D&D 5E Anything You Miss From Past Editions vs 5E?

[77IM]

A meaningful ritual system. 4E's ritual system broke down at high levels (well, mid levels, really) but 5E's feels like it was slapped on at the last minute. Every time I read a spell description with a casting time longer than 1 action and is not a ritual, I cringe.

An armor table that makes sense and isn't full of trap choices.

Warlords.

 

[GameDoc]

I *think* that, with quite a bit of work, one could make 5e work like 1e; where you look at each class' ability independently and take the best rather than just add it all together.

I think it would be fairly simple to create a PC like this. Just keep a separate character sheet for each class and update them when you gain a level in the respective class. Split your XP awards accordingly when you get them.

What may take more work is accounting for monster CRs for this type of character. I don't know how you'd determine its overall level. On the one hand it might be like having two characters, but they each get half as many turns. Also as monsters get tougher there's an assumption that your proficient bonus scales by overall level. A Fighter 6/Wizard 3 would only get a +3 bonus on weapon attacks and a +2 bonus on spells. Meanwhile his single-classed ally with 9 levels would get +4 across the board. Scale the encounters toward the multicass character and the single-class one may be overly powerful. Scale it towards the single-class and the multicass may struggle to keep up. I'm not experienced enough to know if bounded accuracy would mitigate or exacerbate the differences.

 

[Lanefan]

Huh, never saw that done. How is that functionally different from taking one level of a class at a time?

Very. In a 1e or 2e style independent-class system, if you go, say, 90% fighter 10% MU you'll start at 1-1 but your F side will be up to 4th or so before the MU bumps to 2nd. But most of your xp are still going to the F side, you don't have to use 5th-level xp numbers just to tack on a MU level; it's being dragged along as your F advances. Doesn't work worth crap in 3e, I know because I tried it.

I've seen two good character concepts use exactly this breakdown (90%F/10%MU): one was a noble who as part of her lofty position was forced to take and maintain training in magic use; she wanted to be a fighter instead, so 90-10 was the best she could do. The other was a full-on warrior who just wanted to have the MU side available to cast Identify on the cool stuff he found, along with an occasional other spell e.g. Alarm.

We (as many other groups, I think) pretty much handwaved spell recovery.

I usually handwave it too, but I still chalk off the time it takes; and a double-class with caster on both sides can easily delay the adventuring day's start until well after lunchtime.

Lan-"having sais all this I'd better go on record as saying I'm not usually much of a fan of multiclassing in any form"-efan

 

[dd.stevenson]

I *think* that, with quite a bit of work, one could make 5e work like 1e; where you look at each class' ability independently and take the best rather than just add it all together.

Perhaps I'm being daft, but I'm not seeing the difficulty. It seems like it would be enough to just declare that multiclass characters work in the same way as 3.x gestalts, except they gain only half (or one-third) xp from encounters.

I would retain 5E's rule about spell slots not stacking.

 

[Lanefan]

Perhaps I'm being daft, but I'm not seeing the difficulty. It seems like it would be enough to just declare that multiclass characters work in the same way as 3.x gestalts, except they gain only half (or one-third) xp from encounters.

I would retain 5E's rule about spell slots not stacking.

I'll have to take your word for this as I've no idea at all how 3e gestalts work, and not much of a clue as to even what they are.

Lanefan

 

[dd.stevenson]

I'll have to take your word for this as I've no idea at all how 3e gestalts work, and not much of a clue as to even what they are.

Lanefan

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/gestaltCharacters.htm

I cross-posted with you above, and I can see that I might need to now go and educate myself about 1E multiclassing. I don't remember anything like the 90%/10% thing you describe in 2E, and my hands-on 1E experiences were pretty limited.

dd-"you didn't give me a long form sig but I'm not even sore about it"- stevenson

 

[Lanefan]

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/gestaltCharacters.htm

I cross-posted with you above, and I can see that I might need to now go and educate myself about 1E multiclassing. I don't remember anything like the 90%/10% thing you describe in 2E, and my hands-on 1E experiences were pretty limited.

I'm not sure if the variable percentages was a later Dragon magazine option; I don't think it's in the core 3 1e books. We've been doing it that way for ages, though, and it had to come from somewhere.

Lan-"100% Fighter but I'll still steal things if they're left lying around"-efan

 

[Scorpio616]

Cover making you significantly harder to hit. 4 points for half cover felt worth taking up round to go for. 2 points feels like a subtle encouragement not to bother going for cover in 4E. In 5E bounded accuracy means changing anything can get cause messy quick.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

You could house-rule in the 4e version of the crit rule, where a natural 20 is only a crit if the total roll would be a hit; if the bonus+20 is still shy of the AC, all the 20 does is make it into a normal hit.

I'm going to use my personal house rule, where it's only a crit if you hit by a margin of at least four. If a 16 wouldn't hit, then a 20 isn't a crit.

Even then, I don't expect it to come up much. Most things will hit on a roll of 16. This just protects the plate-clad tank from random goblins.

 

[TarionzCousin]

I am impressed that nobody has said this yet:
[sblock]THAC0[/sblock]