The Flight Topic.

[RangerWickett]

I want the game to not be mean to fighters who want to switch up weapons.

In 4e, at 11th level your attack bonus with a sword might be +18 (+5 level, +5 Str, +3 enhancement, +3 proficiency, +2 feat bonus for being a 'sword expert').

Your attack bonus with a bow might be +7 (+5 level, +0 Dex, +0 enhancement, +2 proficiency, +0 feat because you aren't a 'bow expert').

So if you're hitting a tough, armored monster on a 9+ with your elite sword skills, and a flying armored monster shows up, you'd only be able to hit on a nat 20. Too wide of a disparity. Fix things like this, and the rest of the system can be more forgiving. If I've got a fair shot of shooting a dragon with my bow, then it's okay if the dragon flies around.

 

[Yora]

To keep it short, I think 10/11 would make a good marking point fly/no fly.

 

[Derren]

I want the game to not be mean to fighters who want to switch up weapons.

In 4e, at 11th level your attack bonus with a sword might be +18 (+5 level, +5 Str, +3 enhancement, +3 proficiency, +2 feat bonus for being a 'sword expert').

Your attack bonus with a bow might be +7 (+5 level, +0 Dex, +0 enhancement, +2 proficiency, +0 feat because you aren't a 'bow expert').

So if you're hitting a tough, armored monster on a 9+ with your elite sword skills, and a flying armored monster shows up, you'd only be able to hit on a nat 20. Too wide of a disparity. Fix things like this, and the rest of the system can be more forgiving. If I've got a fair shot of shooting a dragon with my bow, then it's okay if the dragon flies around.

Maybe 5E with its flat math will fix that. Still, I don't think we will see much support for multi weapon characters as I fear WotC will go the 4E way that the class defines the weapon you use. But even in 3E how many people used their fighter feats to get good with multiple weapons instead of specializing more and more? And why shouldn't they? Most DMs are so afraid that someone not having fun that they would never put in flying monsters without giving the fighter something to fight even without ranged weapons.

 

[Mishihari Lord]

I'm torn on flying. On the one hand it's COOL. On the other hand it causes so many problems. No more climbing challenges. No more travel adventures when you can fly right over. Wizards hover above enemies that ought to be a challenge and turn them to ash without risk. Mainly it wrecks the flavor I would like to have for low/mid level adventures.

For flight spells, I'd like to split it into two.

Flight can be acquired at about 8th level. It has a duration of about 10 rounds. It requires concentration. You can talk or throw a rope while flying but you can't attack, cast a spell, or use a wand. Movement is 2x standard move per round, and you can only turn 45 degrees per round. If movement is stopped (e.g. there's no way to complete a flight move because of an enclosed space) you fall once you stop. Vertical motion can be 1/2x standard move upward or 2x standard move downward per round. For total weight, the flyer must be unencumbered per whatever rules are in use.

Advanced Flight can be acquired about 18th level. It works like 1E/2E/3E flight and has a long duration.

Flight above answers most of the problems I see with mid-level flying while still being pretty cool. By the time you get Advanced Flight it probably doesn't trivialize any challenges that aren't already trivialized by other spells.

I'm also a big fan of flying ships, but that's a different topic entirely.

 

[Gargoyle]

To use a 4e term, I'd vote that flying shouldn't be allowed until paragon tier (level 11+). Before that, levitation and magically enhanced jumping should fill adventurer's needs, without allowing them to circumvent interesting problems.

But really, with 5e we don't know what the level range will be, or if the concept of tiered play will even be defined. I think it's a useful term though, because it sort of describes what I would call "that level where player characters start to feel powerful, but not godly".

The other aspect of this is how fast will average advancement be? If it takes a longer time to get to level 11+, I'd probably want to see flying happen earlier.

I guess I'd like to see it at least a third and possibly halfway through an adventurer's career, and only as a short duration effect at those levels, permanent only at the highest, epic levels.

But I also think that with the modular approach, there should be a way to tweak the dials to allow such effects sooner (magic dial turned to 11) or later (less magic); if so, then I'm ok with it introduced at almost any level.

 

[Lanefan]

[MENTION=63508]Minigiant[/MENTION] asks the questions, I here give some answers

1) About when do you want Fly to show up in spell lists: low level, high level, or epic?
Low-mid level - if the game goes 1-20, 7th-ish is fine.

2) When do you want Long term Flight spells and magic items to be suggested to appear (if at all)?Long-range travel spells: mid-high level - say 13th-ish on a 1-20 scale. Long-range flight via items: anytime at all. Even a very low-level party can have loads of fun with a Broom of Flying - until they break it.

3) What is your preferred balancing factor for Fly spell (control, duration, speed, maneuverability, action economy)?
Random duration with no warning when it is about to end, and no safety net.

4) Should Flight Magic even have a natural drawback?
It should vary - some flight devices, for example, might be very slow and unwieldy (huge bat wings); some might have altitude limits (won't go higher than 20' above ground); etc. Some should have no drawbacks.

5) Should maneuverability return?
Didn't know it had ever left.

6) How much should the DMG discuss and provide information on dealing with flight (wind charts and effect, falling rules, flight skill checks)?Quite a bit - several pages at least. Some idea of what kind of maneuvers can be pulled off by what maneuverability class (beyond simple turns) would be really useful - *can* a Dragon pull an Immelmann or will it rip its own wings off in the attempt?

7) Should the game encourage mundane tactics to combat hostile fliers or should it just encourage DMs to hand out flight or don't use flight?Neither. Just have the bit from question 6 and let each group figure it out for themselves.

8)Mundane flight in core (war balloons, gliders, airships, and planes)?
Balloons and airships maybe, planes no, flying castles definitely yes!

Lan-"those magnificent gnomes in their flying machines"-efan

 

[Rune]

I'd rather see dexterity checks to maneuver in flight, rather than a maneuverability rating.

 

[Stormonu]

This thread is about how do you what flight to be handled in D&D Next/5E and your view on the special ability.

1) About when do you want Fly to show up in spell lists: low level, high level, or epic?

Low level (1-5) for "rare instances" - maybe once or twice during these level. Moderate level (6-10) for "occasional instances" - maybe once an adventure. High level (11-20) for "moderate instances" - maybe once every few encounters. Epic level (21+) for "common occurrences" - possibly every encounter.

2) When do you want Long term Flight spells and magic items to be suggested to appear (if at all)?

High level.

3) What is your preferred balancing factor for Fly spell (control, duration, speed, maneuverability, action economy)?

duration and speed

4) Should Flight Magic even have a natural drawback?

It can be dispelled or disrupted

5) Should maneuverability return?

Only in differentiating between hovering and flight-in-motion. Ground-based movement already tends to be pretty unrealistic, no need to make flight more complicated (and thus less used).

6) How much should the DMG discuss and provide information on dealing with flight (wind charts and effect, falling rules, flight skill checks)?

A few paragraphs on hazards (such as effects of strong winds), handling simple 3D positioning - nothing fancy. There's no more need for a flight skill than a run skill. Falling is already a basic rule, it shouldn't need much expansion - maybe other than a note you free-fall so many feet a round (forget the 32 feet per second per second calculation - just set it to a fixed number - say 1000 feet a round [about 113 MPH] ).

7) Should the game encourage mundane tactics to combat hostile fliers or should it just encourage DMs to hand out flight or don't use flight?

There certainly should be mundane tactics to counter hostile flyers - ranged weapons, nets, cover/evasion and the like.

8) Mundane flight in core (war balloons, gliders, airships, and planes)?

Gliders and mounts (griffons, pegasi, giant eagles, etc.) should be fine. The others I might expect to find in Eberron, but not in the core rules.

 

[soulcatcher78]

Limited flight works at 5th level as long as the duration is kept short and you can't turn yourself into a flying platform of doom. Concentration is the key to keeping this from getting out of hand (no additional spell/item use when flying) and if you lose concentration you start to fall (feather fall if we want to completely cancel the spell at this point or an OMG fall if there's a % chance to recover).

Once the PCs are high enough level to obtain something like mass flight (not a fan of this idea as a spell...flying carpets/mounts FTW) then overland adventures has already lost their appeal as far as danger. If you still want to challenge them at this point there're plenty of hungry flying things to use instead of land encounters. I'd have to check but IIRC the 1E DMG contains tables for flying monster encounters just like it does for land based encounters depending on terrain.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

1) About when do you want Fly to show up in spell lists: low level, high level, or epic?

After other, lesser travel abilities have been enabled by spells. So, after levitate, spider climb, running boosts, have been seen. Previously it'd been a 2nd level spell usable by 3rd level wizards. This would make it a 3rd level spell at least and not available until 5th level.

2) When do you want Long term Flight spells and magic items to be suggested to appear (if at all)?

Pretty simple - it should appear AFTER a shorter length flight spell/magic item which would put it about 7th level or later.

3) What is your preferred balancing factor for Fly spell (control, duration, speed, maneuverability, action economy)?

Le sigh. Not every ability needs to have balancing factors that hamstring its use in the first place.

4) Should Flight Magic even have a natural drawback?

How about the simple fact that it tends to put you in places and doing things that draw unwanted attention?

5) Should maneuverability return?

Only where flight is an ability that must be maintained by a certain amount of forward momemtum (winged flight).

6) How much should the DMG discuss and provide information on dealing with flight (wind charts and effect, falling rules, flight skill checks)?

As much as it needs to. The rules governing flying should not be existing simply to be a limitation to flying. They should be a natural outgrowth of how flying physically needs to function.

7) Should the game encourage mundane tactics to combat hostile fliers or should it just encourage DMs to hand out flight or don't use flight?

It doesn't need to ENCOURAGE a thing. Players and DM's will determine for themselves how useful flying is and part of a ROLEPLAYING game would be players who can devise clever ways to combat fliers of significant size - not players who can read simply the rules that will TELL them what to do when faced with any particular challenge.

8) Mundane flight in core (war balloons, gliders, airships, and planes)?

No.