Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
Character Builds & Optimization
Loss of Innate Spellcasting (or 'How Dragons Build Lairs')
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 3999842" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>Excellent point. What is relevant to the creature's power (from the point of view of encounter balancing) is not <em>the way<em> in which it got a certain buff, or added a certain trap to its lair, but simply the final numbers for the encounter (including the extra difficulty that traps or other hazards add).</em></em></p><p><em><em></em></em></p><p><em><em>So if I think a balanced combat encounter with the dragon requires buffs X&Y and trap Z I can simply add these to the encounter, plus add as flavour text: the dragon did those things using its Rituals.</em></em></p><p><em><em></em></em></p><p><em><em>What would make a difference would be that those extra Ritual abilities would potentially constitute extra rewards ("treasure") to be gained by resolving the dragon encounter as a social challenge. This might be a reason to be a little cautious about adding too many such Ritual abilities to the dragon (or to any other NPC).</em></em></p><p><em><em></em></em></p><p><em><em></em></em></p><p><em><em></em></em></p><p><em><em>I don't see why the absence of a statement like "Dragons of age X can cast rituals of level Y" would make the gameworld incoherent. If you think a given Dragon would benefit from Rituals X, Y and Z then presumably you have a reason for this, and also a view about how Dragons learn this magic. Why wouldn't these together yield sufficient coherence?</em></em></p><p><em><em></em></em></p><p><em><em></em></em></p><p><em><em>I don't see what is arbitrary about giving the Dragon the stats/traps etc required and jotting down a note that these derived from Rituals. This has nothing to do with GM "cheating" by changing the combat stats mid-encounter.</em></em></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 3999842, member: 42582"] Excellent point. What is relevant to the creature's power (from the point of view of encounter balancing) is not [i]the way[i] in which it got a certain buff, or added a certain trap to its lair, but simply the final numbers for the encounter (including the extra difficulty that traps or other hazards add). So if I think a balanced combat encounter with the dragon requires buffs X&Y and trap Z I can simply add these to the encounter, plus add as flavour text: the dragon did those things using its Rituals. What would make a difference would be that those extra Ritual abilities would potentially constitute extra rewards ("treasure") to be gained by resolving the dragon encounter as a social challenge. This might be a reason to be a little cautious about adding too many such Ritual abilities to the dragon (or to any other NPC). I don't see why the absence of a statement like "Dragons of age X can cast rituals of level Y" would make the gameworld incoherent. If you think a given Dragon would benefit from Rituals X, Y and Z then presumably you have a reason for this, and also a view about how Dragons learn this magic. Why wouldn't these together yield sufficient coherence? I don't see what is arbitrary about giving the Dragon the stats/traps etc required and jotting down a note that these derived from Rituals. This has nothing to do with GM "cheating" by changing the combat stats mid-encounter.[/i][/i] [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
Character Builds & Optimization
Loss of Innate Spellcasting (or 'How Dragons Build Lairs')
Top