D&D 5E October Playtest Packet - Magic Items, Updated XP, Monster Traits

Blackbrrd · Oct 9, 2012

If I understand correctly, you can only have three items active at a time? That is something that pleases me. I hated the Christmas tree look of 4e characters with 5-10 magic items and all of them available for use with encounter/daily powers. It really slowed the game down with all the extra options.

Sadras · Oct 9, 2012

GX.Sigma said:
I cannot disagree more with those who dislike the Belts of Giant Strength. The whole point of the DM-empowerment approach is that these items can feel free to be what they are (i.e., a belt of giant strength gives you the strength of a giant, because that's what a belt of giant strength does). If you don't want your players to have powerful magic items, don't give them powerful magic items.

Can't XP you more, but good post!

FireLance · Oct 9, 2012

Blackbrrd said:
If I understand correctly, you can only have three items active at a time? That is something that pleases me. I hated the Christmas tree look of 4e characters with 5-10 magic items and all of them available for use with encounter/daily powers. It really slowed the game down with all the extra options.

I think the actual rule is that you can't have more than a certain number of items attuned at a time. However, it does seem that the more powerful and complex items require attunement to function at full power.

Falling Icicle · Oct 9, 2012

GX.Sigma said:
If a character has 8 strength, they clearly don't care about having a high strength; so why would they be wearing the Belt of Storm Giant Strength (a unique artifact of which only one exists in the entire world)? The static 29 is actually better than a plus, because a plus will have more benefit for someone with a higher strength score--it would encourage min-maxing.

A more pertinent example is the Gauntlets of Ogre Power, which set your strength to 19. This is basically useless to a fighter, but might be very interesting for a wizard.

So it's better for players to benefit more from an item because they have a lower score? It's okay for the fighter that invested heavily in Str to have those points "wasted" because he could have put fewer points into Str and ended up exactly the same with belt? I couldn't disagree more.

GX.Sigma said:
The whole point of bounded accuracy is that magic items are strictly an improvement, and thus a reward, for PCs.

There's quite a large middle you're excluding here. Magic items can be awesome and rewarding for the PCs without being so powerful that they shatter game balance. One item of the same rarity shouldn't be strictly superior to another. When such unbalanced items exist, it makes all of the other items of that rarity less rewarding because all the PCs are going to think is "gee, I wish I had gotten a belt of giant's strength instead of this inferior item."

GX.Sigma said:
If you think +5 to strength checks is overpowered, wait til you see the other artifacts. I'm betting one of them is a sword that's better than the mightiest 'legendary' sword, and I'm betting that's nothing compared to the Deck of Many Things and the Eye of Vecna.

I'm pretty sure they said that +3 is the highest bonus that magic weapons and armor will ever get, including artifacts. That just shows how enormous the bonus from these belts is. Since PC stats cap at 20, a +4 bonus is the absolute minimum that a belt of storm giant strength can grant. And let's not forget, it's not like every PC fighter is going to have (or should have) a 20 Str to begin with.

GX.Sigma said:
I cannot disagree more with those who dislike the Belts of Giant Strength. The whole point of the DM-empowerment approach is that these items can feel free to be what they are (i.e., a belt of giant strength gives you the strength of a giant, because that's what a belt of giant strength does). If you don't want your players to have powerful magic items, don't give them powerful magic items.

No. It's not good game design to put items in the core rules that are grossly unbalanced and then just expect DMs to know better. That isn't "empowering" the DM, it is just putting more responsibility on their shoulders, especially new and inexperienced DMs. If they make the items balanced, people won't need to be afraid of giving them out to their players.

The DM shouldn't have to sit there and wonder "oh crap, if I give my players this, is it going to wreck game balance?" any time he wants to reward the PCs with an item. He should instead be wondering "will my players think this item is cool and be excited to get it?" After all, not all DMs are expert game designers, nor should they have to be. Making the various options in the books they print balanced and work well together is WotC's job, not the DM's.

Falling Icicle · Oct 9, 2012

FireLance said:
Actually, it doesn't stop them - it just slows them down a bit. You can voluntarily un-attune yourself from a magic item after ten minutes of concentration, and then re-attune yourself to a new one after another ten minutes.

Good point. Maybe attunement needs to require more than just time, at least in the case of spell-battery items like staffs and wands. It might cost a hit die to attune to an item, for example.

Li Shenron · Oct 9, 2012

Manbearcat said:
I was waiting for Boots of Elvenkind to see exactly what they did in 5e as Mearls et al advised they wanted to move back to the "wondrousness" of magic items. Given that, plus the fact that there are no explicit auditory rules embedded in the current 5e Stealth system, plus the fact that this famous item notoriously interacts with the Stealth/Skill system (and given its iteration in past editions), I was curious what we would see and what we might extrapolate from that...especially considering the hard-coding of stealth rules and skill systems in the last few editions.

I give you opaque/non-hard-coded mechanic resolution/GM fiat embedded in the mechanics exhibit A:

- The Stealth rules outline prerequisites for Stealth based on Line-of-Sight (Lightly/Heavily Obscured). They are, however, silent on the auditory requirements for Stealth (eg they do not say that you suffer disadvantage on Stealth checks on terrain or in rooms whereby the acoustics - leaves, open space with 4 sound-reflective walls - do not lend themselves toward being quiet).

- Cloak of Elvenkind specifically interfaces with the hard-coded Line-of-Sight requirements for stealth (it bypasses the requirement for being obscured).

- Boots of Elvenkind interfaces with the lack of rules for auditory requirements for Stealth (nothing about removing disadvantage on terrain or in rooms whereby the acoustics do not lend themselves toward being quiet). You simply don't make a sound in these types of environments.

Now, either they are missing a section in the Stealth Rules (about having disadvantage on stealth checks when navigating dry leaves, loose gravel, creaky floors, "operating-theatre-like" rooms with sound-reflective surfaces, etc) and the Boots of Elvenkind are missing a section whereby they outline that this disadvantage is cancelled...orrrrrrrrrrrr...this is a case of heavy GM fiat embedded in two important mechanical resolution system in the game (the Stealth Rules and the Magical Item rules)...and thus, given the weight of those two systems on gameplay, we should expect this opacity/lack of hard-coding/GM fiat embedded throughout.

Whaaat?

Maybe we are on very opposite ends of the gaming spectrum, but to me a rules that says more or less "You simply don't make a sound while moving" (note: in ALL kinds of environments, not only those examples) is sheer beauty.

GX.Sigma · Oct 9, 2012

So it's better for players to benefit more from an item because they have a lower score? It's okay for the fighter that invested heavily in Str to have those points "wasted" because he could have put fewer points into Str and ended up exactly the same with belt? I couldn't disagree more.

I'm saying that, for a strength character, a +strength item is just a boring piece of math that he needs if he wants to be optimized. An item that sets strength to a high number is more interesting and less gamebreaking because it's more useful for the kinds of characters who aren't already optimized in that direction.

Falling Icicle said:
There's quite a large middle you're excluding here. Magic items can be awesome and rewarding for the PCs without being so powerful that they shatter game balance. One item of the same rarity shouldn't be strictly superior to another. When such unbalanced items exist, it makes all of the other items of that rarity less rewarding because all the PCs are going to think is "gee, I wish I had gotten a belt of giant's strength instead of this inferior item."

The lowest-rarity belt of giant strength is Rare and sets your strength to 21 (essentially doing nothing for a well-optimized strength-focused character). That's at the same tier as the staff that casts charm person 10/day, the dagger that poisons itself with DC 15 paralyzing poison 1/day, and the +1 longsword that attacks by itself all day without you ever having to spend an action.

The second-highest is legendary, and grants 27 strength (+3 above the normal cap). At the same tier is the Holy Avenger (+3, +2d10 dmg vs. fiends and undead), Vorpal Sword (+3, ignore resistance, exploding crits for massive damage), Crystal Ball (scry on anyone, anytime), and Robe of Archmagi (+5 AC, +2 attacks and save DC, adv on saves).

It seems that the belts of giant strength are actually a bit below the curve.

No. It's not good game design to put items in the core rules that are grossly unbalanced and then just expect DMs to know better. That isn't "empowering" the DM, it is just putting more responsibility on their shoulders, especially new and inexperienced DMs. If they make the items balanced, people won't need to be afraid of giving them out to their players.

The DM shouldn't have to sit there and wonder "oh crap, if I give my players this, is it going to wreck game balance?" any time he wants to reward the PCs with an item. He should instead be wondering "will my players think this item is cool and be excited to get it?" After all, not all DMs are expert game designers, nor should they have to be. Making the various options in the books they print balanced and work well together is WotC's job, not the DM's.

Good thing the random tables say the toughest encounters have a 1% chance to drop an artifact, artifacts should be found/used only by level 11+ characters, and the DM guidelines say to make the reward match the challenge?

Magil · Oct 9, 2012

Is anyone other than me alarmed by how... overly complicated magical items seem to be, when compared to the rest of the rules so far? Holy smokes, look at all those properties! ...do we really need a "gleaming" property...?

Manbearcat · Oct 9, 2012

Li Shenron said:
Whaaat?

Maybe we are on very opposite ends of the gaming spectrum, but to me a rules that says more or less "You simply don't make a sound while moving" (note: in ALL kinds of environments, not only those examples) is sheer beauty.

I understand one of their core design tenants is "rulings not rules" but this strikes me as needlessly and arbitrarily "rulingsish". I mean, inserting this non-mechanics resolution bit into a core aspect of the game when there is seemingly only one way to handle this - eg; Boots of Elvenkind cancel Stealth disadvantage on antagonistic terrain or cancel advantage on Listen/Perception checks in those contests - is odd. I thought they wanted to marry fluff to mechanics...not remove explicit, hard-coding of mechanics entirely, arbitrarily and especially when there is only one sensible interpretation for how the boots effect the game...allowing for non-proficient DMs to stumble their way forward or misinterpret. This is bad because the boots outline this "implied mechanic" but Listen/Spot are (as was also done in 4e) married into the single Perception and there are no mechanical implications for the Listen-portion (acoustical ramifications) but there are explicit rules for the Spot-portion. So people might be playing all along with no disadvantage on antagonistic terrain...then all of a sudden the boots are given out...and what? They all of a sudden start putting disadvantage in on antagonistic terrain for folks who don't have Boots of Elvenkind and then retrofit that mechanic to all their future games/rulings? It makes no sense and is willfully obfuscatory or rules-light for no clear advantage in handling.

FireLance · Oct 9, 2012

Magil said:
Is anyone other than me alarmed by how... overly complicated magical items seem to be, when compared to the rest of the rules so far? Holy smokes, look at all those properties! ...do we really need a "gleaming" property...?

Actually, I see everything in the "Magic Item Details" section (Creator, Nature, Minor Properties, Minor Quirks) as optional. You can ignore them quite safely if you want, and just focus on the magic item's main properties, or you can use them as a way to add flavor to and individualize a magic item.

The best part of the section, for me, is that if I decide not to make the transition to 5e, I can also use it to spice up magic items in 4e.