Search results

I feel you on the players throwing a fit during the session. Is this going to kill your character? No? Then please just let me make a ruling now and we can discuss it after game. As far as the distinction in 5e (which, as we've seen, a lot of us unfortunately won't even catch unless we see...

Honestly, as someone familiar with every edition except original, it would be mechanically quite a lot like 5.0e, with a bit more old school sensibilities (typically of the type that doesn't annoy newer players much, so yes to more daily resources attrition, big no to permaren't stat loss). I...

I'm fine with in-combat healing in 5.0e (not switching to 5.5e) being non-optimal, but since it bugs one of my players, there is a house rule we're going to try: Magical healing also grants you temp hp equal to the hp healed. They go away after 1 minute. I'm also using a rule that you get a...

Weren't there floating earthburgs in the sky? Not sure where those are supposed to be in the Realms, and until they can place that, the retcon is about as invalid asyou can get.

Absolutely agree with the OP. I sometimes feel like I'm the only one that sees these kinds of design philosophy shifts, or that everyone else who sees them just prefers 2024's philosophy. I've played every edition from BECMI to 5e and every time I changed to a new edition it was because I...

Concentration serves an important purpose in 5e. It prevents a major power imbalance between parties that have casters who can stack multiple buffs before a battle and throw around multiple save or sucks during a battle, and those who do not. It means the game doesn't have to be built to account...

Taking into account that exposure to the 2014 rules has made it easier to notice some issues already (compared to taking a bit longer in 2014), that a few of these lean more into preference than necessarily issues, and the vagaries of memory, it still seems to me that this is a significantly...

As D&D editions go, 2014 to 2024 is a bigger change than 3.0e to 3.5e, and on average a little less than 1e to 2e, but more in some areas. I'd definitely call that a new edition. And I find the arguments that it isn't a new edition because you can still use characters from the previous one...

That's sad. I'm not going to be adopting these rules, but I was hoping the MM might give me some inspiration on how to increase the power of the monsters in the 2014 MM. The reason that would be good is that they started giving monsters higher CR in later books. I don't just mean printing...

What's interesting is that they've changed the meaning of Passive Perception substantially. Now, many people were already running it that way, but that's because the actual 2014 description wasn't terribly clear (and the designers weren't terribly consistent about it). Personally I prefer the...

Typical example: The monsters are going to invade, and you need to get the local leader to prepare, etc. Linking their resistance to the idea to a high stat (go with Wisdom rather than Int if it helps you see the issue) doesn't make sense for a Persuasion attempt, where you are by definition of...

What bothers me so much about having the DC be based on a stat of the person you're trying to influence, is that it assumes the smarter, wiser, etc the person is, the less likely your attempt to influence them is to work... Which makes sense if you are trying to deceive them, and maybe if your...

I find DPR is useful because it is simple to derived and compare. Most of the other important factors are not, so you have to go on your gut. Therefore I tend to determine DPR and use my gut to figure out how it works for the rest. Real example. I've used projected DPR of the PCs in our main...

Short of the occasional new or particularly young player, the groups I've played with have always handled violence in a way that works for me. We treat enemies with moral capability as more or less people, and we see the game as set in a world at war. Our groups almost always include good...

I like to play monsters smart, and scripts would be useful. One thing I've been doing for a long time is never have monsters flee in the first round (assuming they chose to engage and weren't just ambushed). A round is only 6 seconds, but more importantly, things are actually happening at the...

So 2002 Chainmail for the western continent and Black Moon Chronicles for the eastern. That's really interesting! Now, if only the latter had a gaming-focused write-up.

Technically the (2014) game has a mechanic for temporary exhaustion, meaning exhaustion that goes away after a short rest. However, nobody knows about it because it is only implemented in the seldom used Chase rules in the DMG. I think the concept of temporary exhaustion adds a useful tool to...

All of the above. Integrated rules and maps in the VTT. Digital versions of books open, and physical versions of the most referenced ones open also. Desktop computer and my old laptop are both open. Anything I can do to reduce search and retrieval time.

Not only do I use them in person (which hasn't happened on a while), I use them when I'm playing online--just find the most convenient place to set one up by my monitor. I like having easy access to reference materials.

The only thing I like here is all species having at least 30' of movement, and the only reason I like that is because all small monstrous humanoids already had 30' of movement, leaving that 25' as purely a "typical PC race" penalty.