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isndl posted:There is a tried and true solution to your lack of foresight that will work in the majority of groups: perform increasingly reckless stunts until you die, and then reroll as something better. If by some miracle you fail to die, then maybe you're badass enough that it doesn't matter. Or you're severely lacking in player skill and should take some remedial courses in risk mismanagement. If I knew the player was going to do this I would just straight-up let him remake the character. Maybe talk to the DM about it? It really comes down to the player having a concept in mind, then trying to find a mechanical way to express that concept.
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Feb 20, 2015 08:36
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Yeah just hash out a build restructure with your group, it shouldn't be that big a deal. Frankly it's silly for a group to not allow that since the alternative is for someone to just suicide their character and reroll that way.
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Feb 20, 2015 08:49
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It's less about me wanting to switch characters and more about me being angry that such a garbage class was included like it was a real option as good as anything else. I was just sitting here thinking about what an Eldritch Knight actually gets (extremely limited spells+a bunch of nigh-worthless crap that doesn't synergzie worth a drat) when I realized I was taking 20 levels to get a gimped Level 7 Spellcaster with 20 levels of loving-Nothing Fighter, when instead I could have a non-gimped Level 8 Spellcaster (with whatever specialization on top of that) and 12 levels of At-Least-Something Fighter. I just miss the 4e Swordmage so much. Anyway, related question to all this: does the Sorcerer's Draconic Resilience ("When you aren't wearing armor, your AC equals 13 + your Dexterity modifier") still work when using a shield? The Monk's Unarmored Defense specifically says you can't use a shield with it, and the Barbarian's Unarmored Dense specifically says you can use a shield with it, but Draconic Resilience doesn't specify at all. I would assume this means you can still get the benefit with a shield, but God knows what Natural Language intended.
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Feb 20, 2015 09:30
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Solid Jake posted:It's less about me wanting to switch characters and more about me being angry that such a garbage class was included like it was a real option as good as anything else. The true D&D starts here.
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Feb 20, 2015 09:35
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Yeah that sounds like the real D&D experience to me - realizing you hosed up and forgot to play some form of full caster. I wonder if people would have liked 4e if all martial classes had Wizard appended to them. Rogue-Wizard. Fighter-Wizard. Warlord-Wizard. No verisimilitude lost you see. Laphroaig fucked around with this message at 14:44 on Feb 20, 2015 |
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Feb 20, 2015 14:41
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Solid Jake posted:Anyway, related question to all this: does the Sorcerer's Draconic Resilience ("When you aren't wearing armor, your AC equals 13 + your Dexterity modifier") still work when using a shield? The Monk's Unarmored Defense specifically says you can't use a shield with it, and the Barbarian's Unarmored Dense specifically says you can use a shield with it, but Draconic Resilience doesn't specify at all. I would assume this means you can still get the benefit with a shield, but God knows what Natural Language intended. Personally, I'd let you use a shield. Keep in mind that you need a hand free to cast spells with Somatic Components though. IIRC, War Caster gets around that, but it's not like the whole thing becomes dangerous to game balance or anything at that point.
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Feb 20, 2015 14:51
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This was in my notes as a fix to Eldritch Knight/Arcane Trickster: Spellcasting: Eldritch Knights no longer gain spells as listed in the PHB. Instead, at Level 3, he is a 2nd Level Wizard when it comes to determining his spell list and spell slots, as well as cantrips known. He gains an additional 'Wizard Level' on every following odd level, reaching 'Wizard Level 11' at 19th level. He does not gain any other wizard class features. I still think it prob needs other things to close the gap, but free choice of the list and sixth level spells I think, help. (Arcane Trickster is literally the same drat thing. Although I'd rule you can totally sneak attack with an attack roll spell, because Fun > Verisimilitude for me.) Likewise, Ranger and Paladin have a similar idea baked in with different numbers, but with the Druid and Cleric spell lists - as well as being able to choose off their own list as well.
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Feb 20, 2015 21:30
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For people that are sticking with 3e rules - werent Duskblade and Warmage better than Eldritch Knight?
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Feb 20, 2015 23:20
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I misremembered some of the Warmage's mechanics, so let me revise. The duskblade is designed around being in melee and casting touch spells, doing horrible horrible things with shocking grasp and metamagic is your bread and butter. You don't get many high level spells but the spell levels you do get you get lots of slots for. The Warmage is a Sorcerer with your spell selection made for you. The higher AC doesn't mean much because the Warmage doesn't have much business being in melee anyway, and the Warmage's Edge averages out to an extra d6 on each of your spells unless you have freakishly high intelligence. The Eldritch Knight is still terrible. Kurieg fucked around with this message at 00:22 on Feb 21, 2015 |
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Feb 20, 2015 23:27
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NameHurtBrain posted:This was in my notes as a fix to Eldritch Knight/Arcane Trickster: The key is probably to be able to combine fighter actions with wizard actions, because choosing between 'I attack' and casting a weak wizard spell on your turn still isn't very exciting or all that useful. Hell, you could probably add them the class feature of "You can make a melee attack as a bonus action whenever you cast a spell" and it would be totally fine.
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Feb 21, 2015 00:32
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Kurieg posted:
Warmage is only good with prestige class cheese.
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Feb 21, 2015 00:41
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What a Warmage taking the Dragon Lance War Mage prestige class? Or something else?
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Feb 21, 2015 01:25
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Have they talked at all about what settings are coming? I'd stab a hobo for spelljammer, but would settle for dragonlance. I would bet solid money on Forgotten Realms, Eberron?
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Feb 21, 2015 01:29
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Other than a vague "It's a multiverse, so every setting is the main setting!", no.
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Feb 21, 2015 01:31
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Ryuujin posted:What a Warmage taking the Dragon Lance War Mage prestige class? Or something else? Warmage was a 20 level class from the miniatures handbook. It had a sorcerer's spell progression but their spell list was "All the evocation spells that exist at the time of this printing with some conjuration spells thrown in for good measure", it's a purpose built magic artillery piece class that works fine within the context of a miniatures game but doesn't really bring enough to the table for a spot in a 5 person party. To put it in context, this was the book that also included the healer class. It healed, it got a pet unicorn, and basically nothing else. 
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Feb 21, 2015 01:37
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I just introduced spelljamming by crashing a spelljammer (nearly) into the one of the parties in the West Marches campaign, but I think I'll use it more as a mode of transport to other worlds rather than homebrew a bunch of spaceship fighting rules. Plus they gotta repair the ship.
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Feb 21, 2015 01:39
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Ryuujin posted:What a Warmage taking the Dragon Lance War Mage prestige class? Or something else? Warmages don't have a 'spells known', they just can cast every spell on their class list. A lot of prestige classes add spells to the class list, assuming you'd have to burn one of your spells known to pick up the new poo poo. Apparently you can set thing up so you can cast every spell on the druid, wizard, paladin, and cleric lists.
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Feb 21, 2015 01:46
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Hmm that makes sense, and the War Mage prestige class was probably better for something like a Force Missile Mage that was all about throwing a bunch of missiles, because it had a feature that added some damage to each die of a spell or something. Something that was not tied to a stat, I believe, like the Warmage class, but also applied to more than one magic missile in a cast unlike the Warmage class's feature.
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Feb 21, 2015 01:52
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Elendil004 posted:Have they talked at all about what settings are coming? I'd stab a hobo for spelljammer, but would settle for dragonlance. I would bet solid money on Forgotten Realms, Eberron? As long as Im wishing I would want FR to be reset before the 4e crap, and have the focus shifted to open/ongoing history, almanac nerd stuff, and story hooks and away from "big name" NPCs (as anything but examples and "actual" NPCs instead of designer-insertion-characters).
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Feb 21, 2015 01:55
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FRINGE posted:I would like a complete formal merging of Forgotten Realms, Spell Jammer, and Planescape. With SJ and PS fully integrated that sets the ground for official inclusiveness with Krynn, Oerth, etc... But, but, but, Drizzt...
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Feb 21, 2015 01:55
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FRINGE posted:As long as Im wishing I would want FR to be reset before the 4e crap On the one hand, them admitting that vancian magic was a thing that existed and people were aware of it and it's function was easily the stupidest thing to come out of FR 4e. On the other hand, that led to the most unintentionally hilarious bit of 5e lore in Bear Mystra.
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Feb 21, 2015 02:02
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Boing posted:The key is probably to be able to combine fighter actions with wizard actions, because choosing between 'I attack' and casting a weak wizard spell on your turn still isn't very exciting or all that useful. Hell, you could probably add them the class feature of "You can make a melee attack as a bonus action whenever you cast a spell" and it would be totally fine.
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Feb 21, 2015 02:05
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Elendil004 posted:I just introduced spelljamming by crashing a spelljammer (nearly) into the one of the parties in the West Marches campaign, but I think I'll use it more as a mode of transport to other worlds rather than homebrew a bunch of spaceship fighting rules. Wait, doesn't this kind of gently caress with the idea of a West Marches campaign? Are there going to be rumours of treasure on other worlds going up on the notice board or what? It's not clicking for me. How are you working this in?
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Feb 21, 2015 02:11
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Kurieg posted:On the one hand, them admitting that vancian magic was a thing that existed and people were aware of it and it's function was easily the stupidest thing to come out of FR 4e. Please explain what happened with both of these things.
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Feb 21, 2015 04:36
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Jimbozig posted:Wait, doesn't this kind of gently caress with the idea of a West Marches campaign? Are there going to be rumours of treasure on other worlds going up on the notice board or what? It's not clicking for me. How are you working this in? Sure why not, maybe a player wants to explore a moon or find an artifact among the stars. Most of our players are lvl 5, by the time they hit 10, 15, the idea that every adventure is a backwater exploration is gonna be so far out the window. The concept still works, though.
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Feb 21, 2015 04:40
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FRINGE posted:As long as Im wishing I would want FR to be reset before the 4e crap, and have the focus shifted to open/ongoing history, almanac nerd stuff, and story hooks and away from "big name" NPCs (as anything but examples and "actual" NPCs instead of designer-insertion-characters). This is actually how I would describe 4E Forgotten Realms.
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Feb 21, 2015 05:19
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http://dungeonchannel.com/articles/348635/the-murder-hobo-investment-bubble/ Pretty fantastic article on the economics behind murder-hobo`ing, and the inevitable economic crash when the murder-hobo bubble bursts.
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Feb 21, 2015 05:24
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Dick Burglar posted:Please explain what happened with both of these things. The Weave is the source of all magic in Faerun, and apparently it also maintains the system of vancian magic. E.G. When the first Mystra became a god she edited the Weave to disable all spells over 10th level. When the weave exploded in 4th edition and the spellplague hit, all vancian magic broke down, forcing Wizards and other casters to use AEDUs like everyone else. But see, Mystra wasn't actually dead, because she foresaw that the Weave needed to be destroyed so both it and she could be reborn. So 200 some years later the Elminster senses the return of Mystra's spirit, reincarnated into a Bear. He brings her the rest of the silver fire and she turns back into Mystra, renergizing the weave and bringing back Vancian magic. Unfortunately she did not remain a Bear.
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Feb 21, 2015 06:18
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Kurieg posted:The Weave is the source of all magic in Faerun, and apparently it also maintains the system of vancian magic. E.G. When the first Mystra became a god she edited the Weave to disable all spells over 10th level. When the weave exploded in 4th edition and the spellplague hit, all vancian magic broke down, forcing Wizards and other casters to use AEDUs like everyone else. Further proof Elminster is history's greatest monster.
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Feb 21, 2015 07:25
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Kurieg posted:The Weave is the source of all magic in Faerun, and apparently it also maintains the system of vancian magic. E.G. When the first Mystra became a god she edited the Weave to disable all spells over 10th level. When the weave exploded in 4th edition and the spellplague hit, all vancian magic broke down, forcing Wizards and other casters to use AEDUs like everyone else. So what you're telling us is that the official FR storyline is that one or more gods proclaimed that all warriors are lovely.
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Feb 21, 2015 10:55
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OneThousandMonkeys posted:So what you're telling us is that the official FR storyline is that one or more gods proclaimed that all warriors are lovely. Dude knew how to roll with a posse fighter-style. quote:The Fist consists of:
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Feb 21, 2015 11:47
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FRINGE posted:Roan can detect magic, detect invisible, detect illusion, detect traps, and know alignment once each per day, and will automatic return if it leaves him and he is conscious to so will it (maximum range 9”), if necessary dragging anyone holding it along with it (a combined strength total of 30 will stop it). I assume that's the distance on the battle mat, not in-character real world distance. Magically returning from less than a foot of distance is of... limited usefulness. I do always love to see inch-based measurements in D&D though. There is something wonderful about the expression on a 3e-grog's face when he comes to the realization that D&D has always been a grid-based miniature wargame mod.
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Feb 21, 2015 13:10
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Elendil004 posted:Sure why not, maybe a player wants to explore a moon or find an artifact among the stars. Most of our players are lvl 5, by the time they hit 10, 15, the idea that every adventure is a backwater exploration is gonna be so far out the window. The concept still works, though. Uh, how do rumours of treasure on other planets suddenly appear on the notice board? When presumably until now the notice board has never sent the players outside of a small geographical area? Like, I'm asking for details. I honestly don't get how it fits. It seems like adding aliens to a Hogwarts game.
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Feb 21, 2015 13:39
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Huh, so WotC has made an open call for adventure writers for D&D Adventurer's League. Looking at the provided material you're just supposed to submit two encounters, one combat and the other focused on exploration or interaction. I might consider applying, but the list of provided elements you have to use is giving me a headache. So, you have to use all the items from the following list at least once in your two encounters, but you can also reuse elements that you've already used in your other encounter. Both encounters are supposed to be meant for a party of five 3rd-level characters. The elements are:
That's pretty straightforward. I was already thinking of some ideas on how to make an interesting combat encounter with just those elements, but there are a few problems: They couldn't have chosen a more boring big monster than the manticore. The manticore literally has nothing special to it beyond attacks. Furthermore, even though it's supposed to be a big, brutish monster, it seems like the optimal tactic for the manticore is actually to fly above the battlefield, firing tail spikes from a safe distance of 100 feet (which is within the manticore's optimal range but outside the range of most ranged attacks save for longbows and heavy crossbows). Secondly, I wanted to throw in a few skeletons into the combat just to make the combat a bit more interesting than "Manticore kites the PCs while the PCs scramble for cover" only to realize that it's really hard to build a by-the-book encounter with these creatures without making it Deadly. Just adding two skeletons makes the encounter Deadly (total XP 800, adjusted XP for three creatures 1,600, which is closer to five 3rd-level characters' Deadly threshold of 2,000 than their Hard threshold of 1,125). Obviously, without actually playtesting the encounter it's really hard to tell whether it's actually as deadly as it sounds, but it's just bizarre. Obviously I could just make a single combat encounter with just orcs and skeletons, but it doesn't quite have the same coolness factor as an encounter with a big flying boss monster and their skeleton mooks. (Oh, and the hidden spike pit is obviously a part of this encounter, the spike pit having been by the manticore's skelemans and the spikes are actually extra tail spikes the manticore has shed.) EDIT: By the way, I'm going by the manticore's stats in the Basic rules, if they secretly gave it some actual features in the MM do correct me!
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Feb 21, 2015 13:59
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You could just shove the Manticore in the spiked pit and replace with an actually interesting monster.Jimbozig posted:Uh, how do rumours of treasure on other planets suddenly appear on the notice board? When presumably until now the notice board has never sent the players outside of a small geographical area?
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Feb 21, 2015 14:06
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Not only are you correct that the MM is still the same Manticore as in the Basic Rules, the fluffpiece in the MM outright says that a Manticore should use its flight to stay at maximum range while pelting targets with its spikes, only closing to melee range if it runs out
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Feb 21, 2015 14:08
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Siivola posted:You could just shove the Manticore in the spiked pit and replace with an actually interesting monster. Yeah, that's what I'm starting to think I should do: either make the manticore the second part of an actually interesting and dynamic combat encounter (basically using the guidelines for multipart encounters) so that after a couple of rounds of combat when the PCs have had the chance to eradicate most of their opposition the manticore appears, or just leave it in the background as window dressing. Alternately, find a way to integrate the manticore into the exploration/social interaction encounter.
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Feb 21, 2015 14:19
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Manticore NPC who really wants to be a sphinx.
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Feb 21, 2015 14:20
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I'm pretty sure that list of elements is just a setup for Let's Make a Deal. Elf Noble Monty Hall, behind the curtains are either manticore, skeletons, or orcs. The real solution is the secret door, but watch out for the hidden spiked pit on your way out of the ruined temple set!
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Feb 21, 2015 14:22
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In full recognition of all the caveats, does anyone have any hit location tables/effects they'd like to recommend?
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Feb 21, 2015 14:33
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