D&D (2024) Rules that annoy you

[Lanefan]

Easier in my opinion because the dice results are right there in front of you to add. Even when players have their PC sheet filled out seems they are always searching for stuff and add spells and other situational modifiers on top of that it slows things down, at least in my experience. The addition is not the problem. Telling a player roll 1d20+1d4 is a lot easier than saying make an attack with your weapon, add +2 for spell "x" and subtract -4 because of situation/condition "y", it either takes longer than it should or with new players, they sometimes get confused.

Simple answer there is just tell the player what dice to roll and why, and as DM do the + / - arithmetic for them.

In this example you-as-DM already know that spell X and condition Y net out to -2; so all you have to do is knock 2 off the roll and then compare it to the DC or AC or whatever target is being rolled against.

 

[Lanefan]

Incapacitated as the condition's name keeps catching me off-guard.

'we were chasing this guy and incapacitated him'
'so you caught him?'
'oh no, he kept running and climbed up a cliff'

You're just unable to take actions, but you can move around normally.

And now, Stunned also no longer prevents you from moving. This becomes silly with Monk's Stunning Strike...
if you succeed at the save, you can only move at half speed
if you fail the save and are stunned, you can move at full speed

Where's that facepalm emoji again?

The designers seem to think being unable to take an action is a much bigger penalty than it really is. Being unable to move and yet still act is every bit as bad for the character.

 

[Not a Decepticon]

If I'm a Fighter, I cannot:

Then you should be able to and that is what should be fixed about the game.

I mean you are already turning it into this discussion by complaining about my ‘solution’, so all you do now is chicken out from having to provide one yourself. Put up or shut up, I am ok with either one.

You're now acting like a schoolyard bully in a movie for 10 years old kids. "What's the matter, are you a chicken?" Are you going to start doing chicken dance and make clucking noises next? Is that the level of discussion you need to drag this down to to feel like you have control over it? I'll be honest, this kind of behavior makes me question any good faith you have in this debate. If you make ridiculous demand like "solve 50+ years long problem" and try to act high and mighty when facing reasonable refusal...that's posturing, mate. it's not an argument for you or me, it's so you can make yourself look better to any third party reading this thread. It's why you made this ridiculous demand in the first place, something tells me - you didn't feel in control having to defend your argument, so you tried to goad me into position where I have to defend my idea and you can attack and pick it apart. Poor form buddy.

so what about all the spell slots they have now left over for combat, somehow they are not eager to spend those, outshining combat even more (while supposedly gracefully stepping aside outside of combat, only reminding people every once in a while how much easier the party would have it if they were allowed to do their thing outside combat as well)?

Please, don't act as if we don't have all editions from AD&D 1e (Gygax himself admitted he doesn't know how to solve that issue) all the way to D&D 3.5 to show that forcing every utility spell to be a spell slot does NOTHING to offset martial-caster disparity. You just make playing caster annoying with bookeeping, completely failing to do anything about casters overshadowing everyone else.

 

[mamba]

If you make ridiculous demand like "solve 50+ years long problem" and try to act high and mighty when facing reasonable refusal...that's posturing, mate.

Sounds like exactly what you have been doing in this discussion from the start. I said what annoys me, and you demand the solution for everything while making nonsensical, self-contradictory statements along the way.

It's why you made this ridiculous demand in the first place, something tells me - you didn't feel in control having to defend your argument, so you tried to goad me into position where I have to defend my idea and you can attack and pick it apart. Poor form buddy.

if it is poor form for me, then it is poor form for you, yet you have been doing nothing else this whole time

Please, don't act as if we don't have all editions from AD&D 1e (Gygax himself admitted he doesn't know how to solve that issue) all the way to D&D 3.5 to show that forcing every utility spell to be a spell slot does NOTHING to offset martial-caster disparity.

Please don't act as if limiting them to spell slots has no impact on the disparity. That it in itself does not fix it does not mean that it is not a step towards fixing it

I'd still like to hear your solution, but we know where asking for it leads...

 

[Maxperson]

Everyone's got their own pet peeves with respect to the D&D rules. Some people will find that theirs have been addressed in the 2024 revision, others will find that theirs have not. Looking through the various reviews, I came across two that still kinda irk me.

1) First Aid: I know we're playing a game, and that if they made it harder to do non-magical first aid, no one would bother with it; however, the idea that you can stop someone from dying (regardless of whether they got stabbed, slashed, burned, acidified, etc) in less than 6 seconds simply by expending a "use" of a healer's kit is, frankly, miraculous! Imagine if modern battlefield medics could save their comrades lives that quickly and easily! (Think of the scene from Saving Private Ryan where the medic gets hit and his squad mates fumble about trying to save his life.)

This issue doesn't bother me as much in a sci-fi game, where you can explain it away with a quick "stimpack" injection or the like. But it does bother me in a pseudo-medieval fantasy game, where nonmagical healing techniques ought to be slow and somewhat awkward.

2) Knocking Someone Out: Again, I know we're playing a game, and this rule seems to be based on movie logic rather than reality; however, the idea that creatures remain unconscious for an hour or more* is a bit ludicrous. In reality, if someone is unconscious for more than a few seconds, they're essentially in a coma and are likely to suffer brain damage and may not ever wake up. I had been toying with the idea of changing the 2014 rule to 1d4 rounds rather than hours, and I may still do that, as I'm not sure I like the auto-short rest rule.

*In the 2014 rules, it was 1d4 hours; in the 2024 rules, it's 1 hour (because short rest).


What rules annoy you (either mechanically or conceptually)? What, if anything, do you like to do about them?

Your number 2 is the first thing that came to mind! Hate that rule. In fact, when my group decided to move from 3e to 5e, we decided to play purely by RAW for the first campaign so that we could learn the game. As soon as we encountered that rule we instantly and unanimously voted to ditch it. It was the only rule change we made. LOL

I'll throw in the game being based around the adventuring day.

 

[Daztur]

And this is accomplished by clogging wizard's way of "cheating" with boring utility spells that cannot be used outside precise ways and parameters and thus are useless as means to allow them to "cheat". how exactly?

To quote a random decade-old post by "Random Nerd" on rpg.net my ideal magic system for D&D would look something like: "Okay, I can talk to spiders, fly for as long as I can hold an ice cube in my mouth, curse people to be unable to see dogs, and read the mind of anyone who's holding a fork. I want to get Joe Smith removed from his position on the Board of Directors of ACME Corp. within two weeks. Hmm..."

That's a bit hyperbolic, sure, but I love Love LOVE LOVE incredibly niche spells and figuring out how to use them to get what I want. I don't want to make spells less powerful, I want to make them more narrow. Vancian magic plays into this as having the wizard player get blindsided by a situation he didn't expect and try to figure out how to MacGyver the spells he does have to fit this unexpected sitaution.

My idea class set-up for D&D would look like:

-Fighters: approaches challenges by being masters of straight-forward tactical Combat as Sport beat-downs.

-Rogues: approaches challenges by trying to avoid them.

-Wizards: approaches challenges by trying to invalidate them with Combat as War shenanigans.

-Cleric: pull's everyone else's ass out of the fire when their approach to challenges doesn't work.

Mod Edit: language

 

[pukunui]

Your number 2 is the first thing that came to mind! Hate that rule. In fact, when my group decided to move from 3e to 5e, we decided to play purely by RAW for the first campaign so that we could learn the game. As soon as we encountered that rule we instantly and unanimously voted to ditch it. It was the only rule change we made. LOL

I'll throw in the game being based around the adventuring day.

What did you go with instead?

 

[Maxperson]

What did you go with instead?

You have to declare before hand that you are trying to knock the person out. No deciding after you've killed him.

 

[pukunui]

You have to declare before hand that you are trying to knock the person out. No deciding after you've killed him.

Ah OK. So your issue wasn’t with how long people remained knocked out for so much as how you go about knocking someone out?

 

[Morrus]

I mean you are already turning it into this discussion by complaining about my ‘solution’, so all you do now is chicken out from having to provide one yourself. Put up or shut up, I am ok with either one.

Calm down.