D&D 5E Reducing High Magic (6th-9th levels) Spell Slots Option

[jayoungr]

At these levels AC should be above the 20 mark

Not in my experience. I'm running a game for level 13 characters with no magic items, and the highest AC we have is 18, for a paladin. The casters are more in the 15-16 level, and that's with mage armor. I ran another game that ended at level 20, and in that game, the level 20 wizard had a 19 AC with two magic items. The cleric had an AC of 20 with a shield (18 without). I don't think I've ever had a character of any class hit AC 24.

Again, what's the houserule that is giving these characters such high ACs?

 

[Helldritch]

Not in my experience. I'm running a game for level 13 characters, and the highest AC we have is 18, for a paladin. The casters are more in the 15-16 level, and that's with mage armor. I ran another game that ended at level 20, and in that game, the level 20 wizard had a 19 AC with two magic items. The cleric had an AC of 20 with a shield (18 without). I don't think I've ever had a character of any class hit AC 24.

Again, what's the houserule that is giving these characters such high ACs?

Without houserule, our paladin amd cleric had 23AC with +1 shield, ring and cloak. They could go as high as 25 with shield of faith and even more with a potion or haste spell. Medium armored characters reached similar AC, maybe a bit less but not by much. Unarmored caster often reached around 19 AC without boosting spells and potions. With spells, and judicious usage of shield spell an AC higher than 25. And this is without any house rules.

 

[jayoungr]

Unarmored caster often reached around 19 AC without boosting spells and potions.

How are they getting to 19 without armor, spells, or potions? And at what level?

 

[Helldritch]

How are they getting to 19 without armor, spells, or potions? And at what level?

Level 16-17. +1 ring, cloak and dexterity raised at 16 and even 18. Add in mage armor and sometimes partial cover or an animated shield (you don't have to be proficient to activate it). Or a robe of the archmagi. I am a rutheless DM, but I am still generous.

Edit: Added the animated shield as it was used by one of the character at some point.

 

[jayoungr]

Level 16-17. +1 ring, cloak and dexterity raised at 16 and even 18. Add in mage armor and sometimes partial cover and a higher bonus on one of the items.

If they have AC-boosting items, I'd call that armor. And mage armor is definitely a spell.

Or a robe of the archmagi.

I've never given out one of those.

 

[Helldritch]

mage armor can come from bracers. And it is a non concentration spell. When I talk about boosting AC spells, I always refer to concentration spells.

Armor worn and armor giving items are two different things.
At 20th level, one had a boost in AC of +3 but could not wear armor and it was not cumulative with mage's armor.

 

[jayoungr]

mage armor can come from bracers. And it is a non concentration spell. When I talk about boosting AC spells, I always refer to concentration spells.

What I mean is that from how you described it, I thought you were talking about an AC of 19 achieved purely through stats, and I couldn't see how you would get that.

 

[Flamestrike]

Because the concept of a standard AD is ridiculous IMO. During travel, you might get one or two encounters per day typically, but a lot of that depends on the region and what the DM sets as the chance. Otherwise, when you get to the meat of an adventure, you can have well over a dozen encounters before the PCs can get a rest in (your typical dungeon crawl or infiltration mission, for instance).

The 6-8 encounter adventuring day isnt set in stone mate. It's a rough median (which it seems from your post above, is a median figure you're actually hitting).

On shorter adventuring days (1-2 encounters) the casters will shine and you can throw slighty harder encounters at the party due to the fact they can nova a bit more safely. On your longer (12+) adventuring days, the exact opposite occurs and short rest classes and 'at will' classes (Rogues and Champions) will shine, with casters holding back on dumping high level spells.

The spotlight moves around the table, and different classes have different strengths highlighted.

This is a feature of the short/ long rest resource management system of 5E, not a bug.

Rather than mess with classes, I strongly urge you to play around with Rest rules in your game. Those levers are there for you to pull (Short v Long rest variance, what is recovered on a Short or Long rest etc) and by simply tweaking those levers, you control the frequency of resource recovery in your campaigns for ALL classes.

The good thing with such a method is they apply to everyone equally, and are dead easy to dial back, or dial in harder to your (and your tables) tastes.

 

[Helldritch]

I wholeheartedly agree with Flamestrike on that one. The profound modification you are advocating might seem a good idea but it won't be in the long run. Flamestrike's solution would suit your goal better.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Those ACs sound super-high to me, especially for spellcasters. What's your houserule? And maybe the opponents should be getting +1 for every 3-4 levels instead of 5, if they're still having trouble hitting?

These ACs aren't super-high at all, especially if you roll stats (which is the default...).

The houserule:

Level 1-5: +0 AC
Level 6-11: +1 AC
Level 12-17: +2 AC
Level 18-20: +3 AC

And most of the monsters bonus's actually exceed our bonus. When we were in hell, we were AC +2 so any creature CR 10-14 had an equal bonus to hit us, and CR 15 or higher actually had a better chance of hitting us; even creatures of 5-9 CR were only -1 to hit us... so not a huge penalty by any means.

The rule is meant to help mitigate BA so that lower CR creatures have a harder time hitting higher level PCs. It works for what it was intended to do.

Agreed. I can only assume copious magic items. I'm assuming wizard class for lack of more info as many of the spells being complained about are wizard spells. Most wizards, even by level 20, rarely exceed an AC of 16 even with Mage Armor. Shield helps of course, but the duration is so short I would definitely not consider it to be part of the static AC the way Mage Armor is.

This all depends on what style of game you are playing. IME, I would not consider it "copious" but YMMV. We are levels 19-20 now, so yes we have good magic items, even one legendary item (Holy Avenger). I would say each PC has maybe 3-5 magic items, plus 2-3 potions of healing for back-up if we need them.

For example, my AC of 24 is from my elven chain shirt (AC 14), Shield +2 (AC 18), DEX 16 (AC 21), and our house-ruled Level Bonus (AC 24). As a war magic wizard, I have Durable Magic which gives me another +2 when I am concentrating on a spell, so then an AC 26. Throw out the shield spell and it is AC 31. My only other magic items are my winged boots and a staff of healing, along with the potions typical for each PC.

So, you tell me: is that "copious" to you? Personally, I don't think so, but like I said games differ. shrug