D&D 5E How has 5e solved the Wand of CLW problem?

[delericho]

I'm fairly sure they were an unintended consequence of open-ended wands based on spells. If their use had been intended from the start, the 3e and 3.5e DMGs wouldn't have described attrition-based adventuring the way they did.

Yep. 3e appears to have been designed on the assumption people would mostly play it like 1st/2nd Ed - where crafting was very rare and item purchase moreso. Of course, it didn't work out like that.

 

[Tony Vargas]

So, the wand of CLW was in many games a necessary evil.
How has 5e dealt with that problem aside from full heal after long rest (sleeping)?

5e has dealt with it by eliminating the item, obviously. As far as dealing with the necessity of the item, it has added HD, useable in a very long 'short' rest of 1hr (one defense of the WoCLW was that it shouldn't always be possible to spend 10 rounds (1 min) for each 45 hps healed, obviously, a full hour is something you'll get to do a lot less often), but not very many of them. The WoCLW let the party heal up between combats, making it possible for each combat to really challenge them, and making it less suicidal for the party to do without a traditional healer - and for traditional healers to do more than just 'healbot' all the time.

So, the other half of the equation for 5e is encounter guidelines, which have to be tuned towards less challenging/interesting/deadly encounters so that attrition over the course of a day, rather than jeopardy in each combat, individually, provides tension. Of course, it's very easy to provide that sense of jeopardy within a 5e encounter, as they break 'deadly' very easily, but such encounters tend to spell an end to the day, one way or another, as the party blows through daily spells to try to survive it, and will likely 'need' a relatively short (8 hr) long rest, as a result (or, of course, fail to survive it).

Really, 5e is kind of half-way between the all-about-attrition classic game, and the each-battle-is-significant paradigm of the modern game. Fitting for an edition that set out to be all things to all D&Ders.

Do you always make sure there is a cleric or bard in the party to provide healing?

Or Druid or Paladin or at least Ranger, sure. I just point out that the party will have little chance without 'em - preferably two or more, especially if they're second stringers. It's hardly necessary to it point out, though, unless none of your players have any experience with D&D prior to 4e, since it's such a longstanding truism. You always need a cleric, you never split the party, etc...

[/quote]Do you stock up your players healing potions?[/QUOTE] No. Given the 'magic items are optional' philosophy of 5e, that'd be squirrely. Not to mention, it's the same 'problem' as the WoCLW in a different package.

 

[steeldragons]

The question: How has 5e solved the Wand of CLW problem?

The answer: 5e does not HAVE a Wand of CLW problem to solve.

 

[Leatherhead]

We managed to press on and not have the five minute adventuring day in AD&D, without wands of CLW. Once you take away the ridiculous assumption of not being at full HP = end of adventuring day many things are possible.

It's all the fault of combat healing becoming the default assumption.

Back in AD&D, full hp was full hp, that's all you had to work with period.
Then people realized that you could heal in battle! Being low hp was no longer "scary". The damage arms race began, and DMs/adventure designers treated the hp pool as the amount of hp you had to work with in a single battle, instead of the entire adventure. And the 5 minute workday was born.
In later editions, the hp pool as a temporary buffer idea was exasperated by an increased number of (cleric/druid/bard) spell slots. Then formalized by healing surges and hit dice.

The CLW wand problem wasn't "fixed" so much as displaced by other, more palatable, mechanics.

 

[Remathilis]

Yep. 3e appears to have been designed on the assumption people would mostly play it like 1st/2nd Ed - where crafting was very rare and item purchase moreso. Of course, it didn't work out like that.

This needs to be repeated over-and-over again.

A lot of the problems 3.0 had were due to the fact they assumed things would be similar to 2e's assumptions. I genuinely don't think they took certain things into account. If they had, they would have never allowed that ranger to exist in a world of unrestricted multi-classing. Chalk it up to pioneer spirit.

I actually don't think the designers foresaw certain portions of the game playing like they did. Magic items being the most obvious; I fully believe they expected +5 weapons to actually be +5 to hit and damage, not +1 flaming burst, keen, ghost-touch bane weapons. Likewise, wands being cheaper enough to keep several useful ones on tap (and scrolls for those rare one-offs) was probably not a foreseen conclusion.

In fact, I wager most of the biggest problems in 3e (multi-classing, prestige classes, magic item creation/purchase, and feats) came from backgrounds of being used "like they were in 2e, but with easier/more sensible rules" never expecting the absolute monsters they'd create...

 

[MoonSong]

This needs to be repeated over-and-over again.

A lot of the problems 3.0 had were due to the fact they assumed things would be similar to 2e's assumptions. I genuinely don't think they took certain things into account. If they had, they would have never allowed that ranger to exist in a world of unrestricted multi-classing. Chalk it up to pioneer spirit.

I actually don't think the designers foresaw certain portions of the game playing like they did. Magic items being the most obvious; I fully believe they expected +5 weapons to actually be +5 to hit and damage, not +1 flaming burst, keen, ghost-touch bane weapons. Likewise, wands being cheaper enough to keep several useful ones on tap (and scrolls for those rare one-offs) was probably not a foreseen conclusion.

In fact, I wager most of the biggest problems in 3e (multi-classing, prestige classes, magic item creation/purchase, and feats) came from backgrounds of being used "like they were in 2e, but with easier/more sensible rules" never expecting the absolute monsters they'd create...

Well, my favorite way to play 3.x is to play it like 2e but with no restrictions.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

A lot of the problems 3.0 had were due to the fact they assumed things would be similar to 2e's assumptions. I genuinely don't think they took certain things into account. If they had, they would have never allowed that ranger to exist in a world of unrestricted multi-classing. Chalk it up to pioneer spirit.

To be fair, the balance for multi-classing rangers was supposed to be the experience penalty, and you can't blame WotC when players ignore those rules.

Likewise, spellcasters scale insanely well with a high casting stat, but their default assumption was also that your high stat was a 15, and there were no races in the PHB that gave a bonus to any casting stat. Once you've shaved 20% off from all spell save DCs, and given spellcasters 20% fewer spells per day, they're somewhat less obviously overpowered than they turned out later on.

 

[delericho]

Likewise, spellcasters scale insanely well with a high casting stat, but their default assumption was also that your high stat was a 15, and there were no races in the PHB that gave a bonus to any casting stat. Once you've shaved 20% off from all spell save DCs, and given spellcasters 20% fewer spells per day, they're somewhat less obviously overpowered than they turned out later on.

Yep. Plus, if you don't allow them to buy/craft more than a very few scrolls and wands, that prevents them bypassing the Vancian magic restrictions. And if you also disallow the "Spell Compendium" (or, more specifically, any spell with a Swift or Instant Action casting time) that also cuts down on their effectiveness.

The primary casters are still the three most powerful in the game, right enough, but not so obviously.

Ah, 3e, how much do I both love and hate thee...

 

[CapnZapp]

As I see it, the core issue is that when you hand the controls over when to stop and rest for the day to the players, you will have to accept that the players will want to play it safe and rest even when you the DM knows they don't have to and in fact, resting will lessen/destroy dramatic tension later on.

What the game needs is some way to force the players to keep driving when the fuel gauge is in the red, as it were.

Here D&D has always chosen ONE TRUE SOLUTION which of course doesn't work in all cases.

I would love for the game to finally make this variable, so different adventures can have different solutions.

One adventure can have the classic "one long rest per day".

Another can say "a long rest each hour".

A third can say "you can't long rest until you reach an oasis, which could take a week or more".

Yet another could even say "you get to long rest after 5-8 encounters, depending."

One adventure could allow free creation of Cure Wounds wands. Another would even disallow Goodberry.




Any suggestion that sticks to just one of these answers will always be incomplete.

 

[Ricochet]

As I see it, the core issue is that when you hand the controls over when to stop and rest for the day to the players, you will have to accept that the players will want to play it safe and rest even when you the DM knows they don't have to and in fact, resting will lessen/destroy dramatic tension later on.

What the game needs is some way to force the players to keep driving when the fuel gauge is in the red, as it were.

Well, sometimes. That "some way" is the GM and the story going on in the game. It's a balancing act when to up the tempo, when to slow down, when to burn the last fumes and when to refuel.