Saturday 13 April 2019

Celebrating Basic 5th Edition rules


I'm a big fan of 5e D&D. It's a fantastic ruleset, but it still has some unnecessary bloat (for me) that has been prevalent in the editions since 1e. However, I do think the free Basic rules are the best version of the 5th edition rules. Sure, you don't get the customisation of the main rules, but I'm old school - customisation is for the birds. Give me a dwarf with a hammer and I'll have a great time.

So I'm going to celebrate Basic 5e in some of my blog posts (I also enjoy the term O5R). This is all about using the free ruleset for everything. Classes are Fighter, Rogue, Cleric and Wizard. Races are Human, Elf, Dwarf and Halfling. All those extra rules in the core books - tossed out. You don't need them. You've got 6 backgrounds, too. That's plenty of customisation without getting bogged down.

There's the added bonus that Basic 5e is free, but unlike a starter set takes you all the way to level 20. If you wanted to spice up your game with free, official settings, then why not have a look at the Magic the Gathering settings Wizards put out? All free to download, adding new elements to your basic game. You could play a campaign for years just using this ruleset and a setting.

6 comments:

  1. O5R - nice term! I agree with you. I use the full set so I know how easy it is to get lost among all the rules and customizations (offical and unofficial). Not to mention the amount of money you can spend on the rule books and supplements! Slyflourish had a nice post on roughly the same topic, but strictly from the economical angle: http://slyflourish.com/playing_dnd_on_a_budget.html.

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  2. Could you link to the magic pdfs?

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    1. There's a bunch, but here's Ixalan https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/plane-shift-ixalan-2018-01-09

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  3. Here is the whole collection (incl a free adventure!): https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Plane_Shift

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    1. Another recommendation is to buy the Adventurer's League adventures on DriveThruRPG. They are cheap, fun and offers hours of gameplay. Best of all, they don't require anything else than the Basic Rules to play!

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