Yeah, I mostly play Fate or nWoD. But a lot of people are really emotionally invested in D&D, so sometimes I think of ways to try to trick them into playing something different while they think they’re still playing D&D.

Because 5e is a simple game made for adolescents. It’s easy to pick up, easy to build a character, and easy to run. The problem is once you start trying to do anything particularly interesting, it crumbles. It foists basically all mechanic decisions that aren’t directly related to combat onto DM adjudication, and provides very little guidance. I mean, last I checked you have the option to be proficient with various sets of craft tools, but the system doesn’t actually explain what that actually does mechanically.

If you want to make interesting character builds, you have to transition to a more detailed system. I’m partial to GURPS myself, but Pathfinder 2e is a nice middle ground of detail while still being fairly familiar to someone used to D&D.

Thought: Homebrew where you pick two subclasses instead of one and both evolve normally. No multiclasses cause it’d be kinda nuts as is

It foists basically all mechanic decisions that aren’t directly related to combat onto DM adjudication, and provides very little guidance.

The idea here is that the D&D ruleset is supposed to be permissive, not restrictive:

• permissive - anything not explicitly prohibited is allowed
• restrictive - anything not explicitly allowed is prohibited

The gameplay experience depends greatly on which of these directions you interpret rules from. So, when you say that it “provides very little guidance”, that’s intentional, because it allows the DM and the players to use the basic structure of the game to support and inspire having fun and being creative. It should be a foundation, not a cage.

D&D was always intended to be an open framework for actual roleplaying. The munchkin concept of gaming the rules for min-maxing stats came later.

Rules lawyers, be they DM or player, make playing less fun.

No, the idea is that 4e basically imploded the brand, so they pushed some unfinished stuff out the door before the axe came down and suddenly and unexpectedly they discovered that the brand was printing money.

Rules aren’t restrictive, because every rule is optional. A lack of guidance is WotC asking you to do their work for them.

The game isn’t balanced around multiclassing, either. If it were, everyone and there dog wouldn’t have difficult to explain backgrounds that involve blood magic, mysterious patrons, and devout faith in something.

Also any class that gets their subclass at level 1 or 2.

To be fair those are also troublesome for regular multiclassing, or at least they are if you’re not using the 2024 “definitely not 5.5E” classes. The paladin with one level in warlock or sorcerer is a perennial favourite for a reason.

I suppose an approach that takes the general intention of your design but is a bit omre mechanically rigorous could be to separate out subclass levels? You level up in one class as always, and every few levels the thing you get on levelling up is a subclass level. Subclasses then only get four or so levels, so you could be a warlock 11 (archfey 1 / fiend 2)

I’ve actually done it! I started at level 4, so I didn’t quite do the full 1-20 journey, but I did indeed go to 20 on xp per enemy killed and not milestone levelling

that is one way of making people try out other gamea

I don’t need to buy a set of books to give me permission to use my imagination, and I don’t need it’s permission to disregard rules that don’t serve my campaign, or homebrew my own. Every ruleset of every tabletop game is optional. Sure, ignoring some rules can unravel the system, but every table is free to make that choice.

I buy a set of books because I want an exhaustive set of balanced and playtested rules. I am under no obligation to use every rule, but I want to have them so I know if I choose to use them, I’m not going to break the balance.

For instance, I’ve fully moved to GURPS. It has a reputation for being complicated because there are lots of mechanics available. I ignore the vast majority of them most of the time, but when a player wants to do something out of the ordinary, I can count on having a balanced mechanic available for guidance. I don’t have to worry about being too strict, or too lenient, or inconsistent the next time the same situation arises.

5e isn’t “permissive”, it’s lazy game design. I quit after buying the Spelljammer set, which provided basically zero guidance for any of the actual spell jamming stuff. When the answer to every question is "The DM can decide to do it however they want :)”, you’re not actually releasing a game system.

Again, I don’t need to buy a book to have permission to use my imagination however I want. I buy a book to give me balanced and playtested mechanics. WotC doesn’t seem particularly interested in that.

How long did that take you?? The highest we’ve ever gone is level 11, and that took a couple of years.

The difference is pretty minor either way. I’ve never had more issues balancing this than I have with sorcerer burst damage or creation bards collapsing economies.

About a year and a half. It was a game explicitly intended to just be full of difficult combat encounters all of the time, so it was pretty much the ideal circumstances for levelling quickly. Her last encounter had about 60,000 xp worth of enemies in it per player, without using the multipliers for multiple enemies

I’ll always love a paladin rouge multi even if it’s not the “best”. there’s just so many interesting story possibilities there.

Oh, wargaming dnd? How’d you like it? Did 5e stand up well or did it need a lot of homebrewing?

I enjoyed it enough to play it for all that time, at least! I’m not particularly keen on D&D as a system (regardless of edition) and don’t care for the Forgotten Realms as a setting, I just enjoy playing TTRPGs with people I like and D&D is the easy one to get people together for. Since I had a good crowd, I was having fun. There were usually plenty of interesting tactical decisions to make, and all of us know the game well enough to get through complicated turns smoothly. Everyone involved would still RP in combat so it wasn’t just dice rolling. Gotta talk some shit to the hideous aberration that just deleted half your hp, right?

It was mostly RAW, but with some exceptions. For the sake of everyone being able to tailor their builds to combat, magic items could be purchased at will with prices agreed upon out of character

Multiclassing because it’s fun even if it doesn’t work that well will always have a place in my heart. I’m currently playing a barely-functional monk/druid. I think I can get him to work, but right now his tiger wildshape is more of the paper variety

I suppose I’m lucky enough to have enough friends into ttrpgs to build a group of players open to the system I like. I lost some who were emotionally invested in D&D, but frankly they were the least fun ones to play with (min-max munchkins and rules lawyers undercut by an unfamiliar system), so I’m not too upset about it. Plus I’ve been empowered with many more options for creative play, and blessed with players interested in creative play.

I mean, last I checked you have the option to be proficient with various sets of craft tools, but the system doesn’t actually explain what that actually does mechanically.

Chapter 8, “Between Adventures,” “Downtime,” “Crafting.” Page 187 in the 2014 version of the Player’s Handbook. It tells you exactly how long it takes and how much it costs to create items using artisans’ tools. I concede that it’s pretty generic and would benefit from some refinement, but it does explain what you can do, mechanically, with your proficiency in artisans’ tools.

(If the 2024 version of the Player’s Handbook removed this guidance then I’m not sure what to say, except that I don’t personally consider that version to be “5e.”)

Xanathar’s Guide to Everything also has an extensive section in Chapter 2, beginning on page 78, that does a great job fleshing out each type of tool proficiency and providing novel ways to use them. I highly recommend that if you’re interested in crafting.