What Mechanics Were Scrapped From The One D&D Playtests in D&D 2024?

I’ve scoured the playtest material for One D&D to see which mechanics never made it out of the playtests.

Ardlings never made it as a species option

Ardlings are a humanoid species with the head and some other features of animals. They originate from upper planes like Ysgard, Bytopia and Elyssium.

Their traits were a lot like Elves or Tieflings. You chose a legacy and that determined the spells you gained at different levels (a cantrip at level 1, a level 1 spell at level 3 and a level 2 spell at level 5). These spells could be cast once per long rest without a spell slot. They also gained radiant resistance and bonus action flight that would just last for your turn.

Later, they lost most of their spells for more animalistic traits with a variety to choose from.

Mechanically, they seemed decent, but ultimately, didn’t make the final cut despite 2 iterations. Jeremy Crawford (lead designer on the D&D 2024 rules) actually explained why in a video on the Playtest results, stating that players felt like the species just came out of nowhere and needed deeper lore and context to be introduced into the game (you can see Crawford’s explanation in the video below).

Instead, WOTC pivoted to including the Aasimar as their celestial species in the Player’s Handbook. But they haven’t ruled out revisiting the Ardling at some future point.

It’s a shame that Ardlings didn’t make it into the Player’s Handbook. It’s interesting that the feedback was a lack of lore and context, which has frequently been cited as an issue with WOTC products over the last several years. Hopefully this means we’ll one day get a lore-rich version of Ardlings.

Background ability score increases became more flexible

Backgrounds became more important for your character build in D&D 2024 as they included some important extras like an origin feat and the ability score increases that had previously been tied to your species. For the ability score increase, you have 3 points to distribute across a choice of 3 different ability scores that are determined by your background.

However, in the original playtest, these ability score increases were much more prescriptive. You were told exactly which 2 ability scores would increase and by how much. For example, an acolyte background would grant +2 wisdom and +1 intelligence. Even in the current iteration of backgrounds, many backgrounds only work well with certain builds, but that was even more the case in the playtests.

It meant that an urchin was only really good for a ranger or druid and many backgrounds forced 2 mental ability scores on your character which is almost never a good combination (I’m looking at you acolyte, artisan, cultist, noble and sage).

Personally, I’m glad they made this much more flexible.

Automatic grapples and shoves

Initially, grapples and shoves would work automatically. You’d make an unarmed strike and as long as the creature was one size larger or less, the grapple or shove would succeed meaning the grappled creature would need to attempt to escape at the end of each turn.

I think the idea was to encourage more grappling and allow tanks to easily maintain an enemy’s focus against themself. The problem is that grappling can be quite potent which is why they introduced a saving throw to these. I think the shove is perhaps less problematic to use without a saving throw though (in fact, the push mastery actually allows exactly this).

Arcane, divine and primal spells

We’re quite used to characters having spell lists primarily derived from their class with every class having a different list. One D&D attempted to reimagine this with 3 different spell lists divided into 3 types of magical sources; arcane, divine and primal. Rangers and druids would take their spells from the primal list, clerics and paladins from the divine and so on.

While I don’t know why WOTC ultimately abandoned this for class spell lists again, I imagine it came down to power levels that can come from some classes having easy access to the spells that certain classes have. For example, a paladin with spirit guardians is an absolutely terrifying unit (more so even than a cleric). A bard with the same kind of spellcasting utility likely makes the wizard feel weak in comparison when it’s basically built around its spellcasting utility.

Part of the power differentiation and capabilities between the classes is their spell list and what they have access to. Removing that completely likely led to imbalances.

Bardic inspiration used a reaction

In the playtests, they toyed with having bardic inspiration granted as a reaction in response to a failed d20 test. It could also be used to heal as a reaction to taking damage.

This was perhaps a little too potent, especially once bardic inspiration is eventually restored on a short or long rest (so you get a lot of uses). It would have also meant that allies dropping to 0HP would be able to immediately get back up with reaction healing. WOTC also said that they removed the healing from bardic inspiration as it led to players hoarding bardic inspiration to revive allies. While a little less potent, the current version is still pretty good.

Bards were serious healers

On top of bardic inspiration being used for healing, bards also had access to a load of healing spells through their songs of restoration feature. Bards have access to a bunch of healing spells through their spell list anyway, but bards would get the likes of healing word, lesser restoration, mass healing word and greater restoration as standard (as they reached the relevant levels).

Classes had recommended spells for each level

Spellcasters can be tricky to build as they have loads of spell options to choose from. In an effort to make them more accessible, the playtest had recommended spells for each level. It probably took up a lot of space so the compromise seems to have been to just recommend spells at level 1.

A ranger’s hunter’s mark didn’t require concentration

Hunter’s mark has caused a fair bit of controversy for rangers as they seem to be built around the spell and this can make it a sacrifice to consider other concentration spells. This wasn’t the case in the playtest where they could cast it without concentration.

This introduced a new issue though (as confirmed in the change notes of the Player’s Handbook Playtest 6). Rangers already perform well for DPR (damage per round) at low levels. Allowing other concentration spells made them even more potent which was likely the issue.

There was a dazed condition

This was a brand new condition that would let you move or take an action but prevented bonus actions and reactions entirely. This perhaps ended up too similar to incapacitated so was dropped.

Channel divinity uses were tied to proficiency bonus

They quickly scrapped this one, realising later that a multiclass character could easily grab lots of channel divinity uses despite only having a couple of levels in cleric. They instead tied it to progression in the class that obtained the channel divinity.

Wild shape was based on 3 different form types rather than actual creatures

You could transform into an animal of the land, sea or air and nothing else. This is a pretty big difference from the current, much broader options your wild shape has with a load of beasts available and limitations based on CR.

There are some better and worse things about this method. It meant that creatures tended to scale a bit better. Attack modifiers and AC scaled alongside your own levelling up, your forms also got multi-attack to make them a proper combat form. However, AC remained low (though generally better) and there was no boost to resilience through the temporary hit points we now get.

The big thing though was it was all very generic whereas the options to wild shape into any beast of the right CR now allows a lot of variety in traits and capabilities.

Paladins and rangers had cantrips as standard

I actually think it’s odd that rangers and paladins don’t automatically have access to the weakest types of spells as standard. Instead you have to take a fighting style like blessed warrior to gain cantrips. I’m not entirely sure why this was deemed a problem, but it was removed at some point during the playtest.

There was a dying condition

This condition didn’t really change much mechanically, but perhaps made it easier to communicate what had happened to a creature when writing rules. I’m not sure why this was dropped as it seems like a logical way to describe dropping to 0HP, but wonder if it’s because of backwards compatibility and keeping certain phrasing the same since this didn’t alter the mechanics at all.

Spare the dying would actually heal a creature

This is mechanically a big shift as now there was a cantrip that could bring you back into action! This could make it hard to keep a party down, especially if a few allies possessed spare the dying. Now it just stabilises the creature.

There was a weapon mastery property called flex

This allowed you to use the higher damage of a versatile weapon while wielding it in one hand. This would have actually given a greater use case for wielding a versatile weapon which are often underused. The main issue is the damage boost, combined with the dueling fighting style and a shield would have meant considerable damage on a sword and shield build which should really have diminished damage levels.

Some new spells never made the cut

There were some new spells created that were intended to give different classes some unique capabilities. Some of these replaced the warlock’s pact boons (and later became eldritch invocations) like pact familiar and pact weapon. I suspect having these as spells made them too accessible as using up a spell known is less of a cost than using up an eldritch invocation known. It also meant taking up precious spell slots which aren’t plentiful on a warlock, unbalancing them until their next short rest (though the early playtest for warlocks did grant more typical spellcasting).

There was also a warlock spell called book of shadows which let you pick a couple of cantrips and 2 level 1 rituals to know. You could then cast cantrips and deal extra damage equal to your spellcasting ability modifier. This also became an eldritch invocation called pact of the tome without the damage boost (this was reserved for agonising blast). However, this was a clunky spell that required setup each day.

Wizards had a spell called modify spell that let you enhance a spell you know until your next long rest. I would do things like change its damage type or remove the need for certain components. They also had memorize spell that let them swap spells known on the fly. The problem is that these types of spells pay a price in spell slots and means stifling gameplay while you perform some setup each day.

Sorcery incarnate allowed you to recover some sorcery points and for a minute, apply 2 metamagic options on each spell cast. It also granted advantage on attack rolls for spells. At the cost of your concentration and a level 5 spell, this was quite a pricey setup, and though it was only a bonus action, still limited levelled spells on your first turn of combat. Some aspects of this were eventually rolled into other sorcerer features like innate sorcery granting advantage on spell attacks.

Fighters could grant any weapon any mastery property

The initial fighter playtest had a feature called weapon expert that allowed it to swap out any weapon mastery option with another for any weapon they were using. This later became part of the tactical master property, but instead allowed fighters to use push, sap or slow instead of the normal weapon mastery. This might have meant you could use cleave with a dagger or topple with a whip.

Warlocks got medium armor proficiency

In an effort to help make bladelocks more durable without having to invest heavily in dexterity, warlocks were given medium armor proficiency. This was perhaps too generous on ability score demands and was scrapped.

Warlocks could choose their spellcasting ability modifier

This was based on the pact boon they choose (each giving a choice of 2 abilities). This meant you could have intelligence, wisdom or charisma warlocks.

Warlocks got standard spellcasting instead of pact magic

This was reversed, but apparently, was a much requested feature in surveys. Pact magic certainly differentiates the warlock as a caster and it seems it lost some of its identity during this change so was reversed. Within this, mystic arcanum became an eldritch invocation so warlocks genuinely became 2/3 casters like artificers, but with potential for a high level spell each long rest.

Smite spells were used for ranged attacks too

There’s a version of the smite spells where they work for all weapon and unarmed attacks, not just melee attacks. Doing so much damage at range probably made it less worthwhile to fight in melee which may be why this was changed.

Summary

The playtests for D&D 2024 were pretty massive. Especially for the revised classes. Many changes went through multiple iterations of playtesting and there will have been much more playtesting occurring in the background at WOTC. Ultimately, I think we got a much improved version of D&D 5e and am largely happy with the changes they made.

I’m also glad to see that many of their initial ideas received player feedback and were scrapped in favour of options that were better balanced or more streamlined.

Have I missed any important, scrapped mechanics? Were there any mechanics you wish had stayed in the final rules? Let me know what you think in the comments below.

Latest Articles