I'm super-excited about Solasta 2, but I'm going to stay away from the early access. I burned out on BG3 playing the first chapter in EA, and when the full game came out it was hard to get back in. Not making the same mistake twice!
Very well actually. Combat is a lot more tense when a few bad rolls can end with dead PCs, everyone plays carefully and tactically to minimize the impact of bad luck. We've had 1 death so far in 6 or so sessions.
That confusion would always have been there, but now that we have an official term for the new rules it's simple for 3rd party producers to explicitly state if their product is compatible with 5.5 or not. Confusion resolved!
Guns are less useful when you need to shoot someone 10 times to kill them, and you only have time to shoot them twice before they run up close to you and start bashing you with a sword in a way that makes it hard for you to shoot them again.
Objectively, those folks were "right" the entire time. 5.5 was never just 5E.
This move by WotC just brings the nomenclature in line with reality. It doesn't really matter if it's called "5.5" or "5e2024" or "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition" (ok, that last one might cause some...
But it's going to be a great occasion to surround existing fans with D&D merch! WotC has been pretty clear that their main challenge with the D&D brand isn't recruiting new fans but monetizing the current fanbase.
Suing the company you own stock in is basically the same as suing yourself... If you're unhappy with how a company you own part of is run your options are to either sell your stock or push to replace the board of directors. Even if you win a lawsuit it's essentially your money that will be used...