D&D General Design issues with 5e

[Silam]

Skills.

I really don't like it how they done it. Sure, it's way more elegant than 3.5 version, but still.

What did you not like about 3.5 skills?

You pick skills from class list, maybe background gives you one or two and that's it. You can't get skills after level 1. I want option for getting new skills.

You can, via the Skilled feat, and some classes or subclasses grant skills here and there as part of class abilities beyond level 1. But I agree that it’s pretty limited. Burning a feat on Skilled feels like a waste of a resource that’s already too limited.

In 3.5, you could grow your skill ranks at each level, and either keep honing the same skills further, or branch into new ones.

Also, i want to detach it from proficiency, because as is, biggest impact on how good are you is your ability modifier.

That too was the way you want it, in 3.5… skill ranks gained from levels far outweighed the bonuses coming from abilities.

So I am really puzzled by the opening statement … do you mean that 5e is more elegant simply by virtue of containing fewer skills than 3.5? … even though 3.5 had the characteristics you’re actually looking for ?

 

[Zardnaar]

Apart from its not the D&D I specifically want that ENworld complains about. Judging by its own merits.

1. Saving throws. Better in 5.5 still crap. Non scaling saves with DCs creeping up around 18 by level 11ish.

2. Hit point bloat. Combat takes longer my BS to keep track of.

3. Very uneven distribution of saves. Very few intelligence saves on the game ypu may never see one. Poor wizards as their other good save is tertiary at best stat. Targeting intelligence saves as well.

 

[cbwjm]

I think I'd probably like to go back to the 3e saves of fort, ref, will but use the best of 2 stats of 4e.

I'd also align the subclass levels. Part of me would want to put more emphasis on the subclass with 5-6 levels being the subclass, starting with level one and the class more of a skeleton to hang the subclass on. By aligning the subclass levels it means that the (what I thought were) great ideas of the strixhaven playtest would finally work better.

 

[Stalker0]

What did you not like about 3.5 skills?

Fiddly, horribly balanced, takes a lot of work to do. Need I go on?

 

[Stalker0]

Often issues are often preferences in disguise, so its a short list of what I think are truly "issues" with the edition mechanically.

1) Skills: There needs to be some middle ground between the full customziation of 3e that also take forever and the "I do this and won't look at skills again for 5 levels" approach of 5e. Something to add a bit of spice.

2) High level saving throws. PC wise, PCs are too vulnerable to magic at high levels do to lack of proficiency bonuses. And hell on the monster side every other monster needs magic resistance because there saves are terrible.

3) Concentration: Likely my biggest issue with 5e. The concept of concentration is great, its just too all encompassing. They crammed too much into one mechanic.

A mechanic that prevents certain spells from stacking?: Wonderful
A mechanic that disrupts certain spells when the caster is attacked? Chef's Kiss.

But together its too much and too restrictive. There are plenty of spells I think should be disruptable (like many summons) but I have no issue if they stack with that buff spell X. I don't need my defensive spell to drop the second I actually get hit, etc.

It should have been two seperate mechanics.

4) Stealth Rules: This has to be THE biggest fail of 5.5. They have had years of players telling them the stealth rules suck, they had weeks of people telling them the 5.5 playtest stealth rules suck.....and they still posted a version of stealth that is total garbage.

 

[GreyLord]

I feel 4e did a form of bounded accuracy better than 5e does.

It's a simple...take your level and divide by 2 and you have your bonus.

This marks for a massive difference between someone who is 20th level, is extremely simple math and extremely easy to remember.

The way 5e does it is not really that intuitive and you only have a span of 4 points between level 1 and level 20.

Just my thoughts.

 

[Benjamin Olson]

I think hit point bloat is one of the original sins of 5e, and sadly undermines the bounded accuracy which is one of my favorite design intentions of 5e. Yes, it feels cool to graduate to more advanced enemies, but it doesn't serve the simulationist side of things well. And since 5e doesn't want to come right out and do the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th tier versions of every enemy (most of the time) it means lots of casting about for what enemy types to use by the DM only to find that "nope, we'll have to save that for 10 levels down the line" or whatever.

Tangentially related, I just find the stat blocks too complicated as a DM. It's not like they confuse me when I read them at my leisure, it's just too much to flip through and cross-reference when actually running the game, especially when there's multiple different enemy types in one combat (and some NPC the party decided to bring along, and whatever). Sure I could probably benefit from using cards or something, but that's a whole extra prep step, and really the combat runs smoothest when I've got the stats half memorized. I kind of suspect we'll get a techy solution for this in the not too distant future, but for now it's a lot of extra mental load, and very frustrating if I'm at a table where I don't have a lot of extra physical space to organize stat blocks in. I'm torn on this because I love the simulationist potential of having the enemies use the same rules as the PCs, but without a way to simplify it radically at the table it just becomes too fiddly for me as is.

Spells are in some ways a similar complicating factor to monster stat blocks, where special rules, abilities, etc. have been compartmentalized into a separate compendium that needs to be cross-referenced. Basically a new DM should just avoid running monsters with more than a handful of spells at all, it really only gets easy when you have effectively committed the important spells to memory and learned which ones aren't worth casting. Meanwhile spells have (and increasingly with 5.5) been leaned on way too heavily to effectively replace many characters' class and racial abilities. This makes it easier to (roughly) balance things but it also makes the character options way too samey.

 

[500 Toads]

I feel 4e did a form of bounded accuracy better than 5e does.

It's a simple...take your level and divide by 2 and you have your bonus.

This marks for a massive difference between someone who is 20th level, is extremely simple math and extremely easy to remember.

The way 5e does it is not really that intuitive and you only have a span of 4 points between level 1 and level 20.

Just my thoughts.

I think D&D 5E specifically intended to get away from that, so that even low-level threats have some chance of hitting a high-level target and likewise the latter being able to miss the former on occasion.

Mind you, that's only for attack rolls. Bonuses to ability(skill) checks in particular vary wildly (waves at Pass Without Trace) and likewise the DCs sometimes do ( gestures at DC 70 Strength (no skill) check to force open a certain door that you're really not supposed to be able to open without either being a (literal) giant, or via the knock spell, but where the authors apparently decided to put a very high DC instead of a flat "no"). Likewise, the system allows both impossible saving throws, and auto-succeed saving throws.

You could always adapt the PF2 philosophy of leveled DCs and leveled proficiencies, where higher-level threats will have a much higher chance of hitting and of critically hitting weak enemies, while a far weaker enemy may find it literally impossible to critically hit a far higher-leveled target and have to roll a natural 20 to get a normal hit. You'd have to figure out where the 'expertise' class feature goes in such a system, though; there's no equivalent to that in PF2e (untrained => no proficiency bonus, while trained/expert/master/legendary give level+2/4/6/8).

 

[W'rkncacnter]

I feel 4e did a form of bounded accuracy better than 5e does.

It's a simple...take your level and divide by 2 and you have your bonus.

This marks for a massive difference between someone who is 20th level, is extremely simple math and extremely easy to remember.

The way 5e does it is not really that intuitive and you only have a span of 4 points between level 1 and level 20.

Just my thoughts.

that kind of flies in the face of 5e design philosophy (which is the only reason i didn't mention this - it's subjective whether or not it's really a "design issue"), but i don't really like that part of 5e anyway. even a level 10 character is a superhuman but the difference between your average level 1 character's base attack roll vs level 10 is like +4 (2 from asis, 2 from prof bonus). that's...really nothing. it kind of breaks the illusion when you realize. there's sort of ways around it, like reducing DCs based on what level the character is, but that also flies in the face of 5e design philosophy and kind of defeats the point of even getting better numbers at all.

i also like how 4e folded the level bonus into your ability modifiers, not your training bonus. pf2e does the latter, which means anything you're not proficient in becomes useless very quickly. i like folding it into ability mods both so you have at least a chance at even your worst skills, and because it really reflects that your character is getting generally more experienced and powerful, not just that you're putting effort into a select few things. "b-but how does it make sense that the wizard is stronger then the barbarian????" well if that's a level 30 wizard who can keep up with demigods vs a fresh level 1 barbarian, yeah, i'd fully expect that wizard to have some tricks to outmuscle that barbarian, the wizard's a part of a strike force that's about to MURDER ORCUS.

 

[Zardnaar]

I think D&D 5E specifically intended to get away from that, so that even low-level threats have some chance of hitting a high-level target and likewise the latter being able to miss the former on occasion.

Mind you, that's only for attack rolls. Bonuses to ability(skill) checks in particular vary wildly (waves at Pass Without Trace) and likewise the DCs sometimes do ( gestures at DC 70 Strength (no skill) check to force open a certain door that you're really not supposed to be able to open without either being a (literal) giant, or via the knock spell, but where the authors apparently decided to put a very high DC instead of a flat "no"). Likewise, the system allows both impossible saving throws, and auto-succeed saving throws.

You could always adapt the PF2 philosophy of leveled DCs and leveled proficiencies, where higher-level threats will have a much higher chance of hitting and of critically hitting weak enemies, while a far weaker enemy may find it literally impossible to critically hit a far higher-leveled target and have to roll a natural 20 to get a normal hit. You'd have to figure out where the 'expertise' class feature goes in such a system, though; there's no equivalent to that in PF2e (untrained => no proficiency bonus, while trained/expert/master/legendary give level+2/4/6/8).

Now they suggest you dont go X2 over party numbers. Huge cp budgets so mooks are CR2 and 3 by the mild levels.

And even if you use mooks they buffed emanations so they all die easily anyway. Maybe ranged ones?