Mike Mearls on the underlying philosophy of 5e

[PhoenixPhyre]

I find one of the biggest differences between 5e and 4e/3e to be one of philosophy. The why of the design. The aims of the designers, which influence the "proper" flow of the game.

Apropos of that, I ran across a set of tweets from Mike Mearls on this.

Link: https://mobile.twitter.com/mikemearl...62500282773504

Transcribed text (each paragraph is one tweet in the original):

3.5 and 4 were very much driven by an anxiety about controlling the experience of the game, leaving as little as possible to chance. They aimed for consistency of play from campaign to campaign, and table to table.

The fear was that an obnoxious player or DM would ruin the game, and that would drive people away from it. The thinking was that if we made things as procedural as possible, people would just follow the rules and have fun regardless of who they played with.

The downside to this approach is that the rules became comprehensive to a fault. The game’s rules bloated, as they sought to resolve many if not all questions that arise in play with the game text.

At the same time, 3.5 and 4 were driven by the idea that D&D players wanted as many character options as possible, presented in a modular framework meant to encourage the search for combinations that yielded characters who broke the power curve.

These two aims play together in an extremely terrible way, at least from a design perspective. Your core system has to cover everything... meanwhile you are adding more cases and content to your game. Good luck with keeping those things in balance!

IMO, the basic design premise suffers from a fatal flaw. It misses out on a ton of the elements that make RPGs distinct and doesn’t speak to why people enjoy D&D in the first place.

With 5th, we assumed that the DM was there to have a good time, put on an engaging performance, and keep the group interested, excited, and happy. It’s a huge change, because we no longer expect you to turn to the book for an answer. We expect the DM to do that.

In terms of players, we focus much more on narrative and identity, rather than specific, mechanical advantages. Who you are is more important than what you do, to the point that your who determines your what.

In broad terms - and based on what we can observe of the community from a variety of measures - we went from a community that focused on mechanics and expertise, to one focused on socializing and story telling.

Mechanical expertise is an element of the game, but no longer the sole focus. Ideally, it’s a balanced part of all the other motivators. If balanaced correctly, every has their fun. Enjoyment isn’t zero sum.

As D&D is descriptive rather than prescriptive, individual groups had different experiences. However, that was the design trend and what we saw in the community as a whole. It’s been interesting to see things change with the change in rules and the flood of new players.

This meshes well with my experience, and it's nice to see that my understanding matches the original intent of the designers.

Thoughts?

[NRSASD]

As a player who made the jump from 2nd to 5E, that is basically my thoughts on the subject as well. I feel the rules and gameplay should enhance the story, not dictate to it. Since the DM is the storyteller, rules should make their job easier, not harder.

[hymer]

Who you are is more important than what you do, to the point that your who determines your what.

My bold. What? I think that thought could do with some elaboration. Unless it actually means as little as it seems to, in which case it should be cut.

Anyway, I personally see no real difference in the community side from 3.X to 5e. I play with much the same mix of people now as I did then (indeed, much the same people period). I don't think 5e is any more enabling (whether for DM or player) or constructive, or even conducive to joyful storytelling. It is, however, less time consuming to prepare for, and faster at play, and that's a lot. It's also better balanced between classes.

[PhoenixPhyre]

My bold. What? I think that thought could do with some elaboration. Unless it actually means as little as it seems to, in which case it should be cut.

Anyway, I personally see no real difference in the community side from 3.X to 5e. I play with much the same mix of people now as I did then (indeed, much the same people period). I don't think 5e is any more enabling (whether for DM or player) or constructive, or even conducive to joyful storytelling. It is, however, less time consuming to prepare for, and faster at play, and that's a lot.

I think that the bold part means that the "proper" flow is to reason from character to mechanics instead of vice versa. That is, the fictional layer comes first. Instead of thinking "do I have that ability? No, so I can't do that," it's a thought process more of "is my character the type of person that would attempt that?" and letting the mechanics fall out of that.

To contrast, a common idea in 3e character building was to ignore things like fluff requirements for PrCs and to read roleplaying "advice" as being much less important than mechanical powers. So you'd dance between a bunch of thematically-ill-fitting classes in order to get the abilities you wanted. 5e is designed to integrate the fluff and the crunch, so that isn't as much of a temptation.

Again, this is a philosophical shift, not necessarily even a mechanical one. I see a big distinction between 4e's "the fluff of abilities is explicitly discard-able/mutable" philosophy (which put the fluff in italics, visually separating it from the crunch) and 5e's intermixed description and mechanics. One says that fiction is a separate layer that can be traded out at will, the other says that the fiction is part of the rules and must be considered together.

And maybe you don't see a change because you're playing with people who have been playing for a while (and thus have developed their own philosophies)? I see it when I go from playing with 3e-era people to my usual new players. The 3e-era players are much more mechanics-first and prone to trying to "break the system" while the new players are much more story/narrative/fiction focused. The first group tends to default to checking the book for answers, while the second asks "what should happen? How can we make the rules fit this, even if we have to tweak things?"

It's the difference between a rules-first approach (the rules define the game, so there must be a rule for everything, even if we have to add one) and a fiction-first approach (the rules only help us resolve questions where the fiction is uncertain, and the rules take a backseat to the fiction).

[Unoriginal]

I think that Mearls hit the nail on the head here.

Additionally, most of the issues I've seen people have with 5e were due to them having expectations from previous editions or trying to apply 3.X mindset/concepts to 5e.

[Millstone85]

I think 4e could also have been better on the mechanical part.

For instance, why did classes have non-overlapping lists of powers? Huge waste of PHB space, especially when powers ended up being so similar anyway.

[hymer]

I think that the bold part means that the "proper" flow is to reason from character to mechanics instead of vice versa. That is, the fictional layer comes first. Instead of thinking "do I have that ability? No, so I can't do that," it's a thought process more of "is my character the type of person that would attempt that?" and letting the mechanics fall out of that.

To contrast, a common idea in 3e character building was to ignore things like fluff requirements for PrCs and to read roleplaying "advice" as being much less important than mechanical powers. So you'd dance between a bunch of thematically-ill-fitting classes in order to get the abilities you wanted. 5e is designed to integrate the fluff and the crunch, so that isn't as much of a temptation.

Again, this is a philosophical shift, not necessarily even a mechanical one. I see a big distinction between 4e's "the fluff of abilities is explicitly discard-able/mutable" philosophy (which put the fluff in italics, visually separating it from the crunch) and 5e's intermixed description and mechanics. One says that fiction is a separate layer that can be traded out at will, the other says that the fiction is part of the rules and must be considered together.

In that case, perhaps the difference of perception is that I've never (for a given value of 'never') considered that one had to come before the other. If you see a cool mechanic you like, you can make a character that fits narratively. If you have a cool character concept, you can pick mechanics that fit. You can do both of those in 3.X and you can do them in 5e. And then there are the times when you don't have one or the other come first. The intuitive leap happens so fast you don't know what sparked the idea.

And maybe you don't see a change because you're playing with people who have been playing for a while (and thus have developed their own philosophies)?

That's what I was trying to say. However:

The 3e-era players are much more mechanics-first and prone to trying to "break the system" while the new players are much more story/narrative/fiction focused.

Some players power play, some play more story focused. And some just struggle to keep up, because they're new. But I see absolutely no indication that 3.5 players are more prone to power play and 5e players are more prone to story play. It's down to their personalities and tastes (and just maybe experience, but that's complicated even if it is correct), not to what system they're playing (or learned first for that matter) as far as I can tell.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Some players power play, some play more story focused. And some just struggle to keep up, because they're new. But I see absolutely no indication that 3.5 players are more prone to power play and 5e players are more prone to story play. It's down to their personalities and tastes (and just maybe experience, but that's complicated even if it is correct), not to what system they're playing (or learned first for that matter) as far as I can tell.

I was only talking there about my experiences personally, not trying to generalize. I have heard lots of complaints that 5e doesn't give enough support to mechanical optimization, mostly from people who prefer 3.PF, though. In my personal experience, 3e seems to demand more of a mechanics focus (pre planned builds, juggling prerequisites, avoiding trap options, planning action economy, etc) even down to the tactical level while 5e leaves me much more mental space for adapting to the fiction.

Because as much as people cry stormwind, mental space is limited. The more you're spending mental effort about mechanics, the less you can focus on other things, character included. That's a natural consequence of human nature.

[the secret fire]

My bold. What? I think that thought could do with some elaboration. Unless it actually means as little as it seems to, in which case it should be cut.

He's just referring to backgrounds in a vainglorious way.

[Sigreid]

I was only talking there about my experiences personally, not trying to generalize. I have heard lots of complaints that 5e doesn't give enough support to mechanical optimization, mostly from people who prefer 3.PF, though. In my personal experience, 3e seems to demand more of a mechanics focus (pre planned builds, juggling prerequisites, avoiding trap options, planning action economy, etc) even down to the tactical level while 5e leaves me much more mental space for adapting to the fiction.

This was always my issue with 3.5. If you didn't know where you were going to take your character from the very beginning, you were very likely going to find yourself having made a choice at the very beginning that stops you from achieving a viable character at even mid levels.

[hymer]

I was only talking there about my experiences personally, not trying to generalize. I have heard lots of complaints that 5e doesn't give enough support to mechanical optimization, mostly from people who prefer 3.PF, though. In my personal experience, 3e seems to demand more of a mechanics focus (pre planned builds, juggling prerequisites, avoiding trap options, planning action economy, etc) even down to the tactical level while 5e leaves me much more mental space for adapting to the fiction.

No argument there. But I don't agree entirely with

Because as much as people cry stormwind, mental space is limited. The more you're spending mental effort about mechanics, the less you can focus on other things, character included. That's a natural consequence of human nature.

The first objection I have to this is time. Planning a character, e.g., takes time. But once you're done with it, it doesn't take up any of your mental resources while playing. You return to your plan when you level up. I agree that if someone is struggling with just understanding the system, then they may be distracted from roleplaying. But that's far from guaranteed, and in any case should be another temporary phenomenon until you get up to speed on the mechanics.
Another objection is that mechanics can be very conducive to role and story. They give you something to hang on to. If a character has vulnerability to cold and resistance to fire, it will give you something to use when you choose how the character dresses, and how they react to a given scene or environment. It can also be used by the DM to hook a given PC, and hopefully also the player. The above-mentioned character might be particularly interested in the latest developments in making clothes made from fire hydra leather, e.g.

[LudicSavant]

Because as much as people cry stormwind, mental space is limited. The more you're spending mental effort about mechanics, the less you can focus on other things, character included. That's a natural consequence of human nature.

This is like saying that you better not learn to dance if you want to sing.

The reality is that real human skill acquisition doesn't really work this way. A programmer doesn't get worse at programming if they learn some biology... and often they even find out that learning one makes them better at the other in unexpected ways (which you have to thank for both a number of modern computer technologies as well as breakthroughs in biology, incidentally).

[PhoenixPhyre]

This is like saying that you better not learn to dance if you want to sing.

The reality is that real human skill acquisition doesn't really work this way. A programmer doesn't get worse at programming if they learn some biology... and often they even find out that learning one makes them better at the other in unexpected ways (which you have to thank for both a number of modern computer technologies as well as breakthroughs in biology, incidentally).

It's not about learning. It's about juggling competing demands during play. If I'm worrying about how to mechanically represent a particular action in a way that fits a complex rule set, I don't have the brain power to simultaneously consider the character-based stuff as much. The two conflict because they're both competing for limited focus at any one instant.

[GaelofDarkness]

I was more of a wargamer before getting into ttrpgs and I'd say I agree with 5e's philosophy. The focus on "narrative and identity" is what got me into rpgs and it's what most players I know go to rpgs for. Of course, this doesn't mean we don't appreciate mechanical optimization - but it's not the thing that sells most of us on an rpg. Instead, it's how the mechanics complement the narrative and empower story-telling. I think 5e cuts a nice balance there - right around the sweet spot for getting different styles of gamers having fun at the same table. Heavily homebrewed systems are the norm for us and it's only really with 5e that we're looking to dnd for ideas, mechanics or monsters to steal.

I'm still partial to a game with more of a focus on mechanical intricacies - but I wasn't really looking to dnd for that.

[ZorroGames]

I find one of the biggest differences between 5e and 4e/3e to be one of philosophy. The why of the design. The aims of the designers, which influence the "proper" flow of the game.

Apropos of that, I ran across a set of tweets from Mike Mearls on this.

Link: https://mobile.twitter.com/mikemearl...62500282773504

Transcribed text (each paragraph is one tweet in the original):



This meshes well with my experience, and it's nice to see that my understanding matches the original intent of the designers.

Thoughts?

Well, I think that plays out differently on forums like this one.

[ZorroGames]

I was more of a wargamer before getting into ttrpgs and I'd say I agree with 5e's philosophy. The focus on "narrative and identity" is what got me into rpgs and it's what most players I know go to rpgs for. Of course, this doesn't mean we don't appreciate mechanical optimization - but it's not the thing that sells most of us on an rpg. Instead, it's how the mechanics complement the narrative and empower story-telling. I think 5e cuts a nice balance there - right around the sweet spot for getting different styles of gamers having fun at the same table. Heavily homebrewed systems are the norm for us and it's only really with 5e that we're looking to dnd for ideas, mechanics or monsters to steal.

I'm still partial to a game with more of a focus on mechanical intricacies - but I wasn't really looking to dnd for that.

If I want a fantasy war game I have a basement collection on rules, terrain, and miniatures from some almost 60 years of playing “toy soldiers” but I want the FRPG to layer in the experience with the environment as a priority.

[McSkrag]

In terms of players, we focus much more on narrative and identity, rather than specific, mechanical advantages. Who you are is more important than what you do, to the point that your who determines your what.

In broad terms - and based on what we can observe of the community from a variety of measures - we went from a community that focused on mechanics and expertise, to one focused on socializing and story telling.

The emphasis on storytelling and game flow makes it way more fun and is THE REASON I came back to D&D.

I think it also makes the game way more accessible to a broader audience which is a great thing for the community.

[Beelzebubba]

He's just referring to backgrounds in a vainglorious way.

Nah. It means the choices in your mechanical build are less important than the choices you make at the table.

It's the opposite of 3E, from my experience.

Some players power play, some play more story focused. And some just struggle to keep up, because they're new. But I see absolutely no indication that 3.5 players are more prone to power play and 5e players are more prone to story play. It's down to their personalities and tastes (and just maybe experience, but that's complicated even if it is correct), not to what system they're playing (or learned first for that matter) as far as I can tell.

I'm sure that's true of a lot of tables, but not at ours.

At mine, fully 50% of our players are new to D&D, and half of them are completely new to RPGs. They heard about how fun and awesome the new D&D was, and wanted to give it a shot. They don't even have a clue what 'powergaming' is, and built everything from the character/personality outward.

Hell, even when I explained what it was, a few said 'eh, that's not why I want to play this game' and even turned down some advice to get some more synergy with abilities and stats.

[Pex]

I was only talking there about my experiences personally, not trying to generalize. I have heard lots of complaints that 5e doesn't give enough support to mechanical optimization, mostly from people who prefer 3.PF, though. In my personal experience, 3e seems to demand more of a mechanics focus (pre planned builds, juggling prerequisites, avoiding trap options, planning action economy, etc) even down to the tactical level while 5e leaves me much more mental space for adapting to the fiction.

Because as much as people cry stormwind, mental space is limited. The more you're spending mental effort about mechanics, the less you can focus on other things, character included. That's a natural consequence of human nature.

I don't apologize for optimizing and can optimize with 5E just fine. The simpler and fewer rules make it easy. All it took for my monk game is to play variant human 14 CON with tough feat and I have the highest hit points of the party, including the fighter. I'm playing a kinsei monk. At level 5 with 18 DX 16 WI my AC is 17 and can be 19 with a class ability plus Dodge as a bonus action if I want. I'm not a skirmisher like a typical monk. I'm the tank of the party.

My paladin game. With 15 CO 16 CH, all it took was one feat, Resilient Con, and now I autosucceed all concentration checks for spells of the more common DC 10. Multiclassing Sorcerer for a few levels, the Shield spell alone has prevented character death by negating a hit at the most important time it was needed with Absorb Elements keeping me conscious 1 important round more to defeat the bad guy.

I can nitpick specific rules of 5E I don't like, but I recognize that's more personal taste. Where I claim it's more than personal taste and the 5E design philosophy fails is in skill use which we've debated ad infinitum. It's too vulnerable to DM control. It's great to assume the DM won't be a donkey cavity, but when he is only experienced players know to vote with their feet. When the newbie learns that vote he may vote to leave the game altogether because that's how he thinks the game is supposed to be. Even when the DM is not being a donkey cavity, it still comes down to "mother may I". 5E has shown it is capable of not being that way by giving defined DC examples for tool use and object hardness. The game needs to advise DMs better on what constitutes various tasks being easy or hard more than just what DC to assign.

[ad_hoc]

I'm still partial to a game with more of a focus on mechanical intricacies - but I wasn't really looking to dnd for that.

This is important.

There are a lot of complex and heavy games out there with tough competitive scenes.

I have gone deep into a couple of them and have found the experience rewarding. A consequence of that is that I don't care for the 'optimization' of an RPG. There is no challenge, no outcome, and it's a waste of a good game.

Story comes first in an RPG, otherwise what's the point.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I can nitpick specific rules of 5E I don't like, but I recognize that's more personal taste. Where I claim it's more than personal taste and the 5E design philosophy fails is in skill use which we've debated ad infinitum. It's too vulnerable to DM control. It's great to assume the DM won't be a donkey cavity, but when he is only experienced players know to vote with their feet. When the newbie learns that vote he may vote to leave the game altogether because that's how he thinks the game is supposed to be. Even when the DM is not being a donkey cavity, it still comes down to "mother may I". 5E has shown it is capable of not being that way by giving defined DC examples for tool use and object hardness. The game needs to advise DMs better on what constitutes various tasks being easy or hard more than just what DC to assign.

But that's exactly what MM was talking about. That assumption that, given power, the DM will be a jerk. Which, it turns out, is really independent of the system. No system can constrain a jerk. You're still very much in the 3e philosophy, which conflicts strongly with 5e's philosophy. But he talks about how 3e's philosophy ended up making things suck, both as a designer and as a player. It encourages a particular type of play that's very stifling to a lot of people.

I know it's hard to believe, but most players I play with don't care what the DC is. At all. They don't care about the mechanical bits whatsoever, except when it gets in the way. The rules are one of many tools, and they're happy leaving those up to the DM to fiddle with. They want to interact with the fiction and have a playable, flexible, fun system. Consistency and tight definitions are not even on their radar.

[bloodshed343]

I think that the bold part means that the "proper" flow is to reason from character to mechanics instead of vice versa. That is, the fictional layer comes first. Instead of thinking "do I have that ability? No, so I can't do that," it's a thought process more of "is my character the type of person that would attempt that?" and letting the mechanics fall out of that.

...

5e is designed to integrate the fluff and the crunch, so that isn't as much of a temptation.

Again, this is a philosophical shift, not necessarily even a mechanical one. I see a big distinction between 4e's "the fluff of abilities is explicitly discard-able/mutable" philosophy (which put the fluff in italics, visually separating it from the crunch) and 5e's intermixed description and mechanics. One says that fiction is a separate layer that can be traded out at will, the other says that the fiction is part of the rules and must be considered together.
...

It's the difference between a rules-first approach (the rules define the game, so there must be a rule for everything, even if we have to add one) and a fiction-first approach (the rules only help us resolve questions where the fiction is uncertain, and the rules take a backseat to the fiction).

I feel that this is a poor design philosophy. The purpose of the books is to provide clear arbitration for the resolution of conflicts, and I think the strength of separating the lore aspects from the mechanical aspects is that it allows a character to choose any method they wish to resolve conflicts while playing to any theme they can think of. Your twin-dagger ranger|rogue hybrid could be a pirate wielding a pair of flintlock pistols loaded with primordial ice that double as clubs, or it could be a feral half elemental sprouting claws of frozen blood, without changing any of the mechanical features, whereas in 5e the "lore first" approach encourages picking a character from the explicit themes in the book rather than writing your own.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I feel that this is a poor design philosophy. The purpose of the books is to provide clear arbitration for the resolution of conflicts, and I think the strength of separating the lore aspects from the mechanical aspects is that it allows a character to choose any method they wish to resolve conflicts while playing to any theme they can think of. Your twin-dagger ranger|rogue hybrid could be a pirate wielding a pair of flintlock pistols loaded with primordial ice that double as clubs, or it could be a feral half elemental sprouting claws of frozen blood, without changing any of the mechanical features, whereas in 5e the "lore first" approach encourages picking a character from the explicit themes in the book rather than writing your own.

Be wary of conflating "poor design" with "design I don't like." Wanting disconnected descriptions from mechanics is a valid choice, but it's not superior (or inferior) to wanting merged descriptions and mechanics. Both have strengths and weaknesses.

Merged fluff/crunch promotes strong archetypes and narrative/mechanics consonance. I'd wonder why your pirate with pistols is doing the same damage as the half-elemental (both type and numbers and range), and why the feral elemental has skills with lock-picking and has expertise in skills. Or why your pirate is casting spells. To me, those matter.

Merged fluff/crunch has the downside of potentially restricting the build space. But to some people, that's not a downside, it's an advantage. This is especially true of new players who often don't really know what they want to play or what works in the system. Leaving things wide open and focusing on mechanics makes it easy for them to lose track and get overwhelmed by the choices.

Disconnected fluff/crunch does increase the design space. And for some people, that's important.

Disconnected fluff/crunch also runs the strong risk of fluff becoming only incidental. You pick your mechanical elements for maximum effectiveness and tack on whatever theme you want. This discards the idea of tradeoffs or opportunity cost--you can always pick the most effective options and call them whatever you want. I saw this with 4e--it was easy to build a mechanical monster and then make the fluff as an after-thought. Which is not conducive to strong narrative or to good characterization.

Both are possible, neither is wrong. Just different.

[ad_hoc]

whereas in 5e the "lore first" approach encourages picking a character from the explicit themes in the book rather than writing your own.

Which I think is much better - only I would say 'pick an archetype' rather than 'pick a character'. I want to lay the groundwork and then have the character emerge during play.

There are a plethora of options in 5e, really, a bit more than I would like. I want my D&D to have strong themes, archetype, and world building.

I don't want to play at a table with Mr. Ice Guns.

The options in the game and the themes they represent greatly inform the play experience. I don't want them to be freeform. I have no interest in GURPS Fantasy.

[Pex]

But that's exactly what MM was talking about. That assumption that, given power, the DM will be a jerk. Which, it turns out, is really independent of the system. No system can constrain a jerk. You're still very much in the 3e philosophy, which conflicts strongly with 5e's philosophy. But he talks about how 3e's philosophy ended up making things suck, both as a designer and as a player. It encourages a particular type of play that's very stifling to a lot of people.

I know it's hard to believe, but most players I play with don't care what the DC is. At all. They don't care about the mechanical bits whatsoever, except when it gets in the way. The rules are one of many tools, and they're happy leaving those up to the DM to fiddle with. They want to interact with the fiction and have a playable, flexible, fun system. Consistency and tight definitions are not even on their radar.

The difference is in 5E a newbie doesn't know the DM is being a jerk. If a DM is a jerk in 3E the newbie can look at the rules and see where the DM is ignoring them, so he knows it's the DM's fault. In 5E the rules say and encourage the DM to make up anything he wants, so it's the game's fault and thus don't want to play it anymore. It's still the DM's fault, I agree, but the perception is it's the game's fault. It was worse in 2E when the DMG specifically taught DMs to be a jerk, but I bias digress rant. I've said before 5E does not teach DMs to be a jerk. It does encourage DMs to play with their players, not against them, but the vagueness that creeps in by design facilitates the jerk behavior.

Lack of consistency hurts the game even when the DM is not a jerk. The infamous tree example. It becomes a problem when I play a game and can climb a tree just because I want to even though I have 10 strength and not proficient in Athletics, but when I play a different game with 18 ST and proficient in Athletics I have to roll DC 20 and can fail to climb the tree. The second DM is not wrong or a jerk. In his opinion trees are harder to climb than what the first DM thought. That lack of consistency means I have to relearn how to play the game. I don't have control over what my character can do. It's "mother may I". I want to play my character, not the DM play my character.

[MaxWilson]

This was always my issue with 3.5. If you didn't know where you were going to take your character from the very beginning, you were very likely going to find yourself having made a choice at the very beginning that stops you from achieving a viable character at even mid levels.

This problem still exists in 5E due to path dependencies in multiclassing rules: too many choices you can never undo, which place a lot of emphasis on "builds" instead of play.

I have no opinion on 3.x vs. 5E, but relative to AD&D 5E seems fiddly and mechanically heavyweight. In fact that's it's whole selling point: it has a more complex action economy in combat. Outside of combat it is inferior in every respect to AD&D (or GURPS), so if you're running 5E you'd better be running something hack-and-slashy for players who like lots of fiddly abilities or you're getting no benefit.

And that's how I view 5E.

[ad_hoc]

The difference is in 5E a newbie doesn't know the DM is being a jerk.

I don't need a game to tell whether someone is being a jerk.

[Pex]

I don't need a game to tell whether someone is being a jerk.

You're not a newbie.

[Twigwit]

I would agree with Mearls view more if the rules existed to let people make characters that were utterly their own. In my view they don't. The PHB classes and rules push you to play as something that fits into the already established identity of D&D instead of a character that is entirely player-driven. This in and of itself is not bad, we've had plenty of editions that worked that way and most of them were great fun and had lots of options to make your character your own.

For as much Mearls touts how 5e has great "narrative design," I would like to ask exactly what kind of narrative they're trying to encourage via the rules. I've had this weird feeling about 5e I couldn't articulate until recently, and that it's that the game doesn't feel like a simulation of a fantasy world. Instead it feels like a simulation of a more complex simulation (read: AD&D, 3.5) of a fantasy world. We have the same classes with the same combat gimmicks, mostly, but the stories we can tell with them haven't changed: clerics still worship their gods, barbarians hate civilization, monks cloister themselves, all that.

I would appreciate the effort of making D&D more narrative driven if the narrative they wanted to design for wasn't the story of a bunch of people that kill monsters in dungeons and take their loot. The way Short Rests and Long Rests work clearly encourage a style of play that favors many petty combats a day, but given the narrative focus the edition is advertised on having many groups have far fewer combats in a day, which we hear about all the time from salty Warlock players. Rules for things that help guide out-of-combat encounters and skills started out at "almost nothing" for years. The majority of the guidance of the book is dedicated to replicating the dungeon crawling style story of ye olde D&D, and when you want something different you're mostly left stranded on your own by designers that believe a lack of guidance is more helpful than an abundance of it. And to be clear, I don't think a dungeon crawling or heavy combat style game is bad, it's just different.

[Tanarii]

Meh on the "storytelling" thing. My players (and I when I get a chance to play) are more focused on deciding what their characters want to do in any given situation, and I encourage that. Storytelling is for the birds. Playing characters in-universe, and experiencing what happens, is what we're there for, not telling stories.

5e is a decent system to that, for a certain range of characters and experiences. Namely adventurers going into dungeons and wilderness adventures or planar adventures, coming out rich and powerful, and maybe having saved the world (or part of it) in the process. It can do other things, of course. But that's not its forte.

There's definitely a philosophical difference in the design though. I feel it every game I run, now that I've cottoned on to it. The core mechanic (ability checks) are there as a DM tool when a question of resolution arises in her mind. Not a go-to function for any player decision made or action taken.