this post was submitted on 29 Jun 2026
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Baldur's Gate 2's co-lead designer was asked to make Baldur's Gate 4 after Larian declined: 'Having to compete against Baldur's Gate 3? That would be insanity' (www.pcgamer.com)
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[–] jtrek@startrek.website 3 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

I think it feels fiddly to people who already know a thing or two about mechanics, but most of the fiddliness can easily be ignored or barely paid attention to and you can still manage to play and have fun.

I mean, this is true, but if you ignore enough rules you're essentially playing a different game. I talked to someone once who "played DND" but didn't use skills or spell slots, and I think they just let casters interpret spells based on the names. That's so different it's arguably a different game. Or at least as different as a Chihuahua and a husky.

. It’s a lot easier to just hit straight brick walls in games like pathfinder or shadow run where the player is so lost they just can’t play.

I agree with this, but note those systems are far more crunchy than DND. Something like Fate goes in the other direction, and I think is why it's better for fast games.

Though as an aside, a downside of Fate is it's so open it can cause a tyranny of the blank page effect. DND puts you in a pretty small box, and that can be helpful for people. The small decision space is a positive for some kinds of players. Though if you were doing Fate, you could just tell people to pick from some core ideas similar to character classes.

but 5e is pretty damn good at it while also being popular enough that people have heard of it and are interested in trying. That last part is just as important as being technically good on paper.

This is also undeniable. Someone who's going to half-ass it will drag down a game in any system.

I think we agree more than we disagree for what it's worth. Check out Fate though. It's free ( https://fate-srd.com/ )

[–] huey_m@reddthat.com 2 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago)

I mean, this is true, but if you ignore enough rules you’re essentially playing a different game.

But some systems are easier than others to wing or remove pieces. 5e already, for better and for worse, hand waives a lot stuff as up to the judgment of the GM, rather than having explicit rules on how to handle something. I think this is a bad thing for long term groups because it puts a lot more work on the GM (this might, ironically, make it good for new players but less good for new GMs), and for people who know their way around ttrpgs it's a little annoying that so much of the experience, even more than usual, relies on each given GM with less reliable and predictable outcomes.

But what rules 5e does have are usually pretty simplified... looking at 3.5, something like grappling has very explicit rules on how to resolve things in what feels like a pretty satisfying way, but it is very verbose... 5e just says "eh, contested Strength check and call it a day". It's just a very, very simple system at its heart. And again, a lot of stuff is just straight up written as "leave it up to your GM". This is frustrating for more veteran players that might want to try optimizing or pushing the bounds of a system and need a structure to push against, but for a newbie just having fun and who isn't too hung up on outcomes, this is a feature not a bug imo.

My fear with more open systems is like you said above, it can give especially new GMs and players a bit of paralysis in not really knowing where to go... I think 5e strikes a good balance of giving newbies a structure to work with while telling them not to sweat details too much. I could see with the right group though that isn't too timid or afraid to explore how this might be a benefit more than a hindrance....

All that said, I haven't tried Fate itself, so I'm speaking generally here. I'm sure I'll get around to checking it out at some point, though I'm mostly moving genres these days into stuff like the new Shadowrun and Cyberpunk RED so might be awhile... appreciate the rec though, we have a sub group that runs new systems all the time so I'm sure we'll get around to it lol. Again, appreciate the discussion! :)