D&D 5E Sell Me On Tasha's

[Reynard]

I have not even looked at Tasha's Cauldron of Everything (did I get that right; I didn't even check) mostly because I feel like the general tone of 5E's development isn't my cup of tea -- it's to cutesy, if I have to pick a word. Anyway, I realize there might actually be some worthwhile material in Tasha's. So help me figure out if I should add it to my arsenal.

Some information to help:

a) I am asking from the perspective of a DM, so there are dual issues of whether there is useful DM info, and if there are problematic player facing mechanics.
b) The things I need from D&D rules are ways to make the exploration and social pillars as useful and fun and mechanically deep as the combat pillar. Does Tasha's do anything for those pillars?
c) I generally buy these things twice: once in dead tree format, and once for Fantasy Grounds. And I support my FLGS. So, any given D&D book has to be worth closer to $60 or $70 for me, not $30.

Thanks.

 

[Li Shenron]

Most of it was in Unearthed Arcana articles, why not trying a few options from there first?

 

[Reynard]

Most of it was in Unearthed Arcana articles, why not trying a few options from there first?

I don't know what's in it. I was hoping for folks to explain why I might want it in the context of the things I mentioned.

 

[Charlaquin]

I don't think it's going to be to your liking, honestly. It's definitely got that cutesy tone you dislike. A large portion of it is player-facing options - subclasses, alternate class features (though those are subject to DM approval), etc. As far as DM facing rules for expanding social interaction and exploration... There's rules for parleying with monsters, environmental hazzards, and puzzle challenges. But in my opinion none of it is anything you'd need a book to tell you to do. Most experienced DMs who want such things are probably already doing them better than the book handles them. Group patrons and sidekics are in the book, though they aren't exactly new. There's some new magic items. Mostly though, it doesn't have much of what I get the impression you're looking for. It is very much Xanathar's Guide 2, so if you liked that book, you might like Tahsa's. If you didn't, you can probably give it a pass.

 

[Weiley31]

The Druid gets a sweet ass Fire Stand subclass.

 

[Charlaquin]

Here's the table of contents:

If you're curious about any of those items in particular I could go into more detail.

 

[tetrasodium]

I have not even looked at Tasha's Cauldron of Everything (did I get that right; I didn't even check) mostly because I feel like the general tone of 5E's development isn't my cup of tea -- it's to cutesy, if I have to pick a word. Anyway, I realize there might actually be some worthwhile material in Tasha's. So help me figure out if I should add it to my arsenal.

Some information to help:

a) I am asking from the perspective of a DM, so there are dual issues of whether there is useful DM info, and if there are problematic player facing mechanics.
b) The things I need from D&D rules are ways to make the exploration and social pillars as useful and fun and mechanically deep as the combat pillar. Does Tasha's do anything for those pillars?
c) I generally buy these things twice: once in dead tree format, and once for Fantasy Grounds. And I support my FLGS. So, any given D&D book has to be worth closer to $60 or $70 for me, not $30.

Thanks.

It's probably not going to float your boat much. If you were around back in the day to remember things like phb2 & the original unearthed arcana book(s) filled with big time changes from ACFs (alternative class features) & such you probably got some tinglies that this was going to be 5e's phb2/unearthed arcana to build up the lacking areas you note or something. If that was what you were hoping for though, tasha's is more like a tentative glance in the direction of those mechanics than an actual step. There's not really anything problematic in the ACFs & such in tasha's & a player can generally convey them in a sentence or so like "it lets me swap cantrips" or "it's like archery fighting style but for thrown weapons" so don't worry about your players wanting to use it. That also goes for players wanting to use its character creation rules to swap skills/attribs/etc just because it doesn't change a whole lot for bob to have a +2 in attrib B instead of attrib C or swap a near useless tool proficiency for a different near useless tool proficiency that at least kinda fits his character.

One area of note is that pretty much for the first time they included magic items & feats really aimed at the needs of caster classes that aren't called warlock sorcerer or scorlock and they did it to a much larger degree

 

[Bacon Bits]

I've had scant little opportunities to play D&D since even the Unearthed Arcana that became Tasha's came out. However, I did allow any of the options there.

Overall I would describe Tasha's as D&D 5.1. It's incremental, doesn't do a whole lot really, but what it does is pretty good.

There is, unfortunately, nothing really there for expanding social or exploration pillars. Battlemasters get some new powers for doing that, but that's really it. I don't think the designers find all that much to fix here.

As a DM, I found some of the stuff in the DM's Toolkit at least interesting to read. There are some ideas there that are worth thinking about, but nothing I've directly implemented. Only had a handful of sessions since the book released, though.

The racial modifications I have no problem with. The philosophy behind the change is a progressive one, but it's simply what's going to happen going forward. Some people are going to hate them and insist on the traditional fixed stat modifiers, but I was ready to ditch those along with race-class restrictions, class alignment restrictions, and class ability prerequisites. The rules to swap tools and weapon proficiencies are a little sketchy. Letting an elf fighter get 4 tool proficiencies seems a bit excessive; I'd peg it closer to two. I suppose some tables will find dwarves with armor and an Int bonus too appealing. It's not really a problem at my table, though. My biggest complaint here is that humans went from moderately awful to completely terrible; the design of standard humans needs a gross overhaul if these racial modifications are going to be the norm going forward because they simply have no meaningful benefits anymore.

The optional class features seem to fall into two categories: 1) things you should already have been able to do if you asked your DM, and 2) things that help bring certain classes into line with their contemporaries, namely beastmaster rangers. It's the lion's share of the books content, and I'm a big fan of all of it. I'm sure some people don't like it, but I think they're good.

Bottom line is that I would always choose to play with Tasha's instead of without it as a DM or as a player. If anything I'd say the changes don't go far enough, but the game has been fairly conservative this edition (for largely good reasons). I own it in print and on D&D Beyond.

 

[Reynard]

Thanks @Charlaquin and @tetrasodium for your frank explanations.

I have been looking through my old Pathfinder GM facing books for subsystems like Haunts and Afflictions and Hexcrawling and I was curious if there was that kid of material in tasha's that helps build out challenges and conflicts aside from combat.

That puzzle section is a lot of pages! Is that basically more "random name tables" or something more?

 

[Charlaquin]

That puzzle section is a lot of pages! Is that basically more "random name tables" or something more?

Only one page of it is advice on running puzzles. The rest of the section is example puzzle encounters (each of which take up about a page to a page and a half) and handouts for the puzzles.

Here's an example of one of these puzzle encounters:

https://media.wizards.com/2020/dnd/dragon/34/dra34_dnd_tce_puzzle.pdf