 2nd.

On a similar note, I'm afraid we're moving again to d20 improbabilities. When all you have is a +4 from your extreme charisma and a +1d6, and that's considered a big deal, then the DCs will have to be like 20 for very hard things.
"Climb the wall that's made of superior masonry and is wet from the rain? That's HARD buddy. DC 19!"
"I have +5 from my nearly superhuman strength, +1d6 because I'm an expert climber and a +2 from my climbing tools. Meeeeh... I rolled 3 on the d20 and 2 on the d6. Total 12. I couldn't climb it even if it wasn't raining"
"I have 11 strength and that's it. Wait! I rolled a 19! I got it!"
kind of stuff.

And that kind of stuff won't be that rare. If you got a +10 from being skilled, +5 from simple equipment (not magical stuff), then the result of the d20 wouldn't be as important. The DM could easily put the DC at 25. That way the unathletic, unskilled and unprepared guy would have nearly no chance to climb that wall, while the skilled, strong and prepared climber would climb it 2/3 times.
Ironically, that's what they did with lore.
"OK there are phrases taken from the book of Ezra the chapter of Dementlieu uses. Roll Religion to know what these phrases allude to"
"I'm a genious intel 19, I get +4 from intelligence" "I'm not smart at all, 10 intelligence but I have studied religion for 9 years. I get +10"

What I want to see is:
Skills back, with a +5 bonus for lightly trained and +10 for heavily trained. Classes still give the +1d6 class bonus.

[Jester of the FoS]

Skills are planned as options. clicky.

There are some classes with expertise already, with bonuses to ability checks. Easy to see those yanked out for skills. Or just acknowledging that skills change the DCs and skilled people have a better chance for success.

[alhoon]

Skills are planned as options. clicky.

There are some classes with expertise already, with bonuses to ability checks. Easy to see those yanked out for skills. Or just acknowledging that skills change the DCs and skilled people have a better chance for success.

Well the tweet doesn't clear if they mean the lore thing when they say skills, the class abilities when they say skills or a skill mechanic. Let's hope they mean skills.
And yes, I can easily add skills into the game and adjust DCs with a house rule, and also add the small feats instead of the superfeats.
A lot of people I know though, and I hoped to play D&D with, will turn their thumbs down on a "dumbed-down" game that has to be house-rule fixed. 2nd Edition might have been a star while also needing tons of house rules but now there are many alternatives that people will turn to.

On another note: The next package will be the last.
Did WotC sent you a survey after the August package? I haven't received the survey yet, and I'm itching to pitch my voice.

[Jester of the FoS]

The release dates have been announced.

Starter Set in July

Player's Handbook in August
Monster Manual in September
Dungeon Master's Guide in November.
320-pages each, $50 MSRP