D&D 5E Rise of Tiamat Supplement is online

[Paraxis]

For AD&D, it depends upon how many wishes the characters got hold of... Each wish is a full point to an attribute under 16, or 1/10th of an attribute for higher atts.

And, except for method 1, you're still picking stats, and can have a build.

You know in all my years of playing AD&D and 2e, I never saw a single person wish to be stronger. Maybe it had something to do with the fact you always found gauntlets of ogre power or a belt of giant strength long before you ever saw your first wish.

 

[ZombieRoboNinja]

It's important to bear in mind how huge the effect from these items can be in 5e. For example, someone on /tg/ did a chart of damage for various fighter and barbarian builds, and the most nova-friendly build (fighter17/barbarian3) more than doubled in damage if you went from a normal greatsword to that legendary greatsword from HotDQ (Hazirawn?) and gave him the 24str belt of giant strength.

At level 20, that means he went from doing an impressive 300ish damage over 4 rounds (against an average cr20 foe) to an insane 700 damage. 450ish of which comes from the first two rounds when he's using action surge. Balancing an encounter around that mind of burst damage might prove... challenging.

 

[aramis erak]

You know in all my years of playing AD&D and 2e, I never saw a single person wish to be stronger. Maybe it had something to do with the fact you always found gauntlets of ogre power or a belt of giant strength long before you ever saw your first wish.

I did... went from 18(32) to 18(72) in a particularly monty haul game. Ftr/MU/Th... but that was when I was 12...

 

[FireLance]

Gauntlets of ogre power and belts of giant strength bug me as well, which is why I am probably going to house-rule them as follows:

You must have a natural Strength score of 15 or higher to become attuned to gauntlets of ogre power.

You must have a natural Strength score of 17 or higher to become attuned to a belt of hill or stone/frost giant strength.

You must have a natural Strength score of 19 or higher to become attuned to a belt of fire, cloud or storm giant strength.

 

[Chocolategravy]

Gauntlets of ogre power and belts of giant strength bug me as well, which is why I am probably going to house-rule them as follows: You must have a natural Strength score of 15 or higher to become attuned to gauntlets of ogre power. You must have a natural Strength score of 17 or higher to become attuned to a belt of hill or stone/frost giant strength. You must have a natural Strength score of 19 or higher to become attuned to a belt of fire, cloud or storm giant strength.

Unless there are similar items for other stats, something like this should be done, otherwise it's an even better choice to go DEX main and just get your STR to 13 for MC purposes.

 

[dagger]

We had a fighter wish to be as strong as a Titan in 1e. He changed into a Titan. Fun adventure getting him changed back, a lot of roleplaying since it was in Waterdeep. Mass Chaos

 

[CapnZapp]

A player should not assume that he will ever get a belt of giants strength IMO. Sure some editions assume that player x will have certain items but it appears that is not the default assumption in 5e. Which I love!

The problem is that the player who does, and then gets the belt, is better off.

It introduces a kind of gamble that many players intensely dislike.

Regardless of your thoughts on this matter, you should see that a problem exists.

Do note that if the DMG were to have a general retraining rule, I would expect the issue to go away for most if not all these players. (Such as, "at fourth level and every three levels thereafter, you may undo one (1) character build choice and instead select another option.")

This might be crude and simple, but you get the idea: that a character can adapt to the environment, including redoing choices made irrelevant by the party's haul of magic loot.

Sure, it would take quite a while to "redirect" all your strength increases, but at least in theory you would not be hosed for picking the straightforward option.

 

[CapnZapp]

Oh, magical armor and weapons don't require attunement.

Vanilla +1 items don't, but more rare stuff do.

 

[Kaychsea]

The problem is that the player who does, and then gets the belt, is better off.

It introduces a kind of gamble that many players intensely dislike.

Regardless of your thoughts on this matter, you should see that a problem exists.

Do you expect wizards to not boost their INT just in case they pick up an item that does the heavy lifting for them? Bards? Just how poor do they expect to be at their chosen role until they pick up the magufin that is going to save them all those stat point/feats? And if they are that bad at their job who is to say they are the one who will get it?

 

[Eric V]

Do you expect wizards to not boost their INT just in case they pick up an item that does the heavy lifting for them? Bards? Just how poor do they expect to be at their chosen role until they pick up the magufin that is going to save them all those stat point/feats? And if they are that bad at their job who is to say they are the one who will get it?

I wouldn't expect any of this.

This tangent started because the items in question reverted to 1e/2e versions of them (flat score) as opposed to the 3.x version (+x to your score)

(Notably, 4e did away with stat modifying items, and was probably better for it).

If the designers had opted to go with the latter version, the items would do exactly what one would expect them to do (and probably already seen them do in myth, folklore, etc.): enhance the person's stat significantly. Under this version, the str melee guy benefits most, which makes intuitive sense.*

*By that I mean, if you described the situation to people who never played D&D, but might be familiar with myth and such, it would make sense to them.

The designers went with the former for some reason, and so now, the barbarian is least likely to benefits from strength enhancing gauntlets.

That's counter-intuitive. So it causes a kind gamble that the Captain was describing.