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Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

tweet my meat posted:

I'm committing to running curse of strahd. I got the book in today and that tear out map in the back is beautiful, should make the perfect centerpiece to the table if I block out the legend. I haven't been this creatively fired up in a while and I'm looking forward to running it. Mostly just reading up and planning the tarokka card reading setpiece and death house at the moment.

I'm thinking of switching to a different currency system once they get into Barovia to nerf the slightly ridiculous amount of gold my party has from an overly generous dm before me who let them open a tavern (named twin peaks, after the really lovely hooters-like restaurant that was home to a big biker gunfight in our town) at level 2 while being incredibly generous with profits.

Apparently, Barovian currency has Strahd's face minted on it so I'm thinking of having a Vistani trader offer to exchange currencies at a ripoff rate, unbeknownst to the party. This way I can nerf their wallets quietly with an interesting encounter and switch over to an immersive currency system that I can actually work into the story.

I also just want to eliminate a lot of money conversion that comes with all the smaller pieces of currency and eliminate exp crunching at the end of the session with milestone levelling. Anything I can do to save myself some busywork.

Starting over with fresh characters is probably the best way to do curse of strahd

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Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all
Also milestone levelling is a bit trickier than normal in curse of strahd, as you have like 6 (at level 3)levels to place out, and locations + goals will vary a lot depending on the reading and party.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Mendrian posted:

I had to fudge mine so that all of the Fortunes didn't show up in the same 2x2 area.

Where was they? I had 2 in the swamp, but they pulled the guy that needs to go to amber temple and one in the castle so it wasn't a problem.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

VROOM VROOM posted:

I should note that this is for a LMoP run where it's half the players' first time playing D&D. Optimization is not the goal.

Guise of many faces will let u have a lot of fun as a warlock

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Lucky Guy posted:

Do you gain stat increases/feats every 4 character levels, or class levels?

class levels, and its not always every 4 levels for every class

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

odinson posted:

Never heard of that before M.envy. You sure you're not thinking of scrolls of protection?

probably thinking of the minor magical properties some weapons can have in the DMG, one of them is it glows and alerts the wielder when a certain creature type is near like Sting from lotr

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

MonsterEnvy posted:

I created variants on the Bugbears based on the entry in Volo's guide. Which for some reason describes them but does not stat them out.

https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/103691-bugbear-thug
https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/103695-bugbear-bulwerk
https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/103698-bugbear-murderer

I like these bugbears! the wild swings power is really cool

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Ryuujin posted:

So looking at some Warlock builds I had on D&D Beyond. And it seems that it is adding the Devil's Sight 120 ft Darkvision to the Half-Elf's 60 ft Darkvision, giving the character 180 ft Darkvision.

It’s most likely a bug, probably adding the weird darkvis like they would with features like increased speed that do stack

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Epi Lepi posted:

Yeah we had a great moment a couple sessions ago in my group. The eldritch knight cast thunderwave on two direwolves that were in front of him and I mistakenly let him make an opportunity attack against one of them and he dropped it way below 0 hit points with his greatsword. We described it as him slicing through the wolf's neck as it tumbled away from him and it was pretty cool in the moment.

He did work that session, he killed two other direwolves with Green-Flame Blade, it just so happened that the secondary target had 1 or 2 hp left and so it combusted while he stabbed/burned his primary target.

I need to write up recaps of this campaign, if only so I have a record to remind myself what's been going on. I'm running Curse of Strahd and it's been fun, though the last two sessions were a little rocky There's so many plot hooks in Vallaki that my group has found it a little overwhelming. They've spent a session and a half just following plot hooks but haven't resolved any yet so it's felt like spinning wheels. They've decided both Lady Watcher and the Baron are lovely people and joked that they should kill them both and install Ismark as the Burgomeister and I honestly hope they do it.

The festival and the ensuing feast if your players haven’t finished the bones quest is a good 2-3 day timer with a bang to stop vallaki dragging on. Though both times I’ve run it my players have loved loving around there, it’s a good town and the subplots and characters are varied enough to get some good role playing out of it beforehand

Proud Rat Mom fucked around with this message at 19:37 on Jul 2, 2018

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Mendrian posted:

My group managed to get Vallaki burned to the ground within 24 hours of being there, so I'm honestly kind of jealous.

The first time I ran it was amazing

Through the Wacher brothers egging on the party, they along with book club cultists posing as fed up townsfolk to the party stormed the manor, leading to a pc death at the hands of a fleeing Izek, and the burgomeister getting ejected from the top floor window. Lady Wacher took over the town and held the Monster's Ball, A monster themed fancy dress party. the adventures had collared on that something was majorly wrong with her, and attended the marque party with the rouge who posed as staff to infiltrate the house.

Highlights include the monk having a dance fight off with a vampire spawn while everyone else cheered on, crazy crab man aiding the party to test the guy in the strahd costume, Strahd secretly turning up in fancy dress (wearing a 'costume' of the barons skin and clothes he died in) lady wacher taking the bard upstairs and them having sex while both her husbands corpse lay on the bed, along with the rouge who triggered the sleep dart trap.

The climax was after the awards and toast to the adventuring party, strahd reveals himself, along with the 5 vampire spawn whose costumes now look very real. I got the major NPC's, along with the party IRL, to draw straws. a poor vallakian npc who dressed as a mermaid was the unlucky one, and went forward to claim her prize, which was all 5 spawn descending on her by strahds command, ripping her to pieces and causing instant chaos.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Gharbad the Weak posted:

God, the 5e cr system is so weird.

it just doesnt work at all, its a big piece of poo poo i only glance at for a rough idea. it also just breaks down the higher you go.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Jeffrey of YOSPOS posted:

I think single monsters just don't work in this game and they certainly need legendary actions/resistance if nothing else.

yup, also if your party has any clue how to play the game making important enemies have maximum hit die health totals becomes a must because fights will make the players feel anticlimactic and not even remotely challenged as the bad guy crumbles halfway through round 2 or 3 having done little to make it interesting.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all
I think the normal ranger is fine as it is ? Also when I looked at the math, the beast master seems fine if u go two weapon fighting.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all
Like compare a 9th level war cleric to a fighter if you really want to see a weak class

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

mango sentinel posted:

I can't listen now, can you give cliffs notes?

How does it ever overcome damage resistance?

Lol like any other martial class is expected to: with magic items. Like mearls has come out and said this.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

mango sentinel posted:

What magic items give your animal companion magic damage?

You probably have like one hope officially, with the hotdq that makes natural weapons magical, I’m pretty sure one of the two fuckers said companions can attune to magical items but it takes one of
Your attunement slots

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Conspiratiorist posted:

PHB Hunter Ranger is a rather worse Fighter that gets some spell casting and nearly useless ribbon features to compensate. Its problems are that it's got several downright trap options as part of its diversification features, and that it doesn't scale at all past level 8 (nearly all classes get a meaningful power spike levels 9~11, Ranger does not), but overall it's functional.

PHB Beastmaster is awful, since it's taking what's already the weakest class and essentially removing its archetype features. All they truly have when you get down to the brass tacks is the ability to spend 8 hours to auto-pass the Animal Handle checks to befriend and teach tricks to a CR 1/4 beast. It's just stupid, and why Crawford's comments are so funny to me, because it's true: if you want an Animal Companion you're better off playing literally anything else and just telling your DM to fiat you one into existence.

how is whirlwind attack not a significant power spike? also bestial fury gives your pet two attacks for forgoing one of yours, and you can still two weapon fight

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all
not saying ranger is powerful, but to compare it unfavorably to the whole class of fighter is wrong.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

mango sentinel posted:

At level 11 your you can sacrifice your bonus attack so your 44hp wolf with 15 AC can attack twice and bounce off damage resistance.

same applies to your attacks, fighters, barb etc. You are supposed to have magic weapons if you regularly fight monsters with resistances. not saying that's not bullshit, but it's not a failing of the beastmaster, and if adventurer's league doesn't account for that that's an issue.

also your wolf would have 17 ac, advantage on attack and do 2d4+6, which is better than your damage with a d8 weapon. also its ac can be more with barding, which iirc any medium armor has been ruled fine for.

even later levels they can get your bonus hunters mark for free

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Conspiratiorist posted:

How often are you surrounded by more than 3 creatures? Unless you're delivering truly exceptional combined damage or spreading around CC effects, focus-firing is tactically superior. Volley is situational but actually okay due to being a 20-by-20 template that synergizes with Archery and Sharpshooter, but Whirlwind is just terrible.

RE Bestial Fury pray tell, what Animal Companion do you think is worth sacrificing a level 11 Ranger's attack for?

I meant the whole feature multiattack, sorry. but even whirlwind it does come up (and it will with the average room size for encounters) it's better ( and more flavorable) then an extra weapon die+mod a fighter gets. taken with the level 3 hordebreaker it super neat.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Philthy posted:

There is a segment of players who math it all out, and base decisions on this. It's kind of gamey but people like to look at classes that way for one reason or another.

I like both classes ideally. but even if you do the maths I don't think ranger comes out poorer by any significant margin to the fighter, but they also get spells and a load of nifty flavour/useful abilitys.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

mango sentinel posted:

A level 11 martial is expected to have a magic weapon. Nothing gives your animal companion magical attacks and that is very much a failing of Beastmaster. I don't know about barding. Base damage may be higher for the pet but does not include Hunter's Mark, which doesn't actually work with Shared Spells.

Like i said, Beastmaster counts as martial and, it came across before they did some clarifications that they expected everything to be balanced around no magical items. Yeah i'm wrong about hunters mark, but it's just one of your three attacks (two weapon fighting). Your pet can be anywhere in the encounter, providing 44hp someone else ain't getting hit with, and you pet eventually can get stuff like stoneskin with you.

again, It's not the best but when you are playing the game with martial clerics, moon druids or gmw barbs it not a big enough difference on the power scale to be worth worrying about.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Lucas Archer posted:

I’m running a 5e game for the first time, the Curse of Strahd, for 3 PC’s. Game is fun, the module is great. That’s my current 5e story.

Just finished running this yesterday, the whole module ran great start to end.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Kaysette posted:

I haven't listened to it but that's pretty funny if he phones in the end to his own book.

It looked pretty rushed but curse of strahd isn’t really over, they go back to it next season. The current season has started earlier for the waterdeep storyline and is running double the usual length.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

poorlifedecision posted:

I wish I got to play DnD enough to hate a version. I just started DMing a 5e campaign and I've had an ongoing 4e game for a couple years (with only monthly games) and honestly my 4e players should probably be using 5e and visa versa. The 5e players are exploratory and try creative things and the 4e players just kind of slap a finger down on a power they don't ever remember or bother to review and say they cast it.

I love the tactical nature of 4e but I can't use it much because I'd murder my players in about 5 seconds since they've never bothered to get a grip on combat or tactics or power usage beyond damage.

poorlifedecision posted:

I wish I got to play DnD enough to hate a version. I just started DMing a 5e campaign and I've had an ongoing 4e game for a couple years (with only monthly games) and honestly my 4e players should probably be using 5e and visa versa. The 5e players are exploratory and try creative things and the 4e players just kind of slap a finger down on a power they don't ever remember or bother to review and say they cast it.

I love the tactical nature of 4e but I can't use it much because I'd murder my players in about 5 seconds since they've never bothered to get a grip on combat or tactics or power usage beyond damage.

After a succesful campaign, why not ask them if they would play 4e? It’s been a couple of years for me but I’ve convinced my bunch of players whose only role playing knowledge + experience starts and ends with 5e to start a Delta Green campaign next week.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Verisimilidude posted:

Playing around with critical hits, and I realize I hate when someone rolls a critical hit and it ends up being a low number anyway

so I'm thinking you automatically count the first set of dice as having rolled the maximum, and then get to roll the additional dice as normal.

So if you attack with a short sword and land a critical hit, you get 6 (maximized 1d6) + 1d6 + additional modifiers

This way you always roll at least slightly higher than your standard potential damage

My table plays this way (at request of players)

It becomes a problem because enemies will generally roll a lot more dice than the players, and makes fights too swingy.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Giodo! posted:

Sometimes the way Jeremy Crawford tweets it seems like he is a canon or rabinical lawyer interpreting an ancient, contentious work. Like I expect him to say, "When you see the word 'object', you have to realize that in the original Aramaic the word was objectia meaning 'item that can be manipulated', therefore one must interpret that the true intent of the writer was blah blah blah..."

Rather than, you know, the guy who wrote the stuff a few years ago.

Yeah completely, some of the rulings are pretty clear from the book and I can get behind, but others its clear that the wording or intent doesn't cover a specific case but instead of issuing errata or just a clarification he will stretch the meaning (sometimes in contradictory ways!) like he is delivering wisdom of a hermetical obscure master.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Asuron posted:

Just thought I’d share a story as a new player on their second session.

So far it’s been pretty hilarious, because I have taken on the role of a zealous paladin which the other players and DM have been able to roleplay really well off of. It is really fun to play such an antagonistic party member, casuing conflict or forcing strange situations to happen because your character basically refuses to take the smarter option and looks down on others as heathens because of their values.


Sounds like your group had fun but this can get annoying as poo poo FYI, because alot of the time it ends up with your character hogging the decision making and overriding other players' choices.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

P.d0t posted:

Like, we never know what the gently caress the game wants us to do.

And usually we follow a lead as far as we can take it, and it's just like..... the plot hits a brick wall, and says, "I dunno what you're talkin' about, maaaan."
It's a lot of nothing.

Irina doesn't know poo poo about anything. Fishermanguyman doesn't know who made him do the thing. Apparently trying to fight people in the windmill was the incorrect thing to do (or it somehow should have gone better for us) but we basically had to back off from there and shrug. People at the tavern in Vallaki are just a bunch of nothing. We went to the chapel-thing in front of the graveyard-thing, and we were like.... "there's 4 rooms and they each have a thing in them, I guess? but we don't know which ones matter or don't, and have no idea how we were supposed to know." And then dude has the thing locked in the basement which I guess was nothing -- we were told to just leave it alone (we opened it up and had a look, but didn't bother trying to fight it.)



Like, we've had fun laughing at the campaign, but it's really been a whole lotta us having fun in spite of the module, and not because of it.

The problem is with the players or the DM, not the module. you are trying to play it like a dungeon crawl it looks like, and the tavern and the rumors has loads of plot hooks. also your brain seems to be mushing together vallaki and barovia.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Pollyanna posted:

D&D seems to occupy this weird space between “crawl dungeons and stab things” and “dramatic mystery-solving talky talk” and it really only officially supports the former.

the skill system while being shallow, works in town/non combat parts of the game fine.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

kingcom posted:

It sounds like they are trying to solve the adventure with the tool kit the game provides them and not 'hope people know how to play this game right'. Thats absolutely a fault of the module to not utilize the toolset the game system gives players.

what the hell does this even mean lol. the game provides more than the ability to walk into rooms.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

kingcom posted:

I mean, does it? Sounds like their group is having some problems trying to get it working right in CoS.


So with a game thats about investigation, theres lots of tools for the players to get or even invent clues into the narrative. These are game mechanics that many systems have and often are critical for playing those slow and tense noir games. They encourage behaviour and tones, as well as helping to provide bridges in situations where either a description isn't giving away what should happen next or the players are just not clicking with whats going on for whatever reason.

These kinds of mechanics are pretty handy in re-railing an adventure or helping to move over sections where the players failed to get information or clarity they need. Pdot has said they've been following the plot but keep running into brick walls, this is the exact kind of experience you tend to run into when you don't really have a tool to give player agency to let them leap to the next conclusion that helps the plot and adventure maintain momentum.

Curse of Strahd is not about investigation? if the DM ran it correctly its provides pretty clear directions what needs to be done during the module.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

kingcom posted:


EDIT: Like Curse of Stradh is supposed to be a sandbox kind of adventure except the big danger of a sandbox adventure in D&D is that if the players catch on the wrong hook and it leads to information or knowledge that isn't clearly helpful or relevant to what they are trying to do, the players can get lost in it pretty quickly. The great irony of a good sandbox is that your players get solid milestones out of every choice to make them feel like they always made the 'correct' choice to explore this option even if the end result is not the most positive of outcome.

Most of the side content can either level you up, help you find allies or items, or can provide information on whats going on. that's even without a card making you go there.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

kingcom posted:

I'm providing an example of mechanics my friend. But even in this circumstance its pretty helpful. As a basic thing to take from those investigation style a player have a resource that lets them go 'Irina knows about Stradh and where hes located' . Thats something the player has invented but lets everyone push the story forward a bit because of that 'clue' they've discovered.


Right so the issue is more likely that you've got someone running this who thinks its a module but really its a campaign toolkit that requires the GM to assemble into the adventure you're going to end up running? Which means the players are mostly hoping its put together and organised in a way that makes sense to them too?


It seems like P.D0t has run into situations where they've pursued someone or something and gotten nothing of use out of it though.

Ireena does know this stuff? And those situations you do get information out of it, so either his group doesn't give a poo poo and is playing the wrong module or the DM is screwing up and not giving them the leads they need.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all
Really looking forward to the next adventure book. My group (2DMs) has a shared timeline in the realms and a lot of our adventuring party’s have either started or visited waterdeep during official and home brew adventures, so everyone is down for a social focused adventure there.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

acumen posted:

My group is pretty new to dnd and starting Princes of the Apocalypse tomorrow but I've read that it can be a little messy or disjointed. Is there anything I can do as a player to make the DMs job easier at all?

its easy as gently caress for a new dm to mess up and not give you the proper encounter chain to lead you to the first appropriate area at level 3. the book splits information across the whole thing. engaging with the story + npc's is the only thing players need to do to keep things running smooth and don't roll your eyes if u get rescued by dm fiat, as i'm pretty sure early levels it's almost expected to happen. Have fun!

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all
Dragon heist is shite and i'm disappointed I got hoodwinked into buying it, as a adventure it's almost with no exaggeration completely unusable and there is no actual heist (which the developers straight up lied about on promotional videos). the only use I can see out of it is a bunch of fleshed out characters and a setting to run your own waterdeep adventures.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Mendrian posted:

Curious about this. Can you be more specific?

How is it unusable?

The heist bit is lovely - is there a chance they're setting something up or?

Yeah I can elaborate. chapter one is pretty ok for a level one introduction, no real problems there. chapter 2 has characters do nothing apart from run a business if they choose to, and do a couple of faction missions which amount to like one die check if run as written. which is supposed to level party up to level 3. Chapter 3, characters are thrust back into the main plot by a event, and do some light investigative work to arrive at some unclear and unforeshadowed people and conclusion. you can literally skip this chapter if you just tell the town guards your suspicions.

chapter 4 is where it really starts to get bad. there are these 'encounter chains' that take place in various locations in the city while you chase a plot device.
they are reskinned and repurposed depending what season/villain you are facing. it is assumed your characters don't get the item until the last area. It is extremely easy for them to do so in a lot of the areas. If your party gets the item before the required stop, I poo poo you not, the item refuses to comply and uses magic to keep itself out of the players hands, trying to keep itself in the dumb encounter chain. it will only comply once the train reaches the destination.

The vault at the end is like a 9 room quite bare dungeon, nothing too special as written to get in. your players will not be able to heist the money. there is no grand heist, period. the final showdown will 99% be between the chosen main villain and whatever Forgotten Realms Powerul NPC the party has communicated with the most, with the party facing the lackeys and playing second fiddle.

The villains and various NPC's in waterdeep are written exceptionally well. art and flavor is great. The problem is, without basically a whole adventure rewrite by the DM, or taking a lot of time weaving in the various characters it will all ultimately go to waste. I reckon without a proactive DM, u could go most of the adventure without knowing who the bad guy is supposed to be.

Also they have changed map architects from mike schley to dyson logos, whose maps and layouts are worse. I cant get over how lovely the final vault is.

Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Arivia posted:

They're not low quality. They have a strong style that is effectively conveyed and are clearly readable - they're esthetically and technically well done. Yes, you are objecting following from your observation that the maps do not match the graphic design elements that you've become used to. You should say that, instead of lying and saying they are "low quality."

The maps are low quality with low, strange or omitted detail in waterdeep dragon heist. Mike would have done a better job no question.

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Proud Rat Mom
Apr 2, 2012

did absolutely fuck all

Arivia posted:

Okay. Apology accepted.

What the gently caress is wrong with your brain

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