D&D 5E UA Primeval Awareness Hysteria

[Blue]

There's a difference between "what is in this town square where the players are and I need to have access to it now" vs. "where is every group of humanoids, including ones I haven't thought about". Are their merchants, travelers or pilgrims on the road? Is there a bandit lair nearby, I was thinking maybe of running an adventure of them next. Oh, I know there's a thieves' guild but hadn't detailed where they meet - is it in something like the sewers or other place a group of humanoids would stand out?

It's not that it's overly powerful, it's that it requires information the DM may not have at their fingertips and may not want to take the time to detail mid-session.

A related common complaint I've seen is "I roll random encounters - I don't know if there is an X in the area".

I'd suggest nerfing it slightly - not because it's too good, but to limit what the DM needs to have immediately available. Or at least reduce the scope of what they need to improv.

Instead of all groups in a 5 mile radius, it's closest or largest group within 5 miles. But allowing the ranger to narrow their search parameters however they want. "Where are the closest goblins ahead of us?" "Where's the largest group of beasts besides the farm?" "Are there any dragons with a mile of use above ground level?"

In other words, reduce by intent and it greatly reduces the burden on the DM.

 

[iserith]

If the player is asking for no particular reason, then the answer needn't be specific, especially if it's something like beasts in a forest or humanoids in a city. There is so much information that it basically makes it useless.

It's only when the player is asking for a particular reason - one I hope the DM asks him or her to articulate - where it needs to be specific. And if that is the case, it should be easy for the DM to narrate a result because the context will tell why that reason is important.

If Von Grissle the monstrosity hunter approaches the dungeon and says he wants to attune his senses to determine whether any monstrosities lurk nearby, I can let him know how many monstrosities remain in the dungeon and their approximate level and quadrant (e.g. the northeast corner of the tenth level). For random encounter tables that include one or more monstrosities, I can tell them there are other monstrosities on the move and any random encounters the party gets will be monstrosities at that player's option if the player chooses to focus on Primeval Awareness as an exploration task instead of some other task. (But of course, the ranger can still stay alert to danger per Natural Explorer unlike other classes.) If the PC instead prefers to track down every monstrosity on that random encounter table, he or she can do that too.

I see no issue with this class feature as written.

 

[Lord Twig]

Okay, I'm probably going to regret this, but...

How can the player of the ranger roleplay the ranger without knowing what the ranger knows?

The point is that you don't need to know the specifics. If a Ranger finds a plant that will cure a poison, you don't need to know exactly what type of plant it is. You just need to know that it cures poison. In game the Ranger probably knows the name of the plant, where it is likely to grow, when it is in bloom, when it is dormant, what animals like to eat it, etc. But for the player it is just, "You find a plant to cure the poison."

Likewise with Primeval Awareness. Let's say that in my bandit example that after the party located the bandits in the forest and were headed out that I roll a random encounter and it is a merchant caravan. Now I didn't mention it before, so is it impossible for them to be there? No.

I just say, "Over the next rise you see a merchant caravan traveling towards you on the road."

"I didn't detect them before?" Asks the Ranger's player.

"You did, but there are quite a few groups of people on the road and you figured that bandits wouldn't be on the road, so you ignored them."

This works fine for my group. I guess other groups might not go as smoothly.

 

[Lord Twig]

There's a difference between "what is in this town square where the players are and I need to have access to it now" vs. "where is every group of humanoids, including ones I haven't thought about". Are their merchants, travelers or pilgrims on the road? Is there a bandit lair nearby, I was thinking maybe of running an adventure of them next. Oh, I know there's a thieves' guild but hadn't detailed where they meet - is it in something like the sewers or other place a group of humanoids would stand out?

It's not that it's overly powerful, it's that it requires information the DM may not have at their fingertips and may not want to take the time to detail mid-session.

A related common complaint I've seen is "I roll random encounters - I don't know if there is an X in the area".

I'd suggest nerfing it slightly - not because it's too good, but to limit what the DM needs to have immediately available. Or at least reduce the scope of what they need to improv.

Instead of all groups in a 5 mile radius, it's closest or largest group within 5 miles. But allowing the ranger to narrow their search parameters however they want. "Where are the closest goblins ahead of us?" "Where's the largest group of beasts besides the farm?" "Are there any dragons with a mile of use above ground level?"

In other words, reduce by intent and it greatly reduces the burden on the DM.

Thank you for actually offering a suggestion on how Primeval Awareness might be changed. Your suggestion would work, but it would be a big nerf to the ability.

For example, instead of being able to tell where an advancing army is, how many scouting parties they have and how many are in each party, now you only get to know that there is one group in whatever direction and how many are in that group.

Or for the bandit example you would only know that there was one guy two miles ahead. Or maybe just that there is a large group ahead, but you wouldn't know about any of the guards posted in the trees around them.

At that point the ability isn't very useful or impressive. It is barely even worth taking the time to use it. Still worth it, because it doesn't cost anything, but that's about it.

 

[Lord Twig]

Thinking about this there are some other limits that might help.

How about if Primeval Awareness does not work on creatures that are surrounded by 5' of earth, 1' of worked stone or 1" of worked wood. So you could detect something over the next hill, but not anything under the hill or in the stone fortress on top of the hill. It would also prevent you from detecting creatures behind a closed door.

This means that the Ranger could still get a broad range of information in the wild, but would prevent it from being a pain in dungeons or in the lair of the Big Bad Evil Guy.

 

[iserith]

Thinking about this there are some other limits that might help.

How about if Primeval Awareness does not work on creatures that are surrounded by 5' of earth, 1' of worked stone or 1" of worked wood. So you could detect something over the next hill, but not anything under the hill or in the stone fortress on top of the hill. It would also prevent you from detecting creatures behind a closed door.

This means that the Ranger could still get a broad range of information in the wild, but would prevent it from being a pain in dungeons or in the lair of the Big Bad Evil Guy.

I could live with that and seems fitting for an outdoors-only tracker archetype.

 

[ad_hoc]

Now, if the Ranger pings his favored enemies and ten minutes down the road you roll a random encounter ambush with his favored enemy, well, maybe, just maybe it's time to reroll? I mean, you have random encounter tables, right? It's not like a given encounter must be encountered.

So now the party never encounters the Ranger's favoured enemies.

Or, better yet, roll your random encounters at the beginning of the day, and the ranger gets fore warning of a random encounter. "Hey, you are pinging on undead right? Well, it appears that one of those random groups floating around has caught wind of you and now they're bearing down in your direction. What do you do?"

Now the DM needs to not only change how they play the game, but they must put more work into preparation and they more things to keep track of.

 

[Blue]

Thank you for actually offering a suggestion on how Primeval Awareness might be changed. Your suggestion would work, but it would be a big nerf to the ability.

For example, instead of being able to tell where an advancing army is, how many scouting parties they have and how many are in each party, now you only get to know that there is one group in whatever direction and how many are in that group.

My suggestion was "closest or largest". I'm pretty sure you could find an army with it.

Or for the bandit example you would only know that there was one guy two miles ahead. Or maybe just that there is a large group ahead, but you wouldn't know about any of the guards posted in the trees around them.

You can't know that now - you just get "group of 8", not "4 on the road and 4 hiding in the trees". Well, I guess a DM could say that's five groups, but I haven't seen that.

 

[Hussar]

So now the party never encounters the Ranger's favoured enemies.



Now the DM needs to not only change how they play the game, but they must put more work into preparation and they more things to keep track of.

Umm, how is that more work? What difference does it make if you roll random encounters at the beginning of the day, or as the day passes? It's the same thing.

And no, the Ranger still encounters favored enemies, just less randomly. I know, shock and horror, the players might actually be prepared for an encounter instead of waking blindly into it, but, that's the point of having a ranger in the group. Now you know that there is a bunch of undead nearby. Let's get out the holy water and prepare an ambush for them. Now you know that there is a wandering group of whatever coming your way. Let's get the upper hand.

Really, really, not seeing the issue here. Oh noes, you might lose out on a couple of random encounters, or a couple of random encounters might be easier. Shucky darn.

 

[ArchfiendBobbie]

The point is that you don't need to know the specifics. If a Ranger finds a plant that will cure a poison, you don't need to know exactly what type of plant it is. You just need to know that it cures poison. In game the Ranger probably knows the name of the plant, where it is likely to grow, when it is in bloom, when it is dormant, what animals like to eat it, etc. But for the player it is just, "You find a plant to cure the poison."

Likewise with Primeval Awareness. Let's say that in my bandit example that after the party located the bandits in the forest and were headed out that I roll a random encounter and it is a merchant caravan. Now I didn't mention it before, so is it impossible for them to be there? No.

I just say, "Over the next rise you see a merchant caravan traveling towards you on the road."

"I didn't detect them before?" Asks the Ranger's player.

"You did, but there are quite a few groups of people on the road and you figured that bandits wouldn't be on the road, so you ignored them."

This works fine for my group. I guess other groups might not go as smoothly.

Yeah, that does not go smoothly at all for most DnD groups I've dealt with. There are a lot of players that would get upset if you did that to them. I would be disgruntled as well.

Plus, as a DM, I've found it more fun to just give them the information and watch as they not realize its importance. "You sense two groups of people; one group of four on the road, moving towards town. One group of four off the road, not moving." Every single time, they assume the group of four off the road are the bandits.