by Michael Strauss

Created on: January 19, 2012

What should be included in 5th edition Dungeons & Dragons (D&D)?

If you listen to the grognards, 5th edition should include THAC0, Vancian magic, and save or die effects.  If you listen to the Pathfinder advocates, 5th edition should include fully customizable classes, complex skill systems, and a plethora of completely different character subsystems.  If you listen to the 4vengers, 5th edition should include simple encounter designs, a focus on game balance, and page 42.

Listening to all of these D&D players at the same time is likely to get you nothing more than a headache.  Due to over 30 years and 4-5 different editions, the wants of D&D players are varied and often times conflicting.  Trying to give every D&D player what they want in an edition is nearly impossible.  Surprisingly, the 5th edition designers intend to do exactly that.

According to the 5th edition’s lead designers, Monte Cook, Bruce Cordell, and Rob Schwalb, 5th edition will attempt to blend the wants of D&D players from every generation into a single game.  In other words, according to the designers, what should be included in 5th edition is all of the above.

The designers aren’t completely insane.  According to Monte Cook, the plan for 5th edition is to distill the core rules to that which reflects the key components of D&D and then to allow players to add optional components that reflect the best ideas that have been developed over the past 30 years.  From that description of 5th edition, it is actually quite easy to determine what should be included in the new edition.

5th edition should clearly include classes, races, and attributes at the core level.  It should include a d20 roll, modified by an attribute, to determine the result of an action.  It should also include the basic fantasy tropes that drive D&D: weapons, magic, monsters, and adventures.

Player options should include advanced ways to customize classes, both during character creation and while leveling, a morality system akin to alignment, alternative spell casting systems like psionics and Vancian casting, tactical map-based combat, advanced weapon rules, and a complex skill system.  The DM should be permitted multiple levels of complexity when developing encounters and using traps or enemies in the game.

If 5th edition is going to achieve its goal of reuniting a fractured fan base, it needs to create a game that appeals to a wide audience.  This is no easy feat, given that D&D players range from MMORPG addicted teenagers to aging war gamers that sharpened their teeth on the hobby moving around miniature lead tanks with only a ruler and a pair of 6-sided dice.  If it does appeal to that widespread an audience, then what the game will have included was a miracle.

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