D&D 5E 5e, Heal Thyself! Is Healing Too Weak in D&D?

[Undrave]

Dual Strike Fighter Attack 1
You lash out quickly and follow up faster, delivering two small wounds.
At-Will ✦ Martial, Weapon
Standard Action Melee weapon
Requirement: You must be wielding two melee weapons.
Target: One creature
Attack: Strength vs. AC (main weapon and off-hand weapon), two attacks
Hit: 1[W] damage per attack.
Increase damage to 2[W] per attack at 21st level.

Apparently they errataed it later so that the second attack had to be against a different creature.

 

[Voadam]

Apparently they errataed it later so that the second attack had to be against a different creature.

Better for minion fighting, worse for solos.

 

[Undrave]

Better for minion fighting, worse for solos.

Guess it makes it different enough from the Ranger's twin strike. Let's you mark two dudes per round too.

 

[pemerton]

Guess it makes it different enough from the Ranger's twin strike. Let's you mark two dudes per round too.

I think that's the rationale: by forcing it to be two creatures, it reinforces the fighter's defender/controller schtick while not treading so heavily on the toes of the ranger's single target striker schtick.

 

[James Gasik]

I think that's the rationale: by forcing it to be two creatures, it reinforces the fighter's defender/controller schtick while not treading so heavily on the toes of the ranger's single target striker schtick.

Plus, with the large number of damage bonuses by the end of 4e, there were a lot of people griping about Twin Strike being too good. Who remembers the April 1st Dragon that had like 5 different "rebalanced" Twin Strikes?

 

[Lyxen]

@Lyxen - there are many "auras" in 4e that are not energy fields (like flame or necrotic dread) but that represent, in the fiction, biting or scratching or other physical attacks. Swarms have them, for instance.

And if it's physical, it should say so, and be described that way so that once more intelligent players can deal with it properly instead of being subjected to them by DM's fiat, in particular if it's because the DM has simply decided that it would be cool tactically.

Likewise, there are examples of forced movement that do not represent literally being pushed or pulled - for instance, the Dreadlock Wight has a forced movement attack that represents a person recoiling in terror from its horrific visage.

First, it's funny that you type Dreadlock instead of Deathlock, you should google that and it will make it much less horrific, or rather horrific in a different way.

Moreover, I really dislike that kind of interpretation, I'm pretty sure that a lot of players would complain about player agency here, as a DM you don't get to describe how a character reacts to an event. Being horrified and forced to flee is cool, it leaves some agency to the player. Being forced to move back exactly 3 squares is totally silly to me and just a backwards justification for a power that moves figurines on a boardgame.

Another interesting feature of that horrific visage is that it is a blast - ie operates on only side of the Wight - ie represents it looking at its victims.

That, on the other hand, I can sort of agree with, but again, why does the wight not show her visage to every one around her ? Why is that a specific power in one direction only ? Is she forced to hide her visage again for the rest of the encounter ? Why does just showing her visage need to RECHARGE ? These are simple technical implements with no grounding in the fiction. Once more, this was built backwards, not from the fiction, but from the technical power.

It's a feature of 4e that it doesn't needlessly duplicate mechanics - you don't need facing rule when you've got blasts; you can use aura rules for any effect that is triggered periodically in a radius about a character/creature; you can used forced movement to also cover involuntary movement such as fear or being wrongfooted (Footwork Lure); etc.

And you know what, I agree, but it just shows the heart of the problem. The SYSTEM decided to implement forced movement because it's a nice boardgame trick and it generates technical combos, and the narration explanation where just strapped on, however implausible it is.

Why would level bonuses equate to training? The PCs in my 4e game never trained.

OK, so where does the specific differences of these orcs come from ? Answer, it comes from nowhere apart from the DM needed monsters TECHNICALLY at the level of the PCs. It's totally artificial.

The real development with level is new powers and abilities. The level bonus is just a device for moving PCs through the "story" of D&D.

And then, it's just a TECHNICAL device that 4e IMPOSES to tell ITS story. But 5e has just demonstrated that you DON'T NEED that technical device. Just use the same monster, no need for technical changes, it works.

It's not that first, we assign some measure of "training" to a 10th level PC and second we assign some measure of "toughness" to Demogorgon or a Pit Fiend, and then third we notice that the PC can't beat the demon or devil. Rather, first we decide that Demogorgon and Pit Fiends are epic (and upper epic) adversaries, and then we assign numbers to them, and to the PCs, that will reflect this. The fiction is first, the numbers are second.

Saying that a given adversary is powerful in the world has sense. Saying that it's power is relative to the PCs' current level is what is ARTIFICIAL. You don't need it for your narration, it's contrary to the logic of the world. The ONLY thing that it provides is confort for the DM that the difficulty of the encounter is totally controlled. And that's one of the only two major reasons for which the 4e encounter calculator of 4e is more precise than that of 5e, because the aberrations come in 5e when you have multiple monsters and levels that vary a lot compared to that of the PCs (the other major reason is that 5e PCs are far less calibrated than 4e ones).

So it's just confort for the DM, but it's artificial and not needed for narration at all.

With minions, we have a fiction: these are the foes that fall before the swords and spells of the heroes! Then we assign numbers that support this fiction: the minions have 1 hp. Another part of the fiction is: these foes are not unthreatening, or just ignorable. So we assign numbers that support that too: the minions have mechanically meaningful attack bonuses and defences and damage.

The fiction is first, and the numbers support that.

Only it's the other way around. You decide TECHNICALLY to use minions, and, thank goodness, the fiction supports it. But only part of the fiction, the local fiction that you IMPOSE on your game by constantly reworking the adversaries so that their level matches the PC, minions and others. But don't you see how artificial this is ? How unneeded it is and how it contradicts the global fiction of the world ? I'll give you a pointed example below.

It's not the only viable method of RPG design - it closely resembles (for instance) Robin Laws's brilliant HeroQuest revised

No, it does not, it is completely opposed to it. You START with the TECHNICAL PRINCIPLES of minions. They are not needed, so they should not even exist. 5e understood this.

4e is fiction first, numbers second. The numbers - both the overall framework of level bonuses, hit points and damage per level, etc; and the particular numbers assigned to a particular creature or character - are all in service of the fiction.

No, they are not, you have everything totally backwards, first requiring that the entire world adapts to the level of PCs, totally artificially, then using these technical constructs to build a fiction.

Fiction works the other way around, you create fictional situations where levels and other constructs don't matter.

And the following fiction makes complete sense: for a relatively inexperienced hero, just learning to make their way in the world, fighting this creature is tough; for a hero how is, or is almost, a paragon, this creature will fall before their determined attacks like wheat to the reaping scythe.

And what happens when they are side by side ? Or adventure in the same world. Do monsters change from one to the other ? I've had this specific example in shared campaigns, in particular our best one that lasted 10+ years with multiple DMs, where we had adventurers at any level between 1 and 20 (this was 3e) sharing the world. Did we need to adapt the monsters ? No, we did not, a monster was a monster, he did not suddenly change into a minions with totally different stats when another group, more or less powerful, went to the same type of area.

If I am a 4e GM building an encounter for a PC of a given level

And that's your problem, right here. I don't do that. It's not needed. It's not fiction, it's technical encounter building.

My worlds are completely different, there are situations, some the PC will decide to tackle, others later, others not, but the monsters will not change. And there is a good reason for that, because if they have different abilities, their plots would be different.

I make this decision based on my conception of the shared fiction - so eg for 6th level PCs ogre minions make no sense; but when I ran my version of G2 for mid-epic PCs, frost giant minions abounded - and also based on my intentions around pacing.

Once more, this is purely technical encounter building, it's artificial.

If the stat block I need for my purposes exists in the published books then I use it; if it doesn't then I make it up, relying on the excellent advice to GMs found in the DMG which makes the relationship between level and numbers quite transparent.

Again, the technicalities come first, not the story, not the world, not the fiction.

There's no such thing as an "objective" orc or an "objective" difficulty for a PC of intermediate level. There's a decision about what the fiction will be.

Certainly not, you keep saying this, but it's not the case, it's just technical adaptation to the PC level, you said so yourself, how more artificial can it be ?

The second remark here makes no sense to me. In 5e the reason a 10th level fighter can more easily defeat a goblin than a 1st level fighter is because of numerical changes on the PC sheet. That is no more or less artificial than the GM making numerical changes on their monster stat block.

The changing numbers on a PC sheet reflect the transformation of the PC from noob to hero, it happens over time, and is more or less continuous. Does this mean that the world transforms around them, that monsters change drastically gaining or losing abilities ? Not, it does not, it's not needed, as 5e has demonstrated. It does not happen in the genre, I'm finishing re-listening to the Wheel of Time, the trollocs and fades who were terrifying in the first books are now canon-fodder to the heroes, BUT STILL THE SAME than in the first books and still killing lower level heroes and even more peasants. The entire world does not revolve around a single group of PC, all the adversaries do not adapt their level to match that of the PC because it's easier for the DM to compute ELs.

In my 4e game, what generated the sense of progression was not fiddling around with numbers - that creates change, which can be interesting, but not progression. The progression took place in the fiction. At low levels the PCs fought individual hobgoblins. At mid-paragon they fought hobgoblin phalanxes (in mechanical terms, swarms of hobgoblins) and fought individual demons. At mid-epic they fought swarms of demons. At high epic they fought individual gods and demon lords.

And each and everyone of those was totally artificially constructed to match their level at the time. But what would have happened if the PCs had tackled things in a different order ? Again, the monsters would have artificially adapted to the different path, guaranteeing exactly that they met their match. There is no use being clever, there is no penalty for being dumb, the world adapts around them, and you think it creates fiction. It does not, it just creates a succession of challenges that you call greater because you adapt not only the numbers of the adventurers as they progress, but the numbers of the whole world.

If it works for you, cool, but once more, it's not needed, and there is no benefit to it as 5e has demonstrated, except for your confort of a 4e DMs of presenting technical challenges that you know will be tough, but are confident will not be overpowering. But it's for YOUR CONFORT there, and for technical reasons only.

As far as 5e is concerned, it may have solved a problem for you. There are many reasons I don't play 5e, but one of them is that I think it doesn't do a particularly good job of producing fiction that, for me, is paradigmatic of D&D - starting off with kobolds and ending with Demogorgon.

That is very bizarre as a statement, since 5e does exactly this, kobold to demogorgon or an arch devil or tiamat. And it's demonstrated in every single published adventure.

Whereas that is something that 4e D&D achieved effortlessly.

This is probably the most astonishing thing that you have said. "Effortlessly" when actually it requires adapting every single encounter to the level of the PCs at the time ?

Honestly, I find it even more effortless to NOT do that, just use the monsters as written or as I imagine them when I create my own. If the PCs are overwhelming either technically, by cleverness, or choosing weak foes, they will slaughter them (I don't even create "random" encounters on Avernus, we all assume that they crush them beneath the wheels of their mighty Profanator, and I certainly don't suddenly create incredibly powerful Lemure Minions to challenge them technically), if they bite off more than they can chew, usually for failing to gather enough information, too bad, they have to run or suffer loses. That is effortless, and totally in line with the fiction and the consistency of the world, something that 4e NEVER achieves.

 

[Eric V]

You should have had the gnolls grapple their opponents. Two at a times. The other attacker would then attack the character with advantage (if they were successful in grappling) and your players would have had a very hard time. Grappling is not level dependant and it would give the "horde" effect quite well. Two grapplers means that the check is made with advantage, giving them a good chance to succeed. With other gnolls striking the grappled character with advantage (as said character is restrained) means that the other gnolls (the non grapplers) are now needing only the equivalent of a "12" to hit. A much higher chance.

Correct me if I'm wrong but 2 chances to hit normally or one chance to hit with advantage comes out mathematically to about the same thing, no?

 

[Lyxen]

Correct me if I'm wrong but 2 chances to hit normally or one chance to hit with advantage comes out mathematically to about the same thing, no?

No, it does not, actually. With advantage, you can only hit once. With two attacks, you could hit twice. And then the grapple needs to succeed. I'm pretty sure that if the damage from the sources is equal, it's better to attack multiple times, and it gives you multiple chances to crit too. The "help" thing is only valid if the attack you are helping does way more damage. But I'm too lazy to make the computations now.

 

[Lyxen]

Spirit Guardians do the same. The cleric is not even attacking, taking the dodge action and guess what? It is 15 feet radius of radiant (or necrotic) damage. And we got that in 5ed. Having a creature with a 5 feet radius effect is not that big of a deal.

Again, my problem is not with an aura dealing damage. Balors have a fire aura. But it's something explainable from the fiction of the monster. In that case, there is no fiction, no-one yet has been able to explain convincingly what an aura of "hunger" meant. It's a purely artificial construct to make the minion more challenging at a technical level, and the strapped on explanation convinces no-one.

Compare to the balor, which is literally on fire, or the cleric which has conjured spirits and told them to attack intruders, the fiction comes first and the technical implementation next.

 

[Helldritch]

Correct me if I'm wrong but 2 chances to hit normally or one chance to hit with advantage comes out mathematically to about the same thing, no?

No. The gnolls holding a character will allow any gnolls to hit the character with advantage. Meaning it costs two gnolls to give up to 6 other gnolls an advantage to hit. If you décide that the two holding gnolls are occupying the se space as the character, then it 8 gnolls which will have advantage to hit the held and restrained character. That is the strength of a hoard.