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I have to admit I wasn't monitoring this thread. ON the eve of the book release, can anybody kind enough do summarize what changed between 4e and 5e? Or is it totally new?

Joël of the FoS wrote:I have to admit I wasn't monitoring this thread. ON the eve of the book release, can anybody kind enough do summarize what changed between 4e and 5e? Or is it totally new?

There's a lot of change backward, not just to 3e but to 2e and earlier. Spells look a lot like they did in 2nd Edition. Hit points are low. Having a 15 in an ability score is good.

Big changes include:
Everything is tied to Ability scores. Saves are ability score checks (possibly with a bonus) and skills are ability score checks (possibly with a similar bonus). You might make a Strength saving throw or an Intelligence (Arcana) check.

The bonuses to checks start higher for attacks and lower for skills, and but don't get much higher. You have a single bonus for all: Proficiency. This starts at +2 and gets as high as +6, so the difference between a Level 1 fighter's attack roll and a level 20 is +5 vs +9.
DCs for everything also stays pretty much the same so locks don't get harder at high levels, jumps don't get father, etc.

There's fewer little bonuses and penalties in the game. Instead of small +1s and +2s you gain "Advantage" where you roll twice and take the higher result.

Miniatures are not assumed.

Well, I would say it's quite closer to 3rd than 2nd edition thankfully.

4e seems to have been mostly swept under the rug in this one. A few things remain (like at will attacks for spellcasters). That means the awesome mechanic of skill challenges is gone. The single most major loss from 4e. Not that it's hard to put it in, but you know; it would be nicer for someone ELSE to have done the math already for how many successes/failures and how much XP.

In addition to what has been told: Magic items are not assumed. There will be stuff in the DMG of how to deal with many or few magic items. Feats have been pushed as optional rule. You get ability bonuses or if you want (and have the PHB) you get feats instead. Feats have been combined to megafeats and ability bonuses are +2 or 2x +1. So it's a big thing.

Also, you can download the Basic PHB for free. And Basic = basic classes, basic races and basic rules.

Joël of the FoS wrote:I have to admit I wasn't monitoring this thread. ON the eve of the book release, can anybody kind enough do summarize what changed between 4e and 5e? Or is it totally new?

I didn't get to playtest it as much as I had wanted, but when I did it felt like a cross between the best parts of 2nd and 3rd edition, without the worst parts of either edition.

It's designed to be backwards compatible with all previous editions of the game. It does require a little conversion work to do so, but less than you would have needed to convert 2nd ed. to 3rd., or 3rd ed. to 4th. They want to avoid invalidating any old material if they can.

The base classes will be: Fighter, Ranger, Paladin, Barbarian, Cleric, Druid, Monk, Rogue, Bard, and Wizard.

Ravenloft will be a major plane, essentially replacing the Shadowfell concept from 4th ed. as a plane in-between the Prime Material and Negative Energy planes. Overall cosmology will be closer to 2nd ed. Planescape, though. Spelljammer will focus less on connecting existing worlds and more on just adventuring in outer space.

Bluebomber4evr wrote:Ravenloft will be a major plane, essentially replacing the Shadowfell concept from 4th ed. as a plane in-between the Prime Material and Negative Energy planes. Overall cosmology will be closer to 2nd ed. Planescape, though. Spelljammer will focus less on connecting existing worlds and more on just adventuring in outer space.

That was the concept. We'll see if they stick with that or go back to 4e's Ravenloft as bits of the Shadowfell or 2e's demiplane.

Academically speaking, I just prefer they change the DEFINITION of a demiplane, to "A plane between to planes" like Ravenloft between Prime material and Negative, Feywild between prime material and energy, magma between earth and fire etc.

In any case, placing Ravenloft as the "Default" between Negative and Prime means that it should grow in size, be easier to escape and have an overwhelming majority of domains at CL7.

Although, with the Prime setting changing to Forgotten Realms (which has areas in CL8) it means we could have domains in CL8.

Jester of the FoS wrote:

Bluebomber4evr wrote:Ravenloft will be a major plane, essentially replacing the Shadowfell concept from 4th ed. as a plane in-between the Prime Material and Negative Energy planes. Overall cosmology will be closer to 2nd ed. Planescape, though. Spelljammer will focus less on connecting existing worlds and more on just adventuring in outer space.

That was the concept. We'll see if they stick with that or go back to 4e's Ravenloft as bits of the Shadowfell or 2e's demiplane.

They haven't gone back on anything they've said so far. Besides, the 4th ed. version would invalidate earlier Ravenloft products which is contrary to their design philosophy for D&D Next.

Bluebomber4evr wrote:

Jester of the FoS wrote:

Bluebomber4evr wrote:Ravenloft will be a major plane, essentially replacing the Shadowfell concept from 4th ed. as a plane in-between the Prime Material and Negative Energy planes. Overall cosmology will be closer to 2nd ed. Planescape, though. Spelljammer will focus less on connecting existing worlds and more on just adventuring in outer space.

That was the concept. We'll see if they stick with that or go back to 4e's Ravenloft as bits of the Shadowfell or 2e's demiplane.

They haven't gone back on anything they've said so far. Besides, the 4th ed. version would invalidate earlier Ravenloft products which is contrary to their design philosophy for D&D Next.

They've changed their mind in a few small ways since the process began, based on customer feedback. And the DMG isn't out until November, so that section is probably pretty rough.
If enough people complained or voiced concern I can totally see that changing.

Bluebomber4evr wrote:The base classes will be: Fighter, Ranger, Paladin, Barbarian, Cleric, Druid, Monk, Rogue, Bard, and Wizard..

Those, BUT the base classes will also include Warlock and Sorcerer.

Dion of the Fraternity wrote:

Bluebomber4evr wrote:The base classes will be: Fighter, Ranger, Paladin, Barbarian, Cleric, Druid, Monk, Rogue, Bard, and Wizard..

Those, BUT the base classes will also include Warlock and Sorcerer.

I don't recall seeing either of those in the playtest materials.

Sorcerers were tested and failed.

Both warlocks and sorcerers will be in, untested. They even had articles on how the sorcerer will be different to the wizard, having the equivalent of empower spells etc.

alhoon wrote:Sorcerers were tested and failed.

Both warlocks and sorcerers will be in, untested. They even had articles on how the sorcerer will be different to the wizard, having the equivalent of empower spells etc.

Interesting, hopefully they'll be properly balanced, but that does add some more variety for arcane magic classes.

The sorcerer was problematic for a couple reasons.
They made it the spell point caster class, when that would work better as an optional system for all classes.
But the big problem was that it was also the "Gish" or fighter-mage class. Which didn't mesh with prior versions of the sorcerer. And it did a lot of things that didn't feel very sorcerer.

The warlock was okay.

Then they changed gears and tried to make a "mage" class that had all three as variants. But people rejected that, likely because WotC never revealed the others showing how the system would work.

The previews have suggested how they're doing the classes, and they sound okay. But it would have been nice to test them. But it looks like the alpha testers got a peak.

Dion of the Fraternity wrote:Each of the twelve classes will have its own quirks:

For example, the sorcerer has the ability to choose from the equivalent of Pathfinder's bloodlines (though according to rumors only two are given in the PHB: Draconic and Wild Magic). The wizard will of course follow the schools of magic (though Invocation has been removed). The warlock will have three Pacts (they seem to be adopting 4E on this one: fey, hellish and far realm).

The invocation is in BASIC D&D. I.e. it hasn't been removed.
Also: Draconic and Wild magic bloodlines were from 4e. PFinder perhaps used those too.