D&D 5E No ascending bonuses: A mathematical framework for 5e

[Majoru Oakheart]

First of all, I love this idea and had it myself. Bonuses should not increase as you go up levels. At least not without taking some option to increase it.

The thing is, looking from a 3e perspective, without increasing attack bonuses you lose the option of divergence. Yes, count me as one who likes the fighter becoming so much better with weapons that the cleric can only keep up if he spends time and magic to compensate.

I'm in agreement with this as well. But here I see the solution being something like giving the fighter a +1 to hit as a class feature. Possibly another +1 or 2 to hit at higher levels. Also, let them qualify for a feat or something that gives maybe 2 more bonus to hit.

So, that my 20th level Fighter has a +5 to hit while your cleric does not. Also, the level 1 fighter only has +1 to hit. It preserves the difference between our classes and the difference between levels.

Mind you, your cleric might decide to take fighting feats and get a +2 bonus to attack from them as well. Not as good as a pure fighter, but close. But, if you choose not to take the fighting feats, because you are concentrating on spellcasting, you'd be just as good at fighting with weapons as a first level cleric.

Now the damage/hp scaling, OTOH, I'd like to see go. The Nth level character facing an Nth level threat in 4e will die in just as many hits as the level before, so why exactly do we need damage and hp to increase? In earlier editions the number of hits did usually increase, which was even worse, since it made high level fights take longer.

I think damage scaling needs to be in there, just to maintain a bit of difference between high and low level characters and monsters.

Sure, a 20th level monster might only have an AC of 15, which means that a first level character could hit it(though rarely) but he'd be doing 1d8 points of damage vs it's 310 hitpoints. It might also only have a total bonus of +5 to hit you against your AC of 10. But it would also be doing 2d8+54 points of damage to you with it's attacks against your 20 hitpoints.

It would also solve some problems. Enough level 1 guards attacking that level 20 monster would eventually be able to beat it(69 hits from them could kill it. Which means, it would take 230 of them on average to kill it in a round).

Meanwhile, a 20th level fighter might have +5 to hit and be doing 2d8+54 points of damage as well, and will kill the monster in 5 hits, or about 9 rounds.

It provides some simulationist leanings for those people who like that sort of thing, while still providing the same sort of balanced math 4e already has.

 

[Hassassin]

I'm in agreement with this as well. But here I see the solution being something like giving the fighter a +1 to hit as a class feature. Possibly another +1 or 2 to hit at higher levels. Also, let them qualify for a feat or something that gives maybe 2 more bonus to hit.

So, that my 20th level Fighter has a +5 to hit while your cleric does not. Also, the level 1 fighter only has +1 to hit. It preserves the difference between our classes and the difference between levels.

Mind you, your cleric might decide to take fighting feats and get a +2 bonus to attack from them as well. Not as good as a pure fighter, but close. But, if you choose not to take the fighting feats, because you are concentrating on spellcasting, you'd be just as good at fighting with weapons as a first level cleric.

I would be fine with this, but what's the advantage compared to 3e base attack progression (fighter and cleric +1/+0 at first to +20/+15 at 20th) and multiclassing?

Sure, you could make poor base attack stay constant at +0, average to increase to +5 by 20th and good to increase to +10 by 20th. That way you'd get lower numbers. However, I don't really see the advantage of moving it to feats, since that just makes those feats must-have for the fighter.

I think damage scaling needs to be in there, just to maintain a bit of difference between high and low level characters and monsters.
[...]

But you get the same effect from attack/defense scaling. If a 20th level dragon was AC 30, but didn't have a lot of hp, a first level guard would be hard pressed to hit the weak spot, but still had a chance (natural 20). Take fifty of those guards and a couple of them will hit the first round, the same the next, and after a few more the dragon is dead. Meanwhile a 20th level fighter would have hit almost every round.

If only dmg/hp scales, a lot of first level characters will still be needed to match a 20th level one. If only attack/defense scales, the same is true. I don't see any good reasons to prefer the former. In the latter case damage differences between weapons actually mean something, hp correlates with ability to withstand literal damage, etc. which all seem like good ideas to me.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

If only dmg/hp scales, a lot of first level characters will be needed to match a 20th level one. If only attack/defense scales, the same is true. I don't see any good reasons to prefer the former. In the latter case damage differences between weapons actually mean something, hp correlates with ability to withstand literal damage, etc. which all seem like good ideas to me.

They don't seem neccessarily ike good ideas to me, though:

1) There is a way to preserve the meaning of weapons in a damage-scaling system. For once, you can have special weapon properties. Accuracy, special techniques keying of weapons, reach, critical modifiers. And, the weapon damage itself can be scaled - you can increase the dice size (1d8 to 2d6 or whatever) or the number of dice rolled. (So a 1st level Fighter makes a +5 attack with 1d8 damage, the 6th level Fighter a +5 attack with 2d8 damage.)

2) I do not think that hit points as "flesh points" works particularly well. It creates a system that tends to be unforgiving and has too many randomization in its outcomes.
Potential pitfalls are also that you will probably find someone that wants to have something like action points, karma, hero points and the like to "compensate". And then you have again some special resource that serves the same purpose as scaling hit points did before. And it probably also leads to "armor = damage reduction", and I have yet to see a system where this works well and doesn't end up with invulnerable armored knights or instant-killing unarmored guys.

 

[Hassassin]

2) I do not think that hit points as "flesh points" works particularly well. It creates a system that tends to be unforgiving and has too many randomization in its outcomes.

You have a point with #1 (though I think all of those make the game more complex), but I don't think this is true. In 4e characters already in effect have only five or so "flesh points". Monsters do one more average damage per level, characters gain five more hit points per level.

(Numbers above may be wrong, idea is I think correct.)

 

[SensoryThought]

This is a great thread.
I do agree with Deadboy that it is doubtful 5e will remove level bonuses as slaying of a sacred cow, and I inherently railed against the idea on first hearing it.

Why? Partly, as said earlier, players like the feeling of progression and adding lots of pluses every level (or 2) keeps them on the treadmill.

I think some more fundamental questions have been posed though regarding how much should a level (or 2 or 5 or 10) mean in terms of relative power. Should power increases be linear or exponential? Should a level 5 fighter be able to beat 2 level 1 fighters? Or 5? Or 10? Should a level 20 fighter in a loincloth with a wet rolled up towel be able to beat the level 10 fighter with plate and a longsword? Should epic characters be demigods or just captain America style peak of humanity (great, but still human in capacity)?

Personally I like the exponential demigod high fantasy model, but I realize a lot of others prefer gritty realism. It does make game design hard though.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

maybe this is a point where the d20 fails vs the d100.
We once thougt 5% increments are fine enough... but maybe +1% per level would yield better results.

On the other hand, your attack bonus increased well (if you were a fighter and very very slow when you were a wizard) in ADnD. Your Armor remained about the same... but your hp increased. Damage did not so much.
So in ADnD you had a natural progression from low level to high. Low level was fast and swingy, high level was epic and much moe reliable.
All monsters were useful, as even goblins were able to hit a level 10 fighter, if they were able to hit him at level 1. They were not just inconveniences and could do damage, and were usually hit with every blow: no need for minions or elite. (trade in attack bonus for #attacks and you are equipped well enough as a DM to handle fights from lvl 1 to lvl 10.

BUT: Non AC defenses, especially will and fort need to go up, because your PC´s need to become more resilent to death effects and mental domination, because those attacks circumvent the hp defense. ADnD had this progression, as saving throws went up. And went up high.

So IMHO attack bonus may go up. HP should go up. AC and reflex (tied to hp damage) needs to stay the same. Damage too. Saving throws must go up. And not just in relation to your first level values, but relativ to the enemise as well...
IF you have 100hp, your enemy must have a lower chance todominate you.

Maybe 4e didn´t do so wrong in expressing those kind of spells as hp damage too. However it could have maybe been a wiser idea to allow trading hp for +x to defense as an immediate interrupt or some kinds of mental hp. So that it is not all mixed into one (which most people have problems getting your head wrapped around).

All difficult decisions. But in the end some progression would be great.

The inherent bonus competing with magical bonus is a great idea, no matter what we will see in 5e. Although you could as well argue, that a more proficient char can utilize the magic better...

 

[billd91]

But, as I said before, an archery contest isn't a fight and need not use the same mechanics.

Why have 2 subsystems for doing the same thing? Part of the point of practicing archery by shooting at targets is to get better at hitting things when it matters. Shouldn't one have some relationship to the other in an RPG?

 

[Rune]

This system assumes two important things that are (for the most part) getting glossed over.

First, for all those claiming that a low-level archer will tie a legendary archer in an archery contest, this system assumes that characters obtain options as they level. This is important.

The legendary archer has probably picked up the "perfect aim" option (say, roll 2d20, drop the lowest). Likely has the "steady shot" option for contests involving shooting on the run. Likely has "quick aim" for contests involving moving, or timed targets. Certainly has the "extended range" option for contests involving accuracy at great range.

The low-level archer would have few, if any, of these game-changing options.

Your structure does very well at handling near level encounters. The question becomes, do players feel enough sense of advancement when facing low level encounters?

In others words, should a 20th level character beat a 10th level one...most of the time, or nearly all of the time handily? Should a 10 difference in level make you that much more powerful?

And if so....does the nonscaling bonus system provide enough of that?

The second thing is the pairing of HP and damage output with level advancement.

The 20th level fighter would have more hit points than the 10th level fighter, and the 20th level fighter would deal more damage to the 10th level one, and the 10th level fighter would deal less damage to the 20th level one. Such a fight would not just be over quicker and be more decisive than a fight between two equal-level fighters; it would be much quicker and much more decisive.

Personally, I think that's a good thing.

 

[mmadsen]

BUT: Non AC defenses, especially will and fort need to go up, because your PC´s need to become more resilent to death effects and mental domination, because those attacks circumvent the hp defense. ADnD had this progression, as saving throws went up. And went up high.

Or hit points need to expand their role beyond soaking up physical "damage" -- because players tend not to like pure save-or-die situations.

If you look at how D&D evolved, you can see the tension between hit points serving the useful role of keeping high-level -- and hard-earned -- characters alive, through battle after battle, and serving that role too well to provide enough tension or to seem plausible. So, various bypassing elements came into the game: vorpal weapons, save-or-die spells, etc.

There's a sweet spot there, where players feel threatened, and they might lose the fight, but there isn't such a big risk that all their hard work will be thrown away and the campaign will get derailed. We should focus our analysis on how to achieve and retain this feel.

 

[Rune]

here's a sweet spot there, where players feel threatened, and they might lose the fight, but there isn't such a big risk that all their hard work will be thrown away and the campaign will get derailed. We should focus our analysis on how to achieve and retain this feel.

It seems like the best way to handle that kind of thing would be in the encounter design. If there was an emphasis on multiple victory or failure conditions, not every fight need end in death for either side.

Furthermore, such a failure need not just mean that the campaign is not derailed; it could even spur the campaign on by throwing in a twist. Even a victory could complicate things (in a good way).