D&D (2024) What do you want to see excised?

[Reynard]

Completely remove Verbal and somatic spell components. They have long lived past their usefulness. Instead just assume that there are 3 ways to disable spellcasting.

1) Inside silence.
2) Their hands and/or mouth is bound
3) They cannot access their arcane focus or spell component pouch.

And then if a spell ignores these restrictions, specifically note it as a 'big deal" in the spell itself. These removes all the weirdness with paladins and shields, having to look up components on various spells, how it interacts with ABC, etc. Its all streamlined and simplified.

That's not the most important part of verbal components. The most important part is that it makes real, loud noise.

 

[jasper]

Ugh. No thanks. If anything they should excise milestones.

yes very american. Needs to be Kilometerstones.

Also my group needs excised. We 10 to 50 pounds overweight.

 

[Stalker0]

That's not the most important part of verbal components. The most important part is that it makes real, loud noise.

The way I would fix that to remove all of this confusion around "how stealthy can I be with spells".

You just need a simple "Concealed: Yes/no" option for each spell, or just assume the answer is no unless the spell specifically says it is concealable. Classic one....Charm Person. Can a player conceal they are casting it? some people say yes, some say no. Some say S and V components are loud and obvious, others say you can whisper the words and wiggle your fingers behind a cloak.

Drop all the confusion. If concealed is NO: the spell is as obvious as the sunrise, no way you can stealth with it. If its yes, its limited components or just plain "not obviously magical" but it allows you to conceal your casting. Done, simple and clean.

 

[Lanefan]

Alignment. At some point, it will be pointed out that trying to provide a universal definition of 'good' and 'evil' is problematic; might as well get ahead of the curve.

Encumbrance. Tracking of mundane ammunition. Tracking of rations. For all of these things, the rules provide the merest of nods, which are essentially useless as-is, but also provide inertia that the DM needs to fight against if they want to change.

I'd rather they lean harder into both of these elements, personally.

XP budgets for encounter building. Indeed, they should divorce the amount of XP gained from defeating an encounter from the budget used to build it - that way, once the players become more experienced DMs can build tougher encounters without speeding up progression.

Indeed.

Encounter-building guidelines in general are of very limited use IMO, in that what's a tough encounter for one party might be a cakewalk for another, all dependent on a bunch of factors the designers can't control e.g. the species/class makeup of the party, the size of the party, the approach the players/PCs decide to take in the moment, etc.

Trying to approach it from the angle "I want the PCs to earn 600 xp in total, what can I throw at them to achieve this" is to me a bass-ackwards. way of doing it.

 

[Lanefan]

Here's how I'm currently doing it (playing an OSR game, not 5e)

Group
Major discovery: explore a new and dangerous location, find a rare treasure, make a definitive ally or enemy, confirm the veracity of rumors
Minor discovery: explore safe location, make some money, chat with locals, hear rumors

Individual (once per session)
Invoke character background in some way
Further a personal goal or objective

Fine, but if - as is IME very often the case - it's one character (or a few among several) pulling the group along in those group activities, that character IMO deserves more reward than those others who are just along for the ride. For example, hearing and verifying rumours while chatting with the locals might be something the party's Rogue and Wizard see to while the Cleric and Fighter stay put in the hotel room: why should the C and F get any xp for something they didn't do?

 

[Reynard]

Some say S and V components are loud and obvious, others say you can whisper the words and wiggle your fingers behind a cloak.

Not if you actually read the rules. I swear half the "debates" that exist are literally because people refuse to read the book. It's maddening.

 

[Lanefan]

Completely remove Verbal and somatic spell components. They have long lived past their usefulness. Instead just assume that there are 3 ways to disable spellcasting.

1) Inside silence.
2) Their hands and/or mouth is bound
3) They cannot access their arcane focus or spell component pouch.

And then if a spell ignores these restrictions, specifically note it as a 'big deal" in the spell itself. These removes all the weirdness with paladins and shields, having to look up components on various spells, how it interacts with ABC, etc. Its all streamlined and simplified.

If those are the guidelines then interrupting a spell in mid-casting becomes nearly impossible unless you can put the caster into silence or completely incapacitate her. One of the biggest problems that makes casters all-powerful is that they can't be interrupted.

Change 2 to read "Their normal movement and-or speech is restricted in any way whatsoever" and you're on to something.

That said, the advantage of a simple VSM listing is it fits nicely as shorthand on a one-line-per short list of spells, which is very handy if just looking up the basics such as range, duration, etc.

 

[tetrasodium]

Not if you actually read the rules. I swear half the "debates" that exist are literally because people refuse to read the book. It's maddening.

I agree that is often a culprit, especially with players wanting to debate, but phb203's verbal section hardly imparts the level of clarity you seem to be implying implying

Spoiler: verbal

Verbal(V)
Most spells require the chanting of mystic words. The
words themselves aren’t the source of the spell’s power;
rather, the particular com bination of sounds, with
specific pitch and resonance, sets the threads of magic
in motion. Thus, a character who is gagged or in an area
of silence, such as one created by the silence spell, can’t
cast a spell with a verbal component.

 

[Malmuria]

Fine, but if - as is IME very often the case - it's one character (or a few among several) pulling the group along in those group activities, that character IMO deserves more reward than those others who are just along for the ride. For example, hearing and verifying rumours while chatting with the locals might be something the party's Rogue and Wizard see to while the Cleric and Fighter stay put in the hotel room: why should the C and F get any xp for something they didn't do?

Admittedly I haven't played with these rules for very long; they are substitution for gold-for-xp rules in the game I'm using (Whitehack 3e). The problem you describe is not one I've run into in general, as the group tends to do things...as a group. Individual xp triggers (lots of games use them) are subject to potential player abuse, but I don't have players like that.

With regards to 5e, I think there could be a more elegant solution to xp than the one they have now, and a solution that corresponds to the goals of the game. For better or for worse, my impression is that 5e, especially in the published adventures, is firmly lodged in the adventure path tradition, and so awarding milestones or levels for completing "story arcs" makes sense in that case.

 

[Yaarel]

It is extremely important to get rid of spells that suck.