D&D 5E What, if anything, bothers you about certain casters/spells at your table?

[FrogReaver]

It's funny. I got really taken to task recently for not accepting someone's actual play experience. Yet, ten years on, despite hundreds of posters claiming that they are not having this experience of sameness that is claimed, our experiences are discounted and ignored.

Funny thing. I never claimed you and others couldn’t have had your experience. You certainly seem to be claiming we couldn’t have had ours.

 

[Hussar]

Funny thing. I never claimed you and others couldn’t have had your experience. You certainly seem to be claiming we couldn’t have had ours.

Sorry?

I was just told in no uncertain terms that 4e classes are all samey. When people point to why this isn’t true for them and then further point to other editions which are at the very least just as much samey, and ask why these aren’t also being taken to task, were accused of not accepting people’s experiences.



Call 4e classes samey all you like. It’s still the same old boring edition warrior arguments that have been repeated ad nauseum for the past fifteen years and it’s no more true now than it was then.

Maybe if folks could avoid the same dead horse edition war rhetoric it might help make conversation more productive.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Never had problem with either Shield or Silvery Barbs.

Yes, Shield can make someone with good AC hit proof for one turn. At the cost of 25% of 1st level spell slots. Not all classes have ability to recover spells. If you multiclass, and you get ability to recover spells, it's still underwhelming.

Same with Silvery Barbs, you effectively give someone disadvantage (remember, they can roll lower and still succeed, or they can re-roll and get higher roll then before, so they still succeed) and yourself or someone advantage.

Both are good spells, but nothing so OP and they do burn slots. And to be honest, if i need to avoid getting hit, Shield is better than Silvery Barbs in most cases.

Being hit proof for one round is half the fight normally.

I'd say the issue is they are disproportionately good at upper levels compared to most other 1st level spells AND they allow for more nova potential in a low encounter days due to being off-turn actions. A 1st level Burning Hands is dog poop at 10th level, Silvery Barbs or Shield aren't.

 

[I'm A Banana]

There's a second part though. It's shouting "Stop!" after the die is rolled but before the result is announced. Fighters, OTOH, almost always work either before the roll or after the roll as a reroll.

I might be misremembering, but, I don't recall 4e adding in the part about "after the die roll but before the result".

I have zero problems with off turn actions. It's one of the best innovations of 4e and I'm happy to see it in 5e. I particularly like off turn actions that grant actions to other players and I wish 5e had more of those because it works so well in keeping everyone at the table involved. I'm specifically talking about the "after the die roll but before the result" interrupts that are the problem.

It is 100000% the case that 4e had "after the die roll but before the result" interrupts. The 4e fighter's bread and butter was Combat Challenge, which lets you interrupt a marked creature's shift or attack that didn't include you as a target. From the 4e compendium: "An immediate interrupt jumps in when its trigger occurs, taking place before the trigger finishes. If an interrupt invalidates a triggering action, the triggering action is lost."

I mean, people griped about interrupts in 4e, too, so it's not like this is a problem specific to shield and counterspell. 3e dabbled in interrupts, but 4e definitely raised their profile to something pretty much all tables dealt with. And some tables really did not have patience for this mechanic. So much so that 5e backed off of that mechanic except in a few instances (like shield and counterspell!). No class now relies on it as part of their mechanical identity like the 4e fighter did (though a few subclasses get more out of it than others). And some people really miss that element, too!

I'm curious because these mechanics do seem potent in terms of their effect on the minds of players, beyond the mechanical power the ability may or may not have. It's like stopping the game and yelling "Nuh-uh!" just pushes some very specific psychological buttons. I do think the 5e devs were aware of those buttons, and believed that they were sometimes OK to press (OA's, some spells), but I do wonder about that sometimes.

The difference to counterspell is, an attack of opportunity is something everybody has in their mind, because it happens regularly, everybody can do that from level 1, there are several abilities that add to the attack of opportunity, while counterspell is niche. Only counterspell needs the time frame between declaring to cast a spell and saying what spell it is to cast and no other ability interacts with the distinction of "declaring to cast and naming a spell".

I mean, arguably, this is just an point for bringing back the rule that casting a spell provokes opportunity attacks and that being hit while casting a spell can cause the spell to fail. There's some good reasons why that's not the case, but I do think it removes some of the flavor of spellcasting...

 

[Micah Sweet]

It is 100000% the case that 4e had "after the die roll but before the result" interrupts. The 4e fighter's bread and butter was Combat Challenge, which lets you interrupt a marked creature's shift or attack that didn't include you as a target. From the 4e compendium: "An immediate interrupt jumps in when its trigger occurs, taking place before the trigger finishes. If an interrupt invalidates a triggering action, the triggering action is lost."

I mean, people griped about interrupts in 4e, too, so it's not like this is a problem specific to shield and counterspell. 3e dabbled in interrupts, but 4e definitely raised their profile to something pretty much all tables dealt with. And some tables really did not have patience for this mechanic. So much so that 5e backed off of that mechanic except in a few instances (like shield and counterspell!). No class now relies on it as part of their mechanical identity like the 4e fighter did (though a few subclasses get more out of it than others). And some people really miss that element, too!

I'm curious because these mechanics do seem potent in terms of their effect on the minds of players, beyond the mechanical power the ability may or may not have. It's like stopping the game and yelling "Nuh-uh!" just pushes some very specific psychological buttons. I do think the 5e devs were aware of those buttons, and believed that they were sometimes OK to press (OA's, some spells), but I do wonder about that sometimes.


I mean, arguably, this is just an point for bringing back the rule that casting a spell provokes opportunity attacks and that being hit while casting a spell can cause the spell to fail. There's some good reasons why that's not the case, but I do think it removes some of the flavor of spellcasting...

I dearly miss spell interruption, but generally I think players have it too easy.

 

[James Gasik]

I hear a lot of gripes about Silvery Barbs and the Lucky Feat, but all I ever hear about School of Divination Wizards is "it's a good subclass". I would think Portent would be on many DM's hit lists given how unrestricted the use of that ability is. Last game session, two players got a "Portent roll" from defeating these magical creatures called "Fate Eaters". You better believe the next big spell I cast, some poor sap rolled a 7 for their saving throw!

"Now imagine", the DM said, "if you could do that twice per day".

-As an aside, another place I found a very large amount of abilities that allowed you to modify die roll results "after the roll is made but before the result is known" is Pathfinder 1e.

 

[James Gasik]

I dearly miss spell interruption, but generally I think players have it too easy.

It's been my experience that most player spellcasters are allergic to anything remotely dangerous, find some way to hang out far from enemies if possible, and spend a lot of thought on their own defense.

On the other hand, enemy spellcasters are almost always better at casting spells than the players, so the lack of spell interruption is actually a boon for Team Bad Guy!

If sticking a melee in a caster's face could prevent them from using magic on the party, forget Counterspell, you'd only see DM's use spellcasters if they were completely untouchable or had some weird "you can't interrupt my spells" gimmick...

Much like the situation that the "Magic Attacks" in Monsters of the Multiverse creates, actually, where Magic Resistance and Counterspell become pointless because "oh it's not a spell, it's just an attack he makes", lol.

 

[Hussar]

The 4e fighter's bread and butter was Combat Challenge, which lets you interrupt a marked creature's shift or attack that didn't include you as a target.

But, that's not the same. You didn't roll the attack, and then the fighter interrupted. You rolled the interrupt before the attack was made. As soon as the DM declared the attack, the interrupt occurred. Resolve the interrupt and then make the attack. Which is not the same as what I was talking about where the DM makes the roll, then the interrupt occurs, but before the DM can state the result of the triggering roll. Which means that the DM constantly has to pause after each potentially triggering roll to give the players time to interupt.

Additionally, the players have to pause after each of their rolls because monsters can potentially do the same thing. Now this tends to not be as much of an issue because the player always has to wait on the DM declaring success or failure. But, it can be tricky to time.

But, at any rate, I do totally agree that 4e went WAYYYY overboard on interrupt mechanics. No argument from me there. The interrupt chains could get utterly ridiculous as effect after effect started getting nested inside streams of interruptions.

All that aside though, I was specifically talking about mechanics where the DM is required to stop between making the roll and declaring the results to give the players time to potentially interrupt. As I said, I don't recall that being a thing in 4e, but, it's been more than a minute, so, it's quite possible it was.

 

[Zardnaar]

I hear a lot of gripes about Silvery Barbs and the Lucky Feat, but all I ever hear about School of Divination Wizards is "it's a good subclass". I would think Portent would be on many DM's hit lists given how unrestricted the use of that ability is. Last game session, two players got a "Portent roll" from defeating these magical creatures called "Fate Eaters". You better believe the next big spell I cast, some poor sap rolled a 7 for their saving throw!

"Now imagine", the DM said, "if you could do that twice per day".

-As an aside, another place I found a very large amount of abilities that allowed you to modify die roll results "after the roll is made but before the result is known" is Pathfinder 1e.

Portents very limited in number of uses. Also you want to roll really high or low.

Silvery barbs is a lot more common, arcane recovery for more, can be acquired via fae touched feat and combos with order cleric.

And it's available to all Wizards and is good to aquire for other primary casters by feat or MC dip.

 

[M_Natas]

I mean, arguably, this is just an point for bringing back the rule that casting a spell provokes opportunity attacks and that being hit while casting a spell can cause the spell to fail. There's some good reasons why that's not the case, but I do think it removes some of the flavor of spespellcasting.

I'm totally for that. But in my Heartbreaker 5e I design when I have time and that will be finished in a 100 years , I would change that:
Some spells are quick and not interruptable. Some spells take longer. My current idea would be something like this:

Some bigger spells like fireball need to be declared/started to cast at the end of a spellcasters turn in order to be able to cast that spell in his next turn. While he is doing that, he can be interrupted by the other players before his next turn begins, like as if he is concentrating on a spell. And remove the normal counterspell spell.

I would add that rule also for monsters with big abilities like breath weapons, because that will add a tactical element to the game. When (big) attacks are announced before they happen, players are able to react to them.