D&D General Is character class an in-world concept in your campaigns?

[Umbran]

We don't know specifically what they can do, but we do know that they are still highly limited.

No. We know that they WERE highly limited in prior editions, if you even used those rules, since stats for the gods were not in the core. Your concept of limitations does not hold for any games but your own.

5e has this "rulings not rules" thing going. And 5e has no rules about such powers to begin with. So, really, in a 5e game, they can and will be whatever the folks in the game want. And they are not somehow wrong for doing so just because you say otherwise.

The real question is: Will it be fun for your group if Entity Type X can do this?

 

[TheCosmicKid]

Really?

I always thought the weave was something specific to the FR setting - are you saying 5e's extended it to all settings?

If so, I'm not impressed. The weave's a cool idea for FR but not cool enough to make universal.

It's mentioned in some throwaway fluff text in the PHB as a possible source of magic. It's not a big deal.

If the PCs ever get to the point of being the biggest fish in the pond then that campaign is, for all intents and purposes, done and dusted.

Why? This is seldom true in heroic stories. One might even say that heroes (in the classic sense) are definitionally the biggest fish in the pond. For most, like Achilles and Arthur, becoming the biggest fish in the pond is only the beginning of their story. For some, like Gilgamesh and Superman, being the biggest fish in the pond and figuring out what to do with that status is the entire underlying theme of the tale.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

That's just not true. I've played 3e.........a lot. By the time you hit 20th, actually epic levels, since pretty much all the major NPCs are epic, you've had multiple wishes, stat enhancing books, and have encountered other creatures that have granted stat bonuses as rewards. PCs stats rival those of the major NPCs and depending on how generous the DM is, may even exceed them. I guess if you have a stingy DM who keeps stat enhancing things way, you'd be below them, but at par or better in items/rewards, you and the major NPCs are about the same.

Most NPCs in the Forgotten Realms are not epic level. Drizzt and Artemis Entreri and the like are purportedly in the normal scope of PC characters. Drizzt, for example, is 16th level. But he has an ability score array of Str 13, Dex 20, Con 15, Int 17, Wis 17, Cha 14. If you want to explain those scores with wishes and stat books, well, that's a lot of wishes and stat books.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Really?

I always thought the weave was something specific to the FR setting - are you saying 5e's extended it to all settings?

If so, I'm not impressed. The weave's a cool idea for FR but not cool enough to make universal.

IIRC the PHB describes magic as coming from the Weave. Not just “the weave by any other name”, but specifically, “The Weave”.

Could be wrong, but I’m at work so I’m not gonna check right now.

 

[Salthorae]

Most NPCs in the Forgotten Realms are not epic level. Drizzt and Artemis Entreri and the like are purportedly in the normal scope of PC characters. Drizzt, for example, is 16th level. But he has an ability score array of Str 13, Dex 20, Con 15, Int 17, Wis 17, Cha 14. If you want to explain those scores with wishes and stat books, well, that's a lot of wishes and stat books.

Not sure how NPC stats came up in this discussion but they change and shift from edition to edition. Whatever Drizzt’s were in previous editions, in 5e they are well within the creation scope of PC’s in 5e.

Str 10, Dex 19, Con 14, Int 12, Wis 14, Cha 11

 

[Maxperson]

IIRC the PHB describes magic as coming from the Weave. Not just “the weave by any other name”, but specifically, “The Weave”.

Could be wrong, but I’m at work so I’m not gonna check right now.

It's only called "The Weave" in the FR.

"Mortals can’t directly shape this raw magic. Instead, they make use of a fabric of magic, a kind of interface between the will of a spellcaster and the stuff of raw magic. The spellcasters of the Forgotten Realms call it the Weave and recognize its essence as the goddess Mystra, but casters have varied ways of naming and visualizing this interface. By any name, without the Weave, raw magic is locked away and inaccessible; the most powerful archmage can't light a candle with magic in an area where the Weave has been torn."

 

[cbwjm]

I like to think that the weave in the Dragonlance setting is what the gods of magic created, not because people can't tap into raw magic, but because they can and it's dangerous so the gods of magic created a controlled way for mortals to tap into magic.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I actually kind of like the way they describe the magical interface thing, because most settings already have something of that sort anyway.

It inspired me to envision how magic works in my own setting. Since we have a great world dragon that carries the disc shaped planet in its claws as it flies through the crystal sphere, and that dragon is a Power of magic, I decided that the magical interface is the "breathes of the Dragon".

I like to think that the weave in the Dragonlance setting is what the gods of magic created, not because people can't tap into raw magic, but because they can and it's dangerous so the gods of magic created a controlled way for mortals to tap into magic.

You could even say that there was always a basic interface that the gods of magic were in charge of, but they created a sort of advanced interface when they set up Krynn wizardry. So the basic Weave-analogue is still what allows non-wizardly magic.

 

[Maxperson]

It inspired me to envision how magic works in my own setting. Since we have a great world dragon that carries the disc shaped planet in its claws as it flies through the crystal sphere, and that dragon is a Power of magic, I decided that the magical interface is the "breathes of the Dragon".

That's really cool.