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I envy you. I have tried to get my players to do this, but they are old grognards and wargamers (as am I, BTW) and they like to tactic every move out. This makes even 5e encounters drag a bit (nothing like 3e...oh my God!). I find it difficult to believe people cannot pre-plan their actions...

This is not a sarcastic or rhetorical question. What does the D&D community mean by "optimal" and "suboptimal"? The word optimal itself means the best. By that definition, there is one and only one best build for a given aspect of play and everything else is, by definition, suboptimal...

I think people are not understanding the word "optimize". Definition: make the best or most effective use of (a situation, opportunity, or resource). Best and most are the key words here. We are not talking about simply increasing effectiveness. Optimize means squeezing every last drop of...

I find this to be true and not true for me. What I mean is, for example, I have wandering encounter charts for my world. I also have every monster charted for its geographical location/habitat in my homebrew world (example, basilisks are native to a single mountain range in my world). So in...

While your analysis is correct for homebrews, many campaigns use printed modules (such as the official adventure paths) and many DMs are reluctant to alter those encounters. Therefore, players can beat the curve in those instances.

Read The Hobbit in 1972 when I was 6 years old. Fell in love with fantasy genre. In 1974 I read LOTR. My uncle, who played in one of the very early Cal Tech D&D groups tried to introduce me to this game that he said was like playing LOTR. I was too scared (being 7 years old) and declined. On my...

The problem they have to fret over is the fact that classes are the most difficult addition to the game to balance properly and playtest properly and is the largest contributor to system bloat. Because most games allow multiclassing, every new class or subclass has to be evaluated with every...

You'd be surprised what a group of over intelligent (as most D&Ders tend to be) people can deduce given enough time and experience. I have no doubt that it would become apparent over time to many players.

The problem with adding all of this proposed material for new settings is that it will greatly contribute to what went wrong with 3e. Every time a race or class or subclass is added to 5e, the opportunity for things to get thrown out of balance expands geometrically, as you then have to...

Except when the players realize this and game the system. The problem with what you've proposed is that it penalizes players for finding ways to easily defeat encounters. The players are incentivized to do just enough to defeat the encounter so that it seems tough and they can rack up more XP. I...

Give the sorcerer a special one time item that casts Tenser's Transformation on him (no concentration required). Since the spell effects are balanced for a wizard, there should be no balance issues for the sorcerer to use it. Then watch him charge!

Could someone check my "math"? In Volo's Guide, the Blackguard in the NPC stats section does 1d6+2 damage with a shortbow. This seems wrong to me. I think it should be 1d6+0. Can anyone tell me if I am wrong and, if so, why? Thanks.

I use the optional variant where wands have 25 charges and then are destroyed. Even the lowly wand of magic missiles, without this change, is unbalancing at lower levels (18d4+18 damage during an adventuring day that automatically hits is a lot of fire power). And there is just too much...

There are more D&D references on the van. There is a froghemoth on the side.

That's fine, though I do take issue with the idea that d6s instead of d8s make that big of deal. That's a difference of 1 hp per level. 10 hp at 10th level or 15 hp at 15th level is not going to make a difference. In fact, it is the EXACT same difference as between a fighter at 15th level with...

No worries. I was just addressing the OP's concern that there are all these clunky ways to squeeze out a second SA in a round, so why not just embed that into the rules in the first place? By your response, it is apparent that, in your play, rogues are not squeezing out second or multiple SAs...

I think part of the reason the OP is getting a lot of responses that he considers not on topic is because he essentially made a single point: that rogues should not have a clunky mechanic for optimizing their SA, and then befuddled it with contentions that rogues are not proper glass cannons...

Druids of the Moon are a funny class. They are probably overpowered at very low levels. After all, a 2nd level moon druid can turn into a giant hyena twice per short rest, which basically means 90 hp plus the druid's starting hp. Assume a 14 Con and you effectively have a 2nd level PC with about...

Nope. It says when a creatures enters it for the FIRST TIME on a turn. So it can enter and leave multiple times on a turn and only take the damage once. SORRY...did not notice this was a zombie thread. Rest in peace little thread. Rest in peace.

To clarify even further...the original rule in 1e was NOT cumulative. Page 105 of the PHB makes it very clear that it is not. Gygax then issued an addendum buried in the write up of the Thief-Acrobat class in an issue of Dragon Magazine...official per se but not likely widely disseminated back...