D&D (2024) Bonus Unearthed Arcana Reveals The Bastion System

A 'bonus' Unearthed Arcana playtest document has appeared, and it shows off D&D's upcoming Bastion System.

This October, we’re bringing you a special treat. While we’re continuing to develop and revise public playtesting material for the 2024 Player’s Handbook, we’d thought you’d enjoy an early look at what we’re cooking up for the 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide.

The coming Dungeon Master’s Guide will be the biggest of its kind in decades and contain an assortment of new tools for DMs and their tables. In Bastions and Cantrips, we’re showcasing one of these tools, the Bastions subsystem. Dungeon Masters and their parties can use this subsystem to build a home, base of operations, or other significant structure for their characters.

And if you’re raring to test out more character options, we’re also including revisions for 10 cantrips in this playtest packet.

Claim Unearthed Arcana now! - D&D Beyond

www.dndbeyond.com

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[Alzrius]

He said that Charmed is not mind control, it just grants advantage on Charisma checks against the Charmed creature, and that the closest Charmed comes to mind control is that it prevents the Charmed creature from attacking you. Which is not a change from 2014, he was just reiterating how it already works because he knows a lot of people run it wrong.

Hey, if the arguments about "alignment being absolute" and "no one reads the DMG" taught me anything, it's that if people are running parts of the game wrong, it's WotC's fault for not being clearer.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I will say that after I made that post I went back and looked at the 4e DMG again and the rules are bit more robust than I remember. They are definitely quicker and simpler than the ones in 5e. However, that is also a product of the rigid math of the 4e system. You can never recreate that in 5e.

My issue in 4e was the prevalence of conditions (push, pulls, dazes, stuns, etc,) that definitely do impact the effectiveness of the monster, but there was no guidance in the DMG on how to handle them.

IIRC the idea of the design was you just straight up don’t count them toward the xp budget unless you really feel like you have to.

I will say I too was able to improvise the extras. I could run a whole adventure with just pg 42 tables and the monster design tables. I didn't need a statblock at all! Of course I can do that in 5e too with my DM Cheat sheet (other than or homebrew changes, completely RAW from the DMG).

I do too, yeah. 5e isn’t all that opaque in encounter design, tbf.

 

[dave2008]

IIRC the idea of the design was you just straight up don’t count them toward the xp budget unless you really feel like you have to.

Daze and Stun certainly should count for something. I eventually reversed engineered it based on examples in the books (MMs), but I feel it could have easily been monster guidelines.

 

[Yaarel]

monsters be level instead of CR

Yes, please.

 

[Yaarel]

@AnotherGuy went back and found these from Jeremy Crawford about how the Forgotten Realms are not the core Settong...in 2016. Time has really born out that the drsign team meant what they said about Settings at the start:

https://twitter.com/hashtag/dnd?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc^tfw

https://twitter.com/stout_evan?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

https://twitter.com/gaborcsigas?ref_src=twsrc^tfw

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If a DM prefers a different setting such as Eberron or Theros, then the default setting that one is trying to work against is defacto Forgotten Realms. Tomayto tomahto.

 

[Parmandur]

If a DM prefers a different setting such as Eberron, Darksun, or Theros, then the default setting that one is trying to work against is defacto Forgotten Realms. Tomayto tomahto.

No, against the Great Wheel Heroic Fantasy assumptions, which include the Forgotten Realms. The lore heavy books have consistently ignored "Realmslore" in favor generic D&Disns (the Yuan-Ti in Volo's have nothing to do with Forgotten Realms Yuan-Ti lore, for example).

 

[Yaarel]

I love the concept of the Bastions. Its design approach seems solid.

I feel much of the UA description can simplify and consolidate, with little or no loss of information. And, there are number of options, mentioned in this thread, that are worthwhile adding.

All that said, I am excited.

 

[Stalker0]

Guys, I literally just double checked the thread to make sure this was about bastions and not monster design. It’s been like 3 pages now, take it outside

 

[Neonchameleon]

Guys, I literally just double checked the thread to make sure this was about bastions and not monster design. It’s been like 3 pages now, take it outside

Already done.

 

[bedir than]

I hope that Bastions gets two more UAs.
There's a decent foundation, but it needs work to work.