It makes sense that you wouldn't want people to keep applying stacks, especially in a pen and paper setting where (the one time I played) keeping track of all your feats, proficiencies, skill bonuses and other stuff gets complicated fast lol. But in a video game the computer can keep track of this for you and it could make really interesting plays
I notice people seem to go from edition 3 to 5 and skip over 4, why is that?
4e changed a lot of things in an attempt to solve many of the problems with 3.5:
Martials were (almost) as good as casters because they were given abilities that let them actually do things beyond saying "I full attack"
Monster statblocks were simplified and divorced from the rules used to build PCs, instead just making sure that the numbers were right
PCs were given more HP at low levels and the math was made less swingy so somebody didn't get crit by a greataxe and insta-killed (something I personally have seen happen in the less than 20 sessions I've played of 3.5/PF)
Modifiers were simplified to +2 for "minor" and +5 for "major" and IIRC generally didn't stack, as a sort of proto-advantage system
Spell slots were gone, and every class' abilities were changed into one of 3 categories: Daily (recharges after an 8-hour long rest), Encounter (recharges after a 5-minute short rest), and At-Will (useable every turn)
Additionally, non-combat spells/abilities were classed separately as "Utility Powers", with the same cooldown system
Classes were explicitly labeled with certain roles to give players an idea of what they were going to do (Strikers did damage, Controllers did CC (and damage), Leaders could heal and had support abilities, Defenders could generally lock down opponents with some sort of marking ability)
The rules were written very technically, which stands at odds with 3.5e/PF and 5e, which are more naturalistic, resulting in fewer rules disputes
4e also had its share of problems, however, which turned many people off:
The HP calculations were wrong in the first 2 monster manuals, resulting in long drawn-out slogs
The amount of bookkeeping required to run combat increased by a fair bit, as now almost every PC and many NPCs could inflict status effects with varying duration
Combat more or less required groups to use a grid (this was also largely true of 3.5, for what it's worth)
The Magic Item Treadmill was very much a thing, where every party member was expected to swap out almost all of their equipment every 5 levels to keep pace with the monster stats
Healing was very gamified: you could only heal a certain number of times per day, regardless of how many potions you drank or spells were cast on you etc
Character sheets were very complicated, and it was more or less required to use WotC's software. It worked decently well and was easy to pirate, but it ran into another problem...
The guy in charge of the software side of things at WotC murder-suicided his wife and the project was pretty much abandoned
The biggest issue facing 4e was that WotC's business model during the 3e/3.5e era had been to publish dozens of books non-stop, and 4e was in no way backwards compatible. The licensing that had allowed 3rd party publishers to make stuff for 3.5e was generous enough for Paizo to make Pathfinder 1e, and an extremely large share of then-current players went to play PF instead. As for 5e's popularity, it benefits from several things imo. First, it's the current edition of the game, which means any new players will gravitate to it by default. Second is the effect of big-name actual plays like Critical Role, The Adventure Zone, or Dimension 20 which serve as excellent (if unrealistic) marketing. Lastly, nerd shit has gradually become more accepted in general, and so the audience for people who play D&D has increased.
I notice people seem to go from edition 3 to 5 and skip over 4, why is that?
At the risk of setting off some 4e loyalists that are still out there (and they are, I've met them), 4th edition was especially alienating and offputting for both the old 3.x crowd and it's now quaint and janky for any newcomers that started with 5th.
There were categorical issues with 4th that put those people off, and it even started with the marketing and presentation. 4th was full of "aren't we cool dudes" ActiBlizz style edgelord attitude even in its promotional materials (such as portraying critics of the many, many unasked for changes from 3.x as literal D&D trolls and having a dragon shit on them during official ads https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Azcn84IIDVg ). A lot of prose was purged from 4th's lore in favor of quippy one-liners and stripped down statblocks, because the mantra was "crunch over fluff" which implied that people actually roleplaying and building up character stories and interacting with each other and the NPCs in the campaign was mere undesirable badwrongfun "fluff" instead of the super serious tryhard tactical wargamer experience or the what they called "beer and pretzels" trying-too-hard-to-be-normal aesthetic.
The quips in the books used to minimize "fluff" in favor of "crunch" were bad too. Like, the lore of a rogue being largely replaced with "You seem surprised to see me. If you had been paying attention, you would still be alive." Who was that rogue talking to, a freshly dead body? An even worse example was Galeb Duhr lore being stripped out so severely that the only easily accessible version of the living stone creatures (that were quite interesting to read about in earlier editions) was a statblock and the line "This is how I roll."
The focus from "fluff" to "crunch" was aggressively pushed to the point of making non tactical non combat encounters into abstracted "skill challenges" where (if the DM could be bothered), you could do a "fluff" session where the king of a kingdom can be persuaded to help the party by everyone rolling something at the same time. Like, one character charming the king with magic, another intimidating the king with threats, another seducing the king, another bluffing the king. At the same time. It got even sillier with locked doors where someone could be ramming it down and another picking the lock at the same time.
A lot of the class mechanics were stripped down to the point that a Fighter and a Wizard (because Wizards often, admittedly, had too many advantages and utility in earlier editions and Fighters did not have enough) played almost the same way except for "flavor text" if they had the same chosen role. One notorious example is the "Tide of Iron" ability that Fighters got that basically functioned like a Wizard spell with nothing but some vague blurb about how the Fighter martially did an AOE like a Wizard. And the "flavor text" of spells for actual spellcasters (who didnt function all that differently from noncasters) was usually really clumsy and awkward to visualize, especially with repeat performances, like a spell that pulls an enemy through all of the hells one after another and does moderate damage and applies a debuff on the way out.
Also, Wizards of the Coast were trying very hard to have sleazier monetization, such as "blind bags" for how they sold official minatures, trying to get people to pay for subscriptions for their janky and sloppy official online tabletop, and even pushing for the hubris-laden notion of playing without a DM by "grinding" premade mini scenarios. Basically, the Blizzard dudebros that WOTC picked up brought their MMORPG with them.
ALSO, the campaign lore in 4th Edition was laughably bad. Forgotten Realms, for example, stripped out so much of the layered complexity of the setting in favor of a "oh uh the goddess of magic died and there's a big plague and now everything's scattered and wrecked and the party just sort of loots it like a Diablo map" approach. It also had this bland mass-produced "EPIC DESTINY" system where instead of letting players find their endgame purpose and fate for themselves it was a pre-loaded pre-set planned in advanced set of stats with a copy-pasted "oh wow you are now a god. And so are you. And you. Except you, you chose that other thing I guess."
The art was trying too hard to be generic MMORPG "epic" too. The vast majority of characters had Rob Liefield grimaces and glowing eyes. The art drastically improved in 5th and that was one of the first thing I noticed when I peeked back in.
There's more, but that's a start. 4th was such a fucking mess that it helped launch Pathfinder as a brand because WOTC tried that hard to monopolize the old Open Gaming License and bully Paizo into exclusively producing things for WOTC. Also, official gatherings for 4th Edition D&D started to have so many people playing Pathfinder instead that the suits tried to forbid those players from even attending. SAD!
EDIT: Oh and one more thing: while it was supposed to be "crunch over fluff" and a miniatures-necessary-tactical-combat-as-main-focus experience, for many players (and DMs) the actual experience of playing those "crunch" focused encounters was boring. There were way too many slog fights that simply too long, too many buff and debuff counters to keep track of (5th really cleaned that up with the advantage/disadvantage system) and way too much MMORPGness to even the name schemes and jargon used.
EDIT 2: It got so bad for the Penny Arcade people that used to be 4th Edition backers that when they did an official game with the WOTC people it was so stiff and stale and uncreative and full of "uhhh you can't use that spell except in a combat encounter on a valid target" rigidity that Gabe and Tycho went on to play Pathfinder instead, at least for a time. I stopped paying attention to those two a long time ago, but still a bit of history I recalled.
EDIT 3: Recently, WOTC was trying to do the same old "let's fuck over third party companies and try to force them to exclusively work for us on our terms" trick again with "D&D One" and Paizo had to slap them hard with the ORC counter-license proposal, so even though Baldur's Gate 3 is very good and even though that recent corporate skullduggery was rolled back (for now) I still kind of fucking hate WOTC and am sick of their arrogant hubris-laden greedy bullshit.
It makes sense that you wouldn't want people to keep applying stacks, especially in a pen and paper setting where (the one time I played) keeping track of all your feats, proficiencies, skill bonuses and other stuff gets complicated fast lol. But in a video game the computer can keep track of this for you and it could make really interesting plays
I notice people seem to go from edition 3 to 5 and skip over 4, why is that?
4e changed a lot of things in an attempt to solve many of the problems with 3.5:
4e also had its share of problems, however, which turned many people off:
The biggest issue facing 4e was that WotC's business model during the 3e/3.5e era had been to publish dozens of books non-stop, and 4e was in no way backwards compatible. The licensing that had allowed 3rd party publishers to make stuff for 3.5e was generous enough for Paizo to make Pathfinder 1e, and an extremely large share of then-current players went to play PF instead. As for 5e's popularity, it benefits from several things imo. First, it's the current edition of the game, which means any new players will gravitate to it by default. Second is the effect of big-name actual plays like Critical Role, The Adventure Zone, or Dimension 20 which serve as excellent (if unrealistic) marketing. Lastly, nerd shit has gradually become more accepted in general, and so the audience for people who play D&D has increased.
bruh
lol thanks for the in-depth answer!
At the risk of setting off some 4e loyalists that are still out there (and they are, I've met them), 4th edition was especially alienating and offputting for both the old 3.x crowd and it's now quaint and janky for any newcomers that started with 5th.
There were categorical issues with 4th that put those people off, and it even started with the marketing and presentation. 4th was full of "aren't we cool dudes" ActiBlizz style edgelord attitude even in its promotional materials (such as portraying critics of the many, many unasked for changes from 3.x as literal D&D trolls and having a dragon shit on them during official ads https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Azcn84IIDVg ). A lot of prose was purged from 4th's lore in favor of quippy one-liners and stripped down statblocks, because the mantra was "crunch over fluff" which implied that people actually roleplaying and building up character stories and interacting with each other and the NPCs in the campaign was mere undesirable badwrongfun "fluff" instead of the super serious tryhard tactical wargamer experience or the what they called "beer and pretzels" trying-too-hard-to-be-normal aesthetic.
The quips in the books used to minimize "fluff" in favor of "crunch" were bad too. Like, the lore of a rogue being largely replaced with "You seem surprised to see me. If you had been paying attention, you would still be alive." Who was that rogue talking to, a freshly dead body? An even worse example was Galeb Duhr lore being stripped out so severely that the only easily accessible version of the living stone creatures (that were quite interesting to read about in earlier editions) was a statblock and the line "This is how I roll."
The focus from "fluff" to "crunch" was aggressively pushed to the point of making non tactical non combat encounters into abstracted "skill challenges" where (if the DM could be bothered), you could do a "fluff" session where the king of a kingdom can be persuaded to help the party by everyone rolling something at the same time. Like, one character charming the king with magic, another intimidating the king with threats, another seducing the king, another bluffing the king. At the same time. It got even sillier with locked doors where someone could be ramming it down and another picking the lock at the same time.
A lot of the class mechanics were stripped down to the point that a Fighter and a Wizard (because Wizards often, admittedly, had too many advantages and utility in earlier editions and Fighters did not have enough) played almost the same way except for "flavor text" if they had the same chosen role. One notorious example is the "Tide of Iron" ability that Fighters got that basically functioned like a Wizard spell with nothing but some vague blurb about how the Fighter martially did an AOE like a Wizard. And the "flavor text" of spells for actual spellcasters (who didnt function all that differently from noncasters) was usually really clumsy and awkward to visualize, especially with repeat performances, like a spell that pulls an enemy through all of the hells one after another and does moderate damage and applies a debuff on the way out.
Also, Wizards of the Coast were trying very hard to have sleazier monetization, such as "blind bags" for how they sold official minatures, trying to get people to pay for subscriptions for their janky and sloppy official online tabletop, and even pushing for the hubris-laden notion of playing without a DM by "grinding" premade mini scenarios. Basically, the Blizzard dudebros that WOTC picked up brought their MMORPG
with them.
ALSO, the campaign lore in 4th Edition was laughably bad. Forgotten Realms, for example, stripped out so much of the layered complexity of the setting in favor of a "oh uh the goddess of magic died and there's a big plague and now everything's scattered and wrecked and the party just sort of loots it like a Diablo map" approach. It also had this bland mass-produced "EPIC DESTINY" system where instead of letting players find their endgame purpose and fate for themselves it was a pre-loaded pre-set planned in advanced set of stats with a copy-pasted "oh wow you are now a god. And so are you. And you. Except you, you chose that other thing I guess."
The art was trying too hard to be generic MMORPG "epic" too. The vast majority of characters had Rob Liefield grimaces and glowing eyes. The art drastically improved in 5th and that was one of the first thing I noticed when I peeked back in.
There's more, but that's a start. 4th was such a fucking mess that it helped launch Pathfinder as a brand because WOTC tried that hard to monopolize the old Open Gaming License and bully Paizo into exclusively producing things for WOTC. Also, official gatherings for 4th Edition D&D started to have so many people playing Pathfinder instead that the suits tried to forbid those players from even attending. SAD!
EDIT: Oh and one more thing: while it was supposed to be "crunch over fluff" and a miniatures-necessary-tactical-combat-as-main-focus experience, for many players (and DMs) the actual experience of playing those "crunch" focused encounters was boring. There were way too many slog fights that simply too long, too many buff and debuff counters to keep track of (5th really cleaned that up with the advantage/disadvantage system) and way too much MMORPGness to even the name schemes and jargon used.
EDIT 2: It got so bad for the Penny Arcade people that used to be 4th Edition backers that when they did an official game with the WOTC people it was so stiff and stale and uncreative and full of "uhhh you can't use that spell except in a combat encounter on a valid target" rigidity that Gabe and Tycho went on to play Pathfinder instead, at least for a time. I stopped paying attention to those two a long time ago, but still a bit of history I recalled.
EDIT 3: Recently, WOTC was trying to do the same old "let's fuck over third party companies and try to force them to exclusively work for us on our terms" trick again with "D&D One" and Paizo had to slap them hard with the ORC counter-license proposal, so even though Baldur's Gate 3 is very good and even though that recent corporate skullduggery was rolled back (for now) I still kind of fucking hate WOTC and am sick of their arrogant hubris-laden greedy bullshit.
https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2023/01/the-orc-forges-ahead-even-after-wotc-backs-off.html