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General Tabletop Discussion
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What's your opinion on "Save or Die" effects?
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<blockquote data-quote="Gadget" data-source="post: 7596068" data-attributes="member: 23716"><p>This is a very astute point, but I fear one that requires most of the game to be structured around it. With 5e and its "bounded accuracy," monsters tend to have much more hp than PCs, which can lead to "DM spells": spells that are only effective when used against the PC's by monsters & NPCs. 5e has a few of these type of spells, and the result is very mixed. <em>Sleep</em>, as the classic first example, is very effective at low levels, but fades once the monster hp rise enough to make it more risky, and--imho--is not really used much as a 'finisher' due to the ambiguity of current monster HP and the need to use that first level slot for another shield spell or utility. </p><p></p><p></p><p>At higher levels, the <em>Power Word</em> spells are even less useful, as monster hp rise very fast and players don't want to spend their one and only (9th or 8th) level slot on something that may have zero effect; or to take out a mook. Even if monsters have a hp counter appearing above their heads, you've probably already whittled their HP down quite a bit by the time they reach the threshold and at that point, you're probably better off doing 100 hp of damage to a monster and using your precious slots on something more effective.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Gadget, post: 7596068, member: 23716"] This is a very astute point, but I fear one that requires most of the game to be structured around it. With 5e and its "bounded accuracy," monsters tend to have much more hp than PCs, which can lead to "DM spells": spells that are only effective when used against the PC's by monsters & NPCs. 5e has a few of these type of spells, and the result is very mixed. [I]Sleep[/I], as the classic first example, is very effective at low levels, but fades once the monster hp rise enough to make it more risky, and--imho--is not really used much as a 'finisher' due to the ambiguity of current monster HP and the need to use that first level slot for another shield spell or utility. At higher levels, the [I]Power Word[/I] spells are even less useful, as monster hp rise very fast and players don't want to spend their one and only (9th or 8th) level slot on something that may have zero effect; or to take out a mook. Even if monsters have a hp counter appearing above their heads, you've probably already whittled their HP down quite a bit by the time they reach the threshold and at that point, you're probably better off doing 100 hp of damage to a monster and using your precious slots on something more effective. [/QUOTE]
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