If the DM withholds the roll value and just announces hit/miss, then you also don't know whether or not it is a crit, which also tanks the value of SB. But even in that scenario, Shield is still the better spell (defensively). You don't know that Shield will work, but you also don't know if Silvery Barbs will work.
Example: If you have 15 AC and the monster has a +8 modifier. The DM rolls an attack and just says "it hits", asking for a reaction.
Shield has a ~71.5% of blocking the attack. Silvery Barbs has a 35% chance of blocking the attack. The math continues to favor Shield across a broad spectrum of attack modifiers. The only time SB is better defensively is when you have an extremely high AC compared to monster attack modifier, to the point where the monster needs to roll a 18+ to hit you in the first place - in which case, the attacks are probably relatively weak.
And if you are facing weak attacks, you are only threatened by a multitude of attacks - in which case, Shield wins again because it lasts the entire round. SB only wins against either a single very weak attack, or a single guaranteed crit. Or potentially, a single attack followed by a single saving throw, assuming you can line up the timing properly.
I would agree with this ... If that was the only thing this spell did.
This singular idea is all well and fine but it gets exponentially better the higher level spells you get.
Again getting to cast a 7th level spell immediately again >>>>>>+5 AC
Especially since creatures get better attack stats, ways to get ADV, and damage that is not attack based more and more as levels progress.
Comparison to just the attack part of the spell is completely disingenuous.
Your cherry-picking and dismantling of everyone else's words aside...do you consider Lucky yo be overpoweringly broken?
Do you consider the Halfling species to be overwhelmingly unfair?
Do you consider Faerie Fire to be oppressively fun-destroying?
Your arguments all come down to "forcing someone to reroll an unfavorable outcome is so outlandishly broken I can't believe Wizards printed it." Okay. We've had reroll mechanics in the game by the truckload for ages. Why is this one, specific reroll mechanic suddenly game-shatteringly Ultra Busted Forever and going to be the thing that destroys D&D? You've been saying for this entire thread: "Using a first-level slot to do literally anything but cast Silvery Barbs is a waste of that slot" when that is categorically not true, and now you're accusing me of cheating?
"Flub the save" means the critter's first roll failed. They lost. They got hit with the spell. They got stunned. Barbs cannot change the outcome of that, not that you'd want it to. That's all Barbs can do - try to make something that was already possibly going to happen, happen. One single time, per cast, with absolutely no guarantee of actually changing that outcome.
And this is the spell that's going to break D&D forever and destroy fifth edition?
I'm still on the fence a bit, but the argument about entire teams spamming Silvery Barbs to make absolutely sure someone fails a save has been running through my mind. As a tactic, if it used by NPC's against PC's I think it would be feelsbad gaming and if used by PC's against NPC's more than once it would be feelscheap gaming. And the counterargument of "well don't do that" doesn't seem like a very strong one either. I mean, it works for the coffeelock, but there are slightly shaky rules grounds in the definitions of short and long rests, but a straight up 1st level spell like this has much less to disqualify or deny a player this. Would moving it up to level 2 solve it? Actually, I think it might. It moves it out of range of a simple MC dip or Feat or spellwrought tattoo infusion.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
I'm just simply advocating for it to be a 2nd level instead of a 1st then it's fine for me....
I don't think that's asking too much....I have yet to see how it will negatively impact the game to do this.
Especially if you will just use shield more any way in your games.... You will only have to wait until 3rd level to get this and the problem of MC dips, getting via feats, etc is completely fixed.
Will be much harder to spam if they have to go three levels in a class to get it.
I'm just simply advocating for it to be a 2nd level instead of a 1st then it's fine for me....
I don't think that's asking too much....I have yet to see how it will negatively impact the game to do this.
Especially if you will just use shield more any way in your games.... You will only have to wait until 3rd level to get this and the problem of MC dips, getting via feats, etc is completely fixed.
Will be much harder to spam if they have to go three levels in a class to get it.
Moving it to 2nd level would also move it out of reach of Feats as well. I have said before that I think 2nd level would be a good place for it, I don't think it is necessary to do, but seems like a reasonable compromise.
I'm just simply advocating for it to be a 2nd level instead of a 1st then it's fine for me....
I don't think that's asking too much....I have yet to see how it will negatively impact the game to do this.
Especially if you will just use shield more any way in your games.... You will only have to wait until 3rd level to get this and the problem of MC dips, getting via feats, etc is completely fixed.
Will be much harder to spam if they have to go three levels in a class to get it.
Moving it to 2nd level would also move it out of reach of Feats as well. I have said before that I think 2nd level would be a good place for it, I don't think it is necessary to do, but seems like a reasonable compromise.
Exactly... Seems like a reasonable approach instead of banning outright
Your cherry-picking and dismantling of everyone else's words aside...do you consider Lucky yo be overpoweringly broken?
I don't cherry pick. I do dismantle. I reply fairly methodically to everything they say.
But is Lucky 'overpowered'? No. It is top notch absolutely bonkers powerful, yes, but not quite overpowered. The reason for that is the fact it costs a feat, and is very limited number of uses a day. Silvery Barbs has nether of those limitations.
Do you consider the Halfling species to be overwhelmingly unfair?
Not generally. Their ability is vastly less important, statistically speaking, than some might have you believe. It really only helps if your DM has some homebrew extra juicy crit fail additions to the game or if your DM makes you roll for everything all the time even if there was almost no chance to fail it anyway. Because a roll of a 1 was probably going to fail no matter what and if you're doing something difficult the reroll is likely to also still fail. So 5% of the time you turn failure into...still failure, when it matters, when it is something difficult.
Do you consider Faerie Fire to be oppressively fun-destroying?
Not especially. This doesn't even have a reroll so might be adding it to the convo in error. You conflate rerolls and disadvantage/advantage several times now and the math on them is very, dramatically, different.
Say an enemy fails a save 50% of the time for simplicity sake. You can choose either an ability that grants them disadvantage on their saves 5 times or an ability that forces them to reroll 3 times. Which is better?
By your arguments and conflations, you'd have us believe forcing disadvantage on this save 5 times a day is better than the ability to force rerolls on the save 3 times. But is it?
W/Disadvantage we have 4 results. D1 Saves D2 Saves. D1 Saves D2 Fails. D1 Fails D2 Saves. D1 Fails and D2 Fails. So 25% of the time they succeed. 25% of the time you turned a success into a fail. and 50% of the time they were going to fail on the initial d20 anyway but use your limited resource for no reason.
W/Reroll we have 4 results. 50% of the time they fail and you don't use your limited resource, and 25%you turn their success into a failure, and 25% they succeeded anyway.
So you're on average only using the forced reroll every other turn while the forced disadvantage would need to be used every turn. In this scenario, with a 50/50% fail/sucess the value of rerolls is double the value of disadvantage.
They, are not the same thing.
Your arguments all come down to "forcing someone to reroll an unfavorable outcome is so outlandishly broken I can't believe Wizards printed it." Okay. We've had reroll mechanics in the game by the truckload for ages. Why is this one, specific reroll mechanic suddenly game-shatteringly Ultra Busted Forever and going to be the thing that destroys D&D?
Because it can be easily accessed by just about any class, uses a generic resource, and isn't limited to just once or twice. Lucky, is the best example to compare it to because it is also fairly accessible to people, but Lucky uses a feat, so represents a statistical investment of -1 to a ton of rolls throughout your character's entire career to be able to selectively reroll a few d20s each day... You're not paying that statistical price for barbs. Nor is it limited to just a few times.
But, as I've said before, that isn't why it is bad for the game. There are arguments for why is is strong, or arguments for why it outcompetes other spells, or arguments for why it is bad. Why it is bad is because of how it interacts with the game on a meta-level. To function, the players need to know every single d20 result of every single character/npc/enemy within 60ft of them every time a roll is made and succeeds.
The game expects the DM to now just give that information freely. The inclusion of the spell assumes the trigger will be made known. This is meta-game-shenanigans that is now being endorsed by the game design itself.
You've been saying for this entire thread: "Using a first-level slot to do literally anything but cast Silvery Barbs is a waste of that slot" when that is categorically not true, and now you're accusing me of cheating?
Am I accusing you of cheating? No. I was asking if you think it is a "thrown away" spell slot because you just would ignore the result. I have no idea what else you could mean by it being "thrown away". You're saying it would have no effect and the only way I know of, for that to happen, is if the DM, like you suggested, is ignoring the die result anyway. Did you mean something else?
"Flub the save" means the critter's first roll failed. They lost. They got hit with the spell. They got stunned. Barbs cannot change the outcome of that, not that you'd want it to.
That's like saying shield is useless because an enemy could just miss you with the attack sometimes anyway if it rolled low. It isn't a great argument.
That's all Barbs can do - try to make something that was already possibly going to happen, happen. One single time, per cast, with absolutely no guarantee of actually changing that outcome.
Makes something that was going to happen... possibly not*happen. Is what it does. Then, on the tail end, makes another thing that might have failed less likely to fail. It bends probability and is very efficient at it.
And this is the spell that's going to break D&D forever and destroy fifth edition?
Touch of hyperbole eh? lol. As well all know 5th edition has been destroyed for a while now, this spell is just nails in the coffin to keep it that way. I hear 2024 is the year of reincarnation though so we got that to look forward to I guess.
But seriously, the spell is overpowered, and, it is also bad for the game. I mean, generally something overpowered is bad for the game as a result of being overpowered but this spell is bad for the game as a result of that, and, as a result of what it means for the logistics of actual play and the meta-game-shenanigans it creates. You should get to know, by virtue of having access to this spell, every time a creature with 60ft of you succeeds on a save, ability check, or attack roll. That, is bad for the game.
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen* Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it. DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh.... Player: ...well? Barbs time?
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.
And also, just because I'm curious: what sort of effects do folks think would be allowed for first-level reaction spells? Everybody hates Barbs, everybody hates Shield, everybody hates Absorb Elements, everybody hates Hellish Rebuke...what would a proper first-level reaction look like, if Barbs, Shield, and Absorb are all OHH-PEE and Rebuke is useless garbage?
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen* Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it. DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh.... Player: ...well? Barbs time?
It is bad for the game.
This is a bullshit argument for terrible game masters.
First of all, relevant text from the spell:
A creature YOU CAN SEE. Things which you cannot see, creatures you are unaware of, do not trigger the spell. And no, you don't get to "see" the assassin up until he succeeds on his stealth check. The check is to determine if he remains unseen or not. And the earlier "a nobleman rolls Insight to pierce the bard's Deception" thing fails because you have no idea if that creature succeeded on its check or not and no way of knowing if it did barring mind-reading magic or an Insight check of your own.
A DM does not, even slightly, have to permit the presence of Silvery Barbs at a table to be an automatic universal everything detector. That is way beyond the bounds of all logic, reason, and intuitive sense and anyone with a basic grasp on proper DMing knows it. Barbs lets you influence an event you can see is about to succeed that you would prefer not to. If you cannot see the event? No Barbs. If you cannot determine the success or failure of the event? No Barbs.
Can someone twist RAW to try and force the DM to tell them the result of every single roll ever?
Sure. And the DM is equally welcome to say "stop that or leave my table" because it's ruining the game for everybody and even the guy doing it knows it.
And also, just because I'm curious: what sort of effects do folks think would be allowed for first-level reaction spells? Everybody hates Barbs, everybody hates Shield, everybody hates Absorb Elements, everybody hates Hellish Rebuke...what would a proper first-level reaction look like, if Barbs, Shield, and Absorb are all OHH-PEE and Rebuke is useless garbage?
I don't hate any of those, but none of those can quite lead to the feelsbad gaming shenanigans I mentioned earlier, either. Just like we have to design systems for the rather inept, we also have to design systems assuming that some of our user base is going to be very adept at breaking the turds out of our system. If it's possible and rules legal to use a part of the game in a certain way and if using it in that way will produce mechanically rewarding results you can be sure that it will be used that way and plan accordingly.
I could see .. maybe a reaction based spell that let's you reroll a flubbed Physical ability check or saving throw? I dunno, just shooting off the top of my mind.
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen* Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it. DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh.... Player: ...well? Barbs time?
It is bad for the game.
This is a bullshit argument for terrible game masters.
First of all, relevant text from the spell:
A creature YOU CAN SEE. Things which you cannot see, creatures you are unaware of, do not trigger the spell. And no, you don't get to "see" the assassin up until he succeeds on his stealth check. The check is to determine if he remains unseen or not.
If he ties to hide while within 60ft of you, you can barbs it, because he can be seen before then, so you can see him. Even if he was just walking by and you didn't know to on the lookout for it, because all of a sudden the trigger for barbs is up and you can cast it.
And the earlier "a nobleman rolls Insight to pierce the bard's Deception" thing fails because you have no idea if that creature succeeded on its check or not and no way of knowing if it did barring mind-reading magic or an Insight check of your own.
That is my point. The spell creates this nonsense dynamic where it now expected that the DM gives you information you shouldn't have. That's bad for the game. You shouldn't know a roll is even being made let alone have a spell that specifically is designed to interfere with that roll. What if an NPC is making an Arcana roll to recall some lore, and you barbs that. How, how should you by any rights know that the NPC was thinking about his wizard college days and whether or not he remembered some arcane lore?
The spell presumes on some meta-game level that you should and do in fact have this information, because this information is the trigger for the spell.
Bad, bad game design.
A DM does not, even slightly, have to permit the presence of Silvery Barbs at a table to be an automatic universal everything detector. That is way beyond the bounds of all logic, reason, and intuitive sense and anyone with a basic grasp on proper DMing knows it. Barbs lets you influence an event you can see is about to succeed that you would prefer not to. If you cannot see the event? No Barbs. If you cannot determine the success or failure of the event? No Barbs.
You can homebrew the spell to add these restriction, yes. The spell, as written, doesn't have them. It applies whenever the creature you see makes a roll. Even if you don't know about the roll so long as you see the creature you can silvery barbs it. It is wrong on a meta-game level and you seem to agree but just didn't realize it was a problem.
Can someone twist RAW to try and force the DM to tell them the result of every single roll ever?
Sure. And the DM is equally welcome to say "stop that or leave my table" because it's ruining the game for everybody and even the guy doing it knows it.
Twist RAW? No it is RAW. That is why there is a problem. You're suggesting you'd kick people from your table for expecting to use the spell as written. Obviously. Clearly, That means the spell is bad for the game.
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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.
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen* Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it. DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh.... Player: ...well? Barbs time?
You do have to see the thing to be able to Barbs it, so maaaaybe not the best example there
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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)
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen* Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it. DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh.... Player: ...well? Barbs time?
You do have to see the thing to be able to Barbs it, so maaaaybe not the best example there
You're not hidden until after the stealth check. So.
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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.
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen* Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it. DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh.... Player: ...well? Barbs time?
You do have to see the thing to be able to Barbs it, so maaaaybe not the best example there
You're not hidden until after the stealth check. So.
Or you weren't even in their line of sight when making the stealth check to sneak past them or up to them. So
EDIT: More to the point, the whole point of the stealth check is to determine whether you were seen. If you can use Barbs on that check, wouldn't that then require another Stealth/passive Perception check? If you fail that one too, do you want to try Barbsing it? How far down that hole do you want to go, exactly?
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)
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen* Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it. DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh.... Player: ...well? Barbs time?
You do have to see the thing to be able to Barbs it, so maaaaybe not the best example there
You're not hidden until after the stealth check. So.
You cannot attempt to hide if anyone can see you. That’s one of the few well-defined rules around hiding.
You cannot attempt to hide if anyone can see you. That’s one of the few well-defined rules around hiding.
No, you cannot attempt to hide if anyone can see you clearly. The situation with light obscurement is not defined. Though I would generally rule that silvery barbs requires the action itself be visible, so you can't use it to negate Sleight of Hand, and I'd be pretty dubious about deception or even persuasion.
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen* Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it. DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh.... Player: ...well? Barbs time?
You do have to see the thing to be able to Barbs it, so maaaaybe not the best example there
You're not hidden until after the stealth check. So.
You cannot attempt to hide if anyone can see you. That’s one of the few well-defined rules around hiding.
...you, can though. You're uh, wrong.
I mean, this is off topic at this point but by default you can hide so long as you're not clearly seen, not just seen. Plenty of abilities let you hide even while being observed and only partially obscured. Look at Wood Elves for a common example: "You can attempt to hide even when you are only lightly obscured by foliage, heavy rain, falling snow, mist, and other natural phenomena."
You can watch them hide. Stare them straight into their orbital sockets as they vanish into the rain. Wood elves are spooky.
Also, generally, the phrasing you have is wrong too. By default, you can absolutely hide while being watched by a creature that can see you clearly, you just can't hide from that creature.
The point. There are cases where having this spell means your DM should be giving you information you shouldn't have. Whether it is someone's history check, or insight check, or etc. The spell triggers off a creature who you can see rolling a successful d20, any ability check works. Even if it doesn't make sense that you character would understand a 'check' was being made, somehow they can cast this spell in response to it.
Think of all the weird ability checks this spell can, should, be capable of forcing a reroll. Deception is a fun one.
The thief lies to you, you roll insight, he succeeds on his deception check, but the DM tells you he succeeds because you need to know if you can barbs him or not. But, if you know he succeeds then... did he actually succeed?? Can you just never get lied to again because of simply having the spell??
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 know the counterargument is "you have to see them doing the ability check" but there are a couple things wrong wit that sentiment.
That isn't what the spell says. The spell's casting time is 1 reaction which you take "when a creature you can see within 60 feet of yourself succeeds on an attack roll, an ability check, or a saving throw". You just need to see the creature when they make the check. It says nothing about "seeing the check"
"Seeing the check" is a meaningless sentiment you can't see a check. That is the whole point of my issue with the spell. There is no ingame way for a character to know a check is being made. So how then do they know that they can cast this spell??? They simply can. But, if they can, then they know a check is being made...
So, a character with this spell know whenever a check is succeeded by any creature within 60ft of themselves, somehow.
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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.
Then kill it, Rav. Make it die. Ban it from your table, and from any table you play at.
A reminder, however, that there is one other RAW that matters here. And that is "the DM is the final arbiter of the rules; their word trumps anything written in any book."
You're insisting the spell is bad because if it was used by someone at a table run by a robot with no understanding of human interaction, it would cause mechanical issues. That's not how D&D works. The DM exists to smooth over issues like this and apply common, intuitive sense - or game design chops, if they have them - to their game. No, the DM does not have to give you spit. If a thief succeeds on Deception, that DM is under no obligation to reveal that fact no matter what Silvery Barbs' spell text says. If, to you, that means the spell text is bad and the spell needs to die? Then kill it. But please stop assuming everyone else is a mindless dogmatic robot unable to do anything but execute their programming.
When the spell is used as intended, it's a neat trick spellcasters can use to manipulate luck in a minor, very spellcaster-y way. If people are ******canoes with it, that's a table problem. The spell might've caused the table problem, but that doesn't make it a universal-to-D&D problem.
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I would agree with this ... If that was the only thing this spell did.
This singular idea is all well and fine but it gets exponentially better the higher level spells you get.
Again getting to cast a 7th level spell immediately again >>>>>>+5 AC
Especially since creatures get better attack stats, ways to get ADV, and damage that is not attack based more and more as levels progress.
Comparison to just the attack part of the spell is completely disingenuous.
Ravnodaus.
Your cherry-picking and dismantling of everyone else's words aside...do you consider Lucky yo be overpoweringly broken?
Do you consider the Halfling species to be overwhelmingly unfair?
Do you consider Faerie Fire to be oppressively fun-destroying?
Your arguments all come down to "forcing someone to reroll an unfavorable outcome is so outlandishly broken I can't believe Wizards printed it." Okay. We've had reroll mechanics in the game by the truckload for ages. Why is this one, specific reroll mechanic suddenly game-shatteringly Ultra Busted Forever and going to be the thing that destroys D&D? You've been saying for this entire thread: "Using a first-level slot to do literally anything but cast Silvery Barbs is a waste of that slot" when that is categorically not true, and now you're accusing me of cheating?
"Flub the save" means the critter's first roll failed. They lost. They got hit with the spell. They got stunned. Barbs cannot change the outcome of that, not that you'd want it to. That's all Barbs can do - try to make something that was already possibly going to happen, happen. One single time, per cast, with absolutely no guarantee of actually changing that outcome.
And this is the spell that's going to break D&D forever and destroy fifth edition?
Please do not contact or message me.
I'm still on the fence a bit, but the argument about entire teams spamming Silvery Barbs to make absolutely sure someone fails a save has been running through my mind. As a tactic, if it used by NPC's against PC's I think it would be feelsbad gaming and if used by PC's against NPC's more than once it would be feelscheap gaming. And the counterargument of "well don't do that" doesn't seem like a very strong one either. I mean, it works for the coffeelock, but there are slightly shaky rules grounds in the definitions of short and long rests, but a straight up 1st level spell like this has much less to disqualify or deny a player this. Would moving it up to level 2 solve it? Actually, I think it might. It moves it out of range of a simple MC dip or Feat or spellwrought tattoo infusion.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
I'm just simply advocating for it to be a 2nd level instead of a 1st then it's fine for me....
I don't think that's asking too much....I have yet to see how it will negatively impact the game to do this.
Especially if you will just use shield more any way in your games.... You will only have to wait until 3rd level to get this and the problem of MC dips, getting via feats, etc is completely fixed.
Will be much harder to spam if they have to go three levels in a class to get it.
Moving it to 2nd level would also move it out of reach of Feats as well. I have said before that I think 2nd level would be a good place for it, I don't think it is necessary to do, but seems like a reasonable compromise.
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
Exactly... Seems like a reasonable approach instead of banning outright
I mean, I already did that. I even fixed the "no cool fluff" thing some people were arguing. I got, more-or-less, ignored. Heh.
Please do not contact or message me.
I don't cherry pick. I do dismantle. I reply fairly methodically to everything they say.
But is Lucky 'overpowered'? No. It is top notch absolutely bonkers powerful, yes, but not quite overpowered. The reason for that is the fact it costs a feat, and is very limited number of uses a day. Silvery Barbs has nether of those limitations.
Not generally. Their ability is vastly less important, statistically speaking, than some might have you believe. It really only helps if your DM has some homebrew extra juicy crit fail additions to the game or if your DM makes you roll for everything all the time even if there was almost no chance to fail it anyway. Because a roll of a 1 was probably going to fail no matter what and if you're doing something difficult the reroll is likely to also still fail. So 5% of the time you turn failure into...still failure, when it matters, when it is something difficult.
Not especially. This doesn't even have a reroll so might be adding it to the convo in error. You conflate rerolls and disadvantage/advantage several times now and the math on them is very, dramatically, different.
Say an enemy fails a save 50% of the time for simplicity sake. You can choose either an ability that grants them disadvantage on their saves 5 times or an ability that forces them to reroll 3 times. Which is better?
By your arguments and conflations, you'd have us believe forcing disadvantage on this save 5 times a day is better than the ability to force rerolls on the save 3 times. But is it?
W/Disadvantage we have 4 results. D1 Saves D2 Saves. D1 Saves D2 Fails. D1 Fails D2 Saves. D1 Fails and D2 Fails. So 25% of the time they succeed. 25% of the time you turned a success into a fail. and 50% of the time they were going to fail on the initial d20 anyway but use your limited resource for no reason.
W/Reroll we have 4 results. 50% of the time they fail and you don't use your limited resource, and 25%you turn their success into a failure, and 25% they succeeded anyway.
So you're on average only using the forced reroll every other turn while the forced disadvantage would need to be used every turn. In this scenario, with a 50/50% fail/sucess the value of rerolls is double the value of disadvantage.
They, are not the same thing.
Because it can be easily accessed by just about any class, uses a generic resource, and isn't limited to just once or twice. Lucky, is the best example to compare it to because it is also fairly accessible to people, but Lucky uses a feat, so represents a statistical investment of -1 to a ton of rolls throughout your character's entire career to be able to selectively reroll a few d20s each day... You're not paying that statistical price for barbs. Nor is it limited to just a few times.
But, as I've said before, that isn't why it is bad for the game. There are arguments for why is is strong, or arguments for why it outcompetes other spells, or arguments for why it is bad. Why it is bad is because of how it interacts with the game on a meta-level. To function, the players need to know every single d20 result of every single character/npc/enemy within 60ft of them every time a roll is made and succeeds.
The game expects the DM to now just give that information freely. The inclusion of the spell assumes the trigger will be made known. This is meta-game-shenanigans that is now being endorsed by the game design itself.
Am I accusing you of cheating? No. I was asking if you think it is a "thrown away" spell slot because you just would ignore the result. I have no idea what else you could mean by it being "thrown away". You're saying it would have no effect and the only way I know of, for that to happen, is if the DM, like you suggested, is ignoring the die result anyway. Did you mean something else?
That's like saying shield is useless because an enemy could just miss you with the attack sometimes anyway if it rolled low. It isn't a great argument.
Makes something that was going to happen... possibly not* happen. Is what it does. Then, on the tail end, makes another thing that might have failed less likely to fail. It bends probability and is very efficient at it.
Touch of hyperbole eh? lol. As well all know 5th edition has been destroyed for a while now, this spell is just nails in the coffin to keep it that way. I hear 2024 is the year of reincarnation though so we got that to look forward to I guess.
But seriously, the spell is overpowered, and, it is also bad for the game. I mean, generally something overpowered is bad for the game as a result of being overpowered but this spell is bad for the game as a result of that, and, as a result of what it means for the logistics of actual play and the meta-game-shenanigans it creates. You should get to know, by virtue of having access to this spell, every time a creature with 60ft of you succeeds on a save, ability check, or attack roll. That, is bad for the game.
DM: *rolls dice behind the screen*
Player: Yo I have Silvery Barbs is something happening with 60ft I can change with it.
DM: *looking at the successful stealth check the assassin NPC just rolled* Uh... uh....
Player: ...well? Barbs time?
It is bad for the game.
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.
And also, just because I'm curious: what sort of effects do folks think would be allowed for first-level reaction spells? Everybody hates Barbs, everybody hates Shield, everybody hates Absorb Elements, everybody hates Hellish Rebuke...what would a proper first-level reaction look like, if Barbs, Shield, and Absorb are all OHH-PEE and Rebuke is useless garbage?
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This is a bullshit argument for terrible game masters.
First of all, relevant text from the spell:
A creature YOU CAN SEE. Things which you cannot see, creatures you are unaware of, do not trigger the spell. And no, you don't get to "see" the assassin up until he succeeds on his stealth check. The check is to determine if he remains unseen or not. And the earlier "a nobleman rolls Insight to pierce the bard's Deception" thing fails because you have no idea if that creature succeeded on its check or not and no way of knowing if it did barring mind-reading magic or an Insight check of your own.
A DM does not, even slightly, have to permit the presence of Silvery Barbs at a table to be an automatic universal everything detector. That is way beyond the bounds of all logic, reason, and intuitive sense and anyone with a basic grasp on proper DMing knows it. Barbs lets you influence an event you can see is about to succeed that you would prefer not to. If you cannot see the event? No Barbs. If you cannot determine the success or failure of the event? No Barbs.
Can someone twist RAW to try and force the DM to tell them the result of every single roll ever?
Sure. And the DM is equally welcome to say "stop that or leave my table" because it's ruining the game for everybody and even the guy doing it knows it.
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I don't hate any of those, but none of those can quite lead to the feelsbad gaming shenanigans I mentioned earlier, either. Just like we have to design systems for the rather inept, we also have to design systems assuming that some of our user base is going to be very adept at breaking the turds out of our system. If it's possible and rules legal to use a part of the game in a certain way and if using it in that way will produce mechanically rewarding results you can be sure that it will be used that way and plan accordingly.
I could see .. maybe a reaction based spell that let's you reroll a flubbed Physical ability check or saving throw? I dunno, just shooting off the top of my mind.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
If he ties to hide while within 60ft of you, you can barbs it, because he can be seen before then, so you can see him. Even if he was just walking by and you didn't know to on the lookout for it, because all of a sudden the trigger for barbs is up and you can cast it.
That is my point. The spell creates this nonsense dynamic where it now expected that the DM gives you information you shouldn't have. That's bad for the game. You shouldn't know a roll is even being made let alone have a spell that specifically is designed to interfere with that roll. What if an NPC is making an Arcana roll to recall some lore, and you barbs that. How, how should you by any rights know that the NPC was thinking about his wizard college days and whether or not he remembered some arcane lore?
The spell presumes on some meta-game level that you should and do in fact have this information, because this information is the trigger for the spell.
Bad, bad game design.
You can homebrew the spell to add these restriction, yes. The spell, as written, doesn't have them. It applies whenever the creature you see makes a roll. Even if you don't know about the roll so long as you see the creature you can silvery barbs it. It is wrong on a meta-game level and you seem to agree but just didn't realize it was a problem.
Twist RAW? No it is RAW. That is why there is a problem. You're suggesting you'd kick people from your table for expecting to use the spell as written. Obviously. Clearly, That means the spell is bad for the game.
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.
You do have to see the thing to be able to Barbs it, so maaaaybe not the best example there
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)
You're not hidden until after the stealth check. So.
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.
Or you weren't even in their line of sight when making the stealth check to sneak past them or up to them. So
EDIT: More to the point, the whole point of the stealth check is to determine whether you were seen. If you can use Barbs on that check, wouldn't that then require another Stealth/passive Perception check? If you fail that one too, do you want to try Barbsing it? How far down that hole do you want to go, exactly?
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)
You cannot attempt to hide if anyone can see you. That’s one of the few well-defined rules around hiding.
No, you cannot attempt to hide if anyone can see you clearly. The situation with light obscurement is not defined. Though I would generally rule that silvery barbs requires the action itself be visible, so you can't use it to negate Sleight of Hand, and I'd be pretty dubious about deception or even persuasion.
...you, can though. You're uh, wrong.
I mean, this is off topic at this point but by default you can hide so long as you're not clearly seen, not just seen. Plenty of abilities let you hide even while being observed and only partially obscured. Look at Wood Elves for a common example: "You can attempt to hide even when you are only lightly obscured by foliage, heavy rain, falling snow, mist, and other natural phenomena."
You can watch them hide. Stare them straight into their orbital sockets as they vanish into the rain. Wood elves are spooky.
Also, generally, the phrasing you have is wrong too. By default, you can absolutely hide while being watched by a creature that can see you clearly, you just can't hide from that creature.
The point. There are cases where having this spell means your DM should be giving you information you shouldn't have. Whether it is someone's history check, or insight check, or etc. The spell triggers off a creature who you can see rolling a successful d20, any ability check works. Even if it doesn't make sense that you character would understand a 'check' was being made, somehow they can cast this spell in response to it.
Think of all the weird ability checks this spell can, should, be capable of forcing a reroll. Deception is a fun one.
The thief lies to you, you roll insight, he succeeds on his deception check, but the DM tells you he succeeds because you need to know if you can barbs him or not. But, if you know he succeeds then... did he actually succeed?? Can you just never get lied to again because of simply having the spell??
The spell is a can of worms.
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 know the counterargument is "you have to see them doing the ability check" but there are a couple things wrong wit that sentiment.
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.
Then kill it, Rav. Make it die. Ban it from your table, and from any table you play at.
A reminder, however, that there is one other RAW that matters here. And that is "the DM is the final arbiter of the rules; their word trumps anything written in any book."
You're insisting the spell is bad because if it was used by someone at a table run by a robot with no understanding of human interaction, it would cause mechanical issues. That's not how D&D works. The DM exists to smooth over issues like this and apply common, intuitive sense - or game design chops, if they have them - to their game. No, the DM does not have to give you spit. If a thief succeeds on Deception, that DM is under no obligation to reveal that fact no matter what Silvery Barbs' spell text says. If, to you, that means the spell text is bad and the spell needs to die? Then kill it. But please stop assuming everyone else is a mindless dogmatic robot unable to do anything but execute their programming.
When the spell is used as intended, it's a neat trick spellcasters can use to manipulate luck in a minor, very spellcaster-y way. If people are ******canoes with it, that's a table problem. The spell might've caused the table problem, but that doesn't make it a universal-to-D&D problem.
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