D&D 5E Analyzing 5E: Overpowered by design

[FormerlyHemlock]

We're currently 4th level (HotDQ, in which I'm a player), and I've DMed LMoP all the way through, so not sure what you're getting at with "once you and your players had played a bit". We have played a bit, and so far we haven't seen what's being talked about. If players are repeatedly outrunning monsters and killing them while doing so, I'd say that's a problem with either encounter design or the DM not running the monsters intelligently. Either way, we haven't seen it.

Your players aren't using mobile tactics then. One or more of Expeditious Retreat, Longstrider, Misty Step, Haste, and/or Web/Wall of Force/Forcecage make it very easy to break contact. (There are others too, e.g. Spiked Stones.)

It's not really a problem with DM tactics in most cases because many creatures don't HAVE a counter for mobile ranged tactics, and others don't have the tactical smarts. (E.g. If your black puddings hide and trail the party until they engage another foe, and then attack the rear elements including the wizard, I cry foul. Puddings aren't that smart. Or that sneaky.)

I don't know that it's a "problem" with encounter design either, because 5E is frankly set up to let the PCs win every fight (just look at the encounter building math) but I agree that some or many fights should include ranged combatants on the other side. I love hobgoblins BTW because they are tough and militaristic and absolutely WILL use good tactics.

 

[SirAntoine]

Power-building and clever optimizing makes for overpowered characters?

Well yes, as that is generally the point of doing so.

I'm sorry, but this thread reeks of "If you build a really good character, it'll be really powerful! Therefore the edition is broken!"

I've never experienced any problems with any of this and perhaps 5th is designed to be played fast and violent, what's wrong with that? Wasn't one of people's major complaints about 4th that combat could drag on for hours? (I loved 4th and I agree that was a major issue with it) If your party is amped-up, amp up your enemies. An extra die+5dmg every turn will put those optimizers in their place.

Power-building and clever optimizing aren't problems for me. I object to fundamental things like cantrips being at-will, even at 1st level, and ability score increases.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Or, what if the Dragon figures out that someone is in its domain and casts Etherealness to find out more about such intruders?


It does not matter what abilities PCs have. If a DM is doing a good job to challenge them, the PC tactics are not going to work every single time. The DM will throw monkey wrenches in and set up unexpected twists and turns to his encounters. Or at least, a good DM will do that. He won't allow a few PC combos in the game repeatedly turn Hard encounters into Easy encounters. And he won't let the PCs determine the time and place of every battle. The dragon that went ethereal to escape comes back two weeks later ethereal while the PCs are resting in town and spies on the PCs and then comes up with a plan to take them out one or two at a time.

That's not a good DM, that's a terrible DM who runs Schrodinger's Dragon, who not only has variant spellcasting but also conveniently has every spell in the book memorized even when it's too high a level (need CR 21 for Etherealness so even CR 17 adult reds don't qualify, only ancients do) in spite of the fact that dragons only get a small handful of spells (Cha mod I think) and don't have any way to detect that someone Ethereal is in the vicinity. Metagaming and stat-boosting by fiat aren't related to "good tactics" or good DMing.

I do however agree that a smart dragon won't let the PCs choose their battles. I think a smart dragon won't wait however until after the PCs have already raided him. Instead, he's got his hooks in all the humanoid/human tribes in the area, has spies in civilized areas, etc., to proactively seek out threats, and he is perfectly willing to destroy enemy humans while they are in the middle of their nightly long rest. (Note to self: ask my players when the last was their PCs removed their boots and armor and took a bath. Surely they must take it off sometimes?)

It still requires the spellcasting variant to make this work well though. Vanilla dragons are pretty limited... And brittle.

 

[SirAntoine]

Then it's not overpowered. It's exactly as powered as it should be, and this topic serves no purpose.

I don't look at it this way. I doubt the designers themselves would, either. Whether anything in particular is over-powered has always been one of the criteria for a DM to make a change. The designers probably make modifications at each of their own tables.

 

[KarinsDad]

Also I'm talking non spell caster variant Dragons here by the way, I do happen to think the spell caster variant makes them *much* more dangerous.

A little bit ago, you said any solo monster from the MM except for the Tarrasque. Now, you are putting conditions on it.

Uh huh.

Does the Dragon have one claw tied behind their back as well?

 

[EzekielRaiden]

You completely missed the point of my post. I can't much respond to someone that misses the point.

To be fair, when you use a word like "overpowered" to mean something precisely the opposite of what it actually means, you should expect some confusion. I'm far from the only person who thought you were complaining that 5e made everything "broken," even if you never used that actual word. Since you never clarified that you like these things, approve of them, think it twas a step in the right direction etc., I'm fairly sure the problem lies in not clearly communicating your message. "Overpowered" has an inherently negative connotation; if you want to use it in a positive way, you have to be more clear.

To make it easier to comprehend, I'm saying what people considered overpowered is not overpowered because it is by design. As in the game was designed for the PCs to be quite powerful, in some ways more so than 3.5 or Pathfinder.

And this is what I mean: "When I said 'overpowered by design,' I meant 'design makes what would be overpowered not overpowered.' " But you didn't actually say the latter, you left it up to implication. When we add that to your specifically-stated original intention of bringing these options down to a lower power level, is it any wonder that I completely missed the point?

You must not be allowing feats. Resilient: Con or Warcaster is one of the first feats a wizard should buy. Greatly mitigates the concentration problem.

I don't assume feats are available because certain 5e advocates (elsewhere) have drilled it into my head that FEATS ARE OPTIONAL, and that expecting them would make me an "entitled" player. That said, even with Warcaster and Resilient: Con, I've seen the numbers for what "half of damage taken" looks like, on average, as you gain levels. Without at least one of of those feats, you'll be facing probabilities of 35% or less by CR5, and even with both of them and a good Con score (+4) at (say) level 10 (so best of 2d20+8 vs. the DC), you'll be at 36% or less by CR8ish (definitely CR9). Even at the highest bonuses (max Con and Prof with Adv) a CR9 creature, in the generic, does enough average damage to give you a 43.75% chance to save. Monsters beyond (say) CR12 become borderline impossible to save against, and I'd expect the highest-CR enemies with even a modicum of intelligence to smack the lady/gent in the bathrobe if they foolishly get close enough to be hit (and, note, ranged attacks work just fine--they even make an example out of "an arrow and a dragon's breath"). Should you get critically hit, vs. CR5 or higher (very roughly) you can basically say goodbye to whatever you're Concentrating on.

(Note: These numbers are based on monsters available prior to the DMG coming out, so things may have changed somewhat. I'm relying on SurfArcher's very thorough analyses for this stuff.)

It's 2 6th and 7th level spells. 1 8th and 9th.

Pardon. I keep forgetting that that changed either in the late playtest or final beta. I still think my point remains: slots of levels (roughly) 3-5 remain extremely important for day-to-day functioning, even for players who use (or, IMO, abuse) their spells as calculatingly as possible.

Remember at high level, Planar Binding and Simulacrum are your friends.

Out of curiosity: does the slot remain spent while the Simulacrum is up? I would expect it to, as a balancing mechanic (what with it generating an entire additional party member, albeit at half HP) but it isn't mentioned. Planar Binding is something to watch out for, I agree. That said though, summoning additional allies has always been a way for spellcasters to break the game over their knees and cackle maniacally as they do so. It's not quite the Aggressively Hegemonizing Ursine Swarm of 3e, but sure, these sound big. Maybe even actually overpowered--I'd need to test my intuitions before asserting so, however. It definitely seems like the kind of spell that leans (IMO excessively) on DMs being dicks to players who try for too much, which is a DMing tactic I despise, but again I'd need to investigate.

One of the worst things is if 5th Edition is spoiling players.

What does that even mean? How does one "spoil" players, if they still face challenges appropriate to the tools they've been given and have meaningful chances of failure?

 

[SirAntoine]

The best a bard could do was give you a +1 to hit. I'd like to see that return.

 

[pemerton]

Dodge is just the mechanical term. It's mostly just protecting oneself while hindering a foe in some way.

So it's basically the 5e version of 4e's Total Defence?

 

[SirAntoine]

Most things should be accomplished without magic or special powers. Your chief weapons should be courage and will.

 

[pemerton]

So 12d6 Greatsword Damage + 45 modifier + 22d8 across three attacks. I think his total was something like 170 damage.

I'm assuming that was enough to kill the cleric?

The 28th level sorcerer in my 4e game has an encounter power that is 3 attack at 1d8+1d10+50-ish, and can fairly easily set things up so he has +5 to hit, leading to a damage output of over 150 hp. But at that level, a typical foe has around 250 to 300 hp, so he will bloody them but not kill them.

So your numbers are consistent with my overall impression that 5e combats are quicker (in rounds per combat) than 4e. My feeling is that if the numbers were much lower than you're reporting, that would suggest that high level combat in 5e isn't noticeably quicker (in rounds per combat) than 4e. Does that make sense?