D&D (2024) Do you plan to adopt D&D5.5One2024Redux?

[Azzy]

Still doesn't explain why Detect Life went away.

And for @Azzy - for a "niche" spell it sure gets a lot of use. I see it cast on average once every session or two, which is hella frequent compared to some spells.

Perhaps in your games.

 

[Maxperson]

This kills it instead of applying a status effect that equals prone...

One is cutting it with an edge. One is applying the right amount of force to get resonance from their natural frequency...

Yeah, I'm going to call shenanigans on a fighter(or any other PC) knowing the natural frequencies of every ooze they come across, and how to apply just the right amount of force to set up a resonance.

I'll stick with my ruling of not being able to prone a thing that has no up, down, left or right.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Yeah, I'm going to call shenanigans on a fighter(or any other PC) knowing the natural frequencies of every ooze they come across, and how to apply just the right amount of force to set up a resonance.

I'll stick with my ruling of not being able to prone a thing that has no up, down, left or right.

Which is totally fine. I just tried to be creative here.

 

[Hussar]

I gotta admit, this is the first time I've ever heard of "Detect Life". Where does it come from?

 

[James Gasik]

I gotta admit, this is the first time I've ever heard of "Detect Life". Where does it come from?

It's in Oriental Adventures. The 2e Priest Spell Compendium says it's uncommon for Clerics and Druids, which requires them to research the ability to cast it.

 

[SpaceOtter]

I'm adopting a "wait and see" attitude.
I'll read reviews.
I'll see how extensive the errata is.
I'll see how it compares to 5e in final complexity and changes.
I'll see if it provides options out of the box that support my preferred playstyle.

Then and only then will I make my decision on whether to adopt it or not.

To be fair, much of this is how I approach buying any RPG that interests me. I long ago stopped buying things on a whim or just because it says, Dungeons & Dragons on the cover.

 

[Hriston]

When you take any given feature - or even choose any given class, for that matter - you're also taking on a varying degree of risk that what you choose might not turn out to always be the most useful and may sometimes be of no use whatsoever.

That's part of why I prefer that things like backgrounds (or secondary skills, in 1e) be randomly rolled. If nothing else, any background can be used to inform and-or assist your in-character roleplaying, which IMO is most if not all of the point of them anyway.

For example, my group just picked up two characters who recently escaped from slavery in a foreign empire; giving their players all kinds of opportunity to RP their dislike of said empire even though the current adventure has nothing to do with such.

And sometimes a background or secondary skill can be of practical use in the field e.g. a jeweller might* be better at appraising gems found in the field, or a leatherworker might be able to do some rough-and-ready patchwork to someone's ruined leather armour, or a sailor might be able to reduce the cost of a party's sea voyage by working as part of the ship's crew. That things like this can happen now and then is fine. That they must be mandated to happen, or that "might" must become "will", is not fine.

* - I say "might" because the dice will always have their say...

Is anybody saying this? Because I’m not sure why this is being posted in response to me as if it’s something I don’t know or with which I don’t mostly agree. What I would add is the player should know when their feature will be useful and when it won’t so they can play their character accordingly without the DM saying “no you don’t” after the fact. Clarification of the situation falls outside of this, but I’d consider invalidating the feature due to hidden DM-only information to be in the category of a DM gotcha.

 

[Hriston]

Not come up with. Please stop insinuating that all DMs do is make stuff up on the spot. The last port my players were in I had: the ships that came in and out, their destinations and where they came from, the captains, a ship log for the important ship, the dockmaster's name (and personality and motives), several NPCs that worked on the docks, the guard captain that oversaw the area, the tavern "by the docks," the owner of said tavern along with its three waitstaff, and the two competing nobles who always try to outperform each other.

It always sounds like you DM or have DMs that do no work. That it's just a game of improv. If that's true, then you are 1000% correct - the DM should never say no. But for those people that put work into the world, please show a little respect.

Why does it matter when the DM makes this stuff up, and why doesn’t the player of the sailor know any of this?

 

[Lanefan]

I gotta admit, this is the first time I've ever heard of "Detect Life". Where does it come from?

@James Gasik shows it being from Oriental Adventures but I suspect we got it from somewhere else (Dragon? or UA?) as none of us ever really used OA, and we had it long before 2e came out.

And I know for sure we didn't make it up ourselves.

 

[Lanefan]

Is anybody saying this? Because I’m not sure why this is being posted in response to me as if it’s something I don’t know or with which I don’t mostly agree.

Good to hear. From your posts prior, I'd taken your stance to be that these abilities have to work no matter the in-fiction situation.

What I would add is the player should know when their feature will be useful and when it won’t so they can play their character accordingly without the DM saying “no you don’t” after the fact. Clarification of the situation falls outside of this, but I’d consider invalidating the feature due to hidden DM-only information to be in the category of a DM gotcha.

The problem is that the way some of these features are worded in the book, using words like "will" instead of "may' or "might", can easily give players the mistaken impression that these abilities are guaranteed to work whenever invoked; and thus paint the DM as the bad guy for shutting them down when their not working makes sense.

And most of the time it should be fairly obvious when a feature isn't likely to work; a good example being a criminal trying to find contacts and send messages on/from a new world or plane, or a folk hero playing on that heroism in a distant land where none have heard of her and she maybe can't even speak the local language.

That said, something like the criminal features inexplicably not working when they should might be a clue that all is not as it seems; that somewhere during that storm they and their ship jumped worlds or planes without knowing it, and they haven't arrived at the port they think they have.