D&D General The Beautiful Mess of 5e

[Zardnaar]

That’s surprising, I’m pretty sure it was him who originally made the claim that it was.

I said fireballs a C tier spell. ENworlds gonna enworld.

Its kinda crap most of the time and underwhelming when its "good".

 

[James Gasik]

Some interesting things said about the release of 2024 5e, comparing it to 3.5. People already invested in 3e were willing to buy the revision because they were invested, but people who had drifted away weren't brought back.

 

[Staffan]

Oh! Ok, so he’s not saying that they didn’t intentionally overtune blast spells, but rather that their initial math probably lowballed blast spells too much, and so what they thought of as overtuning them at the time turns out in hindsight to have put their damage right about where it should be.

That makes WAY more sense to me.

Pretty much, yeah. And he also mentioned something about it scaling at +2d6 (and magic missile at +3 darts).

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Oh! Ok, so he’s not saying that they didn’t intentionally overtune blast spells, but rather that their initial math probably lowballed blast spells too much, and so what they thought of as overtuning them at the time turns out in hindsight to have put their damage right about where it should be.

That makes WAY more sense to me.

That and they just assumed people would be fighting lots of tightly clumped rats/goblins at level 5.

 

[Zardnaar]

Pretty much, yeah. And he also mentioned something about it scaling at +2d6 (and magic missile at +3 darts).

They coukd repribt fireball from 3 5 and its no big deal.

Scaling damage spells haven't been an issue since 2E maybe 3.0 being generous.

The spells been getting nerfed over and over since 1989. Usually indirectly.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

They coukd repribt fireball from 3 5 and its no big deal.

-3d6 damage at level 5? No thanks.

Scaling damage spells haven't been an issue since 2E maybe 3.0 being generous.

2E

The spells been getting nerfed over and over since 1989. Usually indirectly.

For good reason. In 2e, throwing any spell was a big deal.
Spells per day was lower at low levels at least (no cantrips, no refresh on short rests). Memorizing spells took 10min per level.
Spells could be lost during castings.

So comparing spells between editions is not really a good idea.

 

[Zardnaar]

-3d6 damage at level 5? No thanks.

2E

For good reason. In 2e, throwing any spell was a big deal.
Spells per day was lower at low levels at least (no cantrips, no refresh on short rests). Memorizing spells took 10min per level.
Spells could be lost during castings.

So comparing spells between editions is not really a good idea.

5d6 at 5th level.

3d6 in effect is the 5E fireball. Maybe 4d6 conversing isn't exact.

A great 5E fireball would need to inflict 16 d6 damage. To match a weak 2E one it would need to deal 10d6 base. And top out around 20-30d6 damage.

A good 5E fireball probably needs free upcasting/ 2d6 per level upcast.

Instant damage x2 over sustained damage maybe X3.
We had this conversation a few days ago irrc.

Mearls has spotted the same problem.

 

[Charlaquin]

That and they just assumed people would be fighting lots of tightly clumped rats/goblins at level 5.

In their defense, we (the folks who playtested D&D Next) really stressed that as something we wanted to be possible.

 

[Zardnaar]

In their defense, we (the folks who playtested D&D Next) really stressed that as something we wanted to be possible.

Yup blame the designers usually comes down to blame the players.

2E, 3E, 5E anyway.

 

[bedir than]

One of things Mike Mearls said that I found interesting was that upcasting of classic blaster spells is where it really doesn't work.
Magic Missile should be 2-3 missiles per upcast level.
Fireball should be multiple dice as well.