Other than potential power level putting SB in the awkward point between L1&2 IMO (I thought the suggestion that it should be on a par with Fireball was overstating the case), another issue is one it shares with Counterspell in that it can drag out encounters, especially since it will particularly be used against high level slots for obvious reasons. At least SB gives Advantage to another roll which somewhat counters this effect by making them more likely to succeed (and doesn't burn higher level slots, leaving then free for hard hitting spells).
I did find SB somewhat disruptive in play. Having to interrupt the DM to get it in - and then the hesitancy that caused the DM on future rolls as well so I had a chance to interject. However, that might have been resolvable with practice and again, is an issue with Counterspell (although it has larger applicability and lower cost, so happens more often).
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Or... not doing that at all and letting players have fun as they define it.
Why are you even playing a game with die rolls if you want to just autowin?
Neither guidance or SB are autowin. Nothing in Erik_Soong's comments have suggested autowin. Where are you getting this weird inference from?
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Imagine what some would say if the DM says when a player casts a spell "Oh, did I mention, whatever PC's can do, the monsters can do? My spell casting Dragon casts Silvery Barbs." Some of us play the game to be a challenge, and get the most enjoyment out of the game when faced with serious problems and solve them via smart game play, as opposed to I-win buttons.
I was talking about Guidance. There is no 'smart' game play to casting it, it's just a mechanical "remember to cast this any time I'm expecting to be making a skill check".
Silvery Barbs in and of itself caused me to ban Strixhaven entirely from my table because this spell is just stupidly overpowered; Like if this was a 3rd or 4th level spell then I'd be Ok with it but as it stands it's simply too powerful and the game really doesn't feel like it was built with it in mind since it leaves no real room for counterplay or adaptation; it's a straight up "get f'd while a buddy get's amazing" effect.
And quite frankly as a GM it tends to push me further towards a sort of headspace that I don't like; the kind where I look for ways to expressley counter and as a consequence punish the players who decided that taking a spell like this was a good idea; Doing things like creating vaccum chambers (no air=no vocalization=no spell) or just having enemies that are festooned in contingency counterspell wards that go off specifically whenever the barber tries to use the spell. That's a bad place for me as a GM and I'd rather work *with* my players to tell the best story possible and that requires trust and friendship from both parties.
Did you actually play with it and find it this awful? I ask because my table has been using it without issue since it came out. I’m curious to hear from someone who is see it and it didn’t work.
In practice, it’s mostly turned some crits into regular hits. And I think one time a monster made a save and then failed it on the SB roll. Really not a big deal. But I realize that’s anecdotal, and would be interested to hear from folks who found it game breaking and why.
As a GM I've found it's made fights that should be fair to be trivial, way easier because enemies become incompetent boobs while the players also become considerably stronger thus removing tension and narrative weight from fights.
That's interesting, thanks. I haven't found that to be so. I'm not trying to argue with your experience, just observing that mine has been different. At our games the general rule is: If its published by WotC, you can use it, and we've had no problems with tense, weighty fights. We probably average 1-3 character deaths per campaign -- SB couldn't help when someone got petrified, for example, or failed a third death save -- so, yeah, tense. But I suppose there are countless variables that could explain how two different tables might experience the same spell very differently.
On to Guidance. We also spam the crap out of it. I completely disagree with those who say it slows things down. I guess mathematically its true, but the difference is trivial. We've never had to stop early because there was too much guidance getting thrown around. However, while we use it, and I think its fun, I do think it's a little too good. One of the big reasons I say this is because if you make a cleric and don't have it, people kind of look at you funny. It just completely outclasses all other non-attack cantrips to the point where you feel almost compelled to take it. We actually have a house rule that you can't use it for checks that last longer than the 1-minute spell duration. (I understand that's not what the meaning of the 1-minute duration is. It's just the metric we use for the house rule.) It still gets used a lot, but that does help tone it down a bit. So a survival check to figure out what kind of tracks you're looking at? Yes guidance. But a survival check to follow those tracks for 6 hours through the forest? Then no, guidance isn't strong enough to boost you for that long.
"As intended" by whom, exactly? Are you talking about the current crop of designers at wotc, that created these OP spells, subclasses and features to sell more product? Or are you talking about the people, like Mearls, who has been pushed out, who designed 5e? Or are you talking about the master, Gygax, who built a game that was intended to be brutally hard, with PC death everywhere? And yes, every single DM has to be adversarial, to some extent. It is the very essence of the game, where the DM creates challenges for the PC's/players. If they are not challenges, with a potential of failure, then they are not challenges at all. If I was playing a D&D game where I knew that my PC was going to succeed, no matter what I did, because either the DM or other players would bail me out, I would Leeroy Jenkins everything.
My players are challenged almost every single session in one way or another. If you can't think of ways to challenge your players if they have Guidance or Silvery Barbs, that sounds like a you problem, not a player problem or a game problem. Gygax had no direct involvement in 5e, so maybe that is your whole problem where it concerns either of these spells.
My players are challenged almost every single session in one way or another. If you can't think of ways to challenge your players if they have Guidance or Silvery Barbs, that sounds like a you problem, not a player problem or a game problem.
It is not at all hard to challenge people who have guidance or silvery barbs: just increase difficulty by the same amount. At that point, however, why bother having the spells in the first place?
Imagine what some would say if the DM says when a player casts a spell "Oh, did I mention, whatever PC's can do, the monsters can do? My spell casting Dragon casts Silvery Barbs." Some of us play the game to be a challenge, and get the most enjoyment out of the game when faced with serious problems and solve them via smart game play, as opposed to I-win buttons. If I want to play a game in auto-win mode, I can play Monopoly Go.
Monsters can already do whatever PCs can do. It's been true for the entire edition. They don't have to follow PC rules, and you can give silvery barbs to every dragon, demon and kobold in your game. Enjoy!
"As intended" by whom, exactly? Are you talking about the current crop of designers at wotc, that created these OP spells, subclasses and features to sell more product? Or are you talking about the people, like Mearls, who has been pushed out, who designed 5e? Or are you talking about the master, Gygax, who built a game that was intended to be brutally hard, with PC death everywhere? And yes, every single DM has to be adversarial, to some extent. It is the very essence of the game, where the DM creates challenges for the PC's/players. If they are not challenges, with a potential of failure, then they are not challenges at all. If I was playing a D&D game where I knew that my PC was going to succeed, no matter what I did, because either the DM or other players would bail me out, I would Leeroy Jenkins everything.
Why do you think invoking game designers of the past makes your point? Mearls was one of the co-designers of 5e. Just one of them. And he never said brutally hard = fun. And why do people keep bring up Gygax? He wasn't some infallible demigod. He (arguably, there are others who can take just as much credit) had the idea for the game. But that doesn't mean the way he played it was The One True Way. He made a game that was a mathematical mess, which thankfully has been fixed over the past 50 years, along with numerous other mistakes. And his whatever intention was (if you've accurately characterized it here. I'd love to see where he wrote that it should be brutally hard.) is completely irrelevant.
The game doesn't belong to the designers or IP owners, current or past, beyond a strict legal sense. It belongs to all of us who play. You want brutally hard, go nuts, it's your game, too, there's plenty of optional rules in the DMG that can get you there, and I honestly hope you have fun playing it however you like. But don't act like you're the only one doing it right.
My players are challenged almost every single session in one way or another. If you can't think of ways to challenge your players if they have Guidance or Silvery Barbs, that sounds like a you problem, not a player problem or a game problem.
It is not at all hard to challenge people who have guidance or silvery barbs: just increase difficulty by the same amount. At that point, however, why bother having the spells in the first place?
This reminds me of the 'wrong answers only' memes. Players choose this spell for three reasons I can think of: curiosity, because they want to have this kind of influence over the game, or they feel like they have to just to survive playing with their DM. Your answers on how to address these spells, should they be permitted in game, offers some insight into which category your players might fall into.
But hey, as long as your players are having fun overall, more power to you. I feel it might be good to point out, just as a general rule to no one in particular: no D&D is better than bad D&D.
This reminds me of the 'wrong answers only' memes. Players choose this spell for three reasons I can think of: curiosity, because they want to have this kind of influence over the game, or they feel like they have to just to survive playing with their DM. Your answers on how to address these spells, should they be permitted in game, offers some insight into which category your players might fall into.
After playing with the spell, we concluded that it made the game better to not have it present in the game.
This reminds me of the 'wrong answers only' memes. Players choose this spell for three reasons I can think of: curiosity, because they want to have this kind of influence over the game, or they feel like they have to just to survive playing with their DM. Your answers on how to address these spells, should they be permitted in game, offers some insight into which category your players might fall into.
After playing with the spell, we concluded that it made the game better to not have it present in the game.
A table decision? Seems fair to me then. It is definitely not my table experience though.
My group finds it fun; we have a Fey-Touched Stars Druid who is still fairly new to D&D and doesn't have much use for her reaction anyway, or didn't until she was able to pick up SB via the feat, and now she's a lot more engaged in combat. I do have to frequently remind her of the "grant advantage" portion of the spell however, which is why I think the spell would be better off (both from a balance and usability standpoint) if that part were simply removed. The "distraction->reroll success" functionality is already good enough to be worth the resource expenditure on its own.
As for Vortex Warp, my Artillerist in that same campaign has saved our melee's bacon with it more than once. "Teleport Other" is just great utility to have, and it's balanced just fine.
Bumping the DC in response to a player having Guidance seems mean-spirited since it basically defeats the purpose. It's literally an average of +2 extra on their skill checks; it's not going to significantly alter their success rate, particularly against high DC checks. Do you bump DC when there's a Bard in the party too? Or whenever someone uses the Help Action?
Bumping the DC in response to a player having Guidance seems mean-spirited since it basically defeats the purpose. It's literally an average of +2 extra on their skill checks; it's not going to significantly alter their success rate, particularly against high DC checks. Do you bump DC when there's a Bard in the party too? Or whenever someone uses the Help Action?
Despite the myth of bounded accuracy, the reality is that DMs generally tune challenges to the capabilities of the PCs, so increasing the capabilities of the PCs results in harder challenges. Thus, the most relevant skill boosts are either ones that focus the character (characters will fail on occasion.. but they have some choice about what type of thing they fail at) or that improve relative to other PCs (challenges are on a per-party basis). Guidance is neither one.
Again, how is it different than the Help Action (will almost always give a larger improvement, potentially much larger), or Bardic Inspiration (limited uses, but once it starts refreshing on SR fairly low-cost to use outside of combat areas)? The entire reason to take the spell is to improve the group's skill checks; raising the DC in response means you've literally just made the spell a trap for the person who took it.
Again, how is it different than the Help Action (will almost always give a larger improvement, potentially much larger), or Bardic Inspiration (limited uses, but once it starts refreshing on SR fairly low-cost to use outside of combat areas)? The entire reason to take the spell is to improve the group's skill checks; raising the DC in response means you've literally just made the spell a trap for the person who took it.
Well, yes, that's the problem with the spell. Making the group universally better at skill checks pretty much forces the DM to increase the difficulty of skill checks. As such, it's just a bad spell to even have in the game, at least as a cantrip (it would be fine as, say, a spell, channel divinity, or limited use class feature).
Again, how is it different than the Help Action (will almost always give a larger improvement, potentially much larger), or Bardic Inspiration (limited uses, but once it starts refreshing on SR fairly low-cost to use outside of combat areas)? The entire reason to take the spell is to improve the group's skill checks; raising the DC in response means you've literally just made the spell a trap for the person who took it.
Well, yes, that's the problem with the spell. Making the group universally better at skill checks pretty much forces the DM to increase the difficulty of skill checks. As such, it's just a bad spell to even have in the game, at least as a cantrip (it would be fine as, say, a spell, channel divinity, or limited use class feature).
For the umpteenth time, how is Guidance different than using the Help Action? More to the point, how is Help not generally stronger? It doesn't take up a slot that could be occupied by something else, isn't reliant on a single player, and it both gives a stronger boost on average and has a much stronger swing factor. You can't tell me the odds that you'll roll lower with Advantage are significantly higher than the odds that you'll roll a 1 with Guidance when you need a 4. Also, just enforce players needing to set it up ahead of time rather than slipping it in after and it becomes a collaborative part of players working a scene: "There's something over there I want to check out" "One sec, let me cast Guidance on you first". Unless the DM is maintaining a death grip on the narration, it's not hard for players to work it in on their own time during a session.
Well, yes, that's the problem with the spell. Making the group universally better at skill checks pretty much forces the DM to increase the difficulty of skill checks. As such, it's just a bad spell to even have in the game, at least as a cantrip (it would be fine as, say, a spell, channel divinity, or limited use class feature).
It's not just a blanket "the group is better at skill checks" that then needs to be compensated for, though. Even as a repeatable cantrip it has a cost - among others, needing concentration in the 2014 version, in-the-moment proximity in the 2024 version, and loud chanting for both. If you can't devise scenarios where those drawbacks matter to the spell's use, the problem lies with your ability to design challenges, not with the spell.
Other than potential power level putting SB in the awkward point between L1&2 IMO (I thought the suggestion that it should be on a par with Fireball was overstating the case), another issue is one it shares with Counterspell in that it can drag out encounters, especially since it will particularly be used against high level slots for obvious reasons. At least SB gives Advantage to another roll which somewhat counters this effect by making them more likely to succeed (and doesn't burn higher level slots, leaving then free for hard hitting spells).
I did find SB somewhat disruptive in play. Having to interrupt the DM to get it in - and then the hesitancy that caused the DM on future rolls as well so I had a chance to interject. However, that might have been resolvable with practice and again, is an issue with Counterspell (although it has larger applicability and lower cost, so happens more often).
If you're not willing or able to to discuss in good faith, then don't be surprised if I don't respond, there are better things in life for me to do than humour you. This signature is that response.
Why are you even playing a game with die rolls if you want to just autowin?
Neither guidance or SB are autowin. Nothing in Erik_Soong's comments have suggested autowin. Where are you getting this weird inference from?
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Well, I don't and my players don't.
Why play a game you dislike so much, you 'steamline' it by adopting a DM vs player mentality and punish players for playing the game as intended?
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I was talking about Guidance. There is no 'smart' game play to casting it, it's just a mechanical "remember to cast this any time I'm expecting to be making a skill check".
That's interesting, thanks. I haven't found that to be so. I'm not trying to argue with your experience, just observing that mine has been different. At our games the general rule is: If its published by WotC, you can use it, and we've had no problems with tense, weighty fights. We probably average 1-3 character deaths per campaign -- SB couldn't help when someone got petrified, for example, or failed a third death save -- so, yeah, tense. But I suppose there are countless variables that could explain how two different tables might experience the same spell very differently.
On to Guidance. We also spam the crap out of it. I completely disagree with those who say it slows things down. I guess mathematically its true, but the difference is trivial. We've never had to stop early because there was too much guidance getting thrown around. However, while we use it, and I think its fun, I do think it's a little too good. One of the big reasons I say this is because if you make a cleric and don't have it, people kind of look at you funny. It just completely outclasses all other non-attack cantrips to the point where you feel almost compelled to take it. We actually have a house rule that you can't use it for checks that last longer than the 1-minute spell duration. (I understand that's not what the meaning of the 1-minute duration is. It's just the metric we use for the house rule.) It still gets used a lot, but that does help tone it down a bit. So a survival check to figure out what kind of tracks you're looking at? Yes guidance. But a survival check to follow those tracks for 6 hours through the forest? Then no, guidance isn't strong enough to boost you for that long.
My players are challenged almost every single session in one way or another. If you can't think of ways to challenge your players if they have Guidance or Silvery Barbs, that sounds like a you problem, not a player problem or a game problem. Gygax had no direct involvement in 5e, so maybe that is your whole problem where it concerns either of these spells.
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It is not at all hard to challenge people who have guidance or silvery barbs: just increase difficulty by the same amount. At that point, however, why bother having the spells in the first place?
Monsters can already do whatever PCs can do. It's been true for the entire edition. They don't have to follow PC rules, and you can give silvery barbs to every dragon, demon and kobold in your game. Enjoy!
Why do you think invoking game designers of the past makes your point? Mearls was one of the co-designers of 5e. Just one of them. And he never said brutally hard = fun. And why do people keep bring up Gygax? He wasn't some infallible demigod. He (arguably, there are others who can take just as much credit) had the idea for the game. But that doesn't mean the way he played it was The One True Way. He made a game that was a mathematical mess, which thankfully has been fixed over the past 50 years, along with numerous other mistakes. And his whatever intention was (if you've accurately characterized it here. I'd love to see where he wrote that it should be brutally hard.) is completely irrelevant.
The game doesn't belong to the designers or IP owners, current or past, beyond a strict legal sense. It belongs to all of us who play. You want brutally hard, go nuts, it's your game, too, there's plenty of optional rules in the DMG that can get you there, and I honestly hope you have fun playing it however you like. But don't act like you're the only one doing it right.
This reminds me of the 'wrong answers only' memes. Players choose this spell for three reasons I can think of: curiosity, because they want to have this kind of influence over the game, or they feel like they have to just to survive playing with their DM. Your answers on how to address these spells, should they be permitted in game, offers some insight into which category your players might fall into.
But hey, as long as your players are having fun overall, more power to you. I feel it might be good to point out, just as a general rule to no one in particular: no D&D is better than bad D&D.
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After playing with the spell, we concluded that it made the game better to not have it present in the game.
A table decision? Seems fair to me then. It is definitely not my table experience though.
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My group finds it fun; we have a Fey-Touched Stars Druid who is still fairly new to D&D and doesn't have much use for her reaction anyway, or didn't until she was able to pick up SB via the feat, and now she's a lot more engaged in combat. I do have to frequently remind her of the "grant advantage" portion of the spell however, which is why I think the spell would be better off (both from a balance and usability standpoint) if that part were simply removed. The "distraction->reroll success" functionality is already good enough to be worth the resource expenditure on its own.
As for Vortex Warp, my Artillerist in that same campaign has saved our melee's bacon with it more than once. "Teleport Other" is just great utility to have, and it's balanced just fine.
Bumping the DC in response to a player having Guidance seems mean-spirited since it basically defeats the purpose. It's literally an average of +2 extra on their skill checks; it's not going to significantly alter their success rate, particularly against high DC checks. Do you bump DC when there's a Bard in the party too? Or whenever someone uses the Help Action?
Despite the myth of bounded accuracy, the reality is that DMs generally tune challenges to the capabilities of the PCs, so increasing the capabilities of the PCs results in harder challenges. Thus, the most relevant skill boosts are either ones that focus the character (characters will fail on occasion.. but they have some choice about what type of thing they fail at) or that improve relative to other PCs (challenges are on a per-party basis). Guidance is neither one.
Again, how is it different than the Help Action (will almost always give a larger improvement, potentially much larger), or Bardic Inspiration (limited uses, but once it starts refreshing on SR fairly low-cost to use outside of combat areas)? The entire reason to take the spell is to improve the group's skill checks; raising the DC in response means you've literally just made the spell a trap for the person who took it.
Well, yes, that's the problem with the spell. Making the group universally better at skill checks pretty much forces the DM to increase the difficulty of skill checks. As such, it's just a bad spell to even have in the game, at least as a cantrip (it would be fine as, say, a spell, channel divinity, or limited use class feature).
For the umpteenth time, how is Guidance different than using the Help Action? More to the point, how is Help not generally stronger? It doesn't take up a slot that could be occupied by something else, isn't reliant on a single player, and it both gives a stronger boost on average and has a much stronger swing factor. You can't tell me the odds that you'll roll lower with Advantage are significantly higher than the odds that you'll roll a 1 with Guidance when you need a 4. Also, just enforce players needing to set it up ahead of time rather than slipping it in after and it becomes a collaborative part of players working a scene: "There's something over there I want to check out" "One sec, let me cast Guidance on you first". Unless the DM is maintaining a death grip on the narration, it's not hard for players to work it in on their own time during a session.
It's not just a blanket "the group is better at skill checks" that then needs to be compensated for, though. Even as a repeatable cantrip it has a cost - among others, needing concentration in the 2014 version, in-the-moment proximity in the 2024 version, and loud chanting for both. If you can't devise scenarios where those drawbacks matter to the spell's use, the problem lies with your ability to design challenges, not with the spell.
Help is absolutely a problem, but it tends to just get handled by changing the rules to reduce its effectiveness.