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You know what? I think part of the problem is with my reading comprehension, but I think a lot of it has to do with this bullshit "naturalistic language" crap they've got going on. I'm trying to skim rules, not read a novel. For example, I just realized that I had been reading the bit about other actions you can take on your turn all wrong. Instead of being able to manipulate objects/interact with environment during both your move and action, it's actually either or. Which means my rules lawyering for loading a crossbow after attacking with a rapier is impossible because I wouldn't be able to stow it after unsheathing it. Now, this would be less confusing if we had a Standard/Movement/Minor style action economy like we had in the last edition, and we just said object manipulation/interacting with the environment took a specific kind of actions. And I wouldn't feel like a dumbass because it'd be plain as day as to what I could and couldn't do on my turn. Tunicate posted:Also, another example of casters getting leeway noncasters don't. Ah, gently caress it, it's 5e. Mecha Gojira fucked around with this message at 07:24 on May 19, 2015 |
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May 19, 2015 07:19
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Strength of Many posted:Yeah, I'm debating on how I would overhaul the whole system. I might scrap Fighter self healing in favor of putting Second Wind back in for Everyone. In the context of the current discussion, I would definitely formalize my own interpretation of problematic feats and effects - "Can you John Woo with hand crossbows? HELLA YES  "Mecha Gojira posted:You know what? I think part of the problem is with my reading comprehension, but I think a lot of it has to do with this bullshit "naturalistic language" crap they've got going on. I'm trying to skim rules, not read a novel. Exactly. We wouldn't have this problem if they just stated precisely how and what the feats or whatever are supposed to be used for in purely mechanistic terms, but that'd turn D&D into a video/boardgame so ehhhhhhh
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May 19, 2015 07:25
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Agent Boogeyman posted:Whoah whoah okay, have to step in here and point how loving dumb this is because... None of this makes any loving sense? Let's take a look-see at this choice quote here:
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May 19, 2015 07:45
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Splicer posted:I'm guessing this is a "common sense" ruling. Clearly you cannot put a crossbow bolt into a crossbow while holding another crossbow in the same hand. He tried putting a pencil on his keyboard while holding a mouse and it was, like, super hard. Hey, my bard can hold onto his rapier with his shield hand for a second while casting somatic spells, negating like half the reason the for picking up the War Caster feat, but God forbid he tries to grab a bolt with a shield occupied hand, even with a fancy crossbow feat. Anyway, I feel less bad about my reading comprehension skills since it's obvious the people in charge of the game don't give a poo poo about the rules they wrote and even misread them themselves.
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May 19, 2015 07:59
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Kai Tave posted:Nothing's wrong with the concept, but my immediate thought is "if you're going to treat crossbows like fire-and-drop guns, why not just bite the proverbial bullet and include guns in your D&D fantasy at that point?"  If people dont care about that kind of nerd poo poo then its no big deal.I avoided firearms because there was no way I would be able to keep up with the high level nerdery involving firearms that some of the players had (plus personal preference). Archaic weapons I could do. Aside from that I agree with you though. Although there would still be a differentiation between crossbows and crappy guns. The crossbows would be quiet(ish), bulky, accurate, and deadly at range. The guns would be more portable but inaccurate and noisy.
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May 19, 2015 08:07
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Anytime WotC posts some kind of not-Errata for this loving game, I end up wishing they had just kept their goddamn mouths shut, or just said "It's Up To The DM™" because literally every example of this so far has been utter banality.
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May 19, 2015 08:28
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FRINGE posted:Crossbows are slow as gently caress. Funny enough your second paragraph reveals the issues with the first. The actual problem is pedantic nerd dumbfuckery and a slavish masturbatory devotion to SIMULATIONISM!
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May 19, 2015 08:45
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ProfessorCirno posted:Funny enough your second paragraph reveals the issues with the first. We had fun and communicated amongst our group just fine. I try and always preface things in this thread with "what we did was..." to avoid that crap/trap. Telling other people "YOUR FUN IS BAD" on the internet is pretty masturbatory. Using two crossbows would have been seen as dumbfuckery in our games. If you think DnD should be an action movie thats perfectly ok. We used other games for that.
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May 19, 2015 09:06
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FRINGE posted:Crossbows: not related to book rules at all, but straight out of my verisimilitudinous penchants, I like the idea of crossbows being big damage/ accurate fire-and-drop items. Dedicated ranged people would stick with bows, but every fantasy warrior that knew anything about fantasy war could pop off a quarrel on the way in. Kai Tave posted:Nothing's wrong with the concept, but my immediate thought is "if you're going to treat crossbows like fire-and-drop guns, why not just bite the proverbial bullet and include guns in your D&D fantasy at that point?" ... now I'm thinking about a Landsknechte campaign
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May 19, 2015 09:27
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gradenko_2000 posted:... now I'm thinking about a Landsknechte campaign A Landsknechte-era game would be fantastic, especially if it drew from contemporary beliefs/myths about magic and supernatural creatures. Probably not as a D&D variant though.
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May 19, 2015 09:56
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Raggi wrote up an adventure set during the 30 Years' War, and Libertad covered it for Fatal & Friends. Turns out adventuring in those days was a bitch and a half, with all sorts of terrible murderous insect god dungeons all over the place.
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May 19, 2015 11:14
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AlphaDog posted:A Landsknechte-era game would be fantastic, especially if it drew from contemporary beliefs/myths about magic and supernatural creatures. Probably not as a D&D variant though. So...Darklands?
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May 19, 2015 12:02
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gradenko_2000 posted:What the gently caress Yes you do. But... ok, this is approaching quantum mechanics territory. Disadvantage consists of two things. First there is the whole "roll twice and suck balls" thing. But Disadvantage is, in itself, also a mechanical condition. A label. A true/false toggle. Why does this matter? Because some of the mechanics of 5e make use of this. Take for example the Rogue's sneak attack, which says you could do SA damage if an ally of yours is within 5 feet of your target, "and you don't have disadvantage on the attack roll." If you close your eyes and use Lucky to roll 3d20 and keep the best, you still don't get to do SA damage. Because the dice-rolling effect has been negated, but the label hasn't. Personally I'm more interested in the new implications of the Ammunition property, which apparently means that you need a free hand to handle the ammo. I wonder what this means for longbows. Because those are weapons which use up two hands and also now require you to have a free hand to handle the ammo. I foresee a lot of thri-kreen in the future of 5e. I kid of course. What's actually going on with longbows is that they are two-handed weapons except we totally know that you're not really using that second hand so you can totally make full use of the Extra Attack feature, unlike the guy with a hand crossbow and a buckler strapped to his left forearm, who can't load a hand crossbow that way. And this makes sense because gently caress you 5e. On the other hand, fighting drow just became that much easier because they make use of an impossibly dumb weapon combination. So... yay for all our resident underdark explorers.
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May 19, 2015 12:37
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if you have disadvantage, but you get to pick the die, you don't have disadvantage
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Sage Genesis posted:If you close your eyes and use Lucky to roll 3d20 and keep the best, you still don't get to do SA damage. Because the dice-rolling effect has been negated, but the label hasn't. At this point I consider it far more likely that they wrote themselves into a corner and are trying to ... retcon the rules? Same with the Ammunition property. Jesus Christ.
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May 19, 2015 12:54
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gradenko_2000 posted:I agree that that's what's going to happen, but again it circles around to how Lucky is defined as a completely separate effect all its own, rather than "spend a Luck point to gain Advantage on this next roll", and forgive me if I don't think the designers actually had enough forethought that they worded Lucky the way they did because they were specifically and deliberately going for a different effect. Oh I agree with all that, they are definitely retconning some stuff here. I was responding to the idea that you don't have disadvantage if you use Lucky. You kind of still do, somehow, even though the dice don't reflect it.
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May 19, 2015 13:04
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Things you can do while holding a shield: Cast a spell Open a door Pick up an item Hold that item Grab something other then an enemy Do pretty much anything actually Things you cannot do while holding a shield: Reload a crossbow ... So...is there honestly any point to hand crossbows if they're now also apparently a two handed weapon but only in disguise? And...wait. Doesn't this make it literally impossible to reload the other kinds of crossbows? Because they're two handed weapons, but you need a free hand to...Oh, Sage Advice! Also it's intensely hilarious to see the differences to how people are taking this between Giant in the Playground and ENWorld, the two big hotspots for 5e discussion. ProfessorCirno fucked around with this message at 13:13 on May 19, 2015 |
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May 19, 2015 13:10
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Closing your eyes to get attack roll disadvantage aside, the other interaction is when a plate wearer tries to do a Stealth check - they have Disadvantage on Stealth checks!
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May 19, 2015 13:10
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ProfessorCirno posted:Also it's intensely hilarious to see the differences to how people are taking this between Giant in the Playground and ENWorld, the two big hotspots for 5e discussion. GiTP brings that can-do attitude. quote:But do note what he says about gnomish devices. A crossbow with a 5 bolt clip is not out of the question, IMNHO, for 10x the usual price. Meanwhile, at EN. quote:How hard is it to accept you need a free hand to cock back the hand crossbow and load it. But you don't need two hands to aim it or draw back a bowstring as you do with two-handed ranged weapons. Crawford is using a very naturalistic understanding of how the weapons work to incorporate verisimilitude into action. Not realism, but the illusion of realism.
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May 19, 2015 13:29
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Hand Crossbows are somewhat bullshit in themselves anyway.
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May 19, 2015 14:01
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The dumbest thing about all of this is that you can't even go rapier + hand crossbow with this ruling. Which seemed to be the only use of it which wasn't at all controversial. Nobody doubted that was fair game; all the poo poo fits were about Chow Yun Fat two-crossbows, and single hand crossbow + shield. 
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May 19, 2015 14:30
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Earlier editions of D&D seem to have handled the hand crossbow thing much better: 4th Edition: "Any weapon that has the load property requires two hands to load, even if you can use only one hand to attack with it. (The sling, for example, is a one-handed weapon, but you need a free hand to load it.)" (on top of dual-wielding rules being tied specifically to powers) 3.5 Edition: "You can draw a hand crossbow back by hand. Loading a hand crossbow is a move action that provokes attacks of opportunity. You can shoot, but not load, a hand crossbow with one hand at no penalty. You can shoot a hand crossbow with each hand, but you take a penalty on attack rolls as if attacking with two light weapons" AD&D 2nd Edition: "The hand crossbow is easily held in one hand and cocked with the other" (i.e. you cannot dual-wield them at all) No hand crossbows at all in AD&D 1st Edition, Rules Cyclopedia, BECMI, nor OD&D In all these cases there doesn't seem to be any ambiguity regarding what you could and couldn't do with a hand crossbow. It's pretty much purely because of how the rules were written. EDIT: The other thing is that a Repeating Light/Heavy Crossbow does specifically show up in 3.5's weapons list, but even then "you must fire the weapon with two hands in order to use the reloading lever, and you must use two hands to load a new case of bolts", which means it's still not a way to get around the free hand requirement. Rather, it allows you to reload as a free action instead of as a move action. gradenko_2000 fucked around with this message at 14:52 on May 19, 2015 |
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May 19, 2015 14:35
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The problem with the whole naturalistic language thing is that it opens it up to load of real-world solutions that are firmly in Ask Your DM territory. Say you're trying to do Rapier + Hand Crossbow and that's forbidden because you need a free hand to load the crossbow. Okay, I guess you tie the rapier to a chain around your wrist, let go of it, load the crossbow and then ready your weapon as part of your free action? Or you specifically use an arm strapped shield that leaves your hand free? That probably doesn't work with a tower shield, but regular size should be fine. That "spellcasters are not restricted by this at all, oh no, they can sheathe, cast a spell then draw their shield all in one action but those trained warriors? Ha, no, they can't do that" thing is making me so unreasonably mad as well. If Spellcasters can already do that, why is that sentence even in the War Caster feat?
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May 19, 2015 14:37
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"This is my usual carry, its a 6mm semi-automatic 80 lb-er. I've got a ballistic knife in the small of my back, spring-launched stiletto, will go through chainmail at 3 yards. Can't reload it without the tube press though. You should come to one of the bow shows, man. We could get you something to protect yourself and your family from all those orcs moving into the neighbourhood."
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May 19, 2015 14:48
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Well, since the retrieve/stow rules are supposed to be lenient and convenient, I guess I'll just have to have a bandolier of hand crossbows that I draw from. Perhaps with integrated Bags of Holding for nigh-infinite numbers in the event of a long drawn-out fight. Or maybe the DM will allow me to use weapon cords?
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May 19, 2015 15:28
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gradenko_2000 posted:EDIT: The other thing is that a Repeating Light/Heavy Crossbow does specifically show up  1e/2e had you covered.  (edit: was still two handed though) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JToxcNxED5I FRINGE fucked around with this message at 15:39 on May 19, 2015 |
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May 19, 2015 15:33
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isndl posted:Well, since the retrieve/stow rules are supposed to be lenient and convenient, I guess I'll just have to have a bandolier of hand crossbows that I draw from. Perhaps with integrated Bags of Holding for nigh-infinite numbers in the event of a long drawn-out fight. As I discovered last night, the retrieve/stow is actually more inconvenient since you only get one free one during you turn, any others require an action. This is even worse than 4e because stowing/retrieving is a minor action in that system meaning you can at least swap your move action for it, still leaving you with a standard that round. You just worried about the action economy more because you actually had other poo poo to do on your turn besides move and attack. The only classes who find it convenient are spellcasters who cast spells, since they seem to be the only ones who get to ignore their free hand rules (see: Somatic and Material components on PHB p. 203 and combine with the Mearls ruling from last page). Mecha Gojira fucked around with this message at 15:55 on May 19, 2015 |
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May 19, 2015 15:44
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isndl posted:Well, since the retrieve/stow rules are supposed to be lenient and convenient, I guess I'll just have to have a bandolier of hand crossbows that I draw from. Perhaps with integrated Bags of Holding for nigh-infinite numbers in the event of a long drawn-out fight. Which one involves more wizards? That's the one that's okay. The other one can be proven fanciful with a quick game of ball in a cup.
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May 19, 2015 16:04
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Didn't they nerf weapon cords after one of the devs managed to be the worst at hand eye coordination?
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May 19, 2015 16:38
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isndl posted:Well, since the retrieve/stow rules are supposed to be lenient and convenient, I guess I'll just have to have a bandolier of hand crossbows that I draw from. Perhaps with integrated Bags of Holding for nigh-infinite numbers in the event of a long drawn-out fight. Do we have Artificer rules for Homunculi yet? Stick one of them in each Bag of Holding, with the instruction to reload unloaded crossbows. With retrieve/stow being so lenient and convenient, it makes more sense, and is "More Verisimilinitudinous", to drop your crossbow into an interdimensional sweatshop staffed by robot-gremlins, and pull out a fresh one; than it would be to just reload it with a hand that has a shield attached to it. I mean, come on, reloading a crossbow; what do you think you're doing, casting a spell?
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May 19, 2015 16:41
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djw175 posted:Didn't they nerf weapon cords after one of the devs managed to be the worst at hand eye coordination? No, that was the other D&D edition made for 3e grogs (Pathfinder).
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May 19, 2015 16:42
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djw175 posted:Didn't they nerf weapon cords after one of the devs managed to be the worst at hand eye coordination? In Pathfinder, yes. A morning spent trying to whip a mouse into his hand by the cord proved that sword cords are worthless to trained warriors.
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May 19, 2015 16:42
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Mecha Gojira posted:The only classes who find it convenient are spellcasters who cast spells, since they seem to be the only ones who get to ignore their free hand rules (see: Somatic and Material components on PHB p. 203 and combine with the Mearls ruling from last page). You just have to find a spell where a bolt or crossbow is the material component
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May 19, 2015 16:42
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Transdimensional crossbow looks like a pistol because all the loading and tensioning is being done by pocket-dimension constructs, and the bolt is released through the gun barrel opening when they receive a signal from the trigger mechanism. Made by a high level wizard, so he could adjust the internal flow of time to make them load faster, and he's stuck a creation spell in there to just keep churning out bolts. Now you can just hold down the trigger and spray it like an uzi. Yours for just $124999.99. The copper change is to throw in the wishing well on your way out.
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May 19, 2015 16:48
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@JeremyECrawford posted:Exactly. The game is not designed to treat a prolonged blink as blindness @JeremyECrawford posted:I'd say the character is blinded if the eyes stay shut until the start of the character's next turn Which still doesn't cover falling prone to gain 3-Dice Lucky Disadvantage on melee attack rolls, or shooting with a ranged weapon in melee for the same effect, or wearing heavy armor for the same on Stealth checks, but okay. If you turn this around, then it could also mean being unable to see your target does NOT cause Disadvantage, with no regard for Lucky at all. EDIT: This is obviously a disassociated mechanic, because the character now has an incentive to drop prone to make his Lucky attack roll more powerful, for no actual in-universe reason.
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May 19, 2015 16:49
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Tunicate posted:You just have to find a spell where a bolt or crossbow is the material component Screw it, my bard is just going to pick up Magic Missile when he gets his poaching feature. He can at least still use his shield AND he won't have to worry about missing ever.
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May 19, 2015 16:53
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"output [highest of d10 and [lowest of d10 and d10]]" averages at 6.33 according to anydice. 12.16 with d20s, not sure why I used d10s, thinking about something else.
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May 19, 2015 17:01
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gradenko_2000 posted:In the context of th-urrent discussion, I would definitely formalize my own interpretation of problematic feats and effects - "Can you John Woo with hand crossbows? HELLA YES In non-4e editions of D&D I always preface stuff like that with 'Is this mechanically an advantage for the noncaster that would be greater/more useful than, being a Spellcaster of the same level using a spell of equivalent level'. Universally, the answer has been a resounding 'NO'. Strength of Many fucked around with this message at 17:07 on May 19, 2015 |
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May 19, 2015 17:02
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Doodmons posted:Okay, I guess you tie the rapier to a chain around your wrist, let go of it, load the crossbow and then ready your weapon as part of your free action? He justified it by saying he'd tied a mouse cord round his wrist and tried to flip it into his hand and it 'felt' like a move not a free action. That ridiculous bullshit where a pasty nerd tried a thing once and decided it was way too hard for a trained professional to do easily? That? Not. A. loving. Joke. This is why your proposal wouldn't fly despite being perfectly sensible.
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May 19, 2015 17:23
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In whatever game I play next, I am doing hand crossbow/sword, and I am going to describe every single reload as some sort of crazy stunt. Toss sword in air, reload crossbow, catch sword. Stab mook, leave sword in mook, reload crossbow, take sword out of dying mook. Pull back bowstring with hook on my bandolier, reveal that sword has a hollow hilt... concealing a crossbow bolt oh poo poo! It will work because it will be some sort of fun game.
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May 19, 2015 17:29
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theironjef posted:In whatever game I play next, I am doing hand crossbow/sword, and I am going to describe every single reload as some sort of crazy stunt. Toss sword in air, reload crossbow, catch sword. Stab mook, leave sword in mook, reload crossbow, take sword out of dying mook. Pull back bowstring with hook on my bandolier, reveal that sword has a hollow hilt... concealing a crossbow bolt oh poo poo! It will work because it will be some sort of fun game. I am %120 down with this.
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May 19, 2015 17:41
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