D&D 5E New DM Question on Options

[Sword of Spirit]

So, what sources are actually available for options? Apart from the PH, I'm aware of Xanathar's and UA. Then, the setting specific options like the Sword Coast. I'm not familiar with Tashas...

One important thing to note is that none of the subclass options in Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide are unique to the Forgotten Realms. The closest to that is the Purple Dragon Knight, which suggests calling the class "Banneret" when used elsewhere. The others are all classic D&D fare, or new generic D&D subclass options. For example, you might remember things like Battlerager and Bladesinger from the 2e Complete Book of Dwarves and Complete Book of Elves (both generic non-setting specific resources) respectively. In like manner, it has the standard D&D racial pantheons (though Mordenkainan's Tome of Foes has expanded versions of those). When it comes to character options, outside of a few of the backgrounds and Ghostwise halfings, most of the stuff in there isn't Forgotten Realms specific. Now, the book itself is heavily invested in Forgotten Realms stuff, but they somewhat unfortunately nestled a lot of not specifically Forgotten Realms stuff in there and didn't reprint some of it elsewhere. So if you're big into options, you might not-setting specific options in there. (I feel like the options in the other setting books really are often setting specific, though most of them have at least a couple you could fit into a more traditional D&D framework.)

Another thing to be aware of that a lot of people miss, is that the listed Backgrounds are just examples. Right in the PHB and even the Basic Rules document they tell you that you can customize them, and precisely how to do it (basically, choose any two skills, any combination of two tool proficiencies and languages, any of the listed Features, and any of the listed equipment packages). This means any character can get proficiency in any two skills they want, for instance. I also like to point out that this isn't listed as an optional rule, but as a core rule. In fact, it's more core than gnomes and half-elves, which are listed as optional.

Of note is that it also contains some new spells, two of which the designers went on to state they feel were mistakes. They are Greenflame Blade and Booming Blade, cantrips that allow the user to make a melee attack and add other effects. If there's anything in any of the supplementary material that is unbalanced I'd say these are the closest to it.

Interesting. Do you have the source? I'm curious to see what their phrasing was. I find those spells to be essential components of my campaign, and think Eldritch Knight needs them as much Bladesinger.

 

[Weiley31]

As one new DM to another I'll say this: If you have a player who plays a Druid and they ever ask you if they can cast Wild Shape on their 1D4 Squirrel weapon, DON'T say yes.


Just trust me on this.

 

[pming]

Hiya!

Thanks for all the advice...very helpful. Both in what was said and in what wasn't said.
(pming...coincidentally, I also started running/playing in '81...)

Ahh...that was a good year, wasn't it?

My original plan had been to include a lot of options. I'll scale back on that, but I'll need to pull in some of the various options to represent certain classes and abilities as they exist in the setting. (It's a mixed setting, some homebrew based on the setting for the Darkurthe Legends RPG from the '90s. Not a great rules-set, but a setting that's been very popular with my groups over the years.)

Small world!
About a decade and a half ago I was talking with Mathew (Yarrow) via email about buying Darkurthe from him/them.
Long story short, he was willing to hand me the reigns but told me I had to talk to Colin (Murcray) first...just to make sure he didn't have any plans for it and to get his nod of approval. Then we'd talk details of price and all that (which was, iirc, basically, "Just do some cool stuff and you can have it" ). Alas, after contacting Colin and talking on Facebook (Facebook was new then...and I only had an account to talk to him; deleted my account after that), Colin told me he wasn't sure if a German (?) company that bought the name "Darkurthe" and the 'setting' was keen on it. Turns out that German company just wanted the name because they were making a video game (post apocalyptic, iric) and couldn't care less about the 'actual setting/game'. I talked with Colin a couple times on the phone and we ended up not being able to come to a conclusion; he couldn't give me anything because he was in a contract situation with the German company, but he did offer to put me in touch with those guys to see if they were interested in any of my revisions, additions and rule-changes/additions...but couldn't guarantee that if I handed my stuff to them, they'd hire me or partner me...so I passed.

I currently have my own system based on Darkurthe, and I have revised the setting a bit to make things a bit more...."cohesive" in terms of pre-history, gods, planes of existence, etc. I also did a rather sweet map of it, if I do say so myself, using Campaign Cartographer and Photoshop. Even printed it out on a poster size. It's sitting on my wall about 3' away, as I write this.

Anyway...sorry for the slight diversion. If you ever wanna talk Darkurthe, drop me a PM. (and yes, I did start working on a Darkurthe-to-5e document...might have to see if I can find it now that I think of it!).

Man... I really wish Colin would have been as enthusiastic about selling me Darkurthe as much as Mathew was (Matt was even going to send me all his original files and his 'work in progress' for the slightly revised 'Skull Tower' re-vamp! ). Oh well. It just gave me more incentive and freedom to create/revise my own Darkurthe Legends.

I'm approaching this more as a new system than new D&D. It's literally been 30 years or more since I've played it.

[I suggested running the game set in Wildemount or Forgotten Realms. The answer I got was, "Hm. What about Darkurthe, could you set it there?" It's a bit of a hodgepodge of tropes with a couple of neat twists, but with a lot of hooks and a lot of white space that I can use to customize it to my campaign.]

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[MonkeezOnFire]

Interesting. Do you have the source? I'm curious to see what their phrasing was. I find those spells to be essential components of my campaign, and think Eldritch Knight needs them as much Bladesinger.

Looks like I can't find the quote. It was a long while ago so I don't remember if it was a Twitter post or an interview article. Or maybe my brain just made it up as a way to understand why some spells from SCAG were reprinted in Xanathar's and those two weren't.

In my opinion they aren't broken. The worst thing they do is allow multiclassing shenanigans to have an at will attack that scales with character level. Breaks my conception that multiclassing gives you breadth of abilities instead of building on the power of existing ones. Other cantrips do that as well but until SCAG most cantrips weren't as competitive as weapon attacks. But even so allowing multiclass characters a decent, but not quite top tier attack option isn't going to break the game.