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Electromax posted:It's a fun book if you like Beholder details. The 2e supplement "I, Tyrant" is honestly a lot better, if you're into that kind of thing.
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Jul 30, 2017 22:40
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Sage Genesis posted:The 2e supplement "I, Tyrant" is honestly a lot better, if you're into that kind of thing.
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Jul 31, 2017 00:00
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FRINGE posted:All three of those were great if you like ridiculous details on specific monsters. (The Illithiad (Mind Flayers) and The Sea Devils (Sahauguin)). Here's the only mind flayer supplement you need: 
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Jul 31, 2017 16:36
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I was DMing a game recently and had the players enter a vampire's lair. One of the PCs should know all about vampires, so I read off some basic info about vampires, including this little gem I didn't know about : "If a piercing weapon made of wood is driven into the vampire's heart while the vampire is Incapacitated in its Resting place, the vampire is Paralyzed until the stake is removed." The players opened the casket and then the player with the stake rolled a natural 20 dex check for plunging the stake into the heart accurately. So, the players were able to kill a monster normally worth 10,000 XP without breaking a sweat — literally the easiest kill in the entire adventure so far. I'm fine with this since the players did carefully prepare for the battle... and, luckily this particular vampire wasn't integral to the story, just something that had been terrorizing a village of nearby NPCs. Still, it doesn't feel right and I'm curious about how other people handle wooden stakes and vampires.
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Jul 31, 2017 17:14
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Polo-Rican posted:I was DMing a game recently and had the players enter a vampire's lair. Any time players use their brains and luck instead of getting in a big dumb fight is a win in my book.
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Jul 31, 2017 17:18
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Polo-Rican posted:I was DMing a game recently and had the players enter a vampire's lair. That actually sounds pretty cool. Vampires are usually portrayed as very intelligent and well-prepared enemies, so maybe the next one isn't some scrub-tier vampire like that one. Give other vampires proper lairs with traps and guardians and have contingency plans in place in case they get attacked during the day time. Killing a vampire by staking it in the heart is a really thematic and neat way to do things, but make sure that getting there isn't easy for their enemies.
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Jul 31, 2017 17:21
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Polo-Rican posted:I was DMing a game recently and had the players enter a vampire's lair. that's exactly how they should kill a vampire. heck, it should be destroyed, not paralyzed, and they shouldn't have needed a Dex roll
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Jul 31, 2017 17:23
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The fight with a big monster can be fun, but if the players want to clever their way around it I don't mind them getting right to the point: how does the world react to this thing going away? E: That said, were I such a vampire I would make it super hard to get to me while I'm sleeping, with guards and traps and fake coffins with alarms. Subjunctive fucked around with this message at 17:26 on Jul 31, 2017 |
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Jul 31, 2017 17:23
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if the players figure out a cool and innovative way to win, let them have the win and move on to the next challenge. if you have a two hour session planned and the group is on track to finish by hour 1, the answer isn't to stonewall for 60 minutes, it's to come up with another boss to kill in the time left
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Jul 31, 2017 17:29
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OK, glad people agree with my reasoning! I explicitly described this vampire as monstrous and a bit animalistic — like Nosferatu (although I was really just thinking Petyr from What We Do in the Shadows) — so it was just hiding out by itself in a nasty catacomb. I don't think I'll have another vampire in this adventure, but in a future adventure it will be fun to build on this experience by introducing a vampire that's smarter and more prepared.
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Jul 31, 2017 17:32
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I had my friend play a changling in a 3.5 Eberron game which decided instead of fighting the cult I had set up for them, he would infiltrate it. Got one of them drunk, took his house key, shapeshifted into him, and grabbed his robes. He then just walked into the temple, which he had found and scoped out earlier, found the head cleric and brained him with a brick. It was a good plan and he got everyone else on board, so I just let him have it. Honestly, that was way more fun than some throwdown with a bunch of idiots. Having a DM just make up a bunch of stupid crap because he didn't think of your plan is the worst, and letting your players have it was a good call, IMO.
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Jul 31, 2017 21:03
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sleepy.eyes posted:I had my friend play a changling in a 3.5 Eberron game which decided instead of fighting the cult I had set up for them, he would infiltrate it. Got one of them drunk, took his house key, shapeshifted into him, and grabbed his robes. He then just walked into the temple, which he had found and scoped out earlier, found the head cleric and brained him with a brick. It was a good plan and he got everyone else on board, so I just let him have it. Honestly, that was way more fun than some throwdown with a bunch of idiots. That's kinda the oldest trick in the book, though  
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Jul 31, 2017 21:12
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I let a barbarian player instantly kill a fire snake by pissing on it.
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Jul 31, 2017 21:13
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P.d0t posted:That's kinda the oldest trick in the book, though Normally, yeah, but the guy doesn't read fantasy and never played DnD before. I was just impressed at how much thought the normally sort of suicidal group put into the whole operation. That and the fact they didn't rush in and get mulched as soon as they figured out where the cult was. Baby steps.
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Jul 31, 2017 21:19
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Polo-Rican posted:I was DMing a game recently and had the players enter a vampire's lair. Nothing is sweeter, as a player, than coming up with a good idea and having the DM admit it by going along with it. It's pretty poo poo to have an idea that should work but the DM makes it not with a garbage reason only because (s)he really wants you to do X. Echoing sentiments already stated, I say good job.
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Jul 31, 2017 23:40
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Any tips for running an Eberron game? Which are the good 3e/4e adventures? I want to run Seekers of the Ashen Crown and eventually introduce the Aurum as major antagonists(Dead for a Spell, maybe) but I need a good two or three hour opening session to get from 1st to 2nd asap. Any good ideas?
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Jul 31, 2017 23:45
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Is there any way of making a melee-focused pact of the blade warlock at all as good as just standing around spamming eldritch blast? It just seems to me like there's no good way to go about it without screwing your party out of the damage (and your ability to stay away from the danger)
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Aug 1, 2017 00:59
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Captain Walker posted:Any tips for running an Eberron game? Which are the good 3e/4e adventures? I want to run Seekers of the Ashen Crown and eventually introduce the Aurum as major antagonists(Dead for a Spell, maybe) but I need a good two or three hour opening session to get from 1st to 2nd asap. Any good ideas? No clue, but my group's dm had the Blood of Vol cultists we pissed off drink their potions of fireball instead of throwing them, putting us in constant danger of dealing with suicide bombers and I think every game should have that.
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Aug 1, 2017 01:39
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Lori posted:Is there any way of making a melee-focused pact of the blade warlock at all as good as just standing around spamming eldritch blast? It just seems to me like there's no good way to go about it without screwing your party out of the damage (and your ability to stay away from the danger) If you can use UA stuff then I can't possibly recommend Hexblade highly enough. Two-three levels of Fighter is also quite nice, especially if your first level is Fighter so you can don plate and dump Dex. Otherwise, Fiend patron, greatsword, GWM, Armor of Agathys and Fire Shield are all your friends for a bladelock. AoA makes you pretty drat sturdy in addition to hurting enemies that hit you (and it just melts multiattackers).
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Aug 1, 2017 01:49
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Lori posted:Is there any way of making a melee-focused pact of the blade warlock at all as good as just standing around spamming eldritch blast? It just seems to me like there's no good way to go about it without screwing your party out of the damage (and your ability to stay away from the danger) Start as a level 1 fighter fo the fighting style and heavy armor proficiency, then multiclass into warlock. Additionally, be a Hexblade from Unearthed Arcana.
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Aug 1, 2017 02:08
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Lori posted:Is there any way of making a melee-focused pact of the blade warlock at all as good as just standing around spamming eldritch blast? It just seems to me like there's no good way to go about it without screwing your party out of the damage (and your ability to stay away from the danger) Why, yes. Take your first level in Fighter for CON proficiency, heavy armor proficiency, fighting style, second wind and more base HP, and the rest of your levels go into Warlock (very preferably Fiend). Your stat priorities go STR > CHA > CON. What you're looking into doing is wielding a greatsword with Great Weapon Fighting style, and your damage is going to be better than Eldritch Blast. Not by much, but you only need to cross the threshold by a little to justify it, and then you get tactical considerations to support the approach: you have better AC, can off-tank effectively with TempHP sources, can deliver very punishing opportunity attacks (through Warcaster), serve as a good platform for reactive damage through Armor of Agathys + Fire Shield (+ Hellish Rebuke). So what gameplay options do you have here? Well, Heavy Armor Master combines very nicely with Armor of Agathys in terms of delivering reactive damage (and can combine it with Blade Ward). Taking Warcaster is of course the way to go if you wish to maintain Concentration on say Hex. As with any 2h strength build, GWM and PAM are effective damage boosts though you don't really have the feats available to go for both. Warlock doesn't get many cantrips, but you have Green-Flame Blade, Booming Blade and Sword Burst on your list. In any case, you are very limited in your number of ASIs so you are only going to take 1, maybe 2 feats, and the rest are going to go into maxing your strength then pumping your charisma with the reminder. This is all released stuff, but if UA is allowed then you get a bunch of options on what to do with your Bonus Action through various invocations, and notably the Hexblade patron. With Hexblade the way to go would be picking Dueling from the Fighter dip, grabbing the Polearm Master feat, and then going Shield+Quarterstaff (reminder that Quarterstaves can be Arcane Foci). Melee is only going to be marginally better than EB until Warlock 12, and actually worse for a couple levels after the 3rd EB ray, but at Warlock 12 you get to double dip CHA to damage and now the staff hits like a truck.
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Aug 1, 2017 02:18
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Conspiratiorist posted:
My GM was willing to very slightly buff casters and handwave this as "you can duct-tape your arcane focus to your weapon".
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Aug 1, 2017 02:33
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Honestly you should be able to just pick any suitable piece of gear and declare that to be your focus (like a spellbook or a weapon or a shield), but from a mechanics optimization perspective the only ones who would actually care about this are sword & board sorcerers.
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Aug 1, 2017 02:43
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So recently my friends at work and I decided to try 5th edition D&D. I am a DM of 3.5 and 4th experience, and having read your guys stuff posted here for a bit, I really need to know how to fix things. So, I was reading about how fighters, some class specifics, skill DCs and whatnot are kinda broken. is there any really good reading onto this particular problem and how to fix it? Additionally, I always just tended to let players shop the DMG and swap stuff across the board in my campaign setting due to it being higher magic than Faerun, and given they don't list gp values of magic items (idiots) in the DMG, has anyone attempted to quantify the power versus gp value for 5th yet or do I gotta do that myself? Any advice would be awesome.
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Aug 1, 2017 02:47
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Lord Psychodin posted:So recently my friends at work and I decided to try 5th edition D&D. I am a DM of 3.5 and 4th experience, and having read your guys stuff posted here for a bit, I really need to know how to fix things. DMG does have prices, but it's not per item. It's per rarity. It's at the start of the Magic Item section, starting about 15 pages before the actual descriptions. Common are 50-100gp, uncommon are 101-500gp, rare are 501-5000gp (recommended char level 5+, sometimes interpreted as needing to be 5+ to use it effectively if your DM is a dick or the player is being powergamey). Very rare are 5001-50000gp (11th level+), Legendary are 50000+, 17th level or higher. If you want to get a feel for what they should be finding, the Magic Item Tables A, B, C, etc are super dumb to roll on, but A is your common poo poo, B is a stuff you'd find 3rd-4th level or so (Your bags of holding, 2nd and 3rd level spell scrolls, Cap of Water Breathing). C is sort of your 5th-7th level poo poo, etc, etc. There's 9 tables, you shouldn't be finding much of the poo poo off the last one until 17th level+. At level one, give them access to the Common stuff, but even then their starting gold isn't going to get them super far. Unless you're being super serious, MOST of the class specific stuff isn't that bad. The Berserker Barbarian seems to be the worst, and the original recipe Ranger seems to get a lot of poo poo as well.
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Aug 1, 2017 03:14
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Lord Psychodin posted:So recently my friends at work and I decided to try 5th edition D&D. I am a DM of 3.5 and 4th experience, and having read your guys stuff posted here for a bit, I really need to know how to fix things. Here's a guide I made for setting skill check DCs that have some basis in player stats: https://songoftheblade.wordpress.com/2017/06/01/rationalized-skill-check-dcs-for-5th-edition-dd/ The main watch-out here is that you should let the players be empowered. A non-caster can't call upon 4e-type powers and rituals to declare that Things Happen - so it's sort of falls upon you as the DM to say yes to them, either outright, or with a roll that both A. has a reasonable chance of them succeeding and B. stakes that won't screw them over if they fail. If a Fighter wants to pull off a stunt, either just give it to them, or make them do a single roll, and don't set the DC too high, and don't hit them with a hard penalty if they fail. Too many rolls (one to jump on the chandelier, another to aim it properly, a third to fall safely) guarantees failure at some point, and hard penalties on failure will discourage innovative play.
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Aug 1, 2017 03:39
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Is there a good guide for how many / how powerful magic items a PC should have by a certain level? And is there a good multiclass dip for an archery focused variant human / revised ranger at level 5? I was thinking about Rogue, but I'm open to whatever is fun. Hollandia fucked around with this message at 05:03 on Aug 1, 2017 |
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Aug 1, 2017 04:21
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Hollandia posted:Is there a good guide for how many / how powerful magic items a PC should have by a certain level? The unspoken guideline is having a +1 weapon at level 5 or 6, +2 at level 11ish and +3 as a very shiny reward. Everything else you hand out when you think it's cool.
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Aug 1, 2017 05:28
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bewilderment posted:The unspoken guideline is having a +1 weapon at level 5 or 6, +2 at level 11ish and +3 as a very shiny reward. Everything else you hand out when you think it's cool. So after all this good info, I just have a very big question, how does a fighter exactly tank compared to 4th ed? Rather, fill that role? I was quite used to the leap attack shock trooper fighter as the end result of 3.5. how does such a character protect or do they just deal damage again?(I already decided as a houserule any spell targetting yourself or any ally can't be broken from concentration, (with feats added in) Lord Psychodin fucked around with this message at 06:13 on Aug 1, 2017 |
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Aug 1, 2017 06:06
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Lord Psychodin posted:So after all this good info, I just have a very big question, how does a fighter exactly tank compared to 4th ed? Rather, fill that role? I was quite used to the leap attack shock trooper fighter as the end result of 3.5. how does such a character protect or do they just deal damage again?(I already decided as a houserule any spell targetting yourself or any ally can't be broken from concentration, (with feats added in) You don't really tank in 5e unless there is literally a bottleneck to funnel people through. Also since your attack of opportunities are capped by default, enemies can freely run past you.
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Aug 1, 2017 06:20
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kingcom posted:You don't really tank in 5e unless there is literally a bottleneck to funnel people through. Also since your attack of opportunities are capped by default, enemies can freely run past you. what does the fighter do then, exactly? 
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Aug 1, 2017 06:40
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Lord Psychodin posted:what does the fighter do then, exactly? Swing their weapon. And if they get leveled up, they can swing their weapon MULTIPLE TIMES! - At least if 5e is anything like 3.5.
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Aug 1, 2017 06:48
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Lord Psychodin posted:So after all this good info, I just have a very big question, how does a fighter exactly tank compared to 4th ed? Rather, fill that role? I was quite used to the leap attack shock trooper fighter as the end result of 3.5. how does such a character protect or do they just deal damage again?(I already decided as a houserule any spell targetting yourself or any ally can't be broken from concentration, (with feats added in) They're more inclined to be damage dealers here in 5e, but tanking isn't completely out of the question. The Battle Master has maneuvers that either impose disadvantage on attacks not against the fighter (goading) or all attacks as long as the fighter is within line of sight (menacing). The Protection fighting style is a thing, although the restrictions of needing to equip a shield and to stand within 5' of the protectee make it more situational than I'd like it to be. The additional ASIs lessen the opportunity cost to take feats, which for tanking means Sentinel. If UA content is allowed at your table, there's a fighting style (tunnel fighter?) that effectively lets you make as many opportunity attacks as you want if you spend a bonus action on your own turn. There's also the Knight archetype, which is pretty much purpose-built around tanking by reviving the mechanic of "marking". A couple Barbarian builds punish enemies for not targeting you as well. The one that comes online soonest is the revised Ancestral Guardian from UA.
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Aug 1, 2017 06:49
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Lord Psychodin posted:So after all this good info, I just have a very big question, how does a fighter exactly tank compared to 4th ed? Rather, fill that role? I was quite used to the leap attack shock trooper fighter as the end result of 3.5. how does such a character protect or do they just deal damage again?(I already decided as a houserule any spell targetting yourself or any ally can't be broken from concentration, (with feats added in) The short answer is that they really can't. The long answer: Characters get one Reaction per round*, and OAs cost a Reaction, so once you do your one OA, you're done. OAs are also only triggered by leaving an enemy's Reach, as opposed to leaving a single square that's within reach - so as long as you don't walk away from the Fighter, you can still walk around them. So we're back to the pre-4e model where "tanking" is a function of: * having a gentleman's agreement with the DM to please not run past the Fighter * fighting in quarters cramped enough that the Fighter can literally body-block the monsters * the Fighter being a dangerous enough target in his own right that the DM wants to kill them for their own sake (but the Fighter also isn't this dangerous in 5e as a damage-dealer, either) You still have a few options: * the Sentinel feat causes successful OAs to reduce movement to zero, and lets you take OAs even if the enemy uses Disengage, and lets you take OAs if an enemy within your reach attacks someone else. This is the closest you'll get to a 4e Fighter's Combat Superiority and Combat Challenge, but you're still hobbled by the limit of one Reaction/OA per round * the Polearm Master feat lets you trigger OAs when an enemy leaves reach, instead of only when they leave it, so that helps a little * there's a Marking optional rule in the DMG that lets you Mark an enemy when you attack them, and then the first OA that you take against a Marked enemy doesn't cost your Reaction (but a second one would). But this is a global rule change, and it applies to everyone, not just to the Fighter * there's an Unearthed Arcana article with a new "Tunnel Fighter" Fighting Style, which lets you spend your Bonus Action so that you can take an unlimited number of OAs * there's another Unearthed Arcana article with a new "Knight" Archetype, whose Implacable Mark is a very close approximation of a 4e Fighter's Marking. * as opposed to 3e, where you can take Combat Reflexes to increase OAs to [1 + Dex modifier] per round, or 4e where you get one OA per character-turn.
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Aug 1, 2017 06:55
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gradenko_2000 posted:* as opposed to … 4e where you get one OA per character-turn. I'm currently statting up a level 6 fighter for a 5E game. Going polearm Battle Master because that seems like the least boring way to play the class without getting into the whole spellcasting business, but even so it feels kind of anaemic. The rest of the party seems to have the damage output part well in hand (GWF paladin and a maul-using hexblade), so hopefully getting to do some controller-y/leader-y stuff will be fun at least. 
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Aug 1, 2017 07:59
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gradenko_2000 posted:* the Fighter being a dangerous enough target in his own right that the DM wants to kill them for their own sake (but the Fighter also isn't this dangerous in 5e as a damage-dealer, either) Fighter is right behind Paladin as the top damage dealer in 5e
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Aug 1, 2017 10:37
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Conspiratiorist posted:Fighter is right behind Paladin as the top damage dealer in 5e I'm willing to stand corrected on this and defer to you 
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Aug 1, 2017 10:41
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gradenko_2000 posted:Here's a guide I made for setting skill check DCs that have some basis in player stats: https://songoftheblade.wordpress.com/2017/06/01/rationalized-skill-check-dcs-for-5th-edition-dd/ Just wanted to quickly say thanks for the work in these, they're great and the monster one is also fantastic. As a more general question, how people handle skill monkeys like bards in a party without setting DC's so high that no one else can stand a chance.
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Aug 1, 2017 12:24
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let bards do what they want, it's literally always better than what you have planned. When they finally fail, then combat happens. (full disclosure: I always play Bard)
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Aug 1, 2017 12:28
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Loosely regarding skeleton talk, I just want to say it's a bad, bad DM who tries to limit the things he as a DM can do to spell effects players have. My players in the post-cybermagipocalyptic Faerun 11491 setting just came upon a warehouse of Manchurian candidate suicide kenku who teach themselves Contingency and Fireball and then suicide bomber themselves into people if certain criteria are met. Yes, of course kenku have 6th and 3rd level slots and no other slots - they are NPCs they have whatever I feel like. Similarly, NPC skeletons go all murder
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Aug 1, 2017 13:54
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