D&D 5E (2024) Preferences in a New Official 5.5e Specific Setting

[Yaarel]

Personally though, I think the initiative system is what makes D&D a poor combat game.

The narrative is, the attacks during a turn are happening simultaneously. Possibly, for a videogame, an algorithm could have this live free-for-all while maintaining the DAD math.

 

[tetrasodium]

The narrative is, the attacks during a turn are happening simultaneously. Possibly, for a videogame, an algorithm could have this live free-for-all while maintaining the DAD math.

Ironically there is a lot of anime wuxia/cultivation and so on where the combat is overtly turn based with generally∆ near instant turn completion but not everyone can break free of real time observation into a heightened state capable of tracking it where they can casually observe & interact with the world mid action at casual turn based speeds


∆just watch Dragonball for a trivial example. Characters regularly just stop to dump a bunch of dialogue and nobody interrupts unless they are much more powerful or the oration drags on beyond their turn. Likewise with long drawn out power moves and transformations in the middle of a fight that was previously or about to be moving at speeds where combatants are sometimes just streaks of color smearing across the gap from where they are to where they will be.

 

[Minigiant]

The narrative is, the attacks during a turn are happening simultaneously. Possibly, for a videogame, an algorithm could have this live free-for-all while maintaining the DAD math.

The way you'd do that is to either have a Death Phase/Round or only have deaths happen on end of turn.

I have a simple 5e based War Game module with 4 rounds

1. Strategic
2. Tactical
3. Skirmish
4. Melee

And you only die at the end of round. Initiative just determines which round you get Movement. So fast characters can move on the Strategic or Tactical Rounds and gank mages and archers.

 

[Yaarel]

Actually, moving on from that, one thing I would do in a S&S setting is make beasts much more powerful. Beasts in 5e are generally weaksauce, and I think that largely comes from the modern perception of wildlife being vulnerable to humans. Back when REH was writing the common perception of wild animals was that they were scary and dangerous (an image that zoos and circuses where happy to cash in on). Of course, in some cases, such as tigers, an animal can be both critically endangered and capable of crushing your skull with a paw.

I like having natural, realistic, animals as a category. They are an important baseline to relate to how powerful the rest of the world setting is.

For a Sword And Sorcery genre, the dangerous animals are usually unnatural, like scorpions the size of houses.


Currently, the Monstrosity creature type is meaningless. There is no categorical difference between it and any other fantastical creature. For example, the Medusa could be Celestial or Fey, but for some random whim is Monstrosity.

It would be nice to redefine Monstrosity to mean something specific, such as a low-Intelligence animallike creature that is of the Material Plane but impossible in reallife.

 

[Yaarel]

The way you'd do that is to either have a Death Phase/Round or only have deaths happen on end of turn.

Good idea.

(Separately, I would like combat-ending mechanics such as Stunned to only be possible after Bloodied.)

I have a simple 5e based War Game module with 4 rounds

1. Strategic
2. Tactical
3. Skirmish
4. Melee

And you only die at the end of round. Initiative just determines which round you get Movement. So fast characters can move on the Strategic or Tactical Rounds and gank mages and archers.

Videogames can handle the consequences of speed naturalistically enough.

 

[Maxperson]

And he got better. You don’t get more invincible than that.

Someone who is invincible does not die in the first place. If he died, even if he "got better," he is not invincible. Invincible = undefeatable and death is defeat.

Edit: Just to add, Conan was captured multiple times, which means defeat in many cases. While he has plot armor against permanent things, invincible he was not.

 

[Maxperson]

It's less KISS and more LCD.

Love Character Dementia? Lick Crying Demons? Large Caffeinated Drinks?

 

[SkidAce]

....oooo... let me guess.

Low Character Death?

 

[Scribe]

Large Caffeinated Drinks?

 

[mamba]

I am definitely a person who thinks the rules need to fit the setting, which means the setting needs to be created first.

you are posting this in a thread about creating a setting for 5.5, so either the rules can come first or the whole thread falls apart