Do you know how some 5E players feel about B/X characters compared to 5E characters?
"They are way too simple! I got nothing to work with here!"
This is how I feel about 5E characters compared to A5E characters.
I went through all the characters I built for my A5E game and designed them in Hero Lab for straight 5E, and time after time, all the fun stuff was missing. The 5E characters were flat and uninteresting. Parts of the rules dealing with resting, navigation, survival, environmental hazards, and social encounters were flat-out missing.
The DMG would say, "Make it up yourself!"
I don't have to; the A5E game gives me all this plus more.
Do you know how GURPS players fall in love with the detail level of their characters? Where is every skill, disadvantage, advantage, and other particular facets of the player character mapped out in intricate detail? While A5E does not go as far as to-the-point GURPS, I can say having 9-12 special abilities (a mix of combat, social, and exploration) for my 5E characters makes all the difference in the world between a flat, combat-only, generic race-plus-class-plus-subclass build.
A5E is 5E with a semi-GURPS level of customization, all done through background choices.
In A5E, I can swap out these specials for anything I can imagine when I start to homebrew and custom-hack my characters. Like swapping the cosmopolitan option's "discreetly armed" feature for "expertise die for getting into royal events." Or anything else, wine tasting, area knowledge, criminal gangs, or any other area of knowledge where an expertise dice will make a character shine above everyone else.
One of my characters in A5E is a sailor berserker who gets angry like Popeye and kicks butt with his giant boarding axe. In 5E, generic barbarian. In A5E, this guy can talk him and his friends onto a ship voyage for free (you may have to do a little work), hire a ship crew (or cargo handlers) for half price, know ship captains and ships, talk salty language to intimidate people, and get information from the local sailors by drinking hard and telling fish stories.
Sorry, D&D, you are boring. Your game gives me nothing to work with. Your advice is, "The DM makes it all up!" or, "The player's backstory gives you ideas!" I have played for 40 years, and none of that would have immediately come to mind. It helps to have a little inspiration and guidance.
He also has an AC of 15 without armor because of his toughness and cool tattoos, and he moves at a base speed of 35' per round. He does a d12 + 2 slashing damage a turn.
In A5E, this guy is fantastic.
Parts of him directly work with the game's unique pillars-of-play systems. He can learn fighting styles at level 2 and have unique attacks and defenses linked to a stamina-like resource.
He is like a freaking Danny Trejo Popeye.
His ability to socialize his way into any waterborne adventure gives me ideas for adventures for this group. If I were doing a game based around ocean travel, this is the guy I would want in my party. Even on land, this guy kicks butt. And he only gets better as he levels.
A lot of the complexity is never seen in A5E and melts away; it plays like 5E. When you need it, it is there. The options and extra systems are only in the places where the original game has a void.
I don't need D&D anymore.
I have this.
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