D&D 5E 5th Edition has broken Bounded Accuracy

[KarinsDad]

Played Mines of Phandelver and everyone in the group had a magic weapon by the end of the adventure.

_Everyone_. Including the monk, wizard, and warlock.

LMoP is a bit of an outlier. It has 10 non-consumable magic items in it for PCs designed to barely reach 5th level. Later products appear to be a bit more stingy.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Not having even a +1 weapon by 10th level is extremely unlikely at all the tables I've seen. Some archer fighters have +8 to hit at 2nd level, so yeah that's a bit of an outlier.

That said, many of the folks highlighting the more broken aspects of the feat are _also_ outliers.

I must be an outlier too because the four 12th and 11th level PCs in my game have one magic weapon between them and it's +0: lifestealing. Another PC has a gith-forged shortsword which is +0 but adds 1d6 psychic damage per hit.

Other than that, there's a robe of the archmagi, horn of valhalla, wand of web, staff of flame, cape of the mountebank, pearl of power, and a stone that grants a burrowing speed and lets you bless crops for higher yields, but no weapons.

Sent from my LS670 using Tapatalk 2

 

[DaveDash]

While what you say might be true in some cases, I do think that there is "group expectations" or "peer pressure" for casters to take certain spells and cast them in situations at many or most tables. For example, some classes take heal spells, arcane casters take Fly spells so that melee types can get into combat, etc.

I was discussing this with my friend who plays the Cleric and I said to her, you have so few spells (Wis 14), if you don't want to take Aid, don't. Let the Paladin do any Aiding. But even with that in mind, she is the only PC that can cast Revival (although it has never been needed except the one time the Cleric almost died, go figure), so there might be some expectation that she have it ready. The player is a people pleaser, so ... she always takes Revival, just in case. It's sometimes hard for some people to not be in this type of expectation mindset.



I originally had a penalty to it in my house rules (or alternatively, an increase to the save DC), but I didn't want a single hard hit to nearly always take out multiple (or all) spells and it was a bit more bookkeeping.

I think the reason you're not seeing brokenness by removing concentration is due to the fact combats are over pretty quickly. When you have three rounds, spending 2/3 of those rounds casting buff spells aren't worth it.

I can see issues later on though when your group gets more scouting abilities and buff stacks for big fights. I've seen it in my game with potions. And well by "problem" I mean don't expect stuff out of the MM to put up a challenge.

 

[S_Dalsgaard]

I don't have many magic items in my campaigns either. I have no intention of giving out +1 (or better weapons) to more than one or two of the players by level 10 in my current campaign. My last campaign only ran to level 5, but the only magic weapon in the party was a +0 longsword (which never needed sharpening or cleaning).

 

[Celtavian]

I guess I must be a huge outlier, because I've not seen GWF or sniper or sharpshooter be overpowered in any of our games. Around 10ish level, we're fighting mostly creatures with ACs between 16-20. Most everyone has about a +8 to hit on average between prof, ability, and any weapons (if any, which most don't even at 10th level). So we hit just about more than half. Taking that -5 penalty means hitting on only 13-17 or higher. That's a pretty significant penalty in actual game play when every hit counts.

But in terms of full disclosure, none of my players ever race to max out ability scores (they chose feats that sound interesting and support their theme). We also almost never play above the teens, and if something doesn't really become a problem until level 20, I don't really care about it because it wont' ever impact my table. We also don't sit and compare our damage output with each other. I have enough to worry about in the game with my character; last thing I'm doing is paying attention to their numbers and worrying if we're the same or not. Whether Bill is doing 2DPS more per round than me or 3DPS less doesn't impact how I play my character or my fun at all. In fact, if Tricia calls out a ton of damage on a nova attack, my first reactions is going to be, "Nice!". Not, "Why can't I do that too? Game must be broken."


Looking at these threads, it seems I am by far the outlier.

Your group is very different from my group. I have one player that doesn't try to maximize his abilities. Every other player looks for every edge including maximizing buffs. I have been holding off on handing out magic items. A lot of creatures rely on damage resistance against non-magical weapons to provide a challenge. I feel if I hand out a magic weapon too early, I'll make a lot of fights trivial.

 

[KarinsDad]

I think the reason you're not seeing brokenness by removing concentration is due to the fact combats are over pretty quickly. When you have three rounds, spending 2/3 of those rounds casting buff spells aren't worth it.

I can see issues later on though when your group gets more scouting abilities and buff stacks for big fights. I've seen it in my game with potions. And well by "problem" I mean don't expect stuff out of the MM to put up a challenge.

Encounters very rarely last 3 rounds in my game. 5 rounds is a fairly typical average because I often throw hard or harder encounters at the group. NPCs just have too many hit points to burn through in 3 rounds.

Buff stacking only occurs if the players are positive that they are going to get into a tough fight. It's often a waste of spells to do it for a fight that is of unknown difficulty. I often use "dungeons" where the players have an expectation that there will be a lot of rooms/chambers and a lot of encounters. If they buff stack a lot, it just means that they will have fewer resources for when they really need them. The primary buff stacking the PCs do in my game (at level 6) is the Aid spell at the beginning of the adventuring day. Almost everything else is cast in combat (with a few exceptions pre-sneak up and open the door).

I also tend to occasionally have some wide open dungeons which means that if the PCs are fighting group 1, 2 rounds later group 2 shows up, and 2 rounds after that, group 3 shows up. I don't like the concept of dungeons with nothing but closed doors, nor do I like the concept that nearby creatures won't come and investigate when they hear noise. The 4E concept (as given in a ton of WotC 4E adventures) where there is a bunch of rooms with a bunch of closed doors is a bit artificial.

 

[Celtavian]

The caster decides his spells. If you dont want to buff.... dont. Every martial should have a ranged attack after all. Relying on the wizard to make you fly is a big mistake.

I agree however that only being able to concentrate on one spell is probably too restrictive. I would be inclined to make a feat to solve that issue. Concentrate on as many spells as you have stat bonus or something, but you still have to make checks if you take damage, athough maybe at a small bonus. Done.

I'm not sure who you play with the majority of the time. I play with real life friends. It's extremely unfair due to the way 5E is designed (concentration, limited magic items, limited feats) to not buff your friend with fly if his primary means of attacking is melee. He had a bow and some ranged attacks. Dragons move fast enough to get outside range of most thrown weapons giving disadvantage on attacks and he only had a 14 Dex and 20 str. That don't work real good using the bow compared to his magic sword.

In 3E you had no concentration and easy access to disposable magic items (not to mention a Christmas tree of magic items), so a melee martial usually found a means to fly on his own. A caster didn't have to worry about it. That isn't the case in 5E. It would be a real jerk move to discourage anyone from playing a melee martial concept because the casters weren't willing to cast fly to help them get into combat. I like to see my buddies have fun with their characters. So I buff them and use other means to attack, since I have other effective means and his other means aren't nearly as effective (disadvantage outside of 30 feet, no magic ranged weapon, lower dex stat).

That's why I've said in 5E dex-based martial classes like the rogue or an archer fighter are better than Str-based martials like a barbarian or heavy weapon melee guy. It's why I don't mind GWM save how it overshadows two-weapon fighting style. Melee martials have problems at high level the way 5E mobility and attacking works in this game.

 

[KarinsDad]

Your group is very different from my group. I have one player that doesn't try to maximize his abilities. Every other player looks for every edge including maximizing buffs. I have been holding off on handing out magic items. A lot of creatures rely on damage resistance against non-magical weapons to provide a challenge. I feel if I hand out a magic weapon too early, I'll make a lot of fights trivial.

At what level? Damage resistance is kind of rare at lower levels. An occasional Ghost or Banshee or something. By the time the PCs get to the second tier, they are a bit screwed if they do not have magic weapons for things like Golems.

 

[keterys]

I must be an outlier too because the four 12th and 11th level PCs in my game have one magic weapon between them and it's +0: lifestealing. Another PC has a gith-forged shortsword which is +0 but adds 1d6 psychic damage per hit.

I'll admit, if I were running a high level game I'd be tempted to do that type of item over +X items. I was pretty sad they kept +2 and +3 items in the game.

But every table I've personally seen has had a full spread of +1s by that level, usually with at least a couple better options around as well by then (though not on every character).

 

[Celtavian]

Rather than casting Fly all the time, the party mage could always make Boots of Flying for everyone.

You mean if the DM allows this? We're not playing with magic item creation right now.