Nimble 5e: Second Edition?

I got a Nimble 5e update today:

Ok, so maybe it is Nimble: Second Edition…

I've fought it for as long as I can, but I think you all may be right. While I didn't intend on this "reprint" growing to become a full on Second Edition, enough changes and improvements have accumulated that I think… it does warrant the new title.

I never intended for this to become a Second Edition, but it has, and I want to do right by the community that has supported and encouraged me so much. Thank you all for your patience, your faith in this project, and your continued support. 

This game and company are so generous; we got updates on the upgrades to the remaster (now second edition) game's crowdfunding:

Free Upgrades

That said, this Kickstarter was pitched as a simple reprint and expansion. I set up the pledge tiers with the goal in mind that backers would not need to repurchase their existing books and I want to honor that. Existing backers have already been sent the updated digital files, but I wanted to go a bit further than that. 

For anyone who has backed the Expansion Boxed Set, you will be upgraded to the Complete Boxed Set for free. You'll get everything you originally pledged for, plus print copies of the Second Edition Core Rules, Game Master's Guide, and Core Heroes.

To not leave out anyone who backed the Complete Boxed Set or at the All In tier, I wanted to show my gratitude by giving you an extra copy of each of the Core and Expansion Heroes, so you can more easily have 2 of the same hero at your table without them needing to share as well as an extra copy of the Core Rules book for easier referencing at the table(and to keep their grubby mitts off your Special Edition books!).

Build Your Own Bundlers will get whatever single upgrade that is reasonably closest to what is listed above.

Wow. This is a very generous company with some amazing books. The game is great, too, and I can easily run all my 5E adventures with this "OSE-like" ruleset, which gives me what I need without all the fluff and distractions. Do I need generic magic items, monsters, and spells to fill a few missing parts to make it feel more like a traditional D&D game? Sure, why not? Grab the 5.1 SRD, and you've got it all.

What I love about Nimble 5e is that it is small. One box is not a shelf of books. Where A5E is three shelves and ToV is five, this is one small, OSE-sized box. If you have a printed SRD copy, that is more than enough to run a years-long campaign. The adventures I have for 5E take up a shelf, but the core Nimble 5E books are small, concise, and easy to understand and teach.

The one thing I love about Nimble 5E is that the math is locked into one fixed point in time and balance. Once, a level 5 D&D fighter doing 30 points of damage in a turn was great. These days, that's up to 80 points of damage or more in a turn - and it keeps going up as books are released. Old content now feels weak, and monsters are blown through easily. If you have ever played an MMO and felt the math was way out of control at low levels, this is what Wizards is doing to us with D&D.

It sucks.

Nimble? They did the math, locked it down, and everything scales and is balanced beautifully. Old adventures are still playable and provide challenge. I am not forced to buy the new "balanced for the current game" adventures that continue scaling hit points and turning the game into a high-numbers slog, and invalidating entire series of adventures and bestiaries.

People want to "defend 5E," but I will challenge them to tell me what they are defending. The original and balanced 2014 books? Good choice. The current game with the latest books? Not so fast. The fact that most people can't tell me what they are saying is their ideal game, or even define it, is a problem.

Nobody on D&D YouTube covers this outside a few optimizer channels.

The community is silent on the game's math and the MMO-like power increases we have seen. It is almost like they are afraid to cover this, since the only way out is to change games or stop using the new books that are many channels' bread-and-butter view sources. The Algorithm strikes again, and it is killing D&D's math and balance.

Where are you, people?

The math in modern D&D is out of control and scaling up to an insane degree. This will end with pleading for sanity and calls for a 6th Edition. The only way to fix it will be a reset, and that is by design. Wizards did this to both 3E and 4E, and TSR did it with 2E. The games were so broken and overpowered by the end of those editions that they became unplayable unless you limited books to the originals.

Nimble 5E?

The math is fixed in one place and won't change. Sanity is here, and it is in a few tiny books. This will be the last version of 5E I keep in my library, and I'll happily play Nimble 1E until my 2E books get here next year.