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treeboy posted:maybe I'm in the minority, but that actually sounds like a neat template, harsh, but a nice setpiece encounter to cap off an adventure or campaign It's not a bad idea, especially given what a pain it could be to come up with a solo in 4E who could actually give the party a decent challenge. Of course, proof of the pudding, etc.
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Jul 3, 2014 16:32
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Chaltab posted:Is this missing content? I don't see the list of Feats or any martial maneuvers. It's the Basic set, so you only get limited options. For martial maneuvers and other complex stuff, you'll have to buy the PHB.
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Jul 3, 2014 18:47
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MonsterEnvy posted:More Balanced. Unless they burn their limited high level spells on damage spells they won't do as much damage as a Fighter. So they are better for buffs debuffs and clearing out rooms of large amounts of weak enemies. (Though most buffs and debuffs can't be used while another is being used.) They are super squishy and need the other classes to protect them in this edition. Rogues are much better with skills, locks and traps then them. Casting Knock for example would be a last resort as it wastes a precious spell slot and it makes a loud knocking noise that will alert everything within 300 ft of the party. Also, I'd note that there doesn't seem to be any assumption that wizards can easily make magic items in this edition, so you can't just crank out a scroll/wand of some problem-solving spell and stash it in your pack so you don't have to worry about using a spell slot. This is probably something that we won't have the full dope on until the DMG, though.
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Jul 4, 2014 07:16
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Ryuujin posted:@SnarkKnight1 : What would be examples of Strength, Intelligence, or Charisma saving throws? uhwait. I thought willpower-type saves were still Wisdom-based (e.g. Charm). But now you resist possession with Charisma? Okaaaaaaaay.
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Jul 21, 2014 18:30
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mastershakeman posted:The rule would be a called shot with a critical hit and a good enough severity roll. Called shots automatically determine location. Only problem is the size category issue, I'm not sure how you'd get around that. I think unarmed is bludgeoning, which only lets you break wings, not actually rip them off but same mechanical effect. For me, at least, the problem is that we've gone backward from "fighters can do cool things" to "fighters can do cool things ... if the DM is generous and the dice are kind." Anecdote time! One of the highest-level characters I played in 4E was a polearm-wielding monk. Like most polearm users in 4E, he was built with an eye toward pushing, tripping, and other movement effects. When I went into a fight, I was golfing dudes all over the place every round. With powers like Furious Bull, I could literally scoot into the middle of a crowd of enemies and knock them all flying with a single mighty swing. And I didn't NEED to explain any of this to the DM beforehand. I'd just decide what I was doing, roll to hit, and if I hit, declare that my target was now thirty feet over yonder and flat on his back. The only time the DM needed to get involved was if I tried to move an enemy into a hazard. A while back, I was invited to join a 2E game, and I rolled a fighter. I didn't want to do the boring, generic longsword-and-shield guy, so I made him a halberdier. (He was originally going to be a William Tell style crossbowman, but that ended quick when I remembered how poo poo crossbows are in earlier editions.) So I started playing him, and I quickly realized that if I wanted to do ANYTHING in combat other than "I hit him with my halberd," I would have to ask the DM first. Not that the DM was a dick or anything. But if I had to negotiate with the DM every round, either he or I would get tired of it quickly. And besides, in older editions, improvising tended to be punished by the rules. If I wanted to, for instance, trip a guy, I'd have to eat a to-hit penalty that would range from annoying to crippling. And the DM would likely expect me to give up my damage in exchange for doing the trip. It's very, very easy to get into a state where improvising just isn't worth it, and the DM doesn't have to be an rear end in a top hat to get there. There's a reason my group rarely saw a lot of improvised actions in combat until we tried Feng Shui and other games where coming up with stunts is actually encouraged and rewarded by rules. This is why, incidentally, I'm going to be very curious to see what guidance the 5E DMG gives for adjudicating improvised actions. For all its flaws, the battlemaster fighter at least doesn't fall into the trap of making you trade damage for status effects.
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Aug 23, 2014 19:07
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Slashrat posted:Are there really any fantasy settings, D&D or otherwise, that doesn't do the thing where all gods are objectively proven to exists through direct communication with mortals and influence on the shape and functioning of the world? Whenever I think about gods in the average D&D setting, I get the impression of a bunch of petulant children in a sandbox, completely unable to get along and play nice together. It makes me wonder why all mortals (or just mortal adventurers) everywhere haven't banded together for the purpose of evicting the gods from existence already. Dark Sun? There are clerics (because doing away with magic healing was a little too advanced way back in 2E days), but they get their powers from the elemental planes, who couldn't really give a poo poo about humans. As regards alignment ... it seems to me that 5E's system of traits, bonds, and flaws, or whatever they're called, exposes alignment as the useless cruft it is. I was looking over the pregens from the starter set and noted that without fail, the traits etc. told me more about what each character believed and wanted than some dumb two-word phrase that no one has been able to agree on the meaning of in 35 years. As for the Fighter Posse, the problem I always had with it back in the day when fighter followers were a thing was that taking a bunch of 1st-level veterans along on a 9th-level adventure was rarely worth it. One fireball, cloudkill, or dragon breath, and your band of sworn brothers was a collection of smoking boots even if they made their saves.
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Sep 2, 2014 14:43
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MonsterEnvy posted:Everyone you do know that a Level 1 Fighter is considered pretty impresive to a normal person with a lot of training and stuff. Normal commoners and soldiers are wusses in comparison. Besides what other folks have posted, this is very much a YMMV thing. I have seen many, many other folks insist that a first-level fighter is a shitkicker fresh off the turnip truck who's just figured out which end of the sword to stick in the enemy. (eta: I am not arguing in favor of this interpretation, which I think is dumb and ignorant of D&D's history. However, it is definitely A Thing in grognard circles.)
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Sep 3, 2014 05:12
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Arivia posted:This was solved in 3e with the adept NPC class and in 2e with acolytes if I remember. Hell, back in 1E days, Len Lakofka proposed a non-adventuring "cloistered cleric" class in his Dragon column.
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Sep 9, 2014 22:56
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branar posted:I get that 5E's ruleset writ large isn't for everyone. But seriously, who is the audience for these monsters? Most of the monsters you fight are nearly indistinguishable sacks of HP + damage expression. The rest have bullshit mechanics that pretty much guarantees an un-fun encounter for somebody involved. Are there really people out there who look at the monsters they've been releasing and think that this represents a step forward in monster design? The grogs I've seen are thrilled with this one, because they love monsters that are "scary" -- by which they mean monsters that can gently caress you over with a bad die roll or two, so you're pretty much forced to do anything you can to avoid fighting them. cf. rust monsters, rot grubs, et al.
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Sep 11, 2014 20:55
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Nihilarian posted:What, really? I want to see this. Word of Gygax from the 1E MM: "Rakshasas cannot be harmed by non-magical weapons, magical weapons below +3 do one-half damage, but hits by crossbow bolts blessed by a cleric will kill them." They're also flat-out immune to any spell under 8th level, so they're not just "gently caress melee" monsters. Of course, this was 1E, when crossbows were so poo poo no one ever used one.... The 1E rakshasa art is one of Trampier's cooler pieces though. 
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Sep 12, 2014 00:57
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pospysyl posted:When did "ability damage" first come up in Dungeons and Dragons? The idea of doing damage directly to numbers abstractly representing your capabilities seems like such a DnD-ism. I can't think of a single case where ability score damage is more appropriate than applying penalties to an ability modifier. It was around as early as 1E -- it wasn't a common occurrence at least IME, but you still had spells like feeblemind and monsters like shadows, which drained 1 point of Strength per hit (with lost Strength points naturally returning in 2-8 turns). However, there were no overarching rules for ability damage; those didn't come along until 3E. Of course, ability damage was less important back when ability scores weren't as vital to your character.
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Sep 13, 2014 03:38
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Yeah, variation in weapon style is one of the things I most regret losing. You don't even have to do it the way 4E did it -- BECMI's weapon mastery tables are right there for another way to give weapons different feels (and make weapon-wielding classes more interesting).
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Sep 15, 2014 00:24
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I can remember meeting some rust monsters back in the pre-2e day. The smart move was always to toss them some iron spikes (of COURSE you had iron spikes in your backpack) and walk away while they were eating. Only a dick DM would actually have them attack the party.
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Sep 17, 2014 14:15
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Babylon Astronaut posted:I mean like Basic completely breaks if you go outside... Isn't that working as intended? Basic was meant only for dungeon adventuring -- the idea was that at Basic levels, you'd just be commuting back and forth between your home base and whatever starter dungeon the DM threw at you. You were supposed to avoid longer outdoor journeys and wilderness exploration until you had enough levels under your belt to move on to the Expert rules.
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Sep 24, 2014 13:47
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Quad posted:I often wonder if there could be an ultra-autistic way to gauge xp for encounters based on, like, a balanced level 10 party, with perfect rolls. Like, if that party, with perfect rolls, could kill monster x in 1 round, it's a CR 1. 10 rounds, CR 10. The old DC Heroes / Blood of Heroes had a system like this. The GM would run two rounds of test combat between the PCs and the adversaries, using the tactics the PCs typically adopted and assuming every roll came up 15. After those rounds, you toted up the number of unhurt, injured, and defeated heroes and adversaries, and the rules explained how much to buff or nerf the opposition based on those results. friendlyfire posted:I semi-followed the development process and it seemed like fighters just kept changing and what we have is just what happened to be in the docket when the deadline hit. At least with the monk, I'm sure gamers everywhere are enjoying the cottage industry of publishing monk fixes that has been booming since 2000. As a monk fan: publishing monk fixes was a booming industry from approximately 1979 through 2010. The 1E monk was the drizzling shits, the 2E monk was barely an afterthought, the 3E monk was a miserable heap of failure. And then the 4E monk came along and it was loving awesome, and got even more fuckinger awesomer with further supplements. So as you may guess, I am deeply, deeply thrilled that the 5E designers threw all that out and took the 3E monk as their starting point.
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Oct 15, 2014 02:40
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The Malthusian posted:Does it strike anyone else as weird that magic items are supposed to be rare and optional this edition, yet the DMG is 1/3 magic items and all its previews so far have just been about how cool magic items are? Because as much as people claim to hate the Christmas tree effect, magic items have always been one of the most colorful and memorable parts of D&D. Bags of holding and helms of brilliance, rings of shooting stars and rods of lordly might ... they're all an iconic part of the game, and Next will always go for the iconic over any other consideration.
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Nov 8, 2014 06:44
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Ryoshi posted:As someone whose only exposure to FR has been the first three Drizzt books (which I'm still enjoying) and several hours messing with NWN I have nothing against the setting, it just seems boring. I like the adventures the characters are having but the actual setting is so blandly Fantasy Settingish that there's nothing really to recommend it over random home brew setting X. The Underdark goes back to Gygax's Drow series of modules. The Realms just expanded and refined the concept, especially after Drizzt came along and drow became the new hotness instead of just tiresome antagonists.
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Nov 20, 2014 06:00
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Let's look at the first announcement for the Adventurer's Handbook (swiped from ENWorld): quote:Not inherently evil, elemental power can be mastered by those with both malevolent and benign intentions. The Elemental Evil Adventurer’s Handbook provides everything that players need to build a character that is tied directly into the Elemental Evil story arc, with skills, abilities, and spells meant to augment their play experience throughout the campaign. Additionally, valuable background and story information provides greater depth and immersion. Now let's check this out: ritorix posted:Characters in the D&D tabletop roleplaying game can help prevent devastation to the lands and people of the Forgotten Realms in the Princes of the Apocalypse adventure by Wizards of the Coast and Sasquatch Game Studio. Princes of the Apocalypse is available on April 7, 2015 and includes an epic adventure for characters levels 1–15 as well as new elemental spells and the element-touched genasi as a new playable race. In addition, a free download will be available in mid-March that includes more new races plus the player content available in Princes of the Apocalypse, just in time for the start of the Elemental Evil season of the D&D Adventurers League. So "skills, abilities, and spells ... expanded backgrounds, class builds, and races" has somehow turned into This is my shocked face. Look at how shocked it is. Edit: Missed that the download also mentions more new races. Selachian fucked around with this message at 01:25 on Jan 21, 2015 |
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Jan 21, 2015 01:17
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Tunicate posted:Genasi are the pinnacle of lazy design. 4 elemental races, plus a shitload of two-element paraelemental races that nobody uses because their only characterization is 'I like Ice'. eh, I had fun with a void genasi psion in 4E, with the Scion of Absence paragon path, so I could do stuff like temporarily blink out of existence, make enemies disappear, or completely absorb attacks. Of course, 5E genasi will probably just get a few daily uses of thematic spells.
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Jan 21, 2015 05:56
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Peas and Rice posted:I'm trying to think of good examples of Lawful Evil characters from fantasy literature as an inspiration for a D&D character - the best I can come up with is Lord Vetinari from the Discworld series. Any other decent ones? Classifying fictional characters into nine-point alignment invariably turns into a shitstorm. But anyway. Dolores Umbridge, the Sheriff of Nottingham, Darth Vader. Any tyrant type who wants to rule because he/she Knows What's Best For You.
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Jan 22, 2015 20:41
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OneThousandMonkeys posted:You forgot to post that their publishing schedule was severely strained by somebody on the team getting jury duty. Fortunately, he was quickly disqualified when he answered all questions by shrugging and saying, "That's up to the judge."
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Jan 23, 2015 21:08
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LightWarden posted:Would you be willing to transcribe or photograph the alignment section? I have this alignment comparison/discussion post rolling around in the back of my mind, and part of it is just the sheer absurdity of how alignment definitions change with every single edition published, but Holmes Basic is the one that I don't have access to. Besides the chart Alhireth-Hotep posted, Holmes Basic devotes all of one paragraph to alignment. Holmes posted:Characters may be lawful (good or evil), neutral or chaotic (good or evil). Lawful characters always act according to a highly regulated code of behavior, whether good or evil. Chaotic characters are quite unpredictable and can not be depended on to do anything except the unexpected -- they are often, but not always, evil. Neutral characters, such as all thieves, are motivated by self interest and may steal from their companions or betray them if it is in their own best interest. Players may choose any alignment they want and need not reveal it to others. Note that the code of lawful good characters insures that they would tell everyone they are lawful. There are some magical items that can be used only by one alignment of characters. If the Dungeon Master feels that a character has begun to behave in a manner inconsistent with his declared alignment he may rule that he or she has changed alignment and penalize the character with a loss of experience points. An example of such behavior would be a "good" character who tortures or kills a prisoner. The next section, "Languages," also devotes one sentence to alignment languages, just noting that they exist.
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Jan 24, 2015 14:26
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Chris Sims has gotten the axe (he's got "I need a job, willing to relocate" up on his Twitter). ENWorld is saying that an editor named Jennifer Clarke Wilkes has also been laid off. At least they did let 'em stay past Christmas.
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Jan 29, 2015 05:35
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Laphroaig posted:
uh yeah seconded. I don't care WHAT system you're using, DMs who feel like they have to "win" are a plague and a pestilence. Good luck.
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Feb 5, 2015 22:12
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I really suggest spending your time doing anything else
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mastershakeman posted:Really? 2e didn't? I could've sworn monsters used the same crit effects in 2e as characters (including double/triple damage on severe crits). Heck, I lost a character recently to that happening. Crits were only an optional rule in 2E -- you either got double damage on a 20, or got to make a second attack on a 20, or you got nothing and liked it, depending on which option the DM preferred. The Combat & Tactics book had more extensive and fiddly rules for crits but I can't be arsed to look them up right now.
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Feb 7, 2015 18:15
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gradenko_2000 posted:Innocent DMs: B-b-b-but! Needs the Lady of Pain standing in the corner shedding a single tear.
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Mar 4, 2015 16:38
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So hey, I hope you weren't holding your breath waiting for the conversion documents for other editions of D&D to Next. Mearls sez on Twitter that the guy who was supposed to approve said documents is on jury duty for the next four months.
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Mar 18, 2015 14:21
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Splicer posted:Also which classes are the premium $6 classes, and which are the budget $3? Rogue, wizard, fighter, and cleric are the budget classes. Everything else will cost you a fiver or so.
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Apr 7, 2015 21:31
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Some of my players on roll20 use macros for their at-wills or other abilities they tend to spam a lot. Me, I can't be arsed to set up up macros for every single disposable monster, especially when typing in the /roll command by hand works just as well.
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Apr 8, 2015 02:08
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Count me in on the "likes Roll20 fine" crew, but I don't really do anything too demanding with it.
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Apr 9, 2015 02:04
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TheAwfulWaffle posted:You have more faith in grogs than I do. Technically, martial powers were called exploits, even if no one ever used that name. Didn't slow the grogs down for a second.
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Apr 16, 2015 21:09
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gradenko_2000 posted:
The Player's Option books were a weird mix of clever, innovative ideas that took AD&D into genuinely new places ... and poorly thought out, gamebreaking poo poo. Of course, everyone tends to focus on the latter.
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May 1, 2015 04:57
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OSR-compatible point-buy?! Now I've seen everything (and my opinion of AD&D 2e is slowly being revised to be better and better over time)
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So hey, they've announced the new adventure path for 5e: Rage of Demons. Wizards posted:Fight alongside Drizzt Do'Urden in the new Dungeons & Dragons storyline  e: f,b
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May 6, 2015 15:29
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I also think the "always use your encounters, then at-wills, and then maybe dailies" thing is a bit exaggerated IME, and it can be alleviated by smart construction of powers so they have different levels of situational usefulness. Some powers are better used right away so you can take advantage of a buff they offer, some are better saved until you need them; some are meant to be used in a crowded battlefield, some are better for focusing on a single target.
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May 6, 2015 17:20
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Bongo Bill posted:In theory, the fighter is best at basic attacks, which is what real fighting is all about. Everything else is either magic (good) or anime (evil). Fighters are also supposed to have the most HP and be able to wear the best armor, as well as being proficient with the most weapons. Unfortunately, all of these are hangovers from editions of the game when they were actually relevant. In older editions -- 1E and the like -- it was a lot harder for casters to just end a fight by skipping past HP damage, which meant that armor, weapons, and HP were still relevant. Even then, though, most fighters just specialized in one weapon and carried a couple backups. And the specialization rules were pretty generous; a 1E fighter with double specialization in bow is a death machine. Plus magic items were usually handed out by rolling on random tables, which meant that your fighter, with his wider range of proficiencies, had a better chance of being able to use that suit of +2 banded mail or +1 glaive-guisarme of sharpness you just found in the dragon's lair. And a lot of the cooler magic items were specifically usable only by martial classes -- no getting around that with Use Magic Device.
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May 10, 2015 19:04
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gradenko_2000 posted:Wait what was in UA that made the Fighter better? Weapon specialization and attacks-per-round rules? Yes, weapon specialization was not part of the core AD&D 1E rules, although multiple attacks were. The WS rules were originally published in Gygax's column in the Dragon and then given official publication in UA. And the loudest and most enthusiastic voices for 5E I've seen have been from AD&D fans who hated 3E/4E. Makes sense that players of older editions would favor a new edition that replaces the DM on the pedestal that 3E/4E knocked him down from. Littlefinger posted:Because it's even older than the whole "edition war" thing. I heard it already in the time when "T$R" was the meme du jour, them being soulless corporate overlords sending C&Ds to hapless fans, and not the True Gamers™ of the halcyon days of Gygax (who too was pretty disdainful of fans homebrewing poo poo up, but whatevs Gygax made so many statements about homebrew that it's hard to pin down what exactly his feelings about it were. You can find quotes from him about not being bound by the rules and making the game your own as easily as you can find him saying, "If you're not playing AD&D exactly by the rules, you're not playing REAL AD&D." But yes, anyone who idealizes TSR as some sort of perfect conclave of Ascended Masters of True Gaming is talking poo poo.
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May 11, 2015 16:52
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Kurieg posted:The worst part about Ante was when they introduced cards that interacted with literal ownership of cards. Not "i control this for the rest of the game" ownership, but "this card is mine now, if you didn't want me to steal it you shouldn't have put it in your deck" cards. I once played with a guy who used a deck that couldn't actually win a game -- it just forced other players to keep ante-ing and then allowed him to loot the good cards from the ante pile. That was some fun.
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May 12, 2015 00:44
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gradenko_2000 posted:I don't know how much these systems were used or how well they were received, but it's clear to me that they were/would've been obsoleted by moving to the [d20+modifier vs DC] and skill category system of 3rd Ed and beyond. Most of the complaints I saw about NWPs in the Old Days dealt with one of two things a) bloat (check out this pdf of all the NWPs that appeared in various 2E products) and b) the fact that a 18 strength fighter could take the Smithing proficiency and instantly be a better smith than someone with lower Strength who had been smithing all his life. I suspect those are the reasons we got a limited skill list (with prohibitions against adding more skills) and skill ranks in 3E.
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May 15, 2015 21:04
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P.d0t posted:So here's a dumb question: In addition to what others have already said: D&D generally doesn't draw enough of a distinction between weapon types to make having a lot of weapon skills be all that useful. Maybe back in 1E with the Weapon vs. AC table, but almost no one actually used that. Stuff like being able to set a polearm against a charge, or using a bashing weapon instead of a piercing one against skeletons, happens so situationally it's not useful to plan for. The other side of weapon skills, as I've mentioned earlier, is that if treasure is randomly distributed, then having lots of weapon skills makes it more likely you'll be able to use the cool thing that just dropped. But if your DM tailors treasure to the group, you might as well just specialize in longsword and call it a day.
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May 21, 2015 11:58
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FRINGE posted:The original "Artifacts and Relics" tables had large lists of (sometimes unique in the system) powers that you would roll for, but they always had a chance to include some terrible drawbacks. I always wondered if anyone actually did that, and if any player actually sat there going through the controls. "Okay, I'm gonna try lever 13 and switch 5 at the same time. What happens?" "Uh, you seem to be rotting."
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Jun 2, 2015 07:11
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