My Experiment with 5e - No Classes with Cantrips

Saeviomagy said:

Level 1 character with specialization and 18 in a stat only has +8 to a check. If you're using the standard array, they only have +7, so it's actually a 10% chance to fail, I misspoke.

I mean sure, by the time you've reached level 9, characters typically can automatically succeed on an easy task in a skill they know with a stat that they're great at... but by that point, the full caster has a pile of spell slots and is heartily mocking tasks that might come up as 'impossible' were you to attempt them by skill.

Click to expand...

And, to me, that kinda fits with my point. In a group with casters, skills IME get somewhat sidelined. Not completely of course, but, de-emphasized I guess would be the way I would put it. I wanted a stronger focus on skills to overcome challenges rather than just scratching off another spell slot.

Hussar said:

Oh sure. And this was certainly discussed. I frankly got kinda tired of what turned out to be a string of "well, what about ..." pitches ...

Click to expand...

Well, cantrips aren't really the problem, systematic daily spell casting is, so what about removing slots rather than removing classes? Casters with just cantrips and rituals would display abilities much more in keeping with genre!

;D

To each their own, but one more thing to consider:

D&D used magic to 'escalate' the types of challenges PCs face. As PCs obtain more tools and gain the ability to bypass certain types of challenges, the game introduces newer challenges that take more advanced capabilities to confront. This is a problem for PC types that do not have evolving capabilities that handle these challenges, but it does provide benefits: Things do not get old and players feel like their characters are evolving. If you're still wrestling with how to get the amulet that sits on a floating pedestal that hovers above a 100' wide canyon when you're 15th level, the PCs don't feel that different than a 3rd level party. If, however, that amulet is in an extradimensional pocket protected by animated energy motes ... the PCs don't feel like they're in Kansas anymore. They've graduated... although the S&S tpe PCs don't feel like they have as much to offer in these challenges.

Why did Shadowrun add magic to cyberpunk? Because without it gameplay is pretty much limited to hackers (rogues) and mercs (fighters).

Click to expand...

Honestly, Shadowrun plays almost identically without magic, because magic essentially functions in Shadowrun as a Measure/Countermeasure. You need magic because the other guys have magic and if you don't have magic, you're boned. Given how advanced the technology was in Shadowrun, and only got moreso as the technological revolution of the 90s and 00s showed us just how much was possible and the gear and cyberware tables expanded because of it, you can run Shadowrun entirely as a Cyberpunk experience and be able to do most of the same things. I mean, this is a universe with explosives, drones, nanotech, infrared and sonic imaging, neurological acceleration, etc. What does magic do that technology doesn't, other than add an extra chapter of rules? You forgot about riggers. They're basically Robot Mages, summoning semi-autonomous killbots instead of elementals and taking people out with stabilized flying sniper rifle platforms instead of manabolts. But the second all of your opponents are "mundane," all of your mundane gadgets can be used to defeat them. The only thing you "needed" magic for in Shadowrun was to kill all the things that were immune to your non-magical stuff.

Magic was only added to Shadowrun to create a niche for the game and attract conventional fantasy gamers. This was the late 80s. The game space wasn't very broad and they were trying to snag D&D players.

Eliminating magic/Tolkein from Shadowrun actually improves its gameplay, from a strictly mechanical perspective, because it simplifies the ruleset and levels out the power curve. The latter being especially notable because you no longer have to worry about Troll Physical Adepts destroying small armored vehicles with a bow and arrow, while withstanding shots from Panther Assault Cannons that turn the other PCs to paste. The classic "How do I hurt the 6 Toughness Dwarf in WHFRP without slaughtering the rest of the party?" I mean, I get that the fantasy elements of Shadowrun is what appeals to a large amount of the player base, so I'm not suggesting there is a right or wrong way to do it. But Shadowrun isn't a great analogy for D&D combat. There's so much more variety to the ways you can play Shadowrun than how you can play D&D, so many different kinds of tactics and approaches in terms of how combats are run. They're just entirely different conceptual monsters.

jgsugden said:

To each their own, but one more thing to consider:

D&D used magic to 'escalate' the types of challenges PCs face. As PCs obtain more tools and gain the ability to bypass certain types of challenges, the game introduces newer challenges that take more advanced capabilities to confront. This is a problem for PC types that do not have evolving capabilities that handle these challenges, but it does provide benefits: Things do not get old and players feel like their characters are evolving. If you're still wrestling with how to get the amulet that sits on a floating pedestal that hovers above a 100' wide canyon when you're 15th level, the PCs don't feel that different than a 3rd level party. If, however, that amulet is in an extradimensional pocket protected by animated energy motes ... the PCs don't feel like they're in Kansas anymore. They've graduated... although the S&S tpe PCs don't feel like they have as much to offer in these challenges.

Click to expand...

Does this match what you saw during your experiment, [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION]?

Hussar said:

And, to me, that kinda fits with my point. In a group with casters, skills IME get somewhat sidelined. Not completely of course, but, de-emphasized I guess would be the way I would put it. I wanted a stronger focus on skills to overcome challenges rather than just scratching off another spell slot.

Click to expand...

I think that can partially be done if the party has few casters, and these casters have short spell lists, which leaves very little room for utility spells.

I have heard of players trying to play characters where they do not use any spells that require concentration and that gave me the idea to maybe run a game where casting magic of any kind is so difficult or draining that none of the spells that require concentration work. So casters would only be able to use spells that do not require it. This would extend to any spell-like abilities that use magic energy to power them. I am not sure where this would fall on the low magic-high magic scale though, or if it would be anything other than high magic, since it is more a clash between abundant magic-scarce magic.

Satyrn said:

Does this match what you saw during your experiment, [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION]?

Click to expand...

Not really. Although, to be fair, the campaign topped out at 9th level, so, I can't speak to 15th level. From my experience though, as soon as I allowed casters, the players pretty much completely stopped trying to use any skills and automatically defaulted to spells. Why bother using social skills when you can simply Charm an enemy and get him to talk? Why bother trying to reach that amulet that's 100 feet in the air, when you can just mage hand or telekinesis it down?

IME, as soon as you add casters to the mix, there's no point in playing characters with skills. Even if you do manage to use the skills instead of spells, the DM will simply pile on skill checks until you fail and every failure will be 100% catastrophic.

It requires a couple of things to break the caster dependency. The DM has to be willing to let the players succeed and not think that he or she "needs to add to the challenge". And the players have to be willing to accept that they no longer have instant win buttons to side step out of combat challenges.

Hussar said:

IME, as soon as you add casters to the mix, there's no point in playing characters with skills. Even if you do manage to use the skills instead of spells, the DM will simply pile on skill checks until you fail and every failure will be 100% catastrophic.

Click to expand...

It's not like casters don't have skills, either.

It requires a couple of things to break the caster dependency. The DM has to be willing to let the players succeed and not think that he or she "needs to add to the challenge". And the players have to be willing to accept that they no longer have instant win buttons to side step out of combat challenges.

Click to expand...

To be fair, 5e adventures set pretty low DCs, for the most part (to the point they draw complaints from certain critics... OK, critic... OK, CapnZapp), so maybe that's an attempt to address the issue?

Tony Vargas said:

It's not like casters don't have skills, either.

To be fair, 5e adventures set pretty low DCs, for the most part (to the point they draw complaints from certain critics... OK, critic... OK, CapnZapp), so maybe that's an attempt to address the issue?

Click to expand...

Well, that casters have skills doesn't really matter. It's not the skills that are the issue. It's the spells.

Actually, setting DC's low is fantastic IF you want to let the players use skills. Honestly, I think it's the other way that causes the problems and trains players to always rely on spells. If a DM thinks that an average check should fail 50% of the time, then what's the point of even trying? You are going to fail. Maybe not this check, but, most likely the next one. So, players are trained to not rely on skills. Far better to use Invisibility than stealth. Far better to use Arcane Eye to scout than a rogue. So on and so forth.