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Father Wendigo posted:Did the Alpha DMG have any indications for how to run a campaign without Magic Items? I'm genuinely curious as to how they're going to tackle that. Dug up my summary. LongDarkNight posted:secret DMG is from 07/30, this turd is so fresh the flies haven't showed up yet. no magic items sadly. bonus content 
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Aug 25, 2014 20:56
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Nucular Carmul posted:All in all combat goes relatively quickly, the advantage system is a great replacement for fiddly math when someone is flanking or attacking in a certain way or defending themselves while hopping on one foot. Just a quick one - you're giving advantage for flanking? That's pretty huge and will drastically increase PCs' damage output.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:11
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LongDarkNight posted:bonus content How do monsters as characters work?
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Aug 25, 2014 21:11
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Who are these mythical people who like facing rules and why?
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Aug 25, 2014 21:14
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Some stupid tech I thought up using the existing rules. First I looked at Reverse Gravity and thought how well it'd combo with Wall of Force for a 50ft radius Dex save or 10d6 ceiling smash then 10d6 fall. Because I like to think about how teamwork can make everything better, I thought "how can we remove the chance to grab a fixed object and negate the spell?" Well, someone else would have to knock the enemy airborne first. But if they could do that, though, they could probably set up mini falling damage combos at lower levels too. At the very least, if you are 6'8" and just grapple and lift an enemy and drop them 10 ft it should do 1d6 damage and prone them. Not a bad usage of Tavern Brawler's bonus action. Then I remembered Moon Druids in animal form get a lot of free grapple abilities, and some get free high jumps. Grapple a guy that you can carry (weight less than 15*your strength score, doubled if you're large), maybe lift them above your head, then high jump if they can get the total to 10 ft (frogs and toads can do this for free), otherwise climb a wall or fly and drop the enemies. If the DM says you take fall damage too, shake your head and cast Enhance Ability (Cat's Grace) before attempting the atoadmic suplex. Then I thought, what about all those "push an enemy in a line away from you" type abilities? Perhaps they could combo with getting under an enemy. 6'8" Open Hand Monk. Run up to an enemy and grapple them. Lift them 10ft over your head (30*Strength score wt limit, you can reach 1.5*your height), then pop your second Attack and Flurry of Blows to force them to make a strength save or be pushed 15 ft upward twice. They fall 40 ft, and if that damages them they're prone. If the DM rules you need to chase them into the air to attack with the second Flurry it gets a little harder, even if you immediately expend your running start to high jump it works out so 3+strength mod is your clearance, +1.5*your height is your reach, and you need to hit 25ft. At level 9 you can run up a vertical surface--maybe plant your pole weapon, or get an ally to give you a shield springboard assist. If all else fails, ask your DM about making athletics checks to eke out extra jump distance, it's on page 182. Halflings can get under most enemies without grappling, because they uniquely can move through enemy spaces even if the enemy is only one size larger than they are, ie medium. Run under such an enemy and shoryuken them 30 ft in the air. Chasing with a jump will require shenanigans because of being 3' tall. Other classes can get in on the action too. A warlock with repelling blast could juggle the enemy with a readied action or be a halfling and eat disadvantage on the ranged attack rolls while still within reach. A battlemaster fighter with pushing attack and Crossbow Expert pushes 15 ft and gets around the disadvantage, but it only works on up to Large creatures and they have to fail strength saves. Paladin with Thunderous Smite get a little 10 ft uppercut. Storm Clerics get to push Larges or smaller whenever they do thunder or lightning damage, so they get a 20ft thunderwave push. Gust of Wind could assist against a lifted enemy but pushes on the enemy's turn, but it'd be pretty funny on a Moon form druid in crab or scorpion form if they can grab two enemies and hold them both 5 or 15 ft overhead. Another random combo is the Horde Breaker Ranger alley-oop. The former gets an extra attack every round but have to take it on a creature within 5ft of the primary target. But what if it's a solo battle or there isn't one? What a waste of a feature, right? Nah, just shoot the monk, who can deflect it into the enemy. Sure, the roll's at disadvantage unless the enemy's unaware or incapacitated, but it's better than nothing even if the monk missed their stunning strike to inflict the latter.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:15
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Jack the Lad posted:Just a quick one - you're giving advantage for flanking? That's pretty huge and will drastically increase PCs' damage output. Yeah, as far as I know there are no flanking rules at all.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:17
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Gort posted:Yeah, as far as I know there are no flanking rules at all. Yeah. The rogue's sneak attack even just specifies than in addition to attacks with advantage against the target, the rogue can sneak attack any target which is within 5 feet of an enemy of the target. That is the closest thing to a flanking mechanic found in the PHB.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:51
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slydingdoor posted:6'8" Open Hand Monk. Run up to an enemy and grapple them. Lift them 10ft over your head (30*Strength score wt limit, you can reach 1.5*your height), then pop your second Attack and Flurry of Blows to force them to make a strength save or be pushed 15 ft upward twice. They fall 40 ft, and if that damages them they're prone. If the DM rules you need to chase them into the air to attack with the second Flurry it gets a little harder, even if you immediately expend your running start to high jump it works out so 3+strength mod is your clearance, +1.5*your height is your reach, and you need to hit 25ft. At level 9 you can run up a vertical surface--maybe plant your pole weapon, or get an ally to give you a shield springboard assist. If all else fails, ask your DM about making athletics checks to eke out extra jump distance, it's on page 182. So monks can literally do fighting game combos with uppercuts and air juggling? This is the best D&D.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:12
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Are Warlocks just jank? Because they look like really wonky spellcasters that don't get enough tricks to compensate for the crippling lack of spell slots.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:34
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Froghammer posted:Are Warlocks just jank? Because they look like really wonky spellcasters that don't get enough tricks to compensate for the crippling lack of spell slots. They refresh on short rests and get some invocations at-will but basically yeah compared to a Wizard they suck. Boing posted:So monks can literally do fighting game combos with uppercuts and air juggling? This is the best D&D. Things like grappling someone then lifting them up and dropping them from a height determined by your high jump reach aren't supported in the rules. Also grappling with Tavern Brawler is a bonus action and so is Flurry of Blows, so the grapple route is probably a no-go unless you use Attack to grapple then bonus to flurry. The Halfling one seems like it could work if you can enter someone's square and push upwards from within it, though. Then again, 5e is about 'rulings not rules' and it's undeniably cool (though it does lead to a pretty weird situation where literally everyone in the party is going to want to do it because of the damage it adds). Good work, slydingdoor. e: Also 600 lbs at 20 Str (which you probably won't have as a Monk) as the max you can lift sucks and Bull's Strength is the only way to improve it that I can see. e: Also you can take Martial Adept to stack Pushing Attack on top of Open Hand Flurry of Blows and hit them potentially 60 feet up into the air with the two attacks. e: Also it works as a non-halfling if diagonals are still 5 feet as in 4e; you just whack them in an arc upwards and away, though weirdly I think they then fall straight down. Not that there are really rules for this either, really. I guess you could treat it as a parabola.  e: It may be that none of this works if they adopt the 4e model where forced movement has to be two-dimensional. Jack the Lad fucked around with this message at 00:06 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 25, 2014 22:37
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Jack the Lad posted:They refresh on short rests and get some invocations at-will but basically yeah compared to a Wizard they suck. D&D NEXT: yeah compared to a Wizard they suck.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:41
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Jack the Lad posted:They refresh on short rests Now they seem much better.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:45
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Froghammer posted:Are Warlocks just jank? Because they look like really wonky spellcasters that don't get enough tricks to compensate for the crippling lack of spell slots. The 5e warlock mimics the 3.5e version quite closely. Their primary playstyle is spamming the eldritch blast cantrip, augmented by invocations, at anything in range and toying around with the at-will abilities available from invocations as well. The spellcasting is just an add-on to that giving them some additional utility. They can kind of be considered a "spellcaster"-flavored martial class, in that there's not a huge amount of variety or complexity in what they do.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:47
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Slimnoid posted:D&D NEXT: yeah compared to a Wizard they suck. Is this an accurate summary of the game for someone who hasn't comprehensively read the PHB? I'm not looking to edition-war; just give it to me straight.
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Aug 25, 2014 23:48
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Kazanir posted:Is this an accurate summary of the game for someone who hasn't comprehensively read the PHB? I'm not looking to edition-war; just give it to me straight. Spellcasters - especially Wizards and Clerics, with their capacity to know dozens of spells - wield much greater narrative power than non-casters can do without significant investment. The biggest issue to me is that non-casters aren't very versatile and often have low levels of fiat except in very narrow ranges. There's no non-caster anywhere near as versatile as any 4e character.
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Aug 25, 2014 23:53
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Kazanir posted:Is this an accurate summary of the game for someone who hasn't comprehensively read the PHB? I'm not looking to edition-war; just give it to me straight. Attorney at Funk posted:- do you currently play and enjoy d&d 3.5 or pathfinder but wish it ran smoother or was less egregiously broken.
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Aug 25, 2014 23:57
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Okay thanks! I do kind of fall into the third category of goons from Funk's post so RIP me I guess. But I wanted to know. 
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Aug 26, 2014 00:00
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Sage Genesis posted:It feels weird to defend 5e, but... Srsly, go ask Mike Mearls about that ruling, I will give you an each way bet he sides with DM Call.
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Aug 26, 2014 00:09
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A Catastrophe posted:Nope, I think you'll find that finally the DM has the power they should and the powergamers have been defeated and it's up to your DM. intentionally misreading one of the few rather clearly written 5e rules isn't helping
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Aug 26, 2014 00:17
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Zombies' Downfall posted:Have you considered the Dungeon Master's Guide, by nobody important? Nonono, they need the delayed releases to improve QA on the subsequent books, like so that the MM can contain adjustments that were noticed between the release of the Player's... what's that? They were selling finished copies of the Monster Manual at Gencon? Oh, well, gently caress that idea, then. On another note we're starting our 5e campaign soon. I'm building it around the things that 5e is good at, so there's no world-threatening conspiracy that the PCs are remotely relevant to, no important plot to hose over, and pushing for, basically, speed and insanity, shoot-the-bad-guy-during-his-monologue sort of stuff. It'll probably burn out super fast, but I'm okay with that, since I also want to do something more in the vein of space-opera, which means convincing everyone that it's worth their time to learn Alternity.
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Aug 26, 2014 00:19
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slydingdoor posted:high jump if they can get the total to 10 ft (frogs and toads can do this for free) I have a mental image of frogs that jump to 10', then die on hitting the ground again. Like, a whole room of them. The party stumbles in, surprising them. A hundred of those fuckers all jumping 10' in the air and landing with a splat. Which explains why evolution has favoured the frog that can't jump 10' high in real life. 
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Aug 26, 2014 00:49
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Jack the Lad posted:How do monsters as characters work?   I am Jack's complete lack of advice. Sorry Jack, you complete me. I think I found a cure, thank your Mr. Mearls. 
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Aug 26, 2014 01:45
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Regular gnolls have five hit dice? Jeez louize, hyenakin are movin' up in the world. I guess that's about what the low level gnolls in 4E were.
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Aug 26, 2014 01:49
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So you might say... It's up to the DM?
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Aug 26, 2014 01:50
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I actually prefer "whatever let the DM figure it out, here's some guidelines" to the 3E approach of "here's a system of racial hit dice and poo poo that doesn't work for poo poo and produces only overpowered and worthless PCs" and 4E's "going through every humanoid and giving them two random stats and an arbitrary racial bonus that again tends to result in them being underpowered or bugbears". I'd rather see them not even try than half-rear end it in a core book and canonize some busted, stupid poo poo that every player will then assume is canonical and should be allowed without amendment, which is what both 3E and 4E did with monster PCs in the core. It's a weird topic to address because you know there's a 0% chance they won't release a race book with minotaurs and undead and poo poo in it at some point just like every other edition. EDIT: Or was it hobgoblins? Whichever one of them got monkey grip as a racial feature Baku fucked around with this message at 01:57 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 01:54
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Zombies' Downfall posted:I actually prefer "whatever let the DM figure it out, here's some guidelines" to the 3E approach of "here's a system of racial hit dice and poo poo that doesn't work for poo poo and produces only overpowered and worthless PCs" and 4E's "going through every humanoid and giving them two random stats and an arbitrary racial bonus that again tends to result in them being underpowered or bugbears". Oh I totally agree. I feel like the DM's influence on rules should be almost directly proportional to how arbitrary or atypical the question is. Creating a race or turning a monster into a race is something that will be a case-by-case basis and that's fine. (Until they release a races guide and advanced players get all kinds of sanctioned brokenness.) Couldn't resist a tired, boring, overplayed, cheeky jab at the system, though. :P
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Aug 26, 2014 01:58
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dichloroisocyanuric posted:Couldn't resist a tired, boring, overplayed, cheeky jab at the system, though. :P Understandable! It probably says something that the thing I added to my post was "I prefer they not even try", which shows how much esteem I have for large chunks of 3E and parts of 4E. Why do we play D&D again
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Aug 26, 2014 01:59
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LongDarkNight posted:
Well...at least it's not Level Adjustment. 
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Aug 26, 2014 02:06
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Zombies' Downfall posted:I actually prefer "whatever let the DM figure it out, here's some guidelines" to the 3E approach of "here's a system of racial hit dice and poo poo that doesn't work for poo poo and produces only overpowered and worthless PCs" and 4E's "going through every humanoid and giving them two random stats and an arbitrary racial bonus that again tends to result in them being underpowered or bugbears". I'd rather see them not even try than half-rear end it in a core book and canonize some busted, stupid poo poo that every player will then assume is canonical and should be allowed without amendment, which is what both 3E and 4E did with monster PCs in the core.
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Aug 26, 2014 02:22
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I was thinking about switching from using 1d20 to using 3d6, to create a bell curve. What should advantage and disadvantage look like in this scenario? Presumably 4d6(take the highest 3) would be too minor a benefit, but would 6d6(take the highest 3) be too great a benefit?
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Aug 26, 2014 02:53
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Sanglorian posted:I was thinking about switching from using 1d20 to using 3d6, to create a bell curve. What should advantage and disadvantage look like in this scenario? Presumably 4d6(take the highest 3) would be too minor a benefit, but would 6d6(take the highest 3) be too great a benefit? I'm not sure exactly how bad removing 4 possible outcomes from the d20 die roll will affect the math, but you could always do advantage = 4d6, disadvantage = reroll the highest and take the lower result.
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Aug 26, 2014 02:58
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Can someone correct me on this? I had a fellow tell me that if a Paladin took Great Weapon Fighting as their Fighting Style then they can reroll Smite damage dice, because Great Weapon Fighting does not specify weapon just damage.
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Aug 26, 2014 03:21
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Strength of Many posted:Can someone correct me on this? I had a fellow tell me that if a Paladin took Great Weapon Fighting as their Fighting Style then they can reroll Smite damage dice, because Great Weapon Fighting does not specify weapon just damage. Great Weapon Fighting goes out of its way to specifiy that its for "an attack", not for "weapon damage". Specifically "When you roll a 1 or 2 on a damage die for an attack you make with a melee weapon that you are wielding with two hands..." Divine Smite is an attack you make with a melee weapon "when you hit a creature with a melee weapon attack... to deal radiant damage to the target, in addition to the weapon’s damage." It's then referred to as "extra damage" on top of the melee attack, not a separate effect. He's right. But ask your DM. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 03:34 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 03:30
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Froghammer posted:Are Warlocks just jank? Because they look like really wonky spellcasters that don't get enough tricks to compensate for the crippling lack of spell slots. They make excellent illusionists. Disguise Self and a pretty decent Silent Image as At Will abilities at level 2 really enable certain normally comic playstyles, and you even get a level 1 pact that lets you communicate telepathically to warn the others what's going on (or not). And wizards can never match them at this sort of mayhem. The spell slots are per short rest, as has been mentioned - but a short rest is an hour. So they aren't as strong as wizards (but then what is?)
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Aug 26, 2014 03:33
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AlphaDog posted:Great Weapon Fighting goes out of its way to specifiy that its for "an attack", not for "weapon damage". Specifically "When you roll a 1 or 2 on a damage die for an attack you make with a melee weapon that you are wielding with two hands..." I will. And hopefully he'll let it fly because that makes neonchameleon posted:They make excellent illusionists. Disguise Self and a pretty decent Silent Image as At Will abilities at level 2 really enable certain normally comic playstyles, and you even get a level 1 pact that lets you communicate telepathically to warn the others what's going on (or not). And wizards can never match them at this sort of mayhem. The spell slots are per short rest, as has been mentioned - but a short rest is an hour. So they aren't as strong as wizards (but then what is?) The game i'm playing in has one player doing this with Deception(?) as a proficiency. Plans on being some kind of Drow master of disguise.
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Aug 26, 2014 03:35
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Strength of Many posted:I will. I was being sarcastic with the last part. Just assume the game will work as-written and if your DM houserules out every cool thing then find a new group.
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Aug 26, 2014 03:42
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So for people asking me about advantage on flanking, gonna be totally honest here and just say that I assumed flanking was a thing that gave you advantage, mostly because I gave advantage to some enemies that were flanking the fighter and wasn't immediately called out on it, and I have a rather loudmouthed individual who will usually jump down people's throats on rules technicalities. Also I read the combat section and mentally said "Yeah, pretty much 3.5 with some 4e stuff" I may be using some other 3.5 rules as well, but we're all so used to it that no one seems to notice. The big feature of this edition to use is the classes and the use of advantage, and the streamlining of math. Probably going to just keep doing it though, because a lot of classes have various abilities that impose disadvantage on my attacks as DM, and the players usually have plenty of other ways to get advantage (especially the Oath of Vengeance Paladin) so I see it more as a buff to monsters than players. That all being said, my group seems much more relaxed about stuff in general, maybe 3.5 made us too uptight about poo poo. I definitely do have one of the typical 4e haters in my group. In any case, we're having a lot of fun, so I plan to forge ahead even if we aren't playing completely by the book, whether we realize it or not.
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Aug 26, 2014 03:44
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Zombies' Downfall posted:I actually prefer "whatever let the DM figure it out, here's some guidelines" to the 3E approach of "here's a system of racial hit dice and poo poo that doesn't work for poo poo and produces only overpowered and worthless PCs" and 4E's "going through every humanoid and giving them two random stats and an arbitrary racial bonus that again tends to result in them being underpowered or bugbears". I'd rather see them not even try than half-rear end it in a core book and canonize some busted, stupid poo poo that every player will then assume is canonical and should be allowed without amendment, which is what both 3E and 4E did with monster PCs in the core. True, it's not the worst advice. It will lead to people saying, "Well, it's not that way at my table  ." In comparison they devote 2 pages to optional rules for "chase" scenes. I don't want to ruin the ending but the guy who can cast Hold Person and Dimension Door is going to make your high movement and Con scores pointless.
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Aug 26, 2014 04:07
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So, okay, I've read about the dread Hectopeasant formations and roaming bands of Skeleton Archers slaughtering enemies for their Necromancer masters, but after skimming through the races section I begin to wonder.. How have the High Elves not conquered everything worth mentioning? They gain access to Wizard cantrips as a racial ability, and have +Int racial mod, combined with their given inclination toward spell casting, suddenly even the lowliest High Elf is blasting bandits and kobolds and what not with Rays of Frost, Fire Bolts and the like. You, Zuggrug Badtooth the Orc Warlord, want to invade that High Elf village? Suddenly every able-bodied adult elf is ruining your poo poo. They don't even need to worry about such trifles as 'ammunition' or 'weapons' like the Lesser Races.  LongDarkNight posted:I don't want to ruin the ending but the guy who can cast spells is going to make you pointless. Fixed. edit: I had an idea! Strength of Many fucked around with this message at 04:42 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 04:09
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Strength of Many posted:So, okay, I've read about the dread Hectopeasant formations and roaming bands of Skeleton Archers slaughtering enemies for their Necromancer masters, but after skimming through the races section I begin to wonder.. I was going to suggest that 5e harkens back to the player characters being heroes and not all villagers will have classes, but those are racial abilities. Maybe only hero Elves gain racial abilities? Or maybe it's dragon elf games and no one messes with Elf City
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Aug 26, 2014 05:02
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