According to Jermey Crawford, we will be getting a new UA every Monday!

[JumboWheat01]

Also, I'd like to apologize to everyone in the thread, but especially CaptainSarathai & DivisibleByZero, for getting my panties in a twist earlier. My bad.

This is why it's better to go commando. No bunching.

[Theodoxus]

Rules can be beneficial or prohibitive when telling a story. No, I do not NEED rules to collectively tell a story, but it can be helpful. For example, if I want to swing on a chandelier to get down to the bottom floor and then strike the opponent with my rapier on the way down...

In D&D the group decides I can, I make a Dexterity (Acrobatics) roll, then if I succeed and have the move to reach my target I can make an attack roll.

In Fate the group decides my superbly suave swashbuckler Aspect gives me permission to swing on chandeliers. I describe my action and make my attack roll. If I fail I can invoke my superbly suave swashbuckler for either a +2 bonus or a reroll.

Note the difference? Because in the second one my character is established at being good at this I get a mechanical bonus for acting in genre.

Or what about bad stuff happening to your dude? In Fate it's simple, the GM compels either one of my Aspects or a situation Aspect, and I can accept it for a Fate Point, or reject it by spending a Fate Point. Any player can initiate a compel by spending a Fate Point, but the GM gets infinite Fate Points for this (separate from his pool for invoking Aspects).

I should never have spent my last Fate Point on getting a bonus to attacking the spy with my chandelier attack, because now I can't get out of the compel where the king finds me flirting with his daughters (both of them, simultaneously). Darn my luck.

From what I've heard (never played it, but played D&D with people who have) Fate is excruciatingly dependent on DM fiat and adjudication before play even begins. Your chandelier example becomes pretty moot if you've worked out beforehand that your character is this suave swashbuckler, and the DM ends up doing kobald cavern crawls forever. And before you poopoo this - one friend had expressly built a necromancer, with the intention of being a minionmancer, working the DM from the very beginning, but once the game started, he didn't let her have a single undead minion because she didn't know any spells!

Fate is apparently really good if you have an accomplished Storyteller type DM and absolute rubbish if you have a more mechanically inclined one.

I think it's a pretty good idea to cobble together a frankstein's monster of gaming systems. If you like a particular way one system handles combat and another handles social constructs, there's nothing wrong with stealing from both, provided they have at least a modicum of similarity. I'd be a little hard pressed glomming the d20 combat rules together with the WoD social rules... but if pressed, could probably manage to make something work - though if they ever combined in the same encounter, it would be very weird...

[RickAllison]

From what I've heard (never played it, but played D&D with people who have) Fate is excruciatingly dependent on DM fiat and adjudication before play even begins. Your chandelier example becomes pretty moot if you've worked out beforehand that your character is this suave swashbuckler, and the DM ends up doing kobald cavern crawls forever. And before you poopoo this - one friend had expressly built a necromancer, with the intention of being a minionmancer, working the DM from the very beginning, but once the game started, he didn't let her have a single undead minion because she didn't know any spells!

Fate is apparently really good if you have an accomplished Storyteller type DM and absolute rubbish if you have a more mechanically inclined one.

I think it's a pretty good idea to cobble together a frankstein's monster of gaming systems. If you like a particular way one system handles combat and another handles social constructs, there's nothing wrong with stealing from both, provided they have at least a modicum of similarity. I'd be a little hard pressed glomming the d20 combat rules together with the WoD social rules... but if pressed, could probably manage to make something work - though if they ever combined in the same encounter, it would be very weird...

I rip off FFG's Star Wars's system for motivations (Obligation, Duty, and Morality) because they are perfect for keeping those aspects of characters relevant while not being constantly brought up and not being forgotten. The combat system it uses, however, is awful. Either you are super squishy or nigh-unkillable.

[mephnick]

You need rules to help you collectively tell a story?

Of course not. Any group can sit there and tell a story, they don't even need a RPG system to do it! Isn't that great?

Just because you can tell a story after a session of D&D doesn't mean the system encourages story building. Apocolypse World, Pendragon, Dogs in the Vineyard (and many more!) all have mechanics that focus on helping shape a story. D&D has mechanics focused on fighting, exploring and some afterthought social mechanics. The mechanics of a system shape the kinds of experience you should expect with the system. It's dishonest to tell people that D&D is a story-telling system when there are real systems out there that make it a focus.

Thankfully, I like D&D better than all of them because I like killing monsters and taking their stuff.

[SharkForce]

D&D focuses more on combat stories than other genres. this doesn't mean it isn't about telling a story (there are plenty of stories about fighting). it also may not be the most "story-focused" RPG (i'm not entirely certain i would describe the fate RPG system as explained above particularly more "story-focused", to be honest. D&D is perhaps more focused on the abilities your character have while fate sounds more focused on the theme your character have, perhaps). that said, while there is certainly a difference between a 500,000 dollar car and a 10,000 dollar car, it's absurd to say that the 10,000 dollar car is not a car. it may not do all the things the 500,000 dollar car does, or do them as well (if it does, then there's something wrong with the 500,000 dollar car and you should definitely complain about it). but that doesn't make it not a car.

so yes, D&D is a storytelling game. it doesn't tell all stories equally well, by any means, and the way conflict is resolved is certainly different, but it is still ultimately a game about telling a story. probably a story that involves a lot of murderhobo-ing, but a story about being a murderhobo is still a story.

[Anonymouswizard]

I think you're confusing collectively telling a story with adjudicating parts of that story. The latter benefits from rules. The former is hindered by them.

Eh, it depends. In D&D I'll always insist on the ability to try and avoid bad stuff happening to my character, while in Fate I'm likely to accept a compel because it gives me lots of Fate Points.

From what I've heard (never played it, but played D&D with people who have) Fate is excruciatingly dependent on DM fiat and adjudication before play even begins.

Eh, yes and no. As written the GM gets final say on Aspects, but it's not truly nessecary as good Aspects are both good and bad, and a powerful Aspect is no more useful than a weak one if you don't have Fate Points.

Now if you use Extras you need a lot of DM fiat and adjudication, but the idea is that everyone should agree on them.

Your chandelier example becomes pretty moot if you've worked out beforehand that your character is this suave swashbuckler, and the DM ends up doing kobald cavern crawls forever. And before you poopoo this - one friend had expressly built a necromancer, with the intention of being a minionmancer, working the DM from the very beginning, but once the game started, he didn't let her have a single undead minion because she didn't know any spells!

That sounds more like a horrid GM. Now repeat after me:

'A good GM can save a bad system (like most editions of D&D), but a good system can't save a bad GM.'

Fate is apparently really good if you have an accomplished Storyteller type DM and absolute rubbish if you have a more mechanically inclined one.

Why is the mechanics-focused GM running Fate? We were talking about telling stories.

I never claimed Fate was best for everyone, its just the storytelling game I'm the most familiar with.

so yes, D&D is a storytelling game. ...but it is still ultimately a game about telling a story.

I await the actual proof with baited breath.

[Tanarii]

so yes, D&D is a storytelling game. it doesn't tell all stories equally well, by any means, and the way conflict is resolved is certainly different, but it is still ultimately a game about telling a story. probably a story that involves a lot of murderhobo-ing, but a story about being a murderhobo is still a story.

With less rancor than before, I still disagree with the basic concept that D&D has anything to do with storytelling. It's about in-character decision making interacting with the presented environment.

Unless the DM & players specifically work together try to force that into a story as they go, that is, and results in, the exact opposite of a story. Just as IRL the results of living as ourselves and doing stuff isn't, and doesn't result in, a story, but rather living life and a bunch of events.

And just as in real life, someone can come along after the fact and make a story out of the total events, given them meaning, plot, and most importantly narrative. But until a journalist, or book writer, or DM/player recap occurs, there is no storytelling going on. There is just living life / playing the game, which is an activity that is, and results in, the exact opposite of 'story'.

[Beleriphon]

On FATE vs D&D discussion one has to remember that D&D at least tries to operate on internal logic/setting logic even if the rules don't expressly do so. FATE however runs on narrative logic, where the bad guy showing at just the wrong time is part of the narrative just like an action movie.

[SharkForce]

i don't think i've ever played a single D&D session where the entire purpose was to kick in the door of some unknown dungeon, kill some random monster because we were both there, and loot all their stuff just because i can.

i mean, i'm sure you *could* play it that way. i'm sure some people *have* played it that way. but ultimately, every game i've ever played has had a story. not necessarily a brilliantly told story, that largely depends on the DM, but every game i've played has had some kind of overarching goal. sometimes the actions the players take directly relate to that goal, sometimes indirectly (attempting to gain the resources and power to accomplish the goal without directly furthering the goal), but they've all had some sort of story to them.

and, ultimately, that's pretty much what D&D has been about for decades now. oh, sure, it started off as little more than a wargame with individual characters instead of armies, but i bet if we ask the original players who created characters like bigby or melf, they wouldn't be excited to tell us about the time they randomly kicked in a door in some dungeon somewhere just because they could, they'd probably tell us about the time they saved a kingdom, or defeated an invading army of demons, or whatever.

look around, there are many D&D video games, and yet i can't recall a single one where the game boils down to "here's some monsters because i say there are monsters, now go kill them because they are there". every single one, as part of the effort to create a D&D game, has had a story. not one of the developers of those games felt like the best way to give the D&D experience was to just hand you randomly generated dungeons where all you're there for is to kill stuff and collect loot. now, some of those stories weren't great (i once made a joke about how i halfway suspected the plot of one of those games was generated by random tables... "now let's see, what's the next plot twist? 87, that's, uhhhh... time-traveling... and 21, that means lizards. time traveling lizards it is!")

is it the best system for telling stories? maybe not. i'll even say probably not, since only one system can be that, and it seems pretty unlikely for that system to be D&D. but ultimately, it is a game that has been intended to have more than random dungeon crawls for a long time. i don't know what the very original DMG looked like (once they got to the point where they actually had a DMG rather than a single book, that is) but i do know that my old 2nd edition books seemed to think that adventures and campaigns were an expected part of playing D&D, and that interaction with NPCs was part of the game. it didn't have great rules for some of those things, but it did expect that those things would be happening.

[Tanarii]

Goals, and achieving them, are not stories. If they were, our IRL lives would be stories.

A story is what happens when you take a series of events, cut out the chaff, and tie them together with a meaningful narrative. You can do that with D&D if you like, and some adventures attempt that by jumping you from 'scene' to 'scene' and skipping the stuff in between. But unsurprisingly, that's where railroading and loss of player agency start to creep in. They do so exactly because just like real life, the game is not inherently designed to be a story, and you have to try and force it to become one.

Edit: or you can tell the story of the game session after the fact of course. By editing the results of the game session into a story. Thats also known as the 'recap'.

Edit2: and just like IRL, trying to force in-character player choices and the resulting outcomes to fit your narrative /story is usually fairly disastrous.

[SharkForce]

our IRL lives are stories. not necessarily the most exciting stories, or stories with general appeal, and not necessarily well-told stories, but they are, nonetheless, stories, in spite of not being brilliantly-told epic adventures.

a story doesn't need to cut out the chaff, though certainly that can make it a more entertaining story. it doesn't even necessarily have to be tied together with a meaningful narrative. i have an uncle who has tons of stories that have no real meaning. many of them are only 10-15 seconds long. they are still stories, they just aren't brilliantly told with action-packed adventures, dozens of memorable characters, and all the boring parts edited out (and yes, i assure you, there can in fact be boring parts in a 15 second long story. often that boring part is "all of it", actually).

furthermore, just because the DM isn't the only one choosing what happens in the story, doesn't make it not a story. there is no reason why the DM needs to force in-character choices to go in any particular direction to have a story at all, that's just nonsense. it could be the story of how the PCs infiltrated a giant's keep at a critical moment, allowing an army to get past the outer walls. but it could also be the story of how the PCs negotiated a peace treaty and permission for the army to get past that same giant's keep. or the story of how the PCs discovered a previously unknown underground passage that got them around the giant's keep without needing to interact with it. or it could even be the story of how the PCs decided that the cause the army was fighting for was not particularly worthy, and went off to do something else. or how they felt that the cause was not only not particularly worthy, but that it was descpicable, and instead of helping when asked they chose to do everything in their power to break up that army.

all of those things are still stories. how well they are told will depend on the particular group. but they are all stories, and D&D has for quite some time been based on the assumption that there will be some form of story. the rules don't generally interact with the story except in terms of semi-impartial conflict resolution. neither the players nor the DM know where the story will end when it begins, but it is, nevertheless, a story.

[DivisibleByZero]

Yep. Just like I already said.

Even in your misguided example of dungeon/wilderness/exploration/combat, the players and DM cooperate to tell the story of those events.
The rules exist only to facilitate that storytelling.
This is why Rule Zero is a thing. Because the storytelling takes priority over the rules. Even if you want to ignore the storytelling and focus on the grind, that doesn't change the nature of the game as a cooperative storytelling game.

[Tanarii]

our IRL lives are stories.

Ah. In that case, there's really no point in us discussing this any more. I not only don't believe this, I think that this kind of belief is a huge part of why many people struggle in life.

[RickAllison]

Ah. In that case, there's really no point in us discussing this any more. I not only don't believe this, I think that this kind of belief is a huge part of why many people struggle in life.

A "story" is literally a series of events. A person's life is a story, a country's history is a story (guess where story came from...), and a fictional tale like LotR is a story. Unless your life is a void of nothingness, it is a story. If it is... Well it can't be, you at least punctuate it with posting on a forum, and presumably you have a rich and varied life outside of the Internet.

Unless you are a robot. In which case I am breaking out the cyber-garlic.

[mephnick]

This argument has come up a few times and I've had to conclude that most people here have never played another RPG system outside of the D&D/Pathfinder brand. To say that facilitating co-operative story telling is a design goal or a target of the mechanics of the D&D system is just such a weird opinion to have if you've played other games that actually do this.

What I'm getting at is brought up in this video with the developer of Dungeon World talking about what systems say their goal is and how the mechanics support it or act against it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0Bk...nqZIa&index=13

[DivisibleByZero]

This argument has come up a few times and I've had to conclude that most people here have never played another RPG system outside of the D&D/Pathfinder brand. To say that facilitating co-operative story telling is a design goal or a target of the mechanics of the D&D system is just such a weird opinion to have if you've played other games that actually do this.

I'd be willing to bet that most of us have.
My favorite system is White Wolf, specifically oWoD Vampire.
Different systems have different approaches to how the players and GM cooperate to tell a story, but that's what they all do in the end.

[Tanarii]

Unless you are a robot. In which case I am breaking out the cyber-garlic.

First (and obviously deficient) attempt at a forum AI. I got shunted to this outskirt forum when I proved to contrary, opinionated, argumentative, occasionally insulting, and far too skilled at talking myself into a corner.

Lucky you guys.

[mephnick]

My favorite system is White Wolf, specifically oWoD Vampire.

Oh..you probably won't like that video then..

[Ruslan]

our IRL lives are stories. not necessarily the most exciting stories, or stories with general appeal, and not necessarily well-told stories, but they are, nonetheless, stories, in spite of not being brilliantly-told epic adventures.

And some of them would be critically panned due to poorly written dialogue and an unlikable main character.

[RickAllison]

This argument has come up a few times and I've had to conclude that most people here have never played another RPG system outside of the D&D/Pathfinder brand. To say that facilitating co-operative story telling is a design goal or a target of the mechanics of the D&D system is just such a weird opinion to have if you've played other games that actually do this.

In a way, it is. 5e uses a rather bare system because it puts a great emphasis on the roleplaying of it without relying on rigid mechanics to solve things (which can be abused, as we've seen in 3.X). I suppose there are two main categories of collaborative story mechanics:

1) Personal, putting the focus on personal RP and influencing the world through your character's actions; this is D&D, Call of Cthulhu, World of Darkness. The DM creates a world and your contribution is as a starring member of said world. These can have loose sets of rules (the DM calls for a roll when it is deemed appropriate), or very stringent sets (nWoD I think had rules specifically for debating...).

2) Collaboration. Things like Paranoia (Perversity Points), FFG Star Wars (Destiny points), etc. Here, the player actively messes with the plot in some way that is independent of the PC.

One involves being a character living the story, one involves actively creating it.

[tsotate]

'Perform' doesn't help me kill anything. Neither does proficiency with a musical instrument or gaming set.

As anyone who's gotten an Instrument of the Bards can tell you, the bolded part is just plain false. Those things are great for killing, if you're proficient.

[Anonymouswizard]

What I'm getting at is brought up in this video with the developer of Dungeon World talking about what systems say their goal is and how the mechanics support it or act against it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0Bk...nqZIa&index=13

I'll watch/listen when I'm at a machine, too long for me to do so on my phone.

I'd be willing to bet that most of us have.
My favorite system is White Wolf, specifically oWoD Vampire.
Different systems have different approaches to how the players and GM cooperate to tell a story, but that's what they all do in the end.

Sorry, but oWoD vampire is worse at it's intended mission statement than D&D is. Have you ever played a narrativist game?

[SharkForce]

This argument has come up a few times and I've had to conclude that most people here have never played another RPG system outside of the D&D/Pathfinder brand. To say that facilitating co-operative story telling is a design goal or a target of the mechanics of the D&D system is just such a weird opinion to have if you've played other games that actually do this.

What I'm getting at is brought up in this video with the developer of Dungeon World talking about what systems say their goal is and how the mechanics support it or act against it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0Bk...nqZIa&index=13

whether the system is bad at collaborative storytelling or good at storytelling does not change the fact that it is a system designed for collaborative storytelling. D&D helps with collaborative storytelling by providing the means to resolve conflict. it isn't good for letting players control the world independently from their characters. that doesn't mean it isn't making a story, it just means that different participants have different roles. as a player, i can control my own character's decisions based on that character's abilities. i don't have control over the rest of the world, except as my character has control over the world (which can be a lot if i'm a level 20 wizard, or very little if i'm level 1 anything), or control over any other character (except as the character does, which again can vary greatly by character). meanwhile, the DM has control over basically everything else. but again, notwithstanding the unequal amount of control, you are still creating a story together.

[DivisibleByZero]

Have you ever played a narrativist game?

I have. I don't see what relevance that has on what my favorite system is or whether you think DnD is a storytelling game, but I have.
The only thing that is relevant is that all TTRPG systems are essentially storytelling systems. They just go about it in different ways

[2D8HP]

Of course not. Any group can sit there and tell a story, they don't even need a RPG system to do it! Isn't that great?

'A good GM can save a bad system (like most editions of D&D), but a good system can't save a bad GM.'.

A good GM doesn't need much of any kind of rules "system" at all.

GM describes a scene.

Player says what actions their PC attempts.

GM makes up a percentage chance of success.

Player rolls dice.

Then the GM narrates the results.

It works.

The first version of what became D&D was the rules system inside Dave Arneson's mind.

The rules are there because players want some idea of what the odds are first, and it's easier to choose from a catalog than write on a blank page.

Just because you can tell a story after a session of D&D doesn't mean the system encourages story building. Apocolypse World, Pendragon, Dogs in the Vineyard (and many more!) all have mechanics that focus on helping shape a story. D&D has mechanics focused on fighting, exploring and some afterthought social mechanics. The mechanics of a system shape the kinds of experience you should expect with the system. It's dishonest to tell people that D&D is a story-telling system when there are real systems out there that make it a focus.

Well I bought and loved four editions of Pendragon over the decades (but I never did find someone else to play it with, and it still remains at the top of my "want to try's"), and while I can see how Pendragon would be much better at modeling a "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" moral temptation challenges than D&D, I just don't see how it's more of a "story-telling system" than D&D. They just seem like different types of stories to me. I think I'm missing something.

Thankfully, I like D&D better than all of them because I like killing monsters and taking their stuff.

While I can't say this about the many game I want to try (Castle Falkenstein, Pendragon, 7th Sea, etc.), I have definitely found D&D more fun than all the other games I have tried (Champions, Runequest, Traveller, etc.).

i don't think i've ever played a single D&D session where the entire purpose was to kick in the door of some unknown dungeon, kill some random monster because we were both there, and loot all their stuff just because i can.

I have, and.........

It was COMPLETELY AWESOME!

Spoiler: A call to adventure!

Show

100 years ago the sorcerer Zenopus built a tower on the low hills overlooking Portown. The tower was close to the sea cliffs west of the town and, appropriately, next door to the graveyard.
Rumor has it that the magician made extensive cellars and tunnels underneath the tower. The town is located on the ruins of a much older city of doubtful history and Zenopus was said to excavate in his cellars in search of ancient treasures.

Fifty years ago, on a cold wintry night, the wizard's tower was suddenly engulfed in green flame. Several of his human servants escaped the holocaust, saying their rnaster had been destroyed by some powerful force he had unleashed in the depths of the tower.
Needless to say the tower stood vacant fora while afterthis, but then the neighbors and the night watchmen comploined that ghostly blue lights appeared in the windows at night, that ghastly screams could be heard emanating from the tower ot all hours, and goblin figures could be seen dancina on the tower roof in the moonlight. Finally the authorities had a catapult rolled through the streets of the town and the tower was battered to rubble. This stopped the hauntings but the townsfolk continue to shun the ruins. The entrance to the old dungeons can be easily located as a flight of broad stone steps leading down into darkness, but the few adventurous souls who hove descended into crypts below the ruin have either reported only empty stone corridors or have failed to return at all.
Other magic-users have moved into the town but the site of the old tower remains abandoned.
Whispered tales are told of fabulous treasure and unspeakable monsters in the underground passages below the hilltop, and the story tellers are always careful to point out that the reputed dungeons lie in close proximity to the foundations of the older, pre-human city, to the graveyard, and to the sea.
Portown is a small but busy city 'linking the caravan routes from the south to the merchscant ships that dare the pirate-infested waters of the Northern Sea. Humans and non-humans from all over the globe meet here.
At he Green Dragon Inn, the players of the game gather their characters for an assault on the fabulous passages beneath the ruined Wizard's tower.



None better for me, even after 38 years!

A "story" is literally a series of events. A person's life is a story, a country's history is a story (guess where story came from...), and a fictional tale like LotR is a story. Unless your life is a void of nothingness, it is a story. If it is... Well it can't be, you at least punctuate it with posting on a forum, and presumably you have a rich and varied life outside of the Internet.

Um.... I work in building repair, and we often say "let's see what the story is" (what's broken now, and what are we going to make up to fix it?)

My favorite system is White Wolf, specifically oWoD Vampire.

Played it, I didn't like the setting (too close to real life), but I don't really remember the rules.
Could it do a Swords & Sorcery setting?

Different systems have different approaches to how the players and GM cooperate to tell a story, but that's what they all do in the end.

True, I'm surprised that anyone would argue otherwise.

In a way, it is. 5e uses a rather bare system because it puts a great emphasis on the roleplaying of it without relying on rigid mechanics to solve things (which can be abused, as we've seen in 3.X)

Since the last version of D&D I played before 5e was 1e AD&D, I thought that since it's so popular I should try 3.x as well. Post like that that suggest that 3.x is even more complex than 5e scare me off.

[King539]

The people in this discussion seem to have differing opinions o the definition of the word "story." Here's a couple of dictionary definitions:

an account of imaginary or real people and events told for entertainment.

an account of past events in someone's life or in the evolution of something.

[Coffee_Dragon]

A good GM doesn't need much of any kind of rules "system" at all.

"I can recommend this system; it doesn't wreck the game for a group that's already creating all the story beats they need."

GM describes a scene.

Player says what actions their PC attempts.

GM makes up a percentage chance of success.

Player rolls dice.

Then the GM narrates the results.

What you're describing here is a bare-bones action resolution system that takes circumstances as input and coughs up a level of success or failure as output, basically 5E minus the situational modifiers. This is a common and legitimate way of creating a system, and here we all are on a D&D forum so I don't think anyone's completely turning up their noses. But this is after all only a part of what rules systems can do. Hence why some don't feel it's entirely accurate to call D&D specifically a storytelling RPG, when it's trivially true that any system will support story creation in the sense of helping produce a record of established facts, and there are other systems that purposely work to establish structure and propel circumstance. And let's face it, in spite of a transparent smattering of background motivations, the selling point of 5E is still to 95.5% that it's a tactical combat system with pages and pages of formalized options and abilities that loosely invokes various settings that we may be sentimental about.

[DragonSorcererX]

People on 5e/White Wolf related forums: Rules are Bullsh*t.

People on Gurps forums: I would like a better magic system because this one is bullsh*t.

Seriously what is wrong with you guys? 5e should be the middle-ground between rules and roleplaying...

[Ruslan]

Seriously what is wrong with you guys? 5e should be the middle-ground between rules and roleplaying...

Which is why both the rules-leaning people and the story-leaning people will always have something unflattering to say about it!

[Coffee_Dragon]

People on 5e/White Wolf related forums: Rules are Bullsh*t.

People on Gurps forums: I would like a better magic system because this one is bullsh*t.

Seriously what is wrong with you guys? 5e should be the middle-ground between rules and roleplaying...

Rules heavy vs rules light is a different question.