D&D 5E Starter Set Character Sheet Revealed!

[LFK]

Are you going to Burning Man or something? Because that's one of the biggest straw men I've ever seen, and will surely cause one heck of a bonfire once lit up by reality.

Nobody here has even vaguely hinted at holding the farcical position you're claiming.

Too bad there's, like, eighty hojillion "rabble rabble, Fighters should heal 1 HP per day!" posts here and on the WotC forums that prove you wrong.

Oh, what's that?

Yes, odd to even have Temp HP when HP now apparently means a character's stamina.

What is Temp HP used for? Battlemaster giving away temps to allies? If Battlemaster actually heals his allies without magic I'm done with 5th. Too bad we won't find out until the PHB comes out. If Wizards had any integrity they would just tell us which way they ruled instead of letting it leak out like this and waste our time following this news.

If fighters can instantly heal fallen, unconscious allies by shouting at them from across the room, without magic, it will be the quickest refund I've ever shipped back to Amazon. Even if we end up playing the game, I'm not paying for that level of stupidity.

I want magic to feel magical and the first step to doing that is to make the mundane seem physically and logically possible.

Emphasis added, but really the whole post, right from this thread, makes my point for me: nerds need to be special, and that means jocks need to be boring. Geek narrative is rife with Randian philosophy, so this isn't really something I'm pulling out of nowhere. A lot of people have noticed that there's an awful lot of Galt's Gulch around these here parts.

Martial healing, Healing Surges, and the Warlord class along with all of it, was one of the best things to happen to the game, dramatically expanding the scope of what a support character could be within the game mechanics and ludonarrative — expanding the scope of the type of games a DM could run without worrying about party composition making that style impossible — and yet we routinely see histrionic posters going into hysterics over the idea that Fighters might (cue pearl clutching) heal themselves.

Because, most assuredly, this is not a debate about the mechanical balance of Second Wind or Action Surge, despite what Sword of Spirit and others claim, because those same posters will argue in the same breath that Cleric and Wizard spells/day are totally balanced just A-O-K because the DM can just put the pressure on to prevent the party for chain-resting to milk the more powerful abilities. S***ily balanced 3rd level spells like Haste 3-4 times per day? That's fine. 1-4d10+con self-generated healing? PREORDER CANCELED!

I mean, dear god, what if the Fighter rests more than once in a row and gets 2D10 hit points back without a Cleric's help!? The earth will crack open and pour out a tide of ducks!

It is absolutely 100% a projection of personal insecurities that dammit, normal people should be indebted to the special people.

See also: Katana arguments, DM Supremacy Complex, and pretty much every attempted justification of 3rd Edition Wizards/Clerics ever.

 

[Hussar]

Heh. This reminds me of the 3.5 rollout when they previewed the mystic theurge and people were up in arms because haste let you cast two spells in a single round.

Of course, since they also changed Haste in 3.5 the issue became moot. I'm thinking this will likely be similar.

There is no MCing in Basic so DDNFan's issue already doesn't apply. And claiming that the Starter Set pregens contains all the rules for DnD seems a tad premature.

 

[Cybit]

You're completely missing the point.

If the only way in 5th edition to gain this ability is through the fighter chassis, that's how people will get it.

Eberron feat didn't have prerequisites, so anyone could take it. Then it's either unbalanced on its own, and can be banned easily, or it isn't an it isn't a problem. By my own playtesting experience, it can be a problem when you can offload 2 daily spells in rapid succession. If it isn't unbalancing, why didn't they give a similar ability to mages? Eldritch knights are going to be very popular in 5th edition, I guess.

I like multiclassing when there are lots of viable options. Not when there is only take this, because any other choice is super weak in comparison. I find it surprising that so many compain about classic wizard power due to their spells, yet fail to realize that having the ability to be twice as powerful when you can offload such a huge burst of energy than your opponents or other single classed mages, and suffer little drawback (Giving up your 20th level capstone isn't a very big penalty for having the ability to nova so spectacularly throughout the duration of the entire campaign), is much worse.

I actually don't think it's overpowered for fighters. I like that fighters can get something nice and be able to whoop some behind once in a while. But when the mage can swoop in and steal his best stuff for a 2 level dip, and benefit his main class better than probably any other MC combination, then I start to wonder what the devs were smoking when they let this slip through. Did they not have any powergamers playtesting this edition? I don't think I would ever play a mage who didn't multiclass just for this ability, even if he wasn't interested in wearing heavy armor or going into melee. Extra HP and saves are a nice bonus, but being able to nova any two of your spells from your ever increasing spell list? Yes, please! I'll take that. Each and every time.

Part of the issue is that at 7th level (Wiz5/Ftr2), you're using all of your third level spells for the day in one go. You basically have to take a full rest after that point. Since spells no longer scale by caster level, but instead only by spell slot level, your 1st level spells aren't going save you from major combat any more. Those spell slots are monstrously important. Also, you are losing one of your bigger stats into STR, which becomes meaningless for the wizard. Those ability scores are far more important now that all six will be used for saves.

Also, concentration is going to wreck people who are used to playing casters. So many "oh hey I will cast these three spells before I go into combat" are "nope, pick one, that's it." I will see many, many tears falling when they read how many spells use concentration. Most novas got blown up by concentration.

Also, you do not get an extra bonus action with Action Surge; it's saying you can take an additional action, on top of your normal action and your normal bonus action (if you have one) you get for the round.

That said, I don't like Fighter/Wizard because I don't like taking a single level and being able to cast in heavy armor just fine. But there's a reason multi-classing is optional and is not expected to be in the game; it straight increases the power level. That said, dipping into Fighter for action surge isn't very powerful in comparison to what other multi-classing will be able to do. But, in the trade off between making the game simple, making it fun at low level, and trying to balance multiclassing, they took the first two and made the third one "DM Beware". Which I'm fine with, personally. Once you put in the rulebook "YOUR DM MUST CHOOSE TO ALLOW THIS BECAUSE IT IS NOT STANDARD"; players no longer have the argument of "well, you're making us weaker than the game expects us to be!!!"

 

[Ichneumon]

Yeah it's that swift spell feature that I think was broken out into a general rule.

I'd expect to see something like "During your turn, you can use one action for casting a spell, or a bonus action if the spell permits". It's a houserule in my games if it isn't in the book.

 

[Mistwell]

Too bad there's, like, eighty hojillion "rabble rabble, Fighters should heal 1 HP per day!" posts here and on the WotC forums that prove you wrong.

Oh, what's that?



Emphasis added, but really the whole post, right from this thread, makes my point for me: nerds need to be special, and that means jocks need to be boring. Geek narrative is rife with Randian philosophy, so this isn't really something I'm pulling out of nowhere. A lot of people have noticed that there's an awful lot of Galt's Gulch around these here parts.

Martial healing, Healing Surges, and the Warlord class along with all of it, was one of the best things to happen to the game, dramatically expanding the scope of what a support character could be within the game mechanics and ludonarrative — expanding the scope of the type of games a DM could run without worrying about party composition making that style impossible — and yet we routinely see histrionic posters going into hysterics over the idea that Fighters might (cue pearl clutching) heal themselves.

Because, most assuredly, this is not a debate about the mechanical balance of Second Wind or Action Surge, despite what Sword of Spirit and others claim, because those same posters will argue in the same breath that Cleric and Wizard spells/day are totally balanced just A-O-K because the DM can just put the pressure on to prevent the party for chain-resting to milk the more powerful abilities. S***ily balanced 3rd level spells like Haste 3-4 times per day? That's fine. 1-4d10+con self-generated healing? PREORDER CANCELED!

I mean, dear god, what if the Fighter rests more than once in a row and gets 2D10 hit points back without a Cleric's help!? The earth will crack open and pour out a tide of ducks!

It is absolutely 100% a projection of personal insecurities that dammit, normal people should be indebted to the special people.

See also: Katana arguments, DM Supremacy Complex, and pretty much every attempted justification of 3rd Edition Wizards/Clerics ever.

Wherein LFK argues that 1 is the equivalent of "eighty hojillion". And that one is weak at that, as while I disagreed with that user, the reason for his argument does not appear to be the motive you try to give him (nor is it the claimed "Fighters should heal 1hp a day" argument you claim is so abundant).

I say again, that is a mighty fine strawman you have there. Sounds like you have some unresolved issues to work through.

By the way, I like a lot of sports. Does that disqualify me for being the target of this particular form of nerdrage?

 

[Obryn]

Wherein LFK argues that 1 is the equivalent of "eighty hojillion". And that one is weak at that, as while I disagreed with that user, the reason for his argument does not appear to be the motive you try to give him (nor is it the claimed "Fighters should heal 1hp a day" argument you claim is so abundant).

I say again, that is a mighty fine strawman you have there. Sounds like you have some unresolved issues to work through.

By the way, I like a lot of sports. Does that disqualify me for being the target of this particular form of nerdrage?

I'm pretty sure you're also not decrying the possibility that the fighter might regain 2d10 hit points on his own without ruining the game.

I'm not sure if [MENTION=61050]LFK[/MENTION] is right about motivations, but there's certainly a pretty deep strain of weirdness about fighters in the D&D fanbase. There's something going on when it's no problem that one class can bend reality over its knee, while another swords things real good and can get hit a few extra times by orcs. I'm not going to psychoanalyze reasons, but I've seen it plenty.

 

[tuxgeo]

. . . eighty hojillion "rabble rabble, . . .

. . . Geek narrative is rife with Randian philosophy, . . . there's an awful lot of Galt's Gulch around these here parts.

. . . ludonarrative — . . . we routinely see histrionic posters going into hysterics . . . (cue pearl clutching). . . .

. . . The earth will crack open and pour out a tide of ducks!

It is absolutely 100% a projection of personal insecurities that dammit, normal people should be indebted to the special people. . . .

Very entertaining post. Does the Fighter heal himself by swimming against the tide of ducks, or was that something else?

Personally, I have given up trying to determine whether a hojillion in greater than a quintillion. (Don't go callin' Jillian names!)

 

[Rygar]

Heh. This reminds me of the 3.5 rollout when they previewed the mystic theurge and people were up in arms because haste let you cast two spells in a single round.

Of course, since they also changed Haste in 3.5 the issue became moot. I'm thinking this will likely be similar.

There is no MCing in Basic so DDNFan's issue already doesn't apply. And claiming that the Starter Set pregens contains all the rules for DnD seems a tad premature.

I wouldn't bet on it. Second Wind, and presumably Inspirational Healing if it's in, are major examples of the issues people had with 4th edition. They are mechanics that force you into one very specific playstyle that runs counter to the way a sizeable number of people play.

The ramifications of this are potentially huge. In 2012 they sold everyone on a return to pre-4th edition design, that's what they showed in the playtest and they expressely walked back 4th edition design like Second Wind, and now just weeks before release they've revealed that their design is increasingly 4th edition style (When combined with all of the articles since the playtest ended)

I suspect there's going to be a lot of angry people who spent as much as a year and a half following 5th edition on the promise of a return to pre-4th edition. There's a very real possibility that WOTC just burned all of its bridges. Will anyone believe them again when they say they're returning to pre-4th edition design now?

 

[MoonSong]

Yeah, f*** jocks, only nerds get to do cool stuff!

All of my sorcerers so far have been proud idiots, jocks, commoners, victims of the circukstances, farmkids, anythung but nerds. And all of them have been very cool, no need to strawman here. I like fighters mundane while at the same time despising wizards, mages and anything remotely bookish. However this has nothing to do with wanting fighters to do cool things, just enough to allow them to work as part of a team -and not only a 'we all pound it to death together' team, but also a 'I kill it before it kills you and you keep me alive' team - an ability that basically allows the fighter to ignore what is another class schtick is pretty worrying.

Part of the issue is that at 7th level (Wiz5/Ftr2), you're using all of your third level spells for the day in one go. You basically have to take a full rest after that point. Since spells no longer scale by caster level, but instead only by spell slot level, your 1st level spells aren't going save you from major combat any more. Those spell slots are monstrously important. Also, you are losing one of your bigger stats into STR, which becomes meaningless for the wizard. Those ability scores are far more important now that all six will be used for saves.
<snip>
Once you put in the rulebook "YOUR DM MUST CHOOSE TO ALLOW THIS BECAUSE IT IS NOT STANDARD"; players no longer have the argument of "well, you're making us weaker than the game expects us to be!!!"

On str, nothing stops a wizard doing this from starting as a fighter while neglecting str, then branch out due to the high int. Multiclass score prerrequisites are meaninngless when they can be avoided by singleclassing first,.

And I think that this Nothing is allowed until DM decides to is the most dangerous thing that could happen. I still insist that a more extense standard for play is desirable, and DMs still need to be encouraged to say yes, giving DMs the sole monopoly over character options will discourage the sales of lots of phbs, why buy something if all you get to use is already free? Or another one thought I hold, every single retroclone and their mom already gives the big four, and they are very easy to get right, but only DND can give the full experience and variety of races and classes and they aren't as simple, if the DMs are the gate keepers of all of that and the content for DMs is aimed at core four, then there is a chance we won't see many barbarians, warlocks and sorcerers this edition, and this might lead to blanket bannings or DM egocentrism which is a very real concern, I've already had to deal with it in editions which 'entitled players', I can only guess it will only be worse in an edition which entitles DM to intrude into the players characters.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Martial healing, Healing Surges, and the Warlord class along with all of it, was one of the best things to happen to the game, dramatically expanding the scope of what a support character could be within the game mechanics and ludonarrative —

It's more a matter of personal preference, but I've found that such things only changed the possible narratives without actually expanding them. After all, fast natural healing plays to a very specific interpretation of hit points - one without a significant physical component - making any narrative that would include such things entirely inappropriate.

We can't play a story where someone is waylaid by a week due to injury in a world where all damage disappears overnight. We can't play a story where anyone could be waylaid for a week, because any significant physical damage would be inconsistent with overnight or martial healing.