|
LeSquide posted:Spells were also really jacked up. I remember playing the cleric equivalent (...mystic?) and I think the spells were moved over a time category for casting, so nothing was faster than one full round, and things that used to be big full round spells took minutes long to cast. I think the idea was to get into more of a Gothic "ritual magic" feel. Also, guns were very much a thing and pretty much anyone could use one so even "wizards" could empty their six-shooters into enemies instead of being stuck with the fairly useless staff/dagger/dart weapons of normal D&D.
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 20:00
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 26, 2024 04:29 |
|
|
JcDent posted:The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Games > Traditional Games > FATAL & Friends 2020: Please Don't Try to Fix Bad Games can apply to DnD. I don't care what the thread title is. If I wanted a one dimensional discussion about how a game was poo poo, I'd listen to System Mastery. The reason FATAL and Friends is a good thread is in-depth discussion about why a game is hosed (based on actual play experience, either of the person reviewing the game or the other people in the thread) and what might be done to make it better. "don't try to fix bad games" is a terrible attitude. If we did that, all we'd have is bad games.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 20:01
|
|
|
*is in the midst of the greatest boom in quality independent tabletop games possibly in the hobby’s history* “Listen it’s really important we rehash the conversation about how to make the 3rd edition of Dungeons and Dragons slightly less painful to play. This is vital for the health of the hobby.”
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 20:05
|
|
|
I'm sure I'm not the only one ITT who realised about 10-20 years into the hobby that they spend so much time 'fixing' that actually playing is almost just a side benefit.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 20:06
|
|
|
I mean, there's a distinct difference, there's: "Hey guys, I had to rewrite 290 out of 300 pages of this game, including the entire core resolution mechanic and premise, but I managed to salvage the 10 pages about playing a dog wizard, so it's saved! Hooray!" And then there's: "A couple of quick house rules turns this from a jankfest into a satisfying game!" Also let's be honest, who here has ever played a game entirely as written except maybe the first time they played it or when they were first getting into the hobby? Practically no game is perfect, and we all do minor "fixing" at all times, whether it's adjusting chargen totals, adjusting a busted or useless ability, or adding a few lines to the core premise. Plus, the thoughts on "how to fix" games are also usually rooted in analyses of where a given game hosed up, which is interesting, and helps people spot broken games in the future before they've managed to mire their game group in them.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 20:17
|
|
|
Everyone posted:I think the idea was to get into more of a Gothic "ritual magic" feel. Also, guns were very much a thing and pretty much anyone could use one so even "wizards" could empty their six-shooters into enemies instead of being stuck with the fairly useless staff/dagger/dart weapons of normal D&D. It worked pretty well, all told!
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 20:37
|
|
|
Again the "Don't Fix bad games" isn't preferring to mechanics, but some people's tendencies to go "OH THIS RAPEGAME IS BAD LETS MAKE IT SLIGHTLY LESS RAPEY AND IGNORE WHY IT IS A PROBLEM IN THE FIRST PLACE"
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 20:38
|
|
|
Don't Fix (thematically) Bad Games.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 21:53
|
|
|
I dunno, DnD just doesn't inspire the desire to fix. None of the systems seem cool in abstract, and it's not tied to a setting I love. And even then, which 5e setting outside Eberron wouldn't be as good to run on any other elfgame rules? What do you lose besides access to adventure modules where you don't need to tweak the opposition?
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 22:09
|
|
|
Dark Sun seemed cool at first glance, but i didn't like where it went.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 22:12
|
|
|
By popular demand posted:Dark Sun seemed cool at first glance, but i didn't like where it went.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 22:15
|
|
|
Pretty much. By the end of TSR, you could set your watch by the release of a second edition setting box that turned everything on its ear.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 22:50
|
|
|
JcDent posted:I dunno, DnD just doesn't inspire the desire to fix. None of the systems seem cool in abstract, and it's not tied to a setting I love. And even then, which 5e setting outside Eberron wouldn't be as good to run on any other elfgame rules? What do you lose besides access to adventure modules where you don't need to tweak the opposition? My singular reason for wanting to fix D&D is so I can go back to a group of friends who only ever play 3.5 or 5 and spend gaming time with them again. They're good people, who I miss, but we all have very limited spare time so it's either game with them or miss out. And I can't stomach any more goddamn D&D. I just can't do it.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 23:34
|
|
|
mellonbread posted:Again, no. Perhaps: The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Games > Traditional Games > FATAL & Friends 2020: Please Don't Try to Fix Vile Games Pretty much all editions of D&D, including my beloved (AKA tolerate) 2nd edition are kind of clunky with even potentially good ideas not being executed all that well. 40K has some pretty strong themes of authoritarianism running through it which can require some GM translation/re-working/alteration to make it workable for some groups - especially groups that would like to at least pretend to be playing people who could called be called "the good guys" without inviting a bunch of snickering. But there's still a considerable difference between those games/systems and Beneath: The Sexual Abuse.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2020 23:41
|
|
|
Yeah I figured the thread subtitle was primarily about Beast rather than, like, D&D.
|
|
#
?
Nov 20, 2020 01:06
|
|
|
Nessus posted:Yeah I figured the thread subtitle was primarily about Beast rather than, like, D&D. lmao it was from a poster trying to fix Beneath a few weeks ago.
|
|
#
?
Nov 20, 2020 02:50
|
|
|
Midjack posted:lmao it was from a poster trying to fix Beneath a few weeks ago. It was from when my dumb rear end went "Wait, here's a couple of tweaks to make this irredeemably vile thing slightly less irredeemably vile." But Beneath would still have been irredeemably vile.
|
|
#
?
Nov 20, 2020 05:33
|
|
|
 Buck Rogers XXVc: The 25th Century RAM Spaceships: Big Red Rockets RAM gets the bulk of the ship cards, as they’ve got a dedicated navy and NEO doesn’t.  I talked a little bit about the X-23A Krait before. Listed as RAM’s Stealth Fighter, it’s the most advanced fighter rocket on the scene. It comes equipped with a stealth cloak that gives it a -6 to Armor Class as long as the ship’s moving, and this is on top of its AC defense bonus of -5, so what is an Armor Class of 6 is actually -5, so you’re looking at starting characters needing to roll a natural 20 to hit this thing. Maybe this only shows up in specialized situations due to the stealth element, I dunno. Has a crew of 1 and has only one gyrocannon, so it’s not especially dangerous, but the amount of time you’re gonna spend trying to hit this thing makes it a problem. The description doesn’t say where it’s designed for but I’m assuming Mars.  There is another fighter-type here, at least. The RMS Scorpion has been modified for Earth’s atmosphere, ditches the stealth cloak and is slightly slower. It also has an AC Defense Bonus of only -4, meaning its AC 6 is really a 2, which is… still pretty tough to hit for low level gunners. I get the feeling that the AC adjustments and such were designed with realism in mind (it’s harder to hit a smaller ship than a big one) but they have the unfortunate effect of discouraging a lot of dogfights. I wondered if the adjustments were relative, i.e. someone in a fighter would have an easier time hitting another fighter, but I can’t see any indication of that.  The RMS Maximus Argyre is an example of a RAM Medium Cruiser, the kind you’re most likely to encounter (and do in the sample adventure!). It’s 150 tons, 300 feet long, and has a crew of 50. It’s slow and easy to hit- the AC Defense modifier is +1 giving it an AC of 7- but it’s got plenty of HP and has a hull bristling with weapons, including beam lasers, gyrocannons, a heavy acceleration gun, and a K-Cannon. It’s still a little too powerful for characters in most situations to take on directly, and yeah there’s no “light cruiser” so I feel there’s a gap in good enemy ships.  The RMS Chryse is a Heavy Cruiser, weighing 500 tons and measuring 1,000 feet long with a crew of 135. It’s got even more weapons, a shitload of hit points, and while its armor is only slightly better than the Medium Cruiser- Maximum Military gives a base AC of 4, and the adjustment gives it 6- yeah these are the ones you run from as quickly as possible, don’t even bother getting off a few shots. Unless of course your players start cruising in a warship of their own, which is entirely possible.  The RMS Tharsis is a Battler, a massive capital ship weighing 5,000 tons, measuring 10,000 feet long, and with a crew of 1,700. It’s got 20,000 HP in the Hull alone, and 240 weapons. Like, all together. It can also carry up to 50 fighters. So these are your Star Destroyers and should be treated as such.  Finally a couple of specialty ships. Ardala Valmar’s Princess of Mars is her personal pleasure craft, and its stats also double for those of the ship the PCs get in the sample adventure. It’s a scout cruiser weighing 35 tons, it’s about 70 feet long and has a crew of 8. Adjusted AC is 6, it’s got two missile mounts and a beam laser, and HP is low enough that you don’t want it getting into too many scrapes. It’s a pleasure craft, capable of defending itself but only just about. It’s not the only ship Ardala has, but it never flies without her in it. (Presumably she doesn’t fly the thing, that sounds more like servants’ work.)  On a similar note here’s Killer Kane’s Rogue and WOW that’s a retro design. Like a lot of the rockets have a few deliberately retro touches, this could have been in a serial easy. It’s another Scout Cruiser, weighing 30 tons with a crew of 3, and its 60 feet long. Its adjusted AC is 2, it’s got a heavy acceleration gun and a missile mount, HP are decent enough- this could be a good fight, though I’m not sure how often your players will be going against Killer Kane himself. So in terms of usefulness as a ship bestiary, I think the collection has a gap or two- I have no idea why they made the fighters as hard to hit as they did, so there’s room for a few easy targets for the PCs to make quick work of. But we’re not done, and next post I will go over the rest of the spacecraft detailed, and with that, finish up the box set! Be there!
|
|
#
?
Nov 20, 2020 20:05
|
|
|
Just want to say I really appreciate the Buck Rogers stuff. It's such a weird swerve for a D&D-based product, but it's trying its best!
|
|
#
?
Nov 20, 2020 20:46
|
|
|
Maxwell Lord posted:
This seems like something that PCs with some deep pockets to hire crewmen would try to steal and repurpose as a really badass pirate ship. Maxwell Lord posted:
This looks like somebody looked at a higher end vibrator and said, "Hmm, I bet I could scale that up into a rocketship..."
|
|
#
?
Nov 20, 2020 23:52
|
|
|
Everyone posted:This seems like something that PCs with some deep pockets to hire crewmen would try to steal and repurpose as a really badass pirate ship. To be fair, that IS pitch-perfect genre emulation for a 40s/50s rocket serial.... And yes I am assuming this is firmly on a 7th Sea "the PCs are expected to steal this stuff as soon as possible" basis.
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 01:22
|
|
|
I know it's the style, but it's really weird to me to see streamlined capital ships with fins.
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 01:49
|
|
|
Killer Kane's ship actually reminds me of the Orgzone Confederation Rocket Cruisers from the Buck Rogers newspaper comic.
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 04:25
|
|
|
Is it too late to say: grimduck
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 04:38
|
|
|
It's never too late to be a fan of ducks that worship a death god in a constant war against the undead, friend. To my great sadness I've never actually played an RPG in Glorantha, just read a bunch and played the hell out of the video games, but I'd be be much less worried about a GM trying to make the ducks grimdark than them trying to make them a joke, or heaven forfend, remove them from the setting. To mirror a prior comment, the Glorantha ducks are a great test of if I want to play with someone ; if you don't think they're loving rad as hell, well, maybe we can still be friends but I don't want to play elfgames with you, your sense of fun is dead inside. They're ducks devoted to the god of death and they worship him as a human with a fake duck-bill! How is that not the coolest thing you've ever heard of?!
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 05:30
|
|
|
Next Smoking Ruin update should be coming tomorrow night, character creation can take a little in this system. Shoutouts to Phil Hibbs, whose google spreadsheet makes it all bearable.
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 06:37
|
|
|
Xiahou Dun posted:It's never too late to be a fan of ducks that worship a death god in a constant war against the undead, friend. Figure my response to people wanting to alter or remove the Ducks would be: Me: "Are Halflings okay in D&D?" Them: "Yeah, I guess so." Me: "Then shut up."
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 14:38
|
|
|
Age of Sigmar Lore Chat: Cities of Sigmar Fire Walk With Me  Greywater Fastness is an industrial city, a behemoth of industry in the middle of Ghyran. And, more specifically, in the middle of a blasted waste of broken trees and polluted swampland. It wasn't like that when it was founded, but in the years since, its factories have sprawled out, producing more and more guns and artillery to feed the war efforts of the Free Cities. The guns of Greywater are some of the best in the Mortal Realms, and they're exceptionally valuable, but that has come at the cost of disregarding of all of Alarielle's requests to live in harmony with nature. In the Season of War, when the land was reclaimed from Nurgle, the Ironweld used the powerful gun batteries and even the Luminark arcane artillery arrays they made in combination with the Collegiate Arcane to demolish hordes of Beastmen at once...and all of the plant life anywhere near the city. Now, the region around Greywater is known as Ghoul Mere, full of vengeful spirits of the land that hunt any mortal fool enough to step off the trade road. The local Sylvaneth are led by a Treelord named the Pale Oak, and they have attached Greywater Fastness several times in the past. Indeed, the only thing preventing total war is the threat of undead or Chaos invaders. The guildmasters and Dispossessed leaders of the city are no less determined to maintain their ways, because the factories and foundries keep the city coffers full. The duardin clans that operate the best of them have become exceptionally wealthy and powerful, and many have seats on the Council of the Forge, a collective of business leaders and craftsmen who, in practice, have even more power over city politics than the actual Grand Conclave. They believe that taking over the land the Sylvaneth control will expand their income, and have been pushing for war. If it does come to that, the devastation will be immense. Few other forces in the Free Cities can match Greywater Fastness' armies for sheer firepower. Their elite Handgunner regiments (called Greycaps for obvious hat-related reasons) and Dispossessed Irondrakes and Ironbreakers form a practically unstoppable gunline, able to set more lead in the air than any other army. They are supported by Ironweld artillery, both normal cannons and Hellblaster volley guns, and Gyrocopter bombing squads. The city's military doctrine is exceptionally simple and direct: shoot everything as much as possible with the biggest guns possible.  The Phoenicium, City of the Phoenix is not a new city, quite, but a reclaimed ruin at the foot of the Arborean Mountain (part tree, part mountain). Long ago, in a huge battle, the mountainside was torn open and a tidal wave of sap was unleashed, washing over the city and all combatants. They were sealed away forever in amber. Centuries later, the Anointed of the Phoenix Temple found the ruins, fully preserved in the amber. The Flamespyre and Frostheart Phoenixes under their care shocked them by taking to the skies and unleashing their innate magical power. The amber melted away, transforming into a golden mist - a mist that has never gone away. The people trapped in the amber were long dead, of course, but the city was intact. Even now, enemies that stray too close to the mist are transformed into amber statues, which the aelves that live there take and place on the ramparts. Many worshippers of the Ur-Phoenix make great effort to take pilgrimage to the city, which has been named a holy site to the divine beast following its discovery. The Phoenix Temple's leadership has settled into the city and turned it into the center of their cult, and many of its armed forces are members. Indeed, many are aelves who were overcome by grief, PTSD and loss who came to the city to find peace and succeeded. The Phoenicium stands as a monument to the lost glory of the aelven nations, and the Ur-Phoenix's rising from ashes is taken as a symbol of the desire of the aelves to return to those glories. It is no surprise that the aelves of the Phoenix Temple are the dominant cultural and political force of the city, with a majority of seats on the Grand Conclave and a majority of the population. They do not discriminate against humans or duardin in most respects, save one: only the aelves may join the armies of the Phoenix Temple, though others can serve the city's armed forces rather than the Phoenix Temple directly. The chief Stormhost of the city is the Lions of Sigmar, who tend not to interfere in the running of the city for any reason. Instead, they spend most of their time either within the Golden Castrum at the center of the city or out in the field fighting for Sigmar. The Phoenix Temple prefers to see the Phoenicium as a cultural bastion rather than a military one, but they still maintain their own armed forces to supplement those of the Grand Conclave. When they march to war, they bring the Flamespyre and Frostheart Phoenixes with them. Normally, these birds roost on the Arborean Mountain, but their presence fills the warriors of the Temple with a fanatical fervor. The Phoenix Guard fight with precision normally - with the Phoenixes supporting them, they became a perfect unit, fighting without fear despite the gouts of flame and ice that rain down around them from the birds.  So...Anvilgard. What I'm about to tell you about it is no longer true. Not since Broken Realms: Morathi. But we'll get to that in a moment. Anvilgard was a fortified port in Aqshy, located on a key strategic position over the Golvarian Passage and a highly contested stretch of resource-rich ocean. It was a major trade city for the region, and the aelven corsairs and pirates that controlled the sea lanes were also its primary police force. It was located on a jungle coastline and surrounded by volcanoes, known as the Crucible of Life. Eruptions were and are frequent, and the ash left behind creates very fertile soil, especially boosted by Aqshy's ambient magic. Indeed, the plants would have overwhelmed Anvilgard if the Ironweld had not developed extremely potent defoliants, fired into the jungle from dragon-headed towers. It withers and kills plants, but is largely harmless to animals and people, though the city always suffered under a gloomy grey fog caused by the constant outpourings. Anvilgard was a criminal haven and home to many smugglers and pirates. The Anvils of the Heldenhammer commanded its Stormkeep and presented a strong image of traditionalism and grandeur, but their hands-off management and the power of the local corsairs in the city's politics allowed its laws to be largely bypassed. The city's political landscape was largely controlled by the Blackscale Coil, an organization of Ulgu aelves from the Scourge pirates, the Darkling Covens and the Order Serpentis. While they were basically the dark aelf mafia, it had agents from all of the free peoples, which it embedded into the city's military and social hierarchy at all levels. The Coil manipulated the Grand Conclave into serving its needs via a mix of blackmail, intimidation and outright assassination, and was skilled and subtle enough in doing so that the Anvils' Lords-Veritant were unable to root out their leadership - and were rarely called on by the locals to do so, mostly out of fear.. But again, that was all in the past. In Broken Realms: Morathi, Morathi enacted her grand plan. She broke into Slaanesh's prison to siphon off a number of aelven souls from the Dark God, accidentally leaving the bindings more vulnerable as she left. She made a deal with Katakros Orpheon to seize control over part of the Eightpoints, asking only for a supply of Varanite and surrendering the land to Nagash's forces. Using these, she empowered herself with the Heart of Khaine and achieved actual godhood. She betrayed the Anvils of the Heldenhammer, taking over Anvilgard and using paralytic poisons to keep those who might have warned Sigmar alive rather than killing them. To make matters worse, she waited to do so until she got word of Chaos forces developing means to prevent souls from returning to Azyr, giving her some level of denability and keeping Sigmar focused elsewhere. All loyalists to the Anvilgard regime have now fled the city, and anyone playing an Anvilgard army is either playing a historic event before this or is playing a rebel group against Morathi. The city is now called Har Kuron, and all non-aelves have been declared second class citizens, executed or been forced out. It is under joint control of the Daughters of Khaine and those among the Blackscale Coil who sided with Morathi. RIP Anvilgard. Next time: Hallowheart and Tempest's Eye
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 19:18
|
|
|
Mors Rattus posted:and those among the Blackscale Coil who sided with Morathi. Which is most of them. As the Blackscale Coil's Sovereign was revealed to be Morathi. Anvilgard is also the site of Soulbound first Adventure path. And as books from the path come out they plan to to go into details about Anvilgard's fall. Characters from both Anvilgard and Har Kuron are also planned to get mechanical support in Champions of order Soulbound's first character supplement. MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 19:50 on Nov 21, 2020 |
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 19:46
|
|
|
Everyone posted:This seems like something that PCs with some deep pockets to hire crewmen would try to steal and repurpose as a really badass pirate ship. As I was scanning it I thought the same thing.
|
|
#
?
Nov 21, 2020 21:45
|
|
|
Smoking Ruin Interlude: Meet the Party Before we go off and cover the adventure itself, let's meet the party that is going to be going to be running through it. I've had these characters in my head for a while as fun little concepts that I've always wanted to play as but never gotten the chance, so I tweaked them a little to fit the needs of the adventure and rolled them up. Since character sheets are massive in this game, I'll just post a summary of their highest runes, passions, and magic, well as a bio: •Shufrin Many-Breasted, the Dark Troll Noble. quote:Highest Runes and Passions: Shufrin Many-Breasted is a Dark Troll Noble from the Shadow Plateau who has had the unfortunate luck of birthing nothing but trollkin in her last three litters. Rather than being able to spend her time relaxing in the nursing chambers and taking her pick of mates, she’s now been given the odious task of being the diplomatic attaché to nearby Esrolia. Deciding to take matters in her own hands, she brought along her two most promising sons, Gore and Gash, armed them with spears and shields, and got to work overthrowing the Old Earth queendom in favor of the upstart Samastina, who had the blessing of the great Firewich Cragspider, after all. She managed to save the life of Samastina from Lunar assassins at the battle of Pennel ford thanks to the timely arrival of an Axe Maiden (more on her later), and decided that her luck had finally changed. After freeing Esrolia and winning a place in Queen Samastina’s court, she decided to head up north to be closer to the great Queendom of Dagori Inkarth, “in order to find a man capable of breeding true.” Along the way she’s helped some little Orlanthi matriarch win back her lands as well. Shufrin is gluttonous in all meanings of the word. She has a great deal of pride, but is surprisingly quick to make friends. She knows exactly who she is, and is getting better and better at learning who humans are, which makes her frighteningly good at getting others to believe that they have gotten one over on her when actually the reverse is true. Still, she doesn’t fully understand human cultures yet, and thinks all of them are similar to the matriarchal Esrolia, which is causing some friction. She’s also freakishly strong, even for a troll, though her lack of mobility and defensive skill means she lets her two trollkin stand in front of her in a fight to soften foes up and take the hits for her. •Oraneva Ghosttalker, Esrolian Ghost Avenger quote:Highest Runes and Passions: Oraneva is perceptive, intelligent, and clever. Her short stature means people tend to underestimate her at their own peril, as she is quite good with an axe. She has a very self-sacrificing nature, and prefers to keep those around her happy even if it’s at her own expense. She’s loyal to her goddess above all, and promises that one day soon she will get around to catching that Arkati. He must be real close by now, and she can ask her friends to help her go looking for him. You know, as long as it’s on their way, and nothing else needs to be done, and none of them have a problem with it, and can she help them with anything first? •Zarlangar Blacktongue, the Grazelander Assistant Shaman quote:Highest Runes and Passions: Zarlangar Blacktongue is a taciturn shaman’s assistant from the Ghost Horse clan. He worships the great Sun Horse Yu-Kargzant, and can command the spirits of the sky and the dead to obedience with the Justice of the sun. He is skilled with a bow, and has learned to read the flow of a battle in order to survive. Though he says little much of the time, on the occasions when he chooses to speak his bearing and the force of his words cut through the conversation and all those present are impelled to take them seriously. When he was 16, Zarlangar went out for an afternoon ride and wound up getting lost in some woods. He emerged sometime after dark, and met a foreign rider upon a demonic black horse at a crossroads. The horse spoke to him in the tongue of spirits, telling him that the darkness would swallow his homeland unless he rode at the side of the Night Watchman. Taking the prophecy seriously, he abandoned his people to head South to Whitewall, where the Orlanthi Warlord Kallyr Starbrow had been seen last. Zarlangar spent the next three years fighting for the Old Earth Alliance in the Esrolian Civil War, before joining Kallyr- whose forehead is marked with the symbol of Rigsdal, the Night Watchman- in liberating her homeland of Sartar from the Lunars. During his fighting in the Civil War he was hired on as a mercenary by Shufrin, who recognized his unique skillset. She tends to treat him as a hireling, and he goes along with this in silence, focused as he is on brooding on his task and the prophecy that was given to him. The few times he has disagreed with her, his counsel has saved their lives, edging him up from mercenary help to trusted subordinate in her eyes very recently. With Oraneva he is friendly and willing to talk shop, though he is unwilling to divulge many of the secrets of his shamanic practices, which irritates her. •Doiavu Keensight, Sartarite Telmori Wolf Guard quote:Highest Runes and passions: However, her arrival was not at all what Doiavu imagined. Kallyr called up a great dragon from beneath the mountains of Sartar, which swallowed the Lunars and the temple to their Demon-God in one great bite. Doiavu himself nearly fell into the Dragon’s jaws, and the near death experience left him traumatized. In the darkness of the night, he just kept running and running, only returning to his senses when he had crossed a quarter of the Kingdom. Now recuperating in the city of Clearwine, Doaivu’s pride has taken a great blow. Still, there’s a fierce determination behind his reflective wolf eyes. He’s planning to make up for his cowardice by doing some great deed or winning a magical treasure, as soon as he can think of one. Not to worry, an opportunity will come along eventually, it is the hero wars after all. Doaivu tends to be shy and distrustful around strangers, but when he counts someone as part of his “pack” there are no secrets between them. He prizes his honor above all, and will never back down from a challenge. He has a deep inner reserve of determination and a clear goal, and those that know him have no doubts that he’ll bounce back from his recent setback.  Treya of Ezel These are our player characters, but for the Smoking Ruin adventure there will be one more party member: Treya of Ezel. Treya is a central character in the adventure and is intended to be run as a DMPC. She was also the worst part of the adventure in both my and my player's eyes. Let me explain. Treya is a friendly, beautiful bard from Esrolia. She worships Donandar, the god of music; as well as Ernalda. She is a highly skilled singer, dancer, harp player, and first age historian. She also has a famous ancestor: her grandmother Thinala, a famous warrior of Babeester Gor who was tragically killed by Tusk Riders. The thing is, Treya loved her grandma more than life itself, and is utterly obsessed with keeping her memory alive. Not only that, but she seems to believe that her grandmother being a famous warrior means that fighting is in her blood, when the opposite happens to be the case. Her highest combat skill is 35% in a single handed axe in a system where players usually start at no less than 60% in a weapon. Her low stats combined with high self-confidence makes her come across as a bit of a moron that has to be protected, whereas the writer’s intention was for the PCs to literally fall in love with her. No, really. The book says “[the GM should] role-play her effervescent personality as best as possible. Treya is beautiful, funny, and charismatic, so adventurers may become smitten with her. “ Love at first sight is a pretty hard thing to get your players to agree to, especially when they know deep down that they’re only going to be spending a single adventure with her. The book also does a bad job of helping the GM roleplay her “correctly,” and has a pretty big problem of telling rather than showing. The book tells us that she is funny, but in all the text I can’t find a single joke written for her to tell. The book talks a lot about how great her performances are, and tells us that audiences love them, but never really shows this very well. In defense of that, it’s pretty hard to do that in a TTRPG rather than just telling the PCs “it’s a really good performance and you like it a lot.” It does have a great moment of showing over telling when, in the PC’s first encounter with her, she grabs one of their weapons and starts swinging it around in the middle of a story, only to nearly injure herself and the party. My players remembered that a lot more strongly than what a good performer she was. However, even though such a central character in the narrative winds up being a bit of a flop, we all wound up enjoying it a lot. Next time we’ll finally get started with the adventure itself. Next: The PCs have to navigate their way through Orlanthi politics to even get permission to go on an adventure. This isn’t D&D, remember? Nanomashoes fucked around with this message at 02:28 on Nov 22, 2020 |
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 01:58
|
|
|
Tasha's Cauldron of Everything #2: Sweet Subclasses, You Drive My Page Count Last time on Tasha's Cauldron of Everything, we mocked the new racial rules for obsoleting themselves with the custom lineage and driving power creep through the roof while also marveling at the artificer's ability to blow bounded accuracy to hell and AC stack to kingdom come. Today we're still on Chapter 1, because we have pages upon pages of new subclasses and optional class features to review. Strap yourselves in as Wizards scrapes the bottom of the creativity barrel to provide power creep they're not going to try and balance because it's "optional". We'll start with the Barbarian, and we're opening strong with a page of "Optional Class Features". Tasha's posted:Optional Class Features AARGH! The features themselves are nothing special, you get proficiency in a skill at 3rd and 7th levels (and you don't care, because 5th edition skills do nothing because the exploration and social "pillars" of the game are near non-existent) and that you can move half your speed for free when you enter a rage. Unlike 3.5 alternative class features, these replace nothing and cost no resources to get. There are a lot of these, from new spells randomly added to the bard list to outright new features like this one, and it should really put the idea that anything in this book was designed with "balance" in mind to rest. I have no idea what "consult with your DM" means - does that give her veto power? I assume so, but like everything in 5e, it's worded so weaselly that it means whatever you want it to mean. Anyway, we have two subclasses for barbarians, the path of the beast and the path of...wild magic. Sure. The beast path exists because werewolves are too good to be PCs so you can be a crappy knockoff in the time honored tradition of things like changelings, shifters, and dragonborn. The third level ability lets you grow natural weapons to attack people - the bite heals you if you're under half health, the claws let you do an extra attack for free, and the tail lets you get an AC bonus as a reaction. The 6rh level feature gets you a swim speed, a climbing speed, or a jump bonus, the 10th level feature lets you infect people with magic rabies that either does bonus damage or makes them attack a buddy, and the 14th level feature lets you hand out d6 extra damage to the team and get temporary HP for everyone who accepts. It seems serviceable, and I feel like there's some exploit involving milking the claw for extra attacks but don't want to dig into 5e books to find it. The wild magic path lets you...throw out wild magic surges every time you rage. Really. I do not know who said "wow, I wish we had more characters who had a chance to fireball their own team when we entered combat", but now you can have an rear end in a top hat who sucks out your life force randomly when they rage. You can also restore 1 spell slot per day per character limited by your proficiency bonus, and no one cares because you have to roll a d3 for the slot level. Ugh. EDIT: MonsterEnvy pointed out I misread the life drain surge, it does not, in fact, attack your allies. The bard gets some weird freebies. They get an expanded spell list of stuff they used to have in Third Edition (such as color spray and mirror image) which is again totally optional and you have to argue with your DM to get it. Their inspiration die can now be expended to add to spell damage or spell healing, but in this context it's a bullshit small bonus that does nothing to obscure just how awful being a blaster mage or healer is in 5e. Sure, it's the equivalent of upcasting a fireball by one level, but things in 5e are running around with stupid high amounts of hit points. A tribal warrior is a 1/8 CR creature and it has 11 hit points, which is more than most martial characters are going to be able to do with an average hit unless they have a greatsword. Hell, even burning hands needs an above average roll to bring them down. The rat swarm is CR 1/4 and has 24 hit points. These are just things that are supposed to show up in groups to fight first level characters. A knight is a CR 3 with 52 hit points, easily enough to absorb a fireball from a level 5 PC wizard. It's bonkers! Then people get all upset and wonder why everyone is just spamming hypnotic pattern! Sorry, rant. We also get the ability for the bard to trade out expertise skills and cantrips when they get an ASI. We then get two new bard colleges, which once again need to pass the litmus test of "is there a reason to take this instead of being a lore bard and grabbing crap like animate dead?" As it happens, there isn't one, but we should probably break down these subclasses instead of me just yelling at you to get skeleton friends. The College of Creation is supposed to be all about speaking the primal language the gods used to shape the world, which is a cool concept that is far beyond anything 5e D&D's power level can handle. You get to add minor bonuses to the bardic inspiration die. It's hilarious, they have a different entry for each use of inspiration in the PHB, but they don't bother to lay out what bonus you get if you use it for the spell damage/healing they laid out on the previous page. It's nuts! You also get to conjure a nonmagical item, which you don't care about because you can buy them at stores, and you get to animate one object that fights for you with a statblock and can increase your team's movement speed. This sounds cool, except that bards get animate objects on their spell list, and that spell is straight fire because it blows up bounded accuracy. Sure, you can combine the two in the hopes of attracting Emma Watson, but this subclass has the fundamental problem that most of its poo poo is on the bard list already. The inspiration die bonuses suck, but at 14th level you can create giant blobs of gold you spend on booze and people with loose sexual morals. I don't even know. The College of Eloquence fares a bit better and actually has a reason to take it along. First, they can just take 10 on social checks which is great if your DM is kind enough to let social skills do anything. More importantly, they can use their Bardic Inspiration die to inflict save penalties, which are somewhat rare in 5e and usually require you to sacrifice your concentration or something odious. As 5e very much runs on the classic D&D game loop of "spam crowd control -> focus fire targets until victory" the Eloquence bard gets to be on your team just by doing that alone. It's even a bonus action, so you can combo it with your sicknasty bard control spells and just run around being good. You don't have anything else going for you, but who cares? Free save penalties rule! The cleric gets a bunch of free evil power and some more domains. They get an expanded spell list of the druid's sun spells and some spells from this book, the ability to burn channel divinity to regain spell slots, and an odd little feature that replaces divine strike and potent spellcasting with an extra 1d8 radiant damage on both weapon and spell attacks. This is a weird one. If you're trading it out for the weapon boost, you lose a die of damage later in the game for versatility now - which is great if you know the game isn't going up to 14th level. If you trade Potent Spellcasting for this, you lose absolutely nothing because the d8 on average will be equal to your +5 Wisdom bonus, but you can also apply it on weapon attacks. The die is also locked to radiant damage, so you can enjoy the D&D cleric experience of explaining that you're a cleric of the dark gods who uses light attacks because whatever, but hey, free power is free! Then we have domains. First is the Order domain, which can represent either law or tyranny depending on how you look at it. You get a bunch of enchantment control spells including stuff like dominate person, heavy armor proficiency, the ability to let people attack when you heal or buff them (use healing word on your rogue or something), a channel divinity that mass charms people and causes them to drop all their weapons, the ability to cast enchantment spells as bonus actions and psychic damage divine strike which can be upgraded to mark a target every turn so the next ally who hits it does an additional 2d8 damage. I have no idea how that works with the feature where you trade divine strike, and frankly I don't care because 2d8 damage is bullshit small, but the Order domain cleric will probably see a lot of play because of their strong control and buff skills. The Peace domain deserves a callout for how stupid it is. The domain spells are mostly a waste of time because they're mostly on the cleric list except aura of purity, resilient sphere, and telepathic bond. As an action, you get the ability to get a posse of people who love peace together and give them attack bonuses. Really. This is a cleric of peace who makes you better at stabbing people. You can't make this poo poo up. As you get to higher levels people awkwardly teleport around the bond and take damage for each other. It's kind of dumb, but it does allow you to spread damage around...except that doesn't really matter because you can pop people back up like cartoon characters with a bonus action. The rest of its features are centered around healing, combat healing is a waste of time, and so is the peace domain. Twilight is a weird domain. It's big gimmick is that it summons a sphere that hands out temporary HP that regenerate and later gets upgraded to half cover (+2 AC). You get heavy armor and the ability to fly around that doesn't take concentration. Being able to fly for an entire combat is good enough to invalidate most of the 5e Monster Manual and you're a drat cleric, so who cares what else you get, this is a solid class. Next we have druid. As you might expect, druids get an expansion to their spell list for no real reason. They also can burn a wild shape use to cast find familiar that lasts for a few hours. Sure. Why not. There are three new druid subclasses. The Spore druid gets animate dead on the druid spell list, meaning that you really don't care what else he gets as his complaining about how the rest of his class features suck will be drowned out by the twanging of skeletons firing bows. The Star druid gets to turn into a weird starry form that eventually gets to fly around casting spells while inflicting save penalties. He gets to join the team. The Wildfire druid is the big sucker here, as they're a fire druid that doesn't get access to the "good" blasting spells and focuses on casting healing spells and fire blasting spells. Remember when we covered how both of those actions were complete and utter wastes of time? Don't be a wildfire druid. The fighter is next. 5e D&D does not like fighters. The authors didn't even bother giving the poor fighter a free bullshit powerup - while all the preceding classes had things they got for free if you "consulted your DM", the fighter only gets things that fit in existing slots. Thus we have a selection of new fighting styles, but we don't actually get anything like giving him an extra style or two. Some of the fighting styles are pretty good, some are bad, and they even gave us new fighter maneuvers. I want to go back to this, because it's been 6 entire years since this game came out and only now are we seeing new maneuvers for the Battle Master fighter. Two of them interact with the skill system, one lets you grapple after a melee attack if you spend a die making you a pretty drat good battlefield controller, one lets you add a die to initiative(!) or stealth, one lets you throw a weapon for bonus damage, and one lets you swap positions with an ally and give an AC buff. It's not bad, but considering we've had multiple books of spells you'd think they could give the fighter a bit more. The subclasses are all weird magic poo poo. The psychic warrior from 3.5 is back, but instead of having !spellcasting you get not superiority dice that you can use to make not-maneuvers that are fluffed as telekinesis. Their ultimate is just the ability to cast the telekinesis spell. It's seriously just the battlemaster but it knows all its maneuvers and they're all fluffed as telekinesis. It does not interact in any way with maneuvers and it's just a pointless callback. There's the Rune Knight, which gets to pick a bunch of runic abilities that have a passive and then can be "invoked" to do things like gain damage resistance or deal fire damage to restrain people. It's fluffed around giants so you get the ability to get super big, and that's probably actually good for controlling a section of the battlefield as a big giant. There's not a third fighter subclass, instead we waste two pages on build advice for Battle Masters. Really. Now, you should never take build advice from Wizards of the Coast, because it's always bad, and this is no exception. Wanna be a Greek Hoplite? Waste a feat on Athletics! Maybe you could take Linguist to be a Strategist! I can't tell if they know how badly they're screwing the fighter or they think they have to offer this bad build advice because of the power creep in the rest of the book. Monks also get stuff. They can turn any non-heavy, non-special simple or martial weapon into a monk weapon, spend a ki point for a bonus action attack, spent 2 ki points to heal a pittance of hit points, or spent 1-3 ki points to add +2 per key point to an attack you missed to maybe make it hit. They get a weird plague doctor mercy subclass that gently caress around with bad healing abilities until they can resurrect people at 20th once per day. There's a subclass around popping out ghost arms that lets you use wisdom for attacks and increase your reach, and then they collect a bunch of disappointing bonuses that approach making you competent as a melee combatant but collapse under you still being a monk. Figure out what this class is supposed to do anyway, Wizards! The paladin is up next, and of course they get a bunch of free new spells. They also get some of the new fighting styles and the ability to swap them out on level up. Their subclasses are kind of worthless here - the Oath of Glory is supposed to be a Greek hero and you have to swear to get swole, but their aura ability sucks (10 feet of movement is not nearly as good as the Ancients or Conquest). They get temporary hit points they can distribute on a smite, but there's really no reason to take this over veangeance, ancients, or conquest. The same sadly applies to Oath of the Watchers, all of whose features center around boosting mental saves in an edition where 99% of the monsters just have melee attacks. It's not good! The ranger gets boned. This is the one class that even the most diehard 5e reddit fanboys will admit is totally trash. They get a bunch of lovely ribbon abilities including 1 expertise skill, a walking speed increase, a garbage temporary HP ability, and favored foe. Favored foe is a feature that replaces the ranger's favored enemy ability, which gives a whopping advantage on checks to track a certain creature type. Favored foe lets you mark a target and deal an extra 1d4 damage. It takes your concentration. Hunter's mark is a 1st level ranger spell that does the same thing but with 1d8 damage instead. Favored foe takes fourteen levels to match a first level spell. There's some other free crap in this chapter you don't care about, a bizarre fey-themed subclass that does extra damage on hit and lets you summon fey to attack people, and a swarmkeeper subclass that adds extra damage or can push people 15 feet after hitting them. If you have competent mages you can push people back into firewalls and black tentacles and whatnot. These rangers also get more stuff added to their spell list. Lastly they end with replacing the beastmaster ranger's pet, but it still can't attack on its own without the ranger losing attacks. No one liked that crap in 4e (when Martial Power came out, people just took the beast and went right back to shooting bows) and it's not good here, especially when, once again, our friend the necromancer can order the entire skeleton army to start shooting as a bonus action. The rogue gets the ability to give itself advantage on its next attack as a bonus action for free. Why not. We then get the Phantom subclass, which you'd think would be about creepily crushing on sopranos and murdering people so that your crush gets the best part, but is actually about stealing souls. You can randomly swap out skill proficiencies, which would be really good in a game with a functioning skill system. You get a lovely feature that when you stab a guy, you can do half your sneak attack damage to another target, become a ghost, steal souls to fuel your crappy sneak attack bonus, ask the souls you stole questions the book gleefully points out the spirits don't have to provide helpful answers to, turn into the world's slowest ghost, and generally waste everyone's time being an inept edgelord. We also have the soulknife, a recurring D&D class that was never good, which is just the battlemaster fighter die applied to rogue stuff instead. The titular soulknife is just the same as having a shortsword and the inept people running the asylum in the D&D department don't seem to understand that this is not inherently good. Just be an Arcane Trickster instead. The sorcerer is up next. They get a bunch of spells dumped into their spell list that you don't care about because the sorcerer list is actually OK at fighting. The two subclasses in this book get a bunch more spells known from a domain style list. The aberrant mind has some vaguely psionic and aberration themed stuff, and the clockwork mind gets robot themed stu - wait, they can take 10 on attack rolls and saves? That's pretty bonkers. You can do some other stuff that's not quite as good, but I would be very surprised if there wasn't some build that exploits that level 10 feature for all its worth. Warlocks get a whole bunch of spells added to their list, including gate so you can ensure D&D night is ruined for everyone. They get a new pact boon, Pact of the Talisman. This sounds cool until you look at what it actually does - you get a talisman that gives you the ability to add a d4 to an ability check a number of times a day equal to your proficiency bonus. It's a complete and utter waste of time! Tome warlocks from the PHB can pick up guidance, which lets them do that an infinite number of times per day, and chain warlocks can order their familiars to use the help action on them for similar results an infinite number of times a day. It's really bad! There are of course new invocations, 3 of which mess with the talisman but don't do enough to make it worth taking, one which lets you cast animate dead 1/day and is worthless (skeletons are only good en masse), and one which lets chain warlocks use their spell save DC on familiar abilities like knocking people unconscious and allowing the familiar to attack as a bonus action. Oh, there's an invocation that gives you advantage on concentration saves and will be taken by 99% of warlocks. The warlock mercifully gets two subclasses that have to pass the "why am I not playing a hexblade" challenge, and it will not surprise astute readers to learn that one fails. The Fathomless is some kind of pact with a kraken or something that focuses on tentacles and is right next to the Great Old One warlock. It's really weird that they had to introduce a second Lovecraft subclass, but the class isn't really that good. You can summon a tentacle that attacks as a bonus action, but you're a warlock with hex and are probably using it. It can intercept some damage, I guess? You get to cast Black Tentacles for free 1/day and can't lose concentration on it, and you get a 1 mile teleport that has to end in a body of water. Yawn. The genie warlock has an actual reason to take it, which is that you can fly around for free, meaning that you get to invalidate 99% of the monster manual by flying around and spamming eldritch blasts. You get bonus damage on Eldritch Blast (but less than a hexblade) but who cares, you can fly! The wizard is last, and contrary to what you'd expect from a 5e publication, doesn't get much in the way of free stuff. They get a bunch of spells from this book added to their list, but the only PHB spell added is Speak with Dead which is something I personally think necromancers should have anyway. They get two sublclasses. The Bladesinger from Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide is reprinted and buffed, which is weird, because it was already fairly solid for adding a bunch of defense stuff for a wizard. It's better at melee fighting (and can combine an attack and a cantrip in a turn) so I guess if you want to autoattack with a sword instead of shoot firebolts into a crowd controlled group of enemies, this is the class for you. The order of scribes is a big useless stinker. You get a weird spirit that looks like Walter White and lives in your spellbook that gives you extremely meh benefits. The internet is extremely hype over the fact that the book lets you switch out damage types on wizard spells IF you know another spell of that level with the damage type. Now, I suspect this was descended from the Unearthed Arcana lore wizard which could change the damage type to any on casting and had the far more bonkers ability of changing the ability score the enemy used to save. Changing the damage type is just such a worthless ability. Very little in the game is actually vulnerable to the types of damage a mage might be throwing around, and you're far more likely to run into resistance or immunity - which this doesn't help you get around because you have to know another spell you could have used to get around it. Absolute worthless trash. There are a few other features - you can get a free 1st or 2nd level scroll per day that is treated as being upcast a level, Walter White can go out for 30 feet and be the origin point for your spells, or you can get prevent 1 instance of incoming damage by wiping spells from your spellbook which you can't cast for 1d6 long rests. This sounds bad, but there are enough garbage spells in the game to sustain this and you get to choose which spells are wiped. However, you could be a necromancer, diviner, or war mage instead and thus I can't recommend this class. There is a short section on feats. The first feat is seriously that you are a chef. You make food that does garbage healing and gives out minor temp HP bonuses and your other party members fantasize about being in a party with useful characters. There's a series of feats for each physical damage type (bludgeoning, crushing, piercing) that give you a +1 ability score to a physical ability, a per turn minor benefit like shoving someone 5 feat or reducing speed by 10 feet for a turn, and a critical proc which hands out advantage to allies attacking the target/disadvantage to the target's next attacks/rerolling 1 attack die. There are feats that let you cast low level spells, there's a crappy poison feat that doesn't make poison damage worthwhile, there's a feat that gives expertise with one skill, a few feats that let you loot metamagic/eldritch invocations/fighting styles, and a feat that lets you use guns without reloading. In conclusion, this book's character options chapter reads like it was written by someone who realized just how boring 5e character options were and was determined to powercreep them, while being beaten down by one of the original authors who wanted to maintain his "vision" for 5e. Balance is completely bonkers - concentration-free flight is handed out like candy, while the order of scribes wizard is mercilessly beaten for trying to cast a forceball. Features like favored foe seem like they weren't designed by anyone who played the game or had any conception of how it worked. This is compounded by this being the second player options book in six whole years! For all their claims of focusing on quality and playtesting this reads like 3.5 or 4e shovelware where you skim the book and after sifting through pages and pages of garbage get to rejoice because you found Divine Metamagic or OG Battlerager fighter. I have no idea what a phantom rogue is supposed to contribute to my team other than Phantom of the Opera jokes, or why I would ever take a peace cleric aside from blowing up bounded accuracy and everyone getting an attack bonus, nor which of these free class features I can staple on to my class because I have to pester every single DM in every game I'm in to let my ranger get expertise or my wizard speak with dead. It's completely loving bonkers! Join us next time as we shed deep tears over the patron rules and new spells! TheGreatEvilKing fucked around with this message at 02:48 on Nov 22, 2020 |
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 02:17
|
|
|
TheGreatEvilKing posted:. Really. I do not know who said "wow, I wish we had more characters who had a chance to fireball their own team when we entered combat", but now you can have an rear end in a top hat who sucks out your life force randomly when they rage. You can also restore 1 spell slot per day per character limited by your proficiency bonus, and no one cares because you have to roll a d3 for the slot level. Ugh Did you read the surges. None of them can do that they are all positive effects.
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 02:42
|
|
|
MonsterEnvy posted:Did you read the surges. None of them can do that they are all positive effects. Ah, I missed the "of your choice" wording on the lifedrain tendrils. Doesn't change the fact that I have no idea what the class is supposed to contribute aside from Wacky Madcap Hijinks.
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 02:47
|
|
|
Changing damage type on wizard spells is actually a fairly huge bonus considering that higher level enemies often have a suite of resistances and immunities to everything but either force or radiant. It's the number one thing I've seen every wizard try to do as soon as you let them have custom abilities (it's also super boring and I just wish the players would instead ask me to give them stuff that bypass said resistances or to just remove the resistances in the first place, which I would). Having to know a spell of the same level that does the type of damage you want is a waste of time of course and I assume this is basically the same thing they've been doing which is realizing that making the game suck because "that's what previous editions did" is bad, but the fanbase would lose their poo poo over a monstrous manual where devils, demons, and the undead didn't have resistance/immunity to like seven different damage types. These are the same people who make hour long YouTube videos about how comic book movies don't abide by the laws of physics so I don't envy the DnD designers having to create content for an audience of pedants that are thick as pig poo poo.
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 05:53
|
|
|
Ithle01 posted:Changing damage type on wizard spells is actually a fairly huge bonus considering that higher level enemies often have a suite of resistances and immunities to everything but either force or radiant. It's the number one thing I've seen every wizard try to do as soon as you let them have custom abilities (it's also super boring and I just wish the players would instead ask me to give them stuff that bypass said resistances or to just remove the resistances in the first place, which I would). Having to know a spell of the same level that does the type of damage you want is a waste of time of course and I assume this is basically the same thing they've been doing which is realizing that making the game suck because "that's what previous editions did" is bad, but the fanbase would lose their poo poo over a monstrous manual where devils, demons, and the undead didn't have resistance/immunity to like seven different damage types. These are the same people who make hour long YouTube videos about how comic book movies don't abide by the laws of physics so I don't envy the DnD designers having to create content for an audience of pedants that are thick as pig poo poo. It's weird, because wizard spells base damage is bad. You can always lose by picking the wrong energy type, but you never actually win by hitting ice monsters with fire spells or whatever which might cause your fireball to actually threaten level appropriate enemies. It's not so much that flipping your damage to force isn't better than fire damage - it is, but even with this relatively mediocre bonus blasting is still a big waste of time that just indicates a lack of system mastery. Changing fireballs to forceballs is putting a motor on a skateboard, casting hypnotic pattern is the equivalent of buying a car. I really don't understand which audience would see the removal of resistance/immunities as bad but see reducing devils, demons, and the undead to boring autoattack monsters like 5e does as a win, but I was personally told by Mike Mearls that 5e was not for me, so I might not be the target audience.
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 07:47
|
|
|
If a mob of lovely skeletons is so gamebreaking, why not hire a mob of lovely mercenaries?
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 09:32
|
|
|
TheGreatEvilKing posted:It's weird, because wizard spells base damage is bad. You can always lose by picking the wrong energy type, but you never actually win by hitting ice monsters with fire spells or whatever which might cause your fireball to actually threaten level appropriate enemies. It's not so much that flipping your damage to force isn't better than fire damage - it is, but even with this relatively mediocre bonus blasting is still a big waste of time that just indicates a lack of system mastery. Changing fireballs to forceballs is putting a motor on a skateboard, casting hypnotic pattern is the equivalent of buying a car. Yeah that's a good way to put it, there's not really many examples of enemies that are weak to a damage type, but strong against others. It's usually just strong versus some types and then normal damage versus everything else which is why force and radiant damage are so strong. I've found that wizard damage dealers aren't that bad and can put out great burst damage if they just unload on an encounter, but are definitely hampered by resistances once you get out of lower levels. Hypnotic Pattern is a great example of a spell that is far more powerful at lower levels than higher levels where more enemies will just be able to no-sell it instantly, but they can't exactly shrug off a Cone of Cold or something else. Buff/debuff/save-or-suck/summoning spells are still better than attack spells, but it's not nearly as bad as 3rd edition and blaster wizard is at least viable. The difference is less of a motorized skateboard vs. car and more like bad car vs. good car. I imagine a lot of the hype for debuff spells in the current edition comes from the diviner subclass. Also enemy casters still exist, but you're right that they're not nearly as prolific. I have no idea who wrote the MM, but for some reason there is a massive difference between some enemy types such as Yugoloths, who are all casters, and everyone else and that really should be addressed. Forgot Hypnotic Pattern, the real busted spells are monster summoning because the dickhead who wrote the MM doesn't know how to connect challenge rating with the ability to cast mid-level spells. But anyway, if they want to make blaster wizard more viable then hey good for them.
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 11:43
|
|
|
TheGreatEvilKing posted:I was personally told by Mike Mearls that 5e was not for me, so I might not be the target audience. I feel like there's a story here, if you're up for elaborating. Thanks for the writeup, it's fun to see the new and creative ways the D&D team can find to further gently caress up the balance in the game.
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 18:05
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 26, 2024 04:29 |
|
|
The Lone Badger posted:If a mob of lovely skeletons is so gamebreaking, why not hire a mob of lovely mercenaries?
|
|
#
?
Nov 22, 2020 18:47
|
|
