D&D General Circle Magic Concerns In "Heroes Of Faerun"

[Cergorach]

But in a dungeon with a Dragon...

The Dragon can do the same Circle Casting with a bunch of Kobold Scale Sorcerers...

People need to realize that this requires spellcasting, be that in a class, a subclass or in a monster/NPC statblock... So what the PCs can do, the monsters/NPCs can do as well...

The question becomes, is Circle Casting fun? For the players and for you? And if it is for your players and not for you you need to figure out why for yourself.

I am seeing way too many players and DMs holding on for dear life onto certain concepts within their D&D game, balance seems to be more important then fun, their perspective seems to be more important then anyone else's, etc.

Now, I was also hesitant to allow everything from the two new books without actually seeing them in our game (as the DM), as having been a DM in the 3e era where we allowed everything officially D&D without question and we had a couple of folks that were in their min/max + combo phase, so I might have a bit of ptsd from that... But having read the rules, I see no issues honestly, just more options. So what if they blow up an encounter? shrugs So what if they become stronger, so do the monsters/NPCs. In none of the D&D editions did the encounter building rules fit 100% with the potential capabilities of the PCs. I've had three 1st level characters steamrolling (with a high dose of luck) through most of a 5th level adventure intended for 4+ characters (they only died once). We're still having fun.

 

[TheSword]

Is it me or is it extremely fast? You in theory could circle cast in a single round if everyone was ready. Not sure I like that. It feels casting spells this way should take a bit more time.

Also apparently anyone with spell casting can contribute so clerics, warlocks and Eldritch knights can all contribute to the same circle casting? Also feels icky.

Lastly I’ve heard it suggested that when a slot needs to be expended it can be any level. So you could improve a meteor swarm with a level 1 slot. Can this be true? I really don’t like this.

I haven’t seen this yet, if this isn’t the cast please let me know.

 

[AlViking]

There is a huge, huge, huge, huge, huge difference between throwing GMs to the wolves because you know every GM will make small tweaks here and there to the game, and making a game that is designed to work exactly as advertised, while recognizing that GMs will likely make small changes here and there to make it truly sing for them.

But I know that continuing this discussion with you is absolutely 100% pointless, so I'm not replying beyond this post.

D&D has been "throwing GMs to to the wolves" since Gygax and Arneson created the game. A lot of GMs run things straight with no tweaking or house rules at all. There is no way the rules can cover everything the players might attempt, all they can do is give general guidelines on how to handle things when they attempt to do so.

The game wouldn't still be around after half a century and wouldn't be as popular as it is if new GMs couldn't figure it out.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

D&D has been "throwing GMs to to the wolves" since Gygax and Arneson created the game. A lot of GMs run things straight with no tweaking or house rules at all. There is no way the rules can cover everything the players might attempt, all they can do is give general guidelines on how to handle things when they attempt to do so.

The game wouldn't still be around after half a century and wouldn't be as popular as it is if new GMs couldn't figure it out.

Therefore we should spend not one penny on making things easier, more approachable, or more pick-up-and-go for GMs.

What a wonderful sentiment.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Therefore we should spend not one penny on making things easier, more approachable, or more pick-up-and-go for GMs.

What a wonderful sentiment.

What you are asking for is not “making it easier” though. You can’t get any easier than “loosey goosey” as you put it.

 

[AlViking]

Therefore we should spend not one penny on making things easier, more approachable, or more pick-up-and-go for GMs.

What a wonderful sentiment.

Your "easier and more approachable" was tried and it didn't exactly lead to stellar success. In 3e they tried to define details for a lot of things but it was always a facade and all it really accomplished was that if you brought up some scenario on the fly someone would say "Hold on, there's a rule for that" and start furiously flipping through books, grinding the game to a halt. If the GM did decide ahead of time they had to look up the DC for everything and then choose the scenario that hit the DC they had in mind.

With 4e my experience was that if a player tried to do something a bit outside the box someone would declare "There's a power for that" and the GM would shut it down because they didn't want to make a power meaningless by letting someone be creative.

So in my experience your "easier" either stifled creativity or just added complexity that didn't add any real value. Meanwhile I prefer the more open approach because we aren't playing a war game, we're playing a TTRPG and the fact that the rules can be implemented in slightly different ways to accommodate what the table wants is a strength not a weakness. There are also plenty of books, blogs and other advice out there if you want to abdicate decisions to someone else. If that doesn't work for you there are other games, no game can be a good fit for everyone.

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

The Dragon can do the same Circle Casting with a bunch of Kobold Scale Sorcerers...

People need to realize that this requires spellcasting, be that in a class, a subclass or in a monster/NPC statblock... So what the PCs can do, the monsters/NPCs can do as well...

Some Circle Magic effect requires expending a spell slot, which isn't something NPCs no longer commonly have, with their own rules for spellcasting allowing them to cast a fixed spell N times per day.

Not that I'd be against houseruling something back.

 

[Distracted DM]

Some Circle Magic effect requires expending a spell slot, which isn't something NPCs no longer commonly have, with their own rules for spellcasting allowing them to cast a fixed spell N times per day.

Circle Casting specifically calls this out and says NPCs can do it. With their X times per day spells.

 

[Distracted DM]

Is it me or is it extremely fast? You in theory could circle cast in a single round if everyone was ready. Not sure I like that. It feels casting spells this way should take a bit more time.

Also apparently anyone with spell casting can contribute so clerics, warlocks and Eldritch knights can all contribute to the same circle casting? Also feels icky.

Lastly I’ve heard it suggested that when a slot needs to be expended it can be any level. So you could improve a meteor swarm with a level 1 slot. Can this be true? I really don’t like this.

I haven’t seen this yet, if this isn’t the cast please let me know.

Agreed on the fast bit. Same goes for a cleric contributing to a wizard spell

It does say that it has to be a slot equal to or greater than the spell being cast.

 

[TheSword]

Agreed on the fast bit. Same goes for a cleric contributing to a wizard spell

It does say that it has to be a slot equal to or greater than the spell being cast.

Okay that helps a lot then.