D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[Maxperson]

I do not buy into the "separate" creatures claim.
For instance if I had to use them in 5e they would not be separate creatures - they would just be a different mechanical representation.
If you want to discuss 4e minions and their named labels sure you can make that argument but not for how I see them being implemented in 5e for my game.

If they're different mechanical representations of the same creature, then it's broken. A ten year old with a rock will kill the minion in 1 round 5% of the time, but has no chance against the ogre with 111 hit points. 5% of the time the ten year old dies to an ogre with 110 hit points.

That's either not the same ogre, or it's two different mechanically broken representations.

There is no resolving for me and that is why I found your argument absurd and likely a jest.
In a game of MASS killing, your argument is with minions we kill too swiftly? too easily?
I'm just wandering where you were when 1e's Fireball or Sleep came out.
Sorry not buying this drama.

Fireball never killed things with 1 hit point that had 111 hit points in another form. Sleep was limited by the hit points of the opponent, as well as the hit dice. It never converted monsters to 1 hit point.

 

[AnotherGuy]

I describe my GM style as using the rules of an RPG as watercolors to paint a story. If my red isn't QUITE pink enough for my scene I'll mix in some white and get it closer to what I need for the moment.

That's my take on rules and systems. There are so many ways behind the screen to use different elements to paint the same picture that depending on the needs at the time a monster might be a focus, a distraction, or just a looming agent of moving the clock forward.

So we agree

 

[Faolyn]

I'd still like the GM to be able to make an in-fiction causal claim though, and preferably one that doesn't read like it was invented from whole cloth because the GM decided at the last minute to double the number of enemies they had already decided were there.

So how do you tell the difference between "thought up yesterday," "thought up ten minutes ago," and "thought up right here on the spot"?

 

[Faolyn]

I think Ezekial is threadbanned so can't respond.

Must've missed that.

Regarding your example, in dnd 2024 most dragons dont have dragonfear now.

Another reason I'm glad I didn't buy that. What an odd decision. I wonder why WotC decided that.

 

[Faolyn]

Relative to people's hit point totals in 1e, breath weapons were nasty enough unless the dragon was young.

Here I meant mostly because it got weaker as the dragon did.

Not sure where you're getting this from. In 1e a dragon's breath damage was a fixed number equal to its hit point total (yeah, dumb rule, but that's how it worked). Further, their hit point total was locked in by the dragon's age, so a young dragon would always be 3 HD and would be locked in at 3 hit points per die, or a mighty 9 hit points total; and that's what its breath would do (save for half). A 7 hit-die very old dragon would have 7 h.p. per die, so 49 total, and that's what its breath would do (again, save for half).

It's entirely possible my math was off, since I did it in my head and not with a calculator.

Personally, I have no idea what the rationale behind any of this was (if indeed there was any!) and long ago - as in, back in the 1980s - I threw out both the fixed points per die idea and the concept of their breath damage being locked to their hit points. I also made them a lot tougher across the board, though not perhaps to the extent that 3e did, such that a high-end dragon could be a serious threat to even the most powerful of parties.

I'm guessing the rationale was old movies. I've seen a couple of movies from the 50s and 60s where the hero hacks away at the dragon and, because the special effects and/or Hayes code prevented obvious injuries and blood, the only way to easily show that the dragon was injured and dying was for its head to droop listlessly and have its fire breath be a weak trickle instead of a powerful blast.

 

[Faolyn]

There are plenty of threads talking about things I like. They still end up talking about things I don't like. Ignoring the parts I don't like is not realistic or fair, and neither is asking me not to post unless I have something positive to say (which is functionally what you're doing).

Of course it's both realistic and fair to expect you to ignore what you don't like. If you reply to it, all you do is encourage the parts you don't like to be talked about more!

 

[Lanefan]

That doesn't seem right, as per @Enrahim's observation they are separate creatures. For instance, there is the Ogre Thug (Level 11 Minion) and Ogre Warhulk (Level 11 Elite Brute).

They're both Ogres, right?

If yes, then there's a bunch of things both in and out of the fiction - in fiction: size, general attitude, appearance; out of fiction: their associated mechanics - that make them Ogres rather than Elves or Kobolds or Humans; and one of those things is their greater inherent toughness and resilience than those other creatures.

To me, that means all Ogres should come with this toughness and resilience built in, and that's reflected by both their hit points and (one hopes!) their high Con helping resist things like poison.

And if an Ogre having 55 hit points means your 20th-level Fighter might have to hit it twice rather than once to kill it, so what?

 

[Lanefan]

So how do you tell the difference between "thought up yesterday," "thought up ten minutes ago," and "thought up right here on the spot"?

More often than many DMs (including me!) would like to think, it's fairly obvious when something's being made up on the spot.

 

[ECMO3]

Because you aren't understanding.

No I understand. Using a weapon (or tool or skill) and being proficient in that weapon, tool or skill are different things and have nothing to do with one another.

You keep going on and on about how commoners use crossbows, which even if true has no bearing at all on proficiency.

The PHB is NOT talking about PCs.

The section you quoted from is from an out of date section of the old PHB labeled and you are taking it out of context.

The sentence you keep quoting does not say commoners are proficient with simple weapons, it says "most people" are and you conveniently left off the sentence proceeeding:

"Your race class or feats can grant you proficiency with weapons or certain categories of weapons"

This is the opening sentence from the paragraph you keep quoting and it makes it explicitly clear who they are talking about - "YOUR" proficiecnes, not a random NPC or commoners or anything else, they are addressing YOU.

Further if we are to say this text applies for all NPC then that means they need a race, feat or class to get proficiency because the paragraph you are qouting makes it clear that is how you get proficiencies. Not by being a commoner and since "most" people have these proficiencies then clearly some don't.

So what is the race, class or feat that gives commoners this proficiency?

It's talking about the entire game, which is why the DMG says the PHB contains the rules to play the ENTIRE GAME. You keep trying to make this about PCs and nowhere does it limit the PHB to PCs.

It is not. It is written in 2nd person.

If you option the 5.5e rules, sure. The 5e rules are just as valid, though.

Except the parts which have been replaced ... and that includes proficiencies by race (and race in general in fact) and therefore that whole paragraph considering the first sentence.

No matter how you twist and shout, you can't avoid that most people(which includes commoners who are in fact most of the people in existence) are proficient with simple weapons.

Most people, even in the out of context way you are using it, means some people don't. It means exactly the opposite of what you claim - that being a person does not automatically give you proficiency.

RAW says that most people, and commoners are in fact most people in existence,

No they are not. The entire definition of person is not even clear.

A commoner is a specific monster, and one of over 500.

It doesn't say most simple weapons, so they are proficient with all of them.

No it doesn't. It does not say commoners are proficient with anything.

Apparently, wizards, sorcerers, and druids are not a part of the "most people."

And commoners aren't either presumably.

How much do you want to bet that if a gladiator subclass ever comes, it will be a subclass of fighter and be proficient in all simple and martial weapons?

Gladiator is already a background in the 2014 PHB - page 131. It provides an unusual weapon like a net or trident as starting gear but does NOT provide proficiency with that weapon. To emphasize my earlier point you get the weapon, you presumably use the weapon every day, but you don't get the proficiency in the weapon .... and any PC can take that background. The proficiencies you get from Gladiator are Acrobatics, Performance and a Disguise Kit.

I am confident a gladiator subclass will not provide proficiency in any class of weapons. If they have proficiency it will be because of the class it is attached to.

It is more likely that it will be a background in the future and if they do that again I expect it it will not offer proficiency in all simple and martial weapons.

This discussions of Gladiators brings up another good point. PCs Gladiators use weapons in their performances every day, but they don't get proficiency in them .... yet commoners automatically do???

The NPC gladiator is a fighter with a gladiator subclass, but built via the NPC stat block rules.

NPCs don't have classes and the only official Gladiator published for PCs to date did not require the Fighter class and did not provide any additional weapon proficiencies.

 

[AnotherGuy]

If they're different mechanical representations of the same creature, then it's broken.

Do not agree and you have left a lot of straw lying around to be picked up.

A ten year old with a rock will kill the minion in 1 round 5% of the time, but has no chance against the ogre with 111 hit points. 5% of the time the ten year old dies to an ogre with 110 hit points.

Show me how mathematically?
How do you know what Damage Threshold a minion ogre in MY 5e game would be? Because that is what you are responding to, right?

My words were

...but not for how I see them being implemented in 5e for my game.

This will be the 8th time I'm mentioning this, granted first response to you.

The below posts to the persons that all xp'ed you referred to my implementation of Damage Threshold (5e DMG 247) for minions.
#21836 to @clearstream
#21753 to @Lanefan
# 21700 and #21527 to @Micah Sweet

I also mentioned Damage Threshold in post
#21664 to @AlViking as well as
#21525 to @FrogReaver

And then even earlier in my post
#21398 to @Pedantic whereby I used a Damage Threshold of 15.

I'd love to see a 10 year old with a stone do 15 points of damage in 1 attack.

EDIT: And the other mechanical option I offered in my posts for a 5e minion were x number of successful attacks would kill it where you could have a lower Damage Threshold like 5 for instance or none at all. There is also Damage Reduction and probably others mechanical ways of representing minion types.

Fireball never killed things with 1 hit point that had 111 hit points in another form.

Ok firstly, this part of my post you're responding to was about the ethical argument. i.e. not about the monsters with 111 hit points.

And secondly a Fireball could kill more creatures in a round in 1e which is where we are going with this. In melee you are restricted to the number of attacks.

Sleep was limited by the hit points of the opponent, as well as the hit dice. It never converted monsters to 1 hit point.

Again missing the ethical argument by a mile.
With Sleep it was about putting a whole bunch of creatures to sleep followed up with some cold Coup de Grace. Again ethical argument.