D&D 5E Weak Saving Throws

[BryonD]

Alright, to me this sounds like elevating a bug to a feature, but to each their own.

With all due respect, 4E fans should be very cautious in taking *my* opinion of what constituted a "bug" in 4E. I'm very qualified to discuss why 4E doesn't work for me at all. I'm not particularly qualified to talk about what works best and least with 4E for the 4E fanbase. The same applies in reverse for 3E and fans/detractors there.

So rather than your word against mine, just look at the overall.

My prediction is that, when we're talking about 5e Charop in under a year's time, abusing and guarding against this gap will be the core of optimization.

Well, first, if they provide the modules to create a 4E feel as they have promised, then this need should go away. While, I don't relate to that need, I 100% support it.
Second, it will depend on what group is doing the talking. I fully expect that within your circles of like-minded gamers, this will be true (to the extent a module doesn't make it moot).

I'm more interested in whether there is a thriving 5E Charop debate 5 years from now.

 

[BryonD]

Yeah, but the problem, as I said earlier, isn't fireball. I only used fireball in my answer because you did. As I said earlier, if the worst thing that could happen when you fail a save was HP damage, I would have zero issues with it (because HP does scale with level ).
The problem arises when a saving throw is your only line of defense against being petrified, paralyzed, killed or otherwise disabled.

Yeah, I like this problem.
You can't defeat a problem you never face.
I like it when the characters face real challenges that they find truly scary.
I find that years later the "great events" players keep talking about are when they face terrible odds. And they go on and on about it with smiles on their faces. And this happens for both stories that involve success and stories that involve failure.

To be clear, I'm not saying my answer is *the right answer*. If you don't like it then it isn't right for you.

I am saying that removing the gap has negative effects on the narrative space and there are very good reasons to love having a saving throw gap.

 

[BryonD]

And [MENTION=957]BryonD[/MENTION], the relevant narrative concept is Aragorn.

In the last playtest the Ranger has Will as a prof save. Just for reference.

 

[Thaumaturge]

Page 80 of Basic says that concentrating on a spell precludes casting another spell that requires concentration. But it doesn't stop other spell-casting, does it?

Good call. Still, as Obryn points out, damage breaks concentration. Con save DC10+half the amount of damage. At high levels that save will be... difficult.

Let's say he didn't bother with feats ( or he's playing basics ) and he's trying to minimize his weaknesses.

Ok. He didn't bother with feats, or is playing 5B.

second, he's taken a grand total of zero feats in order to minimize his weaknesses. While this is a legitimate choice, he's losing quite a bit in the customization department

So we shouldn't feel too bad about the customization department. The player already made a choice that precluded customization.

——
My expectation is that people who want the 4e feel for save math will also want feats. My follow-along expectation is that there will be one or more feats that address saves. My tertiary expectation in this line is that people can, and will, see the math presented in those feats as a "fix" and will just hardcode those into the characters in their games.

I hope people can get what they want out of the system.

Thaumaturge.

 

[Njall]

Yeah, I like this problem.
You can't defeat a problem you never face.
I like it when the characters face real challenges that they find truly scary.
I find that years later the "great events" players keep talking about are when they face terrible odds. And they go on and on about it with smiles on their faces. And this happens for both stories that involve success and stories that involve failure.

To be clear, I'm not saying my answer is *the right answer*. If you don't like it then it isn't right for you.

I am saying that removing the gap has negative effects on the narrative space and there are very good reasons to love having a saving throw gap.

Yeah, but the thing is, it's not like facing it will make them better at dealing with it. They'll just keep failing, over and over again, at exactly the same rate, for their whole careers, because we're talking numbers here.
A story involves heroes that are able to overcome their weaknesses, you don't see much stories where the point is "look how many times this dude got dominated in the last two chapters!".
If you're the DM and want something scary, throw something scary at the PCs ( it's not like you cannot increase the DCs if it DCs and saving throws scale properly).
On the other hand, since CR is a thing again in this edition, this also risks causing other problems in actual play; for example balancing a combat encounter might become a hot mess, 'cause even a bunch of low level chumps with any kind of save or suck might end up being either a cakewalk or a death trap depending on your party composition ( which risks playing pre-written adventures wildly unpredictable unless you check and adjust every single encounter depending on your party, at which point, why even have CR in the first place? ).

 

[Njall]

Good call. Still, as Obryn points out, damage breaks concentration. Con save DC10+half the amount of damage. At high levels that save will be... difficult.



Ok. He didn't bother with feats, or is playing 5B.



So we shouldn't feel too bad about the customization department. The player already made a choice that precluded customization.

Dude, my point was "he took the best approach to fixing his stats willingly", which does not preclude the fact that I think giving up customization just to function at high levels is a bad thing. So yes, he's free to feel bad for everything he had to give up just to be viable, thankyouverymuch
Would you feel better if I wrote: "since he doesn't want to suck at level 20, he decided to spend everything on ability score increases and couldn't choose feats"?

 

[BryonD]

My expectation is that people who want the 4e feel for save math will also want feats. My follow-along expectation is that there will be one or more feats that address saves. My tertiary expectation in this line is that people can, and will, see the math presented in those feats as a "fix" and will just hardcode those into the characters in their games.

I hope people can get what they want out of the system.

Thaumaturge.

A challenge 5E may face is that it appears the base set is neither fish nor fowl. Anyone who truly prefers a prior style will need to change some things.

 

[BryonD]

Yeah, but the thing is, it's not like facing it will make them better at dealing with it. They'll just keep failing, over and over again, at exactly the same rate, for their whole careers, because we're talking numbers here.
A story involves heroes that are able to overcome their weaknesses, you don't see much stories where the point is "look how many times this dude got dominated in the last two chapters!".
If you're the DM and want something scary, throw something scary at the PCs ( it's not like you cannot increase the DCs if it DCs and saving throws scale properly).
On the other hand, since CR is a thing again in this edition, balancing a combat encounter might become a hot mess, 'cause even a bunch of low level chumps with any kind of save or suck might end up being either a cakewalk or a death trap depending on your party composition ( which risks playing pre-written adventures wildly unpredictable unless you check and adjust every single encounter depending on your party, at which point, why even have CR in the first place? ).

My 30 years of playing says that your assessment here is completely wrong.

Again, I don't know you, I don't know your game style or your tastes. I accept my style is a failure for your style.

But at my table the players look for challenges and solutions and teamwork and they often succeed. And they frequently fail. The times they fail and die make the times they succeed even better. The times they fail and escape make REVENGE even better.

But regardless, it doesn't play out as you describe. It is great fun.

 

[Njall]

My 30 years of playing says that your assessment here is completely wrong.

Again, I don't know you, I don't know your game style or your tastes. I accept my style is a failure for your style.

But at my table the players look for challenges and solutions and teamwork and they often succeed. And they frequently fail. The times they fail and die make the times they succeed even better. The times they fail and escape make REVENGE even better.

But regardless, it doesn't play out as you describe. It is great fun.

Yeah, but this has nothing to do with bad scaling.
"Low chance of success" is one thing, "bad scaling" or "no scaling at all" is another thing entirely.
You can easily have the former without the latter, the problem is that having the latter hard coded in the rules makes the former more likely whether you want it or not.

 

[BryonD]

Yeah, but this has exactly 0 to do with bad scaling.
"Low chance of success" is one thing, "bad scaling" or "no scaling at all" is another thing entirely.
You can easily have the former without the latter, the problem is that having the latter hard coded in the rules makes the former more likely whether you want it or not.

5E is a bounded system.
"no scaling at all" and "low (but still real) chance of success" ARE the same thing in this system.

Though that misses the point.
The actual chance isn't all that important if part of the goal is to be highly motivated to not want to ever make that roll in the first place.

I'd also say "hard coded" is again ignoring the NEED for a 4E specific module on this. I, yet again, completely accept and even endorse that. I'm not challenging taste. I'm stating that there are very good reasons for liking it this way. I am pointing out that both of our tastes do come with certain consequences.