D&D 5E Saving Throws design choice

[Li Shenron]

This is the biggest missed opportunity by 5e.

 

[Raith5]

This is the biggest missed opportunity by 5e.

From my perspective it just looks odd compared to the rest of the game. The game is so light and elegant in many respects but there is a mishmash of some spells (and cantrips) you have to roll to attack/ some you have get the target to roll saves and then these weird patterns (so far at least) of which stat gets used. I think this is an issue where elegance and tradition collided at some level.

 

[Evenglare]

Don't you guys think you may be jumping the gun a bit early? I mean we have no idea what the game is going to look like when everything is released. It's like people who see a single trailer of a video game or movie and they immediately say it's going to suck without seeing everything. I mean I understand the controversy but just to flat out say 5e is completely ruined this early is a bit hard for me swallow.

 

[Li Shenron]

Don't you guys think you may be jumping the gun a bit early? I mean we have no idea what the game is going to look like when everything is released. It's like people who see a single trailer of a video game or movie and they immediately say it's going to suck without seeing everything. I mean I understand the controversy but just to flat out say 5e is completely ruined this early is a bit hard for me swallow.

Basic is the 5e game released. It's the core every gaming group will use. More stuff will be added, but with regard to ST they actually removed all spells using Str, Int and Cha saves, which strongly suggests this is in fact a design choice. If it applies to Basic it mostly likely applies to also the additional material which will be in the PHB.

 

[Nebulous]

Or most of the monsters.

I'd bet $20 that there will be some Str, Int and Cha saves by the time all three books are out.

That's a good point. And personally, as DM, i'm sure i would ask for saving throws based on less used Stats sometime or another.

 

[Nebulous]

Someone mentioned in another thread they were going to make death saving throws (which aren't saving throws in the 5E sense anyway) CHA saves. I quite like that, once you're at death's door it is your force of personality that is going to save you!

"MUST....NOT...DIE. I'M....TOO...PRETTY.....(gah)"

 

[Nebulous]

What would happen in 5e if you added your level or 1/2 level rounded down to saving throws? I don't know if that is an unnecessary complication or not.

 

[Snapdragyn]

I think what he meant is that they're giving out saving throw proficiencies knowing there is a disparity. As in, every class only gets one good save (Dex/Con/Wis) and one bad save (Str/Int/Cha).

Right, but the quoted tweet mentions handing out SKILL proficiencies. This seems to indicate there was an attempt to use SKILL proficiencies to counterbalance the save proficiencies. That's not apparent from the simple distribution of key stats on the proficiencies, but may become clear once we see the distribution of skills assigned to each class in the full PHB class list.

 

[Nagol]

What would happen in 5e if you added your level or 1/2 level rounded down to saving throws? I don't know if that is an unnecessary complication or not.

If you add level / 2 to the saves, then at the high end of the game your good save bonus exceeds the caster's DC -- you can only fail on a 1 even if you are getting a -4 on the roll (or have a 12 in the stat instead of a 20). Poor saves go from very poor chances (~5-25% chance of saving) to quite decent (55-75% chance of saving).

 

[Nikosandros]

One could add a lower fraction of the level. For example level/6 for non proficient characters and level/5 +2 for proficiency.