D&D (2024) Why is wotc still aiming for PCs with 10 *real word* feet of range? W/o vision range penalty/limit rules for the GM?

[tetrasodium]

im going to disagree. You can't have a rule for everything. Also gm fiat to just make it fun creates pathfinder style rules where there is no continuity, or logic to the rules at all. You end up with rules that say if you put a wall of fire in the path of a ships sails and the ship sails through it the wall can't start a fire.. But oil and tinder can, or if you anchor the wall of fire to the ship it can start a fire. Then those of us who's minds function logically just can't enjoy the game because of the illogic of the situation. It also creates a the GM is just messing with me because he doesn't like my plan. Which is less fun than an artillery battle on the plains.

Do you not see how toxic you are being? Notice that at no point did you make any effort to justify why that one player's fun is more important than everyone else's.

Someone pointed out that one player actually using or trying to use these excessive ranges is not fun. You respond to that asking what if those ranges are fun for an ad populum "some players" & when outright asked why those players deserve to have their fun elevated above everyone else at the table forced into the role of spectator you don't even feel the need to touch on the problem of why everyone else deserves to be spectators to that ad populum "some players"? You are doing exactly what the current ranges & rules encourage players to do.

The GM needs to take the heat for nerfing f them in some way using rules changes or take the heat for using fiat that restricts the ability of those ranges to turn the rest of their group into spectators because that's unfun for the GM & the rest of the group.

Spoiler: If one player...

for some players it is fun. If not for you don't do it. keep to cities, forests and mountains where they have to
be closer.

am I quoting that player?

In that position the rules insulate you to the point that you don't need to make any effort to involve the rest of the group or justify why the rest of the group deserves to be turned into spectators twiddling their thumbs...

 

[Reef]

I’m still amazed that you think the DM needs to “take the heat” for creating challenges for the players. That’s the DM’s job…come up with interesting scenarios that the players work together to overcome. Sometimes that means putting them in situations where they can’t use their favourite abilities.

Not every time, of course. But no player should be complaining that they can’t use everything 100% of the time. A good DM creates enough variety that all the players have a chance to shine. Sometimes it’s the magic dude. Sometimes it’s the super stealthy one. And yeah, sometimes it’s the one that can make that one in a million 600’ shot. But expecting to be able to do it all the time would be a weird sense of entitlement that I personally have never seen.

 

[Umbran]

Do you not see how toxic you are being?

Mod Note:
If you feel they are being toxic, it is time to disengage. So please do so.

 

[tetrasodium]

I’m still amazed that you think the DM needs to “take the heat” for creating challenges for the players. That’s the DM’s job…come up with interesting scenarios that the players work together to overcome. Sometimes that means putting them in situations where they can’t use their favourite abilities.

Not every time, of course. But no player should be complaining that they can’t use everything 100% of the time. A good DM creates enough variety that all the players have a chance to shine. Sometimes it’s the magic dude. Sometimes it’s the super stealthy one. And yeah, sometimes it’s the one that can make that one in a million 600’ shot. But expecting to be able to do it all the time would be a weird sense of entitlement that I personally have never seen.

That's not what I said.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

That's exactly why the rules should fail-safe in favor of empowering gm fiat for everyone's fun when justified rather than expecting the GM to do what the rules failed to while failing secure against gm fiat. With that switch in the design goals the game changes to one where If such a player exists at a table then the onus is on that player to loop everyone else into their plan of rods from god style volley fire in a way that the gm agrees is fun to enough of the table to justify applying fiat to empower it.

How did the rules fail? Give me an example. Cause I think I need one to grasp your point.

What stops the DM from saying there are trees and such blocking vision.

 

[James Gasik]

How did the rules fail? Give me an example. Cause I think I need one to grasp your point.

What stops the DM from saying there are trees and such blocking vision.

There can't be trees all the time? While this is an easy situation to fix at the encounter level, what about at a world-building level? If the party consistently only fights enemies when there is terrain to prevent long-ranged attacks, someone might start to wonder why anyone bothered to make really long ranged weapons in the first place, lol.

Personally, if players want to invest in distance attacks, I say let them, but the rules shouldn't assume every DM is ready for that. It seems like a pretty easy thing to add in a "DM Troubleshooting" section of a DMG to discuss things like this that could come up.

 

[MonsterEnvy]

There can't be trees all the time? While this is an easy situation to fix at the encounter level, what about at a world-building level? If the party consistently only fights enemies when there is terrain to prevent long-ranged attacks, someone might start to wonder why anyone bothered to make really long ranged weapons in the first place,

A hill then, rocks, mist. There are near limitless ways for enemies to have gotten within 600 feet without either group noticing.
Terrain should not entirely negate ranged attacks, just super far ranged attacks so a reasonable map can be used.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

A hill then, rocks, mist. There are near limitless ways for enemies to have gotten within 600 feet without either group noticing.
Terrain should not entirely negate ranged attacks, just super far ranged attacks so a reasonable map can be used.

Doesn't even need to be a matter of not noticing. Could be both sides know the other is there, but the terrain just blocks any clean shot, and it's foolish to fire ammunition blind into variable terrain just to feel like you're doing something.

 

[Jacob Vardy]

• Converted to 5ft game distance to one inch real world squares:
  • An entire soccer or football field is 6feet of real world table space
  • Olympic sized swimming pool 2.7feet of real world table space
  • The 102 floor empire state building laying on its side , roughly 20.8 feet of real world table space from ground to roof. This is a number that will come up again.

• Longbow, 10ft of table space of table space.
• hexer(pg36) 10ft of table space of table space.
• modify spell & distant spell 3.5ft feet of table space at level 7 & increasing with 6inch increments every level till a full 10ftof table space is reached at at 20.
• light crossbow & shortbow 5.3feet of table space.
• heavy crossbow 6.6ft of table space.
• Musket hand crossbow & sling 1 foot of table space.
• Devil's sight provides a diameter of vision that is four full feet of table space
• standard 30ft PC move speed 1/2 foot of real world table space or double if dashing.

Battlemats made by off the shelf chessex range from 23.5x26inch (1.95...x2.16.. ft)to 48x36(4ftx3ft). PCs shouldn't have abilities that make them look like inappropriately sized hacks. With a VTT capable of scaling to support an unreasonably huge battlefields of space that the GM now needs to both fill and manage the herculean task of running anything that might be in it without just roflstomping their players with a zerg rush using the soon to be forgotten possible extras they are wasting time & brainpower on throughout the combat rather than creating an interesting combat.

How huge? roughly one empire state building on it's side by one empire state building on it's side. That is an excessive burden in the extreme.

I set my current campaigns on a savanna partly so we could play around with such long ranges. We're on Foundry, so at first i just set the map size that big. Which mid-range computers struggled with. And wasn't really necessary. Firstly, tall grass, scrub, rolling hills, et cetera... make for a lot of concealment. Secondly, it is a small sample but so far all three parties have wanted to get close, at least to 100ft. - to make sure enemies don't escape to give warning, to figure out who they might be fighting, and so on... I brought home to me why even infantry with rifles apparently fight at ridiculously close range.

Although the party with three rangers can be really rough on the wildlife...

 

[UngainlyTitan]

There can't be trees all the time? While this is an easy situation to fix at the encounter level, what about at a world-building level? If the party consistently only fights enemies when there is terrain to prevent long-ranged attacks, someone might start to wonder why anyone bothered to make really long ranged weapons in the first place, lol.

Personally, if players want to invest in distance attacks, I say let them, but the rules shouldn't assume every DM is ready for that. It seems like a pretty easy thing to add in a "DM Troubleshooting" section of a DMG to discuss things like this that could come up.

The thing is that these posited engagements make little sense. If you are on flat ground with no cover, then you will see the enemy party well beyond effective range. If a party is receiving effective fire, then they will retreat out of range.
They whoever is local will retreat onto reinforcements.