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Elector_Nerdlingen posted:If I wanted to go spear/shield for +ac and theme, I'd swap out pam/gwm, right? For what? Party won't be super optimised so it'a not enormously important but I don't wanna take useless stuff. Keep PAM as it works with spears. Breastplate, Shield and 14 Dex will get you an AC of 18. You could get +2 Dex at level 8 and go unarmored I guess but that's still only 16 AC. Instead of GWM, you could do: Lucky, Resilient with Dex (maybe adjust your scores to have an odd number to take full advantage), Mage Slayer if you know you'll face a lot of casters, Sentinel is nice as long as you have a buddy that stays next to you, and Shield Master is great as long as you ignore Crawford saying you can only use it AFTER attacking
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Mar 8, 2019 01:14
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Elector_Nerdlingen posted:If I wanted to go spear/shield for +ac and theme, I'd swap out pam/gwm, right? For what? Party won't be super optimised so it's not enormously important but I don't wanna take useless stuff. Unarmored Defense is kind of a trap option; unless both your CON and DEX are extremely high, you'll be better served by wearing actual armor. With 14 DEX and a breastplate, you're hitting 17 AC, so you'd need a combined DEX/CON modifier of +7 before you even break even, and that's a lot of ASIs that aren't going towards your STR or your feats.
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Mar 8, 2019 01:33
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It's nice to have until you can afford or find a breastplate though.
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Mar 8, 2019 01:41
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mastershakeman posted:There's simply no need for multiclassing when so many classes have their own variants. If it was just the 4 main classes, sure, but someone who wants to be a fighter mage can just be an Eldritch knight That's a really good kind of system for replacing multi-classing, too. Come up with like 5 things, bam, now you have a sneaky fighter or an archer monk or whatever. For the record, rogue/warlock is an incredibly cool idea, I've always wanted to play one, but for some reason no one ever sets something up for it.
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Mar 8, 2019 02:47
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I think the only way to do rogue warlock or whatever is all 18s . It's why even wizard/warlock sucks , MAD is real
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Mar 8, 2019 03:17
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I feel like Gharbad means less an actual multiclass and more something that captures the fun things about each class. Like not "I have rogue and warlock mechanics" but more "I want to be a magical sneaky person who does some demonic dirt" And if that's not what they mean, then that's what *I* want instead.
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Mar 8, 2019 03:25
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The problem with multiclassing is that WotC is either too lazy or too stupid to produce enough content to cover the things people want so to get certain core mechanics, you have to multiclass. For instance, I wanted to make a sniper rogue. To get better at being a shootyman, I had to take a level of fighter because it was the only way to get a bonus to-hit for my ranged attacks and it also just so happened to give me access to better bows. It was an easy dip because there just are not any other options to get better at the thing I wanted to do.
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Mar 8, 2019 03:36
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Toshimo posted:The problem with multiclassing is that WotC is either too lazy or too stupid to produce enough content to cover the things people want so to get certain core mechanics, you have to multiclass. Except being an elf, but honestly, who wants that?
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Mar 8, 2019 03:54
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The problem is that there's no rhyme or reason to the classes both narratively and mechanically. One class is "master of all things arcane forever," another just has "KINDA SNEAKY" written across it. And these identities are hardcoded into the classes as much as possible; if you are a wizard, you are CAST SPELLS and nothing else. Instead of a specialty, it becomes your only schtick. Like, a rogue/warlock could also just be a warlock who's sneaky, but since one class is built entirely around the identity of "sneaky," you end up feeling obligated to get some rogue in there somewhere. And a rogue can't just make an unwise (or exceptionally well detailed) pact with a demon, you have to put all your rogue poo poo on pause to take a level in a whole new class, hope you got the attributes for it.
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Mar 8, 2019 04:18
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ProfessorCirno posted:Level by level multiclassing was and is a hideous mistake. Multiclassing sucks in every version of D&D I've played since the early 90's, it's nothing but an extraordinarily clunky vehicle to try to break the system that remains in because it's a sacred cow. D&D has clearly never been designed with multiclassing in mind, and most of the fictional character concepts you could ostensibly run on a multiclass can be done more easily with a single class. 5E does what it can to discourage it by giving more tiered bonuses for sticking with a class, and still all anyone is ever talking about in character design is what multiclasses to do 1-2 level dips in, because Fifth Edition 095 is "take this class specialization, not that one" so multiclassing becomes the only question. 4E was better but not good because the classes were actually balanced for the most part, and most of the multiclassing options sucked, discouraging this depraved practice. For experienced/bored players, multiclassing became cherrypicking class features that WotC forgot to ban in the multiclass options. However, it was really easy to make a bad multiclass, and new players who didn't know what they were doing would immediately latch onto hybrid because it sounded cool, and make their first-ever character a morbidly worthless Frankenstein's monster that struggled to tie its shoes (picking an MC feat to slot yourself into alt-class paragon paths was admittedly not a bad system that felt mostly balanced, but still required significant experience and knowing what you were going to do at level 11 at level 1). 3E was multiclass abominations all the way down, the game outright expected you to dip ASAP, have a life plan that carefully plotted out levels 1-20, and almost all single-class characters were huge dopes unless they went Druid and to a lesser extent Wizard. AD&D had this weird thing where you were limited to a max set of levels in a class by race, which made no sense and all of my groups roundly ignored. Multiclassing involved long division or something and no one ever did it because it was hard enough figuring out if you could move your number around to be an ubermensch that qualified for Paladin. Name Change fucked around with this message at 04:25 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 04:20
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I've started reading through STK, and just what the hell is the point of Zephros? This NPC seems shoehorned into the book just to circumvent long travel times but that's something very easily handwaved by the DM, especially when the book states that this is not an adventure where anything is time-sensitive.
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Mar 8, 2019 04:38
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Nehru the Damaja posted:I feel like Gharbad means less an actual multiclass and more something that captures the fun things about each class. Like not "I have rogue and warlock mechanics" but more "I want to be a magical sneaky person who does some demonic dirt" I sometimes want rogue and warlock mechanics (I liked the 3.5 warlock, an arcane trickster for warlocks would have been fun), but I also like a magical sneaky person who steals the magic instead of reads from some dumb book or asks his magic dragon grandpa for some spell points
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Mar 8, 2019 05:41
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Conspiratiorist posted:
Your example does not explicitly say that PHB+1 isn't a matter of rules balance. Saying that it is about simplification doesn't exclude it also being about rules balancing. I never play AL myself, but I do play with one of the state organizers and he's talked several times about how new spells and abilities are tested and implemented in-house based on the restricted set of interactions: that promotes both simplicity and balance. I admit he could either be lying or mistaken about these motives, but they are certainly consistent with the posted material, simply with a different emphasis. Honestly, your point about how multiclassing is often suboptimal is enough explanation to satisfy me about why the rule is optional. It would be reasonable to call it "advanced," I suppose, as with feats. 5E likes to provide a bunch of rules systems as alternates. I can't agree that these somehow all count as suggested--frankly, XGtE has a bunch of alternate rules of widely varying quality, and few of them are suggested--and I don't suggest that optional rules are free from scrutiny (nor did I ever). I do think that rules which are not presented as alternative, optional, or peripheral should be scrutinized differently from the mainline rules. That said, it is fair to complain that by the time XGtE was published, usage of feats was so wide-spread that they should have been written with a little more care. Dragon Fear and Elven Accuracy are in no way balanced against each other and it doesn't take months of playtesting to prove it. "This rule is optional" may translate to "we don't know what the gently caress we're doing," and it's reasonable to complain about that. But a designer who says "I don't know how these work in-play so we'll mark them as optional" has been more responsible than a designer who says "these probably aren't right, but they're core rules, baby!" Edit: Gharbad, I'll try to post the modular system I'm working on sometime in the next week (I'm guessing it's of more interest than a "high-level encounter design" post, but maybe I will have time for both). It would let you do what you want assuming you can find anyone willing to try the rules out with you. L1: 14 build points. 1d10 HD (2), Three skills/one tool (1), Hexblade archetype (2, reduced to 1 by cashing in default wpn/armor profs for the Hexblade L1 package), Expertise (1), Sneak Attack (4 initially), Warlock casting L1(5). I think the 2 BP/level would let you increase the sneak attack, get your ASIs and give you full Warlock casting, but you'd have to trade off some of that if you wanted other rogue or warlock abilities (like Cunning Action or Eldritch Invocations). Dropping Expertise and lowering HD to 1d8 would help free up some points but there'd still be some tough decisions to make. Narsham fucked around with this message at 06:14 on Mar 8, 2019 |
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Mar 8, 2019 05:49
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Narsham posted:Your example does not explicitly say that PHB+1 isn't a matter of rules balance. Saying that it is about simplification doesn't exclude it also being about rules balancing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tchkd4mxEPc&t=1073s Jesus Christ you pedant.
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Mar 8, 2019 06:04
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Admiral Joeslop posted:Same but for a Kobold. All the ones I can find are ugly, the wrong style, or just bad. Kobold's predate D&D's usage and IIRC even then they only went 'tiny lizard men' circa 3e. Otherwise the dog-men look is entirely valid. That said if you want D&D looking kobolds I think Nolzur's is about the only option.
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Mar 8, 2019 13:12
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inthesto posted:I've started reading through STK, and just what the hell is the point of Zephros? He’s a crutch for the DMs/groups that on insist on using every rule in every book and haven’t yet realized you can just ignore or change the parts of the game you don’t like. AIME has a very in depth and thematic journy system that’s practically it’s own game but I abandoned it because it made more sense to just cherry pick the coolest stuff out of those tables to throw at the players.
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Mar 8, 2019 14:24
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BattleMaster posted:Yeah I feel like subclasses are cool and do a better job at multiclassing than the real multiclassing, aside from some real powergamey combos. If they ever do a 5.5E I'd hope they just ditch multiclassing and rebalance everything without it as a factor. With some rejiggering of the subclass options and maybe being able to pick a second subclass at some point at a higher level they could do better than multiclassing.
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Mar 8, 2019 14:33
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ritorix posted:No no no, you are going about this all wrong. Update. We have been riding a giant turtle down an underground river to my homeland of the lost city (an old module). After fighting some drow and praising Thrym(frost giant god) I had spell slots taken permanently and had my max hp reduced each time I cast a spell from Zargon. However Thrym was enhancing the spells I cast. So my spirit guardians add up a spell slot forever(until I kill zargon or can fully convert) but did 5d8 damage. Or adding 10 flat damage to toll the dead. The DM did a good job handling this. When we reached the lost city at the end of the river, we found out that the turtle we were riding is a dragon turtle who agreed to help us lay waste to the city and kill an avatar of Zargon at its heart if we use our helm of teleportation to bring him to the ocean afterwards. Next session is going to be intense since our wizard, our paladin, and myself are out of spell slots and can't long rest for another 10 hours in game. Going to play ride the moving fortress and protect it the best we can. I eagerly await our tpk
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Mar 8, 2019 15:30
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darnon posted:Kobold's predate D&D's usage and IIRC even then they only went 'tiny lizard men' circa 3e. Otherwise the dog-men look is entirely valid. There’s a bunch of options. 5e has its own miniatures line, you could buy a bunch of those. 3e had a D&D miniatures line, you could buy those. 4e had a product equivalent to the Monster Manual called the Monster Vault, you could buy a copy of that and use the tokens out of that. Pathfinder uses dragon kobolds and has a line of cardstock figure boxes called pawns. Their Bestiary 1 and Monster Codex boxes will have a bunch of kobolds in them. Or Pathfinder has its own miniatures as well. The cheapest DYI way is to print out kobold art and glue it to 1 inch cardstock circles.
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Mar 8, 2019 16:01
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Multiclassing should just be taking either the background for your character or archetype for your class and replacing it with some goodies from another class.
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Mar 8, 2019 16:12
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I’d just blow up the current system and replace it with just four classes (fighter, rouge, cleric, wizard) that get a set of starter pack abilities. Every ability, class feature, and whatnot would be rewritten to be a feat that any class can get. Maybe there is some restrictions like you need 13 int for spell casting feats or something but even then maybe not. When you level up you can pick one feat. Have a burlyboy but wish you could empower your fists with magic so you can be goku? Take that feat that gives you some spells when you level up. Sneakyguy who wishes he could backstab with the power of JESUS? Same deal take a feat that gives you some cleric powers. Etc... Note this is just a back of the napkin idea and no I haven’t though about how to balance all this poo poo so don’t ask.
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Mar 8, 2019 16:40
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Arivia posted:There’s a bunch of options. 5e has its own miniatures line, you could buy a bunch of those. 3e had a D&D miniatures line, you could buy those. Ah, yeah, I'd forgotten about the old blind buy ones from then. Looks like they ebay at $2-3 each or so which is only a bit less than the $4 for 3 guys Nolzur's gets you. Good option to fill out the variety or for particular individuals, although pretty sure they're smaller scale. Reaper has some kobolds too that range from okay lizardy to... ugly mishapen rat thing.
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Mar 8, 2019 16:41
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Numlock posted:I’d just blow up the current system and replace it with just four classes (fighter, rouge, cleric, wizard) that get a set of starter pack abilities. Every ability, class feature, and whatnot would be rewritten to be a feat that any class can get. Maybe there is some restrictions like you need 13 int for spell casting feats or something but even then maybe not.
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Mar 8, 2019 17:14
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inthesto posted:I've started reading through STK, and just what the hell is the point of Zephros? I see him as just a convenient spot to info dump about the Ordening and why giants are going bug gently caress.
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Mar 8, 2019 17:19
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Numlock posted:I’d just blow up the current system and replace it with just four classes (fighter, rouge, cleric, wizard) that get a set of starter pack abilities. Every ability, class feature, and whatnot would be rewritten to be a feat that any class can get. Maybe there is some restrictions like you need 13 int for spell casting feats or something but even then maybe not. I'd rather do a more robust novice/expert or prestige class system. I've never played SotDL but I know they do that. I threw this together a while ago but never got around to implementing anything because I don't know enough about game design +  : Pick a base class and play it for 3-5 levels then either double down on that specialization or go with a hybrid option adjacent to the specialized prestige class. A monk with base class thief would me more ninja-like while a monk with base class priest would be more of a mystic. This idea also assumed normalizing damage output for all the classes so the choice was more about what else you could do on top of that.
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Mar 8, 2019 17:27
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This almost seems similar to what 4E did with roles and power sources, except merged into a single pair of axes.
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Mar 8, 2019 19:54
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Someone posted some good guidelines for milestone leveling a little while ago and I lost them. Does anyone have them to repost?
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Mar 8, 2019 20:26
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The Bee posted:This almost seems similar to what 4E did with roles and power sources, except merged into a single pair of axes. There's no reason a character concept couldn't use Rogueish solutions to noncombat encounters, and still fight using any archetype they want. And aside from thematic mismatch (like martial power sources throwing fireballs and charm person), there's no reason power source even has to be built in to the class. One "archer" (who make attack rolls at range for multiple medium-strength attacks) could be martial with a box/gun, another could be an arcane who throws eldritch blasts with the exact same mechanics. That's kind of the niche multiclassing fills in D&D.
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Mar 8, 2019 20:43
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Sodomy Hussein posted:AD&D had this weird thing where you were limited to a max set of levels in a class by race, which made no sense and all of my groups roundly ignored. Multiclassing involved long division or something and no one ever did it because it was hard enough figuring out if you could move your number around to be an ubermensch that qualified for Paladin. Dual-Classing was difficult and (generally) not fun, and was not really intended for normal use. (You stopped progression in your current class and began as lv1 in the new class. You could only gain xp by not using your previous class abilities at all. If you used the previous class abilities you lost all xp for that session (or scene, or whatever). Once your new class level exceeded your original class level you could use both sets of abilities freely within the rules. (So mages still could not wear armor, etc...)
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Mar 9, 2019 10:06
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Splicer posted:Classless point buy? There's lots of systems that do that. I've often tinkered with the idea of using Mutants & Masterminds to run a more "traditional" dungeon-crawler type game, since D&D tends to want the party to become superheroic (at some point) anyway
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Mar 9, 2019 14:43
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darnon posted:Kobold's predate D&D's usage and IIRC even then they only went 'tiny lizard men' circa 3e. Otherwise the dog-men look is entirely valid. Yeah. Last time I ran a game I went ahead and used both types as divergent lineages of Kobolds. I still have a warmer place in my heart for the originals though.   And its successor. 
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Mar 9, 2019 15:51
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inthesto posted:I've started reading through STK, and just what the hell is the point of Zephros? He became our drug dealer panel van wizard. We used his floating tower as a mobile base/ magic stoner basement.
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Mar 9, 2019 16:47
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I know this is from a very long time ago, but did anyone ever write up/expand on the "More Guys" fighter? I like that idea and would like to read more about it.
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Mar 9, 2019 17:06
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Mambo No. 5 posted:I know this is from a very long time ago, but did anyone ever write up/expand on the "More Guys" fighter? I like that idea and would like to read more about it. Sure: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/28306/ODD-Dungeons--Dragons-Original-Edition-0e?src=hottest_filtered You'll also need https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/17010/Chainmail-Rules-for-Medieval-Miniatures-0e?cPath=9730_9737
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Mar 9, 2019 17:31
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Thanks! That second link is busted but I found the Chainmail rules on there.
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Mar 9, 2019 19:42
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Kaysette posted:I'd rather do a more robust novice/expert or prestige class system. I've never played SotDL but I know they do that. Don't know why you need a compass like that. Why not a rogue/warrior or mage/cleric?
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Mar 9, 2019 21:10
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CJ posted:Don't know why you need a compass like that. Why not a rogue/warrior or mage/cleric? I’m more ambivalent about the warrior/rogue thing but I wish there were more distinct differences between arcane and divine magic.
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Mar 9, 2019 21:14
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So I’ve wrapped up my middle earth game. The climatic battle was fun affair featuring the 3 PCs being chased by a cold drake up and down this abandoned dwarf fortress just like in The desolation of Smaug. Now the drake was not the BBG, the PCs were able to sneak in and ruin his plan (to enslave the cold drake) and didn’t have to fight the cold drake which would have let them leave. Possibly to return 5-7 levels later as they were only level 7 and only three vs a monster from the 1st age. But my dwarf player wouldn’t have that and tricked the drake into having a 1000 ton stone dropped on it. This didn’t kill the dragon which used its corrosive acid breath to meld the floor enough it was simply smashed into the lower floor instead of being pancaked (it took massive damage). Cue Benny hill chase music. Said dwarf got swallowed but used a grappling hook to remain stuck in the dragons throat and effectively choke it to death. They barely survived by the skin of their teeth. I was playing out of a premade module and it’s info on fighting the dragon boiled down to “the players are doomed.”
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Mar 10, 2019 00:48
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Kaysette posted:I'd rather do a more robust novice/expert or prestige class system. I've never played SotDL but I know they do that. https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/82643/Warrior-Rogue--Mage?term=warrior+rogue+mage http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/genericClasses.htm
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Mar 10, 2019 01:10
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gradenko_2000 posted:https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/82643/Warrior-Rogue--Mage?term=warrior+rogue+mage Cool, thanks! I’d never seen that in the 3.5 SRD before.
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Mar 10, 2019 01:53
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