D&D General Explain Bounded Accuracy to Me (As if I Was Five)

[MuhVerisimilitude]

I doubt bounded accuracy was intended as a weapon in the eternal battle against martials.

It obviously wasn't. I'm just saying it's a bad idea in a system with unequal scaling.

Bounded accuracy would be excellent if more care was taken in the design of class features and spells. As it is, it doesn't really add much.

 

[Micah Sweet]

It obviously wasn't. I'm just saying it's a bad idea in a system with unequal scaling.

Bounded accuracy would be excellent if more care was taken in the design of class features and spells. As it is, it doesn't really add much.

What could you do with spells that would help bounded accuracy? Magic does stuff nonmagic can't; it has to, or no one would use it.

 

[Maxperson]

What? 4e added half your level to all your defenses and all your d20 rolls. That’s literally the opposite of bounded accuracy, and in fact was almost certainly the exact mechanic bounded accuracy was created in reaction to. And I have no idea what you mean about “you’d never make a hit if you roll below a 9.”

3e and 4e both. Both editions broke the bounds in different ways. 3e was the treadmill where you were expected to have certain bonuses to hit and magic items by certain levels and the monster math took that into consideration. 4e in the manner you mention.

 

[Krachek]

What? 4e added half your level to all your defenses and all your d20 rolls. That’s literally the opposite of bounded accuracy, and in fact was almost certainly the exact mechanic bounded accuracy was created in reaction to. And I have no idea what you mean about “you’d never make a hit if you roll below a 9.”

Since you always encounter monster around your level, despite having +20 bonus to hit you face monster with defense of 29. in 4ed the usual minimal roll to make a hit was around 9.

In 5ed you are more likely of hitting with lower rolls as you level, giving a real feeling of improvement.

 

[Charlaquin]

3e and 4e both. Both editions broke the bounds in different ways. 3e was the treadmill where you were expected to have certain bonuses to hit and magic items by certain levels and the monster math took that into consideration. 4e in the manner you mention.

Magic items were a required part of the 4e math too. Both systems were definitely guilty of the accuracy treadmill, but I think the reaction to 4e’s iteration of it was harsher, in part because 4e was more transparent about it. You needed a certain amount of system mastery with 3e to notice that CR didn’t work (for a given value of “work,” of course) if you didn’t get the right magic items by the right levels. Whereas in 4e, your level just directly added to your rolls and defenses, and the DMG advised setting DCs based on the party’s level. And you still needed certain magic items by certain levels to keep up with “level-appropriate” monsters, at least until Dark Sun introduced “inherent magic item bonuses.”

So, yeah, clearly bounded accuracy was designed to address a problem that existed in both 3e and 4e, but I think it was specifically the reaction to it in 4e that WotC was trying to quell.

 

[Argyle King]

Yes and no. That original article explaining the concept makes the pretty bold claim that the system math won’t assume to-hit bonuses increase, and that has never really been true, even in the first packet. However, I suspect that claim was poorly worded, as the full article makes it clear that the real goal was to prevent a situation where certain monsters are completely untouchable until you reach a high enough level, and leveling up automatically makes you untouchable to monsters far enough below your level. And 5e does absolutely meet that design goal.

I'm not sure that I fully agree that, even by that criteria, the goal was absolutely met. It's not that difficult to make a character who is difficult to hit -even for creatures at your level.

It may be the case that has been addressed by newer books. Admittedly, I wouldn't know. I'm a few years behind on keeping up with 5e. However, I would guess that floating ability scores and more species with inherent defenses makes it easier to build a character that monsters struggle to hit.

By no means is it anywhere near some issues that 3E had (or even 4E had due to early monster math being wonky,) but I think there's still a gap between what was stated as a goal and what was produced.

Perhaps it does just boil down to miscommunication of design goals. I can't say. But the OP isn't alone it having a bit of disconnect.

 

[Charlaquin]

Since you always encounter monster around your level, despite having +20 bonus to hit you face monster with defense of 29.

Right, which is exactly the treadmill effect that bounded accuracy was invented to prevent.

in 4ed the usual minimal roll to make a hit was around 9.

Ok, I see what you’re saying. Thanks for clarifying.

In 5ed you are more likely of hitting with lower rolls as you level, giving a real feeling of improvement.

Right, which is exactly the effect WotC was trying to achieve with bounded accuracy.

 

[MuhVerisimilitude]

What could you do with spells that would help bounded accuracy? Magic does stuff nonmagic can't; it has to, or no one would use it.

You could, for example, get rid of them entirely?

(I think) bounded accuracy is a bad fit for the system because it empowers spells.

D&D 5E would be better without bounded accuracy is what I am saying (because they would obviously never get rid of the spell casting system).

 

[Vaalingrade]

Right, which is exactly the treadmill effect that bounded accuracy was invented to prevent.

And no one ever stopped to ask if 'stationary bike' was actually an improvement over treadmill.

 

[NotAYakk]

I mean all martial classes mostly out of combat, even though in combat is actually a bit of a problem too, though to a lesser degree.

Rogues are something of an exception since they have expertise so they do get really good at their schtick.

The problem pops up in combat too. For example a fighter gains some white room efficiency as they level up. They go from X dpr to X+Y dpr. But a wizard goes from not being able to shut down a single opponent with Forcecage to being able to shut down a single opponent with Forcecage. The growth here is infinite. And there is no chance of failure.

Sure. But level 6/7/8/9 spells are restricted highly, and in the designed 6-9 encounter day you get to use at most 1 per encounter on average.

Forcecage works on creatures up to a certain size, and slightly larger if they have no ranged abilities, and doesn't work on certain types of foes.

The high level fighter, if we assume modestly optimized, is doing 30 damage per swing 4 times per round (120) with an extra 4 swings 6 times per day. A ~240 damage attack round is often better than a force cage, and the fighter gets more of those per day than the wizard gets forcecage-tier and above spells.

(Battlemaster Fighter with precision attack using a flaming greatsword (rare) with a belt of fire giant strength (very rare) does 4d6+17 damage per hit (31) and has a +8 (+optional 1d12) accuracy. This is modest gear for a level 20 PC, and modest optimization.)

Wizards pulling off 120 potential damage in a round on a single target using only "spammable" low level spells is a challenge. If they are using high level slots, their rival is 240 not 120.

And yes, fiat abilities are strong. But they are at least somewhat restricted in 5e. I'd love for non-spellcasters to have more fiat abilities.

Like, Indomitable should be legendary resistance (you can choose to pass 3 saves a day that you otherwise failed). The dump of Ability Score Improvement in the fighter should have been discarded unless they had a pile of high-tier feats to match it at design time.

Kangaroo Blood: (Requires athletics proficiency, level 11+). Increase your Constitution by 1 point. Your jumping distance is doubled. In addition, once on your turn you can expend a HD and jump your full movement speed plus a roll of that HD in addition to your movement. When you make a melee weapon attack and are at least 20' away from where you started your turn, you have advantage on the attack roll.

but that kind of thing was nixed by "super gritty grognard" fear of designers.