D&D General Requesting permission to have something cool

[nevin]

Fair -- I give "working professionals" increasing levels of proficiency bonus and/or Expertise, without giving them levels. So total agreement there.

My suggestions were colored by the general consensus I have encountered that no one wants to nerf the casters. so that does mean boosting the martials.

I think you missed my point. An adventuring wizard is not a "working Professional". A wizard that stays home and does nothing but craft magic items is going to be an artisan, have a lab, tools they've built themselves and an entire network of supplier and support of various kinds from money to just friends with certain abilities.

 

[nevin]

5e definitely did that, yes. Spontaneous casting is easier than 3e prepped casting and much easier than old-school memorization & looking for new spells to add to your book in-game.
Really, it's been a continuous, if not exactly even, trend throughout the games history. Casters retain complexity, flexibility, & power, but shed restrictions & limitations.

A straightforward change could also be to balance the number/power of slots around the combat pillar (since it's decidedly time-important), and use rituals &c in the other two.

A world-bending ritual could easily involve the whole party, even, with caster & non-caster participants, quests to make the ritual possible, defense against it being sabotaged, etc....

rituals are easy to limit, how much time do they take vs how many casters do you need vs how much attention from who, and what when you start to change reality. And as i said any member of the party can cast a ritual with equal difficulty. Just need the ritual casting feat if you are playing 5e. I think you'll find if most of the change the world spells and i include Teleport, fabricate, gate, wish, limited wish and even unseen servant and depending on where you decide to draw the line perhaps even Wall spells that balancing the wizard in combat become's very easy. In fact you'll find the wizard may even have to be buffed. But that depends on where the line between what a ritual spell vs a quickie spell gets drawn. Then you have to dig in the details for a bit to work it out.

For example I'd give Cleric's and Wizards major bonuses to design level appropriate rituals as they have the magical training.

 

[Corinnguard]

It would be better if all of the martials had access to combat maneuvers, not just the Fighter. Why should the Fighter have all the fun?

Level Up or Advanced 5th Edition by EN Publishing does give it's martial classes (Adept, Berserker, Fighter, Herald, Marshal, Ranger and Rogue) access to combat maneuvers, and not just one set of combat maneuvers like the 5e Battle Master happens to have, but several in the form of Combat Traditions. Each tradition has five 'levels' or degrees of maneuvers (think of each degree being the equivalent of a spellcasting level).

 

[rmcoen]

rituals are easy to limit, how much time do they take vs how many casters do you need vs how much attention from who, and what when you start to change reality. And as i said any member of the party can cast a ritual with equal difficulty. Just need the ritual casting feat if you are playing 5e. I think you'll find if most of the change the world spells and i include Teleport, fabricate, gate, wish, limited wish and even unseen servant and depending on where you decide to draw the line perhaps even Wall spells that balancing the wizard in combat become's very easy. In fact you'll find the wizard may even have to be buffed. But that depends on where the line between what a ritual spell vs a quickie spell gets drawn. Then you have to dig in the details for a bit to work it out.

For example I'd give Cleric's and Wizards major bonuses to design level appropriate rituals as they have the magical training.

I'd be on board with these CtW spells existing as both "quickies" and Rituals. But the quickie version either might fail, or lasts a minuscule amount of time. you can cast fly or wall of stone or gate in combat / in seconds, but then it lasts only for seconds and might fail. Or you can cast it properly, and it (a) works and (b) lasts like it should. Combat Fly lasts a few rounds - which might enough to get across the chasm or into the pit with the sleeping dragon, but won't be enough to battle the dragon or ferry everyone across the chasm; combat wall of stone still lets you be creative with battlefield control, but it can be dispelled, it goes away in one minute, etc, instead of being permanent. Combat gate has a hight chance of doing nothing, and a large chance of summoning an uncontrolled hostile being...

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Unfortunately, your solution is untenable, for the reason you outlined (WotC won't make the changes you want). If you won't accept any other solution, you've put yourself in a tough space.

I do not share your confidence in this claim. Particularly given the apparent runaway success of BG3, which is nearly perfect for making a virtual testing environment that can run numbers and give a useful spread of statistical results. It includes terrain (obstacles, impassable barriers, hazards, slowing effects, height difference, etc.), a wide variety of implemented monsters, many abilities including instant-death ones (e.g. intellect devourers), utility magic, conditional effects, all sorts of stuff.

It--obviously!--cannot handle the sheer creative potential, and careful decision-making, of actual human beings. It cannot generate new ideas, and in all likelihood, even some things it could theoretically test will simply be too difficult or cumbersome to actually express within its engine's code. But it can do a hell of a lot, and it can collect that data at lightning speed, allowing you to do the equivalent of hundreds or thousands of hours of live playtesting with the push of a button. If coupled with some fancier tricks (like, say, something which automatically generates varied terrain and encounters indexed by intended difficulty), it can even be used to do something like actually getting some kind of feel for how impactful terrain features can be on encounter difficulty. If that's feasible, it could open up room for an entirely new set of tools and advice for DMs on how to make their encounters both better and more fitting to their vision for their campaigns.

This really isn't that big an ask in a world with computers. Particularly since they've already expressly said that they're making their own virtual tabletop. Basic statistical modeling. I'm not even talking ANOVA, I'm genuinely just saying basic tests like hypothesis testing, goodness-of-fit tests, and proportion tests. Basic survey design, e.g. you don't make a push polls and shape your questions so it's not actually possible to voice relevant criticism. And some basic consistency on their standards for what gets multiple attempts vs what gets crapcanned on the first pass, e.g. you don't spend six to eight months trying to make Specialties or that martial bonus dice thing work only to quietly abandon both (and suffering serious consequences as a result of dropping them), while literally completely abandoning two whole classes and never making another public attempt simply because things didn't go well on the first try.

None of this is hard. None of it is complicated. They're already doing some of it, and have access to tools that can do much of the stuff they haven't yet. A single survey consultant could fix up their survey design stuff right quick. You don't even need a stats consultant (though that would of course be incredibly useful)--just basic Stats 101 stuff is all you need.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

I do not share your confidence in this claim. Particularly given the apparent runaway success of BG3, which is nearly perfect for making a virtual testing environment that can run numbers and give a useful spread of statistical results.

Based upon the press coverage, I am reasonably certain that any data mining of BG3 will only tell us what various race and class combinations will result in people saying, "Yeah, I'd totally hit that."

 

[TwoSix]

Yeah, the DCC fighter way is definitely just as valid a method.

I agree with that. The core insight DCC had was turning stunts from a player "ask" into a system-prescribed negotiation.

 

[Oofta]

I do not share your confidence in this claim. Particularly given the apparent runaway success of BG3, which is nearly perfect for making a virtual testing environment that can run numbers and give a useful spread of statistical results. It includes terrain (obstacles, impassable barriers, hazards, slowing effects, height difference, etc.), a wide variety of implemented monsters, many abilities including instant-death ones (e.g. intellect devourers), utility magic, conditional effects, all sorts of stuff.

It--obviously!--cannot handle the sheer creative potential, and careful decision-making, of actual human beings. It cannot generate new ideas, and in all likelihood, even some things it could theoretically test will simply be too difficult or cumbersome to actually express within its engine's code. But it can do a hell of a lot, and it can collect that data at lightning speed, allowing you to do the equivalent of hundreds or thousands of hours of live playtesting with the push of a button. If coupled with some fancier tricks (like, say, something which automatically generates varied terrain and encounters indexed by intended difficulty), it can even be used to do something like actually getting some kind of feel for how impactful terrain features can be on encounter difficulty. If that's feasible, it could open up room for an entirely new set of tools and advice for DMs on how to make their encounters both better and more fitting to their vision for their campaigns.

This really isn't that big an ask in a world with computers. Particularly since they've already expressly said that they're making their own virtual tabletop. Basic statistical modeling. I'm not even talking ANOVA, I'm genuinely just saying basic tests like hypothesis testing, goodness-of-fit tests, and proportion tests. Basic survey design, e.g. you don't make a push polls and shape your questions so it's not actually possible to voice relevant criticism. And some basic consistency on their standards for what gets multiple attempts vs what gets crapcanned on the first pass, e.g. you don't spend six to eight months trying to make Specialties or that martial bonus dice thing work only to quietly abandon both (and suffering serious consequences as a result of dropping them), while literally completely abandoning two whole classes and never making another public attempt simply because things didn't go well on the first try.

None of this is hard. None of it is complicated. They're already doing some of it, and have access to tools that can do much of the stuff they haven't yet. A single survey consultant could fix up their survey design stuff right quick. You don't even need a stats consultant (though that would of course be incredibly useful)--just basic Stats 101 stuff is all you need.

What's your goal here? What do you measure and how do you measure it? Because we already have the Solasta game that implements core D&D (with custom feats and builds) and it does tell you some info about your group's statistics if you use player-created modules. That, for example, fighters average quite a bit more damage than wizards with the exception of one module that handed out a wand of fireballs at low level and threw a lot of low-level monsters that always appeared in fireball formation.

So we don't need an AI to tell us who does the most damage overall (well, up to level 13 where Solasta caps out) it's easy enough to just play a few Solasta modules. When every single one comes up with the same result (with the exception noted above for obvious reasons) you don't need to run thousands of simulations. So what else are you trying to "prove"?

 

[Micah Sweet]

I do not share your confidence in this claim. Particularly given the apparent runaway success of BG3, which is nearly perfect for making a virtual testing environment that can run numbers and give a useful spread of statistical results. It includes terrain (obstacles, impassable barriers, hazards, slowing effects, height difference, etc.), a wide variety of implemented monsters, many abilities including instant-death ones (e.g. intellect devourers), utility magic, conditional effects, all sorts of stuff.

It--obviously!--cannot handle the sheer creative potential, and careful decision-making, of actual human beings. It cannot generate new ideas, and in all likelihood, even some things it could theoretically test will simply be too difficult or cumbersome to actually express within its engine's code. But it can do a hell of a lot, and it can collect that data at lightning speed, allowing you to do the equivalent of hundreds or thousands of hours of live playtesting with the push of a button. If coupled with some fancier tricks (like, say, something which automatically generates varied terrain and encounters indexed by intended difficulty), it can even be used to do something like actually getting some kind of feel for how impactful terrain features can be on encounter difficulty. If that's feasible, it could open up room for an entirely new set of tools and advice for DMs on how to make their encounters both better and more fitting to their vision for their campaigns.

This really isn't that big an ask in a world with computers. Particularly since they've already expressly said that they're making their own virtual tabletop. Basic statistical modeling. I'm not even talking ANOVA, I'm genuinely just saying basic tests like hypothesis testing, goodness-of-fit tests, and proportion tests. Basic survey design, e.g. you don't make a push polls and shape your questions so it's not actually possible to voice relevant criticism. And some basic consistency on their standards for what gets multiple attempts vs what gets crapcanned on the first pass, e.g. you don't spend six to eight months trying to make Specialties or that martial bonus dice thing work only to quietly abandon both (and suffering serious consequences as a result of dropping them), while literally completely abandoning two whole classes and never making another public attempt simply because things didn't go well on the first try.

None of this is hard. None of it is complicated. They're already doing some of it, and have access to tools that can do much of the stuff they haven't yet. A single survey consultant could fix up their survey design stuff right quick. You don't even need a stats consultant (though that would of course be incredibly useful)--just basic Stats 101 stuff is all you need.

The issue is, there's no real assurance that WotC will make more money doing what you want. And that's their priority. For all time. Always.

 

[nevin]

The only problem with high risk high reward spells like the gate you describe is They still have a chance of sending the narrative to some random spot like some high powered Planar stepping out and declaring a holy war on those who opened a gate to his god's realm. Now for me that's not a problem, for most people that complain about wizard's being overpowered I think that's exactly the problem.

I love the idea though of trying to cast a ritual as a combat spell and effectively making it wild magic. I envision a surge result and everyone on the battlefield has fly for 3 combat rounds, enemies and friends........ Though I don't know why Fly would be a ritual. (though as I wrote that I realized a non caster might have one).

I guess if rituals need master ritual guides (DM brain reads expensive resource), then perhaps a caster could attempt to convert on the fly into a spell. I could see the rogue or bard pulling something out of their back pack and tossing it to the wizard when all else has failed.