This conversation has been illuminating. I never really understood why people really thought Silvery Barbs was overpowered and needed to be banned. Now that these same people have also stated that Guidance and Shield are overpowered and that even Help needs to be reduced in effectiveness, I get it - we play fundamentally different games that share a name only.
This conversation has been illuminating. I never really understood why people really thought Silvery Barbs was overpowered and needed to be banned. Now that these same people have also stated that Guidance and Shield are overpowered and that even Help needs to be reduced in effectiveness, I get it - we play fundamentally different games that share a name only.
The thing is: the game has a default difficulty. Now, as a DM, I can certainly ignore those defaults and invent new challenges... but I would rather the game actually worked as designed, and that means challenges that are expected to be relevant actually are relevant. Also, I prefer clean mechanics -- most rolls really should just be simple rolls, not 'Let me find all the bonuses I can stack on this roll'.
This conversation has been illuminating. I never really understood why people really thought Silvery Barbs was overpowered and needed to be banned. Now that these same people have also stated that Guidance and Shield are overpowered and that even Help needs to be reduced in effectiveness, I get it - we play fundamentally different games that share a name only.
The thing is: the game has a default difficulty. Now, as a DM, I can certainly ignore those defaults and invent new challenges... but I would rather the game actually worked as designed, and that means challenges that are expected to be relevant actually are relevant.
And an average of +2 to skill checks destroys this "balance"? Imo you're vastly overestimating how fine-tuned any of the systems in this game are.
I want to "Help" someone with a singe Perception check, with Guidance of course, to examine a 30 x 30 room for secret doors or traps in 6 seconds. That in a nutshell is part of what is wrong with 5e.
Which 5e rule are you citing that says a single Perception check always lets you thoroughly scan a 30x30 room in 6 seconds?
For the umpteenth time, how is Guidance different than using the Help Action?
Help is absolutely a problem, but it tends to just get handled by changing the rules to reduce its effectiveness.
I want to "Help" someone with a singe Perception check, with Guidance of course, to examine a 30 x 30 room for secret doors or traps in 6 seconds. That in a nutshell is part of what is wrong with 5e.
What for a perception check is that? Traditional means of detection are much more involved. These are purpose built secret doors, not merely 'slightly hidden but visible to anyone who simply pays attention' doors.
It's a strawman interpretation of what a Perception check is. Out of combat, time is fluid and so the exact timeframe you're looking at for such as check is up to how the DM and players play the scene. Even in combat those hypothetical "six seconds" are really just for tracking durations rather than a realistic interpretation of the timeframe it takes for someone to, say, run 30 ft and effectively swing a weapon in each hand. Having someone cast Guidance on you ahead of making a Perception check of a room is exactly the kind of scenario the spell is for.
For the umpteenth time, how is Guidance different than using the Help Action?
Help is absolutely a problem, but it tends to just get handled by changing the rules to reduce its effectiveness.
I want to "Help" someone with a singe Perception check, with Guidance of course, to examine a 30 x 30 room for secret doors or traps in 6 seconds. That in a nutshell is part of what is wrong with 5e.
What for a perception check is that? Traditional means of detection are much more involved. These are purpose built secret doors, not merely 'slightly hidden but visible to anyone who simply pays attention' doors.
It's a strawman interpretation of what a Perception check is. Out of combat, time is fluid and so the exact timeframe you're looking at for such as check is up to how the DM and players play the scene. Even in combat those hypothetical "six seconds" are really just for tracking durations rather than a realistic interpretation of the timeframe it takes for someone to, say, run 30 ft and effectively swing a weapon in each hand. Having someone cast Guidance on you ahead of making a Perception check of a room is exactly the kind of scenario the spell is for.
Except that would only help one person. And casting it could warn those in the room of your impending entry. Personally, I see it more intended for more conscious, less spontaneous things, like opening a tricky lock. Possibly for a sniper shot, but then you have the warning problem again. Seriously, how often would you say to someone before they simply go into a room "Let me improve your eyesight?"
I mean, I was thinking more when the party is searching an empty room.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
I don't see where it is OP, Broken or whatever adjective people are using now days. Which means it must be only Youtubers complaining, like they always do. And when it gets nerfed, they will complain that it was nerfed. Unfortunately they gather many NPC viewers who run around and echo whatever they say because they don't have an original though for themselves.
Hardly. I have seen this "one check for the room" as standard operating procedure at almost every 5e table I have sat at over the past 8 years. It should take at least in-game 20 minutes to investigate a room that size (DM Discretion on time, and the DM rolling for wandering monsters) , and should require at least one check every 10 linear feet of wall, let alone the floor. Now, is THAT in the rules? I don't think so. This is one of the areas that was not codified. The fact that a player can spam Guidance for each and every check is a major flaw in the game.
The player could spam firebolt at 5' intervals to see if any wall section reacts differently and thus might be a secret door. Or at each and every object in every room just in case it might be a mimic.
So ban all cantrips?
Then what happens if they do the same with a long stick, instead? Ban long sticks?
Most players are sane and would get bored with / realize the futility of that after the first couple rooms, if they even make it that long. There is no idiot proof set of rules.
Huh? Fire Bolt detects traps and secret doors? Not in any universe. And a 10 foot pole should be standard equipment, to trigger traps, and sure, pound on wall sections/floor sections to see if a section is hollow. No one needs to have any spammable magic, of any kind, to perform basic game functions.
You seem to be missing the fundamental point of cantrips; to be basic game functions.
Hardly. I have seen this "one check for the room" as standard operating procedure at almost every 5e table I have sat at over the past 8 years. It should take at least in-game 20 minutes to investigate a room that size (DM Discretion on time, and the DM rolling for wandering monsters) , and should require at least one check every 10 linear feet of wall, let alone the floor. Now, is THAT in the rules? I don't think so. This is one of the areas that was not codified. The fact that a player can spam Guidance for each and every check is a major flaw in the game.
The player could spam firebolt at 5' intervals to see if any wall section reacts differently and thus might be a secret door. Or at each and every object in every room just in case it might be a mimic.
So ban all cantrips?
Then what happens if they do the same with a long stick, instead? Ban long sticks?
Most players are sane and would get bored with / realize the futility of that after the first couple rooms, if they even make it that long. There is no idiot proof set of rules.
Huh? Fire Bolt detects traps and secret doors? Not in any universe. And a 10 foot pole should be standard equipment, to trigger traps, and sure, pound on wall sections/floor sections to see if a section is hollow. No one needs to have any spammable magic, of any kind, to perform basic game functions.
You seem to be missing the fundamental point of cantrips; to be basic game functions.
No, you miss the point. Fundamental game functions should in no way be handled by cantrips.
The designers who made cantrips able to handle fundamental game functions and without a cost to boot appear to disagree with you.
No, you miss the point. Fundamental game functions should in no way be handled by cantrips.
That's what cantrips are designed for. The problem is that guidance isn't a basic game function, it's a buff.
It’s a marginal buff that averages maybe 10% increase in odds of success, assuming the caster is in a position to use it at the time. You cannot seriously tell me it’s more disruptive to this purported “balance” to skill checks than Expertise or Help are. You might as well say +X weapons should be banned because they unbalance combat.
It’s a marginal buff that averages maybe 10% increase in odds of success, assuming the caster is in a position to use it at the time. You cannot seriously tell me it’s more disruptive to this purported “balance” to skill checks than Expertise or Help are. You might as well say +X weapons should be banned because they unbalance combat.
Expertise (all skills) would be disruptive. There are a variety of ways the capabilities of Guidance could be narrowed by enough to make it reasonable, but it needs something to make it work less often. As for Help, RAW help is pretty broken but has sufficiently vague rules that people just ignore it.
Having the challenge scale with the ability of the PCs is pretty standard in D&D. I don't think many of us have L20s facing off against Goblins. If you essentially universally boost the abilities of the players in a significant manner, you have to boost the challenge commensurately or the game becomes too easy.
Is Guidance boosting the player's significantly? Well, a point to note is that it can stack with Help. The former contributes, on average, 2.5. the latter contributes, on average, 3.1 (I can't remember the exact number, but it was something like that or a bit higher, so we'll go with that more conservative number), for 5.6 together. Combine that with the golden success of about 60%, that means that boosting the success rate from 60% to 88%, reducing the rate of failure by almost 75%. You're changing the the odds from "probably will succeed, but a decent chance of failure" to "you'll almost certainly succeed, it would take some pretty bad luck to fail".
That's something that you'd have to account for. The fact that it's effectively resourceless and unlimited (other than time) makes it something that, if used regularly, you'd have to account for and change the DC's of your challenges (which is really bad for reasons already cited) or introduce strict time limits and pressures to stop this from being routine (which is very narratively limiting). The fact that either can be used to boost all the skill rolls of everyone is really problematic.
In practice:
My players almost never use either. They will occasionally use one for important rolls (that generally have naturally high DCs anyway), and I don't think I've ever had them use both simultaneously even when available. I'm absolutely fine with the fact that in the high stakes moments, they have options to do something to improve their chances - which is precisely the effect of what scarce resource abilities are for, right? These seem to have found that usage niche without the bureaucracy of having to track how many times they've been used that day, which is the ideal.
At least at my table, they both seem fine.
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It’s a marginal buff that averages maybe 10% increase in odds of success, assuming the caster is in a position to use it at the time. You cannot seriously tell me it’s more disruptive to this purported “balance” to skill checks than Expertise or Help are. You might as well say +X weapons should be banned because they unbalance combat.
Expertise (all skills) would be disruptive. There are a variety of ways the capabilities of Guidance could be narrowed by enough to make it reasonable, but it needs something to make it work less often. As for Help, RAW help is pretty broken but has sufficiently vague rules that people just ignore it.
Well, they were tweaking it in the UA, so you might get your wish (though that adjustment was so restrictive it would essentially have been a trap pick). But really the issues with it are more just establishing the basic table etiquette/procedure so it gets applied naturally as opposed to the caster needing to interject it mid-roll. Unless you're a DM who is trying to run a campaign on rails and wants players to essentially always fail high DCs, 1d4 is honestly more likely to be unneeded or insufficient rather than critical in terms of skill performance.
Well, yes, if you don't use something, it isn't a problem. In practice overuse of either mechanic will annoy the DM and other players so reasonably socially aware players will self-limit, but that's not a great way to balance a feature.
Well, they were tweaking it in the UA, so you might get your wish (though that adjustment was so restrictive it would essentially have been a trap pick).
Actually, the UA2 version of Guidance would have been perfectly useful, just a strange design for a cantrip.
Hardly. I have seen this "one check for the room" as standard operating procedure at almost every 5e table I have sat at over the past 8 years. It should take at least in-game 20 minutes to investigate a room that size (DM Discretion on time, and the DM rolling for wandering monsters) , and should require at least one check every 10 linear feet of wall, let alone the floor. Now, is THAT in the rules? I don't think so. This is one of the areas that was not codified.
So you agree there's no rule for perception in the way you described, just houserules your DMs/tables have used that you disagree with. Have you tried talking with them?
The fact that a player can spam Guidance for each and every check is a major flaw in the game.
Again, devising checks/skill challenges where casting Guidance (either version) would be a problem, ill-advised, or suboptimal - and therefore a meaningful tradeoff - is trivial.
Well, they were tweaking it in the UA, so you might get your wish (though that adjustment was so restrictive it would essentially have been a trap pick).
Actually, the UA2 version of Guidance would have been perfectly useful, just a strange design for a cantrip.
It would be useful as a race feature, not as a cantrip. Once per day per target like that just means they'll almost never use it and it's likely to just be a waste. Too much of a trap just for a small boost to skill check.
This conversation has been illuminating. I never really understood why people really thought Silvery Barbs was overpowered and needed to be banned. Now that these same people have also stated that Guidance and Shield are overpowered and that even Help needs to be reduced in effectiveness, I get it - we play fundamentally different games that share a name only.
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The thing is: the game has a default difficulty. Now, as a DM, I can certainly ignore those defaults and invent new challenges... but I would rather the game actually worked as designed, and that means challenges that are expected to be relevant actually are relevant. Also, I prefer clean mechanics -- most rolls really should just be simple rolls, not 'Let me find all the bonuses I can stack on this roll'.
And an average of +2 to skill checks destroys this "balance"? Imo you're vastly overestimating how fine-tuned any of the systems in this game are.
Which 5e rule are you citing that says a single Perception check always lets you thoroughly scan a 30x30 room in 6 seconds?
It's a strawman interpretation of what a Perception check is. Out of combat, time is fluid and so the exact timeframe you're looking at for such as check is up to how the DM and players play the scene. Even in combat those hypothetical "six seconds" are really just for tracking durations rather than a realistic interpretation of the timeframe it takes for someone to, say, run 30 ft and effectively swing a weapon in each hand. Having someone cast Guidance on you ahead of making a Perception check of a room is exactly the kind of scenario the spell is for.
I mean, I was thinking more when the party is searching an empty room.
Just think of it as asking your god's assistance in the completion of a task. Cast it when that would be appropriate.
Know the villian entered this room but don't see any exit doors/windows and wanna pray for Guidance to help follow him? Makes sense.
Just walking past a random empty room and are praying for Guidance to spot random details? Heresy.
I'm probably laughing.
It is apparently so hard to program Aberrant Mind and Clockwork Soul spell-swapping into dndbeyond they had to remake the game without it rather than implement it.
I don't see where it is OP, Broken or whatever adjective people are using now days. Which means it must be only Youtubers complaining, like they always do. And when it gets nerfed, they will complain that it was nerfed. Unfortunately they gather many NPC viewers who run around and echo whatever they say because they don't have an original though for themselves.
Just like the Ranger and Monk "suck" videos. smh.
You seem to be missing the fundamental point of cantrips; to be basic game functions.
The designers who made cantrips able to handle fundamental game functions and without a cost to boot appear to disagree with you.
That's what cantrips are designed for. The problem is that guidance isn't a basic game function, it's a buff.
So are cantrips Blade Ward, Friends, Resistance, and Shillelagh.
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It’s a marginal buff that averages maybe 10% increase in odds of success, assuming the caster is in a position to use it at the time. You cannot seriously tell me it’s more disruptive to this purported “balance” to skill checks than Expertise or Help are. You might as well say +X weapons should be banned because they unbalance combat.
Expertise (all skills) would be disruptive. There are a variety of ways the capabilities of Guidance could be narrowed by enough to make it reasonable, but it needs something to make it work less often. As for Help, RAW help is pretty broken but has sufficiently vague rules that people just ignore it.
Theory crafting:
Having the challenge scale with the ability of the PCs is pretty standard in D&D. I don't think many of us have L20s facing off against Goblins. If you essentially universally boost the abilities of the players in a significant manner, you have to boost the challenge commensurately or the game becomes too easy.
Is Guidance boosting the player's significantly? Well, a point to note is that it can stack with Help. The former contributes, on average, 2.5. the latter contributes, on average, 3.1 (I can't remember the exact number, but it was something like that or a bit higher, so we'll go with that more conservative number), for 5.6 together. Combine that with the golden success of about 60%, that means that boosting the success rate from 60% to 88%, reducing the rate of failure by almost 75%. You're changing the the odds from "probably will succeed, but a decent chance of failure" to "you'll almost certainly succeed, it would take some pretty bad luck to fail".
That's something that you'd have to account for. The fact that it's effectively resourceless and unlimited (other than time) makes it something that, if used regularly, you'd have to account for and change the DC's of your challenges (which is really bad for reasons already cited) or introduce strict time limits and pressures to stop this from being routine (which is very narratively limiting). The fact that either can be used to boost all the skill rolls of everyone is really problematic.
In practice:
My players almost never use either. They will occasionally use one for important rolls (that generally have naturally high DCs anyway), and I don't think I've ever had them use both simultaneously even when available. I'm absolutely fine with the fact that in the high stakes moments, they have options to do something to improve their chances - which is precisely the effect of what scarce resource abilities are for, right? These seem to have found that usage niche without the bureaucracy of having to track how many times they've been used that day, which is the ideal.
At least at my table, they both seem fine.
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.
Well, they were tweaking it in the UA, so you might get your wish (though that adjustment was so restrictive it would essentially have been a trap pick). But really the issues with it are more just establishing the basic table etiquette/procedure so it gets applied naturally as opposed to the caster needing to interject it mid-roll. Unless you're a DM who is trying to run a campaign on rails and wants players to essentially always fail high DCs, 1d4 is honestly more likely to be unneeded or insufficient rather than critical in terms of skill performance.
Well, yes, if you don't use something, it isn't a problem. In practice overuse of either mechanic will annoy the DM and other players so reasonably socially aware players will self-limit, but that's not a great way to balance a feature.
Actually, the UA2 version of Guidance would have been perfectly useful, just a strange design for a cantrip.
So you agree there's no rule for perception in the way you described, just houserules your DMs/tables have used that you disagree with. Have you tried talking with them?
Again, devising checks/skill challenges where casting Guidance (either version) would be a problem, ill-advised, or suboptimal - and therefore a meaningful tradeoff - is trivial.
It would be useful as a race feature, not as a cantrip. Once per day per target like that just means they'll almost never use it and it's likely to just be a waste. Too much of a trap just for a small boost to skill check.