Micah Sweet
Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
I have long been in support of that idea, and incorporated it into my houserule doc.
D&D General The Crab Bucket Fallacy
- Thread starter MuhVerisimilitude
- Start date
Let's try this again.
You like to say that when you are advocating for something, you are speaking for "the community."
In my experience, this is not what "the community" is demanding. Imagine you have people watching Critical Role, and they want to play D&D. Do you think that they are looking to get advanced math lessons in the PHB?
Or you have a typical mixed table, the kind where one player doesn't remember that his fighter has second wind, and another is mostly there for the pizza. Do they want the math?
Does someone who is "all into Strixhaven" really want to look at the underlying mathematical assumptions of BA and advantage? Perhaps work a little with stats to ensure that they understand the distinction between advantage and a "mere" + to a roll?
You have strong preferences, and that's great! But the biggest mistake most people make is that they assume that their preferences are necessarily widely shared. One of the things 5e explicitly did is to de-emphasize the importance of the math and the need to optimize; for some people, that's frustrating. For many people, that's not a terrible thing. You can still optimize, and many people do. But it's no longer a requirement to either understand the math, or to keep on the treadmill of optimization.
Again, not a bug, but a feature.
AnotherGuy
Hero
Given how badly they bungled the math in the game with
- Expertise
- how easy it is to get +5 modifiers on your primary stat
- magic items breaking the BA
- the encounter building system
- their two initial OP feats which they changed for 5.5e; and their
- paladin smite ability
It is tough to argue against this point.
Nah.
It was that you could use you 2nd or 3rd highest score, have proficiency, and roll a 10 and still fail at something your DM described as "Moderate".
That nudged the CharOp boards to make things necessary.
I said they don't care about the math.
It is a feature, not a bug.
The math is wonky. That's why they don't explain it in the PHB. Because the DM is supposed to fix the wonky math on the DM side.
My issue is that they don't help DMs in their book. WOTC leaned on DMs being experienced already. The DM is supposed to know already to use lower DCs or hand out items that buff rolls.
AnotherGuy
Hero
Or provide situational Advantage
Crimson Longinus
Legend
Your assumption that you should autosucceed is bizarre More than 50% chances at moderate task is perfectly fine.
What is a moderate task to you?
And again this is 50% with above average raw talent of 14.
It is necessary to reiterate what @payn already said- apparently, no one reads the DMG.
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Let's look at a few rules I excerpted...
Automatic Success: Characters succeed on any ability check with a DC less than or equal to the relevant ability minus 5. (p. 239)
Automatic Success Take 2: Character succeed on any ability check when they take 10x the amount of time required. (p. 237)
Degrees of Success/Failure: You can have success at a cost on marginal failed rolls, or degrees of failure, or critical successes or failures (instead of all-or-nothing). (p. 242)
Personality Proficiency: Instead of skill proficiencies, you are proficient in ability checks related to your personality. (p. 264)
Proficiency: Use dice instead of static modifier. (p. 263)
Social Interaction: Can be either free-form or rolled. (p. 244)
Again, there are plenty of official rules and variants to allow you to modify and customize the game easily. And that's just to start with. And that's within the DMG- part of the "Core 3" books.
Make the game what you want. Or, if you don't ... if you don't want to "kludge it," then this isn't the game for you. There are other games (PF2e!) that are much more "all about the math," and that's a good thing!
But I've seen a lot of people that play 5e bounce off of PF2e, and it's not because of the brand. It's because they don't want that type of math. Which is also okay. Not everything works for everyone.
Vaalingrade
Legend
Actually, neither 3e nor 4e supported either of the terrible principles BA is meant to support.
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