D&D General Mike Mearls says control spells are ruining 5th Edition

[EzekielRaiden]

4e's Hit/Defense scaling was too high.
5e's Save/DC was too slow because it handed out proficiency and expertise too infrequently.

Basically 5e need to give PCs and monsters a 3rd Save proficiency in Tier 3. And a 4th in Tier 4. And Solo boss monsters get one more.

4e's half level bonus of +10 over 20 levels to everything was too much. Because it just became a level check. It didn't add much because you typically didn't run monsters more that 4 levels away. So it's just -2 to +2.. Really you could play 4e without the level bonus. It's just a lot of math to recalculate everything.

And all it did was push the numbers up more to the point that you needed to get saving throw feats to fill up the ever-increasing bonuses so if you had a slower number progression you could eliminate the feat bonus as well.

5e's proficiency is slightly too slow. +2 to +6 is almost alright. But it only offers 4 bumps for progression. Not enough to feel it nor really matter. And for saving throws...

Player Characters only got proficiency in 2 saves. And most monsters in 2014 got NONE.

I mean 5.5e missed an easy fix while being backwards compatible. Give most nonfullcasters and most high CR monsters proficiency with saving throws. And sometimes expertise in saving throws.

But doesn't this undercut your own argument?

Expertise is worse than your claim of the +10 over 20 levels being a problem, because that's +12 over 20 levels.

More to the point though, the defense I mentioned is that I think you're incorrect about the conclusion "all it did was push the numbers up more". No, it did not. It made the game such that facing truly insanely strong enemies, like something 9+ levels above the party, was trying to do the impossible unless you changed the situation. Meaning, it actually did create a world where ultra-difficult opponents clearly and unequivocally have the edge unless the party takes actions to address that gap--or finds a way to fight asymmetrically. Likewise, it made ultra-weak enemies clearly curb-stomp-able. You want to never ever use minion rules? Go right ahead! You'll see quite quickly that weak monsters have actually been outclassed by the PCs, so they can actually see their progression right before their eyes.

Because that's what the books actually tell you to do.

And you should be doing the same thing with skill checks too. A traveller who has tasted the planes, fought off fire giant thanes, treated with lords and ladies of the fae, and walked the streets of the City of Brass, should find it pretty tame to deal with things like sneaking past a town guard or popping a lock made of mere iron. So you should include things like the occasional raid of a mortal-world fortress where the players can see that their characters have learned and grown from their adventures, and are now genuinely beyond things that would have been major obstacles once upon a time. That grounds their adventures. It reminds them where they came from--and how far they have yet to go. It proves that all those little moments, the times they listened to each other, or practiced, or strategized, really did change them.

Forged in the crucible of adventure, they have become too hard, too sharp for the world they once knew.

 

[Zardnaar]

So some thoughts on recent levels.

Kinda seeing bounded accuracy in action. CR 1-3 can hit and hurt level 11-13.

Problem is combats are taking a while with 5.5s bucket of hp. Minotaurs of Baphomet rolled well ad were knocking PCs prone and doing 20+ hp.

They each have 85 hp. CR 1s were fodder but they have 33 hp. CR2 varied somewhere between those numbers.

CR 5-8s had around 105-127.

My xp budgets 21000 and 27000 for moderate and high encounters. I made some larger ones ignoring the X2 suggestions. 2 combats in 3 hours another hour of set up, time out, RP etc.

Bit faster if I use smaller numbers. 27k let's me use a CR16 and 5 CR 5s with a bit of xp for fodder. That leaves you very vulnerable to spells like slow, command, tashas. CR5s generally dont have good wisdom saves.
Somewhere in the middles is probably CR 8-12 with fodder for 10-12 beings in the encounter.

Speed things up by just removing the last low CR mooks. A cheap encounter is 15000 xp.its around 8 CR5s (10 is 18000iirc).

Bounded accuracy concept is at war with the xp budget and advice to not exceed X2 the party members.

Its an improvement over 5.0 encounter guidelines. 30 minutes would be quick 45-60 minutes is typical. Hit the PCs with 3 fireballs in 6th level slots. A couple have resistance to fire, monk has evasion.

Divine intervention is available for hallow and 1 action prayer of healing. In combat refresh yours short rest abilities.

They're being a lot more conservative with spell slots. Time limit for the campaign climax. I prepared 10 encounters. 3 low/medium/high and the final is X2 high boss fight.

They defeated a medium and high encounter. Put some ways in to defeat other ones off camera via NPC allies. The allies eliminated 2 low and 1 more medium. Some allies were from level 1-3. Allies granted a boon. They chose the dragon one a 90' bolt 10d10 lightning damage.

The remaining 2 high encounters are fixed. They have to deal with them to get to the boss. The remaining low and medium encounter can be avoided, cut out or ignored depending on how things play out.

Time limit is a hard one. Long rest= campaign fail. Short rests are roll for random encounters.

Not enjoying level 13 as such. Its fun with the group but kinda going through the motions.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

And?

You still have training in addition to that. You're acting like it somehow replaces things. No.

But the half level bonus overwhelms training rather fast. It means that at already at tenth level untrained person is is good at a thing than a level one trained person, and twentieth level one is way better, not to talk about thirtieth level one. It is like an Olympic athlete (high level) being way better at maths than a university maths student (low level.)

Which is neither particularly bounded (given you can easily achieve bonuses of +20 with a modicum of effort)

Is that easy? I don't think it is easy at all. In fact, I am not sure how you even imagine getting that. (Are there magic items that grants bonuses to skills? I guess there could be...)

nor all that much about accuracy. Like that's literally the problem people are talking about here, that the scaling is all kinds of wonky and the things you aren't proficient in become worse and worse and worse holes in your abilities, while hyper-specialized characters functionally cannot fail, unless they're attempting something meant to be nearly impossible or the GM is using the "skill rolls auto-fail on a nat 1" house-rule. (Still surprises me how many people think nat 1 = auto fail in the actual rules. That's only true of attack rolls. Nat 20 also isn't automatic success for anything but attack rolls!)

Yes, I know it is not a rule. And yes, there are things that break the bounded accuracy. I said it before (perhaps in this thread, who knows.) that how they implemented is not perfect. Though the issue really is not the basic skill scaling, it is that you can pile too much extra crap (guidance, bardic inspiration etc) on top of things.

I have articulated above why I see a pretty blatant double-standard here. 4e's math isn't that much bigger than 5e's, especially if you cap it at 20 levels like 5e does. Folks like to say 5e's math is 4e's cut in half. It's closer to three-quarters. It really is not that much below 5e, and yet--as we've seen in this thread--folks consider 5e clearly and demonstrably inadequate scaling for anything but your core focus stuff, which I've argued grows clearly out of proportion with the claimed goals of "Bounded Accuracy".

But 4e did not cap at level 20. The range of the game is stretched over 30 levels, and that is what we need to consider. Level 20 5e character is not comparable to level 20 4e character, it is comparable to level 30 one.

More to the point though, the defense I mentioned is that I think you're incorrect about the conclusion "all it did was push the numbers up more". No, it did not. It made the game such that facing truly insanely strong enemies, like something 9+ levels above the party, was trying to do the impossible unless you changed the situation. Meaning, it actually did create a world where ultra-difficult opponents clearly and unequivocally have the edge unless the party takes actions to address that gap--or finds a way to fight asymmetrically. Likewise, it made ultra-weak enemies clearly curb-stomp-able. You want to never ever use minion rules? Go right ahead! You'll see quite quickly that weak monsters have actually been outclassed by the PCs, so they can actually see their progression right before their eyes.

And if the game truly had committed to this, then that might have been fine. Except it didn't, so it had to kludge minion and elite versions of basically the same monsters so that you actually could fight them at different levels. It is just confused and counterproductive design.

But you are making this an edition war thing. The fact is that we don't need to think that 4e design was bad and 5 design is good or vice versa. Personally I think both have strengths and weaknesses, and I think we can learn from both. 4e had issues, and in many ways 5e fixed them but in doing so they sometimes ran too far, and refused to use something that already worked in 4e or at least would need just tweaking.

Regarding maths, like I said before, the bounded accuracy should be a bit more limited on the PC side (limit various extras that can be piled on top of it) and too bounded on enemy side (their defences rarely scale enough.)

But also the core issue of course here is save or suck spells, and the most powerful ones tend to target wis in particular. I don't think enemies having bad strength or even dex saves is often an issue. Like hold person/monster has been discussed quite a bit and it is a good example of this. It is rather wild that a second level spell can simply shut down a powerful foe completely, and even multiple when upcast, and let the PCs just beat them to death without breaking the spell. I am not a sure that this simply is a thing that a second level spell should be able to do.

 

[Zardnaar]

But the half level bonus overwhelms training rather fast. It means that at already at tenth level untrained person is is good at a thing than a level one trained person, and twentieth level one is way better, not to talk about thirtieth level one. It is like an Olympic athlete (high level) being way better at maths than a university maths student (low level.)



Is that easy? I don't think it is easy at all. In fact, I am not sure how you even imagine getting that. (Are there magic items that grants bonuses to skills? I guess there could be...)



Yes, I know it si not a rule. And yes, there are things that break the bounded accuracy. I said it before (perhaps in this thread, who knows.) that how they implemented is not perfect. Though the issue really is not the basic skill scaling, it is that you can pile too much extra crap (guidance, bardic inspiration etc) on top of things.



But 4e did not cap at level 20. The range of the game is stretched over 30 levels, and that is what we need to consider. Level 20 5e character is not comparable to level 20 4e character, it is comparable to level 30 one.



And if the game truly had committed to this, then that might have been fine. Except it didn't, so it had to kludge minion and elite versions of basically the same monsters so that you actually could fight them at different levels. It is just confused and counterproductive design.

But you are making this an edition war thing. The fact is that we don't need to think that 4e design was bad and 5 design is good or vice versa. Personally I think both have strengths and weaknesses, and I think we can learn from both. 4e had issues, and in many ways 5e fixed them but in doing so they sometimes ran too far, and refused to use something that already worked in 4e or at least would need just tweaking.

Regarding maths, like I said before, the bounded accuracy should be a bit more limited on the PC side (limit various extras that can be piled on top of it) and too bounded on enemy side (their defences rarely scale enough.)

But also the core issue of course here is save or suck spells, and the most powerful ones tend to target wis in particular. I don't think enemies having bad strength or even dex saves is often an issue. Like hold person/monster has been discussed quite a bit and it is a good example of this. It is rather wild that a second level spell can simply shut down a powerful foe completely, and even multiple when upcast, and let the PCs just beat them to death without breaking the spell. I am not a sure that this simply is a thing that a second level spell should be able to do.

I find 4E monster design best used when applied to 3.5, 5E or SWSE monsters.

Considering they rewrote the monster manual I wouldn't be holding it up as an example of good game design.

They essentially stretched level 3-10 over 30 levels, stuck everything on a treadmill and tried to hammer it into place. Oops.

Mearls is right by going back to the drawing board 3 times in 3 editions each time they introduced new problem.

2E was the 3rd or 4th revision of OD&D in effect. Rereading late 2E and 3.0 seems theres missed opportunity there.

 

[Minigiant]

But doesn't this undercut your own argument?

Expertise is worse than your claim of the +10 over 20 levels being a problem, because that's +12 over 20 levels

Expertise in a Saving throw would be a rarity and closer to immunity.

The issue with 4e's 1/2 level bonus was twofold. It was too fast a progression. And it was on everything.

This moved it from a special progression to a level check.

D&D doesn't need level checks ingrained in the system because you'd still need the DM help to not be TPK.

More to the point though, the defense I mentioned is that I think you're incorrect about the conclusion "all it did was push the numbers up more". No, it did not. It made the game such that facing truly insanely strong enemies, like something 9+ levels above the party, was trying to do the impossible unless you changed the situation. Meaning, it actually did create a world where ultra-difficult opponents clearly and unequivocally have the edge unless the party takes actions to address that gap--or finds a way to fight asymmetrically. Likewise, it made ultra-weak enemies clearly curb-stomp-able. You want to never ever use minion rules? Go right ahead! You'll see quite quickly that weak monsters have actually been outclassed by the PCs, so they can actually see their progression right before their eyes

My point was the 1/2 level was unnecessary because the rest of the system could handle that via powers, HP, and rituals. This thread is based on the fact that control and damage are both really strong in D&D. There is no really to double up and give a 10 levels higher monster an extra +5 to Defense to show they are stronger if they are already that much stronger. They become 25% less strong but are pretty strong. It's a run away fight either way.

And you should be doing the same thing with skill checks too. A traveller who has tasted the planes, fought off fire giant thanes, treated with lords and ladies of the fae, and walked the streets of the City of Brass, should find it pretty tame to deal with things like sneaking past a town guard or popping a lock made of mere iron. So you should include things like the occasional raid of a mortal-world fortress where the players can see that their characters have learned and grown from their adventures, and are now genuinely beyond things that would have been major obstacles once upon a time. That grounds their adventures. It reminds them where they came from--and how far they have yet to go. It proves that all those little moments, the times they listened to each other, or practiced, or strategized, really did change them

Skill checks are different.

Skill use implies a possibility of complete mastery and having a range of skills you are a novice at. So it's okay to have a skill with +10 level bonus and another with a +0 level bonus.

Defences are different because Players and DMs can actively target defenses every encounter and have complete control of it

 

[tetrasodium]

There's not really a good post to reply to when it comes to the back and forth over 4e skills adding level and such but I think that the whole problem was the result of catering to a subset of players/GMs who looked at the 3.x DC examples chart and ignored "who could do it" while hyper focusing only on the example. That chart gave an escalating series of increasingly difficult checks with reasons to be more difficult and left it to the gm to decide questions like "who could do this check my players are attempting". With 4e they listened to that sunset of players and gave a scaling DC table pegged to level ranges rather simply being more heavy handed in pointing out the importance of "who could do it". With 5e we have the worst of both presented like some golden calf upon the altar of simplicity

 

[DEFCON 1]

Bottom line - victory is NOT assured. Otherwise, why are you wasting time playing out the combat?

Because D&D is not a board game. It's a story. And you can have a thrilling combat that is narratively satisfying to all the players AND the DM without just "trying to win".

The DM was "trying to win" by removing two of the players out of the fight in any meaningful capacity. That to me is poor DMing. Not giving a crap if your players are having fun-- especially in the campaign finale-- because you're too busy trying to "play the villain intelligently". Well, a DM can do that while simultaneously keeping all the players active, interested, and a part of a thrilling action set piece.

 

[Minigiant]

There's not really a good post to reply to when it comes to the back and forth over 4e skills adding level and such but I think that the whole problem was the result of catering to a subset of players/GMs who looked at the 3.x DC examples chart and ignored "who could do it" while hyper focusing only on the example. That chart gave an escalating series of increasingly difficult checks with reasons to be more difficult and left it to the gm to decide questions like "who could do this check my players are attempting". With 4e they listened to that sunset of players and gave a scaling DC table pegged to level ranges rather simply being more heavy handed in pointing out the importance of "who could do it". With 5e we have the worst of both presented like some golden calf upon the altar of simplicity

No I will have to slightly disagree.

Really the whole rub was between the two camps:

The camp where you roll for most skill checks.
The camp where DM adjudicates that certain checks are completely impossible or completely trivial that you would never ever roll for them.

4e went with the first camp saying some checks are really really really difficult but actually possible. This mostly came up in the middle of three when millennials started to really come into the game and come in with different touchdowns of fantasy that was much higher and more epic than what was in editions past. So the DMs were making DCS of 25, 30, 35, 40 and 50 and saying "Fine. Make that".

4e and Pathfinder more or less listen to me those groups and this said well if the DC is 30 we're going to let a master get a bonus of +15.

Skills are weird.

Skill are really part of the dungeon crawling RPG community that really needs a modular system for every game because every group uses different mentality when it comes to it.

I believe I think it was Questing Beast who did a video about how different people role play different kinds of skills: High Low, narrow wide.

Unless a table is fully filled with like-minded individuals, I think D&D really does need multiple skill systems in a base game. One were most thieves are bumbling idiots and the other one where every assassin is an Olympic level athlete.

 

[tetrasodium]

No I will have to slightly disagree.

Really the whole rub was between the two camps:

The camp where you roll for most skill checks.
The camp where DM adjudicates that certain checks are completely impossible or completely trivial that you would never ever roll for them.

4e went with the first camp saying some checks are really really really difficult but actually possible. This mostly came up in the middle of three when millennials started to really come into the game and come in with different touchdowns of fantasy that was much higher and more epic than what was in editions past. So the DMs were making DCS of 25, 30, 35, 40 and 50 and saying "Fine. Make that".

4e and Pathfinder more or less listen to me those groups and this said well if the DC is 30 we're going to let a master get a bonus of +15.

Skills are weird.

Skill are really part of the dungeon crawling RPG community that really needs a modular system for every game because every group uses different mentality when it comes to it.

I believe I think it was questing Beast who did a video about how different people role play different kinds of skills: High Low, narrow wide.

Unless a table is fully filled with like-minded individuals, I think D&D really does need multiple skill systems in a base game. One were most thieves are bumbling idiots and the other one where every assassin is an Olympic level athlete.

I don't entirely disagree, but I think we are moving into debating the shades of gray. The 3.x rules pretty much cover all of the stuff you mention Y thes hades come into play with how much weight you apply to individual rules subsections & how flexible those sections are under the GM's needs. The relevant rules in 3.x are really split between the PHB & DMG. IMO that split is entirely justified because I as the GM need my players to understand there is some flexibility & how actions their PCs can take are able to color outside the lines to reach a point where the GM can metaphorically put their thumb on the scale.

I think it's relevant to discussion because Mearls mentions the 3.5 DC table in a questing beast(?) interview with a reference to climbing a wall covered in butter. That example is just as ridiculous & eye rollingly contrived as he described it then, but the DC30 Hurriedly climb a slick brick wall->who could do it-> high level barbarian from the actual list is not at all strange with d&d or even real world bricks.

Spoiler: the 3.5PHB sections

• PHB64 : Trying again. Omitting this from 5e was a huge problem for me as a GM because it spells ot to players that bob can try again & Alice could try after Bob, but that there may or not be consequences as a result of the prior check. A shockingly high number of new to d&d with 5e players I see expect "Oh I'm proficient too [*dice clatter*]->does result do it" seem to hardcore expect CRPG style results there & don't even try to account for the situation or attempt to justify the second check. As a GM I sirely miss the player creativity here & some of that creativity came from attempts to invoke later sections to their benefit★
• PHB64: Untrained skills: 5e does kinda cover this & I'm not sure about 4e, but it's good to call out because sometimes there's a reason unrelated to skill bonus that alice or bob might need to bring relevant knowledge such as a wizard deciphering the runes in a ward of some form enough that they could hand a new skill check off to the rogue
• PHB64: Favorable & unfavorable conditions is the continuation of that last example, but also it sets the foundation for the GM to confidently use some of the many tools provided in the DMG & gives players a ballpark idea of how much taking action to invoke them might help.
• PHB64: holy heck I'm so tired of 5e only D&D players expecting literally any action to take no more than a standard action & then acting like the DM is the one being adversarial when they say it takes considerable time for their PC to go about canvassing the whole town searching the room or whatever. It's not really relevant to the grey area but It's important enough to sorely miss & deserves a mention.
• PHB65: Practically impossible tasks. I think this may have been what you were referring to, but it's only one piece if the puzzle & the GM has semi quantum tools to hook with (un)favorable conditions with almost quantum results. Overall it was a good thing for players to know it existed since the GM could always just reality check any disconnect inscenario understanding by explaining or asking for what a player thinks the scenario is. It's also where DC30/40/50 skill checks eventually became possible for a specialized high level PC with appropriate relevant gear like +7 skill items & such on top of many levels of dedicated investment in a skill. PCs eventually shifted to investing in other skills, but one trick pony specialized NPCs & magic items/consumables existed for a good reason
• PHB65: Combining skill attempts... This is where some of the more powerful DMG tools really come into play
• PHB65: checks without rolls talks about taking 10/20. Most importantly is the party manipulating the scenario with their actions to allow this as an option★. Those "DC25, 30, 35, 40 and 50" checks start looking pretty darned reasonable when the result of a die roll can be settled through other more reasonable DC actions.. heck taking 20 witha mere +5 is auto success. This was one of those rules where players either read the rules & converted extremely difficult/almost impossible checks into fun & interesting multistep puzzles through their actions & the DMG even had a section about chunking tasks. Even at Level 1 it was possible for a specialized character to use taking 20 so they could auto succeed at a dc25 check once the party took actions so they could clear the way for that.

Spoiler: the 3.5DMG sections

• DMG30: modifying the roll or DC. It's pretty much a rehashing of some of the PHB sections that was rephrased to be DM facing. Importantly though is that it talks about circumstances that improve or hamper a PC's performance at a task -AND circumstances that modify the task inself. 4e kinda lost that & 5e has "Oh I help, that should give you advantage" as the first last and only card for far too many.
• DMG30 DMs Best Friend. I sorely miss this because it gave a granular toolkit I could use a gm for adjudicating what also helps/hinders & what is just overlap of some low hanging fruit already in play. More importantly is that it gives the GM a thing they can point to & say "look that's the rule I'm using, use player facing PHB tools to interact with it"
• DMG30: Delineating tasks. A rule to turn a maybe impossible skill check into a chunked puzzle with no predefined solution or even an adventure seed/structure. Once again this was a big loss.
• DMG31: Table 2-5 Difficulty class Examples. Not much to say, it had columns for DC Example Roll (Key Ability) & Who Could Do It. If a GM looked at it as prescriptive with example & DC being the important part it gave iffy results, if they looked at who could do it held up alongside whatever scenario a check was being made in then it worked great & the DM still had other tools
• DMG32: General vrs Specific. "I search the room" & "I search behind the bookcase" should obviously hasve different DCs along with different results. This allowed the GM some additional wiggle room depending on how players phrased their creative efforts to use the player facing PHB skill check related tools. It also meant that players had motive to be specific when they thought there was something to gain even when doing that could come with a cost. Players would inevitably see this & the other DMG sections making them rules subsystems they were aware of on some level. If the players didn't seek it out themselves, simply having it in the DMG allowed the GM to say "look!" and convey the point without needing to meat puppet PCs or channel comic book guy from the simpsons before he was well known
• DMG32: Degrees of failure/success. This was really just two sides to a quantum coin where the GM could set that DC50 you note & give an interesting or useful result either way as appropriate to the check result even when it's nowhere near the DC50. I';ll give an example of the time I had to call a locksmith after a tenant changed the locks moved out & claimed to loose their key. He said "this naughty word lock" while picking the lock. Without breaking stride he had it open & was offering to install a useful lock, that was a high degree of success... The time my lawnmower closet's electronic lock quit working & I hacksawed it off over an hour or two would probably be a poor one & I knew it would be when I got the hacksaw out .
• DMG32: Checks without rolls. GM facig side of Taking 10/20
• etc

The two big breakdowns on the grey area were if a player/gm read the section on things like taking 10/20 delineating tasks the weight of "who could do it" vrs the example/DC & how they could do it 4e streamlined that a bit with easy medium & hard DC ranges for 10 different level ranges, but it left out too many tools & added the +PC Level to create new problems rather than trusting the GM to decide "who could do it" as appropriate & trusting both sides of the GM screen to make opening the door for taking 10/20 via player driven puzzle the important part

★I approve of that

 

[CreamCloud0]

4e went with the first camp saying some checks are really really really difficult but actually possible. This mostly came up in the middle of three when millennials started to really come into the game and come in with different touchdowns of fantasy that was much higher and more epic than what was in editions past. So the DMs were making DCS of 25, 30, 35, 40 and 50 and saying "Fine. Make that".

4e and Pathfinder more or less listen to me those groups and this said well if the DC is 30 we're going to let a master get a bonus of +15.

is one of these meant to say 3.x? just the way the sentences are presented makes it seem like one of them ought to say something else in a comparison structure?