I am playing both Tales of the Valiant and Level Up Advanced 5E. I like both games very much. I know; I had these in my sell boxes, and I still have two boxes of 5E stuff that are just junk and going out the door, so all I have left is the best.
You must eliminate "junk books" from your collection; they will drag down everything.
My journey with 5E has been unique. I started with the first three Wizards books, and then, for various reasons, I decided to skip the rest. However, I have the three-book gift set with Tasha's, although I haven't delved into it yet. That set is getting sold. This sense of freedom to explore other game versions, unencumbered by the weight of 5E, is what drives me. For me, 5E was never about anything beyond the first books and the SRD.
My mind has yet to be poisoned into thinking that parts of the game introduced after the first core books are irreplaceable. They never were a part of my experience with 5E. You get people who have been on D&D Beyond for 5 years, and the game is what is on that site and nothing else.
I love third-party 5E books, but the word "love" is tainted by how awful many of them are in terms of balance. Many of them have great ideas but terribly flawed execution. Love is as far as I will use them, with some being inspirational only and a mess to use in a serious game where balance is essential.
How many people play 5E by the rules and keep an eye on balance? From many discussions I read online, I don't get a strong feeling most care about balance.
So, I am splitting my library in half. One shelf will have mostly Kobold Press books and all my Tales of the Valiant rulebooks. This will be the "core 5E game" going forward. I like this since Hero Lab supports it well. When released, the expansion books will be added, making an excellent "core game," much like my old Pathfinder 1e collection. Core books, expansions, and a world are ready to go. Tales plus Midgard is a powerful combination, and this is the Pathfinder plus Golarion combo that made that game so compelling.
If you want a drop-in, replace D&D, primary system plus world like Pathfinder 1e players had back in the days of 4E, ToV plus Midgard is your thing. The balance is more on 2024-level numbers since the power creep of the last 10 years is factored in and the game rebalanced.
The only weakness is that it is very early, and only the first rulebook is in the system. There are few character options beyond the basics, but we are early, and everyone is learning. I hope the Kobold Press option, magic, and monster books get added soon to the ToV Hero Lab store.
I am helping out by filing bugs and using the character-building app.
The second shelf will be for Level Up Advanced 5E, based around the Lost Lands setting. Level Up is an excellent old-school-inspired version of 5E, and since I need to do the character sheets by hand, any books that do not support the online character creation tools for ToV will go here. Also, if a monster book is more of a CR+0-based (2014 balance) book, it will work better with Level Up than Tales.
Level Up is more of an old-school legacy 2014-balanced 5E support. I wish I could get a decent character designer for this, but it won't happen. It doesn't matter in the end since if this is where I do things by hand, I am free to use any option in any book.
I like Level Up's old-school design sensibilities and support for the pillars of play. We may need to wait until September and the ToV GM's Guide to see more campaign options, and this may change. Level Up also tightens up math and numeric balance.
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