AC does not grow with level unless the DM is purposely handing out +3 armors consecutively. A player's resource pool does grow with level which helps counter the higher hitting enemies. I don't know why you have a party of 21+ AC's but that's the way y'all run your game that's cool but from everything that I know and have looked up that is not the norm.
And I'm not saying the artificer class is at fault, but players choosing to spec into AC boosts *only* which unbalances the rest of the party. That class has a billion options at level 20 that doesn't have to be *only* AC. Again, I urge you to read the large post above that perfectly summarizes all the issues with a super high AC player in a party.
I have read the entire post. I urge you to refrain from condescension as a debate tool.
There are no +3 armours on any of the characters in my party. Exaggeration is also a poor debate tool. It takes very little for most characters to get 21AC and it is wise investment to pursue in terms of longevity, especially when you have a tank running around with 24AC. A +1 armour and +2 shield (exactly what every character is rocking in my party) is going to get most characters to +20AC. For characters who don’t use armour and/or shields, there are other items to boost AC and plenty of other ways to protect yourself aside from AC.
I will reiterate that, if the DM is going to allow an artificer into the game—a character that can easily obtain a mitt full of rare items by tier 3 and 4–then it behooves the DM to ensure that the rest of the characters have access to a mitt full of rare items by tier 3 and 4 rather than expecting the artificer to sandbag themselves. Running around at level 14 with a 15AC is suicidal. Expecting anyone to accommodate such a choice is encouraging foolishly suboptimal gameplay, which might be your thing but cannot be reasonably expected as the norm.
AC does not grow with level unless the DM is purposely handing out +3 armors consecutively. A player's resource pool does grow with level which helps counter the higher hitting enemies. I don't know why you have a party of 21+ AC's but that's the way y'all run your game that's cool but from everything that I know and have looked up that is not the norm.
AC of 21 or above is definitely the norm at tier three. A suit of +3 armor is classified as Very Rare, and at tier three the party should have multiple Very Rare magic items. Your complaints seem to stem from either having a low-magic campaign (in which case, why was an artificer allowed in the first place?) or thinking that the party's equipment shouldn't improve after tier one.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I guess we just disagree unless the entire party is taking shields and speccing into AC boosts. Non heavy armor characters would have to be boosting DEX and take shields/other feats to have an average party AC of 21 pre spell buffs. If everyone takes shields and prioritizes AC boosts in your games, we just play in fundamentally different ways and there's really no more to say to that.
But anyway, we definitely got away from my main point which is what the OP was about: 1 character having incredibly higher AC over the others which becomes a balancing headache for the reasons in the post i mentioned.
But anyway, we definitely got away from my main point which is what the OP was about: 1 character having incredibly higher AC over the others which becomes a balancing headache for the reasons in the post i mentioned.
With all the enemy attacking the rest of the party rather than the high AC character. then doesn't become much of a problem any more.
The player with the high AC character might feel safe, but the rest of the party might want his character to start doing more to avoid them being the target of every enemy.
How does one make a successful tank as I have made something similar with the high AC at level 3 but do want to be more effective at helping my party then just standing there not getting hit. Like sure, I won't die but what about my friends that don't have a tank?
The tanks job is not to avoid being hit but to make yourself more important to hit than your squishie friends. A lot of that will come down to battlefield positioning and preventing or deterring enemies going past you. So a reach weapon combined with polearm master and sentinel can be hilariously funny for stopping people in their tracks. Having control spells cast by party members like spike growth, wall of x, even the humble create bonfire will reduce the enemies options. Tank with reasonable armour and high hp, an Ancestral barbarian can give enemies disadvantage on attacks against other party members. There are so many possibilities so just dig in and have fun!
How does one make a successful tank as I have made something similar with the high AC at level 3 but do want to be more effective at helping my party then just standing there not getting hit. Like sure, I won't die but what about my friends that don't have a tank?
To be very honest, "tanking" is mechanically under supported in 5E. At least if you're trying to go for the convergence of "heavily armored melee combatant" and "prevents enemy damage from landing on allies." There are some ways to go about it, most of them involve imposing Disadvantage on enemies hitting anyone but yourself, but this is a very soft control and so doesn't actually force enemies to attack you, it just incentivizes them. Tactics to make sure enemies target you and not your allies depend on nebulous things like attracting attention and ire since "aggro" is not a mechanic that exists at all in 5E, which means that classic MMO tanking relies on your DM playing into the fantasy and making sure enemies don't simply ... walk around you.
The actual tactic that prevents enemies from hitting allies in 5E is Control and most of those techniques come from spells like Hypnotic Pattern or Hold Person. Which means that if you define tanking as preventing enemies from hitting allies, full casters are the best tanks in 5E.
So if you want to play the fantasy of a heavily armored melee combatant protecting your friends, know that there are ways to build for it, but part of it is just going to be talking to your DM and expressing that this would be fun for you and working with them to make that come true.
In addition to what's been said, there are multiple ways to build a tank. For example, as a Paladin, there is the spell Command makes it disadvantageous to attack anyone but you...whereas a Barbarian might Rage and demand their attention by threatening them with serious damage if they don't attack him...it depends on how you want to achieve your goals.
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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.
I guess we just disagree unless the entire party is taking shields and speccing into AC boosts. Non heavy armor characters would have to be boosting DEX and take shields/other feats to have an average party AC of 21 pre spell buffs. If everyone takes shields and prioritizes AC boosts in your games, we just play in fundamentally different ways and there's really no more to say to that.
But anyway, we definitely got away from my main point which is what the OP was about: 1 character having incredibly higher AC over the others which becomes a balancing headache for the reasons in the post i mentioned.
It’s super easy to get a high AC even at level 1. An 18 dex and studded leather is 17. Throw on a regular shield and thats a 19 before any magical items or spells. Likewise a fighter with scale, shield and 14 dex has an 18 AC straight out the gate. Make that character a warforged forge domain cleric and that becomes aa base of 20 and the shield of faith spell puts it up to 22 as a starting level 1 character with no shenanigans at all.
Once you’ve got your AC adjusted to where it should actually be, the issue isn’t so bad.
If I were DMing you, I’d simply have monsters adapt the way they naturally should, if an unhittable tank hoves into view; use grapplers (ability contest) to occupy you, use effects with saving throws targeted at you, and just naturally have the monsters work around you. You would probably be the focus of most of the monsters actions, so you’d definitely be playing your role. I think it’s a bit unimaginative of the dm to assume that high ac means the game is ruined; there are lots of ways around it, especially with spells and effects.
The main task of the tank is to protect its allies. The best way to do that, is to have abilities that either stop the enemy from going after them (eg Oath of the Crown), or make your allies harder to hit (eg Path of the Ancestral Guardian).
Being a tank has nothing to do with having a lot of AC. It has to do with protecting your allies. Although of course, collaterally it is essential that you can endure on the front line. If you fall, they fall. In addition to the fact that if they can't hit them, they will hit you.
As long as the 25 AC is following all of the rules set out by the DM before character creation, then all you are doing is being the party's tank. Not much wrong with that.
As long as the 25 AC is following all of the rules set out by the DM before character creation, then all you are doing is being the party's tank. Not much wrong with that.
A tank needs enemies to attack them in order to be effective; if enemies can't even hit them, then they have no incentive to try, so it's entirely logical for the DM to have enemies ignore the high AC player completely and attack everyone else instead.
So by pushing an overly high AC for the current stage of play, a player will actively harm the rest of their party.
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It's interesting how many people assume that the GM is just going to metagame monsters by having them realize that their +7 to hit is going to be ineffective against a PC with 25 AC and have those monsters default to attacking a different party member.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
It's interesting how many people assume that the GM is just going to metagame monsters by having them realize that their +7 to hit is going to be ineffective against a PC with 25 AC and have those monsters default to attacking a different party member.
If someone shows up to a fight looking like a walking tank, then your average bandit should be able to work out that their basic weapons will be useless. Even less intelligent enemies should realise that if something isn't working they should try something else (i.e- avoid the enemy they can't hurt, attacks ones that they can).
It's not meta-gaming to have enemies demonstrate a basic level of intelligence, it's only meta-gaming if they do it using knowledge they wouldn't have. But "metal too hard, sticks not work" isn't exactly advanced stuff. 😝
You could for example argue that someone using shield or Patient Defence to boost their AC might not be obviously hard to hit at first, so they would need to use those abilities before enemies will realise. But once the enemy sees what they can do, they're allowed to change tactics.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
An average NPC that lacks any sort of specific magical abilities of discernment can be reasonably assumed to figure out that someone wearing heavy armor is probably going to be harder to hit than someone who's not wearing armor. But that's really as far as that should go. Multiple people in this thread have posted that "if your AC is too high, enemies will just ignore you." Which given that the majority of the methods used for pumping one's AC up would not be readily apparent and consequently would not be things that an enemy would actually know. If an enemy wants to spend several rounds attacking a PC who's jacked their armor class up into the mid to high 20s and isn't able to hit them, then yes, that enemy is justified in concluding that they can't match them. But having enemies who just look at that character and conclude that they're simply going to avoid them and go after the rest of the party as was recommended? That's bad GMing.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
An average NPC that lacks any sort of specific magical abilities of discernment can be reasonably assumed to figure out that someone wearing heavy armor is probably going to be harder to hit than someone who's not wearing armor. But that's really as far as that should go. Multiple people in this thread have posted that "if your AC is too high, enemies will just ignore you." Which given that the majority of the methods used for pumping one's AC up would not be readily apparent and consequently would not be things that an enemy would actually know. If an enemy wants to spend several rounds attacking a PC who's jacked their armor class up into the mid to high 20s and isn't able to hit them, then yes, that enemy is justified in concluding that they can't match them. But having enemies who just look at that character and conclude that they're simply going to avoid them and go after the rest of the party as was recommended? That's bad GMing.
I like your point and I also think this is bad GMing
Who's proposing that enemies should meta-game? "Enemies can just ignore you if your AC is too high for them to hit" isn't the same as saying "enemies automatically know what your AC is (or can be boosted to) so will always ignore you from round one". You seem to be assuming bad GMing in order to get a conclusion of bad GMing.
There are multiple ways for enemies to determine your AC; first is if it's obvious (tonnes of armour), then there's trial and error (one enemy made what should have been a devastating hit but was blocked magically, so other enemies get to respond to that). It's no different to a player using burning hands and enemies repositioning to avoid it; enemies can use information they have in order to make better decisions.
There's also word of mouth; if you've already fought your way through the guards at a cave entrance but an alarm was raised, then enemies further in may already know what they're up against. Word of mouth can also be less immediate, like the evil sorcerer who hears rumours of an adventuring party that seeks to stop them, so scries on his enemies, or sends out spies, to learn about them and orders his minions to adapt (smart boss triggers smarter grunts). This is one reason why it's a good idea for parties to be more surreptitious and stealthy, because every murder-hobo escapade is a chance for the big bad to learn of you and your abilities.
Plus, a good DM should challenge players, and that means accounting for their strengths; that doesn't mean nullifying those strengths in every fight (that would be bad DMing) but players should encounter smarter enemies, fiendish traps, tricky immunities, nasty spells, consequences of earlier actions etc. etc. otherwise combat just becomes a boring chore you have to suffer through. The best combats are like good puzzles, where you have to figure out the best way to deal with the challenges before you, but if your main answer to every problem is "my AC is so high I can hardly ever be hit" then it's reasonable to expect a common challenge to be "enemies don't want to keep wasting their time attacking you".
Btw, the converse argument is that pumping up your AC without considering how enemies might react to it is bad playing; that's not to say every player who does it is a bad player, as maximising your defence and/or offence are perfectly natural things to want to do (the challenge of how to build your character is part of the game), but what's best for your character isn't always what's best for the party. Experienced players are aware of what the consequences might be, and an experienced DM will try to inform new players of what they might be, but sometimes you've got inexperienced players with an inexperienced DM so these things just happen, that doesn't mean either of them is to blame.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
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I have read the entire post. I urge you to refrain from condescension as a debate tool.
There are no +3 armours on any of the characters in my party. Exaggeration is also a poor debate tool. It takes very little for most characters to get 21AC and it is wise investment to pursue in terms of longevity, especially when you have a tank running around with 24AC. A +1 armour and +2 shield (exactly what every character is rocking in my party) is going to get most characters to +20AC. For characters who don’t use armour and/or shields, there are other items to boost AC and plenty of other ways to protect yourself aside from AC.
I will reiterate that, if the DM is going to allow an artificer into the game—a character that can easily obtain a mitt full of rare items by tier 3 and 4–then it behooves the DM to ensure that the rest of the characters have access to a mitt full of rare items by tier 3 and 4 rather than expecting the artificer to sandbag themselves. Running around at level 14 with a 15AC is suicidal. Expecting anyone to accommodate such a choice is encouraging foolishly suboptimal gameplay, which might be your thing but cannot be reasonably expected as the norm.
AC of 21 or above is definitely the norm at tier three. A suit of +3 armor is classified as Very Rare, and at tier three the party should have multiple Very Rare magic items. Your complaints seem to stem from either having a low-magic campaign (in which case, why was an artificer allowed in the first place?) or thinking that the party's equipment shouldn't improve after tier one.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I guess we just disagree unless the entire party is taking shields and speccing into AC boosts. Non heavy armor characters would have to be boosting DEX and take shields/other feats to have an average party AC of 21 pre spell buffs. If everyone takes shields and prioritizes AC boosts in your games, we just play in fundamentally different ways and there's really no more to say to that.
But anyway, we definitely got away from my main point which is what the OP was about: 1 character having incredibly higher AC over the others which becomes a balancing headache for the reasons in the post i mentioned.
With all the enemy attacking the rest of the party rather than the high AC character. then doesn't become much of a problem any more.
The player with the high AC character might feel safe, but the rest of the party might want his character to start doing more to avoid them being the target of every enemy.
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How does one make a successful tank as I have made something similar with the high AC at level 3 but do want to be more effective at helping my party then just standing there not getting hit. Like sure, I won't die but what about my friends that don't have a tank?
Get between your lower AC'd friends and the enemies, then hit those enemies with something pointy.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
The tanks job is not to avoid being hit but to make yourself more important to hit than your squishie friends. A lot of that will come down to battlefield positioning and preventing or deterring enemies going past you. So a reach weapon combined with polearm master and sentinel can be hilariously funny for stopping people in their tracks. Having control spells cast by party members like spike growth, wall of x, even the humble create bonfire will reduce the enemies options. Tank with reasonable armour and high hp, an Ancestral barbarian can give enemies disadvantage on attacks against other party members. There are so many possibilities so just dig in and have fun!
To be very honest, "tanking" is mechanically under supported in 5E. At least if you're trying to go for the convergence of "heavily armored melee combatant" and "prevents enemy damage from landing on allies." There are some ways to go about it, most of them involve imposing Disadvantage on enemies hitting anyone but yourself, but this is a very soft control and so doesn't actually force enemies to attack you, it just incentivizes them. Tactics to make sure enemies target you and not your allies depend on nebulous things like attracting attention and ire since "aggro" is not a mechanic that exists at all in 5E, which means that classic MMO tanking relies on your DM playing into the fantasy and making sure enemies don't simply ... walk around you.
The actual tactic that prevents enemies from hitting allies in 5E is Control and most of those techniques come from spells like Hypnotic Pattern or Hold Person. Which means that if you define tanking as preventing enemies from hitting allies, full casters are the best tanks in 5E.
So if you want to play the fantasy of a heavily armored melee combatant protecting your friends, know that there are ways to build for it, but part of it is just going to be talking to your DM and expressing that this would be fun for you and working with them to make that come true.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
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To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
In addition to what's been said, there are multiple ways to build a tank. For example, as a Paladin, there is the spell Command makes it disadvantageous to attack anyone but you...whereas a Barbarian might Rage and demand their attention by threatening them with serious damage if they don't attack him...it depends on how you want to achieve your goals.
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.
It’s super easy to get a high AC even at level 1. An 18 dex and studded leather is 17. Throw on a regular shield and thats a 19 before any magical items or spells. Likewise a fighter with scale, shield and 14 dex has an 18 AC straight out the gate. Make that character a warforged forge domain cleric and that becomes aa base of 20 and the shield of faith spell puts it up to 22 as a starting level 1 character with no shenanigans at all.
Once you’ve got your AC adjusted to where it should actually be, the issue isn’t so bad.
If I were DMing you, I’d simply have monsters adapt the way they naturally should, if an unhittable tank hoves into view; use grapplers (ability contest) to occupy you, use effects with saving throws targeted at you, and just naturally have the monsters work around you. You would probably be the focus of most of the monsters actions, so you’d definitely be playing your role. I think it’s a bit unimaginative of the dm to assume that high ac means the game is ruined; there are lots of ways around it, especially with spells and effects.
The main task of the tank is to protect its allies. The best way to do that, is to have abilities that either stop the enemy from going after them (eg Oath of the Crown), or make your allies harder to hit (eg Path of the Ancestral Guardian).
Being a tank has nothing to do with having a lot of AC. It has to do with protecting your allies. Although of course, collaterally it is essential that you can endure on the front line. If you fall, they fall. In addition to the fact that if they can't hit them, they will hit you.
As long as the 25 AC is following all of the rules set out by the DM before character creation, then all you are doing is being the party's tank. Not much wrong with that.
A tank needs enemies to attack them in order to be effective; if enemies can't even hit them, then they have no incentive to try, so it's entirely logical for the DM to have enemies ignore the high AC player completely and attack everyone else instead.
So by pushing an overly high AC for the current stage of play, a player will actively harm the rest of their party.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
It's interesting how many people assume that the GM is just going to metagame monsters by having them realize that their +7 to hit is going to be ineffective against a PC with 25 AC and have those monsters default to attacking a different party member.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
If someone shows up to a fight looking like a walking tank, then your average bandit should be able to work out that their basic weapons will be useless. Even less intelligent enemies should realise that if something isn't working they should try something else (i.e- avoid the enemy they can't hurt, attacks ones that they can).
It's not meta-gaming to have enemies demonstrate a basic level of intelligence, it's only meta-gaming if they do it using knowledge they wouldn't have. But "metal too hard, sticks not work" isn't exactly advanced stuff. 😝
You could for example argue that someone using shield or Patient Defence to boost their AC might not be obviously hard to hit at first, so they would need to use those abilities before enemies will realise. But once the enemy sees what they can do, they're allowed to change tactics.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
An average NPC that lacks any sort of specific magical abilities of discernment can be reasonably assumed to figure out that someone wearing heavy armor is probably going to be harder to hit than someone who's not wearing armor. But that's really as far as that should go. Multiple people in this thread have posted that "if your AC is too high, enemies will just ignore you." Which given that the majority of the methods used for pumping one's AC up would not be readily apparent and consequently would not be things that an enemy would actually know. If an enemy wants to spend several rounds attacking a PC who's jacked their armor class up into the mid to high 20s and isn't able to hit them, then yes, that enemy is justified in concluding that they can't match them. But having enemies who just look at that character and conclude that they're simply going to avoid them and go after the rest of the party as was recommended? That's bad GMing.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I like your point and I also think this is bad GMing
Who's proposing that enemies should meta-game? "Enemies can just ignore you if your AC is too high for them to hit" isn't the same as saying "enemies automatically know what your AC is (or can be boosted to) so will always ignore you from round one". You seem to be assuming bad GMing in order to get a conclusion of bad GMing.
There are multiple ways for enemies to determine your AC; first is if it's obvious (tonnes of armour), then there's trial and error (one enemy made what should have been a devastating hit but was blocked magically, so other enemies get to respond to that). It's no different to a player using burning hands and enemies repositioning to avoid it; enemies can use information they have in order to make better decisions.
There's also word of mouth; if you've already fought your way through the guards at a cave entrance but an alarm was raised, then enemies further in may already know what they're up against. Word of mouth can also be less immediate, like the evil sorcerer who hears rumours of an adventuring party that seeks to stop them, so scries on his enemies, or sends out spies, to learn about them and orders his minions to adapt (smart boss triggers smarter grunts). This is one reason why it's a good idea for parties to be more surreptitious and stealthy, because every murder-hobo escapade is a chance for the big bad to learn of you and your abilities.
Plus, a good DM should challenge players, and that means accounting for their strengths; that doesn't mean nullifying those strengths in every fight (that would be bad DMing) but players should encounter smarter enemies, fiendish traps, tricky immunities, nasty spells, consequences of earlier actions etc. etc. otherwise combat just becomes a boring chore you have to suffer through. The best combats are like good puzzles, where you have to figure out the best way to deal with the challenges before you, but if your main answer to every problem is "my AC is so high I can hardly ever be hit" then it's reasonable to expect a common challenge to be "enemies don't want to keep wasting their time attacking you".
Btw, the converse argument is that pumping up your AC without considering how enemies might react to it is bad playing; that's not to say every player who does it is a bad player, as maximising your defence and/or offence are perfectly natural things to want to do (the challenge of how to build your character is part of the game), but what's best for your character isn't always what's best for the party. Experienced players are aware of what the consequences might be, and an experienced DM will try to inform new players of what they might be, but sometimes you've got inexperienced players with an inexperienced DM so these things just happen, that doesn't mean either of them is to blame.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.