|
Mendrian posted:Well right. Every time somebody says, "But what about my friend who literally was raised in an attic, devoid of human contact?!" I have to wonder if the problem exists outside of hypotheticals. "My players have gotta give me something" is basically identical to the scenario you've painted. Yeah, I've played with some really awkward people, and I've yet to meet a player who can't give something. I just don't like the idea that the really awkward player can't just say "I use skill X trying to get result Y, which will look like Z" and roll the loving dice and get the results as good as the person who wants to do a little improv scene and roll the dice. And I flat out reject the idea that the really awkward player isn't allowed to be as good at skill X as the player who wants to do the improv thing, or that the improv-fan player can auto-pass what would be a skill check for the awkward player. Roll the dice and see what happens. If you really do enjoy improv, you'll enjoy rolling the dice first and then playing through a short scene regardless of the result you're playing towards. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 06:26 on May 24, 2018 |
#
?
May 24, 2018 06:22
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 14, 2024 16:00 |
|
|
Baby T. Love posted:Answer my questions and I'll answer yours, friend. I'm just trying to understand this thread. Thats fair I guess. I'll try and do this without making a big detailed post that nobody ends up reading lol. Baby T. Love posted:I don't want this to become my catchphrase, but "If this is the hurdle you're stumbling on then D&D is not the system that can prop you up." What's wrong with saying "I won't allow a persuasion roll without some kind of leverage?" Or talking to that player about the problem they are creating by refusing to engage in roleplaying in this roleplaying game. Is this really the fault of D&D as a system or is the spirit of this thread possessing innocent goons? So the only important part of a social conflict is the intent. What are you trying to do in a scene, everything else is ultimately superfluous. If someone feels comfortable and enjoys giving a speech thats fine but its not something everyone is going to do, be good at or even enjoy really when it comes to a roleplaying game. That kind of person may also be someone who is forced or is trying to talk their way out of a problem. The thing is, in a debate or a argument or anything social really, having leverage isn't necessarily something you need to come up with. Burning Wheel is a system that does a great job at breaking down the different ways a social conflict can work. Someone with no basis in logic, reason or fact and with nothing to back them up can absolutely convince people to do something through their charm and fast words. Some people are just inherently more trustworthy from an outside appearance and just not all the right smiles and body language to impress that fact and make someone feel more comfortable around them. On top of that, the player, when a spotlight is put on them might not be a quick thinker or they might panic and not be able to come up with a good idea. Their character has 20 charisma and Expertise in Persuasion and Bluff and whatever talky skill is relevant but for whatever reason their player is blanking but their character probably wouldn't be in this situation. They might not be refusing to engage in the roleplaying they might be genuinely trying but failing. This is something that comes up a lot really and in my experience no matter who the person is they are going to have an off night at some point or have long day at work and come to the game already tired. I'm not sure why you brought up people refusing to engage in roleplaying or anything. The thing people are bring up is that people are engaging, they are providing player action and intent they just aren't doing the roleplay and the improv part. The second part of the problem is that when this happens, other systems have some guidance or some toolset to work it out, D&D however very much encourages the GM / Player split which I think is a problem. There is no way for a play to introduce a narrative element into a scene like that or world build on the fly or anything. As a result that devide means the easy and natural response of crowsource how something works out after the dice is rolled and the resolution has been determined but the methodology hasn't. Your advice was actually pretty telling of the problem 'just have it happen off screen don't worry about it move on' which often isn't really the most satisfying of answers. D&D is a game with a tonne of rules to manage kind of insanely irrelevant level of detail, from all the different spells and extremely specific and locked down combat rules, to food useage and travelling times, all the detailed information about monsters that goes far beyond what you would use them for and how many rations someone is going to go through and specifically how many kg that ration pack is going to take up. Thats a lot of detail in those places with a lot of hard and fast rulings so when it comes to anything social I strongly disagree with the idea that you should just go do freeform roleplaying. It doesn't click with how any other part of the system is designed. AlphaDog posted:And I flat out reject the idea that the really awkward player isn't allowed to be as good at skill X as the player who wants to do the improv thing, or that the improv-fan player can auto-pass what would be a skill check for the awkward player. Roll the dice and see what happens. If you really do enjoy improv, you'll enjoy rolling the dice first and then playing through a short scene regardless of the result you're playing towards. This is something I absolutely agree with for reference Baby T. Love if you are trying to understand my stances in this thread. Being willing to pass on the intent and even the goal of the action is the only important part in a game like this. D&D's problem is that it seems expect more without giving any tools and handrails for the players to know how and what more is.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 06:32
|
|
|
I'm getting ready to do my very first AL stuff in prep for doing the Moonshae stuff at GenCon this year. I'm fairly novice to 5E, but I played a bit of 2E many years ago. I like being a mage. I was a mage in WoW, I was a mage in FF14, I play Storm in M:tG, and I renamed the bluetooth in my new car "Wizard Van". That said, can someone offer me a sort of compare/contrast overview of the cater classes/archetypes that I'll be able to choose from for AL, sort of "how these classes play out in practice"? I assume that, given that I'll be doing pre-written AL scenarios, there will be a good mix of combat/non-combat so I'll need to cover both sides of that with my choices. Also, if anyone has any good tips for AL play, I'd be glad to hear them. Thanks.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 06:44
|
|
|
It's compromise. It's hyperbolic to suggest you'd need or want a detailed argument just to roll persuasion but it also can't be denied that more detail generally makes for more interesting play. "At least outline what you want and why this person would take a risk for you" is perfectly fine.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 06:47
|
|
|
Oh, and in my experience "Roll the dice then describe or roleplay the result" for skills can also get really good descriptive results or even improv/roleplay from players who might not want to (or be able to) do that if they don't already know the result. I don't know why, but I think it's got something to do with the uncertainty or open-endedness of "tell me how you're trying" as opposed to "tell me how you failed".
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 06:51
|
|
|
There's a GMing principle outlined by I think one of the PBTA pioneers which is "in order to do it, do it". You can do as much narrative description as you'd like, but at the end of the day the only way to interact with the world (short of the GM giving it to you) is to use the rules. That seems to be in keeping with what AlphaDog is suggesting (and personally one that I agree with)
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 06:56
|
|
|
It's the duty of the DM to draw the line somewhere - I'll allow performance rolls for lute-playing but not battle rapping.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 07:48
|
|
|
gradenko_2000 posted:There's a GMing principle outlined by I think one of the PBTA pioneers which is "in order to do it, do it". You can do as much narrative description as you'd like, but at the end of the day the only way to interact with the world (short of the GM giving it to you) is to use the rules. That seems to be in keeping with what AlphaDog is suggesting (and personally one that I agree with) Like that, yeah. I learned how to do it from a local con I went to in... poo poo, like 1996 or something. Before I was 18, anyway. My friends had to leave early so I signed up for a rules-light game that didn't sound much like my kind of thing. That poo poo turned out to be waaaaay out of my "I hit it with my sword. I cast lightning bolt" comfort zone and I was really awkward at first, but the combination of "Roleplay/improv encouraged, not required" and "To do it in the game, just say what you're trying to do. If there's a chance of failure, engage the resolution mechanic and then say what happens" was a real eye opener for me at the time. You always say what happens based on the resolution result. The GM never tells you what happens with no recourse, because you always have input. The result is never "nothing happens". About an hour in, I finally got it and my character shot down the nazi zeppelin with a flaregun. Like this: Me: "Just the flare gun left? drat! I shoot it at the approaching soldiers!" <roll the dice, very low result> Me: <still not quite getting it, slightly disappointed> "I missed..." GM: "...what did you hit instead? Something bad, right?" <internal "click" moment where I finally internalise that this isn't "you rolled low, that's a miss, so nothing happens" and that I don't have to wait to be told what the result was, I should make up a "complication" type of result because it was a low roll> Me: "...the. loving. ZEPPELIN!" GM: "The one that's floating low over everyone?" Me: "YES! THE ZEPPELIN! IT CATCHES ON FIRE!" GM: "OH poo poo!" Everyone else: "OOOOOOH SHIIIIIIIIIT!" Most memorable failed roll ever. e: Talking with the GM afterwards, I asked how the zeppelin thing worked. She explained the difference between "I choose to shoot down the zeppelin, go me, I win" and "I turn the zeppelin that's 20' above everyone into a flaming ball of descending wreckage". I got it. She then told me that she'd run the scenario about 15 times, and the zeppelin had only ever survived once, but had never been blown up the same way twice. I got that, too. I asked if I could buy the adventure. She said "no", and then gave me a copy: A list of NPCs and traits and then dot points about locations and groups, less than an a4 page. That was probably the thing that caused the biggest leap in my ability to run a consistently fun game. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 08:11 on May 24, 2018 |
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 07:55
|
|
|
Toshimo posted:I'm getting ready to do my very first AL stuff in prep for doing the Moonshae stuff at GenCon this year. I'm fairly novice to 5E, but I played a bit of 2E many years ago. The full Caster classes are. Bards. Who can learn a bit of everything and be good at it while supporting and buffing the party. Their Subclasses allow them to focus down a bit more making them very versatile. Cleric. The Standard Divine Caster. Able to specialize in certain directions by their gods domain. Like becoming more fighty, blasty or healy. Druids. A different type of Divine Caster. For the most part, you can go full nature caster with them, or play them as a shape shifter. Sorcerers. A caster that has a smaller pool of spells, in exchange for being able empower their spells in various ways. Wizards. The traditional Arcane Caster. Hard to go wrong with it, they get access to a very large and versatile spell list, and gain some extra features depending on which school of magic they focus on. (My descriptions are pretty lovely andI bet someone else will be able to elaborate on and explain this stuff better.) MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 08:12 on May 24, 2018 |
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 08:09
|
|
|
AlphaDog posted:This, not so much. As far as listing some "interesting variations" thats totally fine.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 08:33
|
|
|
FRINGE posted:Im hundreds of posts behind (so it will be a while until I see whatever is next) but I was thinking partially about the effect on how people think about things as they plan adventures. The old way made the DM think in terms of "this is a creature that can do things, they can pick up a chair and hit someone, they can throw a pot at someone, they can pick up their dead buddies axe and take a swing", the new way seems like it suggests (implicitly) that the individual robots do specific things, and the streams dont cross. You mean like "The orc has a sword, says so in the monster manual. So it can't use an axe because it doesn't say it can in the monster manual. Also there's no "hit with a chair" ability so the orc can't hit you with a chair"? I mean... OK, that happens. But it's not really new, GMs have been loving that up since forever. Unless you mean that the inclusion of more specific abilities / gear / etc encourages that kind of fuckup? I don't get the impression that that's happening, but if it is then I agree with you that it should be addressed.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 08:57
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:The full Caster classes are. MonsterEnvy posted:Cleric. The Standard Divine Caster. Able to specialize in certain directions by their gods domain. Like becoming more fighty, blasty or healy. MonsterEnvy posted:Wizards. The traditional Arcane Caster. Hard to go wrong with it, they get access to a very large and versatile spell list, and gain some extra features depending on which school of magic they focus on. For all casters you'll also want a high constitution but I'm throwing this at the end because constitution has no role-playing implications, it's just a tax. What do you consider a magey playstyle? Spellcasters in D&D use a spell system called vancian casting, which is pretty nontraditional outside of D&D. If you want to play a wow-style mage who shoots out a seemingly inexhaustible supply of murderbolts you might want a Warlock. They lack the end-game game-breaking narrative powers of a level 13+ wizard or cleric but they're the undisputed kings of murderbolts. Charisma/dex again.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 09:07
|
|
|
Toshimo posted:I'm getting ready to do my very first AL stuff in prep for doing the Moonshae stuff at GenCon this year. I'm fairly novice to 5E, but I played a bit of 2E many years ago. Bards. Jack of All Trades, Master of Many. They aren't very good at damage early on, though later on they can steal spells from other casters which can patch this. Otherwise they are decent healers, fairly good at debuffers and buffers. And can pretty much do whatever they want. Again in the core book they have all of 1 damaging cantrip. Beyond spells they are one of the two best classes for skills. Gains their archetype at 3rd level. Cleric. They have fairly decent attack spells, the best of the healing spells, good buffs and probably debuffs. Depending on Domain you might get spells from other class lists. Depending on Domain they might get Heavy Armor. Some Domains focus more on melee weapon attacks while others more on Cantrips, with all Domains getting either a bonus die of damage on melee attacks or adding Wis mod to Cantrip damage, at 8th level. Some domains are more blaster, some more tanky, Healing Domain is going to straight up be the best healer. Gains their archetype at 1st level. Druids. Many take this class for the Moon Druid archetype which gets combat capable Wild Shape. Either domain has access to pretty much the same spells, though can't cast spells while Wild Shaped until very late in the game. Land Druid gets some autoprepared spells like Clerics do with their Domains. And get a few other bonuses, including the 1/day refresh a certain amount of spell slots on a short rest that Wizards get. As far as spells they have most of the healing options, and a few that are limited to pretty much just Druids. They have decent combat spells, but mostly different from what Wizards and Sorcerers get. One such spell is actually fairly great, Moonbeam. They get some good debuff stuff. Some real good early stuff is Entangle and Glitterdust. They get some good buffs, different from what Clerics get. Gains their archetype at 2nd level. Sorcerers. Have the most Cantrips starting out, and the fewest spells. Which is kind of weird when compared to a specific other class. There selection is largely like the Wizard. There may be some differences but I can't remember off hand. Both classes do have some buffs, but tend to less than a Cleric or Druid. The two classes have probably the largest selection, and possibly best, direct damage spells. Not that direct damage is really the best way to go. Both probably have plenty of crowd control type spells, though Wizard may have more. The big thing that sets Sorcerers apart is their Sorcery Points that they start getting at 2nd level. These can be spent to create more spell slots. Or more importantly once they get to 3rd level they get a few Metamagics, abilities they can use by spending Sorcery Points. Such as Twinned which lets a single target spell target two targets. Great for things like Buffs, and decent for damaging rays or what have you. Quicken lets you spend points to cast a action spell as a bonus action, though still doesn't let you cast two leveled spells in a turn, but you could cast a leveled spell as a bonus and use your action to cast a cantrip. Another lets you ignore allies in your AoE. I believe others allow ignoring Somatic or similar components. The archetypes for the Sorcerer either get wild magic which can make things less predictable, and depending on DM let you do a bunch of random things when casting spells. Or Dragon which gives 13+Dex mod AC which is as good as Mage Armor, eventually a bonus to damage for a corresponding element, and even higher up actual winged flight. Gains archetype at 1st level. Wizards. Has probably the largest list of possible spells. Unlike other casters cannot lose a spell to gain another of the same level when leveling up, but can spend time and money scribing spells into their spellbook when they come across them. Spell list is mostly the same as Sorcerer. The Wizards thing is they can regain a few spells slots, based on their level, 1/day on a short rest. The Archetypes are all over the place. Abjurer can get a buffer to reduce damage when they cast Abjuration spells. Evoker gets the ability to ignore a number of allies when using AoEs, eventually deal half damage on a successful save on a cantrip, add Int to Evocation spells damage, and eventually the ability to maximise damage. Divination can roll d20s at the start of the day and pass those out in place of rolls by players or the DM later in the day. Give an ally that 20 you rolled earlier, or the DM that 1 or 3. And similar things for the other archetypes. Later on, toward the end of the game, the Wizard gets a 1st and 2nd level spell they can cast at will. Gains their archetype at 2nd level. Warlock. The one class MonsterEnvy didn't include. It is a caster, but perhaps not a full caster in that it does not use the same chart for spell slots other classes use. Instead the Warlock starts with 1, gains a 2nd at 2nd level, and then getting to 3 and eventually 4 around 10th level. These limited slots recharge on a short rest instead of a long rest, making the Warlock perhaps the most short rest dependant class in the game. The Warlock has the most restrictive spell list in the game. Archetypes can add spells, such as Fiend adding Fireball. The Warlock has very few cantrips, and surprisingly more spells known than the Sorcerer. Which is odd. Especially since Warlock is known as THE Cantrip caster. Warlocks are the only ones who have access to Eldritch Blast, a cantrip that adds beams as you level instead of adding dice. Warlocks also have access to a thing called Invocations, which were THE CLASS FEATURE of Warlocks back when they were introduced in 3.5, but now largely take a back seat to the limited casting of the Warlock. One such Invocation adds Cha mod to the damage of each beam of Eldritch Blast, which turns it into the best damage cantrip in the game. Others improve the cantrip or do other cool things, one gives at will Mage Armor, another gives at will Detect Magic, another gives Devil's Sight which is better than Darkvision because it can even see through Magical Darkness. Other Invocations are less impressive, giving a 1/day spell that uses one of their slots. As the Warlock has so few spell slots their slots all level as the Warlock does, eventually giving them four level 5 slots. Beyond that they get to pick 1 spell per spell level above 5 to cast 1/day. These are mostly terrible and many don't recommend playing a Warlock beyond 10th level or so. The Warlock gets a choice of Chain, Book or Blade at 3rd level, these are not quite archetypes, and do open up new Invocations. Chain gives a Familiar, giving some options Find Familiar can't pick, and the ability to actually use an action to have their familiar attack. Book gives 3 cantrips from any casting class, and the ability to have some rituals, with invocations to pick up more rituals later. Blade gives the ability to create a melee weapon as an action, or changing it as an action. This weapon is magical which can be useful. The actual archetype is picked at 1st level, these are Patrons. Fey gives some illusion or teleporting stuff, such things as Misty Step or Greater Invisibility, and class abilities that are fairly similar. Fiend has some of the more damaging options, like Fireball, class abilities like gaining temp hp when you kill, or a big damaging option at 10th. Great Old One has a lot of odd stuff, gets Telepathy and eventually the ability to make someone your Thrall. A later book adds the Hexblade which lets you pick a 1-handed weapon to use Cha with, or any weapon you create with Blade Pact. Gets medium armor proficiency, not that the class gives the option of starting with medium, gives some better weapon proficiencies, etc. Get a Hex that gives you a better chance to crit against that target, adds proficiency mod to damage against that target and regain hp when that target dies. A Hexblade Pact of the Blade is actually decent at attacking with a weapon, though still would probably be better off just using Eldritch Blast, and is one of the builds people suggested for a Charismatic Fighter, even though it isn't really a Fighter.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 09:10
|
|
|
Toshimo posted:Also, if anyone has any good tips for AL play, I'd be glad to hear them. Thanks. Youtube user Puffin Forest made two fairly brief videos on AL. His experience pretty much matched what I experienced at GenCon's AL games last year, and they may help you if you haven't run across them already. General "how AL feels compared to private games": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0O_77DTXVgI The mechanics of AL/stuff you need to know: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwcpOvnzytw If you plan to play some AL games to level up a character before the convention proper, make sure the place you play at actually does AL. You'll know it's actually AL if you're given a log sheet for your character. My FLGS didn't do this, so I didn't have any paperwork. Thankfully, none of the DMs I ran into at GenCon asked to see my logs, though my level 6 Warlock with no magic items and a sensible amount of gold didn't raise red flags the same way some other guy with a Staff of Wizardry at level 8 did. While not essential, it might help a bit to familiarize yourself with the setting (Forgotten Realms in general and Moonshae Isles specifically for this year's adventure track). I'd only played homebrew settings, so I was a bit lost among the various factions, who the Red Wizards were, how any NPC's connections might affect their motivations, etc. last year. Slippery42 fucked around with this message at 10:12 on May 24, 2018 |
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 10:07
|
|
|
This came up in a game we played but it was my understanding that prestidigitation clean or soil ability was permanent and that the ones that said an hour would last a hour. Also that spell is a fart machine.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 13:36
|
|
|
Slippery42 posted:General "how AL feels compared to private games": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0O_77DTXVgI Wow, 8 hour sessions, that takes me back. GMs do yourself a favor and learn how to run 4 hour sessions because you won’t be running 8 hours once all your players have kids at home.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 15:35
|
|
|
DM fiat has nerfed my familiar. I run it quickly but he's had so many bad experiences with familiars clogging up initiative order and prefers theater of the mind, which requires some bookkeeping on its position, etc. to the point that familiars don't participate in combat. I'm asking him if I can swap it out for a more exotic utility-focused familiar. Any suggestions I can throw at him? I've already mentioned the Chain Pact familiars, Tressyms, Gazers, Boggles, and Faerie Dragons.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 15:47
|
|
|
What would your fam be doing if you were using it combat?
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 15:57
|
|
|
Nehru the Damaja posted:DM fiat has nerfed my familiar. I run it quickly but he's had so many bad experiences with familiars clogging up initiative order and prefers theater of the mind, which requires some bookkeeping on its position, etc. to the point that familiars don't participate in combat. I'm asking him if I can swap it out for a more exotic utility-focused familiar. Any suggestions I can throw at him? I've already mentioned the Chain Pact familiars, Tressyms, Gazers, Boggles, and Faerie Dragons.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 15:58
|
|
|
Ok, duders, having read a bunch of stuff, and looking at the input here, I'm thinking maybe Wizard with the War Wizard features from Xanathar's. So, it seems like martials have a ton of ways to generate Advantage on combat rolls, but how do Wizards do the same? Like, can someone "Help" me in combat the way they can a martial class? Does my spell attack roll get advantage? Does this do anything for me if it's a DC check instead? Are there other good ways to generate Advantage/Disadvantage on spells?
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:05
|
|
|
Anyone have any idea where I could get a decent and not overly expensive set of fantasy themed poker chips? Running Storm King's Thunder and my guys are going to be going to a old style water boat casino and I want them to have fun doing a kind of casino night. I don't want to break the bank on these things, so I was hoping to find some pre-made. I'm not really looking to get a custom printed design, as so far it looks like something like that is going to run ~$25 for a one night affair for about 25 chips. Unfortunately it may just be my google-fu is poor, as searching for 'fantasy poker chips' just yields reproductions from Vegas. A big one is I don't want dollar values on them, or locations. 
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:05
|
|
|
Toshimo posted:Ok, duders, having read a bunch of stuff, and looking at the input here, I'm thinking maybe Wizard with the War Wizard features from Xanathar's. 
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:09
|
|
|
Drowning Rabbit posted:Anyone have any idea where I could get a decent and not overly expensive set of fantasy themed poker chips? Running Storm King's Thunder and my guys are going to be going to a old style water boat casino and I want them to have fun doing a kind of casino night. https://coinweek.com/coins/americana/rare-golden-goose-casino-chip-sold-75000/
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:14
|
|
|
Ignite Memories posted:What would your fam be doing if you were using it combat? Typical owl flyby stuff. Splicer posted:What are you and what is your current familiar? If you're just a regular familiar haver take an owl and set its default behaviour to "At the start of my turn it flies down and gives Player X advantage against Enemy Y" and otherwise it exists in a nebulous probabilistic state somewhere above the battlefield. If you're a fancy familiar haver do the same but with the invisible one warlocks get. GM gets to ignore your familiar's existence and you get to be Advantage Santa. It's win win. Conjuration wizard. The issue isn't that I don't run it fast enough. It's that the DM has removed familiars from combat relevance. And honestly I have no problem with that. Owl flyby is too good not to take but it's also boring as poo poo and I'm 10,000% willing to trade that for fun utility poo poo and RP opportunities.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:16
|
|
|
Drowning Rabbit posted:Anyone have any idea where I could get a decent and not overly expensive set of fantasy themed poker chips? Running Storm King's Thunder and my guys are going to be going to a old style water boat casino and I want them to have fun doing a kind of casino night. Do you know someone who owns the game Splendor? Those chips have images of precious gems on them as stickers.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:18
|
|
|
Splicer posted:This particular shitstorm kicked off when I posted a story about a new player in work getting hammered by the standard newbie traps, which Reik took offence to. I feel like we got off on the wrong foot. I'd like it if we could all be nerd friends. Toshimo posted:Ok, duders, having read a bunch of stuff, and looking at the input here, I'm thinking maybe Wizard with the War Wizard features from Xanathar's. For DC check spells you'd need to impose disadvantage on their saving throws. Restrained is probably the easiest of these conditions to create, with spells like Web. Bestow Curse also lets you just impose disadvantage on any one saving throw you choose.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:33
|
|
|
DalaranJ posted:Do you know someone who owns the game Splendor? Those chips have images of precious gems on them as stickers. I don't unfortunately, although I guess I could buy the game just for the chips and still be out ahead seeing as I would have a full game plus the chips for the ~price of custom printed chips. But the custom chips would have the actual iconography I could get designed for the river boat. Jeffrey of YOSPOS posted:comedy option: Absurd. I had no idea there was this much of a market for this stuff. ( Old chips )
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:39
|
|
|
Nehru the Damaja posted:Typical owl flyby stuff. They said, Tiny Gelatinous Cube. Good for cutting holes in things, disposing of bodies, and hilarious dessert-based assassinations. http://dnd4.wikia.com/wiki/Familiar 4e had some fun familiars
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:41
|
|
|
Drowning Rabbit posted:I don't unfortunately, although I guess I could buy the game just for the chips and still be out ahead seeing as I would have a full game plus the chips for the ~price of custom printed chips. But the custom chips would have the actual iconography I could get designed for the river boat.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 16:49
|
|
|
Splicer posted:Your original post sounds like your GM is worried more about the potential of bogging down combat than the actuality. The thrust of my suggestion was to remove the concept of your familiar as a separate trackable entity and replace it with your familiar as an at will free action that does <familiar's gimmick>. I'm totally down for some of these. I like a lot of the creepy/gross ones. I don't normally go for grandiose backstories but I stole a bit from an old English folk tale and treat my familiar and various conjurations as projections of a captured fey I keep locked in a tiny lead/iron/silver box. Giving him a form with some horrible indignity would be really great for that.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 17:03
|
|
|
Nehru the Damaja posted:I'm totally down for some of these. I like a lot of the creepy/gross ones. I don't normally go for grandiose backstories but I stole a bit from an old English folk tale and treat my familiar and various conjurations as projections of a captured fey I keep locked in a tiny lead/iron/silver box. Giving him a form with some horrible indignity would be really great for that.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 17:19
|
|
|
Kaysette posted:I don’t own it yet but I think the brand new book (Mordenkainen’s) has this type of stuff plus relevant monsters. Just wanted to report - Our local gaming store had Mordenkainen's in stock last night (Apparently it doesn't get officially released until next week but a few stores got early releases?) Mordenkainen's does have too much on Sigil/Lady of Pain, what it does have is some very interesting and in-depth looks at the War of Blood (demons/devils and the Hells, so new Tiefling subraces and possible info for Warlocks), Elven history (and some new subraces), and the Gith war (so some Planescape stuff here). Overall it was a good purchase because it does add some neat options to characters (the fae-elves that can change with the seasons might offer some fun player choices to my group.)
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 17:56
|
|
|
kingcom posted:The second part of the problem is that when this happens, other systems have some guidance or some toolset to work it out, D&D however very much encourages the GM / Player split which I think is a problem. There is no way for a play to introduce a narrative element into a scene like that or world build on the fly or anything. As a result that devide means the easy and natural response of crowsource how something works out after the dice is rolled and the resolution has been determined but the methodology hasn't. Does anyone have examples of what those toolsets look like for other systems? I've been looking into DMing for strangers but it seems like my friend-team experience is way different from the norm. kingcom posted:Their character has 20 charisma and Expertise in Persuasion and Bluff and whatever talky skill is relevant but for whatever reason their player is blanking but their character probably wouldn't be in this situation. kingcom posted:Your advice was actually pretty telling of the problem 'just have it happen off screen don't worry about it move on' which often isn't really the most satisfying of answers. Two things just for this small part of your post: I didn't mean to imply you could resolve it that way all of the time. I think I made it pretty clear that I thought it was not an easily solved problem. The example we were talking about was specifically a non-charismatic character. That's why I said it could be handled off-screen for comedic effect. I even said "you can't do it every time but if he's bad at that thing, you won't have to." kingcom posted:I'm not sure why you brought up people refusing to engage in roleplaying or anything. The thing people are bring up is that people are engaging, they are providing player action and intent they just aren't doing the roleplay Maybe my question isn't the terrible one you're thinking of but the good one I'm thinking of. Thanks for the sincere write-up. (not sarcasm)
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 18:01
|
|
|
Oh I didn't know the owl flyby tactic was a well known thing, though also I really shouldn't be surprised. My party's wizard has one and it's basically become the barbarian's best friend
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 20:13
|
|
|
Saiphae posted:Just wanted to report - Our local gaming store had Mordenkainen's in stock last night (Apparently it doesn't get officially released until next week but a few stores got early releases?) To be exact Wizard's affliated stores get it 10 days earlier. On the Lore chapters for Elves, Dwarves, Gnomes, and Halfings. While they are still primarily for DM's I do think Players could get a decent usage of them for help in how to role play their character. So while a bit short on character options I can see the book useful in that front for players. MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 20:26 on May 24, 2018 |
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 20:19
|
|
|
It seems pretty ridiculous that the game has been out this long and they haven't added a single new class outside of the PHB. The only ones in Unearthed Arcanas are Artificer and Mystic and those are both a hot mess right now.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 20:43
|
|
|
Reik posted:It seems pretty ridiculous that the game has been out this long and they haven't added a single new class outside of the PHB. The only ones in Unearthed Arcanas are Artificer and Mystic and those are both a hot mess right now. I kind of like the focus on Subclasses instead. I am however looking forward to seeing the Artificer and Mystic in their complete forms.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 20:58
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:I kind of like the focus on Subclasses instead. I am however looking forward to seeing the Artificer and Mystic in their complete forms. Yeah, I like having a lot of archetypes for each class. I feel like the way they structured multi-classing in 5e would make prestige classes a good fit, but I don't think there's been a single one published outside of UA?
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 21:43
|
|
|
Reik posted:Yeah, I like having a lot of archetypes for each class. There is not, and UA only has one: the Rune Scribe. I'm actually fond of the stipulation that prestige classes should be used to introduce some kind of new mechanic, as the Rune Scribe article introduces the Master Runes as an alternative form of magic. It's not really a means to become stronger so much as it is a path to a different kind of power.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 21:52
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 14, 2024 16:00 |
|
|
CeallaSo posted:There is not, and UA only has one: the Rune Scribe. I'm actually fond of the stipulation that prestige classes should be used to introduce some kind of new mechanic, as the Rune Scribe article introduces the Master Runes as an alternative form of magic. It's not really a means to become stronger so much as it is a path to a different kind of power. Yeah, a lot of the old 3.5 prestige classes that are just "better version of the class you're currently taking" would be out of place. Loremaster and such.
|
|
#
?
May 24, 2018 22:10
|
|