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|    rec.games.frp.dnd    |    Dungeons and Dragons    |    82 messages    |
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|    Message 41 of 82    |
|    Justisaur to Spalls Hurgenson    |
|    Re: You have the power to change D&D    |
|    03 Dec 25 07:52:34    |
      From: justisaur@yahoo.com              On 12/1/2025 3:03 PM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:       >       >       > So, the other days I was involved in a seance, and whose spirit should       > appear but Gary Gygax. He told me that --through the power of his       > being dead-- he would grant anyone on Usenet the ability to       > retroactively change one rule in D&D that they didn't like, with the       > aim of making the game better. Isn't that neat?       >       > Of course, none of that really happened. But let's pretend that it       > did. What's the one thing you would change about D&D --from whatever       > edition-- that you think was bad for the game.              First rule I even got rid of, the different female ability score limits.        Let's both alienate women from the game and make it impossible to play       an Amazon.              > Preferably it should be       > a rule that hasn't since been already binned (like, say, the specific       > weapons-vs-specific armor type bonuses/penalties from 1E) but,       > whatever. If that's the one rule you _really_ want dead, go for it.       > Ghostly Gygax says its okay. ;-)              Oh, well that one's long been binned as it didn't appear in any versions       of D&D except 1e.                     > * Thing 1: Pretty much all those feats introduced in 3E. You know the       > type: your character does some action that gives them a bonus to their       > rolls. I want them gone. All of them.              5e and 2024 (5.5e? People seem to be calling it 2024 though) made both       that and multiclassing optional. You still get ability score increase,       as feats are optional replacements for those.              Of course when I tried to not allow them I got player rebellion. So yes       I'd love to get rid of them.              In general I don't like character building as it leads to wildly       unbalanced characters. I'm fine with the archetypes of 5e (basically       semi like 2e's specialist wizards) as that's just a single career path       choice.              There's so much in 5e I'd get rid of, but much of it is too tied into       class power, like short rests, advantage/disadvantage, etc. etc. etc.              If you can do more than one I can too:              1. Builds. (at least there aren't any before 3e, see above, even more       encompassing than feats.)       2. Ability scores. Just bake the bonuses into the classes & archetypes.        Avoids so much unbalance between characters, still nowhere near builds       in that. (did this in my OSR)       3. Alignments. (also did this in my OSR, though I stole it from BFR)              > * Thing 2: Goodbye, short rests.              At least people are less resistant to changing those, using the 'gritty'       rests. Unfortunately I really don't like the 'gritty' option either.       And as mentioned getting rid of them greatly impacts some of the classes       balance. Especially Warlocks (not that I care there) and Fighters       (that's a base class, which is already under-powered in 5e)                     --       -Justisaur               ø-ø       (\_/)\        `-'\ `--.___,        ¶¬'\( ,_.-'        \\        ^'              --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05        * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)    |
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