D&D 5E 5E's "Missed Opportunities?"

Lanefan said:

Treasure hordes, or treasure hoards?

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As long as it's not treasure whores.

Blue said:

As long as it's not treasure whores.

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5E needs a "Wandering Treasure Whore" table.

Blue said:

As long as it's not treasure whores.

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I think we call those platinum diggers.

Laurefindel said:

Advantage/disadvantage is only equivalent to +5/-5 if the target number you need on the d20 is around 10-11.

The further you get toward the 1 or toward the 20, the less of a bonus it gives. If you need a 19-20 to succeed, advantage only gives you the equivalent of +1. And if you need more than 20 to succeed, advantage won't help you whatsoever, whereas a flat +5 would allow you to roll the equivalent of a 25 on a d20.

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Indeed, but each of those situations has a calculatable probability of occurring within the set of all possible outcomes and the most likely results, even expected value, can also be calculated. It's actually kind of a fun exercise.
That said, my calculations say the expected value of the bonus is more like +6/-6 than +5/-5 (in fact, it would round up to 7).

Laurefindel said:

Advantage/disadvantage is only equivalent to +5/-5 if the target number you need on the d20 is around 10-11.

The further you get toward the 1 or toward the 20, the less of a bonus it gives. If you need a 19-20 to succeed, advantage only gives you the equivalent of +1. And if you need more than 20 to succeed, advantage won't help you whatsoever, whereas a flat +5 would allow you to roll the equivalent of a 25 on a d20.

Otherwise, I do like backgrounds the way they are, but i do think they could have gone a bit further. Not sure if it is a missed opportunity, but there is room to develop the background aspect further.

Same with inspiration, i think they could have gone further with what benefit inspiration could give, but as it stands it a nice and simple addition to the game. I wish having inspiration could give you something, perhaps an ability relating to your race or background, in addition to spending it to gain advantage on a roll.

Advantage/disadvantage and bounded accuracy are my favourite addition to this edition. That being said, monsters do feel like bags of hp sometimes, and although i don't think it has anything to do with bounded accuracy, I think they could have gone further with small but distinctive monstrous abilities, like what the orcs and goblins have.

I think there could have been more low-magic setting possibilities if some of the core features were set as variants. For what its worth, that's where i think the missed opportunity was.

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billd91 said:

Indeed, but each of those situations has a calculatable probability of occurring within the set of all possible outcomes and the most likely results, even expected value, can also be calculated. It's actually kind of a fun exercise.
That said, my calculations say the expected value of the bonus is more like +6/-6 than +5/-5 (in fact, it would round up to 7).

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This site supports [MENTION=67296]Laurefindel[/MENTION]'s post:
http://zerohitpoints.com/Articles/Advantage-in-DnD-5

1) Backgrounds. The only part of backgrounds I don't like is that you can change the skills. If they would have had each background provide choices for the two skills, like classes do, I'd be happier. As it stands, the skills and tools listed are nothing more than suggestions.

2) Inspiration. I am VERY limited on how I use inspiration. I generally give it out to the party after a story arc, but I also allow it to be used after the roll (making it much more useful). I have toyed with alternate methods of using them more frequently, but my group just doesn't really care that much about it.

3) Treasure Hordes. I have used them, but I keep strict control over which items I allow. If an item is rolled up that may be disruptive to the game, I'll nix it and re-roll. Published adventures are notorious for giving out poor treasure, either way to high or low (usually high), so I just change it (unless I'm running just an AP, because I assume the amount of treasure is acceptable for the entire campaign).

4) Advantage/Disadvantage. You can easily switch (dis)advantage back to +2/-2, which I believe is an official suggestion. Personally, I consider it to be one of the best new mechanics in 5E.

5) Bonded Accuracy. 5E is designed for players to hit frequently for variable damage (based on class and build), because monsters have generally low AC but a lot of HP. Conversly, monsters tend to hit infrequently but for fairly high damage. This is meant to keep players engaged, because they usually feel like they're being useful (rather than missing all the time), but fear being hit because a good hit can drop you (a critical hit can often be fatal to low HP or lower level characters).

My personal "missed opportunities" would be:

* spreading out the saving throws so that any "dump stat" can actually hurt. Instead of focusing on Con, Dex, and Wis, you'd want all of them to be good. Adding 1/2 or 1/3 of your proficiency bonus to untrained saves might have been a decent idea as well.

* starting characters at level 3, with starting abilities being spread out over those levels, allowing "apprentice characters" to feel like it. It would also make multi-classing different, because a single level doesn't benefit as much as it does (higher level abilities would have to be overall lowered so that the opportunity cost isn't as high either).

* a workable weapon and armor list, but that's just a pet peeve of mine.

Inspiration is a horribly wasted mechanic. We have been playing since 5e came out and often commented about this. By now we never remember and it might as well not exist.

Retreater said:

Wow. In my experience it's been: "Hey. It says my character is a hero to the poor. So I gave a kid a CP. Can I have inspiration? So if I throw another CP out the window to the urchin, can I have inspiration on this Stealth check?"

Or it's just been forgotten. I even printed up special rules and maneuvers that you could spend inspiration to use. No one ever used it.

The idea that backgrounds are so tied in with Inspiration kinda drags down the mechanical concept of backgrounds. (Sure, roleplaying is still cool, but you don't really need rules to roleplay.)

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The way I see it is that Inspiration is gained by portraying your character in the ways outlined by the character's Personality Trait, Ideal, Bond, and Flaw. Nothing else is worth Inspiration. And under the approached I linked in my first post in this thread, the players can earn Inspiration four times per session by portraying their characters personality trait, ideal, bond, and flaw. Once a player has claimed Inspiration for a personality trait, subsequent claims for Inspiration must be either for the ideal, bond, or flaw, for example. The players claims this, mind you - the DM isn't involved in the transaction on the assumption the player is acting in good faith when making the claim. It's therefore a player-side resource with no overhead for the DM.

So what this looks like is say I'm playing my forest gnome acolyte wizard Cardinal G. Golly Willikers. He has a personality trait that reads: "I idolize a particular hero of my faith, and constantly refer to that person's deeds and example." In a recent session, some monsters rounded a corner and went after our back line where the ranger and I were standing. I said "Scout Master John, get on outta here. As Saint Bunkin Wigglecrank did at the Battle of Bangwhistle, I will protect our flank while you and the others take out the real threat!" I outputted the personality trait text to chat, took my Inspiration, and played on. If I were at a table, I would have held up an index card with the personality trait on it instead. In order to earn more Inspiration that session, I'd have to portray my ideal, bond, or flaw.

You missed the part where you’re basically wrong on all 5 counts.

Retreater said:

Wow. In my experience it's been: "Hey. It says my character is a hero to the poor. So I gave a kid a CP. Can I have inspiration? So if I throw another CP out the window to the urchin, can I have inspiration on this Stealth check?"

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I know what you mean! That's clearly the fault of the game, not the people you play with.

Once, when I was about 13, I was playing Monopoly with some friends, and one friend (who had some "issues", I understood years later) got frustrated that he was losing so he flipped the whole board over and swept all the cards and money and pieces on the floor.

I was all, "Wow what a badly designed game Monopoly is..."