Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="FormerlyHemlock" data-source="post: 6712528" data-attributes="member: 6787650">Polymorph is great, but it comes with its own restrictions, the most important of which is size and the second of which is AC, and the third of which is mental saves. If you're fighting indoors where a Huge creature won't fit (like in Out of the Abyss), Polymorph doesn't give very many HP at all, and they are generally on a low-AC chassis anyway (T-Rex AC is 13) which means that mobs will chew them apart. Plus you lose access to class abilities anyway. And you become vulnerable to effects like Hypnotic Pattern and illithid Mind Blast. Against a mob of mooks like two dozen hobgoblins, Stoneskinning your AC 21 fighter minion will make him last longer than turning him into a T-Rex, even in an area where a T-Rex would fit. The Stoneskin will reduce 25.20 DPR to something about half that (12ish?), making your fighter last for eight rounds or so instead of four, and it preserves his ability to Shield himself which doubles that yet again. Stoneskin is adding between four and eight rounds to his lifespan. On the other hand, with Polymorph the T-Rex will take 91.20 DPR out of its 136 HP, so Polymorph is adding a round and a half to his lifespan while negating his ability to use class abilities like a bow.Polymorph is good but it doesn't fill the same niche as Stoneskin. Instead of enhancing your best guy, it replaces him with someone who is pretty decent. Ergo it works better on someone who is not otherwise your best guy, like a random spoony bard.IMC, the spell that competes most directly with Stoneskin is Aura of Vitality, which also negates a large amount of damage but doesn't compete for concentration during combat.I agree, in that scenario, Stoneskin was pretty useless. If he'd had a T-Rex or a Blue Slaad or a Mind Flayer or something to cast it on, it would have looked a lot better. You want to use it on a glass cannon to make it not so glassy. I'm assuming that the NPC in question was not much of a cannon (glass or otherwise) or else Polymorphing him wouldn't have been such a no-brainer.Quick comments on a couple of those spells: yeah, I love Evard's Black Tentacles. But it is small area and only lasts for a minute, so it doesn't work well against anyone with missile weapons and it cannot be effectively pre-cast before combat, so it has a worse action economy than something like Polymorph or Stoneskin.Conjure Minor Elementals: there are a handful of elemental creatures of low CR like Fire Snakes and Azers, but if you pick CR 1/4 or 1/2 that mostly means you're going to get Mephits. Try summoning four Magma Mephits to wreck the PCs' day with Heat Metal x4 while your stone golem is tearing them to shreds. Good luck killing the golem when you can't hold your magic weapons, kids...</blockquote>

Verification