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

[Maxperson]

But again. With 6 saves, you are guaranteed that your primary and secondary ability scores go to a save.

With 3, you need to go the 4e route and deal with the issues that brings

Bounded accuracy makes that unnecessary. Especially with all the ways to make saves better.

 

[Minigiant]

A hill giant had 16/6/10
An ogre had 6/0/1 or 12/2/2
The base skeleton had 0/1/2 or lots of other options depending on which skeleton you picked
A kobold had 2/1/-1

On and on and on. Good save bad save medium save was very much the norm and the trend continued as cr scaled to a higher percentage of SR yes monsters before using the monster manual behind the curtain spell resistance sidebar or a template that gave it

You are conflating 2 editions.

In third edition your hill giant has 12 hit die. And only has a plus for will save. A caster with a 18 in there casting stat has a base DC of 14 + the level of the spell that they.

That's terrible for the Hill Giant.

If you go to 5e that Hill Giants will save is not increasing at all because they are still at 10 wisdom with no level bonus. +0 vs DC 16+

 

[Minigiant]

Bounded accuracy makes that unnecessary. Especially with all the ways to make saves better.

Bounded accuracy actually made it worse because it justifies not increasing a monster's bonus from being high level due to the bounds of the bonuses but it justifies the casters DC increasing by level which creates the imbalance of the caster having a high DC but the monster having a low bonus.

Now if you are willing to say every monster of CR8 or greater it has Proficiency or Expertise in every saving throw and has a 15 of better in ever ability score then fine There's no problem.

 

[Maxperson]

Bounded accuracy actually made it worse because it justifies not increasing a monster's bonus from being high level due to the bounds of the bonuses but it justifies the casters DC increasing by level which creates the imbalance of the caster having a high DC but the monster having a low bonus.

Bounded accuracy means that the monsters' saves are not taking PC numbers into account. Just character class features.

Now if you are willing to say every monster of CR8 or greater it has Proficiency or Expertise in every saving throw and has a 15 of better in ever ability score then fine There's no problem.

I think that's excessive. 8 + 5(if the PC even has a 20) + 6(if the PC is 17th level) is still only a 19. Even a monster with a 0 will make that 10% of the time.

 

[Minigiant]

Bounded accuracy means that the monsters' saves are not taking PC numbers into account. Just character class features.

And that is the source of the problem and the entire point of the thread because...

I think that's excessive. 8 + 5(if the PC even has a 20) + 6(if the PC is 17th level) is still only a 19. Even a monster with a 0 will make that 10% of the time

Your boss monster is now only making a save vs a control spell 10% of the time.

This is why this thread exists

 

[tetrasodium]

You are conflating 2 editions.

No we were talking about how good bad and medium saves worked on monsters in 3.5 when the monster manual literally had an entry about adding SR to monsters.

In third edition your hill giant has 12 hit die. And only has a plus for will save. A caster with a 18 in there casting stat has a base DC of 14 + the level of the spell that they.

That's terrible for the Hill Giant.

I liter linked to it and you quoted ihe link, all 3 saves are positive at +12/+3/+4 even with no template or class levels modifying them. It could also absolutely paste most arcane casters at range with a rock. At cr7 a hill giant was a dangerous boss for much lower level parties who didn't have the leeway to worry too much about the saves because the high hob& damage output was enough that it's trivial ability to break web's dc20 strength check was more important when simply not being humanoid while having 12hd made it immune most other a available level big time debuff/control spells

If you go to 5e that Hill Giants will save is not increasing at all because they are still at 10 wisdom with no level bonus. +0 vs DC 16+

I never suggested that the 5e model for monsters was good at anything.

 

[Zardnaar]

How about good saves and bring back SR and use greater magic resistance more?

 

[Minigiant]

No we were talking about how good bad and medium saves worked on monsters in 3.5 when the monster manual literally had an entry about adding SR to monsters

There was no good bad and medium saves


It was a good saving through progression and a bad savings progression.

And you can have a good ability score in a safe or have a bad score to the save.

So you can have a good and a good
A good and a bad
A bad and a good
A bad and a bad

Then you get to how most monsters had at bad saving throw with a bad ability score associated with it.

Thus a 16 stat level 7 caster casting a level 3 spell DC 16 on a CR 7 with a +4 bonus.

This isn't that horrible for a standard monster but it is too easily anticlimactic for a boss. It's not as easy to set up as you have to hold that spell in that slot all day. But your DM has to bait out that slot all day.

But without layering something like SR or LR over saving throws, a caster has a 50-80% chance of royally hosing a monster. Because bad saving throw bonus is very bad with both bounded and unbounded accuracy.

 

[Maxperson]

And that is the source of the problem and the entire point of the thread because...

Your boss monster is now only making a save vs a control spell 10% of the time.

This is why this thread exists

Boss monsters rarely are at 0 when you're using CR 20+ monsters.

The CR 10 Aboleth has +5, -1, +6, +8, +6, +4. The -1 is to damage dex spells. That's just CR 10

The CR 16 Planetar is at +7, +5, +12, +4, +11, +12

The CR 17 Death Knight is at +5, +6, +5, +1, +9, +10

The CR 19 Balor... +14, +2, +12, +5, +9, +12

The CR 23 Baphomet +10, +9, +15, +4, +14, +3

What boss monster is going to be facing a DC of 19 with a 0? And many will have magic resistance and legendary resistance.