D&D 5E Are 5e Saving Throws Boring?

[jasper]

Psst what is a record player? Is someone reading my high school records? Hey I took Latin because I got tired of looking up Latin Phrases that appeared in my fiction.

 

[dave2008]

If the only changes you made were to increase the stakes of saving throws and reduce the availability of healing, the game would be a bloodbath.

Well, maybe that is what the OP is looking for. That makes the game more tense!

 

[Coroc]

Psst what is a record player? Is someone reading my high school records? Hey I took Latin because I got tired of looking up Latin Phrases that appeared in my fiction.

A record player is the device with which you did play those vinyl discs, and some DJs used them for scratching. The disc would be rotating and the mechanical arm attached on the corner of the device, with a tiny needle made out of a crystal, would touch into the spiral groove of the vinyl disc.
Cut into that groove is the music coded as tiny indents. This mechanical vibration of induced into the crystal needle is converted to electricity within the arm by using electromagnetic or piezoelectric effects and then amplified so it is audible in the speakers.
If you rip the arm of such a player it does two things, it makes a nasty noise (Like a DJ scratching but far worse) and it ruins the vinyl disc.

 

[GMMichael]

A big aspect of whether saving throws, or attack rolls, etc. are exciting is whether failure is allowed.

In a game where the party are not allowed to fail their task then there isn't tension. "They know they will just heal up after the fight."

. . . TPKs or individual character deaths, while rare, also create tension when possible.

This. It's not the Saving Throws that are humdrum. It's the consequences. @Saelorn is right about the bounded accuracy - the game assumes you're going to get hit/spell affected, but that you'll live on because there are at least three different systems for preventing PC death.

For the OP though: treat Saves like reactions. They might be more interesting if a player considers them a limited resource (once per round, maybe?).

 

[dave2008]

Of possible interest to @NaturalZero , the OP, @Saelorn and others: a RPG kickstarter that @Egg Embry just linked to in his weekly article might just have what your looking for: The World's Greatest Role-Playing Game: The Zine It plans to include the following (among other things):

• Investigation mechanics for 5e - Turn your dunegon crawl into an archaelogical mystery or adapt 5e for a modern detective story using an optional investigation system inspired by the GUMSHOE system by Robin Laws and published by Pelegrane Press.
• Complications on failed rolls - What if you could take away the pass/fail aspect of attack rolls and make those failures add excitement and tension to your game? We're looking into an optional rule that would apply story-based complications onto those failures to keep players on their toes during a wicked battle.
• Alternate death rules- Feel like living on the edge with your characters? Strip away those death saves and walk on the wild side with some alternate rules that could actually make you wish someone memorized a raise dead spell.

 

[Egg Embry]

Of possible interest to @NaturalZero , the OP, @Saelorn and others: a RPG kickstarter that @Egg Embry just linked to in his weekly article might just have what your looking for: The World's Greatest Role-Playing Game: The Zine It plans to include the following (among other things):

• Investigation mechanics for 5e - Turn your dunegon crawl into an archaelogical mystery or adapt 5e for a modern detective story using an optional investigation system inspired by the GUMSHOE system by Robin Laws and published by Pelegrane Press.
• Complications on failed rolls - What if you could take away the pass/fail aspect of attack rolls and make those failures add excitement and tension to your game? We're looking into an optional rule that would apply story-based complications onto those failures to keep players on their toes during a wicked battle.
• Alternate death rules- Feel like living on the edge with your characters? Strip away those death saves and walk on the wild side with some alternate rules that could actually make you wish someone memorized a raise dead spell.

Thanks for the shout out, dave2008!

 

[dave2008]

For the OP though: treat Saves like reactions. They might be more interesting if a player considers them a limited resource (once per round, maybe?).

I like that idea and wanted to try it, but never did. The reason I didn't: I decided that some saves should require a reaction (Dex saves) but for some it probably didn't make sense. Once I came to that conclusion I lost interest in trying to decide which saves should require a reaction and which ones should not.

 

[Laurefindel]

Although this bugged me for a while; I'm at peace with 5e D&D save mechanics now. If anything it's the "successful save negates" that I find boring; but that has more to do with the spells themselves than save mechanics.

 

[Ashrym]

I find true save or die is only exciting when the characters are making the save. Up to that point they have tension and like having saved. That's not what happens when they fail the save. At that point they're no longer invested in playing until they can be returned to play and can get frustrated. If returning them to play is too trivial then the save or die is also trivial.

Saving throws that create in-combat timers work better, imo.

If a person really wants to make saving throws less boring, shout something corny and throw the dice REALLY REALLY hard.

 

[Sacrosanct]

One of the big reasons why I liked the more deadly saving throw failure risks (like in TSR D&D) is not so much because it made death or sucking a lot more common, but because it added an element to the game that is missing now. That being, robust adventure planning.

When you're playing AD&D, when you're heading out for your adventure, you make sure you have antidotes, you make sure the casters have neutralize poison handy. You made sure your equipment was set up to handle as many situations as possible. If you expected undead or magic immune monsters, you planned for that and made sure you had other options. Load up on holy water, sliver weapons, etc.

In recent editions, it seems this is for the most part lost.

"Poison is just a little bit of extra damage, so no need to prepare neutralize poison when I can just cast another blaster spell."

"Undead? Meh. Just more bags of hit points and we'll fight them like every other encounter. Gee, this game is boring.."

"There's almost no way I am going to fail two saves in a row, so I won't even bother averting my gaze against the medusa and just fight her like everything else."

If modern saving throws suck as a mechanic, it's because the effects of failing have been neutered so much that they become an annoyance rather than something that has a big impact to your PC.