D&D 5E (2014) Some thoughts after more time with the game...

[CapnZapp]

The wording for this is a little weird however. Multi-class rules say: "You determine what spells you know and can prepare for each class individually, as if you were a single-classed member of that class." The prepared-casting classes all limit prepared spells by saying: "The spells must be of a level for which you have spell slots." A cleric 5/wizard 5 has 5th level spell slots, so you could make the argument that they should be able to prepare 5th level cleric spells (not wizard spells however, since they can't put 5th level spells in their spell book). Wizards has clarified that this is not how the multi-class rules are supposed to work, but in the absence of that clarification you could easily interpret the rules that way.

Yes, but this has already been hashed out countless times on this and other forums.

Meaning that this particular subthread would be much better served with links to discussions where all of this has been said already.

Thanks

 

[ZickZak]

"You determine what spells you know and can prepare for each class individually, as if you were a single-classed member of that class."
"The spells must be of a level for which you have spell slots."
....but in the absence of that clarification you could easily interpret the rules that way.

I would have NEVER thought of it that way. Ever.

 

[abirdcall]

I have a similar reaction to the magic items comment. If D&D is about killing things and taking their stuff, we want to make sure they have some stuff to take. Our DM uses the treasure generation rules from the DMG, so it's all been left up to the dice.

It's, interesting, I guess is the right term, to think of D&D as being unbalanced once you introduce basic magic items into it. That in itself is a problem, since having magic items be a part of the game is as old as the game itself.

The problem is, if magic items are balanced, then they don't do anything. We saw this with 3.x.

 

[mellored]

I a bit late to the party, but...

Is AC intentionally that low? If so, does giving a creature better armor significantly change the assumptions of the game or the challenge of an encounter?

Yes. Yes.

Hit points scale a massive amount (8 HP -> 120 HP).
To-hit scales a bit (+2 -> +12)
Damage scales a bit (5 -> 20)
AC scales only a little (18 AC -> 21 AC)

At low levels, you could be attacked by 40 goblins and not be scratched. Or the fist 2 could hit you and you drop. It's very swingy. (20% chance to be hit for 50% of your health)

At high levels, a dragon will hardly ever miss you, but you'll have enough HP to survive a few rounds. You still survive the same number of average rounds, but it's less dependent on a die roll or 2. (50% chance to be hit for 20% of your health)

Does giving a lot of magic items to the party unbalance the game?

Yes. But not too much. The game is build around 1 magic item every few levels.

Magic items only go to +3, not +6 like previous editions. So their impact is overall lower. Even if you stack all defensive items, you won't be uninhabitable. Hard to hit, yes, but your supposed to be.

Not to mention, the DM can simply add more monsters.

Are there particular items which you've noticed are problematic?

Temperate minor magic effect is completely broken if you read it literally.

Does Polymorph Salad work as a tactic? What are you're thoughts on that situation, and how might you handle it differently?

I would rule that you would take damage equal to the damage you dealt to the monster, upto the lowest HP.

i.e. you have 50 HP, and they have 40 HP, they die, and you take 40 damage.
Or if you have 40 HP, and they have 50, you die, and they take 40 damage.

So it works, but not without sacrifice. (at least some diamonds for raise dead).

 

[ExploderWizard]

The problem is, if magic items are balanced, then they don't do anything. We saw this with 3.x.

Yeah, I would rather not have magic items at all, then have them as mundane gear that needs to be constantly upgraded.

Magic items only go to +3, not +6 like previous editions. So their impact is overall lower. Even if you stack all defensive items, you won't be uninhabitable. Hard to hit, yes, but your supposed to be.

Heck, with an AC in the upper 20's I would say that you would be a very desirable residence for the discerning magic jarring wizard. Not uninhabitable at all.

 

[JohnLynch]

- Monster AC is pretty good, and I feel like the idea is that their high HP pool is supposed to be the primary "defense."

Number of monsters (action economy) and HP matter. If your monsters can surround a single PC and each of them get 2 attacks, they can drop a PC (not kill, but get below 0 HP) without too much trouble. That PC can then get up again, but they can also be dropped again (each time they get back up the party has lost a combat resource and also some of the action economy). That said, once the party knows what they're facing, drops a couple of enemies, uses terrain and a cork (high AC that can be boosted by expending more party resources) the fight quickly becomes a forgone conclusion and nothig meaningful will occur unless the monsters get a few lucky crits in (which do matter).

- Player AC is broken once it reaches about 20, for many of the same reasons you mentioned. In fact, my group kind of jokes about how the Paladin only gets critted, because 90% of the time he's only hit on a 20, due to most on-CR encounters having +hit stats in the 4-6 range.

This is the most important dynamic of the AC discussion. Having seen what high AC produces I would be very wary of handing out AC boosting items. A table that operates cooperatively and wants to produce the most efficient results will naturally ensure that a single player gets loaded up with as many stacking AC boosters as they can get. Then terrain becomes an important issue. I'd be happy to hand out Ring Mail +3, Chain Mail +1 or any medium armor with numeric boosters. Shields with numeric boosters or plate armor with numeric boosters not so much. Plain old vanilla Cloaks of Protection or Rings of Protection might get handed out at very high level (where enemies are able to reliably hitan AC in the low 20s),but otherwise unless I've already handed out a bucketload of attunement items these are ones I would not give to players.

That said, absent these magic items AC 21 is about the highest you can get unless you start introducing spells (at which point the party is depleting party resources to boost your AC. Depending on the enemies and terrain this could be worthwhile. Or it might not be. IMO that's working as intended). AC 21 isn't too problematic CR 1 enemies will have +4 which means they're hitting 20% of the time. One of the lowest CRs against the best non magical AC is pretty good and a good recommendation for bounded accuracy. Give those CR 1 enemies 2 attacks and use them in enough numbers and they'll be downing your AC 21 tank without too much difficulty. If that tank can bottleneck them so their superior numbers are no longer a factor and gets a 1st level spell boost to his AC then he's virtually indestructible. But again I'd say that's working as intended. If the high AC player is dominating the battlefield (at the expense of the enjoyment of others) look at the terrain and change it.

The system seems to cope pretty well with high AC's at high level but I would say it would struggle if the players were lets say mid level. From this experience as a player I am going to hold off on magic plussed armour (especially, plate and half plate) until high level as a DM.

Thanks for the feedback from actual play.

 

[Blue]

A brief example: The party barbarian is currently rolling +9 to hit (5 from maxed out strength; 3 from proficiency; +1 from a magic weapon.) Most of the enemies we face seem to have AC ranging from 12-15. So that means, the barbarian is, in some cases, relying on rolling a 3 to hit; sometimes needing a 6 against a tougher foe. If he has advantage, rolling tends to be little more than a formality.

In contrast, my character has 19 AC. I'm wearing full plate, and I have the defensive fighting style (I'm a multiclass fighter/wizard.)

...

Is AC intentionally that low? If so, does giving a creature better armor significantly change the assumptions of the game or the challenge of an encounter?

There's an analysis of creature defenses on Wizard's board that hasn't been brought over to ENWorld yet, though ti only covers the Monster Manual. http://community.wizards.com/forum/player-help/threads/4162596

It shows at CR 8 (since you're 8th level), average AC is 16-17. It very well be that your DM has been running you against is mostly AC 12-15, but that's not a representation of the monsters at your CR.

You gave two PCs, whom I assume are your among your table's best at hitting and high defenses. A PC specializing generally will reach above general monsters in their specialty. I'd hate the thought that a PC trying to be very defensive just reached average monster AC.

So let's swap these two. What's the barbarian's AC, and what is your character's attack? (Weapon or spell attack, whichever is better, considering you are a fighter/wizard.)

Compare the barb's AC vs. 16-17 average monster AC. Well, it sounds he uses reckless attack and would grant advantage, so he actually easier to hit than that.

And how does your attack work out against AC 16-17?

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

I like bounded accuracy so far, but we haven't run a game past L5 and are now at L1 in OotA. But when you add in more players than the game expects, 7-8 instead of 4-5 you ahve to do a lot of tweaking. With a group of Orcs or such foes you just double the number or something like that. But with single foes things get tricky since low AC vs a lot of attacks means solo enemy fights can be a cakewalk unless I rework things. With my 7-8 man party I pretty much have to either go with a much more powerful CR foe or just really jack up HP and AC.

While I'm glad they have yet to go nuts with feats like 3e I do kind of wish the default assumption was the feat selection in the PH.

Either way I'm fairly happy with it so far, I like it much more than 3e/4e to be sure. But its not perfect.

 

[Argyle King]

Where I had some confusion regarding a multicast wizard was in their ability to gain understanding of spells they find.

If I were to find a spellbound or scroll for a level I have slots for, could I learn it?

 

[ExploderWizard]

Where I had some confusion regarding a multicast wizard was in their ability to gain understanding of spells they find.

If I were to find a spellbound or scroll for a level I have slots for, could I learn it?

It would depend upon your wizard level. Spells you can learn ( and thus know) and prepare are determined by each spell casting class individually. So if you were a wizard 1/ Cleric 9, you have the spell slots of a 10th level multi-class spell caster, but you would be limited to preparing wizard spells of only 1st level.