We concluded the first adventure in the Tyranny of Dragons line the other day. It provided a trial run of D&D 5e and Adventurer's League. Here's some thoughts on the adventure, the new edition, and Adventurer's League.
First, some good things. The new edition has done a few things right. Unlike 4e the classes aren't built homogenously. But the proficiency bonus and short and long rests keep some of the balance that 4e achieved. Although I liked the addition of the personality traits, ideals, bonds, and flaws along with inspiration, we rarely used them, or at least it rarely seemed to come up. Certainly Duane was a bit stingy with inspiration, at least compared with the suggestion on page 240 of the DMG that each player earn it once per session. Considering the value of inspiration-gaining advantage on a roll of the player's choice-I plan on trying to stick closer to that when I run. Of course the advice on inspiration overall in the DMG from pages 240-41 suggests using inspiration to encourage a more narrative play style. As a fan of narrativist gaming myself, I plan on encouraging narrative play. That will come up more when we sit down at the table. This introduction of narrative elements to play is move in the right direction for D&D. Especially the advantage and disadvantage system, removing the old fashioned simulationist screens filled with tables and tables of modifiers and modifiers, represents another move toward narrativist play that I approve of.
Of course, 5e still manages to do classical gamist. Duane used the old fashioned minis and grids. It worked fairly well. I wish that the guides for using grids in the DMG also included better templates for spell areas. Duane ultimately adopted the 4e method that squares/hexes are circles. I think I'll use something closer to the 3.5 method for spherical and cylindrical areas. Despite my love of narrativist play, I also enjoy using grids and minis for combat, mainly because it eliminates ambiguities I've had come up when running combat more "in the mind's eye." Even in more narrative systems I often find that rough maps help visualize combat or other tactical situations.
The main issue that kept coming up again and again were ones of balance. As I said, the 5e classes are no longer homogenous. But their abilities don't always balance, either against each other or against the provided challenge ratings for Monsters or NPCs. We weren't alone in this; I found a thread on the RPG.net forums discussing them. Damning with faint praise: 5e's system is better than 3.5's. Specifically, the 3.5 system was "eye-ball it" for self-made monsters or based off of class levels for NPCs. This meant a 1st level NPC Wizard was CR 1; it was supposed to expend about a quarter of their resources fighting that Wizard. That CR 1 Wizard, if it won initiative, maybe got off a magic missile before being swarmed. The CR 1 Fighter, with a higher AC probably got off more hits. Then at level 10, the CR 10 Wizard burned up half the party with a fireball, then used controlling spells on the Fighter and Cleric to finish the job, while that CR 10 Fighter got swarmed right away.
In the new edition, Challenge is derived from the combat stats: offensive-attack bonus and damage per round and defensive-AC and HP. Those values are read off a table, found on page 274 of the DMG, to determine Challenge. There's a strange caveat, though-the Challenge for a monster or NPC also acts as its "Level" when calculating its proficiency bonus. Although unlikely, this could then affect those stats, mostly attack modifier, which could potentially change its Challenge. Its a strange amalgam of the 3.5 method and the 4e method.
Of course, as I looked back through the adventure, I found that Duane had adjusted encounter numbers and creature types. Sometimes, he even pointed out the changes he made. While it gives us a look at the failure of the CR system, it also seems to suggest that the adventure designers either did a bad job of balancing, or had the balance of monster stats changed on them as they were designing the adventure. The truth is probably somewhere between all those extremes, but Duane gave the designers the benefit of the doubt a laid it at the base of the latter.
Aside from the balance issues, the adventure offered plenty of opportunities for role-playing, investigation, and exploration as it unfolded. Unfortunately, probably as a side effect of the early design, it didn't tie in with the Adventurer's League factions. Duane was able to improvise some good tie-ins, but it was still a disappointment. Fortunately, having read through Princes of the Apocalypse for Elemental Evil, I already know that better tie-ins have been put in for the various factions.
The adventure also had some rather poor editing, again probably due to being rushed. For example, the caverns under Castle Naerytar featured no read aloud text. Other easily caught issues-most typoes plagued the book itself. However, Wizards's willingness to work with a third party publisher-in this case Kobold Press and Sasquatch Games for Princes of the Apocalypse is a good sign for future licensing, which is what helped make 3.0 and 3.5 what they were and what is keeping Pathfinder, Savage Worlds, Apocalypse World, and FATE in the industry. Why is licensing so good? Because it means that designers don't have to reinvent the wheel, just build the chassis with their preferred kind of wheel. Also, players don't need to learn a new engine. Granted, for a system junkie like myself, this means fewer original systems, but for learning curves for new players, it is fantastic.
But this brings us to another unfolding issue with 5e: the line is slow in coming. So far, aside from the core books, the starter set, and the DM screen, only adventures tied into the Adventurer's League have been released. Those adventures were licensed, and Wizards worked with a licensee to produce spell cards and condition markers (with Gale Force Nine, who also produced similar products for Privateer Press's Iron Kingdoms, War Machine, and Hordes games). They also licensed with WizKids to produce minis for both the Tyranny of Dragons and Elemental Evil lines. Last, they released a custom screen for Elemental Evil. The most important thing to distinguish it from the standard screen, which featured a delightful table for a DM to roll on entitled: Something Happens!, is the random encounter table for Princes of the Apocalypse.
Adventures are a good thing, but the line will need more support: I'm waiting for some setting books and splat books. So far the only splatbook release is the Elemental Evil Player's Guide, which is free 25 page PDF at dungeonsanddragons.com. I think periodicals would not be amiss either, even if it is just new digital issues of Dragon and Dungeon supporting the new edition. I suspect some delays at this point have more to do with working with licensees. But an updated Forgotten Realms book will be due soon.
Again, having read through Princes of the Apocalypse it seems free of the typoes and other evidence of rush jobs in Hoard of the Dragon Queen. However, from some eyeballing I've already done, I suspect balance issues will still come up.
Last, but not least, Adventurer's League. It's a good idea, particularly getting players into the FLGS. But some of the structure leaves a bit to be desired. For example, it only covers the first three "Episodes" of Hoard of the Dragon Queen, but you need to reach 5th level before moving on to the next "Phase" of the League, Expeditions. Of course, Expeditions are based in the Moonsea, while Encounters are based in the Sword Coast. So to stay official, you'd need to break off the narrative thread and transplant your characters from one end from the Realms to another. Which is why our group opted to go "unofficial" and stick with the adventure after 5th level.
Also, the rigid structure for downtime in League play is problematic. We only got ten "days" of downtime per episode completed. This meant that at most we could accumulate for downtime days was 70 or 80 for the one adventure. However, in order to accomplish anything useful-I thought it would be a good idea to learn Draconic and Thok would have liked to have made a suit of armor, would require hundreds of downtime days under official 5e rules, which we had to use with Adventurer's League.
Lastly, the official experience rules, where you only get experience for defeating monsters, stunted advancement after a certain point, especially if encounters are being adjusted in numbers and types of creatures on the fly by the DM to maintain playability and balance. Duane adopted a compromise with the milestone system: giving more experience for quests. It gave him more control over advancement pacing, which helped in the final chapters. I have come to find that we were one of the few table sticking as close as possible to the official Adventurer's League rules in our venue-the Isle of Games in Tucson, AZ. This is definitely not an accident. I have a feeling as a DM I'll be straying even further than Duane did.
Overall, though, the game has passed the most important test-the fun one. We had fun playing, and we're ready for more.
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