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Good. Since that's the side I'm mostly on, I'm glad I didn't show favoritism. :) When I said "impossibly" I meant in terms of real world toughness. Lava swimming, long falls onto rock, etc. Personally my favorite definition of HP comes, ironically, a non-level based game where they are defined...

Are players always entitled to see their own rolls? Not only are players not always entitled to see the rolls, they are not always entitled to know a roll has been made. When trying to passively notice something hidden for example. My solution is to hand out a 3X5 card at the start of each...

Warlord as an HP proxy war. :D Allow me to see if I can sum up the issue without acrimony. First, I should clarify that HP debates predate 4e. In point of fact they pre-date the Internet, and ARPA-net. Gary Gygax wrote a "clarification" of the concept way back in AD&D that muddied up the...

Incorrect. There is also Ritual Casting, Monk Ki casting, Racial spell casting (see drow), and use of a magic item at the very least. None of which use slots. In fact I don't see innate casting mentioned as a thing in the PHB.

I've been mulling over the idea for a base class centered around magical effects which are more available than spells, which necessitates a balance mechanic of some sort of, and then it occurred to me that the Rune Scribe handed me the missing element on a silver platter. A single base class...

If you want to play an Arcane Archer you need to do exactly nothing to the Ranger class. That was my first 5e PC. Enjoy the lightning arrows and hunters mark.

I agree that the 5e ranger is the best since 1e. Maybe a tad better since he isn't clearly an attempt to file the serial numbers of of Aragorn. In the survey I hope I made clear that I loath the idea of the spirit companion for a Ranger. First, as if they didn't learn from the Battlemaster ≠...

Thinking about Prestige classes, shouldn't they be just a bit more powerful than base classes? Because past 3rd level all base classes are also bringing subclasses with them, which can include some pretty significant levels of utility and power. For that matter should larger (10 level) PrCs...

For extra fun, consider: With the dual wielding feat, a shield can be used as a non-light off hand weapon to make an attack. And therefore should count as a weapon in the off hand granting an extra +1 to AC. Admittedly it's a DM call, although if you're going to allow any improvised weapon to...

Lawrence Watts Evans Ethshar novels are fun to read, and occasionally thought provoking. The Night of Madness is the best exploration of the need for and purpose of magicians guilds that I've ever read. I tend to prefer fantasy novels that are less D&D like, and they give me more interesting...

I just came up with a theory for why the Warlord wasn't in the PHB. It's because the Ardent is a really obvious subclass of warlord, but they didn't have the psionics rules in place yet, so they decided to wait. And with that thought, any ideas for other Warlord sub-classes?

There is a current running through this behind the scenes, which has been with us for as long as D&D has existed. The magic as technology debate. Now magic, in fantasy literature, was originally the province of bad guys, or at least dubious ones. In pulp fiction the heroes were bronzed...

I was about to agree that the form is fixed because the warlocks power says "You can choose the form that this melee weapon takes each time you create it." and when you bind a magic weapon you summon it from an interdimensional space, you don't create it. However I then noticed that in the...

The goal here to to achieve something like the battlemaster, but without having to deal with the throttling effect of having to expend a limited resource, yes? What if you invert the recharge mechanic? Every time you use the ability roll a d6. If you roll higher than the number of times you've...

I think I've made it clear that YMMV so I'm not interested in having an argument, but out of curiosity could you name some of these people who made major advancements in, and were acknowledged as masters of, fields in which they had no training, knowledge, or access to existing materials...

I like the set-up although I wouldn't straight up steal a riddle from the Hobbit, it's too much of a gimmie. Does it make sense that her ancestors would have put a minotaur skeleton down there? For a bloodine test, you can't beat drawing real blood, although what should draw the blood is up to...

Are you familiar with the old Guild Apprenticeship system? It's still sort of used in some trades. A master craftsmen accepts children (generally 12-14) as apprentices. They spend 7 years learning their craft (and serving as cheap labour), and then they become Journeymen, who are junior members...

People do not, in their idle time around the campfire after an otherwise busy day of adventuring, invent for themselves Shao-Lin Kung Fu, or recreate Arcane magic, the D&D equivalent of high energy physics. These disciplines were invented by large numbers of people, across long spans on time...

Why is everyone discussing spell casting progression? It's a lousy PrC for casters, it's not bad for non-casters or 1/2 or 1/3 casters. You don't need spells to get into it, just Knowledge Arcana. That having been said, I don't know who would actually take this class. If you have a rune, you...

Interesting, but also violently contrary to about 30 years of D&D tradition. Classically loss of spell casting power is one of the first signs used by GMs who want to tell PCs that they have gone astray. If that's the way it was in 4e, that's fine, but I don't think it's a default assumption in...