D&D 5E Bad Sage Advice?

[Wasteland Knight]

So he puts things in Sage Advice that could make sense from a certain point of view, but which most people would consider ridiculous on their face. Mainly just to get people to stop listening to him as the be-all-and-end-all of rules questions and just inspire them to decide the correct interpretation on their own.

If that’s true, my opinion of WOTC world drop even lower than it is now.

SA is the technical authority on D&D. No technical authority should ever put out bad information just to make some sort of point.

it’s entirely reasonable to state an area is a grey zone, and needs to be resolved on a case by case basis.

 

[Wasteland Knight]

I don't know if he does that with D&D, but it is part of the WotC philosophy. They've admitted to making crappy MTG cards in order to make the good cards stand out. If all the cards were good, then good becomes average.

Making Rare cards better than Uncommon which are better than Common cards is totally different from purposefully making bad rulings.’

 

[Maxperson]

Making Rare cards better than Uncommon which are better than Common cards is totally different from purposefully making bad rulings.’

No no. I'm not talking about one rarity being better than another. They make cards that are flat out bad and will never be used, just to make good cards, regardless of rarity, stand out.

 

[DEFCON 1]

if that was actually the case he’s a terrible developer. The point of development of a game is to make it run well.

throwing stupid rules into the mix on purpose is literally the opposite of that

It does run well, if you do what you are supposed to. You use the rules you have to play your game and anything that doesn't seem to work for you, you make a ruling in the moment and move on.

That is the actual way the game was developed for play. But some people refuse to play it that way. They use the rules they have and when they find one they don't, they go running to the company that made the game to fix it for them. And regardless of how many times Jeremy tells people "Read the book, what do the rules say? Make a ruling based on that." they still insist on someone else to make their ruling for them.

At that point, since they are deliberately going against the way the game was built to be played... I don't think Jeremy feels the need to contribute to that refusal. Long story short... if you don't want bad Sage Advice... don't ask for it in the first place. Make the rulings yourself like you are supposed to do.

 

[Don Durito]

It does run well, if you do what you are supposed to. You use the rules you have to play your game and anything that doesn't seem to work for you, you make a ruling in the moment and move on.

That is the actual way the game was developed for play. But some people refuse to play it that way. They use the rules they have and when they find one they don't, they go running to the company that made the game to fix it for them. And regardless of how many times Jeremy tells people "Read the book, what do the rules say? Make a ruling based on that." they still insist on someone else to make their ruling for them.

At that point, since they are deliberately going against the way the game was built to be played... I don't think Jeremy feels the need to contribute to that refusal. Long story short... if you don't want bad Sage Advice... don't ask for it in the first place. Make the rulings yourself like you are supposed to do.

From what I understand this goes way back to the beginning. I believe Gygax and co were originally reluctant to implement Sage Advice because they just couldn't believe people were coming to them with these questions rather than figuring things out for themselves.

 

[FrogReaver]

It does run well, if you do what you are supposed to. You use the rules you have to play your game and anything that doesn't seem to work for you, you make a ruling in the moment and move on.

That is the actual way the game was developed for play. But some people refuse to play it that way. They use the rules they have and when they find one they don't, they go running to the company that made the game to fix it for them. And regardless of how many times Jeremy tells people "Read the book, what do the rules say? Make a ruling based on that." they still insist on someone else to make their ruling for them.

At that point, since they are deliberately going against the way the game was built to be played... I don't think Jeremy feels the need to contribute to that refusal. Long story short... if you don't want bad Sage Advice... don't ask for it in the first place. Make the rulings yourself like you are supposed to do.

I used to hate how Mearls would answer Twitter questions, but I do kind of miss the, this is how I would run it responses over what we have now.

 

[Cadence]

No no. I'm not talking about one rarity being better than another. They make cards that are flat out bad and will never be used, just to make good cards, regardless of rarity, stand out.

Draft and sealed tournaments are things though, where the bad cards have a place.

And in constructed, if everything has to be good enough to see play -- then it basically has to be better than what came before. So you get a spiral to brokenness and the game dies. (Heck, the last few years, making the good cards stand out hasn't been a problem -- they've stood out too much, made standard miserable, and led to a flood of bannings).

 

[R_J_K75]

Unless its really a quandary, its probably all bad Sage Advice if Mike Mearls and Jeremy Crawford are the go to for your 5E questions. Kind of defeating the point of 5E.

 

[Maxperson]

Draft and sealed tournaments are things though, where the bad cards have a place.

And in constructed, if everything has to be good enough to see play -- then it basically has to be better than what came before. So you get a spiral to brokenness and the game dies. (Heck, the last few years, making the good cards stand out hasn't been a problem -- they've stood out too much, made standard miserable, and led to a flood of bannings).

I've used to play limited ranked for a long time. At one point I was in the top 200 in the world. There are cards that you don't play even in limited. It's the best format in my opinion, because a lot of cards that wouldn't make the cut in constructed are very playable and even powerful, but it's not a cure all for the really crappy cards.

 

[Pauper]

So if a magic shield gives you magical bonus AC while holding it in any fashion, then shouldn't simply holding the edge of that shield also count as wielding it?

Wielding is no where defined in RAW afterall...

Actually it is, but indirectly.

A shield, like any piece of armor, must be donned to benefit from it, and must be doffed to remove the benefit. (See the Donning and Doffing Armor table in the Player's Basic Rules.)

Dropping an object you are holding is not specifically defined in the rules, but is usually ruled as not an action, as there is nothing in the rules for Interact with an Object or Use an Object that require you to use it to drop an item you are holding. If you could remove the benefit of a shield this way, or by using the free 'interact with an object' action available to a character each turn to put the shield away, just as a character can use that action to sheathe or draw a weapon (see the list of Interacting With Objects Around You in the Player's Basic Rules), then you could argue that the rules treat 'holding' and 'wielding' a shield as the same.

Since dropping an item you are holding does not require an action, and removing a shield you are wielding does require an action and does not qualify for the Interact with an Object action, wielding a shield is not the same as holding it in the rules as written. A DM could certainly rule that a character could use Interact with an Object to 'put away' a shield in contradiction of the Donning and Doffing Armor table, but that doesn't change the rules as written.

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Pauper