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Message: <blockquote data-quote="tetrasodium" data-source="post: 8491240" data-attributes="member: 93670">I've seen things like that against casters.  Since there were several instances of it in a recent frostmaiden campaign I was in & so much of this thread is utter disbelief that casters ever have trouble doing things I'll detail a few for clarity<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Caster does alter self to look like a kobold & "guide" his party into the kobold mine to make peace between kobolds/town with him serving as translator.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Everything seems to go great but the kobold leader wants to meet the mayor in town first.  Players all seem to think this is reasonable given the kobolds are going to be employed as miners & have trade rights in town [spoiler="oops"]Leader immediately attacks he mayor "You should have rolled insight">combat>now there's a ghost in the caster too & you still need to go kill the kobolds[/spoiler]</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Party sees a red dragon heart in duergar furnace & due to abject clueless "uhh does anyone get the feeling that the GM also has no idea wtf we should be doing or why there are suddenly duergar?" the players decide taking the heart out in order to stop the apparent nefarious plan from getting worse><ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Caster notes that they can use unseen servant to pull it out safely>... caster[spoiler="oops no I can't for multiple reasons"][ATTACH=full]148651[/ATTACH][/spoiler]  Ultimately someone shot it with an arrow that had plenty of time to pierce the heart & destroy the furnace without being burned up by the literal furnace capable of melting metal.</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Party kills the ancient white dragon in the region & is told at end of session that they levelup so come back a level higher next week.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Two wizards in the party strategize spell choice to recover maximum dragon giblits!<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Combined they take [spoiler="enlarge/reduce"]'[ATTACH=full]148652[/ATTACH][/spoiler]because 5e got rid of collosal and the dragon  was gargantuan so  [spoiler="dropping 4x4 to 2x2 makes it easily managable for the next step"][ATTACH=full]148654[/ATTACH][/spoiler] but[spoiler="GM:actuallyno it's still too big to carry"][ATTACH=full]148655[/ATTACH] plus the mini made for that dragon is wayy more[/spoiler]</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Both wizards sigh but contiunue as planned [spoiler="I cast fabricate he sez"][ATTACH=full]148657[/ATTACH][/spoiler] with the plan of fabricating the muscle tissue out of the object known as the dragon corpse into a meat block like you see in the grocery store deli sowe can just yoink the bones out through the open mouthinto a pile & leave with the entire skin relatively undamaged woth organs in tact.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">GM: "I don't think muscle is close enough to material for that, it needs to be like stone wood metal crystal & since it has no saving throw I don't think that can work"</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">[spoiler="Teleport circle"][ATTACH=full]148658[/ATTACH][/spoiler] but the corpse won't fit in there soooooooo....</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Ultimately after literally every shred of the wizard duo plan turns to ash the party druid/pally/cleric winds up using the paladin's dragonslayer sword & strength with nature/survival/arcana to carve off the wings<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">but omg it's bleeding lots & the gm tells us it's valuable blood.  Lacking anything suitable to catch the blood one of the wizards tells everyone to step back  because he's going to cast cone of cold & it can't bleed if it's frozen> GM: "It's immune to cold so still bleeding.  Nobody else has plans & when asked if they have a anything else one wizard laughs & the other one pulls out his phone.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">With both wizards having low strength noping out of this carving up the GM mentions that they might be able to user fabricate on bone  but wizards feel quite justified in declaring that bone is probably valuable & that the others are doing fine.</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The corpse is still way too big to fit in the circle  even with reduce & the gm says that it needs to be put inside during the one turn the portal is active so  having carved up the dragon .  Party uses strength & who knows to bring the door from the frost giant castle nearby to the dragon corpse & fighter uses his smith's tools to fashion sled skis to the door.  Wizards attempted to use floating disk to help at one point but are told the door is too big/heavy for those to be useful. <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Having made a sled the party is told still too big & wizards tell the pally to go through a teleport circle wound up inside the tail to hire some minions on the other side so that a reduced dragon missing a tail with wings/neck carved off & tied atop the torso can be shoved through & dragged outside before reduce wears off & everyone is crushed by an expanding dragon in a small room.</li> </ul></li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">corpse is pulled on sled by team of laborers  through town & for some reason gm asks the wizards specifically what they are going to do about the bridge>In unison the pair says "I don't care" with one going on to add "we grabbed all those spells & went through all of this to help the rest of the party get this corpse back to town so they could get the awesome stuff they were talking about crafted from it. That's someone else's problem to solve"<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Solved by the paladin making a charisma persuade check.</li> </ul></li> </ul></li> </ul>Yes 4e did do that to cut the gm's role back rather than correcting the worldbuilding problems  linked to 1e's dying earth roots & an omission in FR .  That doesn't mean that turning the GM into a life support system for the PCs was a good design choice.  5e ditched that like a mold covered mystery leftover found in the back of the fridge  though so it seems that mistake was proven to be oneSome of that links to the 1e dying earth roots & the omission of [spoiler="this  magic item economy footnote from FRCS"][ATTACH=full]148659[/ATTACH][/spoiler].  Other settings like eberron took steps to correct that with an economy that included suppliers.  Despite practically serving as an FR sourcebook at times the 5e phb also omitted mention of that important bit of FR's magic item economy</blockquote>

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