D&D 5E Krynn's Free Feats: setting-specific or the future of the game?

[Horwath]

Yeah. Just let it be. The skills and languages from background are a fantastic place for them. Adding the feats does increase the power level of PCs, but it's more fun! And it can easily be compensated for by the DM. Hell, it will let DMs who stop campaigns at low level use some higher CR monsters that they never get to use.

need to be careful here, having few more skills or an expertise will not help you when you are stomped by higher level CR.

That is why Tough must NOT be on that list.

 

[Charlaquin]

The players are asked to join one of three factions. The noble faction runs out of missions a few chapters in because they are the bad guys (gasp!), which the players don't know, and don't get clues about (the clues are in missions that you perform for the other two factions), forcing me to basically make up things for the group to do, and then hand them a clue so they could actually participate in the endgame.

Ah, yeah, I can see how if the party was only helping one faction the whole thing would end up falling pretty flat. I believe that the design intent was for the players to try to involve themselves with all three factions to figure out who the “real” villains are (which, surprise, they’re all evil), but it’s set up so that you can’t do all three factions’ missions without splitting the party, and each faction looks like the good guys from an internal perspective. So, a typical party will end up helping out two factions, maybe switching sides at some point, but ultimately siding with one faction, and whichever one it is, they turn out to have been evil in the end.

Personally, I had each faction approach a different party member, so the players had inside access to all three and could learn what they were each up to and play them against each other. In fact, for the first few missions my players were actually pit against each other, which is what keyed them in that they were being played and motivated them to try and play the factions back. It was a blast!

 

[James Gasik]

Ah, yeah, I can see how if the party was only helping one faction the whole thing would end up falling pretty flat. I believe that the design intent was in fact for the players to try to involve themselves with all three factions to figure out who the “real” villains are, which, surprise, it’s all of them. But each faction looks like the good guys from their own perspective, and it’s set up so that you can’t do all three factions’ missions without splitting the party. So, a typical party will end up siding with one faction, and whichever one it is, they turn out to have been evil in the end.

Personally, I had each faction approach a different party member, so the players had inside access to all three and could learn what they were each up to and play them against each other. In fact, for the first few missions my players were actually pit against each other, which is what keyed them in that they were being played and motivated them to try and play the factions back. It was a blast!

That's probably the way it was intended to work, but when I had each faction try to recruit them, one emissary they just "distrusted" for some reason right off the bat, and they got it into their heads that they should only work for one of the others. They felt the rewards for helping the nobility, such as the possibility of gaining status, was too good to pass up.

Legacy of the Crystal Shard appeared to have some problems too, but I played in that one, so I don't really know if it was the adventure or the DM in this case.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I would consider it as a fighter at level 14 maybe

I wouldn't know I have not yet seen any fighters over level 11

 

[James Gasik]

I wouldn't know I have not yet seen any fighters over level 11

Me neither, but some people get to play a lot more than others. Bastiches!

 

[bedir than]

need to be careful here, having few more skills or an expertise will not help you when you are stomped by higher level CR.

That is why Tough must NOT be on that list.

Tough shouldn't be on the list because it's boring. Durable and Resilient have better stories and are active.

 

[Charlaquin]

That's probably the way it was intended to work, but when I had each faction try to recruit them, one emissary they just "distrusted" for some reason right off the bat, and they got it into their heads that they should only work for one of the others. They felt the rewards for helping the nobility, such as the possibility of gaining status, was too good to pass up.

Leave it to players to make snap judgments about NPCs and then make a bunch of terrible decisions based on their misapprehensions of those NPCs and their motivations

Legacy of the Crystal Shard appeared to have some problems too, but I played in that one, so I don't really know if it was the adventure or the DM in this case.

Probably a bit of both. The adventure has a similar number of moving parts, which can lead to such problems. But, it’s more straightforward than MiBG in terms of initial setup.

 

[Minigiant]

I find grabing 2 levels of fighter (action surge and second wind and fighting style) with 3 levels of rogue (2d6 sneak attack and cunning action) is just as good as 5 levels of fighter.

I find a 2 level dip into paliden is great for any cha caster that wants to go gish

Well that's rogue and the weaker casters like l said so...

With campaigns ending in 7-9 levels, it really becomes a case of flavor or power for the whole second half if you can't get it from the 1st or 4th level feats.

 

[Wyckedemus]

Infinite regeneration over an 8 hour sleep. As long as you have 1 hp, you won’t have anything wrong with you the next day. Broken ribs, missing limbs, poof. All better tomorrow.

Well, I think it's been made pretty clear that Hit Points aren't pure meat and that % of damage and crits do not necessarily correlate to true wounds.

When a DM describes a critical hit that stabs a PC in the gut or breaks a bone, and is frustrated that the player heals up after a long rest, the DM is the one at fault if that messes with their own verisimilitude. If a DM does not like that narrative, they can house rule healing all they want so that it does.

In my game, as long as you have at least 1 out of 80 hit points, you don't have large/deep wounds or broken bones. You have minor scrapes and bruises that can heal up with long rest. That is, until you drop to 0hp with a lethal strike, upon which you are KO'd and dying.

That said, in my game, villains and disposable NPCs are just that, disposable, and therefore can have serious injuries when struck by heroes. Heroes are the main characters that persist through the story and deserve a hero's narrative.

(edited spelling)

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, I think it's been made pretty clear that Hit Points aren't pure meat and that % of damage and crits do not necessarily correlate to true wounds.

When a DM describes a critical hit that stabs a PC in the gut or breaks a bone, and is frustrated that the player heals up after a long rest, the DM is the one at fault if that messes with their own verisimilitude. If a DM does not like that narrative, they can house rule healing all they want so that it does.

In my game, as long as you have at least 1 out of 80 hit points, you don't have large/deep wounds or broken bones. You have minor scrapes and bruises that can heal up with long rest. That is, until you drop to 0hp with a lethal strike, upon which you are KO'd and dying.

That said, in my game, villains and disposable NPCs are just that, disposable, and therefore can have serious injuries when struck by heroes. Heroes are the main characters that persist through the story and deserve a hero's narrative.

(edited spelling)

You're right, of course. My problem is, I have a hard time narrating combat as a series of near-misses, topped with Schrodinger's "dying" PC. The clash in nomenclature, where hits aren't hits but persist in being called hits, hurts my brain.