D&D (2024) Return to the 3 saves for 1D&D?

[ECMO3]

If your idea of balance is assuming that every party, high level or not, should have very specific classes (like paladins or wizards) and very specific spells (like counterspell, which has its own crapton of issues btw, and would probably deserve its own thread) for the game to work properly, we have extremely different ideas on how this game should be balanced.

Your example uses a very specific spell - psychic scream, and one that is not on any published monster's spell list as far as I am aware.

In terms of specific, I think there are far, far more parties with Wizards and Paladins than there are parties that get psychic scream cast at them. Probably something on the order of 100 to 1 or more.

Finally, 8 different classes can cast dispel magic and 3 different classes can cast counterspell (not counting Rogue and Fighter subclasses that can cast them). So I think it is a safe bet you have those spells in most parties.

The game should be properly balanced, even at high levels, for all reasonably diverse parties, not just for the savvily optimized "meta" ones. Current 5e just isn't, and the saving throw setup is a considerable part of the problem (on both sides of the screen). This is my position on the matter.

I believe it is. High level characters very rarely die and they have high level abilities and high level spells which as a group more than compensate for the adversaries abilities and spells.

 

[ECMO3]

Yes. You said false life gives easy hp, this 15hp are not a lot. I said, resistance gives easy saving throw bonuses, so +3 to a saving throw is also not a lot.

Edit: also imaine using false life on someone with already high hp... They don't care if they make a dex save or not.

Ok, I agree but I don't understand your point vis-a-vis the value of a high constitution score outside the save.

For clarity; my position is that Constitution is not a very useful stat except for the common constitution save and the extra hit points you get are not very many and not as benificial as a higher score in another stat.

 

[ECMO3]

It's a mistake to attempt bald damage comparisons like this. Fighters usually do more damage over the adventuring day. Wizards will spike when the circumstances allow and may set up situations where the fighter does more damage. In my experience, if you only count damage that actually matters (i.e. ignoring damage that doesn't count because the enemy is already at zero hp), the paladin ends up top and the cleric bottom but there isn't as much in it as you think and a cleric with Firestorm in the right scenario will come out top if enough victims are close together.

In most campaigns with experienced players wizards do very little damage IME. While they have the ability to spike damage with something like fireball, and occasionally that is the right call, usually damaging spells are not the best way to use your limited spell slots and abilities.

I am playing with a 7th level Dwarf Enchantment Wizard/Order Cleric with a 7 strength and 8 dexterity and he probably averages less than 10 points of damage per battle and all of that with cantrips. In 7 levels I don't think he has ever cast a leveled spell that does damage, he is usually casting a control spell or using hypnotic gaze.

I am not sure I would agree Paladins are at the top either. I think archers and blaster warlocks probably outdo a lot of paladin builds because they can make an effective attack more often, where the Paladin spends substantial time dashing or throwing a Javelin.

 

[tetrasodium]

In most campaigns with experienced players wizards do very little damage IME. While they have the ability to spike damage with something like fireball, and occasionally that is the right call, usually damaging spells are (NOT?) the best way to use your limited spell slots and abilities.

I am playing with a 7th level Dwarf Enchantment Wizard/Order Cleric with a 7 strength and 8 dexterity and he probably averages less than 10 points of damage per battle and all of that with cantrips. In 7 levels I don't think he has ever cast a leveled spell that does damage, he is usually casting a control spell or using hypnotic gaze.

I am not sure I would agree Paladins are at the top either. I think archers and blaster warlocks probably outdo a lot of paladin builds because they can make an effective attack more often, where the Paladin spends substantial time dashing or throwing a Javelin.

I thinm you left out a "not"?

 

[leozg]

Here I thought by "high ac" you meant monsters that actually had high ac. Those ACs are functional at best & far too low to be considered "high AC" as characters progress through tier3 levels.

I thought you asked for non-boss monsters. Still, even with these "not high" ACs, it's better to aim at the lower save.

You do realize that the fighter A: willbe making 4 attacks.

I do. 4 attacks dealing 1d8 each is no different than a cantrip dealing 4d8. I could consider critical hit chance but it's more math than I want to do and I think I don't need, because in these cases the spellcasters can use their attack cantrips to aim at AC too.

B: will almost certainly have a +1 weapon +2 weapon or better else something like the magic weapon spell

It's simetrical, spellcaster almost certainly have an item that increases spell save DC. Targets can also have magic armor os shields that increase AC as much as the magic weapon bonus. Moreover, I think it is easier to increase AC with magic items than to increase weapon attacks or saves.

C: may have advantage on each of those rolls from pack tactics or a poorly designed flanking rule. D: may have advantage if the target is prone or stunned.

It's simetrical. Spell targets could also have disadvantage in saves.

E: Most importantly is not consuming anything but an action & will never run out of attack slots or something.

Spellcasters will never run out of cantrips.

Amazingly you even listed a necrotic cantrip against the helmed horror which has necrotic immunity

Amazingly I did, my bad. There are 3 other examples there, and mainly, all NPCs built using the same PCs rules will have the problem I mentioned. Just take all PCs you ever created and look at their sheets. Unless you did an amazing job increasing all saves, there's a high chance AC is higher than the lower save. These PCs could be NPCs, bosses, villains. Every time someone asks me to point monsters as examples I think they forget it's possible to play non-dungeoncrawl adventures set in cities and dealing with non-monster enemies.

in addition to the magic resistance for advantage on the save. Advantage tends to amount to roughly a +5 to the average.

It was considered. Advantage tends to add +5 only if chances are 50% or near. The Helmed Horror is an example, without advantage the chances of avoiding a spellcaster DC 19 spell with +0 Str would be 10% without advantage vrs. spell, it is 19% because of the advantage.

 

[tetrasodium]

I thought you asked for non-boss monsters. Still, even with these "not high" ACs, it's better to aim at the lower save.


I do. 4 attacks dealing 1d8 each is no different than a cantrip dealing 4d8. I could consider critical hit chance but it's more math than I want to do and I think I don't need, because in these cases the spellcasters can use their attack cantrips to aim at AC too.


It's simetrical, spellcaster almost certainly have an item that increases spell save DC. Targets can also have magic armor os shields that increase AC as much as the magic weapon bonus. Moreover, I think it is easier to increase AC with magic items than to increase weapon attacks or saves.


It's simetrical. Spell targets could also have disadvantage in saves.


Spellcasters will never run out of cantrips.


Amazingly I did, my bad. There are 3 other examples there, and mainly, all NPCs built using the same PCs rules will have the problem I mentioned. Just take all PCs you ever created and look at their sheets. Unless you did an amazing job increasing all saves, there's a high chance AC is higher than the lower save. These PCs could be NPCs, bosses, villains. Every time someone asks me to point monsters as examples I think they forget it's possible to play non-dungeoncrawl adventures set in cities and dealing with non-monster enemies.


It was considered. Advantage tends to add +5 only if chances are 50% or near. The Helmed Horror is an example, without advantage the chances of avoiding a spellcaster DC 19 spell with +0 Str would be 10% without advantage vrs. spell, it is 19% because of the advantage.

What does that have to do with your original point? You've gone from talking about how the ability to target different virtually identical saves is a boon over being "forced" to target AC even against high ac monsters to arguing anything that avoids the fact that 5e doesn't really have "high ac" monsters unless you jump to epic tier cr20++ legendary monsters like the tarrasque & ancient dragons. The presence of monsters with moderate AC that needs an 8-10ish to hit doesn't make them into monsters with "high AC". Casters would actually be better off and capable of targeting weak saves with confidence if monsters had a great save & poor/trash save as they once did instead of 6 mediocre saves they get to roll 2d20 & drop the lower on & 3x nosell legendary resists.

 

[leozg]

What does that have to do with your original point?

I don't know, you asked me to name monsters with good AC as examples. We've gone too far in this discussion.
We can go as deep as we want in the discussion, add complexity by taking in consideration a lot of factors like criticals, ability bonuses, specific builds, average monster AC and saves and the chance to face them, but it will lead us more to discuss what we should be taking in consideration than my central point. So I'll stop here, just saying the core idea of my point:

- Having multiple saves like 5e is not good because it's hard to keep all of them with decent values. Not good in the sense that it makes spellcasters better when compared to martials because spellcasters can aim at different saves with cantrips and, even thought not knowing which one is the worst save, it's not hard figure it out and, in average, be more effective than martials that can only aim at AC. So, in short, to avoid spellcasters you need to increase 6 saves, while, to avoid martials, you only need to have a good AC.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Ok, I agree but I don't understand your point vis-a-vis the value of a high constitution score outside the save.

For clarity; my position is that Constitution is not a very useful stat except for the common constitution save and the extra hit points you get are not very many and not as benificial as a higher score in another stat.

I understand your position and disagree. The extra HP are worth a lot. You also heal more during a short rest and so a +2 modifier of constitution as you correctly wrote means 20 more hp at level 5.
This is more than the difference between the full damage of a fireball and the reduced damage when you make the save. The +2 save bonus you would get from a +2 higher dex bonus is just a 10% chance to actually make the save.
So HP are actually worth more than you give it credit.
Also, dex saves, although very common often just reduce damage. Thus I, as you too, value the +2 bonus to con saves higher than +2 dex saves, as for casters, the most common save is Con vs DC 10, a concentration save. Here I value 10% higher chance of keeping my concentration up very highly, because it increases my reliability.
But my point stands: HP in 5e are very valuable. And before I raise my dexterity from 14 to 16 I bring my con from 10 to 14. Dexterity is way overrated. It is not the god stat people say.

 

[Pauln6]

PCs with unusually high ACs and paladins with a big boost to all saves impact the game far more than characters investing in saves.

Magic shield bonuses bracers of defence and rings of protection should not stack with other magic bonuses. Paladins bonuses to saves should be halved.

 

[Horwath]

Dexterity is way overrated. It is not the god stat people say.

partially, I agree.

but STR weapons are still too weak in comparison to DEX weapons.
and DEX has better utility vs. STR.

Strength:
melee and thrown attack and damage
str saves
1 skill
carry capacity

dexterity:
finesse and ranged attack and damage
dex saves
3 skills
AC
initiative

even if you value bot groups of weapons as equal(they are not), dex gets stronger save, 3 skills vs 1 skill, AC calculation in most cases, initiative bonus, versus STR carry capacity.

non-finesse weapons need to deal more damage.