Micah Sweet
Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
Nor mine.
D&D (2024) It Is 2025 And Save Or Suck Spells Still Suck (the fun out of the game)
- Thread starter Reynard
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Micah Sweet
Level Up & OSR Enthusiast
Not sure how much of a difference that makes. IMO, if the GM is unhappy you're not going to have a great game.
I agree if the DM is unhappy it is an issue but, I have also found that the DM has too much information (expecially in D&D ) to have a good perspective on how the players find the fights. It is my experience that players find fight more scary and tense than DM, even DMs that are players. The perspective of sitting behind the screen and knowing everyone's hit points changes things a lot.
I have had to opportunity to see a control caster use spells like Tasha's and the like and while it can be frustrating for the DM the players have found those fights to be very memorable. This has changed my perspective quite a lot.
I am not running a wargame, and if the players are happy and found that the fight was tense, it does not really matter that I saw it as a one sided cakewalk and I am not telling them that it was either.
It's fine, but one thing to consider is that I don't think the GM is a performer there to entertain the players. The GM is a participant, too. Yes, they have a different role and responsibilities, but their fun is important too. If the system undermines that, it isn't a good system, any more than it would be if it undermined player enjoyment.
(Note: this changes when running at cons or as a paid GM.)
overgeeked
Open-World Sandbox
Exactly. What’s the purpose of the fight? Is it to challenge the PCs or make them feel awesome. 5E combat is designed so all fights are there to make the PCs feel awesome, i.e. be a cakewalk. If you expect a 5E fight to be a challenge, you have to do a whole lot more work than throw RAW stat blocks at the party.
This is exactly why the 2014 wording was good, and the 2024 wording ruined the spell. I agree it's unreasonable to order the sidekick to simply leave, but a very cleverly worded suggestion can do the same thing. For example: "Hike to the nearest village and tell them we're under attack!" That accomplishes basically the same thing as "Leave and don't return," right? But as a DM, I'd be forced to accept that. And I'd accept it with a big smile, because I love it when my players are creative.
Yes, that's still too powerful for a second-level spell, but at least in that case we're rewarding the ingenuity of the player. Giving an outrageously powerful benefit as an award for great play seems fine to me. Remove the requirement for great play, or honestly even good play, and now it's just unbalanced.
(Edited for spelling)
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Totally if you do not enjoy the system by all means run a different one. However, I have never run a modern version of D&D where the "tension" from the DM's perspective can be dialled up on demand. One can make hard or deadly encounters and some of them can be very clutch for the players, and some can be trivialised by a spell choice or powerset.
In part, because one cannot predict what attrition the party suffers before the encounter. The closest version of modern D&D came to it was 5e but at the cost of a lot of in combat which could result in very long resolution times (especially out of turn powers).
I think, to create such encounters the characters would have to enter every combat at more or less full power.
Flights of Fancy
Candy is King
Yep, the 2024 wording ruined it completely. It was already powerful, now it is just plain stupid strong for 2nd level...
I think it is fine. Knock him prone while grappling if you want advantage.
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
I'd also accept the first one but not the second, as one of the provisos I put on Suggestion is that the suggested action has to have a definable point of completion.
"Hike to the nearest village and tell them we're under attack" is perfect; once those things have been done the suggested action is complete and the spell ends.
"Leave and don't return" has no end point.
"Leave and don't return for an hour" is a gray area, I usually ask for a more specific action as part of the suggestion.
In earlier editions Suggestion was a 3rd-level spell, perhaps jumping it back up to that is a partial solution?
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