D&D (2024) D&D 2024 Rules Oddities (Kibbles’ Collected Complaints)

[Oofta]

I think both takes are valid, but yours is certainly very slightly closer to the RAW so I can definitely see that take.

Grappling may be easier now, but there have always been ways to do it if you really wanted. I kind of wish they had kept some of the wording and exceptions for forced movement that they had in 4E for things like this.

 

[Xeviat]

Maybe people get stuck on the spikes when you try to drag them through it at top speed, so either you can let go and keep running or stop. Horseback/Monkback cleric and spirit guardians, though, that's something else. Doesn't even have to give up punching; move and dash is still 80+feet.

 

[Bacon Bits]

The exact wording is "When a creature moves into or within the area... ". My point is that "moves into" is active tense, it's the creature doing the moving. It's different from "is moved into" which is passive tense, something being done to the creature.

In any case, this isn't anything new and I rule that the creature has to be the one doing the movement. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

I'm just going to generally rule that you can't be affected by the same DOT effect more than once a round, but allow an exception for egregious instances at DM's discretion. The rules don't really need the general rule to handle corner cases like, "What if you zig-zag through a wall of fire?" because it kind of doesn't come up. I need the general rule to handle stuff like, "One by one we pick up the Cleric concentrating on Spirit Guardians and make a circuit of the room to do another Nd8 damage to every enemy," or, "we push him into the fire, then pull him out, then push him back in, then pull him back out...." I need the general rule to be what they designed DOT effects against: a damage cap of one hit per round.

Until you start trying to abuse the fact that the damage is "capped" so you don't have to worry about taking more damage and it's "safe" to zig-zag through the wall of fire.

You don't get to cheat game balance or cheat game world physics. That's why there's a referee at the table. I'm playing the game world realistically, so of course it never works like you want. Murphy's Law isn't just in the real world.

Does that mean the game rules aren't written kinda wonky and with a very unhelpful phrasing? Of course not. Knowing the rules are broken but you can change them doesn't mean they're not broken rules. That's the Oberoni Fallacy. But knowing the rules are broken also doesn't mean you're not supposed to change them as appropriate at the table. The Player's Handbook is not a suicide pact.

 

[Chaosmancer]

So there is two ways to go about this. Either they read the UA comments, where a lot of people pointed that weapon toggled worked, and they intentionally left it in, or they didn't read the UA comments. Take your pick which outcome you believe! I choose to believe they didn't read the comments pointing it out, because they seem to be unaware of how it worked in interviews and articles, but that's just situational evidence.

What do you mean by "weapon toggled worked"? If you mean the ability to sheath and draw multiple weapons, allowing for weapon "juggling" there is a third option. They considered the complaints overblown. I do keep seeing people saying "I could run in, draw my greatsword, attack, throw it on the ground, draw my spear, attack, throw it on the ground, draw my Halberd..." But just because people say it doesn't mean it is going to happen at the table. My biggest complaint with it is that it looks silly, not that it is notably powerful in any way, nor that it isn't really trivial to "counter"

Stopping optimization isn't the goal, and I never said it was or should be. Fixing exploits that are only valuable to optimizers and no one else is the goal. This is the quality we ask for from 3rd party content (I should know, people ask it from me by the hundreds, quite insistently!)

Sure, no one likes broken exploits.... but that requires them to be exploits, broken, or the intended outcome of the rules. I've used some of your content, there are things I've seen in it that I've gone "oof, really?" and looked and found... completely intentional.

So can we separate those things?

I don't know what 2nd level spell you view it as emulating, but I'm aware of no 2nd level spell that drops speed to 0 while bypassing Legendary Resistance, and if I did, I would definitely be complaining about it too. Maybe I'm missing something. Earthbind? Web? Those both definitely have saving throws, and there's a good reason they have saving throws. Legendary Resistances entire purpose is because 1 spell shutting down a monster was deemed to be a bad thing.

I was thinking of Earthbind and Web. And yes, this doesn't have a saving throw... because it is an attack roll. And, again, in 85% of use cases, it won't be used on a creature with legendary resistances. It will be used on non-legendary creatures. And a reduction in speed is only going to shut down enemies that cannot respond at range. Look at the legendary Green Dragon, it may be unable to make melee attacks if you reduce its speed to zero, but it certainly isn't "shut down" in a meaningful way by forcing it to rely on spells and ranged attacks.

So as long as all the legendary creatures have strong ranged options.... is this still a bad thing to rely on their AC instead of legendary resistance? Does the giant insect even have a high attack bonus?

I actually cannot think of any other way to do it without a save. Definitely one I might be missing, but its pretty unique. Even Grapple is a save now. Just to be really clear here, my main problem is that it has no save.

Grapple is a save for PCs making a grapple attempt. I bet some monsters still grapple on a hit, and giant spiders are monsters.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Which is possible, but it's hard to know when the RAI isn't spelled out while the RAW is.

Is it? DO we expect that the intention of the invisibility spell is not to turn you invisible? DO we expect the intent of the Hide action is to make you forever transparent and no one can see you, ever? Do we expect the intent of drawing weapons for free as you attack, was to allow you to drop 30 different weapons over the course of a fight?

Whether or not a spider string shot is intended to bypass legendary resistance? That might be debatable. But some of the other stuff isn't.

I mean, let's be nice and assume they did find these odd/broken interactions ahead of time, and then intentionally chose to leave them in place. Would it be too much to ask for a 2-sentence explanation in a sidebar telling us the rationale for that decision and-or how they envision it working in play? (this applies to every edition ever released by the way, not just the current one)

It might be too much to ask. Once we are at the point of asking them to explain the rules that we just read, that seems to be a fairly high burden to place on them.

The first requires fixing, the second IMO requires explanation.

For my part, this isn't so much disdain for WotC as annoyance they don't (or don't want to) learn from the past. TSR made the same mistakes, as did earlier WotC: every edition* has had some flat-out bad rules that, if put in the hands of some determined optimizers and envelope-pushers, would have been chewed up and spat out in no time.

* - I'll cut a lot of slack for OD&D(1974) here, though, as they were pioneering the whole thing and didn't have the benefit of hindsight.

Every single game ever published by human hands has some flat-out bad rules. I'm sure I could give Monopoly to someone determined to break the rules, and they could find something. And even if they couldn't find a rule to break, they'd find a LACK of a rule and call that a rule, and break it that way.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I thought they had public playtests with thousands of people, with some of these exact issues already pointed out during the playtests…

So no, I do not buy the ‘WotC only has 5 people working on the books, they cannot do any better’. Maybe fire fewer people if you cannot get it done by who is left

You are trying to tell me you WERE NOT aware that they also had an internal playtest team? I don't remember seeing all of the things on this list in the public playtest, so I wonder who would test them?

And yeah, sure, prove that they fired internal playtesters mid-playtest, and you have a point. Otherwise you have speculation.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Also. I expect Reddit had more total man-hours of reading in a week than the entire WotC team had in a year.

Additionally, there is always something said to be seeing something for the first time.

A playtest group who has sat down and seen six versions of the same rules in three weeks, who has been working to stop specific exploits... can every easily miss a new exploit that they weren't considering compared to a hundred people seeing that text for the first time.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Similarly Spirit Guardians now gets OPed if people use the deeply broken exploit of "walk around a bit so more critters are within range."

I find it deeply amusing that people think the changes to Spirit Guardians is some kind of OP buff.

Spirit Guardians now does damage once when the emanation enters a creature's space and when they end their turn in it. That is it. This means a cleric can run into a group of enemies and deal 3d8 damage. And if the enemies do not flee, they take 3d8 at the end of their turn. IF they do flee, no extra damage.

Do you know how it USED to work? People would use Telekinetic or Eldritch blast with Grasp of Hadar. They would stop right before the enemy, then hit them with those abilities, pulling them into the spirit guardians for 3d8 damage, then at the start of the creature's turn, they would take another 3d8 damage. Then on the next turn or as a reaction the caster would find a way to push them out or flee, then pull them back in, and they would repeat the process. They could also get allies to do the same, pulling the enemy out, and pushing them in.

If anything, the exploit is WEAKER than it used to be, because now moving the enemy around in and out of the spell effect doesn't do anything. You have to move the spell effect, and depending on the exact wording, it might ONLY work if you move the emenation on your turn, dropping us from potentially 12d8 damage before the enemy can react to 3d8.

 

[mellored]

Maybe people get stuck on the spikes when you try to drag them through it at top speed, so either you can let go and keep running or stop. Horseback/Monkback cleric and spirit guardians, though, that's something else. Doesn't even have to give up punching; move and dash is still 80+feet.

That gives a big area, but not big damage. And if your monk is dashing they lose punch damage.

Spiked growth on the other hand is big damage to one target. Less than the 2014 version since you have a chance to avoid the grapple.

 

[KibblesTasty]

My biggest complaint with it is that it looks silly, not that it is notably powerful in any way, nor that it isn't really trivial to "counter"

If the ability to use a shield while TWF does not seem notably powerful in anyway, our view point differs quite a bit; that's fine, just not a lot of common ground we'll find there. My problem is that the narratively silly thing to do is the mechanically powerful thing to do, and it certainly seems unintentional that it works that way. But maybe they read the feedback, are aware it works that way, and thought it was fine! I've been told otherwise by people in this thread that read their articles, but I don't know their minds.

Sure, no one likes broken exploits.... but that requires them to be exploits, broken, or the intended outcome of the rules. I've used some of your content, there are things I've seen in it that I've gone "oof, really?" and looked and found... completely intentional.

So can we separate those things?

I think this is a good illustration of why it doesn't really matter much if it is intentional or not. What matters is the outcome and the quality of the content, and many problems the DM will have so smooth over. If you thought 'oof, really' and found whatever it was was intentionally designed did that make you immediately think it was fine then? Probably not.

It's pretty much exactly my point that WotC should be aiming for at least the same standard as homebrewers or 3rd party content creators (and probably much higher). Imagine the show that would ensue if someone like me posted Giant Insect as my shiny new creation and how people would line up around the goddamn block to explain to me that I didn't understand basic game mechanics.

Either the interactions were intended, and it's terribly balanced, or they were not intended, and its terribly balanced. It's at very least a game warping mechanic that all encounters the DM designs will have to account for and design around in each important fight, which is pretty much my benchmark for broken, at least when it comes to a spell.

If I wrote the sort of things that were busted in D&D 2024, I would be happy to have some bloke like me diligently compiling the mistakes so I could review them... and in fact that exact thing is almost always happening; there's google sheets for just that thing out there. In theory, that's what the UA was, but not only did many things change from the final UA and never get reviewed, they didn't seemingly address the ones that were caught in UA.

I was thinking of Earthbind and Web. And yes, this doesn't have a saving throw... because it is an attack roll. And, again, in 85% of use cases, it won't be used on a creature with legendary resistances. It will be used on non-legendary creatures. And a reduction in speed is only going to shut down enemies that cannot respond at range. Look at the legendary Green Dragon, it may be unable to make melee attacks if you reduce its speed to zero, but it certainly isn't "shut down" in a meaningful way by forcing it to rely on spells and ranged attacks.

So as long as all the legendary creatures have strong ranged options.... is this still a bad thing to rely on their AC instead of legendary resistance? Does the giant insect even have a high attack bonus?

The Giant Insect is a summoned creature, it uses your spell attack roll. So... yes.

You'll find when looking at 5e 2014 spells that no high level spells use a spell attack roll (and for that matter, and D&D 2024 spell besides summons), and spells that do tend only do damage. This is an intentional design, because you're not intended to be able to debilitate a creature through hitting its its AC. Again, that's why Legendary Resistance exist in the first place. Saying it can rely on its AC would be same as 'why can't it rely on its saves?'

As for just accepting the monster cannot move... The only high level 2024 Monster I've seen (the Adult Green Dragon) does not have much it can do to PCs that are >30 feet from it. It's Breath Weapon is 90 feet, and it has a few spells, but outside of that its helpless if it cannot get within 30 feet of it's targets. It's offensive CR is halved by being unable to move and its most dangerous interaction is entirely eliminated, which would make it a fairly trivial fight. A CR 22 creature should have its CR halved by a level 4 spell. That might be a subjective opinion, but it seems pretty reasonable an ask to me.

Its only powerful ranged Legendary Reaction (the new version of Legendary Actions) triggers on using Legendary Resistance... which this would never trigger. It certainly does not seem to me like WotC is designing around the possibility of easily dropping a CR 22's monster's movement speed to 0 to me.

Grapple is a save for PCs making a grapple attempt. I bet some monsters still grapple on a hit, and giant spiders are monsters.

The giant spider summoned by Giant Insect is not the Monster Manual Giant Spider block. It is a custom statblock for the spell (thats how it uses spell attack to hit and has 70 hit points and all that). There is no reason for it to use monster mechanics. It only exists in the context of the spell, and is a PC facing ability.

If anything, the exploit is WEAKER than it used to be, because now moving the enemy around in and out of the spell effect doesn't do anything. You have to move the spell effect, and depending on the exact wording, it might ONLY work if you move the emenation on your turn, dropping us from potentially 12d8 damage before the enemy can react to 3d8.

I don't know where you are getting this. Everything you described still works with the D&D 2024 Spirit Guardians.

It triggers "whenever the Emanation enters a creature's space AND whenever a creature enters the Emanation".