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Dedicated Healing or Champion's Reaction or Shield Block generally fixes that up, since they can undo a lot of the damage, that's what our parties tend to do.

They already are according to them, specifically the TTRPG market is just that much bigger now that they can be doing far and away the best they ever have been.

It depends a little bit on party, but pretend you've got a Wizard, Cleric, Fighter, Thief (Rogue), and a Bard The Fighter and Rogue (and/or Cleric depending on doctrine) will generally flank, leading to a +2 to their attacks, this also provides multiple targets to soak the boss's damage, let's...

When you do succeed, it is disproportionately effective, especially as a caster where even a low level fear spell is super likely to knock a point off their AC that stacks with flat footed (if not 2 from a failed throw) and the parties buffs, demoralize is very common as well due to Charisma...

I like the tall boss fights because to me (a player who started with 4e and loves it dearly) the wide boss fights don't feel the way boss fights should-- they don't feel like you're punching up at something super powerful because the HP values are generally hidden, so your larger damage numbers...

That might also be changes in consumer habits with no cons the last couple of years and their newer fans being less in-the-scene, and the growth in subscriptions. if i had gone to gencon this year in person, my copy of Dark Archive still would have had come in the mail weeks before so i could...

Flaming Sphere did have uses for me in boss fights, but my best memories of it were from pack fights.

Wizards get an extra spell from their school, I was indeed playing my evocation wizard (the blasting Wizard), and a universalist could do it as well by simply restoring their blasting spells via the universalist version of drain bonded item. Largely I prefer the feel of the way it's balanced...

I've had great success with Flaming Sphere, Magic Missile, Sudden Bolt, Lightning Bolt, Fireball, Disintegrate (+True Strike), against single targets. Take Lightning Bolt for instance on a base level 5 Wizard that just got it, cast against a Level 8 Chimera-- the base level 5 wizard has a spell...

I think there are four markets that all compromise on DND: - Story centric players who don't like the war game elements who would be better off with indie PBTA style games. - Mechanically invested people who like character building and mechanical texture and game balance and would be better...

I think part of what I refer to as backloading are things that let the core DND experience shine through, by moving away from the upfront tactical presentation of 4e they made players less likely to see it as a complex tactics game for nerds, you can more or less ignore magic items and...

From the 4th edition Wandering Swordmage Paragon Path, it really sold me on the idea of a wandering swordsman/ magic user, and sold the whole fantasy of them as a lightly armored traveler with an eclectic martial arts style that includes magic--I can just imagine her teleporting around to strike...

Heh, I'm more cynical, I think that the narrative can complexify, people do have brand loyalty to DND, but the 'new coke' branding of 4e actually triggered a backlash due to that sense of loyalty, 'fixing the problems of 3.5' was understood as an attack on people who enjoyed 3.5. I actually...

The whole thing is exacerbated by the fact that 5e is the 'blue ocean' game, which means that it's creating new TTRPGs players, which further complicates things because most of the people playing it didn't have a point of comparison until they try something else. But that naturally means that 5e...

In practice, your big bang spells are pretty effective in boss fights, but it's a small ball approach because you're getting 'success' effects on your spells more often than martials can hit, which is usually half damage. So you get a lot of 'runs on the board' and a high overall DPR, until the...

I think the issue is, nothing is universal, there are people who swear by every edition of DND-- so the presence of people who either don't have, don't notice, or don't mind the problems is neither here nor there if you do have issues with it, and their issues with it are neither here nor there...

In 2008 I think everyone would have been enraged by 5e in a "they ended 3.5 for this?" Kind of way. A lot of the initial affection for it was a 'return' to pre 4e mechanics after all, its very much linked into that cultural context of a romanticized return to form.

Actually that was deliberate usually by power source-- The class had a designated role, but each power source had a role it was associated with that made every class in it have a little of that capability tucked into its powers and mechanics. For example, Arcane was associated with the...

The first thing is actually recommended by the rulebook, because having the opposition make steady progress is just easier and the difficulty of the chase is meant to be derived from the objectives-- it makes progress easier to track, it also just has this positive side effect. Paizo stumbled...

I personally liked 4e's class design, but I imagine lots of people would tell you its a spectrum where 4e just wasn't in the sweet spot of balanced asymmetry due to its starting point of symetrical feature and power structure and that similar balance could have still been achieved while creating...