D&D 5E Randomness and D&D

[Vaalingrade]

That "barely functioning system" and its near variants did well enough for 15 years or so. Without it the game, and this forum, wouldn't exist.

I could say the same for hunter gathering and eating the ticks off grandma, but that doesn't mean I want to do it.

 

[overgeeked]

Thankfully? I'd replace that word with "regrettably", if I was forced to play a modern edition. Fortunately, that's not the case.

And were I forced to run a modern edition, I'd say get back to me in a year or so 'cause it's gonna take me that long to kitbash the system into something I'm willing to touch.

I'm about eight years into trying to kitbash 5E into something I'd like to play. Still pounding my head against that particular rock.

 

[Jaeger]

First, the d20 is too swingy. IMO I think skill should trump randomness, so using something non-linear like 2d10 (even for attacks) would be better.

Keeping the current bonuses in the game, I would even prefer a 2d8 or 2d6 system, so bonuses count for more. Being +11 on a d20 is great, but you can still suck--and frankly if you are +11, you shouldn't really ever suck.

Proficiency bonus should trump ability modifiers by at least x2. My ideal (if you want to keep the total around +11) would be proficiency ranging from +2 to +8 and ability modifiers capping at +4 instead of +5.

I don't mind when luck comes into play at all, even against my big boss that I love, but there is so much variability in a d20 that often your bonuses are immaterial.

Interlock games do this. 1d10 with an attribute scale of 1-10 and skills that go to 1-10. I have seen versions where they used 1d12, or even 2d6 and not change much else.

The old decipher LoTR games were 2d6 with attributes -3 to +5 and skills 1-12. It tries to emulate the math of 3.x d20...

I think that you could take Interlock, and tune the math (Stat/Skill levels) so that it will emulate (more or less) the DC progression of 5e: 10,15,20,25,30.

Converting to 2d10 "5e" is doable, but you could not just swap it out for a d20. You would have to re-figure all of the underlying math for the 2d10 'pyramidal' distribution.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Interlock games do this. 1d10 with an attribute scale of 1-10 and skills that go to 1-10. I have seen versions where they used 1d12, or even 2d6 and not change much else.

The old decipher LoTR games were 2d6 with attributes -3 to +5 and skills 1-12. It tries to emulate the math of 3.x d20...

I think that you could take Interlock, and tune the math (Stat/Skill levels) so that it will emulate (more or less) the DC progression of 5e: 10,15,20,25,30.

Interesting, I'll have to think about that...

Converting to 2d10 "5e" is doable, but you could not just swap it out for a d20. You would have to re-figure all of the underlying math for the 2d10 'pyramidal' distribution.

Yeah, I already starting doing that and decided it wasn't worth the hassle.

 

[James Gasik]

If randomness bothers you, how about 5d4? You only auto fail if you roll all 1's, you only critically succeed if you roll all fours. The actual "could theoretically succeed" range is now 5-19, or 15 numbers instead of the current 18. You have an average result of 12.5 which should, given a reasonably good bonus, succeed at most tasks. Extreme results still exist, but are now incredibly rare moments, so they can be given more weight when they do occur, from the catastrophic to the miraculous.

 

[prabe]

If randomness bothers you, how about 5d4? You only auto fail if you roll all 1's, you only critically succeed if you roll all fours. The actual "could theoretically succeed" range is now 5-19, or 15 numbers instead of the current 18. You have an average result of 12.5 which should, given a reasonably good bonus, succeed at most tasks. Extreme results still exist, but are now incredibly rare moments, so they can be given more weight when they do occur, from the catastrophic to the miraculous.

Back in the dim and distant past, I pondered a system that was based on 3d20, take the middle. Crit success was a nat 20 and 2 successes; crit fail was a nat 1 and 2 failure. Two nat 20s was an autosuccess; three was an auto crit success. Two nat 1s was an autofail; three was an auto crit failure. I never got a chance to try it at the table, but it seemed to have some averaging function and to make crits to be more likely to be failures or successes if you were bad or good at what you were attempting.

 

[DND_Reborn]

If randomness bothers you, how about 5d4? You only auto fail if you roll all 1's, you only critically succeed if you roll all fours. The actual "could theoretically succeed" range is now 5-19, or 15 numbers instead of the current 18. You have an average result of 12.5 which should, given a reasonably good bonus, succeed at most tasks. Extreme results still exist, but are now incredibly rare moments, so they can be given more weight when they do occur, from the catastrophic to the miraculous.

I prefer 4d6-4, range 0-20, avg. 10, odds of 20 or 0 are just 1 in 1,296.

I actually bought a lot of d6's with 0 instead of 6, so you get 0 - 20 as each die is 0-5.

Back in the dim and distant past, I pondered a system that was based on 3d20, take the middle. Crit success was a nat 20 and 2 successes; crit fail was a nat 1 and 2 failure. Two nat 20s was an autosuccess; three was an auto crit success. Two nat 1s was an autofail; three was an auto crit failure. I never got a chance to try it at the table, but it seemed to have some averaging function and to make crits to be more likely to be failures or successes if you were bad or good at what you were attempting.

Cool! I did the sort of the same thing:

Roll 3d20.

Attacking: take worst roll. Made success in battle harder than the 60+% WotC designs for.
Skills: take the middle roll.
Saves: take the best roll. Made saves easier since most creatures don't have save proficiencies.

Advantage escalated which roll you took, or added another d20 in the case of saves.
Disadvantage de-escalate the roll you take, adding another d20 in the case of attacking.

Critical success required a 20 plus another success, critical failure required a 1 and another failure.

Going along with this, I basically (more or less) halved the hit points for everything.

It worked quite well IMO, giving the game a more AD&D feel.

 

[Jaeger]

Interesting, I'll have to think about that...

FWIW - DATAFORTRESS 2020 - Cyberpunk 2020 at it's finest

Has lots of Interlock stuff for free with the permission of R.Tal.

Personally I'd trim stuff down a lot, and go with an AC system to emulate the D&D feel.

 

[Mannahnin]

Almost certainly won't happen - that 2 h.p. Fighter only had 1 h.p. all the way through 1st level and if still alive to reach 2nd is the luckiest SOB out there.

That "barely functioning system" and its near variants did well enough for 15 years or so. Without it the game, and this forum, wouldn't exist.

Well, "officially". Max HP at first level didn't become an official core rule until what, 3rd edition? But it was an extremely common house rule before that. To my recollection all of my 2E games used it, and it was a common practice in 1E as well.

Not for me. Random is random; and if you choose to spec. in 2-h sword you're gambling that an enchanted one will turn up someday...or that you can commission someone to make you a magic one.

Further, in this type of game there's no way of knowing whether your 2-h sword specialist will live long enough to find it...by the time they get there you might be playing a mace-wielding Cleric.

Lay the adventure out ahead of time without regard for which specific PCs might play in it, and let the chips - and items - fall where they may.

This is the way I mostly prefer to play and run as well, but it's definitely a subjective preference. I do like to see the option for characters to have a signature weapon and not suffer for it be supported, at least in some games.

I have never read a published adventure and felt as though I understood just about anything about it. They literally don't make sense to me, reading them. And playing them, I feel straitjacketed by the expectations. The stuff I come up with to run--and I'm sure this is a shock--makes sense to me. It might well not make any sort of sense to anyone else, and that''s ... fine, since I'm the only one who has to run it.

Wow. Really interesting. I do tend to find that really long adventures are tough for me to study and absorb, but there are designs which are more accessible and better-written, and laid out with good information design so I can quickly refresh my memory at the table while running. Bryce Lynch talks a lot about some principles of good adventure writing/design on his massive review blog, tenfootpole.org. Some of them are of course subjective, and his tastes run to old-school, location-based adventures for the most part, but he's got some great universal principles in there. Someone summarized a bunch of them on a blog, here:

Bryce Lynch's Adventure Design Tips Summarized and Explained (Mark 2)

What follows is a second attempt to briefly encapsulate the tips and principles for designing adventures presented by the inestimable Bryce...

into-the-dark-rpg.blogspot.com

 

[Lanefan]

Well, "officially". Max HP at first level didn't become an official core rule until what, 3rd edition? But it was an extremely common house rule before that. To my recollection all of my 2E games used it, and it was a common practice in 1E as well.

I'd neither seen nor heard of the concept before 3e.

Then again, back around 1984 we added "body points", which gives everyone an extra 2 to 5 h.p. once at 1st level - mostly "meat" and harder to rest back or cure - which may have to some extent acxcomplished the same thing.