D&D 5E Sell me on Wizards

[samursus]

No worries.

I'm having a great time with the game. I just happen to roll lousy dice a lot and the DM rolls good saves a lot. So a lot of my spells fizzle. Using multiple spells for Mage Armor and Shield and not even being anywhere near the rest of the party AC-wise seems like a waste as well. So yeah, when one is not happy with the cantrips and the defensive spells, that's the majority of the combat rounds.

I've saved the party's bacon twice with Fog Cloud and once with Web, so it's all good. It's just so darn few and far between. And of course, the first casualty of any of my plans is the plan itself. At least a dozen times so far, I'm all set to cast my cool spell and some other PC gets in the way or changes the scenario enough that it is no longer a good idea (even out of combat).

My brother is playing a Wizard in our first 5e campaign (LMoP) and he is having an experience similar to yours. Rolls really bad. It doesn't help that he took a level of Cleric to bring some much needed healing to the party. Luckily, they acquired the Staff of Defense that helps mitigate the defense issue. I may start to fudge Saves vs his Burning Hands for awhile... he needs the confidence boost

On the other hand, he is tremendously versatile, more-so than any of the other PC's, becoming the font of knowledge on everything new, which is especially funny when he makes his infamously low rolls on Int checks and confidently recites the inane misinformation I provide. He just reached 4th level (not sure if he is going to take another Cleric level), so we'll see how it goes from here.

 

[samursus]

I do have a question on that. What do the PCs in your group do with the creatures that they sleep instead of kill? It's one thing to kill a fighting foe, it's another to kill a sleeping foe.

I'm asking this because this happened in our game and the majority of players decided to not kill helpless foes (but they couldn't just tie them up or let them wake up and escape either).

This is great RP fodder in our campaign. My sweet new-age gf is a blood-thirsty Circle of the Moon Druid in her first experience with D&D and was happy to kill goblin prisoners/sleepers when she found out what they did to her people (wood-elves). Another PC, an old friend who I just started playing with again after our group broke up during 3e, she has taken on the role of reluctant executioner, being the Rogue with a criminal background. She also had a major moment of regret when while holding Glasstaff (from LMoP) hostage she was forced to execute him, finding out afterwards it was all for naught.

The rest of the group avoids involving themselves in those decisions.

 

[samursus]

Most archer PCs in 5E have Dex of 16 (at least ones I have seen since by definition, Dex is their schtick) and some have +2 for fighting style.

Bold mine. Picking nits, but Archer fighting style only gives +2 to hit, not damage.

 

[raleel]

Although this is a true statement that it could be done, I doubt it comes up in play that the player says "Ah ha, a vegepygmy. I'll target Wisdom.". For a vegepygmy, which is best: AC, Con, Dex or Wis? I suspect that except for a few iconic monsters, most players do not really know which is the best defense to target against. In 5E, by the time a few rounds have gone by and players start getting a feel (mostly about AC), the combat is nearly over.

Sure, if the DM gives out clues or has various skill rolls tell the players the answer, then it might happen more often.

I lobby for this to be a use of monster knowledge checks, and have been working on a spreadsheet for "best spells if you don't know what you are facing". Basically "this targets X, because X tends to be low" or "take int based anything, plus things to cover undead and other things that tend to be immune to int based things".

This sort of thing, if you can work a way to do it in character, is smart play, and I think totally within the realm of the wizard.

 

[KarinsDad]

Bold mine. Picking nits, but Archer fighting style only gives +2 to hit, not damage.

Yup. But that +2 to hit is pretty big overall. Archers tend to hit nearly all of the time since many NPCs have ACs 14 or less at low levels.

 

[raleel]

My brother is playing a Wizard in our first 5e campaign (LMoP) and he is having an experience similar to yours. Rolls really bad. It doesn't help that he took a level of Cleric to bring some much needed healing to the party. Luckily, they acquired the Staff of Defense that helps mitigate the defense issue. I may start to fudge Saves vs his Burning Hands for awhile... he needs the confidence boost

Lemme guess, fighting things with a reasonable dex? Goblins or something? Your basic goblin has a 15AC and a 14 Dex, making hits against Dex or AC not that much fun (assuming a 17 int, you are looking at a 55% to hit AC, and the goblin has to make an 11+ on his save, which is 50%). Burning hands is going to average 11 on a hit and 5 on a miss, giving him just barely enough to drop regular goblins if he rolls average. Something like sleep is going to be a better choice at low levels, I think. 5d8 averages to 22.5, which should be enough to drop 3 pretty easily. no save too.

This is exactly why a wizard should have some legwork done before he goes in to an adventure. Knowing general kinds of foes goes a LONG ways towards impacting his effectiveness. Take, for instance, Shatter at level 2 vs a level 2 burning hands against the same goblins. 4d6 vs 3d8 is pretty dang close to the same (avg 14 vs 13.5) but with it going against Con, the goblins are 15% less likely to save. Now your shatter is kicked up to around 15.5 and a clear winner.

Not to criticize your player, of course, more to illustrate how those sorts of bits can make a big difference. Hitting an Ogre with Poison Spray is just dumb (+3), but hitting him with Phantasmal Forces is amazing (-3)

 

[KarinsDad]

I lobby for this to be a use of monster knowledge checks, and have been working on a spreadsheet for "best spells if you don't know what you are facing". Basically "this targets X, because X tends to be low" or "take int based anything, plus things to cover undead and other things that tend to be immune to int based things".

This sort of thing, if you can work a way to do it in character, is smart play, and I think totally within the realm of the wizard.

The whole "my wizard would know that" tends to make a lot of aspects of the game a bit less fun for some players. Where is the mystery if a simple die roll lets PCs know NPC abilities? Should NPCs get a simple die roll to know PC abilities? It depends on the group, but I think it is more interesting for some groups if the PCs find out that these types of creature are resistant to fire by observing it. Monster checks were basically problematic in 4E, but handing out the worse AC/saves goes even beyond the 4E rules.

I'm not too bothered by knowing some racial aspects of a creature with some form of knowledge check, but it should be more generic info and potentially some well known strengths or obvious weaknesses of the creatures race (medusas turn creatures to stone). But 4E had the entire Goblin Sharpshooter that was different than a Goblin Grunt which is different than a Goblin Sniper. Not too keen on PCs knowing the difference between various abilities of same race NPCs based on a quick glance. Just because one Goblin is quick and has high Dex should not necessarily mean that all Goblins are quick with high Dex.

 

[KarinsDad]

Lemme guess, fighting things with a reasonable dex? Goblins or something? Your basic goblin has a 15AC and a 14 Dex, making hits against Dex or AC not that much fun (assuming a 17 int, you are looking at a 55% to hit AC, and the goblin has to make an 11+ on his save, which is 50%). Burning hands is going to average 11 on a hit and 5 on a miss, giving him just barely enough to drop regular goblins if he rolls average. Something like sleep is going to be a better choice at low levels, I think. 5d8 averages to 22.5, which should be enough to drop 3 pretty easily. no save too.

This is exactly why a wizard should have some legwork done before he goes in to an adventure. Knowing general kinds of foes goes a LONG ways towards impacting his effectiveness. Take, for instance, Shatter at level 2 vs a level 2 burning hands against the same goblins. 4d6 vs 3d8 is pretty dang close to the same (avg 14 vs 13.5) but with it going against Con, the goblins are 15% less likely to save. Now your shatter is kicked up to around 15.5 and a clear winner.

Not to criticize your player, of course, more to illustrate how those sorts of bits can make a big difference. Hitting an Ogre with Poison Spray is just dumb (+3), but hitting him with Phantasmal Forces is amazing (-3)

Sounds like massive metagaming to me when a player knows the difference between Shatter and Burning Hands as a percentage of average damage. Is knowing that or having the DM give you that info really fun for you?

 

[raleel]

I certainly don't have a problem with it, at least on a character who is arguably supposed to be smarter than me. Right tool for the right job, simple as that. The whole phrase batman wizard revolves around the wizard always having the right tool on his belt.

It certainly doesn't have to be perfect numerically, but knowing that "ogres are very tough, can eat whatever garbage they get, but are massively stupid and easily manipulated" is totally within line and will yield solid results.

 

[KarinsDad]

It certainly doesn't have to be perfect numerically, but knowing that "ogres are very tough, can eat whatever garbage they get, but are massively stupid and easily manipulated" is totally within line and will yield solid results.

I think that there is no problem with well known and obvious types of things like the mental capabilities of Ogres, I just draw the line at every single creature ever encountered. In order for the wizard to even have a chance of knowing non-obvious weaknesses, there has to be lore out there for him to know.

Wizards are not the D&D equivalents of zoologists and in fact, dangerous creatures would be very difficult to know many details of. There should be inaccurate myths and legends and such. Any given wizard could also be totally mistaken as to what a given creature is. The concept of knowing that this obviously strong creature has a lousy Con just seems metagamey to me.

I prefer a game of mystery where the PCs discover things by doing instead of by knowledge checks. For general info, sure. For specifics like whether the creature has a higher AC or a better Charisma save, not so impressed with that.