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Littlefinger posted:
I really want them to look at the Malazan series for fighter balance. Wizards in it are probably more dangerous on the whole than DnD Wizards but the Heroic Fighter types will do things like walk through fire wall type spell that lasts for miles, come out the other side naked and weaponless because their clothes burned off and their swords melted and just beat the wizard to death with their bare hands. Or insta kill the Werewolf King with a suplex after killing his gods. Or they'll counteract a spell imprisoning a godlike being by just throwing themselves into the middle of it and short circuiting the magical energies with their body. Wizards are beings capable of wielding godlike power but at the end of the day they're mortals and can be killed by a random crossbow shot. Heroic Warriors are stabbed through the heart with poisoned daggers and slow down a bit.
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Aug 16, 2014 17:05
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So does this game actually have anything that 3e/Pathfinder/etc. etc. don't have? Apart from Unintended Skeleton Fiesta, I mean.
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Aug 16, 2014 17:12
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Really Pants posted:So does this game actually have anything that 3e/Pathfinder/etc. etc. don't have? Apart from Unintended Skeleton Fiesta, I mean. It's easier to play.
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Aug 16, 2014 17:15
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Played 5e for the first time last night, along with my DM and a bunch of neighborhood kids. The consensus was "it's fun, but a little bland". From what I gather, we're back to Wizards being able to ruin poo poo with unfairly powerful spells again, and if I ever run it I'm going to have to hack the monster creation rules to death. Joy.
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Aug 16, 2014 17:16
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The thing is that most of what you just described is the stuff well-built warriors in basically any edition of D&D are already good at. They can take a shitload of damage and deal a respectable to extreme amount of it. The problem is that mages and priests can also survive a lot and deal a lot of damage, and can also teleport, fly, bring the dead back to life, summon a horde of skeletons to do their work for them, become invisible, walk through walls, breathe underwater... you get the gist. It's not an easy problem to fix unless you design a game where everyone has magic (because you give it to every class or obliterate classes), you allow the warrior to intimidate rivers into moving or run so fast they seem to teleport, or you hamstring mages and do what games like Shadowrun do and say "you know what? nobody can teleport or resurrect the dead". Baku fucked around with this message at 17:21 on Aug 16, 2014 |
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Aug 16, 2014 17:17
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Really Pants posted:So does this game actually have anything that 3e/Pathfinder/etc. etc. don't have? Apart from Unintended Skeleton Fiesta, I mean. Advantage/disadvantage may not be mathematically ideal or whatever but it's way simpler than a million fiddly +2 and +4 modifiers and feels great, it doesn't have a million broken/overpowered/useless/dysfunctional splatbook classes and feats yet, Fighters get abilities other than "Bonus Feat", and things like ability score caps help keep the game from breaking down into crazy edge cases. Once basic and obvious errata rolls out, it'll be a far less of an absurd mess than 3E/PF, but if that's what you like about 3E/PF and you go to 4E for your balanced tactical fantasy combat I'm not sure it has anything for you.
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Aug 16, 2014 17:20
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Zombies' Downfall posted:The thing is that most of what you just described is the stuff well-built warriors in basically any edition of D&D are already good at. They can take a shitload of damage and deal a respectable to extreme amount of it. Nope. A core conceit of D&D is that everyone is armed with nerf bats. In 1e it takes a sixth level fighter a minimum of a minute to deal with a first level wizard in melee. That's not respectable to extreme. At seventh level it takes them two minutes to deal with three first level wizards.
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Aug 16, 2014 17:24
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Zombies' Downfall posted:The thing is that most of what you just described is the stuff well-built warriors in basically any edition of D&D are already good at. They can take a shitload of damage and deal a respectable to extreme amount of it. The problem is that mages and priests can also survive a lot and deal a lot of damage, and can also teleport, fly, bring the dead back to life, summon a horde of skeletons to do their work for them, become invisible, walk through walls, breathe underwater... you get the gist. Not really. DnD makes fighters normal people that are talented and have magical arms and armor that carry them through, while Wizards are Magic. In this setting Badasses can do Badass things and most Wizards just steal a little badass from somebody else while fighters are mainlining it.
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Aug 16, 2014 17:27
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NovemberMike posted:I really want them to look at the Malazan series for fighter balance. Wizards in it are probably more dangerous on the whole than DnD Wizards but the Heroic Fighter types will do things like walk through fire wall type spell that lasts for miles, come out the other side naked and weaponless because their clothes burned off and their swords melted and just beat the wizard to death with their bare hands. Or insta kill the Werewolf King with a suplex after killing his gods. Or they'll counteract a spell imprisoning a godlike being by just throwing themselves into the middle of it and short circuiting the magical energies with their body. Wizards are beings capable of wielding godlike power but at the end of the day they're mortals and can be killed by a random crossbow shot. Heroic Warriors are stabbed through the heart with poisoned daggers and slow down a bit. Well ideally, Erikson will do something with the setting as he and Esselmont did make it as a "Setting". I really want to play in that world, aside from the sadtimes both "heroic" wizards and fighters could do some awesome poo poo.
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Aug 16, 2014 17:48
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Jack the Lad posted:Actually, turns out Bards can't inspire themselves - only their allies. Also I was looking at the old fighter DPR charts, and they seemed low to me after I thought about checking to see how other classes would do at soloing the Adult Blue Dragon at level 13. It seems they don't take Sharpshooter or Great Weapon Master into account, even though at least sharpshooter is definitely a DPR increase, because of archery style. Napkin math'd 12.6 damage per attack, 50.4 DPR on a level 20 EK with four attacks at +6 proficiency, 20 dex, archery style, a longbow, sharpshooter, and +2 magic weapon against 20 AC. That's at 600 ft range, too. At level 11 with everything else and +1 magic weapon it's 8.9 DPA, 26.7 DPR. On a phantom steed they could kite out then chase down the dragon without it ever getting close enough to do anything, terrain permitting. On a flying mount the dragon is hosed unless it can get home or burrow. Also the "max skeletons controlled" column is incorrect at level 5. Since you only have one level 3 spell slot and can't yet regain it with Arcane Recovery, you max out at 4 skeletons, which would all turn on you before you can assert control in 16-24 hours because you used the long rest trick and will miss the next deadline by the minute needed to cast the spell. Even if you used your second day's 3rd level slot to reassert control over 2 skeletons, you'd only delay missing the deadline to the 3rd day. If the DM was really evil, the skeletons would stand there and let you fizzle your only 3rd level slot before they started to eat you. I feel like I just saved all the level 5 necromancers who'd have followed your guide. Do the rest of the columns take this into account or are you actually a mole trying to get young necromancers killed?
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Aug 16, 2014 17:48
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NovemberMike posted:Not really. DnD makes fighters normal people that are talented and have magical arms and armor that carry them through, while Wizards are Magic. In this setting Badasses can do Badass things and most Wizards just steal a little badass from somebody else while fighters are mainlining it. Have you ever had a Barbarian in your party in a 3E or Pathfinder game? They're hilariously badass (at not dying and killing guys, until someone casts Hold Person on them)
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Aug 16, 2014 17:52
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Jack the Lad posted:WotC have pulled even the Google cache of the old content on their site now, and have in fact disabled caching entirely: They just shoved everything into the archive section because they're overhauling the site. Just stick "archive." in front of the "wizards.com" part of whatever previous address you wanted and you'll go right to it. "Fighter Design Goals" is right here and the rest of the Legends & Lore are right here. Other things: 4e article archive, 3.5e article archive, 3e art & map archive.
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Aug 16, 2014 18:07
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Jack the Lad posted:Starting at level 17, a Bard/Warlock/Wizard can use True Polymorph to permanently turn into (for instance) a CR17 Adult Red Dragon, retaining all their own mental stats, class features and spellcasting. illrepute posted:"Well, look, it's not all bad as a fighter. Later on, your party members can polymorph you until something useful that they can also polymorph themselves into, while keeping all the poo poo that made them better than you in the first place." I just read the spell. They don't keep that stuff. Their statistics are replaced completely. MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Aug 16, 2014 |
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Aug 16, 2014 20:07
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MonsterEnvy posted:I just read the spell. They don't keep that stuff. Their statistics are replaced completely.
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Aug 16, 2014 20:11
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No ranged attacks.
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Aug 16, 2014 20:21
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slydingdoor posted:No ranged attacks. No they should get the fire breath. Still the Fighter will lose all of their class features. But yeah they can still turn into an awesome Dragon. If they don't want to permanently they can flick the wizard.
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Aug 16, 2014 20:30
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slydingdoor posted:No ranged attacks. I see one that's 120', one that's 60' AoE and flight @ 80'. MonsterEnvy posted:No they should get the fire breath. Still the Fighter will lose all of their class features.
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Aug 16, 2014 20:31
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dwarf74 posted:I see one that's 120', one that's 60' AoE and flight @ 80'. Because their statistics are replaced with the Dragons.
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Aug 16, 2014 20:33
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MonsterEnvy posted:Because their statistics are replaced with the Dragons.
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Aug 16, 2014 20:35
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Woah wait, it apparently does do mental ability scores too now. Pretty cool for a Bard, since an Adult Red Dragon has 21 Cha, but kinda eh for a Wizard, since they only have 16 Int. Great for a Fighter, though!
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Aug 16, 2014 20:49
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So if game statistics are only the HP, AC, etc. of the dragon, not abilities, you must not get the breath and wing attack and legendary actions and such, right? I don't think that ruling's correct. I think class abilities are lost because Wildshape and Shapechange specify that class abilities are retained if the form can use them, and Polymorphs do not. You probably just "trade sheets" with the latter, which is still great because of the huge HP buff. The question was how it was a downgrade, the best answer to which was losing 600ft range longbow shots. It's also harder to get the dragon's damage past nonmagical weapon resistance because of its multiple weapons I suppose.
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Aug 16, 2014 20:53
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Yeah given that Shapechange has the class abilities clause I'm guessing you do just swap sheets. I think I had Shapechange in mind when I posted about True Polymorph. What's the world coming to when Fighters are better at something (being turned into dragons) than Wizards!? (Even if it is because they give up less). e: That said, it's still good as prep. If you can blow your 9th in advance and start the combat as a dragon, that's 256 extra HP's worth of dragon attacks and stuff. If/when you take that damage, you get knocked into your normal form and can start casting. Just like a WoW boss or something. e: Also, weirdly, Shapechange specifies that it doesn't give you any legendary actions or lair actions of the new form, which presumably confirms that True Polymorph does. Jack the Lad fucked around with this message at 21:03 on Aug 16, 2014 |
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Aug 16, 2014 20:55
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Is there stuff in the PHB about familiars? Can't see anything about them in the
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Aug 16, 2014 20:57
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mirthdefect posted:Is there stuff in the PHB about familiars? Can't see anything about them in the Find Familiar has details - page 240.
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Aug 16, 2014 20:58
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On that note, does the polymorph thing work with familiars?
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Aug 16, 2014 20:59
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ProfessorCirno posted:On that note, does the polymorph thing work with familiars? Nope. Familiars are the dumb CR0 animals in the Basic DM MM thing like bats and sea horses.
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Aug 16, 2014 21:00
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On the other hand you could have a Wildshaped druid whose Shapechanged themselves get both Polymorphed and True Polymorphed by party members to have a Five form raidboss.
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Aug 16, 2014 21:10
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Waits so what happens if you polymorphed into a red dragon then get enough exp to level up? Is the game even built to handle a permanently morphed party member long term?
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Aug 16, 2014 22:08
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I would imagine you level up as whatever you were before the polymorph, then nothing happens until you get back to your old form by going to 0 hp or getting dispelled.
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Aug 16, 2014 22:12
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What's the game's expectation for the level of new characters joining an in-progress game? Does it tell you to make them at the party's level or do they start from 1? Because if you need to catch up, hell yeah do it as a dragon.
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Aug 16, 2014 22:16
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PublicOpinion posted:What's the game's expectation for the level of new characters joining an in-progress game? Does it tell you to make them at the party's level or do they start from 1? Because if you need to catch up, hell yeah do it as a dragon. I believe they leave that up to the groups. (Though I think adventures league is one level lower.)
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Aug 16, 2014 22:38
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In AV if you die, the group declines or can't afford to rez you, and you don't have cash either, you get to start at 1. There's also a faction rez available to 1-4 characters only.
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Aug 16, 2014 22:44
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There are "tiers of play" 1-4, 5-10, 11-16, and 17-20 that determine which modules you can play in. There's an option to spend downtime days (which cost lifestyle gp and otherwise could be spent to learn new tools/languages, recuperate from stuff, or gain faction benefits) to jump from 4 to 5 and 10 to 11 if you want to play with friends that advanced faster than you did. So you wouldn't ever run into a guy who could TP you into a dragon til you're top tier anyway. Also you're pretty hosed if you die at low levels with no money, but there's always this: quote:Faction Charity. If the character is of level 1 to 4 and
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Aug 16, 2014 22:49
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Oh yes ritorix can you tell me the CR of the Ultroloth, Balor and Pitfiend. I want to know were the highest tier of fiends outside of the named ones lie.
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Aug 17, 2014 00:23
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PublicOpinion posted:What's the game's expectation for the level of new characters joining an in-progress game? Does it tell you to make them at the party's level or do they start from 1? Because if you need to catch up, hell yeah do it as a dragon. DM's choice. (replace any answer to any 5e question with this)
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Aug 17, 2014 00:37
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I just tried to run the Starter Set for some friends a few days ago. They both had fun, but they just complained (when asked, not out of the blue) that the rules weren't like Pathfinder or GURPS. I was really excited for 5th ed, but it's really hard to play it by yourself, I would imagine. They had fun, and I did as well, but I think they just like playing Microsoft Excel (min-maxing). I personally prefer the new rules. Anyway, do you think there's any way to convert people who like min-maxing to this game, or do I just need to find other methods of playing, like with internet randoms or finding RPG groups nearby?
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Aug 17, 2014 03:44
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D&D 4E is the best game for Min-maxers. But some min-maxers are really just power trippers, and like to lord over other players (and even the DM). In the latter case, just show them Jack's graphs re: skeletons and I'm sure that'll get them excited. But seriously, I'm sure your friends aren't like that. You need to figure out what it is they're really after. There's plenty of opportunity for min-max in 5E, compared to most RPGs. Are they just wanting what's familiar?
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Aug 17, 2014 03:57
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Perhaps. I'm not going to push them to try it again, because although they had fun, I got the feeling they just weren't that into it. I think they just prefer World of Darkness for their casual stuff and GURPS for their complex gaming. Something like that. A mould I never fit into, but went along with. At least I can assume new D&D games will be based on the new rules, so I can enjoy them that way.
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Aug 17, 2014 04:01
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eth0.n posted:D&D 4E is the best game for Min-maxers.
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Aug 17, 2014 04:10
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ghostofbox posted:I was really excited for 5th ed, but it's really hard to play it by yourself, I would imagine. It's kind of an open secret that this is how 5e is actually meant to be played. You read the rules, think about how they'd work out, and then talk to other people who have done the same. It's the D&D from your childhood, before you met anyone who played D&D. The game doesn't stand up so well to actual play, but they were never meant to. Buy the books, enjoy the art, reminisce about Flumphs and dragons (and imagine skeletons fighting them!), and - most importantly - just use it as the cultural touchstone it's intended to be.
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Aug 17, 2014 04:13
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