D&D 5E Likes and Dislikes?

[77IM]

About archery specialization: very frequently, the archer will be in the back row, and his targets will have +2 cover due to the archer's own allies! I think archery style +2 bonus is meant to directly compensate for this.

Granted, sometimes the archer will have a clear shot and net a +2 bonus from fighting style. But contrast the melee fighting styles, whose benefits work all the time.

 

[KarinsDad]

Yes, archers work on accuracy, but that's because archery is inherently less accurate than melee. So hitting more consistently at targets 100 feet away doesn't work for me.

Archery is actually more accurate than melee in real life. Melee attacks can be blocked (at elbow or wrist or with a shield or with a weapon) or avoided (step back, step to the side). It's not that the weapon doesn't move fast (it does), it's that the positioning of the body is such that in order to fully swing (or even stab with) a weapon, a defender can start to react before the weapon actually starts in motion.

Longbow arrows tend to fly at 150 to 175 feet per second (a hockey puck flies at about 165 fps). Your 100 feet example is about 0.6 seconds for an arrow, about the time that it takes for you to say the phrase "what the". It's difficult to block or dodge an arrow, or even know when the archer is going to fire. It's really tough to do it at 30 feet (~0.2 seconds). By the time your brain registers that it is coming at you, you are already hit. Arrows are also difficult to see mid-flight if they are coming directly at you, regardless of background contrast. Their small (diameter) size and speed make them look like a blur at best, and not seen at all at worse.

The one advantage that melee has over ranged is range itself. As the distance gets larger, the apparent size of the target gets smaller (and for arrows, they have to be arced greater). But, that's handled fairly well by disadvantage in 5E.

 

[Raith5]

I like that it feels like an updated 1e to me (because I play 1e), and that it feels like an updated 2e to some (who play 2e), and that it feels like an updated 3e to others (who play 3e), and that it feels like a mish-mash of annoying rules that have blatantly vague descriptions that make the game virtually unplayable (to those who play 4e).

I am a fan of 4e and the old school/1e feel has absolutely zero value to me, despite having played in that era. However, I recently played a game of 5e with 2 guys that have not played D&D before and 3 that have not played since the days of 1e. We had a great time, I think 5e is great entry into the hobby.

The only thing that really stood out as clumsy or confusing to all concerned was where spells had a mixture of rolls to attack, saving throws, automatic effects, effecting a hp amount of creatures. Compared to 4e the resolution of spells, 5e looks like a dog's breakfast in this respect (IMO).

The other thing that the guys picked up on was the effectiveness of the rogue in combat with the sneak attack damage, compared with everyone else. The fighter at the table asked "why are we all here", and the rogue replied, to set up my sneak attack! But overall I think the balance between martials and spell casters worked out well. I played a cleric and he was effective. We had a lot of fun with creative uses of cantrips - but I did not like the cleric being drawn back into the healbot role.

So my likes and dislikes are shaped by gaming preferences but drawn from my actual gaming experience.

Like:

I was really surprised how much I liked being removed from the encounter framework of 4e.
Liked the fragility of the PCs/danger of combat
Cantrips - especially the non combat cantrips really make the casters interesting
Advantage/disadvantage is excellent

Dislike:

Lack of self healing options for non-fighters (also not sure how well the fighters second wind is going to scale)
Cleric dependence for healing - I would have been shot if I used my spell shots on anything other than healing. I really miss the way healing spells and everything else was siloed in 4e.
I still think the 4e system of static defences is more elegant than the 5e mix of attacks, saves and effects.

In sum: i had a great experience playing 5e, but I still have mixed feelings (and some frustrations) about some of the good innovations of 4e being thrown out.

 

[Eric V]

"I still think the 4e system of static defences is more elegant than the 5e mix of attacks, saves and effects."

Same here...what's the advantage of sometimes having the attacker roll to determine success and sometimes the defender rolls?

 

[aramis erak]

"I still think the 4e system of static defences is more elegant than the 5e mix of attacks, saves and effects."

Same here...what's the advantage of sometimes having the attacker roll to determine success and sometimes the defender rolls?

Multiple defenders with equal abilities not all being automatically equally effected.

Plus, the conditions for advantage/disadvantage to saves are potentially different than for attacks.