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

[Hussar]

Yeah of course, the whole idea will be to bring the Dragon down using Bigby's/Telekinesis or whatever so Henry Handaxe can get in there.

However, I do note, that some posters claim Henry Handaxe simply doesn't need any help because hand axe's are fine.

We'll see how they go.

Why do you keep insisting on hand axes and not javelins? No one else is.

 

[Celtavian]

Interesting.

In our game, I have to tell a few players to shut the heck up. My daughter in particular and a friend of mine of 40 years both like to talk away "Try this, go there, do that".

I stop the game for a second and say "Karin, this is Mom's PC. Let Mom run her. You run your PC.".


Ahead of time planning, no problem. But in combat, I allow a little of it to go on, but there is no way I'd let players plan out tactics. If they do so, then the foes hear them and if the foes can understand them, they can try to counter them.

We discuss the hell out of combat in tough situations. Sometimes the discussions are intense and stressful because a mistake means death. We don't like our characters to die. DM has usually planed out the combats on his side extensively to deal with our commonly used tactics. That means once combat is engaged, we might find a commonly used tactic is ineffective. We have to come up with something on the fly or die.

This is not the most recent game I'm talking about. As I said, we ran that pretty standard by the module. The tactics were straightforward enough not to require much thinking.

But usually in our games major encounters have been crafted to require us to think outside the box to live. That's why we allow discussion. The DM has spent a lot of time creating an encounter specifically to kick our asses. The encounter is usually meant to expend all our resources per day in one big combat with most of us near dead by the end.

This is definitely a play-style difference. I wouldn't base individual observations based on those encounters. That's why we play Core first to learn a game, then start tweaking. If we started a learning a new system using our standard method of encounter building and combat, we would probably kill the party over and over again due to lack of system knowledge. How far can you push without breaking only comes from experience using the core rules.

 

[DaveDash]

Why do you keep insisting on hand axes and not javelins? No one else is.

I find it cute that you actually believe it makes a difference.

Without the party buffing him and getting him in there, Henry is toast, whether he's throwing Javelins or Hand axes or Halflings.

 

[KarinsDad]

We discuss the hell out of combat in tough situations. Sometimes the discussions are intense and stressful because a mistake means death. We don't like our characters to die. DM has usually planed out the combats on his side extensively to deal with our commonly used tactics. That means once combat is engaged, we might find a commonly used tactic is ineffective. We have to come up with something on the fly or die.

...

But usually in our games major encounters have been crafted to require us to think outside the box to live. That's why we allow discussion. The DM has spent a lot of time creating an encounter specifically to kick our asses. The encounter is usually meant to expend all our resources per day in one big combat with most of us near dead by the end.

Hmmm. Odd. The reason I say that is because the first casualty of every battle is the plan. Even the evolving plan. Crap happens. If your combats are so close to the cliff, I would think that the three 20s in a row that the DM suddenly rolls (and that and/or other unusual things do happen) would make mincemeat out of the PCs.

 

[CapnZapp]

+8 damage has the same issues regardless. It still doesn't work.

It becomes +24 or +32 for mid to high level PCs. Even a 5th level PC can do +16 or +24 with this (+48 with a paralyzed Hold Person target).

+10 = +3D6. That's reasonable. That's the equivalent of a 5th level Rogue, but with the -5 to hit.
+24 = +7D6. That's not reasonable. That's the equivalent of a 13th level Rogue. Way worse if it is +48 or +64 with a Hold Person target.

JMO.


Once per round solves all of these issues. It becomes +10, +20 with a Hold Person target. Done. Once per turn allows a tiny bit more umph with OAs (which rarely happen, so it just adds fun into it without lack of balance).

These two feats as written are the CoDzilla of 5E, it's just a MeleeZilla instead. Trash them.

Where in that line of reasoning does the issue go away? At +6? +5? Even less?

What I'm saying is, I welcome your take on this, but you need to analyze, not merely emote.

 

[KarinsDad]

Where in that line of reasoning does the issue go away? At +6? +5? Even less?

What I'm saying is, I welcome your take on this, but you need to analyze, not merely emote.

Where in that analysis did you miss the analysis? I explicitly listed things such as +24 extra points of damage at level 5 being excessive.

That was not an emote.

The answer is fairly simple. How much extra damage should a PC be able to do at a given level due to a reusable non-resource using ability?

If one assumes a ratio of +1 point of damage at level one and +20 points of damage at level 20, then with 1 attack per round at level one and 5 potential attacks per round at level 20, then -5/+4 is reasonable.

Personally, I think that +1D8 per tier (or per attack) is reasonable which would make -5/+D8 reasonable. I don't think that -5/+8 is reasonable compared to what Rogues get (for example) of +D6 per 2 levels. -5/+8 is about +8 per tier. Rogues get ~ +3D6 per tier as a class feature and it's only usable once per turn. A multiple times per turn feat (which has other benefits as well) should not be equivalent to a once per turn class feature. IMO.


Going back to my earlier statement, there is a reason that Hunter's Mark, Sneak Attack, Colossus Slayer, etc. are once per turn or once per round. It simplifies the game and avoids the very problem of stacking damage that we are discussing. The easiest way to avoid stacking damage per round is to just disallow it from stacking.

 

[Celtavian]

Hmmm. Odd. The reason I say that is because the first casualty of every battle is the plan. Even the evolving plan. Crap happens. If your combats are so close to the cliff, I would think that the three 20s in a row that the DM suddenly rolls (and that and/or other unusual things do happen) would make mincemeat out of the PCs.

It does. That's when bad things usually happen. In 3E we countered this with a powerful healer. I built a healer in one campaign that could cast that spell that revives the dead and could quicken a heal for 150 points of damage. She could bring someone up pretty quick even if pasted with multiple crits. Sometimes the damage was too much. Then again that is what Fort armor was for and elemental form.

In 5E crits aren't very bad from most creatures. So not as much to worry about. Three 20s in 5E can hurt, but doesn't always kill the majority of the time.

You stated why we all scratch our head when players tell us we don't need a dedicated healer. We tried not having a dedicated healer a few times from recommendations from players on ENworld and the Pathfinder boards. We built a class with healing ability like a cleric, but that would do more offense. We died a ton. So we went back to the dedicated healer waiting to get people back on their feet. We couldn't survive the battles without an optimized healer. Most of the players are paranoid about playing without a character built for healing due to our play-style.

I think 5E we can get away with less healing due to how "pop up" healing functions. So far I've found the game less combat healing intensive. I hope it stays that way.

 

[KarinsDad]

It does. That's when bad things usually happen. In 3E we countered this with a powerful healer. I built a healer in one campaign that could cast that spell that revives the dead and could quicken a heal for 150 points of damage. She could bring someone up pretty quick even if pasted with multiple crits. Sometimes the damage was too much. Then again that is what Fort armor was for and elemental form.

In 5E crits aren't very bad from most creatures. So not as much to worry about. Three 20s in 5E can hurt, but doesn't always kill the majority of the time.

Tell that to the 6th level wild shaped Moon Druid that took 66 points of damage from 3 Minotaur Skeletons in a single round last week (miss, hit, and crit, even with a single miss, I rolled huge on the damage). Any other PC would have been pasted and some would have been dead.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

This was a long debate. When to buff? We spent quite a while discussing this. With the new lower durations in 5E, prebuffing can be a problem except long duration buffs like aid. Though a single dispel magic can completely strip a single target of all buffs. At the time we played, we did not know that dragons no longer had spellcasting. So it was a real conundrum. We had sworn off reading the MM because we wanted to be surprised.

Without a rogue, we did not have a very efficient way to scout the dragon's cave. It was quite large and difficult terrain. So sending a forward scout to locate the dragon was dangerous. If he was caught alone by the dragon, the dragon would dispatch him and we're down a party member. If we give him fly, then he can scout and move, but our slot is active and if he dispels it he is dead. As you stated, dispel magic strips fly automatically. No roll unless it is cast at a higher level.

The dragon was not in the immediate vicinity of the tunnel entrance. So we staggered the casters in back with the melee acting as our vanguard.

Although you said this in response to dragon tactic #2, all of this is addressing dragon tactic #1 (Dispel Magic), but you didn't actually address #2 (run out the clock). If the dragon had simply held the range open you would have died. Your DM seems to be pretty good at roleplaying dumb creatures appropriately dumb (e.g. your gnoll fight), so I suspect you're wrong when you say he plays dragons as infinitely patient creatures who are just as happy waiting a week as a minute--I suspect he deliberately played the dragon dumb to give you a chance. But I suppose it's possible he just didn't think of it. If he'd done it, you'd be dead, no question.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

+8 damage has the same issues regardless. It still doesn't work.

It becomes +24 or +32 for mid to high level PCs. Even a 5th level PC can do +16 or +24 with this (+48 with a paralyzed Hold Person target).

+10 = +3D6. That's reasonable. That's the equivalent of a 5th level Rogue, but with the -5 to hit.
+24 = +7D6. That's not reasonable. That's the equivalent of a 13th level Rogue. Way worse if it is +48 or +64 with a Hold Person target.

JMO.


Once per round solves all of these issues. It becomes +10, +20 with a Hold Person target. Done. Once per turn allows a tiny bit more umph with OAs (which rarely happen, so it just adds fun into it without lack of balance).

Perhaps, instead of once per round, make it once per Attack action? That way, the Fighter Action Surge isn't (IMO kind of unfairly) denied the effect? It also means that using Action Surge simply means repeating the same attacks in the same way (as it does now), rather than making Action Surge fundamentally different.