D&D 5E What Single Thing Would You Add

TwoSix · Apr 1, 2021

Faolyn said:
That being said, you still haven't said which incarnation of psionics was done "right." I honestly do want to know what you consider to be a good D&D psionics system.

I'm not Ruin Explorer, but I would argue that the 3.5 psionic system (especially the portion expanded upon in Pathfinder 1e by Dreamscarred Press) was a good psionic system, and certainly superior to the 3.5/PF magic system.

I'd also argue for Spheres of Power, for both 3.5 and 5e, having a spell system that contains psionics and is superior to both the the 3.5 and 5e magic system.

Tales and Chronicles · Apr 1, 2021

Schools of magic useful to make a thematic mages from all other non-D&D fictions:
Fire magic, Ice Magic, Blood Magic, Beast Magic, etc

Ruin Explorer · Apr 1, 2021

Faolyn said:
So instead of one system that's not great, you'd have one system that's not great plus a system that is one or more of (A) just like the first one, but we'll pretend it's different, (B) overly complicated, and (C) either underpowered or overpowered. I can forgive the foibles of the magic system (especially since I find it much improved in 5e), but both magic and psionics is a bit much for me.

This isn't a rational or reasonable approach, sorry mate. There's no actual reason it necessarily has to be those things.

Faolyn said:
And that's not even getting into game questions of how psionics and magic affect one another or what powers brings to the table that magic doesn't, or shouldn't (do we go so far as to edit the spell lists so there are things that only psionicists can do, in the same way there are spells only wizards can cast?). Or worldbuilding questions of why and how both things exist in the same world.

These are utter trivialities, especially in 5E. Not real concerns at all.

Faolyn said:
That being said, you still haven't said which incarnation of psionics was done "right." I honestly do want to know what you consider to be a good D&D psionics system.

I liked the 2E, 3.5E, and 4E systems.

2E worked weirdly well, it was breakable, but it was the 1990s, let's not pretend everything wasn't breakable, but it was a fun system that a lot of players seemed to like, at least who I played with it. It certainly didn't seem over or under powered, particularly.

3.5E is a bit Marvel/comic-book for my liking, but it was quite fun and worked pretty well. Better than most things in 3.XE did anyway.

4E's psionics stuff was just beautiful. Obviously hard to translate to other editions in terms of mechanics, but the fluff and classes was really cool.

5E's Mystic was absolutely fine and the only thing wrong with it was it needed about 1-2 more rounds of balancing. It would have been perfectly good. WotC got obsessed with their own dumb metric which would have stopped them ever adding a full caster, and applied a double-standard, and we didn't get it. I feel pretty sure if the Mystic came out today, they wouldn't apply the same foolish metric in the same mindless way, because it's a very different WotC now.

Lanefan · Apr 1, 2021

Not so much a single thing but more a general category of things I'd like to see added (back) in: Bad Stuff.

Stuff that can happen to characters beyond, or instead of, simple loss of hit points:

--- level loss
--- save-or-die (be it by spell, massive damage, or whatever)
--- equipment and-or wealth loss
--- permanent stat loss (e.g. in 1e on revival from death you came back down a Con point)
--- unrevivable death, be it due to your corpse dissolving or due to a failed revival roll

CleverNickName · Apr 1, 2021

Gorg said:
Dammit- you took mine!

So, I guess it'd have to be the older version of the alignment system. A) I LIKED how spells like protection from Evil, Dispel evil, and stuff like that worked. As well as aligned items like weapons.

and also B) because it would annoy all those who've been annoying the rest of us with I HATE ALIGNMENT screeds for decades now.

I like the old alignment system too, and I liked how spells like Detect Evil worked. But I can also see where a lot of the "I hate alignment" crowd is coming from. I don't think it's a problem with alignment as a whole, though. To me, it feels like a problem with how the players and the DM have been using it.

Some players want these spells (and by extension, the whole alignment system) to be a shortcut or substitution for roleplaying. For example, they try to use detect evil as a "lie detector test," because they want to assume that an evil creature is incapable of telling the truth whenever it's convenient (which is false), and a good creature is unable to tell a lie whenever it is necessary (which is also false). Trying to use detect evil to solve a murder case, as if good-aligned people are incapable of killing and evil people can't help themselves around knives. And so on. Over time, of course the DM is going to hate that.

And certain DMs do this as well, but they take it even further: using it as a shortcut for moral dilemmas and no-win scenarios. You know, something they could point to and say "Ah ha! Gotcha!" whenever the player inevitably did something the DM didn't want them to do. And of course the players are going to hate that.

So I get the hate, I really do. But I feel like it's misdirected from lazy roleplaying.

cbwjm · Apr 1, 2021

I would add/alter the cleric into the generic "priest" class. Domains can still be chosen but they would only grant domain spells and a thematic channel divinity power. For the subclass I would add in things like Crusader (priest focusing on combat), Mystic (priest focusing on delving into the deeper mysteries of magic), shaman (tribal priest, deals with spirits), and runecaster (honestly, I just like the name but I don't know what I would do with this one).

cbwjm · Apr 1, 2021

Oofta said:
So it was easy because you had the numbers already printed out ... which you could do right now if it matters.

THAC0 was confusing for a lot of people, addition is easier for most people. Especially when adding bonuses really meant subtracting.

The attack bonus currently used in 5e is also confusing to many. I've seen many people not know whether or not they can add their proficiency bonus, which stat do they use. I don't think it really matters which is used, there will always be some people that have difficulty with what many others consider easy to do.

Faolyn · Apr 1, 2021

Ruin Explorer said:
This isn't a rational or reasonable approach, sorry mate. There's no actual reason it necessarily has to be those things.

Not wanting two things that are both not great but cover the same ground isn't rational or reasonable? Seriously?

No, there's no reason that it "has" to be those things, but they usually are.

Ruin Explorer said:
These are utter trivialities, especially in 5E. Not real concerns at all.

Those are extremely major issues, not trivialities at all. Literally the entire reason to even have psionics in the first place is in those questions. Sure, you can say "because I like psionics, that's why" as your reason to have them both, and that's fine for your game but not for the game.

Ruin Explorer said:
5E's Mystic was absolutely fine and the only thing wrong with it was it needed about 1-2 more rounds of balancing. It would have been perfectly good. WotC got obsessed with their own dumb metric which would have stopped them ever adding a full caster, and applied a double-standard, and we didn't get it. I feel pretty sure if the Mystic came out today, they wouldn't apply the same foolish metric in the same mindless way, because it's a very different WotC now.

At the time, I was posting only on reddit, in r/dndnext. My experience there tells me about a third of the people who talked about the Mystic--any of its incarnations--liked it, a third were ambivalent, and a third hated it. And that some of the people who liked it ended up not liking after playing it, and some of the people who didn't like it liked it after playing it (I can't honestly recall anyone saying that they loved it, though).

And I, personally, prefer the archetypes approach. My Psi Knight is quite enjoyable, and this way I don't have to learn another spellcasting method.

Charlaquin · Apr 1, 2021

I’m gonna cheat and give two answers: a practical one and a pie-in-the-sky one.

Practical answer: Non-AC defenses. It would be a simple thing to achieve and wouldn’t require a total overhaul of any systems to make work. You kind of have them in spell save DCs and their analogues for specific non-magical features that force saves. But they’re applied backwards. Have the active party always roll against the passive party’s NADs and you’ll finally have a consistent unified action resolution system.

Pie-in-the-sky answer: Pathfinder 2e’s action economy. You’d basically have to re-write every spell and every combat action in the game to pull it off, which I feel is against the spirit of the question. But it was the one design innovation PF2 made that made me go “that’s awesome, I wish D&D had that!”

Man, I want so badly to mash up the best bits of 4e, 5e, and PF2.

delericho · Apr 1, 2021

Bloodied.

Not just as an easy measure for "this creature is visibly wounded" (which I do anyway), but also for things like having monsters behave differently as they take damage, or indeed having them behave differently when the PCs take damage.

D&D 5E What Single Thing Would You Add

TwoSix

Dirty, realism-hating munchkin powergamer

Tales and Chronicles

Jewel of the North, formerly know as vincegetorix

Ruin Explorer

Legend

Lanefan

Victoria Rules

CleverNickName

Limit Break Dancing

cbwjm

Seb-wejem

cbwjm

Seb-wejem

Faolyn

(she/her)

Charlaquin

Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)

delericho

Legend

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