The Design Problem at the Heart of Dungeons and Dragons

It probably goes without saying that I like Dungeons and Dragons.

I've made homebrew rules for it, written game systems that are based off of it, and sunk untold hours into various campaigns. I've played every edition from 1st to 5th, and just about everything under the d20 OGL to boot. I have countless fond memories of delving through dungeons and slaying dragons with all sorts of unlikely heroes.

Which is why it's such a shame that the rules really don't hold up to scrutiny. The actual system just... isn't that great.

What Do I Mean?

Obviously I'm not talking about the fundamental idea of tabletop RPGs. I don't have any gripe with the idea of a group of melodramatic nerds sitting around a table and living out a story together, nor do I have any problem with the idea of using dice and stats to adjuticate these adventures. Honestly, I don't even level my criticism equally across all of the editions of the game - but I'll delve more into that later.

The issue is with the rules of D&D specifically, and it's divided into three main issues.

Issue #1: Static Options

Combat begins, you roll initiative. What do you do? If you're the average warrior, not much.

4th and 5th edition specifically make solid efforts to combat this, but it exists there too. It's the conundrum sometimes phrased as "linear fighters and exponential wizards", where an entire subsection of player characters are expected to have no real alternatives to the base strategy of "I run up and hit it". Even when alternatives exist, they are either underpowered to the point of uselessness (as sundering and disarming in 3.5) or unavailable to many of those who would want to use them (2nd edition kit features).

Even spellcasters are often given simple flowcharts in terms of options. Cast fireball against cold-resistant enemies, fireball against the rest. Use dominate against the dumb-looking ones, or power word kill against the injured-looking ones. In some ways, spellcasters have the opposite problem - they have so many options that they have access to an instant solution more often than not.

There are exceptions. Niche strategies do come up, and they can feel incredibly satisfying to pull off. The problem is, I have found that they often aren't the result of the actual game system and are instead the product of clever role play and a lenient DM. The game didn't tell my player how to jam his spear into the jaw of an iron golem to disable its poison breath; that was allowed by pure DM fiat as compensation to a fighter who hadn't been able to meaningfully affect the game up to then.

Issue #2: Slow Gameplay

In all fairness, this is a criticism that can be leveled at far more than just D&D. However, most of the systems that struggle from this problem are the systems that take the most after D&D.

In all my years of playing various editions, I've never had a single combat encounter that I would consider fast. It didn't matter if there were no spellcasters. It wasn't about how experienced the players were. The number of combatants is nearly irrelevant. Every fight will involve a rule lookup somewhere. Whether it's splitting hairs over how a spell is supposed to be targeted or the barbarian looking up the grappling rules for the thirty-seventh time, combat in every edition of D&D is prone to frequent and extreme slowdowns.

It's really not surprising. The rulebooks are big and character sheets simply can't hold enough information to be acompetent reference guide. Even if they could, there are simply too many corner cases to have flat rules for everything. Suddenly the dungeon master has to get involved to make a ruling, and before you know it someone at the table brings up some obscure inconsistency of the ruling and it becomes an entire discussion.

That's not always the case. Some groups are going to resolve rules disputes more functionally than others. But when push comes to shove, the amount of indecision and confusion that arises in a typical D&D session is simply not proportional to the very limited set of options that most players use.

Issue #3: Goblin Dice

"Goblin Dice" is a term coined in this article on ponderingsongames.com. In short, it objects to the use of random chance to decide the course of important events. The author of that article makes a story-based objection to the concept, but a perfectly valid argument can be made that goblin dice are poor design from a purely mechanical standpoint.

The problem specifically is that there are too many ways for player characters to get extremely lucky or extremely unlucky, often without any sort of counterplay. Because of how most encounters play out, combat or otherwise, every attack roll made by an enemy or saving throw made by an ally has at least a 5% chance of some kind of crippling setback. The wizard fails his will save and gets dominated, the bard fails his diplomacy roll and angers the king, the fighter flubs his perception check and the party gets robbed in their sleep. Every player has these stories.

It's okay to fail, of course. The fighter getting turned to stone by the big bad because he didn't pack any magic resistance is fine. The character had a clear weakness, and the weakness was exploited by a clever opponent. The fighter with 50 layers of magical protection getting turned to stone because of a natural 1 is not fine. There was no counterplay other than simply not being in the room at the time.

This is far less of a problem when the stakes are supposed to be high, but it can lead to some very unsatisfying player deaths when it comes at the hands of a throwaway monster. An ambush by a random encounter can spell immediate death if the dice are unkind. It should go without saying that that flies in the face of a game about player choice.

The Big Picture

These three points may be seperate flaws, but they all combine into one overarching problem.

The system is bad for dungeon masters.

None of the previous problems are insurmountable. The dungeon master can help players build interesting characters. The dungeon master can be fluent in the rules and make good rule calls in the moment. The dungeon master can design encounters that rely on the strategic skills of the party rather than simple dice checks.

The problem stems from the fact that none of these skills are actually taught by the game, and they don't follow easily from the rules as written.

Every edition has a Dungeon Master's Guide. These tend to range from useful to invaluable, providing extra stats, tips, tricks, and rules that make the job of running a game much easier. What they don't do is prepare the aspiring DM to run a game that actually makes good use of the mechanics of the system.

A good example of this is the random encounter table. Tons of these tables have been made, but how many of the encounters on them are actually good? They teach aspiring Dungeon Masters to rip monsters out of their context and throw them blindly at players to pad out play time. Perhaps the numbers can tell you that a group of X beholders is numerically a good match for your party's power level, but will the fight be fun? The systems give no heed to this question. They do not teach DMs how monsters think or strategize. They do not reccommend ways to challenge players.

For a system that can so easily fall into repetitive and unsatisfying gameplay loops, this is a problem.

There is a lot to love about D&D content, and its rules can be incredibly satisfying. However, like so many monolithic games, it has a lot of content that just isn't. The game leans players towards monotonous "blast the bad guy with your usual weapon" solutions, and it offers little no no wisdom for the aspiring GM to alleviate this problem. The satisfying flanking maneuvers, clever spell interactions, and dynamic problem-solving moments are all locked away on a high shelf, hidden from players and DMs alike.

Fun is fun, of course. There is novelty to rolling big dice, and there is excitement in the simple fights. The problem lies in how much of the strategic depth of D&D's wargaming roots gets buried by DMs who are underequipped to find it in the mess of poorly-flavored mechanics. The way it's written, Dungeons and Dragons is about fighting like a meat grinder. The tragedy is that is can be so much more.