D&D (2024) What have you seen new players confused by/mistakes they make?

[Nebulous]

The big one for me. Ability scores. They are never used. 16 and 17 Wis for no direct reason add 3.

It would be much nicer if we could just skip to the modifiers. Roll 3d4, take the middle or some such.

I wouldn't mind seeing actual scores utilized more. Such as, "You need a 17 Strength to lift that table, no roll needed." or, "You need a combined 30 Strength to roll the boulder aside."

 

[Art Waring]

Things that are completely separate, but using the same terminology, for example character "levels" and spell "levels."

Honestly I got tired of explaining the difference, so I just call them spell ranks instead of levels now. When I publish I will be using spell ranks instead of levels as one example, to help brand new players.

 

[Charles Lowry]

While none in my family are overly experienced in 5E, my 15 and 17 y.o. had challenges creating new characters. Lots of page flipping. These books really could benefit (or I create it myself) some type visual cheatsheet to speed up character creation. Something simple on a single powerpoint slide...or I suppose we could just use an online tool which does all the number crunching.

 

[mellored]

Things that are completely separate, but using the same terminology, for example character "levels" and spell "levels."

Honestly I got tired of explaining the difference, so I just call them spell ranks instead of levels now. When I publish I will be using spell ranks instead of levels as one example, to help brand new players.

I always thought "circles" would be a cool name for spells.

Cast a third circle spell.
Foresight is a spell of the 9th circle.

Or maybe something like.
Least, lesser, greater...

 

[Art Waring]

I always thought "circles" would be a cool name for spells.

Cast a third circle spell.
Foresight is a spell of the 9th circle.

Or maybe something like.
Least, lesser, greater...

Haha, I like it except my players would immediately associate nine circles of spells with the nine circles of hell (i know them well enough).

 

[mellored]

Haha, I like it except my players would immediately associate nine circles of spells with the nine circles of hell (i know them well enough).

Then perhaps...

Warlock: circle
Arcane: grade
Divine: sphere
Primal: order

 

[UngeheuerLich]

in 3.5e it was;

Standard action(5E Action)
Move action(5E move)
Swift action(5E Bonus action)
Immediate reaction(5E reaction)

only difference is that you can now split your move between action and in 5E you cannot use higher tier actions for lower. Easy to houserule back.

what is so confusing?

Fullround action and 5 ft step. Moving before and after the action.
This seems to be confusing for our player that still plays 3.5 and pathfinder.

 

[Gorck]

I always thought "circles" would be a cool name for spells.

Cast a third circle spell.
Foresight is a spell of the 9th circle.

Or maybe something like.
Least, lesser, greater...

That sounds like it could get very confusing with Druid circles

 

[mellored]

That sounds like it could get very confusing with Druid circles

Fair. But there still other word that could be used besides "level".

And it wouldn't hurt compatability to rename it.

 

[Lojaan]

Things that are completely separate, but using the same terminology, for example character "levels" and spell "levels."

Honestly I got tired of explaining the difference, so I just call them spell ranks instead of levels now. When I publish I will be using spell ranks instead of levels as one example, to help brand new players.

Hahahahah it's been almost 20 years and this is still hilariously relevant;

12 Up a Level, Down a Level - Giant in the Playground Games

www.giantitp.com

"How much crap do we go through on a daily basis because no one at TSR looked up "level" in the thesaurus?"