D&D 5E (2014) What am I missing?

[cmad1977]

Could a monk i a Chinese martial arts movie stun a ghost or golem with a punch?

Absolutely! ... when it serves the plot.

Similar to modern action movies.
No ammo... unless the plot demands a reload.


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[BryonD]

Oh, I wasn't expressing personal preference.

Fair enough!!

I was voicing my impression of what the customer base wants according to WotC.

That is: WotC didn't include any monster immunities to class features for a reason. That reason being, making 5E attractive to the most number of gamers.

Yep, I agree with that. And kudos to WotC for making a game that is so readily adaptable from a baseline to numerous different approaches.
Though I do wish they would coach that idea more. There seems to be a significant number of people sticking to vanilla and not building on the game the way it can be. Hopefully my perception is just off. I know during the 3E days there were tons and tons of "RAW" debates among people who were playing strikingly different home games. RAW was simply the common baseline for conversation. Maybe that is happening in 5E more than it seems.

Whether you or I find such immunities fun or unfun is, as you say, not the issue. When I say they're unfun, I mean it in the sense that they are unfun if WotC thinks the majority of their customers find them unfun!

Cheers,

Absolutely. This has been exactly the problem in the past. Great to see it left behind

 

[Sword of Spirit]

Now, 5E is certainly vastly more symmetrical than most prior editions. For the most part every class is capable of dealing with threats one way or another. 1E through 3E/PF certainly had some elements of distinct rock/paper/scissors match-ups. Whether you love that or hate that is a matter of taste. A many times these situations just end up being the time when some other character gets to shine. And that's ok so long as a good DM keeps everyone shining. If you want this in 5E though and you go tweaking things, keep that symmetry in mind. Balance it somewhere.

I like both the symmetry and the rock/paper/scissors style of gaming. The improvisation and adaptation to threats is more interesting than just whacking everything until it dies. It does end up a pain though when it mostly just hits certain classes. You're kind of making me want to add in some extra immunities in my game while trying to balance the overall class impact.

 

[Eltab]

re: monk

My AL Monk/Rogue wound up "playing Ranger" for one Epic because I had a +1 Longbow that did full damage against incorporeal undead - of which we ran into a lot. The rest of my group didn't realize I was actually a Monk until I told them.

I wish I HAD been high enough level to stun the ghosties.

 

[BryonD]

I like both the symmetry and the rock/paper/scissors style of gaming. The improvisation and adaptation to threats is more interesting than just whacking everything until it dies. It does end up a pain though when it mostly just hits certain classes. You're kind of making me want to add in some extra immunities in my game while trying to balance the overall class impact.

Agreed that finesse and experience are important on the DMing side. I consider 5E RAW a great beginner game, that also include all kinds of open slots to readily complicate it to personal comfort level and taste.