D&D 5E [+] What are your favorite things about 5e?

[Sacrosanct]

Another thing I really like is the discouragement of multi-classing. MC was always intended to be the exception, rather than the rule. Somewhere along the line (and especially in 3e), it became the norm. To me that doesn't sit right because a class is like a career. It should be able to stand on it's own all the way up. With 5e, sure you can multi-class, but what I've found during actual play as you level up (as opposed to starting at level 20 or whatever), the choice to MC is not an easy one because you're missing out on a lot.

I've often thought about MCing my shadow monk to a warlock to get Devil's sight. But when the time comes that I've leveled up, the next level of monk abilities is too good to give up. We do have a MC fighter/warlock, and he feels like he's always behind everyone else (we're all level 8 now).

 

[Imaro]

LOL I thought you just mistyped the title.

D'ope... I guess my plan didn't really work...lol!!

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Another thing I really like is the discouragement of multi-classing. MC was always intended to be the exception, rather than the rule. Somewhere along the line (and especially in 3e), it became the norm. To me that doesn't sit right because a class is like a career. It should be able to stand on it's own all the way up. With 5e, sure you can multi-class, but what I've found during actual play as you level up (as opposed to starting at level 20 or whatever), the choice to MC is not an easy one because you're missing out on a lot.

I've often thought about MCing my shadow monk to a warlock to get Devil's sight. But when the time comes that I've leveled up, the next level of monk abilities is too good to give up. We do have a MC fighter/warlock, and he feels like he's always behind everyone else (we're all level 8 now).

Multiclassing becomes more attractive after level 11, because high-level abilities are often kind of meh compared to maximizing your action and concentration economies. In other words, high levels have more dead levels. E.g. what does the ranger gain from levels 12 to 20 that is better than Cunning Action, Assassinate and a bunch of Sneak Attack dice? An Sharpshooting Assassination Volley from Camouflage, supported by a pack of raging wolves while the ranger holds the distance open with Cunning Action, getting a bonus 5d6 damage on every Volley is a pretty nice synergy. Similar things can be said about the paladin capstone compared to sorcerer spells.

Edit: apologies for the tangent, didn't mean to argue. Just thinking out loud about a character concept that I am dying to try.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Multiclassing becomes more attractive after level 11, because high-level abilities are often kind of meh compared to maximizing your action and concentration economies. In other words, high levels have more dead levels. E.g. what does the ranger gain from levels 12 to 20 that is better than Cunning Action, Assassinate and a bunch of Sneak Attack dice? An Sharpshooting Assassination Volley from Camouflage, supported by a pack of raging wolves while the ranger holds the distance open with Cunning Action, getting a bonus 5d6 damage on every Volley is a pretty nice synergy. Similar things can be said about the paladin capstone compared to sorcerer spells.

Edit: apologies for the tangent, didn't mean to argue. Just thinking out loud about a character concept that I am dying to try.

What I've found, and I know this is just me, is that the time spent gaming to go from level 10 to 11 is a few sessions, so it's an actual significant time sink of not playing the PC I really want just to get to a certain "build level". I.e., the "take a couple levels of X" argument. A couple levels is a couple months of gaming.

That's one factor. The other is that we rarely play above the low teens. 90% of our gaming is between level 3 and 10. So I'm sure that's a factor too.

 

[MARCVS AVRELIVS]

My favorite things (not a complete list)

- my 10 year old son really enjoys the game and finds it easy to understand the rules and what his character can do (doing a character in Pathfinder bored him).
- my play group gets disappointed when we play something else, and had 3 out of 5 of us wanting to DM it (and the other 2 thinking about it)
- when I go back and "convert" a B/E or AD&D1e module, it's easy
- I feel like my mapping a dungeon is useful, and not just a time-waster between encounters
- adventuring feels dangerous again in a way it didn't with 3e/4e/Pathfinder
- we can get through 4-5 encounters in our usual 3 hour time slot
- a monster can be written up in a single line (or maybe 2)

 

[AntiStateQuixote]

Faster (than 4e and 3e) combat is hands down my favorite thing. I like being able to have 3 - 7 meaningful skirmishes and one big fight plus exploration and interaction time instead of just 2 big fights and nothing else in a game session.

 

[Hussar]

What I've found, and I know this is just me, is that the time spent gaming to go from level 10 to 11 is a few sessions, so it's an actual significant time sink of not playing the PC I really want just to get to a certain "build level". I.e., the "take a couple levels of X" argument. A couple levels is a couple months of gaming.

That's one factor. The other is that we rarely play above the low teens. 90% of our gaming is between level 3 and 10. So I'm sure that's a factor too.

It's funny how everyone experiences the game differently. We've had 2 5e campaigns so far, one to 8th level, and the current one to 3rd. In the 8th level one, with six PC's, 2 multi classed within 8 levels. All the fighter types multi classed into something. I'm the only straight fighter now. In our second campaign, by 3rd level, we have one multiclass already.

IME, 5e encourages multi classing much more than I ever saw since my AD&D days.

 

[Votan]

It's funny how everyone experiences the game differently. We've had 2 5e campaigns so far, one to 8th level, and the current one to 3rd. In the 8th level one, with six PC's, 2 multi classed within 8 levels. All the fighter types multi classed into something. I'm the only straight fighter now. In our second campaign, by 3rd level, we have one multiclass already.

IME, 5e encourages multi classing much more than I ever saw since my AD&D days.

I think that this is true. But it encourages it much less than 3rd edition, which probably pushed things too far in one direction. I like it when people can enjoyably multi-class. This is fun. What I disliked in some editions was making multi-classing so much better than a straight class (with few exceptions) that one felt sub-optimal if they did not. I don't see this at all in 5E.

And that is a pretty nice balance point all on it's own.

 

[Staffan]

I don't know. In 2e, multi-classing, if you were a demi-human, was almost a no-brainer - a fighter/mage would almost always be a better idea than a fighter or a mage, particularly with the way XP worked (most classes doubled XP/level up to high single digits, so you'd be one level behind). Dual-classing was of course a different animal, with very steep requirements.

3e made it easy to multi-class non-caster classes, and particularly easy to "dip" a few levels into one for extra cool stuff. It was very harsh on multi-classing spellcasters however, because the power from higher-level spells was so great that any delay in acquiring them could be crippling. There were some prestige classes that tried to soften the blow, but it was very rare to see a character doing deep multi-classing using a spellcasting class (except for prestige classes that gave up no more than one level of spellcasting, and that was a big price to pay).

5e uses 3e-style multiclassing (split levels rather than XP), but class design discourages it. Most of the basic competence stuff for a class is spread out over the first three levels, rather than being given it all at level 1. The first three character levels fly by due to low XP requirements, but if you take three levels of a new class that's more like levels 5-7 of your main class, and that's a big investment. And when you're done with the first three... well, you might as well take the 4th level to get the stat bump, and then there's always something really sweet (like an extra attack) at level 5. And five levels of a class is a really big investment. On the plus side, multi-classing spellcasters is easier than 3e.

 

[Jessica]

I'm in a very negative mood atm so I'll try to keep this positive:

1) Bounded Accuracy for keeping low level monsters/summons/etc still relevant even at higher levels.
2) Backgrounds for providing neat little bits of customization and roleplaying extras from the very start of the edition and did it in such a way that it doesn't really effect optimization/min-maxing/etc.
3) Changes to Vancian casting. If you're not going to use AEDU then I am glad they got rid of that old school Vancian non-sense of choosing spells for each specific spell slot ahead of time. I didn't mind it too much back in 2nd but steadily I grew to hate it. When I go back to try and play BG/IWD/NWN, I always make my main arcane caster(s) a Sorcerer so I don't have to deal with that system.
4) Necromancers. Finally there is an edition where your actual raising-the-undead type arcane Necromancer feels like a playable concept and you aren't just suggested to "play a Cleric instead".