D&D 5E Monsters and Magic (Items)

[Andor]

So between the starter box and the Hoard of the Dragon Queen supplement we are getting some idea of 5es approach to monsters and magic items.

Charged items seem to start with some low number of charges (10 for staves, 7 for wands), then regenerate more each day. So they are a potentially infinite resource, BUT if you spend the last charge you have a 1 in 20 chance of watching the item crumble away. I like this myself, and I'm curious to know if the rules specify if you know how many charges an item has. You would if you identified or attuned to it, but then the next day you get a random number of charges. Do you need to recast identify or spend another hour communing with your wand to learn the new total? And do you need privacy for that? Keeping the charge total secret from the players adds to the GM bookkeeping total, but can add a measure of tension into the game.

Speaking of attuning, it looks like magic items of a certain level of power, or perhaps coolness need to be attuned to use, limiting both party sharing and how many you can have. On the one hand I like many of the throttle limiting functions this serves, but I'd hate to see a dramatic scene ruined because the ensnared Paladin couldn't throw his Axe of Demon-Splitting to the fighter because the fighter wasn't attuned to it. According to the starter set the limits are one attuned user per item, 3 attuned items per character.

Monsters look pretty good to me. I think rule 1 of 5e is do not take dragons lightly! Although the vampire is no slouch either. Regen 20!

Btw, who is planning to use the fixed (average) damage option for monsters? Is it a time saver? Is it just more fun to roll?

 

[Tormyr]

I think we are getting a very good idea of what the monsters and magic items will look like, and I came to the same conclusions as you. As for wands, you could keep the number of charges from the player, but I think that would just be annoying. Each day he would wake up, use the identify ritual and figure out how many charges he had. Plus then the DM would have to keep track of it. You might as well just have the players keep track of it.

As for taking average damage or rolling, I like rolling because you find out how bad the hit was. For saving time, just have them roll the attack and damage dice at the same time.

 

[KarinsDad]

As for wands, you could keep the number of charges from the player, but I think that would just be annoying. Each day he would wake up, use the identify ritual and figure out how many charges he had. Plus then the DM would have to keep track of it. You might as well just have the players keep track of it.

Not very necessary.

Items have things like: 10 charges, recharges 1D6+4.

So if the player uses 5 or fewer charges on a given day, he knows that it is fully charged the next day.

The player can husband his resources.

If the player uses up say 8 charges on a given day, he still knows that he has 7 charges minimum the next day and can control his usage.

If he decides to go over 7 that next day, then he tells the DM what he is doing and the DM then rolls to see how many actual charges got regained that morning. If he doesn't go over 5, he's back to 10 charges the day after that.

But 90% of the time, there's no reason to roll or worry about it. Only do so if the PC has a chance of using too many charges in a given day. Really no need for the DM to keep track. The player just needs to keep track of his minimum number and how many he uses.

Same with 7 charges, roll D6+1 items.