D&D 5E Unexpected but (mostly) awesome new rules in Basic

[Kobold Stew]

There are some awesome new rules in Basic -- here's what I noticed while converting a character from the play test to the new rules.

Races:
* Dwarves -- completely reformulated (wis bonus now for hill dwarves; stone cunning completely rethought;; tool proficiency; +2 strength gives hope for interesting bonuses for the half-orc)
* Elf weapons: part of sub race, so that when they add Drow, they can be given hand crossbows, but not all four of these).
* variant human: this is so appealing; the bonus skill seems almost overkill.

Equipment:
* donning and doffing rules are great, clear, and relevant
* spellcasting foci rules are completely new
* as I had hoped, gaming tools are broken into a small list form which to choose (4 possibilities); still lots and lots of instruments though ("You find a magical shawm"; "too bad you only play the dulcimer")

Spells.
* spare the dying seems to meet all the objections that were raised against the last play test version.
* where's feather fall?

Other:
* multi classing will only give some of the new class's proficiencies, apparently.
* has proficiency in mounts just gone? is it rolled into vehicles (land)?
* have there ever been rules on dehydration before?
* training in languages and tools now a simple matter of time+money. It will be interesting to see how and if this gets abused in play.
* half-column on underwater combat is great -- not complete, but it makes easy sense of many situations.

EDIT:
* presentation of sex and gender preferences comparatively progressive
* reach weapons!

 

[Remathilis]

* where's feather fall?

PHB probably.

* has proficiency in mounts just gone? is it rolled into vehicles (land)?

Its rolled into Animal Handling

* have there ever been rules on dehydration before?

Wasn't it mentioned in one of the L&L?

 

[Kobold Stew]

Its rolled into Animal Handling

That seems odd to me -- anyone can ride a horse, but you need training to drive a wagon?

Wasn't it mentioned in one of the L&L?

I don't remember it there. In any case, I'm glad to have it.

 

[Remathilis]

That seems odd to me -- anyone can ride a horse, but you need training to drive a wagon?

Only in difficult situations. Driving a wagon on a road requires no check, but if you want to fight off a chariot or race a stagecoach, you add proficiency.

Same with Animal Handling: you only need it if you're doing a risky maneuver. You can ride a horse easily without it.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Only in difficult situations. Driving a wagon on a road requires no check, but if you want to fight off a chariot or race a stagecoach, you add proficiency.

Same with Animal Handling: you only need it if you're doing a risky maneuver. You can ride a horse easily without it.

It's strangely inconsistent, like most things involving tool proficiencies, but at least it works out okay.

 

[doctorhook]

* presentation of sex and gender preferences comparatively progressive

It might've been months before I actually read the section (sex-tion?) about choosing your character's sex, but having gone back to read it, I'm pretty impressed. It's not only progressive and modern-thinking, it also heads-off any uncomfortable discussions about the nature of sex and gender in a fantasy world.

D&D's come a long way from the days when females had a lower limit to their natural strength score.

 

[Kobold Stew]

It's strangely inconsistent, like most things involving tool proficiencies, but at least it works out okay.

As I think about it (with the help of this thread!), I see that it makes sense.

Skills are a limited resource for characters, whereas tool proficiencies like languages are not: you can train yourself to have more and more tool proficiencies/languages, but not to have more skills.

And so,
vehicles (land) and vehicles (water) can be learned, but aren't exhausting a finite resource the way that animal handling is.

horseback riding in combat is the most "useful" of the abilities, and so it gets rolled into the skill.

The problem then exists only for things such as chariots, but I'll admit I've not seen chariots ever used in D&D combat.

 

[Melkor]

* where's feather fall?

Read Magic seems to be missing as well.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

The problem then exists only for things such as chariots, but I'll admit I've not seen chariots ever used in D&D combat.

There were rules in an early 4e splat book that (at first) looked good, but we used them a few times and then discovered that RAW, if you tried to run over a Kobold on a speeding wagon, you instantly crashed killing everyone aboard.

At least you killed the kobold. Good thing we had a good enough DM that we ignored the rule problem, but it kind of put us off bothering with the rules after that. It's too bad, they seemed like an interesting idea. Badly needed some errata.

 

[JC99]

I had to make my first post because I don't think I've seen anyone comment on the 'shove' action. It's a simple mechanic that seems to be pretty darn useful.

In 3e I noticed players never using the special attacks (bull rush, overrun, grapple, trip, disarm, etc) unless it was the focus of their entire build, just because they were so damn complex. No one wanted to be the guy who brought the combat to a halt thumbing through the PHB to figure out if he could knock the orc over instead of just whacking it.

Just reading the Basic rules for 5th, I'm excited to see more pushes and shoves being mixed into combat without much fuss.