D&D 5E (2014) How To Make High Level 5E Work.For You +

[Zardnaar]

I hadn't looked at the new rakshasa. Love the greater magic resistance! Definitely getting some use, and soon.

Yeah. Anything with SR tg
Thats a boss. Free upgrade imho.

 

[Mort]

Yeah. Anything with SR tg
Thats a boss. Free upgrade imho.

For me, I'd rather keep it a bit rare. You want the Players to 1) be taken by surprise 2) really sweat it. Too often, makes it less of a "Holy Crap!" moment.

 

[SteveC]

I know this is going to sound strange considering how grumbly I can be about 5E (and moreso about 5.5E) but we haven't had much trouble. We were playing the Shackled City AP and converted from 3.5E to 5 after a near TPK and the game ran much better.

Our other campaign is in the Vecna adventure, and we're just about to hit 14 and ... it's fine.

Now that's from the perspective of a player. And what I've seen about it is that the game shows much less risk of death. For that Shackled City campaign we have a Roll20 map with tokens for all the characters who have died in the game and I just looked at it: 25 dead PCs. Since we shifted to 5E? It has been 0.

Is that a problem? Everyone is having fun, including the DM. The game has a different feel to it because we're experiencing the adventure and getting into it but aren't constantly worried about our characters dying. Is that bad? Don't know. I expect for a fair number of players and DMs it will be, but for us we do a lot of roleplay, engage with NPCs, and try and solve the adventure. It's pretty fun for us.

 

[Mort]

I know this is going to sound strange considering how grumbly I can be about 5E (and moreso about 5.5E) but we haven't had much trouble. We were playing the Shackled City AP and converted from 3.5E to 5 after a near TPK and the game ran much better.

Our other campaign is in the Vecna adventure, and we're just about to hit 14 and ... it's fine.

Now that's from the perspective of a player. And what I've seen about it is that the game shows much less risk of death. For that Shackled City campaign we have a Roll20 map with tokens for all the characters who have died in the game and I just looked at it: 25 dead PCs. Since we shifted to 5E? It has been 0.

Is that a problem? Everyone is having fun, including the DM. The game has a different feel to it because we're experiencing the adventure and getting into it but aren't constantly worried about our characters dying. Is that bad? Don't know. I expect for a fair number of players and DMs it will be, but for us we do a lot of roleplay, engage with NPCs, and try and solve the adventure. It's pretty fun for us.

Yeah, I tend to look at the less deadly nature of 5e as a feature, not a bug. I quite like the flow and feel of the game, obviously ymmv.

 

[Zardnaar]

I know this is going to sound strange considering how grumbly I can be about 5E (and moreso about 5.5E) but we haven't had much trouble. We were playing the Shackled City AP and converted from 3.5E to 5 after a near TPK and the game ran much better.

Our other campaign is in the Vecna adventure, and we're just about to hit 14 and ... it's fine.

Now that's from the perspective of a player. And what I've seen about it is that the game shows much less risk of death. For that Shackled City campaign we have a Roll20 map with tokens for all the characters who have died in the game and I just looked at it: 25 dead PCs. Since we shifted to 5E? It has been 0.

Is that a problem? Everyone is having fun, including the DM. The game has a different feel to it because we're experiencing the adventure and getting into it but aren't constantly worried about our characters dying. Is that bad? Don't know. I expect for a fair number of players and DMs it will be, but for us we do a lot of roleplay, engage with NPCs, and try and solve the adventure. It's pretty fun for us.

Bought the hardcover AP a few weeks ago. I was thinking of 5E conversion.

I suspect the 3 3E APs and som of the PF1 APs might be worth a 5E conversion using milestones.

 

[SteveC]

Yeah, I tend to look at the less deadly nature of 5e as a feature, not a bug. I quite like the flow and feel of the game, obviously ymmv.

Totally. There is some discussion of making a "cozy" version of D&D. For me, I see a lot of that already in the game. Just as an example. In Shackled City we did a battle with a Dracolich. We prepared and buffed extensively for the encounter. One of the players made a bad choice for his character on his first action and went from buffed and full hit points to dead before he went again. That's not how the encounter worked at all in 5E.

Is that problematic? Not for how we're playing. If I wanted to extend a grim, horror campaign, I think I would have some issues with it.

 

[Reynard]

I think high level PCs in 5E should have to pour on the gas in order to come out ahead. the encounters and especially the boss fights should be tough -- not just burn your most powerful abilities tough, but work together and find the weakness tough.

 

[SteveC]

I think high level PCs in 5E should have to pour on the gas in order to come out ahead. the encounters and especially the boss fights should be tough -- not just burn your most powerful abilities tough, but work together and find the weakness tough.

I think you may need to tweak some game elements to get there. In the Vecna campaign, we did a combat where the entire group was poisoned (so all attacks at Disadvantage). I took the time to get rid of that on my character (and I asked the other players who to cast it on, no one else wanted it!) and we were fighting this huge monster that would swallow people whole. We curb stomped it. I was genuinely surprised because the battle had all the setup for being very tough, if not deadly, but we just smashed it. I don't know if that adventure has a reputation for being easy, but it turned out to be less difficult in practice than I would have thought.

 

[Zardnaar]

I think you may need to tweak some game elements to get there. In the Vecna campaign, we did a combat where the entire group was poisoned (so all attacks at Disadvantage). I took the time to get rid of that on my character (and I asked the other players who to cast it on, no one else wanted it!) and we were fighting this huge monster that would swallow people whole. We curb stomped it. I was genuinely surprised because the battle had all the setup for being very tough, if not deadly, but we just smashed it. I don't know if that adventure has a reputation for being easy, but it turned out to be less difficult in practice than I would have thought.

Disadvantage is essentially -4 to hit.

Not much has an AC over 20 so -2 to hit is probably more in line where monster AC should be at higher CR.

 

[Reynard]

I think you may need to tweak some game elements to get there. In the Vecna campaign, we did a combat where the entire group was poisoned (so all attacks at Disadvantage). I took the time to get rid of that on my character (and I asked the other players who to cast it on, no one else wanted it!) and we were fighting this huge monster that would swallow people whole. We curb stomped it. I was genuinely surprised because the battle had all the setup for being very tough, if not deadly, but we just smashed it. I don't know if that adventure has a reputation for being easy, but it turned out to be less difficult in practice than I would have thought.

5E high level monster design is just terrible. You have to look for different solutions than what's in the MM.