D&D 5E Finding 5th edition too "safe".

[FormerlyHemlock]

I get it. I esssentially hit the same wall. I was converting everything , and at a certain point said "why bother?". I love 5th, but I dont use the AP/long, save the world yet again stories WOTC is putting out for it, so Its just easier to take adventure X and run it under whatever system it was designed for.

On the subject of a/d- I transported the idea into Castles and Crusades back during the 5e playtest. Castles and Crusades' "prime" system has always bugged me, but I love how easy it is to houserule the system (I prefer to add to, rather than subtract when it comes to rules) and convert products from 0e through 3rd on the fly in about 2 seconds (flip AC, figure out whether monster saves should be better with physical or mental abilities-all the other math is fine-as is) So I simply dropped the 12/18 challenge base, and set all challenge bases (think DC, which then gets modded by the level/HD of threat) to 15, and characters who had that ability as prime got "advantage" on the roll. Works awesome. The PCs are a tad more heroic than with the original systemwithout a big power increase AND they do slightly better on nonnprime checks (where as written, non prime checks have a very low chance of success- something that many C&Cers think is a bit too rough). So yeah, fiigure out how you want to incorporate it into 1/2e. Its totally worth stealing!

I understand where you're coming from on this. I spent a while playing GURPS: Dungeon Fantasy, trying to convert AD&D or D&D content to GURPS. It never really worked out, but it did prime the pump so that when 5E came out I was open to playing it.

Adapting stuff across game systems can sometimes distort the material beyond recognition and give an unsatisfying experience. Personally, I'm currently reasonably happy with 5E (one big factor: even though I hate how combat-oriented 5E MM stat blocks are now, I at least appreciate having Str/Dex/Con/Wis/Cha stats for everything instead of strictly just Int) and my players know the system; but it wouldn't shock me if I at some point returned to AD&D instead. AD&D does have a superior magic system, especially for priestly magic. (Simultaneously more powerful and much more fragile: no casting while moving, for example.) The main downside of playing AD&D would be: 5E combat is more tactically intricate. AD&D has some cool stuff you can do with called shots and Complete Fighter's Handbook-type stuff, plus some specialized weapons; but 5E fighters have grappling/pushing which is generally more effective due to the way disadvantage works. If I were to play AD&D I'd feel somewhat compelled to extend martial combat to include some 5E stuff like the effects of being prone, behind partial cover, or out of visual range. In short, bell curves are more interesting than linear d20s, and 5E has better bell curves, as well as a more interesting action economy.

 

[S'mon]

[MENTION=463]S'mon[/MENTION] Thanks for the reply upthread. Hakeem sounds very Conan-esque

I know 5e, with how complex the characters are, is not really suited for a meatgrinder game. I love the high risk / high reward feel of AD&D though, where losing a character is like busting in poker or knocking down the Jenga tower. It's hard to get that on the inidividual player level without a pretty significant chance of character death. I will cogitate upon other ways to achieve this... I don't think gimping characters with penalties is the answer.

Yes - I was going for a 'Thongor of Lemuria' Conan pastiche feel in my Wilderlands game, and 5e supports that very well. BTW Hakeem is faithful to his beloved Paladin wife Malenn of Mitra and expecting his first child, that's the one way he's not very Conanesque. He is currently War Chief of Clan Greywolf leading an army of barbarians & pirates in a war against (a) the dark empire of Neo-Nerath, and (b) the evil Barbarian Warlord Yusan, who is rumoured to be Hakeem's own father...

For high risk/reward, well I think unbalanced encounters & treasure, and xp for gold, would be the main things, plus save or die traps - you can do this in 5e with save-or-take-lethal damage, especially at lower level. And crushing walls, stone blocks from the ceiling, etc can be inherently fatal. I think 5e supports this a lot easier than 4e at any rate - 4e is actively designed to avoid this style.

 

[ExploderWizard]

[MENTION=463]S'mon[/MENTION] Thanks for the reply upthread. Hakeem sounds very Conan-esque

I know 5e, with how complex the characters are, is not really suited for a meatgrinder game. I love the high risk / high reward feel of AD&D though, where losing a character is like busting in poker or knocking down the Jenga tower. It's hard to get that on the inidividual player level without a pretty significant chance of character death. I will cogitate upon other ways to achieve this... I don't think gimping characters with penalties is the answer.

Character death works because it gives the player a clean slate. Applying permanent penalties that hamper the character forever after leaves the player stuck with a reminder of his/her screw up for the rest of the campaign. These are not real people we are talking about (the characters) so going out with a bang (or a whimper in some cases) and moving on is just fine.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I want to come back in and say a few things.

Lethality is not just about hit points and HD. There are many other things that exist in 2nd edition but not always in 5th.

1. Magic Resistance.
2. Magic Immunities.
3. Loads of Save or Die effects.
4. Age penalties.
5. Death from massive damage.
6. Aging effects from Ghosts and other undead.
7. Elves being restricted to Resurrection only.
8. Racial level limits.
9. Weapon Speeds.
10. Resting.
11. Item saving throws.
12. etc... etc....

Now these things could possibly be added to 5th edition but why would I do that when there is a system that already has them? Not to mention the fact that because of the limited amount of material for 5th edition, we are already using loads of 1st and 2nd edition material anyway. There are only two things that 5th edition gives us that we would hate to miss and those are feats and adv/disadv. Those are not enough to make us want to keep our main game in 5th edition. Now we will most likely go back at some point because 5th edition does give it's own uniqueness, but right now we feel like 2nd edition is more in line with what we are looking for.

Best of luck with your future endeavors.

 

[Rhenny]

Undead in 5e are still pretty scary. The max hp drain and the Shadow's strength drain scares the heck out of my players. Use more of them (especially if your group doesn't have a cleric).

 

[Saeviomagy]

In all my years playing D&D, the involvement of my character with the world has generally been inversely proportional to the lethality of the game, whether that resulted from different rulesets or just from being a cheezy munchkin bastard. If characters tend to just drop dead with no mitigation strategies available and no way to recover, then that causes me to see each character as a bundle of stats, drastically reducing any tension to do with death and dying. My character is down? Oh no, good thing I already have the next one pre-rolled to join the party of random goons who have no ties to each other who go smash dungeons for no apparent motivation!

It's only once you conquer that, and death becomes fairly rare that any investment occurs.

That said, past a certain point of survivability, tension can dissipate: but the solution can be found in more player investment. You can seek harder challenges. I start paying attention to the world the DM is describing so I can find harder things for my character to do.

 

[S'mon]

Undead in 5e are still pretty scary. The max hp drain and the Shadow's strength drain scares the heck out of my players. Use more of them (especially if your group doesn't have a cleric).

Yeah, two of the PC deaths IMC were due to a wight and some shadows. The others were
due to (a) PC wandering off alone and (b) PCs attacking a force of 16 Veterans & their high priest Morthor Coff (think Thulsa Doom & his Riders) - they killed the priest ok but two of them (a PC Behir & a PC T-Rex!) got hacked to pieces by his guards, Hakeem escaped with a potion of invisibility.

 

[Hussar]

Couple of thoughts.

About the lethality of AD&D. The point is well raised that AD&D manages to remain pretty lethal throughout the game. But, I think the argument misses the point somewhat. The lethality in AD&D comes from (mostly) save or die effects (or things like Dragon breath which are essentially save or die as well). Thing is, this comes down a lot to the DM. A DM that uses lots of snakes and spiders and undead will have a much higher kill ratio than a DM that uses a lot of humanoid monsters.

IOW, AD&D maintains lethality by doing an end run around the HP mechanics. It doesn't matter if your character has 10 HP or 100 HP, a failed poison save still kills you. Whether this is a good or bad thing is left up to the reader. But, from 3e onwards, the trend in the game is to focus on the HP mechanics. You don't die from poison in 3e, you take ability damage. In 4e, you took poison damage directly to HP. 5e, generally, just gives you the poisoned condition and that's it.

In return for stripping away SoD effects, the monsters have gotten a whole lot scarier though. 3e was brutal for this. A creature, by and large, could do about 10xCR damage in a round. Granted that was max damage and the average was a lot lower, but, even the average damage from a 3e creature was usually considerably higher than the max damage of most AD&D monsters. 4e and 5e have continued this trend. You aren't going to just die in 5e. But, you can die.

Thing is in 5e, it's almost impossible to flat out kill a PC. Negative Max HP means that it's extremely difficult for anything to outright kill you. Knock you unconscious? Sure, no problem. But outright kill you? Not likely. So, you have a fair bit of buffer there. One round to knock you down. Probably a round of making a death save (and even if the baddies took a shot at you in the meantime, a successful save still leaves you at 2 death saves) and then someone patches you back up. And all it takes is 1 HP of healing to bring you back to your feet.

It's not easy to kill a 5e PC. At least, not after about 30 HP or so.

Really, the trick here is to isolate a PC, then he'll die. Swallowed whole works wonders. Any area attacks including fallen PC's makes for added bonuses two.

Like a lot of things 5e, it just takes a bit of thinking to up the lethality of the game.

 

[RotGrub]

IOW, AD&D maintains lethality by doing an end run around the HP mechanics. It doesn't matter if your character has 10 HP or 100 HP, a failed poison save still kills you. Whether this is a good or bad thing is left up to the reader.

I think you are 100% correct with your observations. Personally, I'm not a fan of grinding HPs, so I think it was a good thing.

I also think it's hard to kill a PC in 5e. A PC hit for max damage with a great sword while at 0 typically results in a single failed death save and not death.

For greater lethality, make death at 0 HP the rule. I can't think of anything more simple. PCs already get Hit Dice and high HP totals anyway.

 

[Tony Vargas]

About the lethality of AD&D. The point is well raised that AD&D manages to remain pretty lethal throughout the game.

Between HD advancing, saves getting easier to make as you level, protective items, and spell availability, AD&D gets noticeably less lethal after only a level or few (in the 'sweet spot' characters can generally take a hit without being instantly killed), and notoriously so at higher levels (thus spheres of annihilation and variants like type XX poison and a host of outright 'gotchyas').

A DM that uses lots of snakes and spiders and undead will have a much higher kill ratio than a DM that uses a lot of humanoid monsters.

Sure, he's the DM afterall.

AD&D maintains lethality by doing an end run around the HP mechanics. It doesn't matter if your character has 10 HP or 100 HP, a failed poison save still kills you.

OTOH, Neutralize Poison will bring you right back, as will mere Slow Poison, for a little while. But, yes, an end-run around mechanics that make the game less lethal restores lethality, if the DM goes there.

But, from 3e onwards, the trend in the game is to focus on the HP mechanics. You don't die from poison in 3e, you take ability damage. In 4e, you took poison damage directly to HP. 5e, generally, just gives you the poisoned condition and that's it.

And a lot of former SoDs have a hp threshold in 5e, too. Point taken. That doesn't necessarily make it less lethal, it just makes what it takes to kill more consistent.

Thing is in 5e, it's almost impossible to flat out kill a PC. Negative Max HP means that it's extremely difficult for anything to outright kill you. Knock you unconscious? Sure, no problem. But outright kill you? Not likely.

At very low level, entirely possible, but random. A crit or a modest-damage attack dropping you to very few hps followed by a higher-damage one killing you. That's very AD&D, too. At higher levels, yes, you have mountains of hps. Then again, thanks to bounded accuracy, a large enough group of attackers can dig through them pretty quickly.

Like a lot of things 5e, it just takes a bit of thinking to up the lethality of the game.

Agreed.