D&D 5E Arcane Rules- What is your favorite "hidden" rule in 5e?

[Azurewraith]

Delericho,
In reality, D&D is like Monopoly, but moreso. It has the gradual accretion of gamer's knowledge of old versions (and the baggage they bring in), gamer's table rules from prior games, and gamer's levels of sophistication. D&D has always been a game involving houserules. So, *in practice*, the ruleset has only been the starting point.

Quoted for truth we have never used material components for spells since i began playing in 3e i have recently taught a new group the rules and one guy asked why Chromatic orb did a level 1 spell did so much damage my reply was "it needs a 50gp diamond to cast it as a component, oh wait ye some spells need components to cast most are covered by your casting focus or component pouch but ones with cost arnt but components aint cool so forget we ever had this conversation"

 

[delericho]

I don't want to get all philosophical on you, but what you ask for doesn't exist, either in reality or in theory.

No, perfection doesn't exist. But we can still aim for better.

Where a rule is "hidden" because the books are poorly organised, that's a design flaw that can be corrected and that should be corrected next time there's a revision.

Where a rule is "hidden" because the text explains it poorly, that's a design flaw that can be correct and that should be corrected next time there's a revision.

Where two rules are contradictory, either accidentally or deliberately, that's a design flaw that can be corrected and that should be corrected - probably immediately through errata, but certainly by the next time there's a revision.

I don't think asking for these improvements is unreasonable. And nor should it be a requirement that we be able to attain perfection before we proceed to make things better. The perfect is the enemy of the good.

 

[Quartz]

My favourite is that under the basic rules an adult human cannot have a stat of 3.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[delericho]

We'll try one final time. Your desires cannot be met within reason.

It is impossible to rewrite the game to be better organised?

For example (to use the 1e analogy) the monk was written as having the same attack table as the their; this was corrected in the DMG to the attack table for the cleric.

The 1st Ed books are almost legendary for their poor organisation. And this sort of correction is exactly the sort of thing that would go in a revised edition - had 2nd Edition not dropped Monks entirely, you can bet the 2nd Ed PHB would not have made this mistake.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[delericho]

Yes, things can always be better organized. Things can have indices. There's a wealth of material (some of it is even peer-reviewed) out there regarding how to best present different type of rule-sets. But you cannot have-
(1) rules that interact with other rules; and
(2) rules that modify other rules; and
(3) rules that create exceptions to other rules; and
(4) increasing numbers of rules; and
(5) rules written in English (or any other language) which is inherently subject to ambiguity; without

(6) error, both fundamental and as applied.

Which was why I said they should aim for better, not perfection.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[delericho]

No offense, but ....

I find a request for fewer typos in a thread about cool rules a little banal.

It was rather more than that, but whatever.