D&D 5E Reducing Power Gaming

[MichaelSomething]

What do your players think about the issue??

 

[FrogReaver]

This is not to start an argument, but to seek advice: I am not thrilled with how quickly characters become powerful in 5e. I am a dude who started with 1st, then 2nd, then 3rd edition, and I find the powers that characters have very quickly in 5e is a bit...vexing. Similarly, they just get too many powers, in my observation. So what are some ways to take some of that out? Remove bonus actions and reactions? No feats? Limit spell choice (like a ranger could only take spells like Animal Friendship)? I'm open to ideas.

My crew plays on Roll20, so it's not hard to futz with the built in 5e character sheet. I'd love some FRIENDLY, POLITE council. I'm not yucking anyone's yum.

My initial thought is - start them at level 1 and slow the leveling by increasing the xp to the next level. Make magical loot fairly hard to come by.

My second thought is - what about powerful PC's bothers you? Is it too hard to challenge them? Is it that they feel less fictionally grounded in medieval fantasy? Something else?

My third thought is - remove multiclassing, when done right is the single best way to gain power. Feats are the second.

My final thought is - if you really don't like 5e powerful characters then just play another game. An earlier version of D&D, 3rd party 5e system that tones magicalness/power down, or another game entirely. It's fairly hard to remove power from wotc's 5e characters, so probably best to avoid the problem entirely.

 

[Clint_L]

This is not to start an argument, but to seek advice: I am not thrilled with how quickly characters become powerful in 5e. I am a dude who started with 1st, then 2nd, then 3rd edition, and I find the powers that characters have very quickly in 5e is a bit...vexing. Similarly, they just get too many powers, in my observation. So what are some ways to take some of that out? Remove bonus actions and reactions? No feats? Limit spell choice (like a ranger could only take spells like Animal Friendship)? I'm open to ideas.

My crew plays on Roll20, so it's not hard to futz with the built in 5e character sheet. I'd love some FRIENDLY, POLITE council. I'm not yucking anyone's yum.

I don't think you're really describing power gaming (players min-maxing to create optimal characters, usually with combat as a measuring stick) but rather the power of a typical character being too high for your tastes. I find it a bit surprising that you find this more of an issue in 5e than in 2e and especially 3e, but setting that aside, this is a hard issue to deal with without seriously tinkering with the design.

For example, if you get rid of bonus actions, that hurts some classes (e.g. monks, rogues) a lot more than others (e.g. wizards). Same with reactions, and so on. So while you would be reducing overall power levels, you would also be seriously impinging on class balance. I'm not sure that taking out feats does much, unless you also remove ASIs.

Slowing progression certainly slows power creep, though it sounds like you might have issues with basic class design. Being stingy with magic items is an option. But ultimately, why not go back to one of those earlier editions that you prefer, or an OSR variation on them?

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

Consider using the ability score bonuses of earlier D&D.
+1 at ability score of 14
+2 at ability score of 18…

 

[Micah Sweet]

This is not to start an argument, but to seek advice: I am not thrilled with how quickly characters become powerful in 5e. I am a dude who started with 1st, then 2nd, then 3rd edition, and I find the powers that characters have very quickly in 5e is a bit...vexing. Similarly, they just get too many powers, in my observation. So what are some ways to take some of that out? Remove bonus actions and reactions? No feats? Limit spell choice (like a ranger could only take spells like Animal Friendship)? I'm open to ideas.

My crew plays on Roll20, so it's not hard to futz with the built in 5e character sheet. I'd love some FRIENDLY, POLITE council. I'm not yucking anyone's yum.

I suppose the first question I would ask is: have you considered how your players would feel about reducing the power levels of their PCs? The biggest problem I have with houserules in D&D 5e (either version I would assume) is that the game is so forgiving on PC oomph that any houserules feel like nerfs. Most players don't like nerfs.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Power level is always going to be relative to what the PCs are facing. So if that is an issue, there are several tweaks you can do. Another possibility is magic items, I'm pretty stingy in my own game. Last thing from a power level is that many of the really cool things people can do are a limited resource. Don't let them take a rest after every fight or every other fight might be a solution.

But overall? Just slowing down progression can help a lot. Ultimately though it may just be that the core assumptions of D&D don't fit what you prefer, which I get. I've learned to just roll with it, but that's me.

So if you can be more specific about what the issue is, there may be different answers.

The core assumptions of D&D 5e and 5.5. Those assumptions have not stayed the same over the decades.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Honestly the easiest way to recreate the 1e experience is to just play 1e.

Great if you can find players that want to play 1e.

 

[Stormonu]

A lot of good advice above. 5E has somewhat changed the curve. Used to be in older editions that 1st level heroes were "just off the farm" characters, inexperienced rookies in the world around them. Most modern RPGs expect starting characters to be competent in their field, if not already extraordinary in some way and non-D&D advancement swings tend to be small. D&D has tried to incorporate that "competent from the start" from other games, but then throws wildly accelerated advancement and power growth on top of it from its old self.

If you want the power curve to closely follow earlier editions, then the best way to do that (short of playing an older edition) is to strip down characters to their older edition counterparts.

Things like:
No HD healing during short rests, long rests only heal a handful of hp (Con mod + 1)
No feats, no ASIs
Death at 0 hp
No subclasses
Ban multiclassing or figure out how to implement it like older editions (raise XP required to level by 1.5x to 2x)
Paladin and Ranger don't get spells until after 9th level
Stop leveling after 5th level

I'll be honest, I'd rather not play 5E if the above were implemented, I'd probably just roll back to an older edition (B/X or 2E, most likely). If you're a "forever DM", I'd strongly suggest playing on the other side of the table for a stint. It gave me a real insight as to why modern players tend to enjoy the way 5E is currently set up, and I adjusted my DMing because of it.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

You don't need to do anything too extreme, but you do need to be careful.

All of the following can work together without feeling like you are depriving players of too much of what they may want.

Player Side:
1) Slower level progression. Potentially much slower.
2) Curated subclass and species options. Anything in the 2014 PHB is probably fine, but stuff can get complicated outside of it.
3) Limit or eliminate feats.

All of these keep things more manageable by reducing the amount of things the PCs can do without depriving them of expected mathematical power or features for their level.

DM side:
4) Almost always use lots of foes if a fight is supposed to be at all challenging. Seriously, even if it's a creature with Legendary Actions try to find a way to justify minions. The 5e math doesn't support olo foes well. Either they are defensively satisfying but offensively strong enough to one-shot PCs and risk a TPK, or they are defensively satisfying but the party doesn't expend many resources to destroy them.
Use multiple optional rules that tweak but don't completely changer how things work like:
5) Slow natural healing: no hp on long rests so you have to spend HD. Healer's kit dependency sounds cool, but in practicebit might be more trouble than it's worth.
6) Harder magic identification. More of a feel than power thing.
7) Using encumbrance rather than just carrying capacity--which might be the hardest sell to players!

None of those require house rules except for slower progression, and none of them fundamentally change the game math of expectations. They just ground the game better or make the math actually work better (4).

After that it's house rule territory, which gets trickier. Selectively nerfing specific spells and class features helps, but make sure it doesn't target specific types of characters. So changing spells that eliminate negative effects so they have to be equal or close to the level for example (no dispel magic on 9th level spell or remove curse that always works at 3rd level) would work.

Adding exhaustion (temporary and recovered on short rest for feel, normal to be more punishing) whenever dropped to 0 hp can be useful.

Here is an extreme but interesting option I just thought of. I recommend using it only on a trial basis as might completely and undesireably change the game. All healing becones temp hp. Any temp hp you have left after a long rest convert to actual healing.

Finally, make sure not to gloss over or forget existing rules. I mentioned the optional encumbrance rule, but just the standard carrying capacity is something it is actually pretty easy to exceed if no one is keeping track. Follow the rules for spellcasting components. This means you have everything you need in a component pouch (unless it's expensive), but somatic components require a free hand or some in combat juggling. Make sure players use the rules for switching weapons rather than just ignoring them and letting players put away their bow and draw their sword for free.

It takes care but you can get a more traditional D&D feel without doing extrene things like switching long rests to a week off (which destroys the old school feel of spell recovery for me).

 

[aco175]

I have seen people talk in other threads about taking levels 1-10 and spreading them out over the 20 levels. Keep the monster threat the same and see how the players start thinking more. If you are 10th level, but have the stats of a 5th level PC, you might go about fighting giants differently. Now you see PCs going to libraries and taking side quests to find the McGuffin instead of just a 7th level spell or a paladin/sorcerer that deals 150 points of damage in the first round.