@Parple: The reason the designers are ignoring the 4e way so often is the 4e way probably does not meet what appears to be the primary design criteria of 5e: get back as many D&D players who stopped buying WOTC D&D products because they did not like the very different 4e way of doing things.

While 4e looks to have been very popular with those who liked it, it apparently was not nearly popular enough to make the bean counters at Hasbro happy. Therefore the marching orders for 5e appear to be "do whatever it takes to get as many of former customers back as possible." As a tactical version of D&D, 4e was a successful game. As a commercial product, it apparently was a flop when it came to meeting the sales and profit goals set by the corporate bosses.

i hope the 4E players have fun making characters off-line. it'll show what a blast the game is if you dont have computer programs to make a character just to move your mini around. being constrained to a grid and "powers" that are useless without a grid is just an overly complex board game ("yo, thats SIM-play, bro." not really)

there will definitely be some 4E ghosts in the game rules, but it will also mix itself with other editions ghosts and some new things too.

theyre forgetting that the "modular" aspect proposed should probably cover their garbage grid rules, etc.

where'd phantasmal force go in 4E? oh yeah, it doesnt fit into a battle grid. instead of creating imagination scaffolding – you should only think about how efficient you can be with your 3 actions on a grid while annihilating numbers and their miniature representation. boring.

I would be surprised if there won't be a rule module in 5E/DDN that uses very 4E like rules.

I think Raggi said it best with his "An Open Letter to my 4th Edition D&D Brothers and Sisters". Google it.

Cancer Fund Update: We've hit $1500 point! (Thank you one and all). Drawing for EPT will be Monday evening!

I don't know how many times I've heard 4e fanboys tell the "old timers" that if they want to keep playing older editions, WotC isn't stopping them. After all, they still have all the older editions books.

It would be quite ironic to see those same 4e fanboys suddenly become "old timers". Although, if I get a vote, I don't think I want to share the clubhouse with them.

My own personal feelings about 4e aside, I hope that 5e realizes some of what the 4e players liked about D&D as a modular piece.

If not, they can do what other folks did ala Pathfinder and the OSR movement.

Right now the best advice for anyone, of course, is just wait until we actually have something substantial to base any worries on and this would be the public playtest. For now, ignore everything you see, read or hear about as it's all just guesses, hype or grief.

Patronize WizBro with the the full knowedge that they see the downtime between new edition sales spikes as only a necessary evil or not at all, IMHO. They're not "by gamers, for gamers." They're by marketeers for disposable gamer income. They rely on blatant planned obsolecense just as much as Apple does with its line of i-gizmos.

I don't think they're being thrown under the bus at all. But based in part on the past behavior of WOTC, many seem certain that this is the case. As a result, some seize upon the smallest words and phrases related to the discussion of Next, assume the worst, and go into a rage. I would argue that the 4E player base is the most numerous and most vocal within the outlets where WOTC is primarily seeking feedback, and they've been listening to their feedback overall for nearly 4 years now. There's no reason to assume that those voices, desires, playstyles etc. will be given any less weight than the others WOTC is evaluating. It's too early for anyone to be freaking out to the degree it has been, and I'm surprised that these 4E players choose to ignore the fact that what little word that has come out of playtests — mostly from current 4E players — has been quite enthusiastic.

OTOH, I'll echo what Aaron said. The self-proclaimed "4vengers" were a nasty little bunch throughout forums in 2008 and beyond, and many deserve to get what they gave.

I'm not sure why anyone feels like they are being thrown under the bus. They have their fourth edition books, they can play fourth edition till the cows come home and there really isn't anything WotC can do about that.

Oh maybe its the fact that D&D will come to mean something other than what it has meant for them…

Well as has been the advice to us old timers who weren't fond of being misunderstood when we talked about THE D&D, suck it up. WotC owns the rights to "our" game and can slap that label on whatever they like.