D&D 5E Advanced 5th edition Dungeons & Dragons!

[dave2008]

Dexterity doesn't represent training or skill. Dexterity represents balance, agility, and hand-eye coordination. Training and skill are represented by your level.

If you equalize skill on both sides and take it out of the equation, you're left with comparing the combat ability of a burly blacksmith or farmhand who has never thrown a punch to a lanky pickpocket or juggler who has also never thrown a punch. The former is significantly more likely to injure the latter than the other way around.

Remember that a hit which doesn't deal damage is effectively a miss under D&D rules. High Dex might mean that it's easier for you to land a blow, but you're significantly less likely to inflict any real damage. The strong character might have a harder time landing a blow, but the hit that does land is going to actually hurt.

But if the blacksmith can't land a "hit" then the well balanced farmer will win. I see your point, put I don't have any real data to say how this would come out. I tend to think the stronger will win, but I also think that there is a strong bias to assume that strength equals might. So I can't be sure if this is really true or just my inherent bias that makes me think strength would win. I need more real data to make a conclusion. With the lack of real data I find it best to be more accommodating of differing interpretations.

 

[CapnZapp]

One small change that would justify a new half-edition would be getting rid of Finesse-type weapons. Make all melee weapons use Strength to hit and damage.

I'm wondering, why the focus on melee?

I would've thought the problem is ranged, that switching ranged weapons over to strength based damage is the primary concern.

Not melee. What imbalance does finesse weapons create in your opinion?


Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

 

[CapnZapp]

Adding new monster abilities is super easy.

That may be true, but there are still lots of us wishing monsters had these abilities built-in per default.



Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

 

[CapnZapp]

There's a couple magic item price documents floating around, but most are pretty arbitrary. Here's one: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8XAiXpOfz9cMWt1RTBicmpmUDg/view

Always this. This is the same "sane" list everybody is always bringing up.

I wish people would stop saying there are "a couple" such documents, when the reality is that this is the closest we get, and it is still far far away from something that fully restores the utility based thinking and pricing of 3e.

The main problem with this list is that it still uses the rarity based prices of 5e.

Sure it's a fix, but still only a quick and dirty one - still very far from a 3e era based approach.


Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

 

[Jester David]

Always this. This is the same "sane" list everybody is always bringing up.

I wish people would stop saying there are "a couple" such documents, when the reality is that this is the closest we get, and it is still far far away from something that fully restores the utility based thinking and pricing of 3e.

The main problem with this list is that it still uses the rarity based prices of 5e.

Sure it's a fix, but still only a quick and dirty one - still very far from a 3e era based approach.


Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

I've seen others, they're just less pretty.

I don't know what you mean by "rarity based prices". It includes the rarity but the price varies wildly from the DMG suggestion. You can but a rare item for 1000 and a very rare for 1500 or an uncommon for 20,000, depending on how valuable the author thought it was.

 

[Jester David]

The phrase you're looking for is "honesty" not "negativity". There's still a great amount of help to be found here, and a lot of extremely knowledgeable people. Facebook and reddit are both crap for actual discussions, facebook because you paint a giant target on your back for anything controversial, and reddit because downvotes are a means of suppressing views, but not actually refuting them. Many legitimate points on that site go un-discussed because people would simply rather bury them than admit their opposition has merit.

Your statement implies dishonesty in Facebook and Reddit. Or equates "being a jerk" with honesty. Neither is true.

I'm hanging around all three, and only ENWorld has regular flame wars and Edition wars.

If I need actual advice for my game, I'd go to the others first, because it would actually get a response. People seldom offer advice here. Those threads are ignored and vanish. Ditto a rules question. There are a ton of knowledgeable people on both. But the discussion is far less likely to descend into angry debate.

The D&D Reddit is actually one of the better Reddits I've seen. Because it's apolitical and hobby based (and there's no Edition Warriors fighting proxy edition wars) it's far less toxic and there's far less subversion of down voting.
And there's soooo much continual creativity there. Mapping. Art. Miniatures. The UA subreddit with continual home brew.

As for painting a target on your back.... if you hold opinions and don't really what to let people know you hold those opinions without the veil of anonymity... what's the point? If you can only express your views when behind a mask, are those views worth having? If it's going to upset people so much that you don't want the, knowing your real name, why are you saying it and upsetting people?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

[Smacks palm against forehead. Again]. [RANT] Guys, guys, you do know that AC in D&D has NEVER represented how hard it is to HIT something; it has ALWAYs represented how hard it is to HURT something. That's why every hit causes at least 1 point of damage (barring actual immunity to that kind of damage). How hard something is to HIT, irrespective of damage, is always represented by some other mechanic. In various incarnations of D&D it's been "save vs Breath Weapon", "Reflex save", "Dex save", "touch AC" etc. etc.

Now somebody give me a 5-page dissertation on why armour should provide damage reduction instead of AC, and let me show you my Smack Down of Inestimable Torture.[/RANT]

Cheers, Al'Kelhar

Misses don't do damage. AC has no effect on how much damage you take if you are hit, it only affects whether or not you are hit.

 

[CapnZapp]

I don't know what you mean by "rarity based prices".

I mean that the "Sane" pricelist might be an improvement over the DMG prices, but at the end of the day, it is still only a reaction to the DMG prices - a "quick fix" as it were.

So the underlying basis of the prices are still rarity-based, that is, the idea that something "very rare" is a hundred times more valuable than something "uncommon", for example.

But that's no way to create support for a magic item economy. It simply makes not a lick of sense to model magic items on our world's fine arts auctions.

Magic items are first and firemost tools. Things adventurers use and need to survive. The market for rich people to just hang magic swords on their walls is utterly secondary in this regard.

What you need to do is to look at the utility of magic items. (And ideally, the utility of components of magic items - the individual bonuses and powers of items, such as "+2" or "flaming" or "lightning resistance")

An adventurer doesn't care about "rarity", she cares about utility - how useful the thing is to her.

I would say a proper and sturdy improvement of the 3e system updated and fine tuned for 5e is the last major subsystem needed in order to truly support the 3e playstyle.

 

[Nebulous]

Bring back the Random Harlot Table for AD&D (5th edition).

Cheers, Al'Kelhar

YES, please

 

[Nebulous]

I'd like to see damage reduction make a return, not just a blanket 50% resistance.