D&D 5E (2014) L&L: New Packet Hits This Wednesday

[keterys]

I hear edition warring is bad, m'kay. So let's agree to disagree and drop that side of the discussion.

 

[Visanideth]

I didn't mean to war or anything with my reply, but if it's considered too "aggressive" I'll gladly delete it or edit it. It doesn't contribute much to the current discussion anyways.

 

[VinylTap]

Collapsing 'spell like abilities' and "spells" into one system certainly isn't the worst idea. I wonder if they could wrap all that up into a "cast x times per day" system.

Do we even know how they're planning on displaying spell info for players? I really like the idea of spell cards, although they're tough to do in a corebook. They want people to jump onto a character and start playing with as little "rulebook flipping" as possible. At that point your choices sort of are "cards" or "print them on the character sheet". Any other solutions?

 

[Zaphling]

Very very excited for this one.

For Druids: yes. players should have the choice between spellcasting and shapechanging versions. I don't know if summoning is part of spellcasting, but it can be a good third.

For Rangers: I'm actually HAPPY that they took away combat-themed Rangers (archery and TWF) since they don't actually define a ranger. What defines them is their favored terrain, hated foes/favored enemies, and to some extent their animal companions. (although i'm not entirely full-on with spellcasting)

For Paladins: this is my best so far. Asides from cavalier, warden, and blackguard representing G, N, and E. I have a strong guess that the oaths will represent virtues/vices like freedom, sacrifice, valor, justice, etc. and is subject to DM/player decision on what specific alignment it will be.

For MDD: happy it is gone. it's a bit awkward.

For Fighters: I think resting for a turn to regain dice is a logical thing. I mean, if you've played Marvel Avengers on FB, they sacrifice a turn to regain stamina, which is probably the same thing.

 

[Ratskinner]

This obviously leads to the ages-old problem of making the Fighter some sort of super-broad parent class and the other melee archetypes super-specialized ones. Which, sadly, is the reason Fighters tend to be terribly weak in most D&D editions.
<snippage>
Fighters should be as rare as Rangers and Paladins: they should be the elite troopers, the battle hardened veterans, the sword saints, and if no room for the Warlord is left, then also the generals and the commanders. If the definition of the Fighter is "anything with a sword that isn't a paladin, ranger, barbarian or rogue", then you have an archetype that probably doesn't deserve a place in a class-based system.

Good thoughts. I can go either way. Either we should have a very small number of flexible classes and decent multiclassing (like 3: Warrior, Rogue, Caster like True20) to focus on the three concentrations of the game mechanics OR we should have a wide variety of fairly narrow classes (probably still with good multiclassing of some kind.) In the second scenario, "Fighter" should be blown up into a variety of less-broad classes (Warlord, Swordsage, etc.)

However, I think the second scenario gets into toe-stepping territory with things like Background and Specialties. If we are keeping those, its harder for me to see how we pull off the zillion special classes track.

 

[Ratskinner]

I wonder if fans of old-school stuff would have a problem with a spell that had special text that said: "You may cast this spell 3 times before this slot is expended."

They shouldn't. IIRC, some versions of cantrip worked that way. Of course, doing that with several spells would add a lot of bookkeeping to a class.

 

[GX.Sigma]

Cavalier: oath of valor
Warden: oath of the guardian
Blackguard: oath of destruction
Avenger: oath of enmity?

 

[Bow_Seat]

I didn't play much fourth edition, but wasn't the avenger unarmored? Maybe they could do it like the cleric class and have armor proficiencies be determined by sub-specialization.

 

[Greg K]

Good thoughts. I can go either way. Either we should have a very small number of flexible classes and decent multiclassing (like 3: Warrior, Rogue, Caster like True20) to focus on the three concentrations

It is been while, but I seem to recall that with the Companion, it became five roles in True20 to cover hybrids with guidelines for building your own roles and which was carried over into the revised edition. This would be the ideal for me, but I prefer True20 (owning only the original first book).

 

[Sunseeker]

I'm not excited about a spell-casting ranger, but hey, that's a bow-fighter....so I'm OK with that, I hope the emphasis on spellcasting is not too strong.

I'm glad the druid gets wild shape right off the bat, making them a cleric until 5th level was always a turn off for me.

The 3rd ed Paladin was by far one of the most BORING classes I've ever seen. And the 4th Paladin was one of the most robust and enjoyable I've ever played, and not just due to the lifted alignment restrictions. It really felt like I was playing a paladin, not just some fighter with morals.

So I really hope we don't go back to the Lameadin.