Out of the 3 book editions, none with the exception of Skills and Powers have been bad when starting out with just the three core books. Even 4th edition brought a lot of interesting changes, and was playable in the beginning levels with the original release materials. I really feel that a lot of the praise for 5th edition is coming from the fact that it is not 4th edition, and that it hasn't been out long enough for its flaws to be an issue, and there aren't any really game breaking releases yet.
Also, its worth mentioning that I'm not part of the target audience for this release. The main focus area for these rules are two groups, young new players and players who began with 4th edition. Starting back when WOTC took over, the writing level of D&D products have continually been released to a lower grade/age level. There has been a lot of effort put into the writing of this new release to explain how to use the rules and how to role play. I'm not sighting that as a bad thing. Overall, I think it is good if it helps get new people into the hobby and keeps the game alive.
So before I go on, let me do a tiny bit of fill in here. 3rd edition came out in 2000, so people who started out in 3rd edition (if they started out as kids or teens) should be getting to that point in their life where they are moving on to other things and its hard to get together a gaming group to play on a regular basis. Those of us who started in the 80's are even farther removed from being the target audience. While there are still a large number of older gamers who will buy and play 5th edition, the majority of people who are going to be playing it are going to be younger, or new gamers. It's been that way for every system, but until about midway through 3.5 that was never really capitalized upon.
I'll skip right over everything up to 5th edition now. When play testing began, one could kind of watch the various revisions and see the direction the game was shaping into. While there was a lot of input from the older gaming crowd, the focus was still held to the newer gamer. Rightly so, as they are trying to sell a new product. With all due respect, 5th edition is not bad. Also, it's not for me. Everything that has been done in this rules set has already been done in a different edition, or a different company's product and in most cases done better. I won't bother to nitpick apart the actual rules, but will just say that there is nothing new in this edition. Love or hate 4th edition, it brought new game play and ideas to the table, not all good, not all bad, but 5th does not. They played it about as safe as they could with this one, and to me it just seems quite bland and I've no reason to buy into any future releases of it. Again, I'm not the target of the system, and that is not a fault of the system.
Previously when I had mentioned "some of the stuff you though should have been in the books looks to have been left out just so it will appear in the next book" it was not due to they had faulted and forgot to cover something in the rules, or forgot to add in a class or race. The core books are actually cram a lot of content, more so than I think really is need in some of those areas as I've no interest in many of the expanded races and classes that have become core. Again, I'm not the target audience.
So without breaking open the books I'll try to explain what I was talking about. I started playing D&D back when I was like 9 or 10, and it was a huge influence on my young self, (really got me into reading, and to this day miniature painting that spawned from that is my main hobby.) I've played or read through massive amounts of table top gaming material over the last 30 years. So what I was giving there was my opinion based on that. When I read through the books after a couple of times I started asking myself why things were written the way they were, such as options that were or weren't given for single example.
Now the actual rules are complete, so the company can say that there are not going to be any more releases to the rules. What we are going to get is a glut of optional content, not just adventures, settings, and such, but what we are going to see is an expansion of the classes, new paths that seem to fill in those blanks between the ones that are already listed, expanded races, optional rules additions, and a continuation of the practice that WOTC has had since the late 90. Not to come off as just speculating, but with a bit of inside track I can say that there is not enough money in non core content, such as modules. There is so much free and super low cost content in the area of setting and adventures that a person could play them for years. Not to mention free rules sets.
About free rule sets. WOTC pretty much had to release a free core set. Some players are new and will just buy into 5th edition, some players are brand loyal and will buy into it, others who were on the fence may read the free rules and decide to buy into it. They really don't loose anything with having a free basic set of rules. It is a great service to their fans players and potential player base and I was quite happy they went that route.
All, in all 5th edition (in my opinion) is a huge step in the right direction. Its just not for me. I don't hate it or dislike it, so much as I just don't need it and am disinterested in it past being curious to give it a try. It kind of gripes me knowing that nothing has changed though with how the property is being handled. When I have some more time I'll go into the books in some detail and the rules as well.
As for my video game reference, I was trying to and seem to have failed to compare their business model for the property future releases to the video game industry and their love affair with DLC. I won't mind trying to explain that more later as well if anyone wants.
