D&D 5E Is Concentration Bugging You?

[Eirikrautha]

Wow. I'm going to have to bring some cheese to this thread, to go with all this whine.

What we have here is a difference in expectations. For the folks who were happy with the linear-fighters/quadratic-wizards of the first few editions, I can see how the change would be irritating. It sucks to no longer be able to solo an encounter. To no longer be the necessary cog so that your martials are viable, and then save-or-suck the BBEG while the help mops up the mooks.

Then 5e comes along and you actually have to choose what you do. You can help make the martials more effective OR try to lock down an opponent. Heck, you might actually NEED other party members in this edition! What's the world coming to...

 

[EroGaki]

Wow. I'm going to have to bring some cheese to this thread, to go with all this whine.

What we have here is a difference in expectations. For the folks who were happy with the linear-fighters/quadratic-wizards of the first few editions, I can see how the change would be irritating. It sucks to no longer be able to solo an encounter. To no longer be the necessary cog so that your martials are viable, and then save-or-suck the BBEG while the help mops up the mooks.

Then 5e comes along and you actually have to choose what you do. You can help make the martials more effective OR try to lock down an opponent. Heck, you might actually NEED other party members in this edition! What's the world coming to...

I love how people automatically assume that not liking the way magic works equal "being upset you can't solo an encounter," or "being butthurt that you need your party." I don't seem to recall anyone saying anything like that. Frankly, your implication is disgusting and insulting.


Disliking a rule doesn't make someone a munchkin throwing a tantrum.

 

[DaveDash]

Arcanes can still solo encounters, had it happen to me.

Forcecage.

Just sayin.

 

[Celtavian]

If you're going up against a Dragon you don't cast your concentration spells until after it breaths.

Not how we do it. We have found prebuffing and sending the martials in to engage first, then moving into range more effective. The martials absorb the breath weapon, then we move in.

The casters in my party know this. They also work together to mitigate hits, use full cover to their advantage, etc.

A dragon can bypass full cover with its move. Depends on how the DM runs it. If your caster moves out, blasts, and hides behind full cover away from the martials, the dragon can swoop behind it, hammer on the caster, wing buffett, then bounce 40 feet in the air. If the caster is one casting fly and concentration is broken, the dragon has a good chance of cutting off access to itself by martials and setting itself up for an easy win. You have to be very careful how you position and what you encourage the dragon to do. We tried the back and forth behind cover. Not real effective against dragons.

Very effective against many other monsters.

Also the way the game works - one big hit for lots of damage or many small hits for small damage. The big hit can be avoided with abilities like cutting words, warding flare, popping shield, etc. The smaller hits are a bunch of DC10 checks which are easy to pass with the appropriate feats.

Cutting words softens a breath weapon only slightly. As far as big melee or ranged hits, all those abilities help. Not guaranteed, but definitely helpful.

AOE? They shut this down with counterspell or simply focus fire enemy casters down.

How do you shutdown a breath weapon with counterspell? Or another innate AoE attack?

BBEG fights the Abjurer loads up on Mirror Image, Blink and his Arcane ward. He is IMPOSSIBLE to hit.

He is not impossible to hit. Dragon closes his eyes and ignores Mirror Image. Dragon will rip through arcane ward super quickly. Blink is random. It depends on if he makes the roll. At the end of the day, the dragon can simply fly away until your duration runs out. You wasted a 2nd and 3rd level slot.

Bard and Cleric will usually hang back and help each other with cutting words/warding flare. They usually buff then find full cover to hide behind and pop in and out as required.
Bard took shield as part of his magical secrets.

You still low level aren't you? Dragons have a +11 to hit. Maybe you have better magic items or dex than I do, my AC mage armor and dex is 15. It goes up to 20 with shield. +11 to hit cracks on that AC quite easily. In fact, most stuff hits me pretty easily at level 10. I'm hoping the staff of power helps that some.

Paladin just gets in there and smashes things in the face.

They are quite tough.

And also so people know, I use custom monsters that do MORE damage than their MM counterparts. Vampires with bows that do an extra 6D6 necrotic with melee strikes, just recently used a CR15 Banshee that hit for 15d10.

I know that I could kill almost any party with a well played dragon with them having a minimal chance of beating it. Other creatures, not so much.

 

[Celtavian]

Why do you have to cast those spells? What are the melee characters doing? Why do the monsters face no obstruction to getting to you?

We're talking high level creatures like dragons with flight that move at 80 feet. They don't have any obstructions because they move over or around them easily. If we try to hang out in an area that would force it to bottleneck, it flies around until our spells run out or its breath weapon recharges and breathes on us. It has no incentive to attack us. We have to kill it. The dragon gets to bide its time and use its most effective strategy.

Movement speeds are 25-30 ft. Being one move action apart is pretty well spread out.

Not for a 60 foot wide cone. On top of that the lairs we were in were difficult terrain.

I think part of the hinge might be what you consider "effective." If all you're looking at is concentration spells, then yeah, casting one is going to limit your options significantly. But you're a spellcaster -- versatility is a huge asset for you. Rely less on concentration spells. Try some variety!

I'm working on refining my spell list. As I stated in another thread, the spell list can't be built for beating one creature. You have to build it with other uses in mind because you're never sure what you're facing. I'm trying to reach the point where I have sufficient spells for dealing with the variety of situations we face and am capable of adding good damage to battles against dragons. Dragons are tough as hell in this game with the mobility rules as they are. The faster we get it down, the better chance we have of surviving.

I know our DM has been playing the dragons against softer than I would play them. Given their advantages, I don't many parties I couldn't kill with nearly no chance of them winning.

 

[Celtavian]

Wow. I'm going to have to bring some cheese to this thread, to go with all this whine.

What we have here is a difference in expectations. For the folks who were happy with the linear-fighters/quadratic-wizards of the first few editions, I can see how the change would be irritating. It sucks to no longer be able to solo an encounter. To no longer be the necessary cog so that your martials are viable, and then save-or-suck the BBEG while the help mops up the mooks.

Then 5e comes along and you actually have to choose what you do. You can help make the martials more effective OR try to lock down an opponent. Heck, you might actually NEED other party members in this edition! What's the world coming to...

What we have here is a guy making assumptions that has no basis to do so. This isn't a discussion of "wizards should be uber. Please go back to 3E. I'm rage-quitting." This is a discussion concentration damaging the fun of the game by being too limiting.

I'm not advocating getting rid of it. I think there should be slightly more leeway to allow for more options for an arcane caster. Near impossible concentration checks will be a real problem at higher level when you have 1 or 2 high level spell slots that will discourage taking any high level spells with concentration. Why would you cast shapechange with your one 9th level slot when a single big attack will cause the spell to fail and high level creatures are able to do single big attacks very easily.

 

[Shadowdweller00]

Well...dragons ARE tough. But in spite of the name of the system they're also kind of rare in most games I've personally played. Maybe they shouldn't be the standard by which a mechanic is judged? Actually, while we're on the subject Legendary creatures are rare. Open and coverless fights are rare (depending on campaign of course). AoE attacks are rare...ish. (YMMV, obviously)

Celtavian - Have you considered that maybe the Abjurer archtype is part of your problem? I'm sure that ward gets used pretty frequently, but while it might help you survive a few extra damage it also does little to expand utility or to shut down the enemy. Furthermore, it can be largely replaced with a False Life spell and "costs" the Abjurer not one but two special ability "slots". In contrast, for example, a Transmuter can give themselves or an ally resistance to an energy type all day long without the cost of a spell slot or concentration for ONE of those "special ability slots".

 

[DaveDash]

Not how we do it. We have found prebuffing and sending the martials in to engage first, then moving into range more effective. The martials absorb the breath weapon, then we move in.



A dragon can bypass full cover with its move. Depends on how the DM runs it. If your caster moves out, blasts, and hides behind full cover away from the martials, the dragon can swoop behind it, hammer on the caster, wing buffett, then bounce 40 feet in the air. If the caster is one casting fly and concentration is broken, the dragon has a good chance of cutting off access to itself by martials and setting itself up for an easy win. You have to be very careful how you position and what you encourage the dragon to do. We tried the back and forth behind cover. Not real effective against dragons.

Very effective against many other monsters.



Cutting words softens a breath weapon only slightly. As far as big melee or ranged hits, all those abilities help. Not guaranteed, but definitely helpful.



How do you shutdown a breath weapon with counterspell? Or another innate AoE attack?



He is not impossible to hit. Dragon closes his eyes and ignores Mirror Image. Dragon will rip through arcane ward super quickly. Blink is random. It depends on if he makes the roll. At the end of the day, the dragon can simply fly away until your duration runs out. You wasted a 2nd and 3rd level slot.



You still low level aren't you? Dragons have a +11 to hit. Maybe you have better magic items or dex than I do, my AC mage armor and dex is 15. It goes up to 20 with shield. +11 to hit cracks on that AC quite easily. In fact, most stuff hits me pretty easily at level 10. I'm hoping the staff of power helps that some.



They are quite tough.



I know that I could kill almost any party with a well played dragon with them having a minimal chance of beating it. Other creatures, not so much.

I wasn't specifically talking about Dragons in general with my entire post, but rather my experience with the game and concentration.

However, I have fought many Dragons as an Abjurer and a Cleric both.

Any Dragon under Gargantuan size just gets force caged and then it's game over.

All the bigger ones, including an ancient red that I have fought, were far too busy with the EK Crossbow Expert Sharpshooter Fighter than to worry about the Wizard, and with good reason, since that guy basically won every Dragon fight by themselves. It's not like the ancient red would have hurt much anyway since I had fire shield up (another neat non concentration spell) and their non fire melee attacks are not terribly scary.

As a high level Wizard I havent bothered with Shapechange when I can put Foresight (which is not concentration, just sayin) on the Crossbow Expert Sharpshooter Eldritch Knight and basically win D&D.

 

[Celtavian]

Well...dragons ARE tough. But in spite of the name of the system they're also kind of rare in most games I've personally played. Maybe they shouldn't be the standard by which a mechanic is judged? Actually, while we're on the subject Legendary creatures are rare. Open and coverless fights are rare (depending on campaign of course). AoE attacks are rare...ish. (YMMV, obviously)

Celtavian - Have you considered that maybe the Abjurer archtype is part of your problem? I'm sure that ward gets used pretty frequently, but while it might help you survive a few extra damage it also does little to expand utility or to shut down the enemy. Furthermore, it can be largely replaced with a False Life spell and "costs" the Abjurer not one but two special ability "slots". In contrast, for example, a Transmuter can give themselves or an ally resistance to an energy type all day long without the cost of a spell slot or concentration for ONE of those "special ability slots".

I'm an evoker. I just reached level 10. I'm hoping the extra damage from my stat helps me feel a little more oomph. You play an evoker wizard to do damage. That's why it is has been somewhat disappointing to be so far behind the martials.

 

[Celtavian]

I wasn't specifically talking about Dragons in general with my entire post, but rather my experience with the game and concentration.

However, I have fought many Dragons as an Abjurer and a Cleric both.

Any Dragon under Gargantuan size just gets force caged and then it's game over.

All the bigger ones, including an ancient red that I have fought, were far too busy with the EK Crossbow Expert Sharpshooter Fighter than to worry about the Wizard, and with good reason, since that guy basically won every Dragon fight by themselves. It's not like the ancient red would have hurt much anyway since I had fire shield up (another neat non concentration spell) and their non fire melee attacks are not terribly scary.

As a high level Wizard I havent bothered with Shapechange when I can put Foresight (which is not concentration, just sayin) on the Crossbow Expert Sharpshooter Eldritch Knight and basically win D&D.

You have a Crossbow Expert. You have had a far easier time. I know if we had archers, the dragon wouldn't last long. It has been spending the fly spell to engage that has been screwing us up badly.

Foresight is awesome. I sure do want to try Shapechange. That spell looks fun. I imagine they'll errata that before too long. DMs will not be happy having everything beat with that spell.

I'm still shocked they made Forcecage and Wall of Force so powerful. No save locking a creature down is very powerful.