D&D General Wizard vs Fighter - the math

[Oofta]

Bears and tigers attacking humans, stampeding elephants, orca's attacking ships off the coast of spain. Sharks snacking on diver's, octopi with 100 ft tentacle reach feeling around on the top of boats. In fact there is one swamp in asia where the tigers can't be hunted effectively by humans and they'll snatch people out of boats. They aren't afraid of humans because humans have demonstrated themselves able to follow them back into the swamp. All of these things and more have happened in the real world. and if a pack of wolves (real world) can be smart enough to observe and decide to attack only the animals after the people leave or even are smart enough to avoid the dangerous people, give your magical monster's the same level of intelligence. If animals fought with the same tactics I see in most games , all predator animals in our world would be extinct by now.

To be fair "stupid predators" are not limited to D&D. How many movies have the predator sneaking up on the unsuspecting humans only to roar and announce their presence at the last moment? Then standing there watching for several moments while the people flee?

Followed, typically, by a chase scene where suddenly the predator who lives by catching fleeing prey far faster than humans can run pursues them moving only as fast as a flightless duck with a limp. Maybe the predators have watched too many slasher movies where the able-bodied 20 something is running for their life being followed by someone walking slowly who still manages to catch up to them.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Bears and tigers attacking humans, stampeding elephants, orca's attacking ships off the coast of spain. Sharks snacking on diver's, octopi with 100 ft tentacle reach feeling around on the top of boats. In fact there is one swamp in asia where the tigers can't be hunted effectively by humans and they'll snatch people out of boats. They aren't afraid of humans because humans have demonstrated themselves able to follow them back into the swamp. All of these things and more have happened in the real world. and if a pack of wolves (real world) can be smart enough to observe and decide to attack only the animals after the people leave or even are smart enough to avoid the dangerous people, give your magical monster's the same level of intelligence. If animals fought with the same tactics I see in most games , all predator animals in our world would be extinct by now.

But do hundreds of tigers spawn because one of the fishermen in that swamp sleeps in a house when god wants to make him fight a tapier in the middle of the night?

 

[Minigiant]

Nobody is talking about porting in monsters, this is just another non-answer that has zero bearing on the game.

Want to discuss actual scenarios and options, we can talk.

Then where are the orcs come from? 100 orcs within 3 days travel requires the infrastructure for 100 warrior and double the number in non-combatants the lowest.

If that many orcs are near the dungeon, it's idiotic to be anywhere near the dungeon.

That's why D&D uses scout parties and raiders. Actual settlements would be terrible dungeons

Bears and tigers attacking humans, stampeding elephants, orca's attacking ships off the coast of spain. Sharks snacking on diver's, octopi with 100 ft tentacle reach feeling around on the top of boats. In fact there is one swamp in asia where the tigers can't be hunted effectively by humans and they'll snatch people out of boats. They aren't afraid of humans because humans have demonstrated themselves able to follow them back into the swamp. All of these things and more have happened in the real world. and if a pack of wolves (real world) can be smart enough to observe and decide to attack only the animals after the people leave or even are smart enough to avoid the dangerous people, give your magical monster's the same level of intelligence. If animals fought with the same tactics I see in most games , all predator animals in our world would be extinct by now.

The animal kingdom is more or less all obsolete as natural challenges in 5e well before the double digit levels.

 

[nevin]

To be fair "stupid predators" are not limited to D&D. How many movies have the predator sneaking up on the unsuspecting humans only to roar and announce their presence at the last moment? Then standing there watching for several moments while the people flee?

Followed, typically, by a chase scene where suddenly the predator who lives by catching fleeing prey far faster than humans can run pursues them moving only as fast as a flightless duck with a limp. Maybe the predators have watched too many slasher movies where the able-bodied 20 something is running for their life being followed by someone walking slowly who still manages to catch up to them.

Id go for too many DM's have watched too many slasher movies......

 

[Oofta]

Then where are the orcs come from? 100 orcs within 3 days travel requires the infrastructure for 100 warrior and double the number in non-combatants the lowest.

If that many orcs are near the dungeon, it's idiotic to be anywhere near the dungeon.

That's why D&D uses scout parties and raiders. Actual settlements would be terrible dungeons

The animal kingdom is more or less all obsolete as natural challenges in 5e well before the double digit levels.

What's the specific scenario? You're fixated on this 100 orcs I threw out off the top of my head as one example of many. It may make sense that another 100 orcs would show up, maybe it wouldn't But the DM should always be looking at a daily XP budget for the party, right? If my budget for an expected adventuring day equates to 30 blargs and I decided to split those blargs into 6 separate encounters, that means I expect them to fight 5 blargs at a time. If they go in, have 1 or 2 encounters before going to the spa for a week, those 20 remaining blargs have choices. If 30 blargs isn't enough to challenge the party, increase the number of blargs.

1. Recruit allies. Are there any blarg allies close? Cool, come on down! Maybe they don't get 100 blargs, but perhaps a few grogs can join them or even just another 20 blargs so that they can get ready for step 2.
2. Set up for the next attack. Even if they couldn't get any recruits, there are still 20 blargs left, set it up so they're ready for the PCs to return. Have them set up traps and an ambush area. They may not have expected strong resistance, they're ready now. They also likely have at least a clue about the PC tactics.
3. Run away. The blargs look at their dead allies and decide it's time to gather up the treasure and skedaddle. Might as well raid villages on the way out.
4. Hunt down the invaders and attack them while they're at the spa.
5. Other options including killing the prince the group was supposed to rescue, finishing the ritual to summon the grand high blarg, finishing their scouting and report back to the poobah, any number of other things.

Beyond that? It just depends. Do the blargs have ranged attacks? Have scouts and set up in the hills approaching their lair. Have archers fire from a distance and then dive into holes and pull a trap door over their heads for total cover. Use guerilla tactics to slow and harass. Set up waves of attackers because the blargs now know you have effective AOE attacks.

Like I said, it just depends on the specific situation.

 

[Tony Vargas]

To be fair "stupid predators" are not limited to D&D. How many movies have the predator sneaking up on the unsuspecting humans only to roar and announce their presence at the last moment? Then standing there watching for several moments while the people flee?

's'all for the benefit of the audience. It wouldn't be entertaining to have a blur of motion, some gun shots, and a dead character you've spent the first half of the movie developing and a dead mountain lion on the ground when the dust clears.

TTRPGs are also all for the benefit of the audience... who just also happen to be the actors, writers, and director, as well.

Realism makes bad movies and worse games.

For that matter, to back up your 1000 orcs example for once, movies rarely ever establish how Suaron raises & quarters millions of orcs in a wasteland or how the First Order builds ever more gigantic ships while the New Republic with the resources of a galaxy keeps using the same battered x-wings. It wouldn't be dramatic if the heroes weren't overcoming impossible odds every time.

 

[payn]

Realism makes bad movies and worse games.

For that matter, to back up your 1000 orcs example for once, movies rarely ever establish how Suaron raises & quarters millions of orcs in a wasteland or how the First Order builds ever more gigantic ships while the New Republic with the resources of a galaxy keeps using the same battered x-wings. It wouldn't be dramatic if the heroes weren't overcoming impossible odds every time.

I don’t really believe this. Zombie Emporer’s hidden super fleet made a bad movie even worse.

 

[Clint_L]

I knew that was coming

You should have known it was coming, because 5e is not just the hands down most popular edition overall, for most current players it just is D&D. "What is your favourite edition of D&D?" is a debate for forums like these, not for most players.

 

[M_Natas]

's'all for the benefit of the audience. It wouldn't be entertaining to have a blur of motion, some gun shots, and a dead character you've spent the first half of the movie developing and a dead mountain lion on the ground when the dust clears.

TTRPGs are also all for the benefit of the audience... who just also happen to be the actors, writers, and director, as well.

Realism makes bad movies and worse games.

For that matter, to back up your 1000 orcs example for once, movies rarely ever establish how Suaron raises & quarters millions of orcs in a wasteland or how the First Order builds ever more gigantic ships while the New Republic with the resources of a galaxy keeps using the same battered x-wings. It wouldn't be dramatic if the heroes weren't overcoming impossible odds every time.

While I agree on some level we are back to verisimilitude.
You can't go completely unrealistic.
For a lot of people it matters where the ships come from, because it helps understand the conflict and the stakes.

Of course you don't need to explain war logistics or even have them when the war is only a backdrop of the game/novel/movie for some personal stories.
But if it is a war story, even a fantastical one, stuff like that matters.
And in Star Wars you can conjure starships out of thin air. They need to be build. That needs man/robot power.

Even though Star Wars 1 to 3 were bad in other regards, there was never a question of where the Ships and Soldiers came from.

Going back to my campaign example:
The neogi pirate did start out with two ships (he stole from other neogi). One got destroyed by the PCs. With the other he is still running around attacking settlements and enslaving people, to have people to 1. Repair is run down ship and 2. Build new ones he wants to crew with enslaved people (he has an artifact that allows him to have more people under his mind control than a normal Neogi, which he stole from another neogi, who is angry because of that).

The city of Plankstadt in the asteroid belt far away frome the primary sun could only thrive and survive, because the founder enslave a solar dragon, bound it in the asteroid and used his power to warm the place up and help with plant grow to feed the people and have wood to build stuff.

Everything has an explanation. Everything is grounded in the setting.

With the new Star Wars Movies you don't have that sadly.

 

[Minigiant]

I think the issue really isn't realism but consistency..

The mechanics for the wizard and most of the full casters of D&D don't match a dungeon game nor an adventure game nor a monster of the week game

It is players who pursue the delve despite it not being the best use of resources given the default D&D assumptions

Wizards with less spells per day and more Arcane recoveries feels more like D&D and matches Classic D&D to me than Gritty Rests to get all spells after 7 days.

The logical deduction of Gritty Resting is to Nova spells and Quiting Dungeons early because you can't rest on the way to the dungeon nor back.

You'd have to save more spells for random encounters and will have to ditch the dungeon earlier as you can't short rest quickly AND you you can't long rest until you get back to town AND your spells are still stronger than most monster features AND you still get all your magic up front.

Wizard: That's 3 fireballs. Time to pack it up. We need to go home.
Fighter: You still have plenty of magic left.
Wizard: That's got to last us until we get back to Woody Pines. In case we run into more random goblin raid parties or another draconic bear. (stares at DM)
Cleric: It's not like we found any safe places to rest for a week on the way here. (stares at DM) I'm on half spells too. Too bad for the lord's son. Won't make it back by the full moon.
Rogue: Can't save him if we're dead too. (stares at DM) Welp. At least I got this +1 dagger.
DM: OKAY FINE. If you continue, No random encounters.
Ranger: RIP Immersion.
Wizard: That died when we met that dragonic bear.

(paraphrasing of my only game using Gritty Rests)