Oh, and yeah, the only way HP are involved = taking damage = combat or traps, and traps are part of combat.
Someone poisons your drink at the tavern. Take 2d4 poison damage.
Rocks fall on you as you attempt to travel the treacherous mountain pass. Take 3d6 bludgeoning damage.
You get struck by lightning out of a clear blue sky because the gods have decided you're just generally unpleasant. Take 10d10 lightning damage.
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Oh, and yeah, the only way HP are involved = taking damage = combat or traps, and traps are part of combat.
Someone poisons your drink at the tavern. Take 2d4 poison damage.
Rocks fall on you as you attempt to travel the treacherous mountain pass. Take 3d6 bludgeoning damage.
You get struck by lightning out of a clear blue sky because the gods have decided you're just generally unpleasant. Take 10d10 lightning damage.
I will say that generally HP is related to combat...these things happen but be honest how often they happen compared to HP loss in combat....
Just like Bardic Inspiration is generally related to combat. Sure you will use it outside of combat sometimes but lets be honest about when it is most commonly used. Its 10 min time limit does make it kind of impractical for out of combat use but it does happen.
A lot of features have a mix of uses of course but how often are you actually using them out of combat?
I think in a low combat game it could shift obviously but depending on the class its not going to be a huge impact.
For the upcoming adventure that can be completed with 0 combat I would struggle to keep fighters, monks, barbarians, and rangers engaged in the game.
Should adventures/campaigns be tailored to specific classes? Maybe....it depends on the table. I do not really understand it from a marketing perspective myself and honestly a 0 combat campaign sounds....painful to me.
My personal opinion is if you run a 0 combat game it is highly in your interest to play another system that is just frankly better at handling that type of RP/Game experience....
To have to learn all the stuff for 5e just to have that kind of experience is...silly in my opinion.
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
This Feywild module through levels 1-8 is supposed to be done most successfully with zero combat.
Can I get an actual quote on this? Because I was under the impression that what was said was something to the effect of social skills being better than combat ability for these levels, which is not the same as saying you don't want any combat at all.
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This Feywild module through levels 1-8 is supposed to be done most successfully with zero combat.
Can I get an actual quote on this? Because I was under the impression that what was said was something to the effect of social skills being better than combat ability for these levels, which is not the same as saying you don't want any combat at all.
I believe that JC said "the module is better completed with a smile than a sword". I will see if I can find what article it came from. Possibly a Polygon review.
I mean, that's not exactly "no combat for you!"
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This Feywild module through levels 1-8 is supposed to be done most successfully with zero combat.
Can I get an actual quote on this? Because I was under the impression that what was said was something to the effect of social skills being better than combat ability for these levels, which is not the same as saying you don't want any combat at all.
I believe that JC said "the module is better completed with a smile than a sword". I will see if I can find what article it came from. Possibly a Polygon review.
Can we say for certain that that is a "bad call" at this point in time? From what context I have gathered from this thread, it sounds like Jeremy is suggesting that the new module will be better solved using social skills over combat. If the module comes out and it turns out that investing in social skills makes sense based on the challenges presented within the module as it is written, is it really a bad call to allude to that through his comment?
Or are you suggesting that designing encounters around the social pillar as opposed to the combat pillar is, in and of itself, a bad call? As has been pointed out, many class abilities are focused around combat, but D&D 5e is not a purely combat-oriented roleplaying game (even if all of its aspects are not equally balanced). I don't see any issue with a module that aims to try and empower one of the other pillars of the game. I cannot imagine that combat will be 100% out the window, but I would welcome challenges where a combat-oriented solution is not always the best route to take.
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You should likely have an idea of how often combat should come up at session 0.
Its likely not fair to say "combat light" then have 1 combat in 12 different 3-4 hour sessions as that's basically "non-combat" in my book.
However if its 1 combat in 3-4 sessions I could see that as reasonable and MIGHT pick a martial class....otherwise if its the former I will never pick a martial class.
But thats my individual standards that would need to be factored in at session 0.
DM's can choose to dial back how much activity is combat related. But as I have said before, not sure how many combat based chars (and yes, this is where the 90% features kick in) would be useful in a non-combat campaign.
Even monks, barbarians and fighters have at least 4 skill proficiencies. Rogues have a lot more, and everyone else has magic. Probably not ideal for a low-combat campaign, but they certainly don't have to be useless. And as remarked, this is unlikely to be a non-combat campaign.
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DM's can choose to dial back how much activity is combat related. But as I have said before, not sure how many combat based chars (and yes, this is where the 90% features kick in) would be useful in a non-combat campaign.
Even monks, barbarians and fighters have at least 4 skill proficiencies. Rogues have a lot more, and everyone else has magic. Probably not ideal for a low-combat campaign, but they certainly don't have to be useless. And as remarked, this is unlikely to be a non-combat campaign.
I would be VERY upfront with even low combat campaigns if someone is picking a fighter....those skill prof. are going to be able to make them less than useless but obviously not focused on a social/exploration campaign.
DM's can choose to dial back how much activity is combat related. But as I have said before, not sure how many combat based chars (and yes, this is where the 90% features kick in) would be useful in a non-combat campaign.
Even monks, barbarians and fighters have at least 4 skill proficiencies. Rogues have a lot more, and everyone else has magic. Probably not ideal for a low-combat campaign, but they certainly don't have to be useless. And as remarked, this is unlikely to be a non-combat campaign.
I would be VERY upfront with even low combat campaigns if someone is picking a fighter....those skill prof. are going to be able to make them less than useless but obviously not focused on a social/exploration campaign.
Not looking at you specifically, OG, since from what I've seen from your posts I expect you to do right by your players anyway, but in general I'd suggest being upfront with any sort of campaign. I don't mind players picking characters that are created specifically for the kind of campaign they're going to be in, while players who picked something a lot less suitable than the others might feel a bit gipped. But that goes for anything - combat, exploration, survival, intrigue, mystery, horror, seafaring, underdark, airship, jungle, high or low magic, advanced civilization, post-apocalyptic wasteland, and so on (and on, and on, and on). If there's a silver-tongued bard in the party, I assume they'd want to exercise those interpersonal skills; just the same, if the campaign is going to have a lot of intrigue it's not unlikely the fighter player might give a nod to a background with at least one skill that will be useful for that kind of situation - even if in both cases there might still be a hefty dose of combat content as well.
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I suppose if you REALLY wanted to play fighter in a social focused campaign you could take some of the social manuevers to spend your superiority die on if the DM allows the Tasha's maneuvers. Though yeah still probably not the best option lol.
See, I tried to just leave my 2cp that Tasha’s was his worst call. Youse all had ta keep pokin’ the bear.
I would be very interested to see what the results of this poll would be if it was run again in, say, November, after the release of the new books. Everything I am reading says that "opinions may change" on what is the worst move call. When a designer says "you can get further in the level 1-8 module with a smile than a sword", well, flags go up.
Social skills actually mattering... the horror!!!! (Kidding aside, when written well, there is rather more to it than just a few good persuasion rolls. For one thing, figuring out who the right people to persuade are).
Plenty complaints about D&D being all about combat and the other two pillars not getting enough attention too. If a module is presented as trying to fix that, I'm at the very least going to check it out rather than see it as a cause for alarm.
I agree. In myuomebrew adventures, combat is only ever necessary if something directly attacks the party. 90% of the combats they engage in are completely their choice, and totally unnecessary to further the adventure. In many instances, they would likely get further with a smile than a sword. As soon as they stopped killing NPCs trying to end the big-bad, the sooner they got additional information indicating the big-bad is at least a whole level bigger and badder than they realized and they have been killing lieutenants at most. (Lieutenants that might have given more info we’re they not dead.) It has kinda thrown them through a loop.
Even monks, barbarians and fighters have at least 4 skill proficiencies. Rogues have a lot more, and everyone else has magic. Probably not ideal for a low-combat campaign, but they certainly don't have to be useless. And as remarked, this is unlikely to be a non-combat campaign.
A lot of the problem has to do with key stats, not proficiencies. Mostly when a game says 'non-combat' challenges they mean investigation and social scenarios, and in both of those Strength is nearly useless, Dexterity is marginal.
That fact that someone can take a dip into another class and then completely ignore it, but that dip class’ features continue to improve is un-D&D. Class features should only increase with either class progression, or direct investment on the part of the player through ASIs.
ASI-based features suffer from the exact same thing you're complaining about. I can take 1 level in Light Cleric and keep improving Warding Flare through ASIs gained from levels in other classes. The idea that ASIs are ok because they require making a "direct investment" the player was going to make anyways is completely arbitrary.
But it isn’t. It still requires the investment. It still requires active dedication to one thing at the expense of being able to dedicate to something else. Even if the player was going to invest in that anyway for their character, it still means that PC’s ASI is going to be tied up in that investment as opposed to a different ability score or a new feat. They can’t both have their cake and eat it too.
With PB, it will automatically increase no matter what the player does as long as the PC keeps leveling up. For a racial trait that would make sense. For a feat I can see that making sense. For a class feature, I say nay nay. The whole point of classes is that they have to be invested in to make them work.
Yeah, but not in the class. You can't have it both ways.
With PB, it will automatically increase no matter what the player does as long as the PC keeps leveling up
And they're also going to automatically get ASIs at least every 4 levels as long as they keep leveling up. It's almost like ability scores and proficiency bonus both reflect your character's general capabilities and leveling up makes you better at things in general. If it makes sense for a class feature to get better just because you can lift heavier weights now it also makes sense for other features to get better because you're more skilled.
And sure, a player might choose to take a feat instead of the ASI while PB never skips a beat, but the flip side of that is that PB starts at a lower value and there's nothing you can do to fast-track it. A 1st level character with standard array or point buy can always start with a +3, and even take a half-feat and still hit +4. If they're a Fighter they can hit +5 by 6th level. If they rolled stats and they're really lucky they could even start with a +4 or +5 right off the bat. But no matter what, your PB always starts at +2 and won't hit +5 until 13th level.
Some of the new class/subclass features that work off of PB also are deeper into classes, where you can't just throw a level or two at it for a quick dip, or ALSO require investing in the base class to improve them in other ways. For example the new favored foe for ranger allows you to do it X times based on proficiency, but in order for that d4 to grow into a higher die you have to invest in the ranger class. Bladesinger uses scale with PB but you won't get the buffs to your bladesong that later subclass features get etc. Not to mention this only because an 'issue' with multiclassing, which is an optional rule, and it's not like people have never done a multiclass to powergame before anyway.
The low level ones you can get out of a dip or two generally don't seem like huge deals to me.
I wouldn't want to see PB become the ONLY metric of scaling class abilities. And maybe there are some specific examples in the book that are in and of themselves potentially problematic, I haven't reviewed each and every example of it. But I have no problem with the idea on principle, and think as another option to use for scaling things in general it's a welcome addition.
Yeah, but not in the class. You can't have it both ways.
With PB, it will automatically increase no matter what the player does as long as the PC keeps leveling up
And they're also going to automatically get ASIs at least every 4 levels as long as they keep leveling up. It's almost like ability scores and proficiency bonus both reflect your character's general capabilities and leveling up makes you better at things in general. If it makes sense for a class feature to get better just because you can lift heavier weights now it also makes sense for other features to get better because you're more skilled.
And sure, a player might choose to take a feat instead of the ASI while PB never skips a beat, but the flip side of that is that PB starts at a lower value and there's nothing you can do to fast-track it. A 1st level character with standard array or point buy can always start with a +3, and even take a half-feat and still hit +4. If they're a Fighter they can hit +5 by 6th level. If they rolled stats and they're really lucky they could even start with a +4 or +5 right off the bat. But no matter what, your PB always starts at +2 and won't hit +5 until 13th level.
I have to agree with this. PB does a better to job as showing and/or limiting growth than basing it on Stat modifier that can start maxed out at level 1.
See, I tried to just leave my 2cp that Tasha’s was his worst call. Youse all had ta keep pokin’ the bear.
I would be very interested to see what the results of this poll would be if it was run again in, say, November, after the release of the new books. Everything I am reading says that "opinions may change" on what is the worst move call. When a designer says "you can get further in the level 1-8 module with a smile than a sword", well, flags go up.
Social skills actually mattering... the horror!!!! (Kidding aside, when written well, there is rather more to it than just a few good persuasion rolls. For one thing, figuring out who the right people to persuade are).
Why go from level 1-8 when all you need is your social skills? Why not simply say "the chars are level 5 with a Prof Bonus of +3, for the entire module". 90% to 95% of all subclass features in the game are designed around combat. D&D IS a combat oriented game. It is not called Discussions and Diversions.
Neither is it called "Dropkicks and Decapitacions". You are also wrong on the subclass features, but I assume you meant it as a hyperbole.
90% is about right for subclass features, let alone class features when you look at all classes.
And most bards/bard subclasses? Or they just lower class to you?
Well, lets see.
Let's. Because your math is waaay off. :)
Bardic Inspiration: 2 of the 3 uses are combat based.
Only the attack roll is inherently tied to combat. The other two can be used in any situation.
Song of Rest: HP related, and HP only used in combat.
This is objectively false. You can lose hit points for a number of reasons, combat is just one of them. The actual ability of Song of Rest can only be used outside of combat so it's also not combat related.
Countercharm: Half of the uses are typically combat.
"Typically" combat? Perhaps, but that means that at least the other half isn't combat. :)
Spellcasting: Not going count how many spells are combat based. But the vast majority. Anything HP related automatically falls in that category.
Again, you are completely wrong when you say that anything HP-related is automatically combat. That is simply not how the game works. And the bard has comparetively few pure damage spells. The fact that something can be used in both combat and for other pillars doesn't mean that it's "automatically combat".
You want to have a look at Barbarian, Fighter, Rogue, and Cleric features? Or the various subclasses?
We could, but I think I've shown that you are wrong already. I'm more curious as to why you chose to ignore the Bard's most iconic ability, Jack of all Trades. Any particular reason why you chose to ignore this inherently non-combat ability?
Yeah, 90% of the games features are indeed combat based.
Nice moving of the goalposts. The original claim was " 90% to 95% of all subclass features in the game are designed around combat", not "90% of the games features are indeed combat based." Quite the difference.
But let's work out the maths and see if you are correct, just using the example in this thread. The Bard has the following base class abilities (ignoring ASIs and number of spell levels as well as subclass features); Spellcasting, Bardic Inspiration, Jack of All Trades, Song of Rest, Expertise, Font of Inspiration, Countercharm, Magical Secrets and Superior Inspiration. I'm counting the features that just get improved (like the bardic inspiration die) and those you get multiple times (like magical secrets) just once, for simplicitiy's sake. That's a total of 9 class features but some of them have multiple areas of use so the total will be more than that.
To keep this nice and easy I will count spellcasting as having half combat and half non-combat spells (it's really not, for example, only three of seven 9th level bard spells deal damage). That's one each for combat vs non-combat.
Bardic Inspiration has, as mentioned, only one use that is inherently combat-oriented (although on could easily argue that you can use attack rolls outside of combat, like in a friendly game of darts or when trying to break down a door) so that's two more for non-combat, one for combat.
JOAT is a non-combat ability that can arguably have some uses in combat but since we didn't give attack rolls out-of-combat use we won't give JOAT in-combat use.
Song of rest is an ability that you must use outside of combat so that one is fairly obvious.
Expertise is also an out of combat ability and so is Font of Inspiration. Countercharm will, as per your own words, be split half-ways so that's one each for combat vs non-combat.
Magical Secrets will, since it's basically spellcasting, also be given a half-way split.
Superior Inspiration happens when you roll Initiative and even though Initiative can be used for other things, like chase scenes and so on, I'm just going to give this one to the combat side anyways.
For those keeping scores at home that means that "combat" has a total of 5 points, out of combat has 9 points. I haven't got a calculator on me but I'm pretty sure that 5 is less than 9 and that 5 isn't "90% to 95%" of the total number.
And yes, of course certain classes and subclasses will have more abilities focusing on combat, because those are the combat-oriented classes and subclasses, but even the Champion gets one out of five subclass features (that's 20% for those who count, or care) that has out of combat use. So claiming that "90% to 95% of all subclass features in the game are designed around combat" is simply wrong.
I am not going to debate with you.
Well, that's just rude. Can you at least admit that you are wrong?
Tell you what. You burn 6-10 hours and go over every single subclass of every class, and get back to me.
Well, no. You were the one making the claim, it's your job to back that claim up with evidence. I have already shown that you are wrong, so far youäve brought zero evidence.
Oh, and yeah, the only way HP are involved = taking damage = combat or traps, and traps are part of combat.
Well, this is just an obvious lie. Setting of a trap is not "combat" (are you sure you know what that word means?) and traps are most commonly encountered during the exploration pillar of the game.
Physical damage from a mountain pass, well, maybe I can give you that one, though I have never done that to my players, only through trap damage = Combat, which that sure sounds like.
Gods hitting you with lightning = Combat.
Again, are you sure you know what the word "combat" means? Because simply the act of taking damage doesn't mean that you are in combat. So your claim that "Poison = Combat" is just a lie.
I kinda glossed over it the first time, but trap = combat makes no sense either. Falling into a pit in the dungeon corridor doesn't mean you are now fighting the pit
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I kinda glossed over it the first time, but trap = combat makes no sense either. Falling into a pit in the dungeon corridor doesn't mean you are now fighting the pit
A statement along the lines of "You can get further with a smile than a sword" doesn't imply environmental challenges, it implies social challenges. HP are for dealing with physical challenges (includes but not limited to combat).
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Someone poisons your drink at the tavern. Take 2d4 poison damage.
Rocks fall on you as you attempt to travel the treacherous mountain pass. Take 3d6 bludgeoning damage.
You get struck by lightning out of a clear blue sky because the gods have decided you're just generally unpleasant. Take 10d10 lightning damage.
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
I will say that generally HP is related to combat...these things happen but be honest how often they happen compared to HP loss in combat....
Just like Bardic Inspiration is generally related to combat. Sure you will use it outside of combat sometimes but lets be honest about when it is most commonly used. Its 10 min time limit does make it kind of impractical for out of combat use but it does happen.
A lot of features have a mix of uses of course but how often are you actually using them out of combat?
I think in a low combat game it could shift obviously but depending on the class its not going to be a huge impact.
For the upcoming adventure that can be completed with 0 combat I would struggle to keep fighters, monks, barbarians, and rangers engaged in the game.
Should adventures/campaigns be tailored to specific classes? Maybe....it depends on the table. I do not really understand it from a marketing perspective myself and honestly a 0 combat campaign sounds....painful to me.
My personal opinion is if you run a 0 combat game it is highly in your interest to play another system that is just frankly better at handling that type of RP/Game experience....
To have to learn all the stuff for 5e just to have that kind of experience is...silly in my opinion.
No one's rolled initiative. Are you just going to randomly attack the bartender?
As for "combat" with the gods, again, there's no one around to fight. Good luck with that.
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Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Can I get an actual quote on this? Because I was under the impression that what was said was something to the effect of social skills being better than combat ability for these levels, which is not the same as saying you don't want any combat at all.
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I mean, that's not exactly "no combat for you!"
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Can we say for certain that that is a "bad call" at this point in time? From what context I have gathered from this thread, it sounds like Jeremy is suggesting that the new module will be better solved using social skills over combat. If the module comes out and it turns out that investing in social skills makes sense based on the challenges presented within the module as it is written, is it really a bad call to allude to that through his comment?
Or are you suggesting that designing encounters around the social pillar as opposed to the combat pillar is, in and of itself, a bad call? As has been pointed out, many class abilities are focused around combat, but D&D 5e is not a purely combat-oriented roleplaying game (even if all of its aspects are not equally balanced). I don't see any issue with a module that aims to try and empower one of the other pillars of the game. I cannot imagine that combat will be 100% out the window, but I would welcome challenges where a combat-oriented solution is not always the best route to take.
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Yeah overall it falls on expectations....
You should likely have an idea of how often combat should come up at session 0.
Its likely not fair to say "combat light" then have 1 combat in 12 different 3-4 hour sessions as that's basically "non-combat" in my book.
However if its 1 combat in 3-4 sessions I could see that as reasonable and MIGHT pick a martial class....otherwise if its the former I will never pick a martial class.
But thats my individual standards that would need to be factored in at session 0.
Even monks, barbarians and fighters have at least 4 skill proficiencies. Rogues have a lot more, and everyone else has magic. Probably not ideal for a low-combat campaign, but they certainly don't have to be useless. And as remarked, this is unlikely to be a non-combat campaign.
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I would be VERY upfront with even low combat campaigns if someone is picking a fighter....those skill prof. are going to be able to make them less than useless but obviously not focused on a social/exploration campaign.
Not looking at you specifically, OG, since from what I've seen from your posts I expect you to do right by your players anyway, but in general I'd suggest being upfront with any sort of campaign. I don't mind players picking characters that are created specifically for the kind of campaign they're going to be in, while players who picked something a lot less suitable than the others might feel a bit gipped. But that goes for anything - combat, exploration, survival, intrigue, mystery, horror, seafaring, underdark, airship, jungle, high or low magic, advanced civilization, post-apocalyptic wasteland, and so on (and on, and on, and on). If there's a silver-tongued bard in the party, I assume they'd want to exercise those interpersonal skills; just the same, if the campaign is going to have a lot of intrigue it's not unlikely the fighter player might give a nod to a background with at least one skill that will be useful for that kind of situation - even if in both cases there might still be a hefty dose of combat content as well.
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I suppose if you REALLY wanted to play fighter in a social focused campaign you could take some of the social manuevers to spend your superiority die on if the DM allows the Tasha's maneuvers. Though yeah still probably not the best option lol.
I agree. In myuomebrew adventures, combat is only ever necessary if something directly attacks the party. 90% of the combats they engage in are completely their choice, and totally unnecessary to further the adventure. In many instances, they would likely get further with a smile than a sword. As soon as they stopped killing NPCs trying to end the big-bad, the sooner they got additional information indicating the big-bad is at least a whole level bigger and badder than they realized and they have been killing lieutenants at most. (Lieutenants that might have given more info we’re they not dead.) It has kinda thrown them through a loop.
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A lot of the problem has to do with key stats, not proficiencies. Mostly when a game says 'non-combat' challenges they mean investigation and social scenarios, and in both of those Strength is nearly useless, Dexterity is marginal.
But it isn’t. It still requires the investment. It still requires active dedication to one thing at the expense of being able to dedicate to something else. Even if the player was going to invest in that anyway for their character, it still means that PC’s ASI is going to be tied up in that investment as opposed to a different ability score or a new feat. They can’t both have their cake and eat it too.
With PB, it will automatically increase no matter what the player does as long as the PC keeps leveling up. For a racial trait that would make sense. For a feat I can see that making sense. For a class feature, I say nay nay. The whole point of classes is that they have to be invested in to make them work.
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Yeah, but not in the class. You can't have it both ways.
And they're also going to automatically get ASIs at least every 4 levels as long as they keep leveling up. It's almost like ability scores and proficiency bonus both reflect your character's general capabilities and leveling up makes you better at things in general. If it makes sense for a class feature to get better just because you can lift heavier weights now it also makes sense for other features to get better because you're more skilled.
And sure, a player might choose to take a feat instead of the ASI while PB never skips a beat, but the flip side of that is that PB starts at a lower value and there's nothing you can do to fast-track it. A 1st level character with standard array or point buy can always start with a +3, and even take a half-feat and still hit +4. If they're a Fighter they can hit +5 by 6th level. If they rolled stats and they're really lucky they could even start with a +4 or +5 right off the bat. But no matter what, your PB always starts at +2 and won't hit +5 until 13th level.
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Some of the new class/subclass features that work off of PB also are deeper into classes, where you can't just throw a level or two at it for a quick dip, or ALSO require investing in the base class to improve them in other ways. For example the new favored foe for ranger allows you to do it X times based on proficiency, but in order for that d4 to grow into a higher die you have to invest in the ranger class. Bladesinger uses scale with PB but you won't get the buffs to your bladesong that later subclass features get etc. Not to mention this only because an 'issue' with multiclassing, which is an optional rule, and it's not like people have never done a multiclass to powergame before anyway.
The low level ones you can get out of a dip or two generally don't seem like huge deals to me.
I wouldn't want to see PB become the ONLY metric of scaling class abilities. And maybe there are some specific examples in the book that are in and of themselves potentially problematic, I haven't reviewed each and every example of it. But I have no problem with the idea on principle, and think as another option to use for scaling things in general it's a welcome addition.
I have to agree with this. PB does a better to job as showing and/or limiting growth than basing it on Stat modifier that can start maxed out at level 1.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
Well, that's just rude. Can you at least admit that you are wrong?
Well, no. You were the one making the claim, it's your job to back that claim up with evidence. I have already shown that you are wrong, so far youäve brought zero evidence.
Well, this is just an obvious lie. Setting of a trap is not "combat" (are you sure you know what that word means?) and traps are most commonly encountered during the exploration pillar of the game.
Again, are you sure you know what the word "combat" means? Because simply the act of taking damage doesn't mean that you are in combat. So your claim that "Poison = Combat" is just a lie.
I kinda glossed over it the first time, but trap = combat makes no sense either. Falling into a pit in the dungeon corridor doesn't mean you are now fighting the pit
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
A statement along the lines of "You can get further with a smile than a sword" doesn't imply environmental challenges, it implies social challenges. HP are for dealing with physical challenges (includes but not limited to combat).