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BigRoman posted:I think I'm going to regret posting this, but... So the only thing I'd be aware of is that a lot of people have a latent idea of What D And D Is, and 4th doesn't always match it. For people who've never played before, it mostly means a fun game where you play as fantasy heroes and murder orcs, and 4th is that. If you've played D&D as a child and are trying to recapture some specific thing, the details of that specific thing are super important. I know there are 2nd ed die-hards here who adore 4th and there are 2nd ed die-hards here who won't play anything that doesn't have rules for downtime and starting up your own town or whatever the gently caress.
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Dec 19, 2015 06:24
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Ambi posted:I don't really know much wrt books/pdfs, but before putting down serious money for them consider trying a month or so's subscription to D&D insider, it's like $5-10 and gives you access to searchable bestiary with statblocks, character builder, some other cool stuff I forget. D&D Insider isn't accepting new subscribers at this time. Knowing Wizards, it's probably dying a slow death. http://ddi.wizards.com/
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Dec 19, 2015 06:26
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BigRoman posted:Is this a good idea, or would you recommend something else? Keep in mind this will be their first tabletop rpg ever. Don't get me wrong, they're definitely the most tightly designed D&D rules ever. And I personally enjoy the game a lot. But if they don't have a concept of keywording, tactical combat, or character building (which is not unlike building a MtG deck) then you might not get the most out of it. You can offset some of that by doing some of the heavy lifting for them. Ask them ahead of time what kind of characters they'd like to play and come to the first session with premades, and let them customize/rebuild them after a session or two. If you're not that confident yourself in building characters, ask someone in the 4e thread. Most of the people that have stuck around do so because they get a kick out of the mechanics, and requests like that are generally met with either really solid suggestions or sometimes even whole character sheets made in the character builder software. If you get into it, in addition to the books Ederick mentioned, you'll probably also want two other things: 1) Rules Compendium - Released midway through the edition's lifecycle (after most of the kinks had been worked out), this is a great table reference. And it's updated to the latest version of the rules, as opposed to the PHB which has been erratad pretty heavily. 2) One of the two character building software options - There's a fair amount of paperwork involved in any 4e character, nearly as much as a spellcaster in other editions. And even more so, it's handy to have a copy of the rules in front of you with precalculated attack and damage values. Either option will let you build characters and either print them out or upload them to software on phones or tablets while skipping all of the busywork of copying and calculating. If none of that sounds appealing, maybe look into 13th Age or Dungeon World. While neither one is perfect, the rules of both get out of the way a little more (or in the case of DW, a lot more). Alternately, the new Star Wars by Fantasy Flight is pretty neat.
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Dec 19, 2015 06:31
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Ederick posted:D&D Insider isn't accepting new subscribers at this time. Knowing Wizards, it's probably dying a slow death. http://ddi.wizards.com/ Oh for gently caress'S SAKE. I hope they release the character builder code at least, given it's no longer for a supported product, though given how stuff like Dndtools.eu (database for 3.5, with lovely hyperlinks and collected spell lists etc.) gets taken down with cease-and-desists that doesn't really seem likely. I'm mostly just sad I had to let my subscription lapse, it really was a wonderful character builder.
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Dec 19, 2015 06:47
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Wow. Thanks for all the helpful responses. When I say, no rpg experience, I mean one of them may have played the pokemon card game. I think I get what you guys are trying to tell me. Even if 4th Ed. is the most even handed, its still a whole bunch of rules and races and classes and mythos to throw at someone with no background. What I'm looking for is a nice intro experience for these guys: lots of storytelling with simple combat mechanics: 1 round = 1 action (attack, heal, cast spell, use skill),= 1 roll (with modifiers from stats) maybe include initiative; some skill checks, and a good excuse to drink some beers and smoke. I figure if I can hook them with that, and it lasts more than a few months, I can visit my parents and see if they threw out my gary gygax roll chart for gnome lawn furniture types. I'm in no rush, so I'll check out 13th age. Even if I don't like the setting, if its simpler I can always replace the setting.
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Dec 19, 2015 07:17
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Fwiw level 1 4th isn't too bad in that regard especially if you're only working out of the core book. 13th age is reasonably streamlined too but I might be a little floaty in places for newcomers. 5th isn't awful for newbies but just keep in in the entire game starts to break down after level 6.
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Dec 19, 2015 07:21
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BigRoman posted:Wow. Thanks for all the helpful responses. When I say, no rpg experience, I mean one of them may have played the pokemon card game. Also check out SA's own The Next Project. It's meant to a simple-ish introductory RPG that has D&D feel.
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Dec 19, 2015 07:23
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BigRoman posted:I think I'm going to regret posting this, but... 2e: http://www.purpleworm.org/rules/ http://www.purpleworm.org/content/index.php/tools/2e-character-generator.html (I have never used that generator) BigRoman posted:What I'm looking for is a nice intro experience for these guys: lots of storytelling with simple combat mechanics: 1 round = 1 action (attack, heal, cast spell, use skill),= 1 roll (with modifiers from stats) maybe include initiative; some skill checks, and a good excuse to drink some beers and smoke. I figure if I can hook them with that, and it lasts more than a few months, I can visit my parents and see if they threw out my gary gygax roll chart for gnome lawn furniture types. basic: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/110274/DD-Basic-Set-Rulebook-B-X-ed-Basic expert: http://www.dndclassics.com/product/110792/D%26D-Expert-Set-Rulebook-%28B-X-ed%29-%28Basic%29?term=expert Rules Cyclopedia (B, E, C, M) http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17171/DD-Rules-Cyclopedia-Basic?it=1 * yeah I said it. 
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Dec 19, 2015 07:51
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Let's talk about Shoving a Creature in 5th Edition5e PHB posted:Using the Attack action, you can make a special melee attack to shove a creature, either to knock it prone or push it away from you. If you're able to make multiple attacks with the Attack action, this attack replaces one of them. The question is, can you use the shove action with a weapon, or unarmed strike? Well, nothing seems to say that you can't; Grappling specifies that you have to use "at least one free hand" so if they wanted to make a similar specification for shove, they could have, but didn't. Shove also specifies that the target "must be within your reach." This comes down to the OA question, which has been errata'd to the effect of "the reach of your weapon becomes your reach" more or less. Congratulations, you can trip a dude who is 10 feet away from you, using a whip. Does this work with Two-Weapon Fighting? Well, TWF says "you take the Attack action and attack with a light melee weapon that you're holding in one hand" whereas Shoving just says "Using the Attack action" and we already kinda think you can use weapons with it. You can't make a shove attack as a bonus action (at least, without having the Shield Master feat) but maybe your 'mainhand' attack as part of the TWF combo can be a shove.  The other side on this argument might be that an "attack" using a weapon is always an attack using the weapons proficiency, with the intent of making a damage roll, and since shove uses a check and not an attack roll, that it's not an attack even though it uses "the Attack action."  Discuss.
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Dec 19, 2015 08:24
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P.d0t posted:Let's talk about Shoving a Creature in 5th Edition Not sure what you're asking (probably because it's late) but do you mean can you use a shove, and then make a secondary attack with an offhand weapon? I would have no issue with this, as from what I can tell, it's not meant to be a huge actions, as evidenced by only taking one of your multiple attacks if you have them PHB pg.195 posted:If you're able to make multiple attacks with the Attack action, this attack replaces one of them.
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Dec 19, 2015 08:47
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In that same vein Polearm Master says "When you take the Attack action and attack with only [certain weapons]" does that mean you use the Attack action only to make an attack? Or can that Attack action be a shove instead? And, does the 10ft push from Charger stack with the 5ft from a normal shove action, or overwrite it? While I'm looking at feats, using Shield Master, can you use the Bonus Action to shove before you take the Attack action? Or does it have to be after? 
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Dec 19, 2015 09:04
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Ambi posted:Oh for gently caress'S SAKE. I hope they release the character builder code at least, given it's no longer for a supported product, though given how stuff like Dndtools.eu (database for 3.5, with lovely hyperlinks and collected spell lists etc.) gets taken down with cease-and-desists that doesn't really seem likely. I'm mostly just sad I had to let my subscription lapse, it really was a wonderful character builder. They won't. Of course they won't, whatever would make you think they would. Hell, I honestly doubt they have anyone left on staff who would even be able to.
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Dec 19, 2015 09:12
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BigRoman posted:Wow. Thanks for all the helpful responses. When I say, no rpg experience, I mean one of them may have played the pokemon card game.
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Dec 19, 2015 09:18
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BigRoman posted:Wow. Thanks for all the helpful responses. When I say, no rpg experience, I mean one of them may have played the pokemon card game. If you start at level 1 with 4e (and keep in mind that the math actually works so that you can start at level 1 without being murdered by a poor dice roll), then characters have two at-will abilities, one encounter, and one daily. Everyone will have something interesting to do, as all abilities have some sort of rider or unique thing to make them more than just rolling an attack. The combat does get pretty involved at times, but it's at least an interesting strategic puzzle instead of two entities rolling dice at each other until one falls down. That being said, definitely look into other systems outside of D&D for what you're describing. There are systems out there that shove a lot more narrative control onto the players, which lets players do cool things to the world.
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Dec 19, 2015 10:02
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BigRoman posted:Wow. Thanks for all the helpful responses. When I say, no rpg experience, I mean one of them may have played the pokemon card game. Get goon-written Good RPG based on 4e mechanics but vastly simplified, Strike! by Jim McGarva.
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Dec 19, 2015 10:11
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P.d0t posted:Let's talk about Shoving a Creature in 5th I've been specifically mucking about with these sort of questions lately, because my current PC is a rogue with athletics expertise and I've been trying to work out a way to grapple, then shove prone or sneak attack in one turn without multi-classing. We just started Out of the Abyss and I threw an awful lot of drow to the spiders. My interpretation of the rules as written (along with scouring the Sage Advice Twitter and monthly articles) is that the bonus action from two-weapon fighting requires that you make at least one "normal" (roll to hit and if successful, roll for damage) or shove attack with the attack action during your turn while wielding eligible weapons. Since unarmed strikes aren't weapons, they don't enable the bonus action on their iwn. Shove and grapple are "special" attacks that don't involve attack rolls that only can be used as part of the attack action, unless an ability or feat says otherwise. One way to use Ready is to make a single attack as a triggered reaction, so you can grapple or shove that way. A five foot or prone shove is basically using the weapon in hand (or unarmed strike) to drive back or trip the target, so I can see a whip being used for that.
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Dec 19, 2015 12:04
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P.d0t posted:In that same vein Polearm Master says "When you take the Attack action and attack with only [certain weapons]" does that mean you use the Attack action only to make an attack? Or can that Attack action be a shove instead? On my phone, so can't edit this into my previous post. Polearm Master: Yes, shove works to enable the bonus action. The whole "natural language" thing means they would have specified "and make an attack roll" instead of "and attack". Charger: No, they don't stack. "Up to ten feet" means exactly what it says. Shield Master: Unless the ability/feat that enables the bonus action requires a certain order (like how Tavern Brawler requires a hit and not just an attack to enable the bonus action grapple), you can take the actions in any order and even move in between them as long as the required action happens. If you're somehow prevented from performing the required action (like if someone with Sentinel tagged you with an opportunity attack), you just turn the bonus action into the regular action.
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Dec 19, 2015 12:49
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P.d0t posted:Let's talk about Shoving a Creature in 5th Edition Spiteski posted:Not sure what you're asking (probably because it's late) but do you mean can you use a shove, and then make a secondary attack with an offhand weapon? Hello Sailor posted:I've been specifically mucking about with these sort of questions lately, because my current PC is a rogue with athletics expertise and I've been trying to work out a way to grapple, then shove prone or sneak attack in one turn without multi-classing. We just started Out of the Abyss and I threw an awful lot of drow to the spiders. My whole thinking with this line of questioning is that shoving and grappling give you some interesting options on your turn, and actually let martial classes have a degree of battlefield control. Moreover, this seems like exactly the design space you could/should slot a Monk or a Champion Fighter into, except that:
- the only way to get double prof on Athletics is to dip 1 level of Rogue or 2 levels of Bard; Champion can get half-prof on Athletics at 7th loving level, if they for some reason don't take prof in it to begin with - Barbarian can get advantage on all STR checks (including Athletics) by Raging; other than that, you're looking at the Enhance Ability spell, possibly complemented by Bestow Curse or Hex  So basically, a Barbarian who dips Rogue is going to be your best grapple/shove character. So much for the Champion Fighter being a "Remarkable Athlete" A pure Monk is going to have problems being good at Athletics, because they don't get Expertise, and their AC and attacks generally lean heavily on DEX, making it hard to be good at STR (and they need high AC to be survivable, because they're at the smallest Hit Dice of any melee-oriented class.) Monks seem to be needing to spend Ki to just survive, let alone do anything interesting; they seem to hit a sweet spot around level 5ish, but they could stand to start off with more Ki points. Similarly, a Battle Master Fighter can sort of circumvent the normal shove mechanics by using their Maneuvers/Superiority Dice instead; again, this resource probably needs to refresh more easily than it does in the base ruleset (i.e. not counting "  b-b-but there's an optional rule in the DMG!"-type bullshit w/r/t Short Rests or the like.)Not to mention that being "Grappled" still allows the target to attack anyone and everyone at no penalty; if you take the Grappler feat, you can basically turn Grappled into Restrained (which actually has some decent penalties in its mechanics) with another successful check, but you also become Restrained yourself  See also, "this poo poo is overcomplicated" as mentioned here: P.d0t posted:
Like, the amount of finicky combat feats that could just as easily have been made class features for martials (or flatout added to the sparse combat rules as options for everyone to use) is really starting to bug me. Give everyone Grappler and Charger for free and you still have to invest into other feats/class features heavily, before anything cheesy starts to happen. Monks basically get half of Polearm Master and one clause of Tavern Brawler as class features at level 1, but Fighters are supposed to burn ASIs on this poo poo (because they get more of them)? gently caress off, Mearls. This post pretty much hits it right on the head [emphasis mine]: EvanSchenck posted:imo the problem with them isn't just that they're too weak, it's also that none of them add up to a "fighting style." They all amount to mundane increases in combat effectiveness, limited to a specific group of weapons to kind of gently push you towards using them. Like the choice between dueling and great weapon fighting is, do you want to do slightly more damage, or do you want to carry a shield for +2 AC? Not exactly a compelling difference, especially considering you're going to do exactly the same thing by standing in front of enemies and rolling to make their numbers go down. With the way the combat system works, if you want to have a real effect you want to be doing something that's imposing conditions on an enemy--giving them disadvantage on attack rolls, stunning them, restricting their movement, preventing them from attacking anybody but you, taking away their reaction, etc. i.e. stuff that spells do, or that battlemaster maneuvers do to a much more limited extent.
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Dec 19, 2015 14:36
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My tables have houseruled that monks get to grapple using acrobatics. Basically the big strong fighter or barbarian is physically overpowering them, but the monk is using some precision martial arts technique to achieve the same effect. e: Though I'm still in the middle of doing a complete rebuild of the monk class to better capture that cheesy kung fu movie feel and to make them feel useful and distinct. Right now my biggest change is that I've scrapped the default archetypes and am instead having the monk choose one out of about 8 dojos the way clerics and wizards work. Each dojo has its own thematic list of battlemaster like abilities to spend ki on. Soylent Pudding fucked around with this message at 16:08 on Dec 19, 2015 |
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Dec 19, 2015 16:05
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The recent discussion here got me writing about how one might get started with 4th Edition without using D&D Insider. The three basic PDFs you'd need comes out to 35 USD, compared to 25 USD for a hardcover of just the 5th Edition PHB
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Dec 19, 2015 18:24
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Babylon Astronaut, I'm at the point of tracking you down in threads, because you don't have PMs and are not responding to email. Did you maybe somehow forget about Trad Games Secret Santa? You had gifts delivered to you weeks ago that you haven't acknowledged, and your Santee has not received a gift. You still have a couple days to not be a Grinch. Please check your email and spam folder and respond ASAP! Thanks and sorry for barging in on this totally unrelated thread.
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Dec 19, 2015 20:28
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Is there another way to do grappling so that it's not an athletics check? Some of the problems with it come from that. The whole area is really neglected because it's one of the core disciplines for fighting and it was especially important in armored combat. Like, the rule about needing a free hand. Historically armored combatants used swords as grappling levers about as much as they struck with them, if not more. Or the lack of rules for grappling-based attacks, like throws, slams, chokes, joint manipulation. I'm playing a minotaur barb/rogue, and I want to suplex the evil wizard... just lift him up over my head, jump both of us into the air, and land on top of him with all 350 pounds of my gross beef body. Where are the rules for that? P.d0t posted:Not to mention that being "Grappled" still allows the target to attack anyone and everyone at no penalty; It's funny to imagine but I think it was probably written that way because a few different monsters like to grapple the PCs, and if they did grappling rules for verisimilitude it would not be fun because you wouldn't really be able to do poo poo once somebody with a better strength score got their hands on you. Like freedom of movement and thunderwave are almost explicitly written as "get out of grapple free" cards for casters, but realistically how do you cast a spell with a somatic component when there's a big drat orc sitting on your chest playing "stop hitting yourself" with your wizard's noodle arms? quote:if you take the Grappler feat, you can basically turn Grappled into Restrained (which actually has some decent penalties in its mechanics) with another successful check, but you also become Restrained yourself Trap feat. One of the three features was errata'd out for negating a non-existent rule, and you get the other two features from shoving to Prone anyway without needing to spend a feat.
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Dec 19, 2015 20:40
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EvanSchenck posted:Trap feat. One of the three features was errata'd out for negating a non-existent rule, and you get the other two features from shoving to Prone anyway without needing to spend a feat. I'm going to try and talk my DM into replacing the pin and errata'd features with a bonus offhand attack with a TWF-eligible weapon against a target you just successfully grappled that turn. Though at that point, the feat is probably better called "Grab and Stab".
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Dec 19, 2015 21:07
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All you need is for prone + grappled = 'Incapacitated with a contested escape chance every turn', and three-attack-fighter dude can semi-reliably lock a fucker down. Turns them into a single target controller type as they kneel on a monster's shoulder and smash its face into the floor. Assuming he can reach it, which is a different problem.
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Dec 19, 2015 21:15
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Do you have to "convince" your DM for everything in 5e? jfc. Is nothing just simply worded or standardized? I miss the keyword system.
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Dec 19, 2015 21:22
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Turtlicious posted:Do you have to "convince" your DM for everything in 5e? jfc. Is nothing just simply worded or standardized? Everything except spells, yes.
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Dec 19, 2015 21:29
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Honestly, the most fun my party has in 5e is loving up the campaign and seeing how our DM has to change the story to add in the fact that we burned the forest to the ground instead of going in and fighting the fey. Or hitting the mob boss so hard his legs blew off. Or having one of our players become a werebear and become completely immune to most damage.
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Dec 19, 2015 21:44
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Turtlicious posted:Do you have to "convince" your DM for everything in 5e? jfc. Is nothing just simply worded or standardized? This is what we refer to as "empowering the DM."
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Dec 20, 2015 00:19
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Turtlicious posted:Do you have to "convince" your DM for everything in 5e? jfc. Is nothing just simply worded or standardized? It isn't worded as clearly as it should be sometimes but you don't have to lawyer anything either. Just remember that some goons hate everything to do with 5e or anything else that isn't 4e.
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Dec 20, 2015 01:09
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Games that are nothing like 4e can be perfectly good, as long as somebody's making a little effort.
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Dec 20, 2015 01:41
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Actually this post was dumb nm.
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Dec 20, 2015 02:46
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Hitlers Gay Secret posted:Honestly, the most fun my party has in 5e is loving up the campaign and seeing how our DM has to change the story to add in the fact that we burned the forest to the ground instead of going in and fighting the fey. Or hitting the mob boss so hard his legs blew off. I apologize in advance if I'm misrepresenting what you had to say, but "we wanted to burn the forest to the ground and the DM adapted their plot on the fly to let us do that" isn't something that 5e specifically allowed your group to do. Trast posted:It isn't worded as clearly as it should be sometimes but you don't have to lawyer anything either. Just remember that some goons hate everything to do with 5e or anything else that isn't 4e. TBF even Pathfinder has more clearly worded rules.
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Dec 20, 2015 03:04
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Trast posted:It isn't worded as clearly as it should be sometimes but you don't have to lawyer anything either. Just remember that some goons hate everything to do with 5e or anything else that isn't 4e.  gently caress off, there's plenty of love for Basic and people don't get uptight about AD&D 2e and only mildly make fun of AD&D 1e. The only edition that gets as much poo poo as 5e does is 3.x/PF and even then people readily note what it did well.
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Dec 20, 2015 03:18
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Babylon Astronaut posted:4e had too many rules for me at first, but after playing gamma world I now grasp what it is trying to do and could pick it up easily. My suggestion is either that, or the mother loving basic red box. The red box, even if you don't stick to the basic line of games, is an amazing teaching tool and I highly recommend it for beginners no matter which edition they end up playing. With cheap pdfs available, it's worth it just to have them read through. You'll understand after you read it, it holds your hand like none other and unlike almost every other edition, you need no outside knowledge. Not a bad idea either. The red box is what got me started and into D&D.
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Dec 20, 2015 03:35
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I think the problem with grappling dates back to when monsters played by the same rules as players, and whoever was writing rulebooks realized that making powerful and easy to use grappling rules would screw the pcs over and it just got neglected for a really long time
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Dec 20, 2015 03:39
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ProfessorCirno posted:
Wow, rude.
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Dec 20, 2015 03:48
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ProfessorCirno posted:
Its calmed down a lot, but the "typical poster" in DnD threads on SA a few years back was a raging rear end in a top hat to anyone that talked about anything but 4e. Posters would brag here about how they were stalking people on other forums because they had "wrong opinions on DnD". Among other reasons, I think things calmed down partially because of the cross-edition posts that gradenko_2000 and some others have done that actually exposed the rules that people were not as familiar with as they thought.
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Dec 20, 2015 04:22
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FRINGE posted:It was a problem before, so that warning has some merit. People like gradenko_2000 do a great job spreading knowledge.
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Dec 20, 2015 04:47
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I'll be the first to admit that I wade right the hell into "what's the deal with 4e?"-type posts in other forums, and that it's mostly a losing battle against the "tabletop WoW" narrative, but 4e also isn't the be-all-end-all of D&D either. It's just that BECMI is still better than 5e
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Dec 20, 2015 04:48
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gradenko_2000 posted:I'll be the first to admit that I wade right the hell into "what's the deal with 4e?"-type posts in other forums, and that it's mostly a losing battle against the "tabletop WoW" narrative, but 4e also isn't the be-all-end-all of D&D either. Seriously, anyone claiming "YOU ALL JUST LIKE 4e AND NOTHING ELSE" isn't paying attention. These forums have a GIANT love for Basic / BECMI.
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Dec 20, 2015 06:46
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