D&D 5E My biggest gripe with 5e design

[5ekyu]

Again, if that’s your experience playing AD&D, then you were playing a vastly different game than everyone else. Multiple wishes by 10th level? Sounds like you were playing Monty haul. While ways to improve ability scores existed in 1e, you didn’t get automatic +2 bonuses every 4 levels like in 5e. They were super rare to get an ability score improved in 1e. I can only think of three or four adventures that gave that opportunity, and almost always also gave you serious penalties if you chose the wrong option (like castle amber). Magic items were random, so no, not everyone was going around with belts of giant strength and ioun stones and decks of many things that they always conveniently pulled the right cards


And yes, 25 hp was average. If that, since you also stopped getting CON Bonuses after 9th level and stopped rolling hit dice. You got 1 hp per level after 9th for MUs. Even fighters only got 3 per level. To say there is no difference between that and a 5e fighter makes me think you don’t have any idea what the rules in 1e actually are. You also had lower abilities in 1e because you didn’t have point buy or arrays to guarantee a good roll, humans didn’t all get bonuses to stats, and Demi humans had penalties to some stats to offset the bonuses they did get, but also were capped at certain levels. Monsters also routinely had better AC values than in 5e.

Typical avg hp for a 10th level Party was 23 for MU, 33 for thief, 42 for cleric (maybe 52 if the cleric had a con bonus), and 81 for a fighter with a 16 CON (being generous). I wasn’t cherry picking. Even without level drains or save or die, it didn’t take much damage to wreck your day for most PCs. Worse at low levels, when a single attack from a goblin or orc could outright kill your PC, even if they were level 2 or 3 (since you didn’t start at max HP like 5e either). How many 2nd level wizards, or 1st level fighters could die from a single non critical attack by a goblin in 5e? A housecat could kill a MU in 1e for Christ’s sake. Also, hp were more valuable because you didn’t recover them nearly as much as you do in 5e. There were no hit dice to roll during short rests. There was no going back to max at every long rest. Also, no things like low level revivify. You had a much lower pool of HP, and they had to last you much longer between recovery

sorry, you’re wrong. RAW, 1e was more dangerous to PCs than 5e. This isn’t uphill both ways nonsense. It’s objectively true by looking at the actual rules of the game, and something people accept as true because it’s so obvious.

You can’t say that there was no difference, and also say the reason they got rid of all those horrible things was because people hated them. Those are contradictory positions. You can’t deny a problem exists, and then say they fixed the problem because people wanted it.

"Again, if that’s your experience playing AD&D, then you were playing a vastly different game than everyone else. "

My experience from 1e was everyone was playing "a vastly different game" than everybody else. From one table to another each AD&D game varied so much that things were often hard to recognize as the same game. Between house rules galore to plug vast gaps in the rules to how most anything outside dungeons was mostly homebrewed ad hoc to little to no built in "cr" - every table was it's own mystery box jackpot with plenty of variations of lethality between them.

The proposition that there was anything like a "1e style" that was experienced by any vast majority is to me an artifact of nostalgia and echo-chambering with a serious degree of OSR filtering. Dragon magazine, later Dungeon and certainly the modules were a diverse and nothing like consistent lethality or tone. My recollection was that they all to various degrees tried to cover with various inclusions the gamut of what we saw at the tables - from high crunch lethal to more mystery to more social and magical to down right humorous.

But, I admit, my recollect is also nearly 40 years old and that's a lot of beers and too many other impacts on my mental faculties.

 

[Oofta]

As has been shown to you repeatedly, 1e's danger was far more than save or die. That was actually only a small part of the danger. Most of my characters never got to a level where save or die showed up.

Have I been shown? Really? Because the OP's claim is that 5E risk is all about HP management. If you take save or die out of 1E you're left with HP management with the addition of death saves. Once a PC is below 0, it's easy to kill them by just targeting them for damage again.

Chance of PC dying in a campaign is up to the DM.

 

[Maxperson]

Have I been shown? Really? Because the OP's claim is that 5E risk is all about HP management. If you take save or die out of 1E you're left with HP management with the addition of death saves. Once a PC is below 0, it's easy to kill them by just targeting them for damage again.

Chance of PC dying in a campaign is up to the DM.

Sure. I can also snap my fingers and all the PCs die. This is about playing the game as presented, not about upping the risk to compensate. We're discussing the base games, not solutions to the issues.

 

[5ekyu]

Bah, back in my day we fought dragons with sticks! They weren't even pointy sticks! And we were happy to get those. There wasn't any Monty-haul campaigns for us with "multiple wishes". If you saw a pool it was probably full of acid and the fountain was probably a giant mimic that would eat you. Because nothing says "monster" like a mimic disguised an ottoman. That's right, even the furniture tried to kill you!

Wait, where was I?

And dont forget the deadly gazebos!!!!!!

 

[Oofta]

Sure. I can also snap my fingers and all the PCs die. This is about playing the game as presented, not about upping the risk to compensate. We're discussing the base games, not solutions to the issues.

I'm not violating a single rule by having monsters target a downed PC. It's a legitimate tactic for intelligent creatures.

Personally I up the risk level of the game by house ruling that raise dead isn't as easy casting a spell and resurrection doesn't exist.

 

[Oofta]

And dont forget the deadly gazebos!!!!!!

But can you magic missile the darkness?

 

[5ekyu]

So rather than say "no it's not", what do you consider heroic?

Because I'm confused. I don't think randomly living or dying by a single roll of the dice is heroic. But that's what it frequently came down to in previous editions.

If I read some of these posts right, heroism is shopping. If you go buy the right stuff, right gear, right inventory so you have items to reduce the threats from cockatrices, medusa's, specters or whatever you were getting that 1e feel and surviving the "threats" (even tho that risk has been negated or minimized by the brave "shopping" challenges.)

Wasnt that said - it's not about the actual loss of characters and bringing that back, but the shopping/gathering stages to get the stuff to minimize that risk?

Maybe that is where "that 1e feel" lies for some - the loads of gear and items you rely on because the characters alone are not enough to meet the challenges without their cans of spinach and rings of secret power pills.

 

[5ekyu]

But can you magic missile the darkness?

Fortunately, I was wearing my chainmail bikini.

 

[Oofta]

If I read some of these posts right, heroism is shopping. If you go buy the right stuff, right gear, right inventory so you have items to reduce the threats from cockatrices, medusa's, specters or whatever you were getting that 1e feel and surviving the "threats" (even tho that risk has been negated or minimized by the brave "shopping" challenges.)

Wasnt that said - it's not about the actual loss of characters and bringing that back, but the shopping/gathering stages to get the stuff to minimize that risk?

Maybe that is where "that 1e feel" lies for some - the loads of gear and items you rely on because the characters alone are not enough to meet the challenges without their cans of spinach and rings of secret power pills.

But it's not about save or die, don'cha know? Except that it is. Unless it's not. I'm not sure any more.

 

[jayoungr]

I do think there should be more opportunity to die from stupidity and carelessness in 5E. Basically from not paying attention and being sloppy.

Happened to my group in Ravenloft. They were busy whittling down the ogre zombies and ignoring the undead beholder. Boy, were they sorry when the cleric got disintegrated!

Also, that campaign ended (for now) with the BBEG charming half the party (the hardest hitters) and taking them out of the fight, then completing her desired ritual while being plinked at by the two remaining PCs and flying off into the night. Charm doesn't have multiple saving throws even in 5E, unless the charmer does something silly like hurting the charmed one. So that's something @Sacrosanct might be able to use.