D&D 5E I'm just sayin', the concentration mechanic makes it WAY easier to balance spells

[Sacrosanct]

And I'll say that will take 50 minutes to recalculate, because I can make up nonsensical big numbers too!

We know, because you already did:

Some combats would literally go twice as fast without this mechanic.

 

[the Jester]

You must have some mighty quick combats. Since an attack and damage roll would also only be a few seconds per round you must get your combats over in under 2 minutes!

No, that takes a bit longer, as you have a series of rolls and possibly notations (spells or ammo expended, features or powers used up, hit point loss, etc) as opposed to "make a Con save, DC... 22." *Roll* "Made it!"

So rolling for haste getting dispelled every single hit in 5E and accounting for it is "seconds", but getting debuffed in 3E takes 5 minutes. Yeah, not buying that bridge there.

Perhaps I was unclear. The difference is that in 5e, you have one roll to check. In 3e, a targeted dispel will check against each effect in play on the target, so let's say bull's strength, cat's grace and haste. Three checks vs. one. Then, you have to go through and track the cascade of effects- "oh, my cat's grace is gone, that means my AC and Reflex drop by 2... " It's not too bad at 5th level, but by 12th or 15th it's getting quite lengthy.

Vs., in 5e, "roll to dispel my one concentration buff in effect! Oh, well, I guess you no longer have disadvantage on your attacks against me."

Again, a completely overblown time estimate that destroys any credibility, not to mention a completely inappropriate comparison.

Appropriateness of the comparison aside, you sound as though you may not have actually played in any high, or especially epic, 3e games. Trust me, an hour is NOT out of the question, especially when you add in an epic career's worth of magic items being destroyed, too. It is neither an overblown time estimate nor mere theorycrafting; I ran 3e from 1st to high-30's in levels, and saw this happen not once, but MANY times, often with the pcs as the ones throwing the (first) disjunction, at higher levels.

High level 5E characters walking into an anti-magic field and losing all their potions, buffs and magical equipment bonuses would be more accurate. And I'll say that will take 50 minutes to recalculate, because I can make up nonsensical big numbers too!

Let's look at what kind of stuff a high level pc (say 15th) in 5e might have on them that requires recalculation in antimagic: Perhaps one or two effects from non-concentration things, perhaps one concentration effect, perhaps 3 or 4 magic items. Assuming a generous campaign, maybe 6 magic items.

Compare to what a 15th level pc in 3e is likely to have in terms of spells and magic items: at least one magic weapon, magic armor, an item that boosts the pc's primary stat, something for flight, something for free action, something to counter death effects, a way to fly or teleport- so far we're still in "obligatory stuff you must have if you want to be able to meet high-level challenges in 3e"- probably something for a resistance bonus to saves, if you're the right class, you almost certainly have a few wands that do healing, etc, etc.

High-level 3e parties buff up like crazy. There's a reason that the "scry-buff-teleport" tactic became so obligatory at high levels; it was, generally, the best tactical option available. And a high-level buffed party would be sporting so many spell effects, not to mention the "magic item Christmas tree", that... well, let's just say that I don't think there is any comparison to 5e when you talk about the complexity of dealing with debuffing via dispels.

And that's a good thing. That was, in fact, one of the goals of 5e- to make tracking stuff easier. I applaud them for it.

 

[drjones]

I'm really liking the mechanic. So far, my buffing player is still getting a lot of bang for his spell slot buck and rarely fails the conc save. It does not take particularly long at the table because he knows to do it when he gets hit, and if he was getting hit a lot he'd be dead anyway. Besides serving as a curb on stacking and reducing buffing time it also makes for a nice 4e style duration limit where most spells last at least the whole encounter unless interfered with so keeping track of rounds active is not necessary. It also serves as a good reason for tactically smart players to actually protect the caster.

Something like this that explicitly restricts the power of certain characters and classes will always have a vocal minority lobbying against them (even though it makes little sense in a game where you can change all the rules at any time). Fortunately in this case I think the designers are going to be leaning much more on the results of the surveys at the end of the year than individual gripes.

 

[dco]

So rolling for haste getting dispelled every single hit in 5E and accounting for it is "seconds", but getting debuffed in 3E takes 5 minutes. Yeah, not buying that bridge there.

If you have dices of different colours you can throw them when the DM starts his combat turn. 0 seconds of time if enemies hit you to know if you keep concentration and the effect is resolved more easily because there are going to be far less buffs and probably they have easier mechanics.

 

[EroGaki]

Something like this that explicitly restricts the power of certain characters and classes will always have a vocal minority lobbying against them (even though it makes little sense in a game where you can change all the rules at any time). Fortunately in this case I think the designers are going to be leaning much more on the results of the surveys at the end of the year than individual gripes.

I'm not against a mechanic that helps balance out the classes; as I stated in a previous post, I like the concentration mechanic for the most part. I simply think it goes too far, especially since the caster classes have been nerfed in other areas; with spell slots higher than 5th level being so few, and the fact that you have to use those higher slots to scale your spells effectiveness, you have a neat little limiter that will prevent casters from dominating like the good ol' days; add into account that there are thus far no methods of obtaining any bonus spell slots, and a caster has to decided if that 14 die fireball is truly worth the investment.

And some DM's (such as mine, damn his bones) are strictly by the books when it comes to rulings; players such as myself lobbying against the established rules do so because if they stay the way they are, I'll lose most of my desire to even play magic-users, considering they can't really do anything fun anymore without their losing their few spell slots because they rolled low when a bee stings them.

 

[CapnZapp]

I'm not against a mechanic that helps balance out the classes; as I stated in a previous post, I like the concentration mechanic for the most part. I simply think it goes too far, especially since the caster classes have been nerfed in other areas; with spell slots higher than 5th level being so few, and the fact that you have to use those higher slots to scale your spells effectiveness, you have a neat little limiter that will prevent casters from dominating like the good ol' days; add into account that there are thus far no methods of obtaining any bonus spell slots, and a caster has to decided if that 14 die fireball is truly worth the investment.

I believe it is excellent casters are complaining the nerf stick "got too far".

That probably means the designers' got it right

 

[EroGaki]

I believe it is excellent casters are complaining the nerf stick "got too far".

That probably means the designers' got it right

I disagree.

I'd rather they had buffed the non-casters instead of just slapping down the magic users with garbage restrictions.

 

[keterys]

Appropriateness of the comparison aside, you sound as though you may not have actually played in any high, or especially epic, 3e games. Trust me, an hour is NOT out of the question, especially when you add in an epic career's worth of magic items being destroyed, too. It is neither an overblown time estimate nor mere theorycrafting; I ran 3e from 1st to high-30's in levels, and saw this happen not once, but MANY times, often with the pcs as the ones throwing the (first) disjunction, at higher levels.

Confirmed. The worst part for me as a DM was needing a disjunction style effect to reign in the PCs - the cleric, for example, had 23 or so sticky notes for the buffs he had on at the time - while also not wanting to do anything at all with magic items. Not only did the magic items suck to handle at the table (oh god, laborious grind), but they weren't the things I cared about either.

Anyhow, disjunction was why I took Elminster's Effulgent Epuration as one of the only ways to defend against the effect I could find.

 

[the Jester]

Anyhow, disjunction was why I took Elminster's Effulgent Epuration as one of the only ways to defend against the effect I could find.

I'm not familiar with that, but an npc wizard adversary of my epic 3e pcs researched disjunction buffer specifically to eat up that first MD without losing all his buffs and items.

 

[evilbob]

Until something breaks the concentration mechanic

Gah, no one likes a Cassandra!