Recent content by Mustrum_Ridcully

Interestingly, 4E NPCs, despite being differently derived then PCs, actually usually share the race's special ability. And I think it's often what made a group of NPCs of a race (like Goblins or Kobolds) feel more uniquely that race than in any other edition I played. I am surprised they didn't...

But "once per day" is already a "cooldown", so maybe they didn't see the forest for the trees, and though they had found something new when it was already there all along, contained in every D&D edition, and stolen by WoW and other MMORPGs? Maybe WoWs influence is more that they really thought...

Alternatively, the cost of the counterspell/disruption is lowered. Losing your action and the spell slot is a pretty significant setback. Maybe instead of losing a spell slot and the action, you can choose to keep casting another turn, or switch to casting a cantrip as reaction (retaining the...

Maybe with a meta-mechanic like compels in some games I've read about on EN World? You stat with 1 "Wild Flow" point at session start. When you use something involving wild magic, the GM can say: "Hey, I'd like to give you some bad wild result. If you agree, you'll get a wild flow point." or...

I think that any negative modifier is already something that makes things more complex, because always adding stuff is easier than sometimes subtracting and sometimes adding (and subtracting is always a bit more difficult than adding). So giving a general +4 is preferable to giving a general -4.

You "need" a +4 to hit because you want something to say "you're good at hitting stuff with X". Sorcerors get +4 to hit with spells, +2 to with Daggers, +0 to hit with anything else, and Wizards get +4 to hit with spells, +2 to with Staffs and +0 with anything else. Barbarians get +4 to hit...

I like(d) the move to having all character classes use a similar resource recovery schedule in 4E, and disliked losing that in 5E, it solved so many problems in balance and pacing I used to experience in 3E, and it enabled a relatively flexible way to run my campaigns. I like Warls, e.g...

But, well, you don't need to do that. Just like you don't need every adventure to 100 % enforce that the player characters run 8-12 encounters before they can take a long rest, and force that the 8th or 12th encounter is a life or death struggle while the rest were kinda boring, unexciting...

The advice the DMG probably actually needs to provide is this: The classes are balanced around the idea that they can handle a certain number encounters per day. If they do more, they will struggle and run out spells, hit points and similar resources. If they do less, particularly classes that...

One thing to keep in mind is that a "simple caster" does not need to have the breadth of options a complex caster has. In fact, that would be counter-productive, the breadth is part of the complexity. The goal is to have a way to play the narrative role of someone that uses magic for his...

I don't play Fortnite, but I sometimes watch a Twitch Streamer that is sometimes playing it, especially during special events. They can be fun to watch, if you're into that kind of thing. It's kinda crazy what kind of effort goes into those. THough this doesn't seem to be an event with a grant...

Deanna was an Empath (but she could communicate telepathically with other Betazoids, and her Imzadi, aka Riker.), because she was a Half-Betazoid. Lwaxana Troi was reading thoughts casually from the people around her. Tam Elbrun couldn't block out thoughts like most Betazoids, and was a very...

But Betazoids are telpaths, so they don't really need sign language among each other, they can just talk telepathically. However, if the daughter must suppress her telepathic abilities for health reasons, she can't use it with her father, so that's why they picked up sign language as...

I mean, it might really be all about their deaf leader, but I wonder if that psychic shield might also come at a prize to the Betazoid telepathic abilities. They definitely need ways to communicate non-telepathically if they are also protecting several non-Betazoid worlds. Unless those all...

I think the choice is based on theme, not on previous mechanics. If the Sorceror is using an inborn talent for magic, it wouldn't be surprising if his power set is a bit simpler, possibly with a strong theme (e.g. a dragon-blood sorceror has draconic themed powers and doesn't, say summon a...