D&D 5E What are the "True Issues" with 5e?

[mamba]

What about an action hero from an 80’s movie, like Rambo or John Matrix or any character by Steven Segal and Chuck Norris?

What about John Wick?

Heck, a recurring problem is people not understanding how impressive a REAL LIFE HUMAN can be at certain activities.

if you think John Wick is an accurate depiction of an impressive human assassin.... well, I very much disagree.

A level 20 Fighter should be able to win the gold medal of every Summer Olympic competition and probably break a few records.

not really, what do you think athletes are then... they excel at their one thing, your fighter is just physically fit but not specialized like they are

 

[AnotherGuy]

yeah, different things then. You basically have to exhaust all their spells with a large enough number of encounters. I was more talking about resources in general, starting with food and water to short rests. Spells make all of this trivial pretty much right from the start.

Dials for low level magic campaigns would be cool.

 

[mamba]

So there's my problem: I don't want to alter story structure, the setting, or genre in order to add challenge. I don't see why I have to choose between "dungeon crawl" and "unbalanced."

you can also choose unbalanced dungeon crawl

 

[Vaalingrade]

Yeah but you mentioned a DM who has city guards that recognise every alleyway and thus able to see through/past the illusions.
That's not a problem with the game. That is a problem with that DM.

I use that example because that's the most common example I've seen over and over again over decades. Once is a problem 'with that DM', hundreds is a statistic we should look into instead of handwaving it away by recommending handwaving.

And that is specifically why I endorse a 1/2 page on illusions which teaches DMs how to be better DMs than suffocating the game with wisdom saves which weakens the School of Illusion. IMO.

Having a rule that makes illusions reliable regardless of DM fiat strengthens illusion. Half-formed non-advice that D&D tends toward will do nothing.

 

[mamba]

I wonder how many of the commonly discussed issues here will be addressed?

the index

 

[mamba]

Dials for low level magic campaigns would be cool.

I agree, but that seems to be relegated to a lot of houseruling, or switching games entirely

 

[Retros_x]

I honestly don't think 5e has that big issues. Most of the complaints are due to personal preference. I think the biggest real offender is the bad layout and structure of all the books, not just DMG. Things are often hard to find, spread all over the place and difficult to understand. I especially loathe that the adventures are so hard to use as DMs. important information hidden in text blocks or in some keyed room on a map. Seriously, in almost every official dungeon stuff like villains big plan and motivation are in some room description. Give me a goddammn summary at the start. Use bullet points and text highlighting through bold and italics. And most boxed texts are written horribly for game usage.

The rest is minor in my eyes, some clunky rules that could be better (exhaustion is first I can think of, but DnD One playtests version looks much better already), magic item prices hidden in downtime rules (although that is layout and structure issue again).

I never understood the complaints about money. I never noticed them, because I actually don't run an economic simulation. Would be weird, because that is definitely not the product I bought.

 

[SteveC]

not really, what do you think athletes are then... they excel at their one thing, your fighter is just physically fit but not specialized like they are

I think this is just a fundamental disagreement on what a 20th level character is. A Beowulf level hero is what I am looking at (and even beyond). The notion that a cleric or wizard can perform wishes or miracles and that a fighter is a good athlete at best is a divide that I don't know if we can bridge.

And I don't think either of those positions (super heroic Martials/good but not exceptionally talented athlete) reach the level of consensus we're talking about (is that the 70% mark?)

 

[Warpiglet-7]

That's just not true. Those of us who run fewer encounters tune them accordingly.

I actually have found some sessions that focus on this to be really fun! Throw everything you got at it!

I also like some sessions in which people have to be more mindful of slots and ammo.

We have had some great fights that got down to people exclaiming they are out of spells when it comes down to the wire.

 

[Parmandur]

That's just not true. Those of us who run fewer encounters tune them accordingly.

Hey, cool, I'm not the one saying it's not doable.