Things your table should do, but doesn't do- The Fun v. Efficiency Thread

Any BBEG worth the label is going to have legendary actions as well. One common legendary action is to move without provoking opportunity attacks (and since that's not the disengage action, Sentinel definitely doesn't help there).

Also, the reaction attack has to hit to reduce their speed to zero. A BBEG is probably relatively hard to hit, especially if they're facing a group of PCs solo. But failing that, dodge. In this case (or if you buy my interpretation of Sentinel's disengage text, which, having gone to read it, is at best ambiguous) the combo has managed to deny the BBEG an attack action. But that seems fair to me for the price of two feats.

I guess what I'm saying is that if you have a BBEG that has to be within 5' to hit, doesn't have the ability to avoid opportunity attacks outside the disengage action, is relatively easy to hit, and is facing a group of PCs solo, then if the PCs defeat them easily, it's not because of a broken feat combo.

Finally noticed this:

lowkey13 said:

*Hatred of Paladins > Gnomes > Pets > Rapiers > Charisma

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of course, Paladins are a CHA 'pet class.'

...makes a little more sense, now.

My pirate campaign features the occasional mass combat situation, and whenever that happens I try to limit the number of dice that I actually need to roll. Instead of rolling for each and every individual, I often describe the scene as just a massive battle going on around the players, and I tell them that the only fights we'll play out at the table are those between them and enemies that are actively fighting their characters. And so we limit a battle of hundreds of individuals to like 12 combatants.

When the battles become even larger, such as during a massive naval battle, we zoom out even more. We treat the ships as just one unit, rather than a vehicle containing hundreds of individuals. Some of the personal influence and actions become lost in that process, which is regretable, and we haven't yet found a perfect solution to this issue.

We've reached the point where the rules as written are not sufficient for what we are trying to do, and we need to borrow rules from other systems, and homebrew a bit. It's an experiment, and an ever improving process. It's not perfect, but so far it hasn't stopped us from playing the game. It is one of the many challenges for me as a DM when running a campaign of this scale.

Esker said:

Any BBEG worth the label is going to have legendary actions as well. One common legendary action is to move without provoking opportunity attacks (and since that's not the disengage action, Sentinel definitely doesn't help there).

Also, the reaction attack has to hit to reduce their speed to zero. A BBEG is probably relatively hard to hit, especially if they're facing a group of PCs solo. But failing that, dodge. In this case (or if you buy my interpretation of Sentinel's disengage text, which, having gone to read it, is at best ambiguous) the combo has managed to deny the BBEG an attack action. But that seems fair to me for the price of two feats.

I guess what I'm saying is that if you have a BBEG that has to be within 5' to hit, doesn't have the ability to avoid opportunity attacks outside the disengage action, is relatively easy to hit, and is facing a group of PCs solo, then if the PCs defeat them easily, it's not because of a broken feat combo.

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That's making assumptions that you make NPCs/monsters specifically to counter the build. Which I can do of course but then I've just told my player "neener, neener, I'm the DM so I can always come up with some custom monster to nerf your investment". In addition, while I didn't do an extensive search, the only monster I found that had the ability to avoid opp attacks are the handful that can teleport/phase and the vampire that can move without provoking. At the very least, it's not "common".

The DM can always find ways to threaten PCs. This is just one of my least favorite combos because it either works a lot (and it's boring), or the DM writes encounters so that it's rarely if ever useful particularly against boss monsters. Including mini-bosses. I'd rather discuss it with the player and either come up with alternative house rules or work something else out.

Oofta said:

That's making assumptions that you make NPCs/monsters specifically to counter the build. Which I can do of course but then I've just told my player "neener, neener, I'm the DM so I can always come up with some custom monster to nerf your investment". In addition, while I didn't do an extensive search, the only monster I found that had the ability to avoid opp attacks are the handful that can teleport/phase and the vampire that can move without provoking. At the very least, it's not "common".

The DM can always find ways to threaten PCs. This is just one of my least favorite combos because it either works a lot (and it's boring), or the DM writes encounters so that it's rarely if ever useful particularly against boss monsters. Including mini-bosses. I'd rather discuss it with the player and either come up with alternative house rules or work something else out.

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I don't think you have to specifically counter the build to have a good chance that the BBEG has some way around this combo. Any caster isn't worried about it, since they're not trying to get into melee. Dragons aren't worried about it. Beholder's don't care. Aboleths don't care. Vampires only care a little. Can you point to any BBEG-caliber creatures in the monster manual that would be shut down by Sentinel+PAM?

Esker said:

I don't think you have to specifically counter the build to have a good chance that the BBEG has some way around this combo. Any caster isn't worried about it, since they're not trying to get into melee. Dragons aren't worried about it. Beholder's don't care. Aboleths don't care. Vampires only care a little. Can you point to any BBEG-caliber creatures in the monster manual that would be shut down by Sentinel+PAM?

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.
All I'm saying is that it eliminates the effectiveness of an entire category of monsters that rely primarily or exclusively on melee. Can I come up with other types of monsters? Give all my melee types from CR 5 on reach or effective ranged attacks? Sure. But that means either I ignore melee opponents, fights are either boring or incredibly dependent on luck of the die.

Let's say I throw a Champion (CR 9) melee type against a level 5 party. If the fighter is lucky, the champion never has a chance to attack anyone (I rule you can't switch between a held weapon and another weapon without dropping one of them or taking an action). On the other hand a couple of misses and suddenly the PAM fighter is down and it's looking bad for the PCs.

YMMV and I don't feel like arguing about this any more. I just dislike the effect the rule has when I've seen it in actual play.

Oofta said:

.
All I'm saying is that it eliminates the effectiveness of an entire category of monsters that rely primarily or exclusively on melee. Can I come up with other types of monsters? Give all my melee types from CR 5 on reach or effective ranged attacks? Sure. But that means either I ignore melee opponents, fights are either boring or incredibly dependent on luck of the die.

Let's say I throw a Champion (CR 9) melee type against a level 5 party. If the fighter is lucky, the champion never has a chance to attack anyone (I rule you can't switch between a held weapon and another weapon without dropping one of them or taking an action). On the other hand a couple of misses and suddenly the PAM fighter is down and it's looking bad for the PCs.

YMMV and I don't feel like arguing about this any more. I just dislike the effect the rule has when I've seen it in actual play.

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Obviously you're entitled to do what you want and prohibit certain mechanics that you don't like. And you said you don't feel like arguing about this any more, which is fine; I won't take offense or treat it as an admission of anything if you stop responding. But since this is a forum that other people read as well, I just want to point out (for posterity, or something?) that there are a whole lot of ways that encounters involving a single melee-focused enemy can become trivialized with the right rolls. In the case of the Champion, a failed save or two on a hold person, say, and it's over, or at least it will be very quickly. Yes, they will probably either save or use indomitable and then save, but maybe not. Or how about Heat Metal? Cast it on the greatsword, and they have to resort to the shortbow, just as they would if they want to avoid approaching the PAM+Sentinel fighter.

I am certainly not advocating for modifying every formidable melee type to have reach or ranged attacks, because a character who has invested in this combo should be able to use it, but encounters against solo melee types have high potential to be boring regardless of this particular combo, and so make bad boss fights. So if using melee types, give them backup, or occasionally don't and let the fighter feel awesome when they shut down the bad guy with a few good attack rolls.

Or ban or house rule the Sentinel+PAM combo. I'm not telling you what to do at your table. I'm just saying I don't think it actually breaks anything in encounters that aren't already easily trivialized.

Oofta said:

.
All I'm saying is that it eliminates the effectiveness of an entire category of monsters that rely primarily or exclusively on melee. Can I come up with other types of monsters? Give all my melee types from CR 5 on reach or effective ranged attacks? Sure. But that means either I ignore melee opponents, fights are either boring or incredibly dependent on luck of the die.

Let's say I throw a Champion (CR 9) melee type against a level 5 party. If the fighter is lucky, the champion never has a chance to attack anyone (I rule you can't switch between a held weapon and another weapon without dropping one of them or taking an action). On the other hand a couple of misses and suddenly the PAM fighter is down and it's looking bad for the PCs.

YMMV and I don't feel like arguing about this any more. I just dislike the effect the rule has when I've seen it in actual play.

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Honestly, I can easily see this combo bring frustrating, but...

To me in 5e the "value" of a primary melee only bbeg without it having chosen favorable terrain and circumstance is close to nil before we get anywhere near double feat reach weapon combos. To be s challenging boss much less any sort of finale style contedt, challenges for z gtoup need to be far more robust and resilient than one that's easily stymied by this feat combo.

But, that's me.

Back in the day there was a tendency to check EVERYTHING. Was that smoked turkey hanging in the larder stuffed with a key to the desk in the groomsman's room? Check every section of wall for secret doors. Develop extreme myopia by peering through the Gem of True Seeing near constantly. Run ball bearings on the floor to see if there was a gradient. Poke obstructed passages with 10' poles. Try to determine how to rotate the Pentagram in the direction of Falbanian's Folly without opening the acid spigots by a detailed examination of the runic inscriptions and gear intermeshings of the mechanism.

These days this sort of interaction has largely been replaced by a Perception/Investigation roll and spoon-fed clues. There are pros and cons...

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