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Madmarker posted:Honestly, I'd highly recommend taking either Resilient (Con) at lvl 4 or +1 Str and +1 Wis at level 4. Whichever you take at level 4, take the other at level 8. The rest of your stat bumbs should be in Cha That all makes sense. GM says he's expecting to get to 10th so basically there'll be two opportunities for feats/ASIs
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Aug 4, 2020 22:12
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Monathin posted:I honestly disagree quite heavily in the merger of STR and CON, though at least some of it is that the horse has long left the stable. To repeat; the problem with maining str isn't that you're maining str, it's that if you're maining str you can't secondary something interesting like wis or dex or cha or even int, you're stuck secondarying con, and you can't run anything interesting off con without starting to steal stuff from str (because they're the same dang archetype space)
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Aug 4, 2020 22:45
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Undead Hippo posted:Needs an "Aura" or "Power" stat, to shunt all magical abilities onto so you don't have to try and awkwardly balance them into the rest of the stat system. Save DCs are actually capped by level and everything gets cha to saves.
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Aug 4, 2020 22:53
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Kaysette posted:a lot of PbtA games do stuff like this where if you're a magic user you use the magic stat to do some basic move where the default is something else, if you're using drones you roll +synth instead of +cool to do something, etc. dungeon world doesnt do that from core rules just because there is no basic "magic" move and the moves to do magic are class based and have a preferred attribute, but the defy danger move does let you select to roll +(attribute) so its not like its out of the game design by default E: with that said though, everyone should use arcana(casting stat) when their players want to stretch the boundary of a spell to do something that doesnt break the game. its way more fun than saying no and when the player pulls it off it feels like they cheated the system in the best way
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Aug 4, 2020 22:55
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Splicer posted:The dex ranger is better than the str ranger because the dex ranger gets to be a dex/wis ranger, while the str ranger has to choose between being a str/con ranger or a dead ranger. Simply by switching from dex to str/con turns the ranger it a full MAD class. Wouldn’t all melee rangers need CON regardless of primary weapon ability score?
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Aug 4, 2020 23:08
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Plus wisdom isn't super important if you're a ranger anyways, just don't pick save spells. You can get by on hunter's mark/beast befriending abilities and summons at higher levels.
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Aug 4, 2020 23:11
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I think cha for intimidate makes some sense, hang on don’t pull out the noose just yet. You’re not just trying to scare someone, you’re trying to make them do something. As a GM I don’t even make raging barbarian players roll for that unless they want to, I just let them growl and grunt and flex while the enemy cowers ... but the enemy decides in which way they’ll display that fear. If you want to influence that you need actual presence, not just teeth and abs
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Aug 4, 2020 23:12
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nelson posted:Wouldn’t all melee rangers need CON regardless of primary weapon ability score? No because DEX pulls double duty as both and offensive and defensive stat. A DEX ranger doesn't need as much CON because a DEX ranger will not be hit as often. E also if you're a DEX ranger just shoot arrows.
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Aug 4, 2020 23:13
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please knock Mom! posted:I think cha for intimidate makes some sense, hang on don’t pull out the noose just yet. You’re not just trying to scare someone, you’re trying to make them do something charisma for intimidate makes complete sense. do people argue otherwise? "we are the legendary heroes and we can handle whatevers behind this gate. let us through, this gate was meant to protect civilians, not protect the monsters from us."... rogue playing with their knife during an interrogation with the paladin. says to paladin "hey, let me talk to this guy. you seem to be getting nowhere" to imply a good cop bad cop... a slick talking character with some documents in a court situation trying to present these documents authoritatively to defend the party... etc etc. chances are if you think "intimidate = barb yelling at shopkeeper to get discount" you are probably using a lot of things that should be intimidate as a persuasion check
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Aug 4, 2020 23:19
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I also meant that I don’t think I would be okay with intimidate as a strength check. You’re not just trying to scare people, a bear can do that. You’re trying to scare them into behaving a particular way. I also think it’s dumb to make giant angry fighters roll just to scare someone, though (a roll they inevitably fail, making them feel clowny)
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Aug 4, 2020 23:28
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GHOST_BUTT posted:No because DEX pulls double duty as both and offensive and defensive stat. A DEX ranger doesn't need as much CON because a DEX ranger will not be hit as often. This sounds more like a discussion that is more about melee vs ranged rather than str vs dex. Of course ranged characters will get hit less often and therefore need fewer hitpoints/con.
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Aug 4, 2020 23:40
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One of the few things I like about 5e is that STR and DEX do both work double duty as offensive and defensive stats, and in a way that makes them mutually exclusive, such that no reasonable build needs to invest heavily in both, at least in theory. On one hand, DEX improves your defense directly by improving your AC; on the other hand, STR lets you wear heavy armor which doesn't permit a DEX bonus, which precludes the need for DEX entirely. Also, two-handed weapons are (almost) exclusively STR-based. A heavy armor-proficient fighter wearing full plate has 18 AC, but needs 15 STR to do so. Meanwhile, half plate caps out at 17 AC with the max DEX bonus, and Studded Leather likewise hits 17 AC, but only with a maxed out DEX of 20. If anything, the conclusion here is that medium armor is outright better than light armor at anything but the most extreme case, as it should be, and heavy armor still gives the best AC, as it should. The fact that both DEX and STR help you defensively, and heavy armor being generally less burdensome, is one of the choices that has made the game both a little less SAD and less MAD - most classes are designed to use either STR or DEX for AC (but not both), CON for hp, plus one other mental stat, so they're on roughly equal footing in terms of ability score dependency. But personally, I put a pretty high premium on CON, even for ranged characters, since "tanking" is pretty laughable in 5e, so I always prioritize it pretty highly. Of course, this all assumes that half plate and full plate are as accessible as studded leather, which isn't a safe assumption with the game as written, and there's also the issue that DEX has extra utility in the form of boosting both initiative and a relevant save, but at least there's a sense of differentiation when pure STR gives better raw AC and damage while DEX gives better utility in the forms of saves and initiative. And I know there's exceptions to the rule that characters need STR or DEX but not both like barbarian, but that still makes them dependent on three stats only, which puts them in line with most other classes. TL, DR: DEX supremacy is not that bad, and STR does indirectly contribute to AC by enabling heavy armor, and STR has a few unique advantages over DEX, for what they're worth.
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Aug 5, 2020 00:50
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:D&D is the game with six stats. That ain't changing. They'd get rid of levels or races first. I thought this about race stat bonuses but then all the Twitter hullabaloo happened and now "+2/+1 or +1/+1/+1 to any stat" is probably coming in an upcoming book. I don't necessarily agree with most of the reasoning behind it, but I like it as a rule and started using it way before the whole thing happened. So basically, to get rid D&D of the atavistic burden of having attributes, we need to figure out how they're racist somehow.
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Aug 5, 2020 01:05
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The stat argument is great, but this fails to address the problem that the skill system has no actual outputs and that overhauling the skill system to actually function needs to be done before we argue whether athletics can run off dex. It doesn't matter, because I don't know and you don't know if a 25 lets us climb the chain-link fence, and the entire system is just arguing with the DM. You want skills to be more interesting? Give them actual uses!
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Aug 5, 2020 01:50
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Convo came up in my old groups chat. Could you use twinning on Wish to cast Simulacrum twice on one person?
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Aug 5, 2020 04:15
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Cassa posted:Convo came up in my old groups chat. No. From the twinned spell description: "When you cast a spell that targets only one creature and doesn’t have a range of self..." Wish has a range of self.
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Aug 5, 2020 04:23
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I threw a bunch of ghosts at our level 7 party and the only ones who ended up aged were the drow NPC who was helping them (he failed 3 consecutive horrifying visage rolls and aged 50 years), and their familiar, who got poofed into dust after aging 40 years. Having them get ambushed by drow gunslingers, who they then needed to team up with to survive, was really fun.
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Aug 5, 2020 04:23
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change my name posted:I threw a bunch of ghosts at our level 7 party and the only ones who ended up aged were the drow NPC who was helping them (he failed 3 consecutive horrifying visage rolls and aged 50 years), and their familiar, who got poofed into dust after aging 40 years. Having them get ambushed by drow gunslingers, who they then needed to team up with to survive, was really fun. My druid was the only character to fail to save vs. a ghost in our last session...he has a +6 on WIS saves and rolled a 1. Now he's a ~50-year-old lizardfolk (max typical age 60 years). I'm pretty salty about that, especially because if I'd known what I was saving against I would probably have used my inspiration.
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Aug 5, 2020 04:43
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:My druid was the only character to fail to save vs. a ghost in our last session...he has a +6 on WIS saves and rolled a 1. Now he's a ~50-year-old lizardfolk (max typical age 60 years). I'm pretty salty about that, especially because if I'd known what I was saving against I would probably have used my inspiration. Lizardfolk can easily reach 80, the typical age is because lots of them are fighters and they live in dangerous environments which kill them Still sucks tho
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Aug 5, 2020 06:29
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Are aging effects typically something people worry about? Like there is the ingame mechanic of keeping track of time and your character aging but outside of the few things that are like "also you age 30-50 years as part of this attack" how would you go about treating that? If you get hit with that kind of thing enough you die? Your character just has to suddenly retire because they can't preform like they used to? I have never been quite sure what to make of the whole age thing.
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Aug 5, 2020 07:54
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there's no mechanical effect associated with it in 5e, so like many things it depends on your GM it makes for a cool plot device, IMO.
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Aug 5, 2020 10:21
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Some quick first time dm questions: When a creature is effected by Hold Person, but passes their will save to break it on a subsequent turn, do they then get to play their turn or is it kind of like escaping a grapple where they essentially have used their action to break paralysis? Are there any restrictions on crossbows like in previous editions, where you must essentially take an action to reload them? Is it supposed to take an entire action to switch from a heavy crossbow to a short sword and enter melee? Finally, how exactly does disengage work? Its worded a little bit openly... if a rogue takes their bonus action to disengage, does that mean that they avoid all AoO from all creatures for the rest of that turn? Or does it basically effect one creature that they have targeted with disengage, so if they are surrounded by 3 mobs the other 2 will still get attacks on them? Thanks yall, I know these are basic but googling hasn't given me a totally clear idea
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Aug 5, 2020 11:09
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The Shame Boy posted:Are aging effects typically something people worry about? Like there is the ingame mechanic of keeping track of time and your character aging but outside of the few things that are like "also you age 30-50 years as part of this attack" how would you go about treating that? If you get hit with that kind of thing enough you die? Your character just has to suddenly retire because they can't preform like they used to? I have never been quite sure what to make of the whole age thing. I was really worried about them with my Aarakocra monk because Aarakocra have a lifespan of like 30 years total in 5e. We had one encounter with a monster that we thought might be a ghost (i think it turned out to be a non-hostile NPC, don't really remember) and I got so panicked that my DM just said "don't worry, I wouldn't kill you with an aging effect, that'd be bullshit" because it really would have been a save-or-die instakill.
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Aug 5, 2020 11:14
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Jeremor posted:When a creature is effected by Hold Person, but passes their will save to break it on a subsequent turn, do they then get to play their turn or is it kind of like escaping a grapple where they essentially have used their action to break paralysis? Hold person says they save at the end of their turn, so yes their turn is over after they've made their save. quote:
All crossbows have the "loading" property which just says you can only fire it once per action regardless of how many attacks you're entitled to. Swapping weapons is supposed to be a free action but different sources are unclear on it so you do you. Drawing or sheathing a weapon once a turn is explicitly free though so that shouldn't be a problem. quote:Finally, how exactly does disengage work? Its worded a little bit openly... if a rogue takes their bonus action to disengage, does that mean that they avoid all AoO from all creatures for the rest of that turn? Or does it basically effect one creature that they have targeted with disengage, so if they are surrounded by 3 mobs the other 2 will still get attacks on them? Disengage says you're movement doesn't provoke opportunity attacks, the rogue is free to go wherever their little heart desires.
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Aug 5, 2020 11:21
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Ohh, that all makes sense, thank you. Apparently I accidentally did all of those things correct last night. Edit: I could also use a little bit of help crafting an encounter, if anyone has the inclination? My party is a lvl 4 soulknife rogue, lvl 4 swashbuckler, and lvl 5 war cleric. The smaller party size has made things slightly tricky with CR stuff. They will be plundering an abandoned archmage's vault basically, and i want them to fight a guardian of the wizard's treasure. I was thinking a single construct or maybe elemental, but none of them have magical weapons or anything. Pretty standard gear. Any suggestions for a difficult, but not suicidal fight? Is CR 7 pretty fair for the party? Jeremor fucked around with this message at 13:14 on Aug 5, 2020 |
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Aug 5, 2020 11:39
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Any transparent battle maps with grids out there that I can overlay on my maps?
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Aug 5, 2020 13:50
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Affi posted:Any transparent battle maps with grids out there that I can overlay on my maps? online? offline? what's your programs if you're doing it online?
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Aug 5, 2020 13:59
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Jeremor posted:Ohh, that all makes sense, thank you. Apparently I accidentally did all of those things correct last night.
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Aug 5, 2020 14:15
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Arivia posted:online? offline? what's your programs if you're doing it online? Sorry I mean irl.
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Aug 5, 2020 14:19
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Jeremor posted:My party is a lvl 4 soulknife rogue, lvl 4 swashbuckler, and lvl 5 war cleric. Is CR 7 pretty fair for the party? The theory behind the CR system is that a CR 1 monster is a reasonable challenge for 4 level-1 PCs, CR 2 is reasonable for four level-2 PCs, etc. So no, CR 7 would not be pretty fair; you should expect it to wipe the floor with the party. In practice the ratings aren't exactly reliable because it depends a lot on party composition and what exactly the monster can do. If you've found a CR 7 monster that you like the looks of, you can always use it but put some disadvantage on it due to it having been abandoned for so long. Ideally this disadvantage is something that you can adjust on the fly based on how the fight is going. For example, a golem that's unmaintained and its joints are locking up, worsening its movement range and occasionally making its attacks fail. If the fight goes really well for the party, you could have it dump the last of a jar of magical grease onto itself, fixing those problems...if it's going poorly, then you can quietly make its rheumatism worse.
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Aug 5, 2020 14:39
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Addendum to the above: in practice a CR X monster is usually not a match for a party level X party because of action economy issues and the ability to easily completely shut down a single monster. Raising the CR doesn't help because while a monster with more HP, better saves and damage might seem to counter that, in practice it just means that if the players fail to lock it down, it'll start eating them alive with its way above curve damage and abilities. They might win but not without it turning into a bloodbath. Expect people without tons of HP to get pasted instantly. It's much better to use multiple monsters that are weaker. Look up kobold fight club for guidelines but be aware that it's basically guessing, CR barely means anything. It's a fair ballpark though. Edit: Also to address the single monster issues for when you want a big scary monster to challenge the party, big solo boss monsters are often given legendary actions and resistance in the book which just means they can just say "I pass" a number of times an encounter to 3 saves they fail and have small actions they can take off-turn between the other players. This is used (for some reason) extremely sparingly and basically only on very very big monsters like the biggest and baddest of dragons and beholders and stuff, even though there's lots of smaller monsters one would expect to be kind of a solo fight that don't get it. I'd consider stealing the resistance if you wanna run a solo monster, although maybe only for one or two saves or something, and probably skip the legendary actions because they're all low level and it's a bunch of extra work to make them up yourself. Glagha fucked around with this message at 15:06 on Aug 5, 2020 |
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Aug 5, 2020 14:57
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The Shame Boy posted:Are aging effects typically something people worry about? Like there is the ingame mechanic of keeping track of time and your character aging but outside of the few things that are like "also you age 30-50 years as part of this attack" how would you go about treating that? If you get hit with that kind of thing enough you die? Your character just has to suddenly retire because they can't preform like they used to? I have never been quite sure what to make of the whole age thing.
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Aug 5, 2020 15:03
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:I was really worried about them with my Aarakocra monk because Aarakocra have a lifespan of like 30 years total in 5e. We had one encounter with a monster that we thought might be a ghost (i think it turned out to be a non-hostile NPC, don't really remember) and I got so panicked that my DM just said "don't worry, I wouldn't kill you with an aging effect, that'd be bullshit" because it really would have been a save-or-die instakill. You say that, but the banshee, an explicitly weaker ghost, does have a save or die instakill
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Aug 5, 2020 15:03
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change my name posted:You say that, but the banshee, an explicitly weaker ghost, does have a save or die instakill The difference on that is that the banshee only drops you to zero hp, but doesn't kill you. If you age to death you're straight up dead and nothing can bring you back save Wish. You can healing word a banshee wail, you shrug and get a new character sheet if you get ghosted past 40 as a birdman.
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Aug 5, 2020 15:07
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Every time I think I’m finally getting 5e fixed to where I like it with my million house rules, I’m reminded how bad 5e monster design is and how frustrating it makes trying to homebrew encounters. Playing A system (PF2E) where the counter math actually works and the monsters are interesting really drove this home and made DMing soooo much easier. Giffglyph’s thing helps a ton, but it would be really nice if there was interesting stuff to grab off the shelf and CR was actually useful.
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Aug 5, 2020 15:12
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Glagha posted:ghosted past 40 as a birdman this phrase really tickles me, thank you
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Aug 5, 2020 15:13
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Glagha posted:The difference on that is that the banshee only drops you to zero hp, but doesn't kill you. If you age to death you're straight up dead and nothing can bring you back save Wish. You can healing word a banshee wail, you shrug and get a new character sheet if you get ghosted past 40 as a birdman. Well fair, but as the DM I also wouldn't just have them drop dead immediately, plus it's reversible with a greater restoration. Maybe just immobile/incredibly feeble until the party can get to a temple or something.
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Aug 5, 2020 15:14
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Jeremor posted:Ohh, that all makes sense, thank you. Apparently I accidentally did all of those things correct last night. Hello, fellow new DM here. I've found Giffyglyph to be a great way to come up with custom monsters/encounters when I have a concept, but nothing in the book matches what I am looking for. Here's a monster you can build your encounter around: 
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Aug 5, 2020 15:26
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change my name posted:Well fair, but as the DM I also wouldn't just have them drop dead immediately, plus it's reversible with a greater restoration. Maybe just immobile/incredibly feeble until the party can get to a temple or something. It's reversible with greater restoration within 24 hours if they even have access to it. It's definitely fixable it's just a really weird thing to design a monster for and sneak up on a DM who might not understand the actual gravity of what they're inflicting on their players.
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Aug 5, 2020 15:36
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I want to introduce the Underdark to our group. Currently we're running Lost Mines of Phandelver and after this we're going to do Dragon of Icespire Peak. Basically i'm looking for a quest that gives us a good reason the explore the Underdark for a few sessions with some lore about what it is and how it works. Anyone have any tips?
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Aug 5, 2020 15:56
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