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Dirk the Average posted:Die, swap to a spellcaster, proceed to automatically succeed on things without rolling. we're also playing the critical failure rule variant...but with no saving throw because DM thinks (and I agree) that crit fails are hilarious....just not when you get 4 of them in the same encounter.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 16:07 |
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# ? May 14, 2024 19:19 |
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gradenko_2000 posted:There's also busting your rear end/slipping the DM :tenbux: to gain Inspiration, and the Hero Points variant rule. hero points variant? Not familiar with this. Whazzat?
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 16:08 |
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DMG page 264 A player starts with 5 Hero Points. Every time they level up, their count of Hero Points gets reset to [5+half character level] You can spend a Hero Point on any d20 roll (either before or after it is made) to roll a d6 and add that to the total roll. You can spend a Hero Point on any failed death saving throw to turn it into a success. Much like Lucky and Inspiration, it's just another mechanic for the player to spend a limited resource to improve their roll when they really want this roll to succeed. (for those keeping score, this was originally a variant rule from 3.5 Unearthed Arcana)
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 16:16 |
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doesn't look like it would apply to natural ones though However, I saltwater tested my opaque dice today. MOTHERFUCKERS!!!!!!!!! yeah. they weren't balanced. Using clear and metal from now on.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 16:18 |
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Well if your table's rules are that you fail as soon as you get a 1 on the d20 then yeah, only Lucky/Inspiration would help with that by letting you ignore the intransigent die completely.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 16:21 |
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As a brief aside to this, please remember that Alchemist's Fire, weak molotovs, and saucy fire beetles can drop a low level party without much effort - or any effort if you roll well on damage and they can't/don't immediately put themselves out. Also, you may want a grid for this unless you enjoy arguing Schrodinger's Theater of the Mind Party Layout every time a blast goes off. Also, let the party get some of whatever ordinance you're throwing at them at the end (or middle!) of the encounter. Explosions are always fun! Ryuujin posted:If they don't do Unearthed Arcana then the question would be, what do they do?
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 16:52 |
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gradenko_2000 posted:A player starts with 5 Hero Points. How is the madness thing(s) anyway? Is it any good? I always wanted to come up with an actual system of subtle chaos/demon effects on prime people but never got around to it.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 17:30 |
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The madness rules are copy-pasted from d20 Call of Cthulhu.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 17:37 |
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FRINGE posted:How is the madness thing(s) anyway? Is it any good? I always wanted to come up with an actual system of subtle chaos/demon effects on prime people but never got around to it. I used once them in 3.5e, where they were virtually identical. They're dumb as bad.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 17:38 |
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gradenko_2000 posted:The madness rules are copy-pasted from d20 Call of Cthulhu. So they didn't even use the superior rules from heroes of horror? Or are they trying to distance themselves from the archivist?
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 17:41 |
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Looking at Heroes of Horror, no, they didn't use that, it's definitely the ones from d20 CoC/Unearthed Arcana. I did a compare-and-contrast a while back: d20 CoC/3.5 Unearthed Arcana quote:01–10 Character performs compulsive rituals (washing hands constantly, praying, walking in a particular rhythm, never stepping on cracks, constantly checking to see if crossbow is loaded, and so on) 5e DMG: quote:01-10 The character feels compelled to repeat a specific activity over and over, such as washing hands, touching things, praying, or counting coins The only significant change is the 41-45 result going from aberrant sexual behavior to powerful delusion. The 56-65 result is also great because it cites a pair of percentages but never actually tells you what that means. It's just assumed you're an experienced-enough player that you would roll percentile dice to determine if it's blindness or deafness. d20 CoC/3.5 Unearthed Arcana quote:Contact Other Plane: When using the Sanity variant, characters casting this spell risk a lost of Sanity instead of Intelligence and Charisma. 5e DMG: quote:Various magical effects can inflict madness on an otherwise stable mind. Certain spells, such as contact other plane and symbol, can cause insanity, and you can use the madness rules here instead of the spell effects in the Player 's Handbook. Diseases, poisons, and planar effects such as psychic wind or the howling winds of Pandemonium can all inflict madness. Some artifacts can also break the psyche of a character who uses or becomes attuned to them. The significant change here is that while the d20 CoC/3.5 rules define Sanity as a 1-100 score derived from 5 times your WIS and you lose it in 1d4/1d6/1d20/etc amounts for compatibility/similarity to CoC, Sanity in 5e is defined as either a 3-20 ability score, or as just a WIS or CHA saving throw.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 18:12 |
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3.5: 31–40 Character gripped with severe phobia (refuses to approach object of phobia except on successful DC 20 Will save) 5E: 31-40 The character regards something (usually the source of madness) with intense revulsion, as if affected by the antipathy effect of the antipathy/sympathy spell How did they manage to out-3.X 3.X.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 18:44 |
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41–45 Character has aberrant sexual desires (exhibitionism, nymphomania or satyriasis, teratophilia, necrophilia, and so on) Ok it's obvious why they removed that, but wait, it was in 3.5?
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 19:06 |
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Yes, it was in 3.5 As far as I can tell, it's just because it was in d20 CoC, which in turn copied it from the Chaosium Call of Cthulhu games, as that exact description also shows up in CoC 6th Edition (2005) and 5th Edition (1999)
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 19:22 |
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gradenko_2000 posted:Yes, it was in 3.5 So... did whatever contract produced CoC d20 allow for material from it to be reused indefinitely, or has this just been subtle copyright infringement over and over because nobody at WotC keeps track of where a given chunk of text actually comes from?
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 19:43 |
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Can't copyright rules text!
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 21:04 |
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Esser-Z posted:Can't copyright rules text!
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 21:10 |
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What I take away from all of this is that the d20 bubble really was a continuation of the shovelware ways of late TSR. Good to see that 5e is preserving this proud D&D tradition in a way, even if they had to abandon the supplement treadmill for reasons. Also that the seemingly pointless 'lift anything you can from older editions but reword everything' is instead shrewd legal practice.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 22:18 |
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As someone working on a 4e retroclone, let me say that it's not as easy as it sounds.
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 22:27 |
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I've decided that I am definitely getting into Expeditions. I want to play a sneaky wizard with a troubled past; should I dip into Rogue at all or will sticking with pure Wizard (plus the Criminal background for stealth proficiency) be better?
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# ? Sep 7, 2015 23:05 |
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While we're talking about madness, I'm running a campaign where the PCs will be exposed to lovecraftian horrors. I did want to do something like the madness table, but it sounds like there's something better in Heroes of Horror? How would you all implement something like this one of your games?
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 00:33 |
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Thanks to everyone who provided advice. I've noticed that a lot of entries in the monster manual tend to just be blocks of health and attack damage, so I'll have to tweak things. Aside from fire, I'll try to come up with more victory conditions for fights other than "kill everyone in the room".blastron posted:I've decided that I am definitely getting into Expeditions. I want to play a sneaky wizard with a troubled past; should I dip into Rogue at all or will sticking with pure Wizard (plus the Criminal background for stealth proficiency) be better? You can get thieves' tools and skill proficiencies just fine from backgrounds, or even the Skilled feat if you need to. You should only take rogue levels if you think your character should be really good at some of those skills, or hiding/dashing/disengaging a lot in combat. Vanguard Warden fucked around with this message at 00:44 on Sep 8, 2015 |
# ? Sep 8, 2015 00:39 |
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Father Wendigo posted:As a brief aside to this, please remember that Alchemist's Fire, weak molotovs, and saucy fire beetles can drop a low level party without much effort - or any effort if you roll well on damage and they can't/don't immediately put themselves out. Also, you may want a grid for this unless you enjoy arguing Schrodinger's Theater of the Mind Party Layout every time a blast goes off. Yeah, for sure - so use things that make an area dangerous on the next round. Fire that spreads slowly, catapults that take a while to rotate, goop that gets acidic after it's exposed to air for a bit, ominous slowly billowing green clouds, etc. That's why I mentioned big slow catapults, rickety or fragile floors, etc. If your goal is just to get them to stop turtling in doors or corners you'll be fine without a grid. To me, it's more that I wouldn't want to do grid combat without that kind of thing. It's not impossible without a grid, just instead of trying to track the spread of fire in feet/round or whatever say "that whle corner's a raging inferno now" and maybe singe the first couple of PCs who try to get near it. And yeah, make sure the players can get some small amount of whatever's being used against them. Also they will always want to push, kick, tackle, or trip bad guys into the AoE. Don't make this hard for them to do. e: For rotting planks or unstable floors, just abstract it to "every round you don't move, there's an 8/10 chance (or whatever) you'll fall through (possibly "and so will anyone next to you")" and don't try to keep track of where the holes are. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 01:27 on Sep 8, 2015 |
# ? Sep 8, 2015 01:21 |
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You can also offer advantageous positions instead of hazards. Raised ground offers advantage on attack rolls against anything beneath your characters. Shrines to forgotten gods are old fashioned RPG and can justify elemental resistances or temporary abilities (though your players will probably think you're copying Diablo or whatever their favorite ARPG is). A fungal forest might provide disadvantage to enemies attempting to burn the PCs out. Siege weapons have already been mentioned, but a twist you might use is that they're for the players to make use of. Make special attacks and tie them to interesting bits of the scenery. "Chandelier: Use an attack action near the rope winch to drop the chandelier on enemies. Make an attack roll with your best bonus against every enemy in ZONE. Enemies you hit are immobilized until they succeed on a strength saving throw DC: X." "Brazier of Coals: Use an attack action near the brazier to upend the brazier on your enemy. Enemy takes XdY damage and may make a dexterity saving throw DC: Z to take half damage." "Fruit Cart: Use an attack action near the cart to throw rancid fruit at your enemy. Enemy must succeed at a charisma saving throw DC: X or suffer disadvantage on all attack rolls until the enemy benefits from the aid another action." Let your players know ahead of time that there's an opportunity there. You could write the rules on one side of a notecard, the object "Chandelier" on the other side, and place the card rules side down on the table. The other trick is to keep those notecards because your players (might) start trying to do tricky things with scenery that you haven't prepped in advance. Keeping the notecards isn't so you can leaf through them at the table, it's so you can compare them to each other while preparing. "Yeah, the chandelier was kind of a bust because it trivialized the fight. Maybe the next one should only immobilize for one turn. The fruit cart saved a lot of damage from the ogre, but the table never stopped cracking jokes about it. What could inflict disadvantage and fits our desired tone better?" Finally, resist the temptation to let NPCs use these; until the players catch on that bits of the scenery are weapons to be used.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 02:53 |
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There are really lots of ways you can encourage players to move forward, depending on the environment and enemies. Goblins have built or looted a ballista or catapult and are slowly loading and aiming it, which is delayed by it being a piece of poo poo and them not being expert operators. Giant spiders or other creatures could refuse to leave the nest because that's outside their territory or would leave their queen/eggs/young unprotected. Kobolds might try to collapse a tunnel to block off the party. The enemy taunt and belittle the party for being craven knaves. Bandits would try to evacuate with all their treasure, they might even have slaves or prisoners worth rescuing. A storm could start flooding part of the ruin or dungeon (it happens fairly regularly so the denizens live in the dry part). The denizens have a pet ogre, giant, dire wolf etc that needs to be woken up and told to attack the party. The boss or champion of the enemy sees the party hanging back and challenges them to a duel. There's a ritual or whatever that is very time sensitive.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 03:14 |
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I remember back in 3.5 when you'd look at D&D.com and every day there'd be an article, whether they were previewing a new book that was coming out (with actual excerpts from the book) metacommentary about the game itself, and new ideas and options for both DMs and Players to use. In the past month they've only talked about Rage of Demons (in vague terms), waxed nostalgic about how brutal adventure paths were back in the day, and told DMs that they should be streaming on Twitch and getting more players to join their games. I'm still completely confused as to why they're so fixated on only keeping the DM engaged on the content treadmill. Why put out articles that 1/5th of your playerbase can read and benefit from rather than ones that 100% can? (And they still haven't put out the next unearthed arcana)
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 03:37 |
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@JeremyECrawford What specifically does "Melee Weapon Attack" mean: A melee attack with a weapon, or an attack with a melee weapon? A melee weapon attack is a melee attack with a weapon. @JeremyECrawford @ApocalypticTwit since unarmed strikes are no longer considered weapons, they cannot be used for melee weapon attacks? @undrhil @ApocalypticTwit The rule on unarmed strikes is an exception: they can be used for melee weapon attacks, despite not being weapons. @jeremyecrawford Not to be confused with: an attack with a melee weapon @sebkha That's correct, since an attack with a melee weapon can be a ranged attack if you throw it. === This descent into solipsism was brought to you by Divine Smite: quote:Starting at 2nd level, when you hit a creature with a melee weapon attack, you can expend one paladin spell slot to deal radiant damage to the target, in addition to the weapon’s damage. The extra damage is 2d8 for a 1st-level spell slot, plus 1d8 for each spell level higher than 1st, to a maximum of 5d8. The damage increases by 1d8 if the target is an undead or a fiend. He's saying that throwing a spear and melee-attacking with a spear both fall under "attack with a melee weapon", but only melee-attacking with a spear falls under "a melee weapon attack", and so only melee-attacking with a spear can trigger Divine Smite.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 04:33 |
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Can you dual-wield fists?
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 04:37 |
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loving hell I hate natural language.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 04:39 |
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Skellybones posted:Can you dual-wield fists? It's my understanding that they errata'd Unarmed Strikes from "a weapon" to "not a weapon, but can exceptionally be used for melee weapon attacks" that if you are wielding a sword in one hand and nothing in the other, you cannot claim that you get +1 AC from the Dual-Wielder feat from having two weapons armed/drawn. Since Unarmed Strikes are not weapons, and their special exception does not grant them the Light property, you cannot dual-wield them.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 04:44 |
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gradenko_2000 posted:It's my understanding that they errata'd Unarmed Strikes from "a weapon" to "not a weapon, but can exceptionally be used for melee weapon attacks" that if you are wielding a sword in one hand and nothing in the other, you cannot claim that you get +1 AC from the Dual-Wielder feat from having two weapons armed/drawn. They had to do this: quote:Weapons (p. 149). Unarmed strike So you couldn't do things like cast Elemental Weapon on your goddamn hands: Elemental Weapon posted:A nonmagical weapon you touch becomes a magic But they had to add this: quote:Melee Attacks (p. 195). The rule on So that stuff like this would still work: quote:S t u n n i n g S t r i k e But that broke resistances since the resistances were only to Weapon Types, not Weapon Attack Damage. So, an Unarmed Strike would go right through Bludgeoning Weapon Resistance. But then they ruled that separately, to be fixed in the MM or something.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 04:53 |
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What does this mean for my plans of an unarmed wrestler Barbarian/Fighter?
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 05:02 |
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Toshimo posted:They had to do this: Was this an actual exploit they were trying to patch, or did they just hate the idea of someone's fists getting wreathed in fire?
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 05:08 |
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Skellybones posted:What does this mean for my plans of an unarmed wrestler Barbarian/Fighter? Consult your DM before starting a multi-class regimen. If you have an erection that lasts more than 4 hours, seek immediate clerical treatment.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 05:10 |
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dwarf74 posted:This is absolutely marvelous. Yes.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 05:10 |
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dwarf74 posted:This is absolutely marvelous. The wonder of the internet and modern social media is that players now have a direct, 24/7 line to the developers to bug them about whatever rules lawyery argument they just came from.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 05:20 |
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gradenko_2000 posted:@JeremyECrawford What specifically does "Melee Weapon Attack" mean: A melee attack with a weapon, or an attack with a melee weapon? BTW, I don't see the issue with this. Smites need a solid connection between you and your foe, an a weapon can act as a conductor, but not a transport.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 05:23 |
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Well yeah it's not wrong per se, but it's a tangled mess of rulings. I'm looking at 3.5's Divine Smite and it says:quote:Smite Evil (Su): Once per day, a paladin may attempt to smite evil with one normal melee attack.
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 05:38 |
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Toshimo posted:BTW, I don't see the issue with this. Smites need a solid connection between you and your foe, an a weapon can act as a conductor, but not a transport. What about a harpoon?
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 06:47 |
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# ? May 14, 2024 19:19 |
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AlphaDog posted:What about a harpoon? What about a Shoge Hook? (That thing the ninja in daredevil used)
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# ? Sep 8, 2015 06:51 |