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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ovinomancer" data-source="post: 8573496" data-attributes="member: 16814">Yes, several posts have asserted this.  [USER=22779]@Hussar[/USER] does the best job of it above, but that argument is "well, I could increase party power by giving out magic items and then decrease it later by destroying them."   5e doesn't use that method, but offers much the same abilities through much more open and functional encounter math so that the GM can better balance things.  Also, open math allows for better monster creation understanding.  The tools moved, they didn't become less.  Sure, you can't yo-yo magic items at a whim as GM, but the need you're citing for doing so is provided by other tools.  If you can't adjust, the problem isn't in the tools, but that you want to play older edition with newer edition.  They are different games and do things differently.  Expecting the same tools to address problems that have moved seems contraindicated. This is an odd argument.  One, the GM's friend didn't stack for multiple instances.  Two, bonus types wasn't a GM's tool, it's was an annoying system development of 3.x, which was entirely player facing and gameable by players -- not GMs.  So the GM's friend (and not bonus types) are the thing for comparison.  GM's friend was a small, often pointless addition to 3.x.  This is because the skill check was most likely either going to crush the DC because it was focused or be so far from it because it wasn't focused that +2 wouldn't help.  I ran entire games of 3.x where I didn't even bother using it because it didn't really matter.  Dis/advantage usually matters, or matters much more often than the GM's friend of 3.x ever did.  It does it differently, and the complaint it's either there or not has some validity, but not in showcasing that it isn't a new, effective tool for the GM.  It is an effective tool, and one I find far more useful than the GM's friend (again, because quite often the GM's friend just did not matter at all).If the GM isn't following the expectation of the game, then the GM is not playing the game as presented.  This is always open -- you can make stuff up and go against expectation in any game.  Why this is considered a strength of prior editions I'm not sure -- "hey, Bob, just ignore stuff and do your own thing!"  "Thanks, Fred, this makes this edition so much better now that I'm ignoring things.  It's the bestest at doing things because I ignore it and do what I want."  "I know, Bob, such good design!"</blockquote>

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