"Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition Player’s Handbook Review" Topic

Of possible interest?

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Amicalement
Armand

Rpgs today are all about becoming a walking nuke without going to too much effort. Combat and treasures are accumulated only to get the character more power to fight the next combat. We used to Role Play back in the day. There was a sense of wonder in exploring some of the worlds put together by the dungeon master. It was fun. Now its smash, kill loot and onto to the next smash, kill and loot.

Just my two cents worth.

… and get off my lawn, you rotten kids!

Sneakgun,

I've been playing D&D since the very first pamphlets came out in the 70s and the "smash, kill loot and onto to the next smash, kill and loot" has been around since then. It's nothing new :-)

I agree with Sneakgun. Smash, kill, loot and on to the next smash, kill, loot seems to be the main focus of most RPGs for some time. The sense of wonder and exploring, the "role-playing" part has been diminished if not outright omitted over the past few years/decades. One huge reason why I don't play RPGs much any more.

Well, the rules do seem to be set up that way.

Not really too exciting to set about farming, or baking, or……

So, the alternatives seem to be a bit limited, though with creative players and GMs, I suspect adventures don't have to be.

Nice review, thanks for sharing.

However, RPG are what you make them, if you have a good GM & set of players then you will have fun, but if you only have those of a more limited intellect whom only want to "Smash, kill, loot" then I agree you are probably onto a loser.

Interesting that monsters don't become a waste of time, ie orcs still being a threat above 6th level; that always bugged me in any edition. As for the role-playing push, if it's the way to get some of the min maxers to do it, sounds good. To me the game was what you put into it, characters & dm's. Unfortunately I doubt I'll play this as the group pretty much broke into the "smash-loot" fight fight group and a group wanting a bit more rpg. I'm still tempted to buy it though and see if the kid is interested. FYI I heard the index is pretty awful, haven't seen it but interested in comments.

PS: has anyone seen "Zero Charisma". Lots of cringing moments if you've been in an rpg group.

Glad you enjoyed it my friend.

Amicalement
Armand

Nice writeup and matches my own findings and feelings about D&D 5e.

Interesting, I skipped 3 and 4, I might just pick it up.

The new 5e D&D books are some of the most beautiful I've ever seen – evocative images on nearly every page. And there is special emphasis (particularly in the new DMG) on story hooks. So I would say it is not simply smash and grab -far from it – but to each his or her own.

I love the 5e stuff, having collected almost none of the 4e (Essentials, basically) due to the MMO feel of it. Our group is running around in 5e now, after awaiting it's arrival by side-trips into OD&D clone systems and derivatives.

As for "kick the door, kill the monster, how much gold do we get.." gameplay style, it's all about how the DM works the game.

I think there's enough to RP with in 5e, tho I'll admit some other systems have more RP-centric mechanics.

One rather nice thing about 5e is the free version of it, the books opening up a TON more options though.

I love 5e. It's a great way to have friends over, eat some snacks, laugh, and have fun.

I have all 3 books now and like what I read. Feels like D&D. 4th did not. Not saying there is not a place for 4th ed but it didn't feel like what I grew up playing 25 years ago.

I really like the new system but have one major complaint about the PHB, it's how they have the spells laid out. It's really STUPID to alphabetize the entire list. They used to be sorted by class and level.

So if I wanted to look up 2nd level Wizard spells. I have to look at the spell list, then flip through the ALL spell descriptions to read just my spells. Jeez, I'm ranting now…

Xin