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Feel free to fudge dice roles if it makes narrative sense. Killing a character in their first encounter with a goblin who rolls a 20 is dumb.
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Mar 13, 2019 13:59
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Madmarker posted:Eh don't worry to much..............if everything is statted out (monsters/traps what have you) then mechanically your golden. Just lean in on being a descriptive story teller dude, and let the players run the show. If you gently caress up...............eh play it off, your players don't know whats happening on your side of the screen, so its really easy to fix. Oh and never fudge dice rolls, for good or ill. They might not say they know you fudged the dice, but they will know, and if you fudge the dice to save one person, and not someone else, that leads to bad times. Never fudge the dice, even if it kills a PC. Never fudge the dice, but feel free to fudge the outcome. Mechanical death doesn't have to mean actual death, it can just as easily be a setup for 'and then you all wake up captured' or whatever. Kaysette posted:Feel free to fudge dice roles if it makes narrative sense. Killing a character in their first encounter with a goblin who rolls a 20 is dumb. Don't start at level 1, start at level 3, this kind of thing is a LOT more avoidable.
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Mar 13, 2019 14:02
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thespaceinvader posted:Don't start at level 1, start at level 3, this kind of thing is a LOT more avoidable.
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Mar 13, 2019 14:05
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Stroop There It Is posted:Also that's when most classes start getting fun and more specialized, but it's not super complicated yet, so I think it's easier for beginners to create characters they're more interested in than starting at 1-2. I'm starting to think that they should just declare level 3 as the new level 1.
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Mar 13, 2019 17:32
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JustJeff88 posted:I'm starting to think that they should just declare level 3 as the new level 1.
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Mar 13, 2019 17:45
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Fudge if bad game mechanics lead to the consequences exceeding the player's culpability for the situation. The character you just finished an involved character creation process to even get to the table getting one shot by a kobold's crit in a game where fighting kobolds is expected and normal 100% falls under this category.
Splicer fucked around with this message at 18:05 on Mar 13, 2019 |
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Mar 13, 2019 18:00
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Splicer posted:Only fudge if the consequences of the bad roll exceed the player's culpability for the situation. The character you just finished an involved character creation process to finish getting one shot by a kobold's crit in a game where fighting kobolds is expected and normal 100% falls under this category. Not even then.......if you don't like the outcome,as Space Invader said, fudge the outcome, not the roll.
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Mar 13, 2019 18:04
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no totally just lie about the roll
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Mar 13, 2019 18:11
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Madmarker posted:Not even then.......if you don't like the outcome,as Space Invader said, fudge the outcome, not the roll. Agreed. I had it happen in a kids game I ran and instead of dropping the character to a lucky goblin arrow they got pinned though the arm to a wall. Generally I like to treat critical hits from enemies more as negative changes in the situation rather than just pure more damage.
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Mar 13, 2019 18:12
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Madmarker posted:Not even then.......if you don't like the outcome,as Space Invader said, fudge the outcome, not the roll.
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Mar 13, 2019 18:16
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Splicer posted:Sometimes that's more immersion breaking than just fudging poo poo. I do not endorse fudging poo poo in games where it's not required, but RAW in 5e you only don't start dying from hitting 0 if the attacker chooses and it doesn't work for instant death or anything other than a melee attack. If you're houseruling this already then just give them more starting HP or start at level 3 and sidestep the whole issue. Just house rule no instant deaths until level 5 and let the party have to deal with healing the character. The highlight of my first session was the level 1 rogue taking a 16dmg crit from a worg (I RPed it picking her up, shaking her around like a rag doll then slamming her into the ground) and everyone having to run in to save her. Really heightened the sense of how dangerous adventuring is right off the bat.
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Mar 13, 2019 19:00
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In the current game I'm working on a generic ork warrior crit on some sort of cleave attack and very nearly killed the entire party in the very first combat encounter. I was able to use Lay on Hands to salvage the situation but it was one hell of an introduction to a new game system for me (in a good way, mind you).
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Mar 13, 2019 20:08
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If you're worried about getting crit at low level just say low level monsters can't crit.
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Mar 13, 2019 22:00
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Kung Food posted:Just house rule no instant deaths until level 5 and let the party have to deal with healing the character. The highlight of my first session was the level 1 rogue taking a 16dmg crit from a worg (I RPed it picking her up, shaking her around like a rag doll then slamming her into the ground) and everyone having to run in to save her. Really heightened the sense of how dangerous adventuring is right off the bat.
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Mar 14, 2019 00:57
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Splicer posted:Was 16hp enough for an instant kill? If not, there's no need to fudge anything here and it's not really a pertinent story. If yes, then you're not using the instakill rules anyway and this example is indistinguishable from knocking her to -1. It's a pertinent story because Kung Food was illustrating the benefits of not using the instakill rules. (Yes, 16 damage is an instant kill on any rogue whose Con is 11 or less, and even on an 18-Con rogue it's an instakill if they're at <= 4 HP.) Speaking of rogues, I have a tiefling arcane trickster who's just hit level 4, and Hexblade is calling to me. Someone talk me out of taking a level in warlock. SneezeOfTheDecade fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Mar 14, 2019 |
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Mar 14, 2019 01:12
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Besesoth posted:Speaking of rogues, I have a tiefling arcane trickster who's just hit level 4, and Hexblade is calling to me. Someone talk me out of taking a level in warlock. Take two levels of warlock
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Mar 14, 2019 01:50
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Gharbad the Weak posted:Take two levels of warlock nooooooowait why?
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Mar 14, 2019 02:02
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Besesoth posted:nooooooowait why? Devil's Sight
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Mar 14, 2019 02:03
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Conspiratiorist posted:Devil's Sight ...oh, that is quite good. I'd misread it as being just double-range darkvision. e: Heck, and an at-will Disguise Self? Sign me up. SneezeOfTheDecade fucked around with this message at 03:01 on Mar 14, 2019 |
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Mar 14, 2019 02:11
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CJ posted:If you're worried about getting crit at low level just say low level monsters can't crit. This or just admit level 1 is garbage and start at level 2.
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Mar 14, 2019 02:43
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I was joking, but as long as you're happy I'm willing to run with it
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Mar 14, 2019 03:19
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Besesoth posted:It's a pertinent story because Kung Food was illustrating the benefits of not using the instakill rules. (Yes, 16 damage is an instant kill on any rogue whose Con is 11 or less, and even on an 18-Con rogue it's an instakill if they're at <= 4 HP.) Honestly not quite as useful as it would be for a Swashbuckler Rogue.
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Mar 14, 2019 08:31
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One of my players has decided to play a cleric/druid multiclass (no I don't know why either), and I'm not entirely clear on how preparing spells works. Since the character is going to start at cleric 1/druid 2, does the character have the ability to prepare level 2 spells, or are they stuck boosting level 1 spells? The rules text is incredibly murky on this.
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Mar 14, 2019 13:01
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inthesto posted:One of my players has decided to play a cleric/druid multiclass (no I don't know why either), and I'm not entirely clear on how preparing spells works. So the second one.
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Mar 14, 2019 13:09
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Kung Food posted:Just house rule no instant deaths until level 5 and let the party have to deal with healing the character. The highlight of my first session was the level 1 rogue taking a 16dmg crit from a worg (I RPed it picking her up, shaking her around like a rag doll then slamming her into the ground) and everyone having to run in to save her. Really heightened the sense of how dangerous adventuring is right off the bat. just houserule no deaths ever seriously just tell your players. "hey peeps you're fuckin protagonists you got that good plot armor poo poo you don't die unless you want to"
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Mar 14, 2019 13:17
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inthesto posted:One of my players has decided to play a cleric/druid multiclass (no I don't know why either), and I'm not entirely clear on how preparing spells works. The character will receive spell slots as if 3rd level in one of the classes (4 1st and 2 2nd level slots) while preparing spells as Slicer indicated (1+Wis modifier Cleric spells, 2+Wis modifier Druid). The higher level slots can be used to boost spells like Healing Word or just to cast 1st level spells as they are. Going forward, the easiest way to prepare spells is to do as the multiclass rules suggest: pretend that the character only has X levels of Cleric, and prepare Cleric spells accordingly; then pretend the character only has Y levels of Druid. A one level dip into Cleric is a way to get heavy armor without giving up any spell slots (just delaying spells known for one level). I suppose someone might get lured into two levels of Tempest for the max lightning damage (40 damage in a storm at L6 is OK, but not optimal and rapidly less good with more levels), and taking 6 levels gives you Mass Healing Word and a Call Lightning spell that deals 3d10 damage and shoves people around, which is cute if not especially effective. Life 1 gives you heavy armor, common preps that scale up, and boosted healing that works with druid spells, too. Nature 1 gives heavy armor and almost covers for the lost druid level; War 1 grants armor and martial weapons and is thus arguably as good as taking Fighter 1; better if you take it at higher level because Fighter 1 only grants its advantages if taken as your first level.
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Mar 14, 2019 16:02
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Heavy armor and martial weapons for a druid is gonna be situational and up to GM fiat.
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Mar 14, 2019 16:09
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Elfgames posted:just houserule no deaths ever seriously just tell your players. "hey peeps you're fuckin protagonists you got that good plot armor poo poo you don't die unless you want to" Not even close to being the same thing but hey thank's for the suggestion.
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Mar 14, 2019 16:15
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Toshimo posted:Heavy armor and martial weapons for a druid is gonna be situational and up to GM fiat. Normally I'd enforce the no-metal restriction for druids, but SKT already looks pretty hard and this party composition isn't stellar (moon druid, assassin rogue, fiend/tome warlock, order cleric/shepherd druid), so I'm going to be quite a bit more lenient than usual
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Mar 14, 2019 16:46
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Building a lore bard lvl one for the water deep heist adventure, are there any traps to watch out for without spoiling things? I'll be using the standard array. It looks like it'll be me a tempest cleric and monk most of the time, with occasional drop ins week to week who'll pick up a pre-made of their choice. Are any feats worth taking over getting to 20 charisma at lvl 4?
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Mar 14, 2019 17:02
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inthesto posted:Normally I'd enforce the no-metal restriction for druids, but SKT already looks pretty hard and this party composition isn't stellar (moon druid, assassin rogue, fiend/tome warlock, order cleric/shepherd druid), so I'm going to be quite a bit more lenient than usual I mean, yeah, if you are running it, by all means do what works for you. I was just giving general advice to people who were thinking about going down that path.
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Mar 14, 2019 17:03
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Toshimo posted:Heavy armor and martial weapons for a druid is gonna be situational and up to GM fiat. Welcome to 5e, the newest in Dungeoning and Dragunning. Paladins are not beholden to alignments. Their power doesn't even have to come from gods. They don't even need to be religious. All they have to do is listen to a simple, easy-to-interpret-in-several-ways set of commandments. But Druids still can't wear metal armor because industrialization or smth
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Mar 14, 2019 17:28
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There’s even a sage advice about it that’s literally “here’s our cargo cult design philosophy, talk to your DM” http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/rules-answers-march-2016 So loving lazy.
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Mar 14, 2019 17:32
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Conspiratiorist posted:
But they will use swords and scimitars and so on made by those exact same smithies. Because reasons? The real reason is because Mearls and the design team are grogs and can't decide what DnD is even when they're completely in charge of it.
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Mar 14, 2019 17:35
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Does it say anywhere in 5e that druids can't use metal armor? If a new group started with 0 experience, is this a thing they'd see? Edit: also throwing my hat in the "only cool and dramatic deaths" ring. Screw getting crit by a slug
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Mar 14, 2019 18:40
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I think it even says in the PHB that Druids aren't mechanically penalized from wearing metal armor, they just usually don't. Feel free to be the druid who doesn't give a poo poo.
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Mar 14, 2019 18:41
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It's a parenthetical on the armor proficiency line that days "druids will not wear armor or use shields made of metal" Of course, thanks to natural language, this statement is meaningless on top of being very easy to miss
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Mar 14, 2019 18:44
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The actual text in the PHB is under the proficiencies for the class: "Armor: light armor, medium armor, shields (druids will not wear armor or use shields made of metal)" It's stupid, but also explicit. It's also really easy to ignore, because it's really just an excuse to go "my scale mail is made of macguffin scales which are as hard as steel".
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Mar 14, 2019 18:46
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Are there even any rules for shields made out of alternate materials or do they all just give you AC 2?
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Mar 14, 2019 18:48
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BattleMaster posted:Are there even any rules for shields made out of alternate materials or do they all just give you AC 2? You can do whatever you want with them really. I think the only real official variant is the Buckler, which is AC 1 but easier to drop. I've done AC 3 tower shields, shields that give a Shield Bash-esque bonus action to push or knock prone, bladed shields that functionally retaliate on attack, etc.
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Mar 14, 2019 18:54
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