D&D 5E A Glimpse Of High-Level Play

GlassJaw said:

While I do agree that hit points are important, my gut says that AC is equally important and viable in the long run, perhaps more so than any edition in a long time. With the proficiency bonus being so flat, any bonus to AC is going to be huge and continually to be for a long time.

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Kind of. Monster attack bonus doesn't outpace AC like it did in earlier editions but I still wouldn't bother as a cloth wearer unless I could get easy decent AC like a mountain dorf. 14/16/18 is what I'd be aiming at for low/low-med/med levels (maybe even med-high). Its enough that you have some miss chance rather than none. Past that, its diminishing returns for a cloth wearer.

GlassJaw said:

Heck, it's the first edition in a long time where a shield is a great option, as is the Dodge action. 5E finally allows you to be a legit tank, and all it really takes is fighting with a shield and the Dodge action.

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Quite true for a heavy armor/shield wearer or a monk/bbn type. 5e fighters are considerably less sticky than previous editions, even with the Sentinel and goading maneuver. Just taking the dodge action isn't enough imo.

Wulf Ratbane said:

Granted, this has always been my personal preference in any edition of the game-- I like playing dead 'ard heroes-- but it is really paying off for my 5e Wulf Ratbane build.

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Oh! Do share!

Plane Sailing said:

I don't suppose there will be a StoryHour for 5e Wulf Ratbane? I loved those 3e story hours with him in!

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TerraDave said:

So, will there? [MENTION=94]Wulf Ratbane[/MENTION]

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Rune said:

Oh! Do share!

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Thanks for the interest guys; it's very gratifying (even after all these years). I don't want to derail the thread but I don't want to leave it unanswered, either:

Story Hour is very unlikely. I just have so many irons in the fire, right now! Setting aside my day job, I am thrilled to say that many of those irons are have "Play 5e!" or "DM 5e!" or "Paint some Dwarven Forge for 5e!" or "Design something new for 5e!" stamped on them; writing another Story Hour is just not even on my radar.

Still-- loving 5e. My current Wulf build started as a 5 Rogue / 5 Fighter; we're going through Against the Giants and I just dinged 11th level after the Steading. Took a feat-- Resilient (Wisdom)! Take that, ty Wis saves!

I understand completely

Still, there are only two or three story hours that I remember from what, a decade ago? Your's is one of them. Never trust a peck, eh?

Wulf Ratbane said:

we're going through Against the Giants and I just dinged 11th level after the Steading.

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Do you use the monsters from the 5E MM, or use them as is in the 1E adventure (reversing AC of course)?

Wulf Ratbane said:

I don't want to derail the thread but I don't want to leave it unanswered, either

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Oh, derail away! You just hit 11th, so that qualifies as a glimpse of high level play, right?

As for my game, we finally had our follow-up session. At the conclusion...

Melvina (our human cleric) had been disintegrated by the lich.

Borzin (the dwarf barbarian with sacks of hit points) was trapped in the Abyss after being dominated and sent through a portal by the lich.

T'Raste (the elven bard) was enslaved by the lich, after bargaining for her life.

Durbag (the orc wizard) teleported away, with Rosaline (our half-elf sorceress) accompanying. Neither of them engaged the lich in his sanctum, which is why they could teleport away.

So... yeah. Nearly a TPK. Or they went off exploring on their own. It was a great session, with plenty of crazy shenanigans. They were fighting a giant tentacled horror in the water of a level of the dungeon where the floor had collapsed, revealing a subterranean lake twenty feet below. Most of the deaths were the PCs own faults, though; they went back into water, trying to bait the beastie to attack by swimming around (it worked). The cleric stone-shaped his adamantine shield (with a chain attachmenet) into the wall, then used the chain to anchor a tentacle while the beastie was briefly paralyzed. The beastie had to bite off its own tentacle to escape (after several failed strength rolls). The beastie ate one of the elf NPCs early on, and the wizard cleverly used 'locate object' on her belt buckle to track the creature's movements when it slipped beneath and lurked about.

All in all, lots of craziness, especially once the PCs realized the bottom of the subterranean lake was the ceiling of the lich's sanctum; a magical forcefield holds up the water, but allows all other things to pass through. So the beastie would grab someone and swim down to deliver them to the lich (if the beastie couldn't just swallow and digest them). That surprised many a PC.

A pic of the final dungeon, drawn on the battle-mat. The battle began in the bottom left, and finished up in the top left, with a few periods of exploration throughout.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who'll be very interested in your analysis of the strength of high-level PCs once you've had time to review the session. For example, do you think you got the levels right?

Last night one of my lvl 15 groups (the Merchant Prince group, where the heroes are part of the most powerful and influential merchant family in the empire) showed me what happens when high level heroes meet low level monsters. The group was on a flying carpet at treetop level, following a series of allied elven scouts who were following a trail in the forest below. We played for about 2, 2.5 hours, and got in two fights and lots of roleplaying. The dragonborn paladin even summoned his new mount, a wyrm-like dinosaur with a lot of teeth and blackish-red scales.

Fight 1: five griffons, charging the group at 4am. The PCs with blindsight picked them up at 60 feet away. The rogue and her crossbow managed to turn one into a partial pin-cushion before they closed, then they were sweeping in and past. Weirdly, nearly every claw attack hit, and not one beak attack connected. As a result, they were more or less doing 11 hp damage per hit. Then, with three of the griffons beside the flying carpet and two past it, the PCs went.

It was impressive.

The rogue got 8d6 sneak attack on her next action, and then sneak attacked again thanks to the battle master fighter. One warlock used a (still being playtested) spell to fling a griffon into the trees below, almost killing it. The bard's arrow volley spell (taken from the ranger, although I have the name wrong) killed three injured griffons in one fell swoop. The fight lasted two rounds, and griffons rained from the sky. In retrospect melee combat should have had disadvantage on a flying carpet, but it wasn't a huge goof.

Fight 2: The scouts on the ground reported (mentally -- one PC's familiar and one paladin's warhorse were traveling with them) that they'd been ambushed by gnolls and hyenas. The carpet descended on one side of the battlefield, a flying warlock on the other. For the gnolls, I just grabbed a handful of glass gems from my stash. 20, probably? Sure, let's say 20. And their initiative wasn't bad! And they had longbows! I expected a rain of arrows on the heroes, doing some serious damage.

Instead, the warlock led with a lightning bolt that did 31 damage. 4 gnolls and 3 hyenas, dead, 1 gnoll wounded. KRAKATHOOM! The other warlock went next, and cast hypnotic pattern (or whatever it's called), entrancing all but one freakin' gnoll. And then it's the 16 remaining gnolls' turns! With 15 hypnotized, one got to shoot... and missed. The rest drooled unattractively and looked at the pretty colors.

"Remember, any attack on them breaks the hypnosis," said the warlock.
"That's probably okay," said the bard, and cast sunburst (or whatever it's called.) FWOOSH. My dice betray me and one gnoll saves. 14 gnolls and a couple of hyenas turn into smoking ash.

"There's one left, and he's staggering?" asks the paladin. "I think I'll just have my mount kill him." CRUNCH.

Total elapsed time: one round. The elven scouts never had a chance to go. They stood there, arrows half-drawn, mouths open.

Don't get me wrong. It was a joy. With initiative, it could have been pretty devastating on the part of the gnolls. Let's say half of them aimed at one PC and half at another; that'd do some serious damage. But the players were cheering and greatly amused, and it was a fun fast fight. I'll take it. And after all, they can now hear something huge crashing its way through the woods towards them. The gnolls had some help from something much larger...

Tell me more about this "two sneak attacks in one round."

Strictly for educational purposes, of course.

Piratecat said:

One warlock used a (still being playtested) spell to fling a griffon into the trees below, almost killing it.

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Defenestrating sphere??