change books so they don't do something called rail roading
To be honest, a lot of other TTRPGs go that route. It has its advantages, but it means that they can't have a grand narrative...which is one of the advantages D&D has over them.
I do think D&D has the scope to do both kinds...but I don't think they will. Too conservative to risk that.
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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.
change books so they don't do something called rail roading
To be honest, a lot of other TTRPGs go that route. It has its advantages, but it means that they can't have a grand narrative...which is one of the advantages D&D has over them.
I do think D&D has the scope to do both kinds...but I don't think they will. Too conservative to risk that.
What I mean is that in something like curse of strahd you don't force them to kill strahd in this way like I could add a deck of many things and they could get the one to wish something never happened so they could wish that strahd never turned into a vampire
change books so they don't do something called rail roading
To be honest, a lot of other TTRPGs go that route. It has its advantages, but it means that they can't have a grand narrative...which is one of the advantages D&D has over them.
I do think D&D has the scope to do both kinds...but I don't think they will. Too conservative to risk that.
What is the alternative in any given published adventure? "Here are a bunch of places. Now you figure out what to do with them?" As others have said, any given DM can already change anything they want.
change books so they don't do something called rail roading
To be honest, a lot of other TTRPGs go that route. It has its advantages, but it means that they can't have a grand narrative...which is one of the advantages D&D has over them.
I do think D&D has the scope to do both kinds...but I don't think they will. Too conservative to risk that.
What I mean is that in something like curse of strahd you don't force them to kill strahd in this way like I could add a deck of many things and they could get the one to wish something never happened so they could wish that strahd never turned into a vampire
Well, for one thing, I’m pretty sure no official adventure is going to include the Deck of Plot Nuking as a part of it. For another, official adventures do sometimes give multiple possible resolutions to various points, but there’s only so much variance that can be worked into a single narrative- which is what pre-made adventures are- without making the product bloated and unwieldy. As people have said, none of this negates a DM’s ability to change things up, but by definition a pre-established narrative must lay down its own set of tracks.
You can avoid rail roading, or at least significantly increase options. Choose your own adventure books used to do that.
It comes down to "how much unused content is it acceptable for an adventure to have"; the more choices the PCs have, the more stuff they'll wind up missing because they didn't make choices that led in that direction. You have to be pretty railroad-y to avoid the majority of the adventure never being used.
If I could change one thing, I'd de-link Concentration checks from proficiency in Con saves. I'd rather NOT need to start as a Con save class to be able to help maintain concentration on my spells. For example, if I want to be just a spell caster, I don't want to need to choose Barbarian, Fighter, Sorcerer or Artificer, if I wanted to just play a Bard, Cleric, Druid, Warlock or Wizard.
In a similar issue, full spell casters should NOT be able to maneuver and cast spells in anything other than nothing or Light armors only.
If I could change one thing, I'd de-link Concentration checks from proficiency in Con saves. I'd rather NOT need to start as a Con save class to be able to help maintain concentration on my spells. For example, if I want to be just a spell caster, I don't want to need to choose Barbarian, Fighter, Sorcerer or Artificer, if I wanted to just play a Bard, Cleric, Druid, Warlock or Wizard.
In a similar issue, full spell casters should NOT be able to maneuver and cast spells in anything other than nothing or Light armors only.
Both cases are deliberate design choices, not happenstance. The general dearth of CON save profs among casters is part of the balance of concentration alongside the one at a time limit, and the two full casters who get at medium or heavy armor have a lower burst potential and generally need to be closer to combat for their big spells.
If I could change one thing, I'd de-link Concentration checks from proficiency in Con saves. I'd rather NOT need to start as a Con save class to be able to help maintain concentration on my spells. For example, if I want to be just a spell caster, I don't want to need to choose Barbarian, Fighter, Sorcerer or Artificer, if I wanted to just play a Bard, Cleric, Druid, Warlock or Wizard.
In a similar issue, full spell casters should NOT be able to maneuver and cast spells in anything other than nothing or Light armors only.
Both cases are deliberate design choices, not happenstance. The general dearth of CON save profs among casters is part of the balance of concentration alongside the one at a time limit, and the two full casters who get at medium or heavy armor have a lower burst potential and generally need to be closer to combat for their big spells.
Building on the above, many concentration spells either deal significant damage or have debilitating effects that change the flow of battle. Many of these abilities can be difficult to escape for bad guys, changing the balance of the fight. By making spellcasters susceptible to a check they are not as good at, the DM (or the players if the DM is using the spells) have a chance to break the spell through other means, such as allies piling on attacks until the spell drops.
Additionally, it helps make combat more dynamic - “protect the squishy caster to preserve their nasty spell” becomes an important element of combat balance.
If I could change one thing, I'd de-link Concentration checks from proficiency in Con saves. I'd rather NOT need to start as a Con save class to be able to help maintain concentration on my spells. For example, if I want to be just a spell caster, I don't want to need to choose Barbarian, Fighter, Sorcerer or Artificer, if I wanted to just play a Bard, Cleric, Druid, Warlock or Wizard.
In a similar issue, full spell casters should NOT be able to maneuver and cast spells in anything other than nothing or Light armors only.
1) You don't need to start as one of those classes - just pick up Resilient Con, or War Caster, or both.
2) Did you mean arcane casters? Because clerics have been wearing mail/plate since, like, forever. And druids were stuck with the metal armor thing for a long time but they still had things like ironwood, dragonscales, stone etc.
What would you change if you had the chance to go back and build 5e again from the start? And what bits do you consider perfect already?
So a similar thread got posted on reddit recently, and I'm wondering what the responses would be here. I've noticed each forum tends to give completely different answers and results for questions.
Well, I for one miss having a Bardic Knowledge class feature; and while I know many players I like it, I wish I could replace my cutting words class feature with one that would let me apply that amount, or my inspiration dice, or my wisdom bonus, or have advantage, or something to my knowledge checks; some means of better ensuring that I know stuff when I roll a 2 or higher.
I am so very bothered when my lore bard fails knowledge checks. I picked Bard in the first place near 25 years ago, because I like being the one who knows stuff, and wanted a means by which it would not be meta that I know all the lore that I do from knowing it IRL. It's bad enough Intelligence has become a bit of a dumpstat in modern bards while knowledge skills still rely upon that particular stat.
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Thank you for your time and please have a very pleasant day.
1.) For powerful casters to be able to maintain concentration on more than one spell at a time. The current system disproportionately affects certain schools of wizardry such as enchanters.
2.) For higher level characters to be able to attune maybe up to five items at level 20.
change books so they don't do something called rail roading
To be honest, a lot of other TTRPGs go that route. It has its advantages, but it means that they can't have a grand narrative...which is one of the advantages D&D has over them.
I do think D&D has the scope to do both kinds...but I don't think they will. Too conservative to risk that.
What I mean is that in something like curse of strahd you don't force them to kill strahd in this way like I could add a deck of many things and they could get the one to wish something never happened so they could wish that strahd never turned into a vampire
Well, for one thing, I’m pretty sure no official adventure is going to include the Deck of Plot Nuking as a part of it. For another, official adventures do sometimes give multiple possible resolutions to various points, but there’s only so much variance that can be worked into a single narrative- which is what pre-made adventures are- without making the product bloated and unwieldy. As people have said, none of this negates a DM’s ability to change things up, but by definition a pre-established narrative must lay down its own set of tracks.
To be honest, a lot of other TTRPGs go that route. It has its advantages, but it means that they can't have a grand narrative...which is one of the advantages D&D has over them.
I do think D&D has the scope to do both kinds...but I don't think they will. Too conservative to risk that.
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.
What I mean is that in something like curse of strahd you don't force them to kill strahd in this way like I could add a deck of many things and they could get the one to wish something never happened so they could wish that strahd never turned into a vampire
What is the alternative in any given published adventure? "Here are a bunch of places. Now you figure out what to do with them?" As others have said, any given DM can already change anything they want.
Well, for one thing, I’m pretty sure no official adventure is going to include the Deck of Plot Nuking as a part of it. For another, official adventures do sometimes give multiple possible resolutions to various points, but there’s only so much variance that can be worked into a single narrative- which is what pre-made adventures are- without making the product bloated and unwieldy. As people have said, none of this negates a DM’s ability to change things up, but by definition a pre-established narrative must lay down its own set of tracks.
You can avoid rail roading, or at least significantly increase options. Choose your own adventure books used to do that.
It comes down to "how much unused content is it acceptable for an adventure to have"; the more choices the PCs have, the more stuff they'll wind up missing because they didn't make choices that led in that direction. You have to be pretty railroad-y to avoid the majority of the adventure never being used.
See above regarding a bloated and unwieldy product.
If I could change one thing, I'd de-link Concentration checks from proficiency in Con saves. I'd rather NOT need to start as a Con save class to be able to help maintain concentration on my spells. For example, if I want to be just a spell caster, I don't want to need to choose Barbarian, Fighter, Sorcerer or Artificer, if I wanted to just play a Bard, Cleric, Druid, Warlock or Wizard.
In a similar issue, full spell casters should NOT be able to maneuver and cast spells in anything other than nothing or Light armors only.
Both cases are deliberate design choices, not happenstance. The general dearth of CON save profs among casters is part of the balance of concentration alongside the one at a time limit, and the two full casters who get at medium or heavy armor have a lower burst potential and generally need to be closer to combat for their big spells.
Building on the above, many concentration spells either deal significant damage or have debilitating effects that change the flow of battle. Many of these abilities can be difficult to escape for bad guys, changing the balance of the fight. By making spellcasters susceptible to a check they are not as good at, the DM (or the players if the DM is using the spells) have a chance to break the spell through other means, such as allies piling on attacks until the spell drops.
Additionally, it helps make combat more dynamic - “protect the squishy caster to preserve their nasty spell” becomes an important element of combat balance.
1) You don't need to start as one of those classes - just pick up Resilient Con, or War Caster, or both.
2) Did you mean arcane casters? Because clerics have been wearing mail/plate since, like, forever. And druids were stuck with the metal armor thing for a long time but they still had things like ironwood, dragonscales, stone etc.
Well, I for one miss having a Bardic Knowledge class feature; and while I know many players I like it, I wish I could replace my cutting words class feature with one that would let me apply that amount, or my inspiration dice, or my wisdom bonus, or have advantage, or something to my knowledge checks; some means of better ensuring that I know stuff when I roll a 2 or higher.
I am so very bothered when my lore bard fails knowledge checks. I picked Bard in the first place near 25 years ago, because I like being the one who knows stuff, and wanted a means by which it would not be meta that I know all the lore that I do from knowing it IRL. It's bad enough Intelligence has become a bit of a dumpstat in modern bards while knowledge skills still rely upon that particular stat.
Thank you for your time and please have a very pleasant day.
I’d like
1.) For powerful casters to be able to maintain concentration on more than one spell at a time. The current system disproportionately affects certain schools of wizardry such as enchanters.
2.) For higher level characters to be able to attune maybe up to five items at level 20.
You know what I mean right
I would add being able to create spells like in Elder Scrolls Daggerfall. But I'd change it to make it more beginner DM friendly.
Really
how dare you call me your sister