Level Up (A5E) minor advantage/disadvantage

[Faolyn]

Baby goblin in steel manacles. I know who my group would be freeing.

 

[Faolyn]

Also, I realized that the expertise die can be used to create a whole slew of minor magical items for settings like Eberron where low-level magics are quite common. Paintbrush +1d4, guitar pick +1d4.

 

[tetrasodium]

Also, I realized that the expertise die can be used to create a whole slew of minor magical items for settings like Eberron where low-level magics are quite common. Paintbrush +1d4, guitar pick +1d4.

You can also do things like A:+1expertise die(#) & B:=expertise die(#) or C: =expertise die(+#) where the number in parenthesis is the lowest your expertise die can roll similar to the 4e brutal(#) weapon property so a +expertise(2) set of locksmith's gloves with A might bump a rogue's 1d6 to 1d8 but rolling a 1 is a 2 while B & C would still be a 1d6 expertise die but any number rolled below a the floor & cumulative floor is just treated as the floor

 

[WarDriveWorley]

Interesting take. Do you have plans for adding a mechanic (maybe based around a feat or in a class feature) that allows for rerolling of expertise dice? I mean I could see a someone so "skilled" that they have the option to reroll an expertise dice once or twice per short rest, but have to use the new roll.

 

[Faolyn]

You can also do things like A:+1expertise die(#) & B:=expertise die(#) or C: =expertise die(+#) where the number in parenthesis is the lowest your expertise die can roll similar to the 4e brutal(#) weapon property so a +expertise(2) set of locksmith's gloves with A might bump a rogue's 1d6 to 1d8 but rolling a 1 is a 2 while B & C would still be a 1d6 expertise die but any number rolled below a the floor & cumulative floor is just treated as the floor

If I'm reading you correctly, that would also be a good item, one that's slightly more powerful than my version but still well within the scope of minor magical items.

Item A can help anyone be good at this task; it grants an expertise die.

Item B can help anyone be good at this task, but if you're already knowledgeable in it, then it helps you be even better: it grants an expertise die, and if this would raise your expertise to a d6 or d8, then (depending on how you, the DM, want to do it) rolls of 1 and 2 are treated as if you rolled a 3, or you can reroll the expertise die and must use the second roll. (Both of these methods are used in D&D a lot, so it's up in the air as to which would be the better version to use.)

 

[AllOlive]

What the above page sets up is a limited spectrum: +0, +d4, +d6, +d8. The fact that it's limited is good; if it weren't, it would break the whole idea of bounded accuracy. But let me try to suggest something a little bit less limited. This is just exploring what it would look like, more than it is an actual suggestion; I'm not actually sure this is any better than the system already explained above.

The spectrum runs -d8, -d6, -d4, +0, +d4, +d6, +d8 (+d10, +d12). The only way to get above +d8 on a straight roll is with bardic inspiration. The only way to get anything at all on this spectrum is either if the narrator grants it situationally, or if you spend finite resources (including, in the case of Guidance, concentration); nobody should be adding dice as a matter of course.

Guidance and Bless move you 1 step up the spectrum, but only if you end up at +d6 or lower.

Disadvantage and advantage move the endposts. That is, the most you can add with disadvantage is +d6; with advantage, +d10.

If you have both a +1 item and expertise, only the expertise applies (eg, +d4, not +d4+1), but the end-point is +d10. A +2 item with expertise adds one point of expertise and has an endpoint of +d10. A +3 item with expertise adds 2 points of expertise and has an endpoint of +d12.

You never get to reroll or otherwise modify expertise dice. The above is (more than?) complicated enough.

Example: creature A has bless, creature B targets them with a damage spell that has "3 steps of metamagic" to the saving throw. +d4 minus 3 steps means they get a -d6 to their saving throw.

Note that the average value shifts faster in the middle of the spectrum than at the ends. That's good; you want fun bonuses, but you don't want to over-incentivize stacking up many bonuses (ahem, Pathfinder).

 

[tetrasodium]

If I'm reading you correctly, that would also be a good item, one that's slightly more powerful than my version but still well within the scope of minor magical items.

Item A can help anyone be good at this task; it grants an expertise die.

Item B can help anyone be good at this task, but if you're already knowledgeable in it, then it helps you be even better: it grants an expertise die, and if this would raise your expertise to a d6 or d8, then (depending on how you, the DM, want to do it) rolls of 1 and 2 are treated as if you rolled a 3, or you can reroll the expertise die and must use the second roll. (Both of these methods are used in D&D a lot, so it's up in the air as to which would be the better version to use.)

A&b yes. C grants no expertise directly but raises the floor by # in combination with whatever floor raising items you have.

None of them raise the max unless it happens to bump the experience die but there's a lot of room to play with the floor on the expertise die pr even the d20 to manipulate the reliable average

 

[Faolyn]

Speaking of Eberron... would the +d4 bonuses given by the various Dragonmarked Houses count as Expertise dice where it increases the die size, or be more like bless or guidance, where presumably it would be an additional die?

 

[Faolyn]

What the above page sets up is a limited spectrum: +0, +d4, +d6, +d8. The fact that it's limited is good; if it weren't, it would break the whole idea of bounded accuracy. But let me try to suggest something a little bit less limited. This is just exploring what it would look like, more than it is an actual suggestion; I'm not actually sure this is any better than the system already explained above.

This seems a whole lot more complicated and it puts a lot of work on the DM to decide when it happens. Especially if you include something that has "three steps of metamagic," which would be a completely new system to learn as well.

Guidance, bless, and similar effects are magical and should give you an actual bonus (an actual additional d4), not just make your bonus potentially larger (rolling 2d4 has a minimum of +2; roll a d8 has a minimum of +1).

You also reduced advantage/disadvantage to just another step on this ladder, rather than the full second d20 it currently is. Don't forget LU is supposed to be backwards compatible, meaning that advantage/disadvantage needs to remain as is.

Also, LU has completely done away with the standard Expertise/doubling of proficiency bonus that Rogues and Bards get and some other things grant. The expertise die is a replacement for that. So not having it as a matter of course automatically takes away from some PCs.

As it currently is, it's pretty simple. Expertise gets you +1d4. If you get another expertise die in the same thing, it becomes +1d6. If you get a third, it becomes +1d8. And that's it. It's more granular than the binary advantage/disadvantage, but not so granular it becomes, well, Pathfinder-esque. And you can have expertise and ad/disad at the same time--just like you could have ad/disad with a skill you got to use double your proficiency bonus in, in o5e.

 

[AllOlive]

Just to be clear: I didn't reduce advantage/disadvantage to a step on this ladder, I just suggested that in addition to its normal effects, it should change the boundaries of the ladder.

But yes, this is probably overcomplicated.

On the other hand, the "guidance should be an actual bonus, not just a potential one" is exactly my argument for this kind of system. That is, I think the ideal situation is the opposite of what you say. The problem to be avoided is if stacking a bunch of bonuses gives you a guaranteed outcome; that ends up pitting your rules-crafting fun (look at all these bonuses!) against your fun at the table (You succeed. Again. Yawn.). This is exactly the kind of situation that comes up in Pathfinder more than it should, and occasionally in 5e (with belts of giant strength, or the new "bonus to spell DC" magic items). So I think 1d8 is far better than 2d4 from that perspective.