Mar 09

May as well give it the opportunity to be a reasoned discussion with some basis in fact, so I guess here comes the "leaked info."

Two caveats:

1) I am not under NDA.

2) *This info is all from the 1.0 version of the playtest, they're on I believe 1.5 atm, so this may be slightly outdated, but still more concrete than what exists.* Also, I don't have it in front of me now, so it's mostly paraphrasing.

First of all, if you're interested in specific things, feel free to ask. Otherwise I'll just list some things I found interesting.

*Stats!*

As mentioned, they list rolling as the primary method, and I didn't look hard at the point buy stuff (I will later and update) but I did glance at the array.

The array provided in the book is something like 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8. You get a stat bump at level 3 (and assumedly every three beyond that, this packet only had 1-3) of 1 point to 1 stat. Your race gives a +1/-1, and your class gives a +1 to the prime, so by optimizing you could hit a 17 in your primary, assuming race and class synergy.

Most of the stats just have a mod, but certain ones have extra things to them. Int gives extra languages. Charisma brings back Loyalty and Max Henchmen (and when I say brings back I mean from my reading it seemed as if it had been C&P directly from 2e in the wording of Loyalty.)

Wisdom is odd, and the only stat to do this, but it has an extra line in the table that gives you a bonus to your Charisma saves. I didn't notice if it lined up directly with the Wis mod, but as mentioned, it's the only stat that added to another stat's defense. I'm not sure whether to assume they will add something similar for all of the stat pairs going both ways, or if this was just random.

*Races!*

Really standard, +1/-1 to stats, movement in feet. Dwarves have Dwarven Weapon Training (as in, good with hammers and axes, not word for word the 4e feat,) Halflings are auto-proficient in slings and thrown, etc. Halflings are also small, with the normal stuff that entails. Dwarves move 20, halflings 25, everyone else seemed to be 30.

Humans get +1 to all saves instead of a stat bump, and also a... I forget what they called it, some sort of adaptability die, they get 2 per day and can add one or both to any d20 roll to add d6 to the roll.

*Spells!*

Back to spell lists from previous editions, a "spells per level" table (although not modified by your prime stat that I saw.) Knock still exists (fuck off Rogues) and in fact opens basically anything. They go so far as to specify that it opens stuff that's welded shut, chains that are used to hold a portal shut are loosened, etc.

>This is the worst of news, did you notice any charm-type spells?

A clarification before I get too deeply into spells, this is only level 1-3, and so it only includes up to level 2 spells (like old school, you can cast spells of half your level rounded up.)

However, there's a level 1 Charm Person, usable by Bard, Druid, Warlock, and Wizard, which basically turns someone into a trusted friend and companion. Won't do anything outside of normal, or put themselves (or family, etc. blah blah) or property at risk. It does however remember being charmed, so... I guess there's a hook there?

>Those are some solid "roleplaying, not rollplaying" numbers there.

>Please tell me that Invisibility is back (wasn't it L2 in 3x?) and lasts a long time and/or obviates the Sneaking Hidey Guy aspect of rogues.

>Also, material components: Yes or no?

Invisibility Bard, sorcerer, warlock, wizard 2 - Makes invisible. DC 17 concealment and advantage* against all creatures you attack--once, since it goes away if you do anything harmful.

* These are very obviously playtest rules, they use the term advantage a lot, alternating between specifying what type or not. I've seen advantage, combat advantage, skill advantage, etc. And of course multiple use cases, one skill related thing will say skill advantage, one will say advantage, and another will say +2 to this skill. They haven't gone through and normalized yet.

I'll have to check on components, I remember an offhanded remark about Wizards using them but didn't note whether it was an integral part, or just a fluff thing.

One thing I did notice immediately was that they've continued the old tricks of making every class have specific strengths and weaknesses, and then giving Wizards a way to counteract their weaknesses. For instance, Wizards get a few things for being wizards. Detect Magic is one. Javelin of fire is one (range 60, 100 with wand, d6 versus dex, your at-will equivalent.) Ritual caster is one. The last is Mage Armor. You concentrate for a minute, and get +2 to your AC with no max dex bonus, which lasts until your next long rest (so all day.) Scale Armor, for comparison, gives 4 AC with 4 max dex, and gives -5 speed and a -1 armor penalty.

>Spell lists? I wonder what Fighters get :smugface:

Don't have it in front of me, but they get, let's see. d10 for hit dice, d10 for crit dice (crit dice are determined by class, crit confirmation is roughly back in - you do max damage on a 20, and on a confirm you also get your crit dice, but 20s explode so if you rolled repeated 20s you could get multiple crit dice.)

Fighters don't have to confirm on a crit to get a bonus d10, but they can still roll for exploding chance.

They get a... fighting style I think they're called?

Anyway, *Archer* is when you shoot you can shoot again at a -5 (that number will HAVE to be adjusted, with the flattened power curve you're just throwing away an arrow.) *Guardian* (or Defender? I don't remember specifically) is the knight mechanic, things adjacent get -2 if they don't include you, and once per turn if they don't include you and are adjacent you can make an attack. *Slayer* is that you can do an extra d10 to someone after you successfully hit, but you can't do it again until your next long or short rest (NOT AN ENCOUNTER POWER!1~1!). *Two-Weapon Fighting* (these names won't persist to release, they'll have to come up with something catchy for each one) is when you have a one hand and a light weapon in each hand, you get a +1 to AC, and when you hit with your mainhand you can take an attack with your offhand at a -5 (see above, close to auto miss) but if you do then you lose the AC bonus until your next turn.

Oh, and a +1 to break down doors, smash "compartments" (I remember that because the wording was so weird) or destroy objects.

I think they get one or two other things, but I don't remember. Also, there are rules for donning and removing armor, which scale linearly until you hit heavy armor, which is d4+1 minutes to remove. Why is that a random number? Jesus, I don't know.

Also, Dwarves can see 10' in complete darkness. Why 10'? I also don't know, but it strikes me as very funny.

>and your class gives a +1 to the prime

>That's a nice smidge of Death To Ability Scores :fakehopeface:

Oh god, I'm opening a can of worms here, but I'm going to clarify.

It only gives a bonus to your prime if it's your first class.

The first step when you level up is choosing your class.

Multiclassing is just taking a level in another class, I didn't see any restrictions on it. The only penalty seems to be spreading it around.

Also, classes are divided up into rarities, but I didn't see an immediate use of that rule, other than only the 4 "common" classes were in these rules.

>You have to raise a common class character to level 10 before you can unlock the uncommon ones. Or you can unlock them right now for 400 Wizard Points.

>Every PHB will contain a random selection of 7 common classes, 3 uncommons, and 1 rare.

>So wait a second.

>Abilities are still going from the standard 8-18ish range, but race/class are giving +1/-1 bonuses and penalties, right? And they still have the mod presumably based on (10-score/2) math.

>So sometimes your bonus does nothing and sometimes your penalty does nothing. Oh how I've missed you.

Class is +1, Race is +1/-1. In the section describing races it mentions giving bonuses and penalties to "two or more" attributes, but none of the races in the book have more than a +1/-1. They've left the door open (or perhaps directly copied from wording that left the door open - seriously there's a TON of straight C&P from other stuff in here) for broader, or deeper bonuses and whatnot, but none so far.

Edit: But yes, similar range, although there are also score maximums, which are 18+class+race bonus I believe, so 20 is the max. I'm not sure how they mean max, it seemed worded with finality, but I have to assume based on what they've said that magic items will exist that modify that, possibly over the max.

>Did they just cut up a bunch of older Handbooks and then pasted them onto a page ransom-note style or some such?

Not far from the truth. It's all mostly uniformly (albeit poorly) formatted, and it's obviously just a file of their print version, it's got tags everywhere. - i.e. [rule] between blocks of rules, etc.

>To me this is a good sign. It means that they're extremely early in the process and all of this is subject to change. Really it sounds like they threw a bunch of older edition rules together and now they're looking to see what gets tossed off in the wash.

That's the feeling I get too. What worries me is that previous edition stuff was copied whole cloth, and anything that seems 4e was rewritten, where it was included. The amount of divorcing from the previous edition in wording more than function clearly indicates the market they are pursuing - new players don't care if it's worded like it was in the last edition, and I honestly (and I am by extension insinuating/assuming most 4e players) don't either, only grognards really do.

Oh, the other two things Fighters get that I forgot about - passive +2 to damage rolls with weapon attacks (note: not unarmed, get fucked!) and at level 3 I think, Fighter's Surge. Once per day you can take an action at any time.

>I bet you there's still a Helm of Opposite Alignment in it though.

Not sure, but I'm willing to bet cursed items will make a re-appearance, since the whole not knowing what items do/identify spell chicanery is in the game, and I saw a Potion of Delusion (Healing) which when you drink it gives you back d8 hp, but next time you take damage you take an extra d8. So, you could (in extreme cases) either get 7 free HP, or lose an extra 7 HP from it.

Everyone starts with their con score in HP.

There's a 1.5 out there now, which I am informed is updated quite a bit, but with this as the basis I'm not sure what to make of it.

Also, skills currently (as of the time of this playtest, so not currently, but 1.0 currently) are given either by class features (if you're a Thief) and/or by your theme, and training in the skills gives you a +2 to the ability score (for passive "is your ability score higher than this DC" style checks) or a +1 to the modifier (for rolling against a DC your stat wasn't high enough to auto succeed at.)

I'll let someone else do the math for what this means for your various chances to succeed, but if you're rolling for something you should be the one rolling for (i.e. have a reasonable score in), they probably aren't good.

>[I've cut a couple of things like save-or-die chat because that part almost certainly changed from this SA post and 1.0, if the D&D blog is any indication.]

>I'll let someone else do the math for what this means for your various chances to succeed, but if you're rolling for someone you should be the one rolling for, they probably aren't good.

Actually, the autosuccess guidelines for attributes were one of the standout good parts of the rules, I think. It's a really clever way to put the odd-numbered attribute scores to use, and the fact that there's a straightforward five step scale there (six if you count twenty one) means that you can pretty comfortably use a character's ability scores as though they were, for instance, a 1-5 dot attribute in a World of Darkness game.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go compute how many hit dice of servants I can control using Animate Dead.

>Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go compute how many hit dice of servants I can control using Animate Dead.

The answer is an infinite number, because there's an item that makes it so every enemy you kill is raised as a 1 HD zombie under your control that specifically doesn't count against the max HD of undead you can control with Animate Dead.

Here's something I hope/assume they fix before the next playtest: monsters lacking ability scores are back. As written, currently, monsters that lack an ability score aren't susceptible to attacks vs that ability score. So like, a Wraith with -- STR can't be bull rushed, or a golem with -- CON can't be poisoned. Except... the current version of Turn Undead is a vs CHA attack... and skeletons and zombies are -- CHA. wtf m8

Rituals are called out, but Knock is a spell.

Take the defences. Yes, each stat acts as a kinda 3e style 'save defence' vs spell-like attacks. This is a huge mess. Hard to keep track of, impossible to balance- remember kids: using the optional array, one of your defences is going to be a sixteen, and one of them is going to be AN EIGHT. That eight will be used for *SAVE OR DIE EFFECTS*.

If we're fessing up to having seen the 1.0 playtest, it's pretty mind-bogglingly regressive. Some highlights from the materials:

-Part of the class description for the wizard is copied verbatim from the 3.5 PHB class description

-Nine alignment axis is back :cryface:

-Magic items that are mechanically based around alignment are back (Helm of Opposite Alignment, Swords that damage Chaotic creatures)

-At-wills/Dailies/Encounters are gone for martial classes, but are still around for wizards, sort of

-*Twenty* different conditions that can negatively affect a character. 20. What's the difference between Blinded, Dazzled, and Dazed? Between Enervated, Sickened, Frightened, Shaken, and Panicked? Buy 5e and find out

-Different types of weapon damage. Piercing, Bludgeoning, Slashing

-Healing surges are gone, now with a rest you get a certain amount of hp back OR you can be healed by a magic user, of course

So...yeah, it's bad. It's really bad. Unless you really, really liked 3.5! Or you are Monte Cook, I guess. Or wanted your rules to be written in the most obfuscatory language possible. Hopefully they can scrap the whole thing and build on 4e's improvements, but the design team has really strongly shown what they want the next edition to look like, and it looks like 3.5 with a few tweaks here and there.

One of the best parts of the rules is the way all movement is listed in multiples of five feet. So, difficult terrain might require fifteen feet of movement for every five feet you want to cross. That's literally what it says.

Also, presumably in an effort to make the rules sound friendly and casual, Just Like Garyma Used To Make, there are a lot of basic game concepts that the writers deliberately did not reify into official mechanics. For example: there is no "move action". This means that if you, personally, wish to stand still while your summoned celestial dire badger advances on the enemy, you must elect to *move zero feet*.

One of the best parts of the rules is the way all movement is listed in multiples of five feet. So, difficult terrain might require fifteen feet of movement for every five feet you want to cross. That's literally what it says.

Also, presumably in an effort to make the rules sound friendly and casual, Just Like Garyma Used To Make, there are a lot of basic game concepts that the writers deliberately did not reify into official mechanics. For example: there is no "move action". This means that if you, personally, wish to stand still while your summoned celestial dire badger advances on the enemy, you must elect to *move zero feet*.

Yeah as Ferrinus mentions, please note one of the funniest features: often when they have a 4e style concept, they deliberatly hide it behind plain speech language, and delibatly make it non-standard as well.

So as a hypothetical, imagine if minor actions kinda exist? But instead of defining them in a glossary, and using a standard name for it, each instance in the rules is a plain-speech sentence describing a small unit of time which is never quite the same thing.

It's really breathtaking. There are a ton of things in the game that just say "This can be done so quickly that it still allows you time to take an action" or "at the same time as you move during your turn, you.." or a similarly clumsy sentence. Because, presumably, Move Actions are too immersion-breaking and gamey.

Yeah, they replaced the action economy and any case of elegant language from 4e with... whatever the opposite of elegant language is, I guess? Things like the Cleric's "Healing Word" power at level 3, which lets you cast a single curing spell so fast that "you can still take your normal turn." I'm not sure it ever defines what a normal turn is though.

To be clear, this is 1.0, this is almost certainly *pre poll*.

The problem is that the polls have not been asking 'should we make fighters boring shit', or 'should wizards be able to step on everyone's niche'?

The polls are almost certainly shaped by NDA playtest, which is a huge love-fest if the blogs and comments online are anything to go by, and has certainly failed to give a voice to fans of 4e. The poll questions only make this clear. They're just there to get confirmation or be ignored.

There may be fans of 4e who claim they like this, that it offers a place for them but. . I struggle to think that part of 4e they are fans of, or what of 4e they see in it.

>I also like that the people most pessimistic about it seem to be the people who have had access to the rules. Not a coincidence, sadly.

The thing is, we were super down on 5e before we saw this, based on everything we've been discussing.

Then we saw it.

>Once you see it, you can only really be shocked by how the design team has been operating in such bad faith. If you were hoping they would at least acknowledge that 4th edition had some improvements and worked to build on them, it's a punch to the stomach to see that a bunch of honest-to-goodness grognards are running the show.

It is honestly pretty dishonest for them to claim that this is anything but a do-over of 3e.

There is nothing relating to 4e here, apart from a few trappings of mechanics balance which, frankly, are meaingless without a solid, ludic context of the sort 4e has.

When they say 'drawing on 4e', they mean '3e by way of the dodgier bits of essentials'.

Ferrinus is right to say that 5e has bits of 4e stuff in it. But he already said the punchline to that.

It's like 3e, only:

Wizards get at-will powers. No more crossbows!

Fighters still don't get shit.

They adding the bits of 4e /which made things more fun for wizards/, and leaving out the bits /that made the game more fun for everyone./

>-Twenty different conditions that can negatively affect a character. 20. What's the difference between Blinded, Dazzled, and Dazed? Between Enervated, Sickened, Frightened, Shaken, and Panicked? Buy 5e and find out

i'm going to spoil some of this for everyone, as a mean pessimist! here's what they do in current playtest. note that all this is DMG-only! players don't get a glossary or an explanation of status effects.

maybe you're Blinded.. or merely Dazzled?

blinded: you are *hindered*, grant *combat advantage*, cannot gain *combat advantage*, automatically fail checks that rely on sight

dazzled: everyone has *defensive advantage* against and you have -2 to Search and Spot

let's hope it wasn't the Real Blind because that first one is nasty. "hindered", incidentally, reduces your speed to 10' (it's all feet, squares are out)

it's bad to be Sickened...

"The creature takes a -1 penalty to all attack rolls, saving throws, and checks."

even worse to be Enervated, because it stacks..

"The creature takes a -1 penalty to all attack rolls, saving throws, and checks. Until the condition ends, each time the target is hit by an attack that would enervate the target, the penalty worsens by 1"

or you could just be straight up Shaken, which starts out worse than Enervated but doesn't stack:

"The creature takes a -2 penalty to all attack rolls, saving throws, and checks. A shaken creature that would become shaken again becomes frightened."

oh no! what's Frightened?

"The creature takes a -2 penalty to all attack rolls, saving throws, and checks. On its turn, the creature must use its movement to move away from the source of the condition. If prevented from moving, the creature becomes stunned until the start of its next turn. A frightened creature that would become shakened or frightened becomes panicked."

and you wouldn't want to be Panicked:

"The creature drops whatever it is holding. The creature takes a -2 penalty to all attack rolls, saving throws, and checks. On its turn, the creature must use its movement to move away from the source of the condition. If prevented from moving, the creature becomes stunned until the start of its next turn."

does the -2 from Frightened stack with the one from Shaken? or with the -2 from Panicked? or does Panicked just make you drop shit? whooooo knows! the whole thing is incredibly clunky and full of duplication. the chapter goes on for some time about its ~25 redundant, confusingly named conditions, and then makes sure to point out that monsters and spells may impose conditions not on this list. it's not, really, a codification of states - it's a fake, an attempt to take 3e's lack of consistent design and fit a framework around it.

>Don't worry, the wizard will get spells that make it better then the fighter too.

The Class descriptions for both wizard and fighter list a set of abilities.

The Wizards get cantrips/feats: Detect Magic, Javelin of Fire, Mage Armor, Ritual caster.

Fighters get fighting styles: Archer, Guardian, Slayer, Two-Weapon fighting.

The Wizard get all of the abilities listed. The Fighter gets to *pick one*.

That isn'tcounting the spellbook, which I guess is balanced against weapon specialisation? Which isn't even mentioned in the basic fighter packet. Anyway, if you specialize in a weapon, you get an underpowered and often highly conditional quasi-power. They seem mostly based on crits?

You might think that i'm being uncharitable, and somehow the classes balance out in other ways. They don't.

It's 3.x, where wizards get real, cool powers, and fighters get bullshit, fake ones which never actually pan out unless the situation is perfect. The wizard defines the battle, while the fighter is at it's mercy.

At third level, fighters get fighter's surge: once per day, take one action at any time -your action being 'I attack', and remember, charges are nerfed, too! At the same level, twice per day, the wizard can cast anything from a dazing blast attack, to web, to ARC FUCKING LIGHTNING.

That was one of my laughable silver linings- Prior to getting the pdfs, I assumed that they might, as a base module, create a really simple basic game which might please some OSR types, and also be newbie friendly as well.

Nope, it's just 3e. With seven defenses.

If we're talking changes from 3e - and frankly, the playtest version I saw basically WAS 3e-with-changes - then there's at least one big one: the core maths of the system don't scale with level anymore. There's no base attack bonus and no 4e-style +halflevel, no skill points and no +level to skills either. Absent feats and so on, you have the same chance to hit at level 12 as you did at level 2.

That could be a positive thing, if it was done in a good system. As is, it just means that having good stats is REALLY important..

I'm ambivalent on the seven defenses. The 1.0 rules use them as a springboard for improvisation - want to push a goblin? Roll your Str vs his Str. Want to hide from a guy? Roll your Dex against his Wis.

In 4E, your Reflex, Fortitude, and Will are stats you have in addition to your ability score bonuses, but in 5E you just use those ability score bonuses, straight up. Since there don't seem to be any formal, generic skills (but rather things like "Your wizard can roll Int + 2 to know things about magic or magical creatures"), a 5E character arguably has fewer numbers to remember and invoke in play than a 4E or 3E character did.

My main worry is whether making every attempt to do anything besides attack with a weapon (????) require two separate rolls would just make everything take too long to resolve.

Oh, yeah, and also, obviously we're talking about a game where you start with a high 17 (+3) versus a low 8 (-1) - assuming you're using the array - and then you increase that 17 by 1 at every third level, and spells like Bull's Strength and items like the Headband of Intellect are part of the core item list. (At some point we need to get around to talking about the 5E 1.0 item rules because they're hi-laaaaarious). Oh, and if you have a stat of 21 your bonus is +6 and goes up for every single stat point, not every two stat points.

>That could be a positive thing, if it was done in a good system. As is, it just means that having good stats is REALLY important..

No to mention magic swords which are written clearly as a non-balanced domain of DM fiat. A fighter will have to pray for a high str and a magic sword (and gauntlets of ogre power!) to do well on offense- defense will of course, be a crap-shoot either way.

And here again we see the clear relationship between the developer blogs, and the game as written- do you guys remember that line Monte Cook used early on, about how the DM picking items could allow them to "subtly manipulate' the development of a pc?

It's in the magic item section of the playtest, word for word.

If you look at the monsters' attack bonuses, they pretty much scale with about half level.

>So as of 1.0 RAW it's just magic item treadmill as far as the eye can see?

Seems that way; Banana's right that PCs don't get attack bonus or defenses from level. So if monsters do, then either PCs become more incompetent as they level up or magic items are the fix.

You pick whether you want to regain HP or spells twice per day, and then go to bed for six hours.

>Wait, aren't there spells that recover HP? So the fighter gets "take a breather" and the wizard gets "take a breather and reload your fireballs/sleep powder"?

Only if the cleric is compliant. But assuming he is...yyyyyep, you got it!

>The ideal party in 5e is Wizard, Wizard, Wizard, Cleric.

This might not be true, at least not at low levels. A wizard's at-will attack deals 1d6 damage without any bonus, and iirc at level 3 the wizard gets like four first level spells and two second level spells per day. If you're going to fight lots of creatures, you probably are going to want to have a fighter around just because they can consistently deal mid to high attack damage by just telling the DM "I attack." over and over again.

One interesting thing I've seen is that none of the spells scale with "caster level" at all - they sometimes invoke your Int bonus for their DC generation roll, but beyond that the only way to power up a spell is to prepare it in a higher level slot. For example, cast as a first level spell, Shield is an immediate interrupt that increases your AC for the next round. Cast as a second level spell, Shield is an immediate interrupt that increases your AC for the next hour.

There's no way this system is module friendly, either by design, or by basic simplicity.

The skill system kinda is, because skills are just a small bonus on top of your stat- but overall, there's no way they're going to dovetail jack shit with this mess.

Fighters already get kinda-powers, they're just hidden, very minimal, and underpowered by design.

So like, weapon specialisation is in the equipment list, and it gives you a special feat-like or power-like effect on a crit- but the base fighter description makes no mention of weapon specialization at all. And the crit effects are what you'd expect- prone a dude, grab a dude, push a dude 5 feet, ect.

Hey, so, in celebration of this most recent derail I want to share with the thread my absolute single favorite thing from the 5E 1.0 playtest packet. It's in the monster rules.

Monsters are built 4e-style. They're divided into minion/standard/elite/solo and monsters of increasing rank get more hp and damage per round. Their hp, damage, and AC/to-hit/to-hit-with-spell all scale with level.

Of course, the categories are actually called "mob"/"pack"(? i forget)/some other thing/"solitary." Presumably this aids immersion. "Mob" monsters like kobolds DON'T literally have 1hp each, but can easily have like 2hp each, especially at low levels.

So anyway, the rules tell you to pencil in what you think the monster's ability scores might be, then compute its hitpoints and attacks and so on. If it makes multiple attacks, divide its per-round damage by the number of attacks it's supposed to make and otherwise mess with the math so everything lines up with the provided table. (Presumably, this is the point when you go back and fill in the monster's precise ability scores, carefully massaging its Str to line up with the static damage bonus on its melee attack, etcetera).

*Then you backsolve for hit dice.*

That is, you take the average result of a die based on the monster's size (i.e. d12 for really big things), add the monster's Constitution modifier, then divide the monster's role-and-level-determined total HP by this sum in order to figure out how many Hit Dice the monster has. (Yes, this means that as of 1.0 big tough monsters have fewer hit dice than small puny ones) Why, do you ask?

/"All monsters have some number of Hit Dice, a value that determines whether or not certain spells can affect them."/

It does suggest that after you've done the work, you might want to literally roll the hit dice of any given monster to randomize its hp!

>So wait, how are you supposed to figure out the HP before you backsolve for hit dice?

Sorry if I didn't make it clear - you look 'em up on a table, 4E style. A level 5 Solitary Monster should have a certain amount of hitpoints, and this many more more at level 6, and so forth.

>Having a simple MM3-style math system for making monsters seems like such a good idea to me that I can't believe they'd abandon it again.

But, you see, they haven't. They've just glued a bunch of crap on top of it and changed some of the words so that it looks like a simulation of some sort of stupid monster ecosystem and wastes a carefully calculated percentage of extra time on the DM's part. As has been the general trend, they are deliberately making their system opaque to look at and tedious to use in order to appeal to people who like bad games.