D&D 5E Softening Concentration

[Sword of Spirit]

Concentration serves an important purpose in 5e. It prevents a major power imbalance between parties that have casters who can stack multiple buffs before a battle and throw around multiple save or sucks during a battle, and those who do not. It means the game doesn't have to be built to account for that. And the most important benefit for me is that it eliminates the hassle of maintain lots and lots and lots and lots (ever play high level 3e?) of buffs on the party.

However, after playing 5e for 10 years, we've developed some dissatisfaction with it. It seems like its restrictiveness eliminates too many options.

There are interesting spells no one ever takes because they aren't worth the concentration cost. Since you can only ever concentrate on one spell at a time, you are likely going to pick a very small number of them to learn or prepare. There's little point walking around with an arsenal of known/prepared concentration spells for situations that will rarely come up, when you can just pick your favorite concentration buff and maybe a concentration debuff that is situationally awesome, and prepare other spells you know you will actually be able to use because they don't require concentration.

The game is never going to be so balanced that all spells are equally interesting and desirable, but when there are lots of spells that are both too underwhelming to be worth choosing because of their concentration, but would be too powerful to be balanced without concentration, we have a problem.

While I don't have a solution yet, I do have some observations, and I'm interested in hearing other people's experiences (especially those who have played a lot) with how the concentration rules have worked for you, if you've noticed the same sorts of undesirable consequences we have, and any solutions you may have tried.

First observation: Debuffs that both require concentration and allow the target a save to end every turn feel undesirable, because the likelihood of getting them to stick long enough to be worth their slot is rather low. It seems like it might just not be necessary for both of those things to be in play at the same time, since they individually accomplish the same goal anyway.

Second observation: With the typical combat assumed to be 3 rounds, and most combat buffs lasting 1 minute, unless you regularly surprise your foes and are able to stay hidden while casting verbal components, you aren't going to be able to cast many buffs in a particular combat anyway. Most of the time, casters probably aren't going to want to cast more than one of these 1 minute buffs, maybe 2 if they are a dedicated support caster or had the chance to prepare. It seems like the 1 minute duration might have already mostly solved the problem, making concentration a redundant solution that limits other possibilities (like casting a buff and then still being able to cast a debuff).

Third observation: Concentration really handles two different issues. The first is the issue of having too many spells maintained at once. Concentration limits you to only having one concentration spell. The second is the issue of not wanting to have a character (whether a PC or the BBEG) failing one save and it being game over because now they are stuck while the other side pummels them to death. Concentration allows you to end a spell by attacking its caster. The problem is that it is not necessarily true that spells that need one of these solutions also need the other. By making a single concentration mechanic, both limitations are being forced on any spell that could benefit from having one of them.

I could go on and on (and will if I do not stop myself) so I'm going to try leave it there for the first post.

How has concentration worked for you? Have you noticed these issues? Do you think some manner of softening concentration (perhaps breaking it into it's two components so spells don't necessarily have to have both limitations) would mess up more than it fixed? Have you tried any adjustments to the mechanic, and if so, how did they work out?

Thanks in advance for any thoughts!

 

[Xeviat]

I share your frustrations. There are lots of spells that don't feel worth their concentration slot. My Wild Fire druid always had the spell that lets you negate someone's energy resistance, but I never felt like it was worth my time and I just used other concentration spells.

Offensive save ends spells don't need them.

 

[Horwath]

simple rule:
you can concentrate on as many spell levels as you have highest spell level slot.
you roll separately for every spell when you take damage.

 

[Stalker0]

In my game, we houseruled it that a 5th level or higher caster can concentrate on two spells at once. You get one concentration save for both spells, and lose them both if the save fails.

I've used it for 2 years now, and never had a single issue. Honestly solved a lot of problems with a very simple houserule.


Now if you want to get more involved. I think the fundamental issue with concentration is its two mechanics crammed into one:

1) A mechanic to prevent stacking of certain effects (often buffs).
2) A mechanic to create "spell interruption" for opponents.

Both of these are good to have, but they serve different masters. Instead there should be two different mechanics. Something like this:

1) Dedicated: You cannot have two spells with the dedicated keyword active at the same time.
2) Concentration: Normal rules for losing concentration, concentration saves, etc etc.

so for example shield of faith. We don't want player stacking a ton of defenses, but its also really annoying when a character puts a defense on themselves, and then when they get hit they can lose the defense (suffering a double whammy).

In this model, shield of faith would have the Dedicated keyword, but would not be concentration.


I think that is a much better model, but of course to implement it you would have to review and adjust all the concentration spells, so its a lot of work.

 

[Shardstone]

Concentration serves an important purpose in 5e. It prevents a major power imbalance between parties that have casters who can stack multiple buffs before a battle and throw around multiple save or sucks during a battle, and those who do not. It means the game doesn't have to be built to account for that. And the most important benefit for me is that it eliminates the hassle of maintain lots and lots and lots and lots (ever play high level 3e?) of buffs on the party.

However, after playing 5e for 10 years, we've developed some dissatisfaction with it. It seems like its restrictiveness eliminates too many options.

There are interesting spells no one ever takes because they aren't worth the concentration cost. Since you can only ever concentrate on one spell at a time, you are likely going to pick a very small number of them to learn or prepare. There's little point walking around with an arsenal of known/prepared concentration spells for situations that will rarely come up, when you can just pick your favorite concentration buff and maybe a concentration debuff that is situationally awesome, and prepare other spells you know you will actually be able to use because they don't require concentration.

The game is never going to be so balanced that all spells are equally interesting and desirable, but when there are lots of spells that are both too underwhelming to be worth choosing because of their concentration, but would be too powerful to be balanced without concentration, we have a problem.

While I don't have a solution yet, I do have some observations, and I'm interested in hearing other people's experiences (especially those who have played a lot) with how the concentration rules have worked for you, if you've noticed the same sorts of undesirable consequences we have, and any solutions you may have tried.

First observation: Debuffs that both require concentration and allow the target a save to end every turn feel undesirable, because the likelihood of getting them to stick long enough to be worth their slot is rather low. It seems like it might just not be necessary for both of those things to be in play at the same time, since they individually accomplish the same goal anyway.

Second observation: With the typical combat assumed to be 3 rounds, and most combat buffs lasting 1 minute, unless you regularly surprise your foes and are able to stay hidden while casting verbal components, you aren't going to be able to cast many buffs in a particular combat anyway. Most of the time, casters probably aren't going to want to cast more than one of these 1 minute buffs, maybe 2 if they are a dedicated support caster or had the chance to prepare. It seems like the 1 minute duration might have already mostly solved the problem, making concentration a redundant solution that limits other possibilities (like casting a buff and then still being able to cast a debuff).

Third observation: Concentration really handles two different issues. The first is the issue of having too many spells maintained at once. Concentration limits you to only having one concentration spell. The second is the issue of not wanting to have a character (whether a PC or the BBEG) failing one save and it being game over because now they are stuck while the other side pummels them to death. Concentration allows you to end a spell by attacking its caster. The problem is that it is not necessarily true that spells that need one of these solutions also need the other. By making a single concentration mechanic, both limitations are being forced on any spell that could benefit from having one of them.

I could go on and on (and will if I do not stop myself) so I'm going to try leave it there for the first post.

How has concentration worked for you? Have you noticed these issues? Do you think some manner of softening concentration (perhaps breaking it into it's two components so spells don't necessarily have to have both limitations) would mess up more than it fixed? Have you tried any adjustments to the mechanic, and if so, how did they work out?

Thanks in advance for any thoughts!

Give me more of your observations.

 

[el-remmen]

With the typical combat assumed to be 3 rounds

Who assumes that?

My only issue with concentration is remembering concentration checks when people take damage, both for the PCs and their foes. I recently got condition counters for our minis in hopes of fixing that.

 

[Umbran]

Thanks in advance for any thoughts!

One solution I've seen is introducing a magic item (rings seem thematically appropriate for this) that requires attunement and supports extra concentration slots.

That way it costs the PCs a bit to get more concentration slots, and the GM can control how many by how common the items are.

 

[James Gasik]

Concentration annoys me. The problem it set out to solve was spell combos and layering buffs (and probably self-buffing too), things that were a menace in 3.5.

But even if most buff spells weren't nerfed into the ground (I mean, enlarge for +1d4 weapon damage? As a second level spell slot?), all this does is prevent anyone from using them ever, as you have more important spells to concentrate on.

Cast magic weapon or fly to help your BSF? Sorry my guy, sleet storm, slow, sickening radiance, wall of force, and many more, are higher priority, and have a greater impact!

And spell combos, sure, those can get nasty, but all that prevents is one spellcaster being able to pull them off. Two or more still can, and it's trivial to have a party full of spellcasters in 5e.

Then of course, the DC of concentration is fairly low- most concentration checks are going to be DC 10 anyways, and only banning feats and multiclassing is going to prevent someone from figuring out how to get an effective +9 to their check eventually (I'm reminded of the 3.5 Concentration skill, which could easily be bulked up so that casting on the defensive was an automatic feat).

I know a lot of people are terrified of casters getting more powerful, lol, and removing concentration is the stuff of their nightmares (some want all spells to be interruptible, and for spells to have a chance to turn the caster inside out, for fun!), but I don't think concentration is doing what it's meant to be doing, and it's not a great balancing force on spells either. In fact, the one thing I've noticed it does do (and the main reason why I'm loath to remove it from my game) is keep players from casting leveled spells willy-nilly, lol. Because if my players could cast leveled spells every turn, they would, but the fact that many cool spells have concentration attached to them just narrowly avoids 5MWD's.

I'll stop short of saying how I think spells should work, because that's beyond the scope of the thread's topic.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

One solution I've seen is introducing a magic item (rings seem thematically appropriate for this) that requires attunement and supports extra concentration slots.

That way it costs the PCs a bit to get more concentration slots, and the GM can control how many by how common the items are.

This seems like the right way to do it. As a bonus with an item, you could easily justify limiting the "extra concentration" to either:

A) A narrow and specific list of spells, which are ones you think (or know) the players want to use but can't justify.

B) A specific maximum spell level, like the ring or w/e can only work for up to spell using a 3rd level slot or lower or something.

One thing to decide would be whether a failed Concentration check dumped one spell or both. My instinct says both to prevent extra rolls and limit how OP this could be, but I could see it either way.

 

[Voadam]

Save every round spells are variable in efficacy in my experience. Sometimes it is make a DC 15 save with a +7 which happens in a couple rounds. Sometimes it is make that save with a -1, which can stick the whole fight.