D&D 5E Race/Class combinations that were cool but you avoided due to mechanics?

[Micah Sweet]

Ever since

Yeah they dropped that part pretty fast. Even the Cleric lost its STR/CHA powers moving forward... 4e mostly kept the secondary attribute more modular (like the Warlord being STR/INT, STR/CHA, STR/INT/CHA and even STR/WIS depending on presence, or the Wizard going INT/DEX, INT/CON or INT/CHA depending on what they wanted to specialize in) and I miss that. Even the Barbarian would go STR/WIS or STR/DEX if they wanted.

I feel like the Sorcerer would have made a lot of sense as a CON caster since they're using their innate magic. It's something that could strain their body to overuse and all that. It would make Sorlock and Sorcadin less synergetic, but open up a ton of Sorcerer Gish options.

But I can also see Concentration being harder to break for that kind of caster and that being considered an issue.

It would certainly have made them stand out more.

Ever since 3rd ed, I've always seen sorcerers as "the mutant menace", a la Marvel comics, since they have a limited number of spells that come from within. I would LOVE to be able to cast from Con. It would really aid the concept.

 

[Helldritch]

I hadn't read 5e about Random encounters yet, but I didn't see any of those. One of the sample ones in the DMG gives magic berries.

Are those part of the house rule to enforce the 6 to 8 encounters per day?

The 6 to 8 encounters per day is a guideline that you will find in the DMG under encountwr building.

The no exp or treasure from random encounters dates back from OD&D where some players were aware that random encounters/patrols had access to random personal treasure and that patrols were deducted from the pool of monsters. Seeing the pattern, I simply remove treasure and exp from random encounters and patrols altogether and patrols do mot reduce enemy forces in dungeons/keep/caves or whatever. Just that is a big incentive to get as few random encounters as possible. I do however are them count towards the 6-8 encounters per day guideline. We also limit short rests to two per day (players voted, I was in favor of four but they outvoted me...) and short rests are 10 minutes long. This helps keep the narrative pace and allows some group healing spells to be used.

If your question was about a table for random encounters, I make my own tables adapted to the adventure at hand or the tables in the XGtE (or is it MToF?).

Random encounters prevents the stalling of an adventure and making them worthless experience and treasure wise ensure that players keeps a good pace, manage their resources so that they can't do the 5mwd and also help short rest classes to be on par with daily usage classes.

Because of these I have avoided so much of the complains that 5ed is carebare that I sometimes have a difficulty relating with those that claim this
A nearby DM bend on saying that came at my house to check the game I was hosting. I can tell you that he changed his mind. It is because of him that we ay at the hobby store on Friday per month. People come and see us play. We're not Matt Mercer but our games are appreciated in our little corner.

 

[Helldritch]

Ever since

Ever since 3rd ed, I've always seen sorcerers as "the mutant menace", a la Marvel comics, since they have a limited number of spells that come from within. I would LOVE to be able to cast from Con. It would really aid the concept.

Man, I feel the exact same way.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Ever since

Ever since 3rd ed, I've always seen sorcerers as "the mutant menace", a la Marvel comics, since they have a limited number of spells that come from within. I would LOVE to be able to cast from Con. It would really aid the concept.

One problem I have with stats is the standard human +1 to everything. That factually makes demi humans +1 to their main stat, +0 to their secondary stat, -1 to everything else. So I am really interested in how exactly they do the stat allocation. Especially since the amount of +'s vary between different species.

 

[humble minion]

3e is older than many of the people playing D&D these days.

I roll to disbelieve!

 

[ccs]

14 and NEVER raising it? So you play a character who fails at its primary role and wear it like a badge of honor?

1) I don't envision the character as a miniature hulk.
2) This is 5e, not PF. In 5 years of constant play I've yet to experience any real problems hitting things. There's spells, means to gain advantage, magic items, fellow players who live & breath +s, etc etc etc. So a 14 is serving this character well enough.
3) This is 5e. I'm not too concerned with letting a fight go on for a few more rounds.
4) This is 5e. I only get an ASI/feat once every 4 lvs. At 4th I took Healer. At 8th I took Linguist (Ancient D&D Egyptian/Arabic). These two feats, especially the linguist, have proven far more valuable & important to play than another + to hit/damage. at 12th lv I'll up her Wisdom. And I seriously doubt we'll ever get to lv.16+.... But even if we do? I still won't envision the character as a mini-hulk so bumping her str won't be happening. So yeah, never.
5) Perhaps you missed the part where I said that the character is quite efficient at being the character I envision?
(for the record I could do it slightly better in PF1, but 5es Ancestral Guardian subclass is a nice consolation prize)
And finally....
6) You & I have different ideas on what this characters primary role is. My idea trumps yours as it's my character.

 

[Helldritch]

It’s WAY MORE noticeable on casters because in addition to missing more often and having their spells saved against more often, they can prepare fewer spells.

Maybe you haven’t seen this happen, but I absolutely have. Missing 5% more often is noticeable, especially over the course of an adventuring day, especially in a bounded accuracy system like 5e’s. When players, especially new players, notice that they’re doing the same stuff as everyone else, but consistently doing just a bit worse at it, they get frustrated.

When one of your players wants to play an underdog and you agree to it; it is a part of your job as a DM to make sure that the charcater can shine too. Maybe the caster will find a wand of the war mage? A holy symbol faith that raise spell save DC by one up to a maximum of 15? Or a nice pair of ogres strength gloves? As DM it is so easy to make sure that a cool concept can have a little nudge in the right direction.
Our halfling barb found a nice +1 Longsword early in his career and it got used for a long time. A wand of the warmage in the form of a talking skull (well too talkative to the dwarf taste but it was hilarious to see the dwarf arguing with the skull) made wonder for our dwarven sorcerer. That missing +1 is so easy to compensate for. And it because that +1 is missing that you know that the magic's item presence will not unbalance your game and it will make the player so happy that it will be worth it. For an optimized character, such an item is just icing on the cake. For an underdog, it can be a game changing event.

 

[cbwjm]

Meanwhile the player who started with a +3 is either getting +4 or a Feat at the same time. Any way you slice it, a character who starts with a +2 in their primary stat is forced to play catch-up until 12th level, which the majority of campaigns won’t even get to.

start with a 15 and you can grab a feat at the level 4 to take you to 16. Starting with a +2 really doesn't seem like it holds you back in my experience.

 

[Coroc]

Another side thought based on the changes in TCoA and the decoupling of several racial features from races. Has anyone thought of a cool concept of a PC they wanted, but when creating the character, saw that the mechanics of how racial features didn't really support it well from a mechanical standpoint? I'm not just talking about optimization, but in general. With bounded accuracy, every modifier counts, so have you ever been swayed to avoid a particular concept that you would do if features were decoupled?

I do not see the point here: Many people tend to put points in CON for better survivability. Others bolster DEX for all its benefits especially for classes with light , medium or w/o armor.

So you e.g. got a race which does not offer boon on STR (WIS) but want to play a fighter (cleric)?

Well it will not start out with the highest possible prime attribute, but you can get there, can't you? After all 5e caps everything at 20, it is not that gnomes can get to 22 in INT.

If you got a halforc, you got a 10 STR for your caster, so he will not be grappled that easy. If you got a dwarf he will have high CON for free when you eventually wanted to bolster it anyway. I cannot see any problems in that.

 

[Coroc]

...

Not bad isn't really the same as good, though, and as you go on with playing them, the situation gets worse - the Halfling can never get GWM, which if Feats are in the game, is going to be a huge source of damage to any 2H Barbarian with the faintest hint of optimization.



....

Yes but he is lucky from the start, no other race barbarian can get that (except via feat). And tbh. a Halfling carried around by an oversized weapon just looks..., sorry I do not want to hurt anyone's taste or so, but even in computer games where characters all are disproportional like WoW, I always thought "Where is that big sword dragging the gnome?"