You do realize they changed the wording on sneak attack which requires the "attack action." Booming blade is a spell action amd wouldn't apply sneak as worded 😬
Yes, we know, but most Rogues didn’t use them off-turn Sneak Attacks anyways, so it’s not that big of a nerf. Also, some people exploited Sneak Attack to get more uses out of it, and they with that exploit unavailable, WotC can buff Rogues without buffing those already powerful min-maxed multi-round Sneak Attackers too. Overall, I think this change is a good one.
I think you misread his post. This has nothing to do with off-turn or multi-round sneak attacks. He is talking about using a cantrip with sneak attack and this is a huge nerf.
I agree of-turn sneak attacks are somewhat rare and exploitive, but almost every melee Rogue I have seen played uses booming blade or green flame blade for sneak attack. They pick that up through Arcane Trickster, multiclass, Magic Initiate or Elf.
This will make swashbucklers just about useless as a subclass and will seriously nerf scouts beyond their current alreadyweak state. Ironically, the Arcane Trickster is the most powerful Rogue currently and will suffer from this as well but do to spells you will be able to play around it effectively and it will actually increase the gap between AT and others as they will be nerfed more.
I think it will also just about elminate melee Rogues as a viable option, the extra damage you get with booming blade was the tradeoff for not having advantage from steady aim or having to disengage.
You do realize they changed the wording on sneak attack which requires the "attack action." Booming blade is a spell action amd wouldn't apply sneak as worded 😬
Yes, we know, but most Rogues didn’t use them off-turn Sneak Attacks anyways, so it’s not that big of a nerf. Also, some people exploited Sneak Attack to get more uses out of it, and they with that exploit unavailable, WotC can buff Rogues without buffing those already powerful min-maxed multi-round Sneak Attackers too. Overall, I think this change is a good one.
I think you misread, his post has nothing to do with off-turn or multi-round sneak attacks. He is talking about using a cantrip with sneak attack and this is a huge nerf.
Oh, my bad then. But just because Rogues can't do one thing they couldn't do before, it doesn't mean they are "useless" and that they don't "excel" at anything. The overall changes to Rogue are actually pretty minimal, and overall, I think they're cool; Pack Tactics and earlier subclass features are both great. And some Rogues can break combats too, and they can also do a lot of things outside of combat that 5e's fighter and barbarian cant. However, I'm actually also against not having Sneak Attack on spells, though I like the overall changes to Sneak Attack and it's not as big a deal to me as it might be for some other people.
PS- Yes, they temporarily made the change of reverting crit rules back to their former state for this UA, though that may (hopefully not) soon change. It says so in the video and I think it may also say so somewhere in the PDF.
No one enjoys being useless. The only thing that rogues excel at in this UA is expertise with thieves tools, which artificers may still get. Other than being worse off than before, where is the draw to being a rogue? You can't even be smart and hold an action because those normally activate off turn. I have never seen a legit rogue outside of homebrew break an encounter.
Overall martials lost most of that which allowed them to compete with casters in the expert UA. We still need to see the other classes to see how they compare overall but SS and GWM are just bad now and just swinging a weapon for little damage is a far cry to what a caster can do in all pillars of play.
On a side note, did they adjust player crits from just weapon damage or is that still a thing? If it was changed where should I be looking for that?
I agree on Rogues and I don't get the nerfs there.
I think martials gained quite a bit in this though with GWM and PAM being half feats, although they were not the equal of casters before and still aren't
GWM is WAY better than it was before. Most martials in tier 1/2 will do quite a bit more damage most of the time with the new feat compared to the old feat. GWM was overated before, it has never been as great a feat as people thought, but mathematically it is better now than it was and the new feat is one of the best in the game.
I know people see the loss in the +10 damage being replaced with +2/3/4 once a turn, and they think it is a huge loss, but they are not doing the math and factoring in the ASI which makes it a +6 to hit comparitively to the old feat while still getting a damage boost. When you combine the ASI and bonus damage you are going to outrun the old feat most of the time, it is going to beat the old feat by a wide margin against enemies with a high AC because you still get the bonus damage without taking a hit penalty.
Sharpshooter is awash I think. The best part of sharpshooter is eliminating cover and long range and you keep that. You give up the -5/+10 to get a half ASI. Some builds that will be better, some it will be worse. On a Rogue it is a lot better now than it was before, so that is one bone I guess.
I did some math for the new GWM vs the old GWM using a greatsword or maul. These are all DPR rounded to the nearest whole number. Does not include bonus action attacks:
I have a concept thought. Does every class have to have abilities that are also spells? Does everything have to be magical? Can those things that are spells just be class abilities with a certain number of uses per short or long rest? I have been DMing 5E for a few years now, but before that I was heavily invested in 2E. The classes had special abilities that may have been linked to a spell description, but didn't require spell mechanics. Why not utilize the class ability more. Rangers didn't use to be able to cast spells until 8th or 9th level.
Part of the reason I ask this is how difficult it could become to create a low or medium magic setting. Magic is a part of the D&D history and its future. But I am not sure EVERYTHING needs spell casting ability that early.
It also can cause confusion when creating a spell list. Which spell is a class ability? Which spell is part of a background? Which do I not have to use a spell slot for? Which one is always prepared?
The spell description can still be referenced in the ability, but does it doesn't have to be a spell casting ability.
I have a concept thought. Does every class have to have abilities that are also spells? Does everything have to be magical? Can those things that are spells just be class abilities with a certain number of uses per short or long rest? I have been DMing 5E for a few years now, but before that I was heavily invested in 2E. The classes had special abilities that may have been linked to a spell description, but didn't require spell mechanics. Why not utilize the class ability more. Rangers didn't use to be able to cast spells until 8th or 9th level.
Part of the reason I ask this is how difficult it could become to create a low or medium magic setting. Magic is a part of the D&D history and its future. But I am not sure EVERYTHING needs spell casting ability that early.
It also can cause confusion when creating a spell list. Which spell is a class ability? Which spell is part of a background? Which do I not have to use a spell slot for? Which one is always prepared?
The spell description can still be referenced in the ability, but does it doesn't have to be a spell casting ability.
Just my thoughts
Personally I like spells and I would like to see more spells or spell options for most classes.
I have been experimenting with the play test materials. It feels like feature creep. I was hoping that this would be an opportunity to simplify the game not make it easier to create power characters.
Feats should be simple with only one or two things. No feat should affect ability scores. Characters should only have access to about 1-3 feats total. They should be used to give some flavor and specialization to a class, not power it up so that 5th level characters are not challenged by 5th level adventures.
Ability score increases should be only in the class area. No feat or race should affect the basic ability scores. You should not have to sacrifice an ability score boost for a feat, they should be separate.
Reliable Talent should be changed somehow. A difficulty score of 25 should be a daunting thing to roll. I have had Rogues in my games that automatically have base scores of 27. I had to invent a new difficulty of 40 just to make the game a little challenging for them.
Backgrounds should give less game mechanic bonus and more role playing bonuses. Instead of giving out spells and bonus feats, backgrounds should give players access to guilds, universities, churches, noble courts, tribes that can help the character in an adventure.
One of the things I did like was that finally Rangers have both Goodberry and Create/Destroy Water spells available to them through the Primal spell list. A Ranger should not have to worry about rations and water while on the hunt for enemies of a near by village.
Feats should be simple with only one or two things. No feat should affect ability scores. Characters should only have access to about 1-3 feats total. They should be used to give some flavor and specialization to a class, not power it up so that 5th level characters are not challenged by 5th level adventures.
Ability score increases should be only in the class area. No feat or race should affect the basic ability scores. You should not have to sacrifice an ability score boost for a feat, they should be separate.
The way it is, you don't have to choose between a feat and ASI - you get a feat while still progressing your main stat a notch. It's good.
Reliable Talent should be changed somehow. A difficulty score of 25 should be a daunting thing to roll. I have had Rogues in my games that automatically have base scores of 27. I had to invent a new difficulty of 40 just to make the game a little challenging for them.
A player chooses to excel at one thing and the DM auto-scales the world to challenge him exclusively. That's TES: Oblivion on a tabletop.
Backgrounds should give less game mechanic bonus and more role playing bonuses. Instead of giving out spells and bonus feats, backgrounds should give players access to guilds, universities, churches, noble courts, tribes that can help the character in an adventure.
So, lock down these social paths for everyone without the right background? And if they're not completely locked and can still be accesses by talking to people, what's the point? Trivializing parts of the game from the very beginning ("I skip the quest because I'm a noble", or "we automatically ignore survival scenarios because there's a ranger in group") is not fun.
A player chooses to excel at one thing and the DM auto-scales the world to challenge him exclusively. That's TES: Oblivion on a tabletop.
It's the way every game everywhere works. DMs are predisposed to make games interesting, and automatic success is not interesting. It's also a side effect of 5e apparently not having a real numbers person to make sure that the design intent is actually followed.
A player chooses to excel at one thing and the DM auto-scales the world to challenge him exclusively. That's TES: Oblivion on a tabletop.
It's the way every game everywhere works. DMs are predisposed to make games interesting, and automatic success is not interesting. It's also a side effect of 5e apparently not having a real numbers person to make sure that the design intent is actually followed.
Technically DMs aren’t suppose to be setting DCs higher than 30. Honestly they should rarely be set at 25 or higher. DCs are suppose to be set by the task difficulty not the player skill in the task.
A player chooses to excel at one thing and the DM auto-scales the world to challenge him exclusively. That's TES: Oblivion on a tabletop.
It's the way every game everywhere works. DMs are predisposed to make games interesting, and automatic success is not interesting. It's also a side effect of 5e apparently not having a real numbers person to make sure that the design intent is actually followed.
Technically DMs aren’t suppose to be setting DCs higher than 30. Honestly they should rarely be set at 25 or higher. DCs are suppose to be set by the task difficulty not the player skill in the task.
DCs are set by task difficulty, but the DM decides what the task is and can make it as easy or difficult as they want. For example, it's obviously possible to have locks of different quality. If I were coming up with rules, I would say something like
A Common lock is DC 15. This would be typical protection for a level 1-4 treasure hoard.
An Uncommon lock is DC 20. This would be typical protection for a level 5-10 treasure hoard.
A Rare lock is DC 25. This would be typical protection for a level 11-16 treasure hoard.
A Very Rare lock is DC 30. This would be typical protection for a level 17-20 treasure hoard.
Legendary and Artifact locks generally can't be opened with a simple check, and are normally found protecting plot devices.
Nothing about that is inconsistent with setting DCs by task difficulty, nor is it objectively unreasonable: you expect more valuable stuff to have better protections.
A player chooses to excel at one thing and the DM auto-scales the world to challenge him exclusively. That's TES: Oblivion on a tabletop.
It's the way every game everywhere works. DMs are predisposed to make games interesting, and automatic success is not interesting. It's also a side effect of 5e apparently not having a real numbers person to make sure that the design intent is actually followed.
If a player puts effort into becoming so good that his character can trivialize a certain task, let him. Otherwise, there's no point in even trying to grow, because DM will nullify that growth. The game has more than one aspect, and no character can trivialize them all. You party has Sherlock Holmes with ridiculous detecting skills? Fine, let him breeze through etective investigation. Then throw a big group fight at them. Suddenly, all that perception and insight isn't exactly helpful. You got an unstoppable killing machine in your party? Make them tangled in a court intrigue from time to time. If you simply raise the difficulty to offset specific PCs strengths, you steal their triumphs, the feeling of power they work for.
A player chooses to excel at one thing and the DM auto-scales the world to challenge him exclusively. That's TES: Oblivion on a tabletop.
It's the way every game everywhere works. DMs are predisposed to make games interesting, and automatic success is not interesting. It's also a side effect of 5e apparently not having a real numbers person to make sure that the design intent is actually followed.
Technically DMs aren’t suppose to be setting DCs higher than 30. Honestly they should rarely be set at 25 or higher. DCs are suppose to be set by the task difficulty not the player skill in the task.
DCs are set by task difficulty, but the DM decides what the task is and can make it as easy or difficult as they want. For example, it's obviously possible to have locks of different quality. If I were coming up with rules, I would say something like
A Common lock is DC 15. This would be typical protection for a level 1-4 treasure hoard.
An Uncommon lock is DC 20. This would be typical protection for a level 5-10 treasure hoard.
A Rare lock is DC 25. This would be typical protection for a level 11-16 treasure hoard.
A Very Rare lock is DC 30. This would be typical protection for a level 17-20 treasure hoard.
Legendary and Artifact locks generally can't be opened with a simple check, and are normally found protecting plot devices.
Nothing about that is inconsistent with setting DCs by task difficulty, nor is it objectively unreasonable: you expect more valuable stuff to have better protections.
Actually per the current DMG and the UA the DC for very hard should be 25 and 30 is reserved for those things that are nearly impossible. You are correct Plot devices don’t have DCs. If you are setting DCs at 30 I have to ask who made these locks. Also what are they made of, because if somehow the tumblers on the lock are a DC 30 to pick it might be easier to break the lock. Oh the lock is adamantine. Well I’ll break the box or door. Oh the entire thing is adamantine. Hmm again who made this? The reality the problem is that people forget that there is a vast difference between DC 15 and DC 17 in this game. So while a common lock is DC 15, an uncommon lock would be about DC 16-20, rare would be about DC 20-25 and very rare would be about 25-29. With 30 being legendary. Anything above 30 is God made. You probably shouldn’t even set a DC for it.
A player chooses to excel at one thing and the DM auto-scales the world to challenge him exclusively. That's TES: Oblivion on a tabletop.
It's the way every game everywhere works. DMs are predisposed to make games interesting, and automatic success is not interesting. It's also a side effect of 5e apparently not having a real numbers person to make sure that the design intent is actually followed.
Technically DMs aren’t suppose to be setting DCs higher than 30. Honestly they should rarely be set at 25 or higher. DCs are suppose to be set by the task difficulty not the player skill in the task.
DCs are set by task difficulty, but the DM decides what the task is and can make it as easy or difficult as they want. For example, it's obviously possible to have locks of different quality. If I were coming up with rules, I would say something like
A Common lock is DC 15. This would be typical protection for a level 1-4 treasure hoard.
An Uncommon lock is DC 20. This would be typical protection for a level 5-10 treasure hoard.
A Rare lock is DC 25. This would be typical protection for a level 11-16 treasure hoard.
A Very Rare lock is DC 30. This would be typical protection for a level 17-20 treasure hoard.
Legendary and Artifact locks generally can't be opened with a simple check, and are normally found protecting plot devices.
Nothing about that is inconsistent with setting DCs by task difficulty, nor is it objectively unreasonable: you expect more valuable stuff to have better protections.
Actually per the current DMG and the UA the DC for very hard should be 25 and 30 is reserved for those things that are nearly impossible. You are correct Plot devices don’t have DCs. If you are setting DCs at 30 I have to ask who made these locks. Also what are they made of, because if somehow the tumblers on the lock are a DC 30 to pick it might be easier to break the lock. Oh the lock is adamantine. Well I’ll break the box or door. Oh the entire thing is adamantine. Hmm again who made this? The reality the problem is that people forget that there is a vast difference between DC 15 and DC 17 in this game. So while a common lock is DC 15, an uncommon lock would be about DC 16-20, rare would be about DC 20-25 and very rare would be about 25-29. With 30 being legendary. Anything above 30 is God made. You probably shouldn’t even set a DC for it.
SO MUCH THIS. This is why Expertise is so underrated all the time. DC 30 is Nearly Impossible. DC 25 VERY hard. Expertise that lets you routinely pull off very hard tasks is better than a 3rd level spell slot because you can do it all day, but to do that you are going to be a pretty high level (a class with a +5 in their Ability score and expertise at level 1-4 only has a +9 so need a 14 to do very hard, +11 at 5, +13 at 9 so even here you still need a 12 to beat a DC 25, 13 you have a +15 so only now do you only need a 10 to beat the 25, finally maxxed out it is only a +17 so you still need a 13 or better to beat a 30 without magic items. Skills and expertise are highly under-rated and thankfully scales quite well. Early they will be strong, but not so strong that it over shadows, and as others get more powerful your PB goes up which means you get more and more out of it. Expertise in skills is good. Reliable talent is good, my complaint with rogues is and probably will always be that they don't get enough besides that.
Rangers and Bards get 2 sets of expertise just like the rogue does. While the rogue is getting Sneak attack, cunning actions and reliable talent, Rangers are getting spells and martial weapons and mobility, and bards are getting Spells and Bardic Inspiration. I personally have felt cunning action is really pulling the weight on rogues until 11 and then reliable talent is what you played rogue to 11 for. Subclasses are subclasses, and I don't know if I ever felt like Rogue had just inherently better subclasses than others to hold it up.
Thief is so flavorful and cool, even in this doc, but Fast hands really feels like it is missing something without object interaction. Second story work is AMAZING and by far my favorite feature that thieves get, Supreme sneak, with the way the hidden rules are just feels redundant, Use magic device could be great, in the right campaign and right setting, but if you are in a low magic setting this might as well be blank and thieves reflexes has so much potential, but seems so limited by the loss on fast hands and the actual limit of number of uses per long rest. Rogues are cool, I feel the base class is ONE level 5, or level 9 feature away from being really awesome. And the Thief is just an idea or 2 away from being a great flavorful subclass. Just bringing back object use, or even an interact with the environment option and making the use magic device do SOMETHING even if you are never given magic items, being able to once per long rest just produce a one time use item and people are like "where did you get that" and you being, "Best not to think about that hope it saves our skins" or something that isn't reliant on the GM handing out a gaggle of magic items.
Well anyway I think I just went on another random rant.
Actually per the current DMG and the UA the DC for very hard should be 25 and 30 is reserved for those things that are nearly impossible.
Which is why I claim that they don't have a competent numbers person; a 'nearly impossible' task should actually be nearly impossible. As it is, a tier 4 character designed to be good at lock picking will usually succeed vs DC 40.
Actually per the current DMG and the UA the DC for very hard should be 25 and 30 is reserved for those things that are nearly impossible.
Which is why I claim that they don't have a competent numbers person; a 'nearly impossible' task should actually be nearly impossible. As it is, a tier 4 character designed to be good at lock picking will usually succeed vs DC 40.
Or maybe you don't understand the narrative function of a character WITH that high of a skill. T4 are beings who are supposed to be facing down multi-versal threats. They SHOULD be capable of the nearly impossible. A T4 character with Expertise and maxed out ability score is supposed to be monolithic in ability. Wizards at this level have spells like Wish and True Polymorph. They can practically re-write certain fabrics of reality and travel to other planes of existence. There should be almost no lock in this tier of play that a rogue can't crack with ease. And yet a 30 still will take him a 13 or better. So 60% chance to fail. For someone of that skill at this level to still fail more than half the time.... nearly impossible is the correct word for it.
Or maybe you don't understand the narrative function of a character WITH that high of a skill.
The narrative function of a character with that high of a skill is to, with extreme effort, overcome near impossible challenges. Which means 'near impossible' should be a DC somewhere between 40 and 50.
There should be almost no lock in this tier of play that a rogue can't crack with ease. And yet a 30 still will take him a 13 or better. So 60% chance to fail. For someone of that skill at this level to still fail more than half the time.... nearly impossible is the correct word for it.
A thief who only has a +17 in tier 4 isn't trying.
Actually per the current DMG and the UA the DC for very hard should be 25 and 30 is reserved for those things that are nearly impossible.
Which is why I claim that they don't have a competent numbers person; a 'nearly impossible' task should actually be nearly impossible. As it is, a tier 4 character designed to be good at lock picking will usually succeed vs DC 40.
Edit: this is a pointless and redundant post by me. Others have already stated this.
A tier 4 character is suppose to be succeeding at impossible things. They already succeeded at getting passed not only teir 2, but tier 3 also.
Or maybe you don't understand the narrative function of a character WITH that high of a skill.
The narrative function of a character with that high of a skill is to, with extreme effort, overcome near impossible challenges. Which means 'near impossible' should be a DC somewhere between 40 and 50.
There should be almost no lock in this tier of play that a rogue can't crack with ease. And yet a 30 still will take him a 13 or better. So 60% chance to fail. For someone of that skill at this level to still fail more than half the time.... nearly impossible is the correct word for it.
A thief who only has a +17 in tier 4 isn't trying.
Your argument gets voided because we are talking about tier 4. You know the tier were a wizard could literally open your plot device no set DC lock with a wish spell. The wizard only had to reach level 17 and choose wish. The rogue still can’t open that lock. As for a level 30 lock, the rogue needed to focus on dex which they likely would anyway. Take expertise in thieves tools which takes away from choosing a more often used skill. So the rogue had to try a lot harder than the wizard. Oh and let’s forgot the wizard opening the plot device with wish, they can open the DC 30 lock with a 2nd level spell. Talk about not trying.
Which is why I claim that they don't have a competent numbers person; a 'nearly impossible' task should actually be nearly impossible. As it is, a tier 4 character designed to be good at lock picking will usually succeed vs DC 40.
20 Dexterity and Expertise with Thieves' Tools gives you +17 to your roll. So you need to roll at least 23 on a d20. Cool, cool. I assume you set enemy saving throws at at least +20, you know, so that spellcasters that are designed to cast spells can feel some challenge)
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Defaulted back to the old 5e rules
I think you misread his post. This has nothing to do with off-turn or multi-round sneak attacks. He is talking about using a cantrip with sneak attack and this is a huge nerf.
I agree of-turn sneak attacks are somewhat rare and exploitive, but almost every melee Rogue I have seen played uses booming blade or green flame blade for sneak attack. They pick that up through Arcane Trickster, multiclass, Magic Initiate or Elf.
This will make swashbucklers just about useless as a subclass and will seriously nerf scouts beyond their current alreadyweak state. Ironically, the Arcane Trickster is the most powerful Rogue currently and will suffer from this as well but do to spells you will be able to play around it effectively and it will actually increase the gap between AT and others as they will be nerfed more.
I think it will also just about elminate melee Rogues as a viable option, the extra damage you get with booming blade was the tradeoff for not having advantage from steady aim or having to disengage.
Oh, my bad then. But just because Rogues can't do one thing they couldn't do before, it doesn't mean they are "useless" and that they don't "excel" at anything. The overall changes to Rogue are actually pretty minimal, and overall, I think they're cool; Pack Tactics and earlier subclass features are both great. And some Rogues can break combats too, and they can also do a lot of things outside of combat that 5e's fighter and barbarian cant. However, I'm actually also against not having Sneak Attack on spells, though I like the overall changes to Sneak Attack and it's not as big a deal to me as it might be for some other people.
PS- Yes, they temporarily made the change of reverting crit rules back to their former state for this UA, though that may (hopefully not) soon change. It says so in the video and I think it may also say so somewhere in the PDF.
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HERE.I agree on Rogues and I don't get the nerfs there.
I think martials gained quite a bit in this though with GWM and PAM being half feats, although they were not the equal of casters before and still aren't
GWM is WAY better than it was before. Most martials in tier 1/2 will do quite a bit more damage most of the time with the new feat compared to the old feat. GWM was overated before, it has never been as great a feat as people thought, but mathematically it is better now than it was and the new feat is one of the best in the game.
I know people see the loss in the +10 damage being replaced with +2/3/4 once a turn, and they think it is a huge loss, but they are not doing the math and factoring in the ASI which makes it a +6 to hit comparitively to the old feat while still getting a damage boost. When you combine the ASI and bonus damage you are going to outrun the old feat most of the time, it is going to beat the old feat by a wide margin against enemies with a high AC because you still get the bonus damage without taking a hit penalty.
Sharpshooter is awash I think. The best part of sharpshooter is eliminating cover and long range and you keep that. You give up the -5/+10 to get a half ASI. Some builds that will be better, some it will be worse. On a Rogue it is a lot better now than it was before, so that is one bone I guess.
I did some math for the new GWM vs the old GWM using a greatsword or maul. These are all DPR rounded to the nearest whole number. Does not include bonus action attacks:
Level 4 Fighter:
Level 6 Fighter:
Raging Barbarian Using Reckless Attack 4th Level:
Raging Barbarian Using Reckless Attack 8th Level:
Hey folks,
I have a concept thought. Does every class have to have abilities that are also spells? Does everything have to be magical? Can those things that are spells just be class abilities with a certain number of uses per short or long rest? I have been DMing 5E for a few years now, but before that I was heavily invested in 2E. The classes had special abilities that may have been linked to a spell description, but didn't require spell mechanics. Why not utilize the class ability more. Rangers didn't use to be able to cast spells until 8th or 9th level.
Part of the reason I ask this is how difficult it could become to create a low or medium magic setting. Magic is a part of the D&D history and its future. But I am not sure EVERYTHING needs spell casting ability that early.
It also can cause confusion when creating a spell list. Which spell is a class ability? Which spell is part of a background? Which do I not have to use a spell slot for? Which one is always prepared?
The spell description can still be referenced in the ability, but does it doesn't have to be a spell casting ability.
Just my thoughts
Personally I like spells and I would like to see more spells or spell options for most classes.
I have been experimenting with the play test materials. It feels like feature creep. I was hoping that this would be an opportunity to simplify the game not make it easier to create power characters.
Feats should be simple with only one or two things. No feat should affect ability scores. Characters should only have access to about 1-3 feats total. They should be used to give some flavor and specialization to a class, not power it up so that 5th level characters are not challenged by 5th level adventures.
Ability score increases should be only in the class area. No feat or race should affect the basic ability scores. You should not have to sacrifice an ability score boost for a feat, they should be separate.
Reliable Talent should be changed somehow. A difficulty score of 25 should be a daunting thing to roll. I have had Rogues in my games that automatically have base scores of 27. I had to invent a new difficulty of 40 just to make the game a little challenging for them.
Backgrounds should give less game mechanic bonus and more role playing bonuses. Instead of giving out spells and bonus feats, backgrounds should give players access to guilds, universities, churches, noble courts, tribes that can help the character in an adventure.
One of the things I did like was that finally Rangers have both Goodberry and Create/Destroy Water spells available to them through the Primal spell list. A Ranger should not have to worry about rations and water while on the hunt for enemies of a near by village.
The way it is, you don't have to choose between a feat and ASI - you get a feat while still progressing your main stat a notch. It's good.
A player chooses to excel at one thing and the DM auto-scales the world to challenge him exclusively. That's TES: Oblivion on a tabletop.
So, lock down these social paths for everyone without the right background? And if they're not completely locked and can still be accesses by talking to people, what's the point? Trivializing parts of the game from the very beginning ("I skip the quest because I'm a noble", or "we automatically ignore survival scenarios because there's a ranger in group") is not fun.
It's the way every game everywhere works. DMs are predisposed to make games interesting, and automatic success is not interesting. It's also a side effect of 5e apparently not having a real numbers person to make sure that the design intent is actually followed.
Technically DMs aren’t suppose to be setting DCs higher than 30. Honestly they should rarely be set at 25 or higher. DCs are suppose to be set by the task difficulty not the player skill in the task.
DCs are set by task difficulty, but the DM decides what the task is and can make it as easy or difficult as they want. For example, it's obviously possible to have locks of different quality. If I were coming up with rules, I would say something like
Nothing about that is inconsistent with setting DCs by task difficulty, nor is it objectively unreasonable: you expect more valuable stuff to have better protections.
If a player puts effort into becoming so good that his character can trivialize a certain task, let him. Otherwise, there's no point in even trying to grow, because DM will nullify that growth. The game has more than one aspect, and no character can trivialize them all. You party has Sherlock Holmes with ridiculous detecting skills? Fine, let him breeze through etective investigation. Then throw a big group fight at them. Suddenly, all that perception and insight isn't exactly helpful. You got an unstoppable killing machine in your party? Make them tangled in a court intrigue from time to time. If you simply raise the difficulty to offset specific PCs strengths, you steal their triumphs, the feeling of power they work for.
Actually per the current DMG and the UA the DC for very hard should be 25 and 30 is reserved for those things that are nearly impossible. You are correct Plot devices don’t have DCs. If you are setting DCs at 30 I have to ask who made these locks. Also what are they made of, because if somehow the tumblers on the lock are a DC 30 to pick it might be easier to break the lock. Oh the lock is adamantine. Well I’ll break the box or door. Oh the entire thing is adamantine. Hmm again who made this? The reality the problem is that people forget that there is a vast difference between DC 15 and DC 17 in this game. So while a common lock is DC 15, an uncommon lock would be about DC 16-20, rare would be about DC 20-25 and very rare would be about 25-29. With 30 being legendary. Anything above 30 is God made. You probably shouldn’t even set a DC for it.
SO MUCH THIS. This is why Expertise is so underrated all the time. DC 30 is Nearly Impossible. DC 25 VERY hard. Expertise that lets you routinely pull off very hard tasks is better than a 3rd level spell slot because you can do it all day, but to do that you are going to be a pretty high level (a class with a +5 in their Ability score and expertise at level 1-4 only has a +9 so need a 14 to do very hard, +11 at 5, +13 at 9 so even here you still need a 12 to beat a DC 25, 13 you have a +15 so only now do you only need a 10 to beat the 25, finally maxxed out it is only a +17 so you still need a 13 or better to beat a 30 without magic items. Skills and expertise are highly under-rated and thankfully scales quite well. Early they will be strong, but not so strong that it over shadows, and as others get more powerful your PB goes up which means you get more and more out of it. Expertise in skills is good. Reliable talent is good, my complaint with rogues is and probably will always be that they don't get enough besides that.
Rangers and Bards get 2 sets of expertise just like the rogue does. While the rogue is getting Sneak attack, cunning actions and reliable talent, Rangers are getting spells and martial weapons and mobility, and bards are getting Spells and Bardic Inspiration. I personally have felt cunning action is really pulling the weight on rogues until 11 and then reliable talent is what you played rogue to 11 for. Subclasses are subclasses, and I don't know if I ever felt like Rogue had just inherently better subclasses than others to hold it up.
Thief is so flavorful and cool, even in this doc, but Fast hands really feels like it is missing something without object interaction. Second story work is AMAZING and by far my favorite feature that thieves get, Supreme sneak, with the way the hidden rules are just feels redundant, Use magic device could be great, in the right campaign and right setting, but if you are in a low magic setting this might as well be blank and thieves reflexes has so much potential, but seems so limited by the loss on fast hands and the actual limit of number of uses per long rest. Rogues are cool, I feel the base class is ONE level 5, or level 9 feature away from being really awesome. And the Thief is just an idea or 2 away from being a great flavorful subclass. Just bringing back object use, or even an interact with the environment option and making the use magic device do SOMETHING even if you are never given magic items, being able to once per long rest just produce a one time use item and people are like "where did you get that" and you being, "Best not to think about that hope it saves our skins" or something that isn't reliant on the GM handing out a gaggle of magic items.
Well anyway I think I just went on another random rant.
Which is why I claim that they don't have a competent numbers person; a 'nearly impossible' task should actually be nearly impossible. As it is, a tier 4 character designed to be good at lock picking will usually succeed vs DC 40.
Or maybe you don't understand the narrative function of a character WITH that high of a skill. T4 are beings who are supposed to be facing down multi-versal threats. They SHOULD be capable of the nearly impossible. A T4 character with Expertise and maxed out ability score is supposed to be monolithic in ability. Wizards at this level have spells like Wish and True Polymorph. They can practically re-write certain fabrics of reality and travel to other planes of existence. There should be almost no lock in this tier of play that a rogue can't crack with ease. And yet a 30 still will take him a 13 or better. So 60% chance to fail. For someone of that skill at this level to still fail more than half the time.... nearly impossible is the correct word for it.
The narrative function of a character with that high of a skill is to, with extreme effort, overcome near impossible challenges. Which means 'near impossible' should be a DC somewhere between 40 and 50.
A thief who only has a +17 in tier 4 isn't trying.
Edit: this is a pointless and redundant post by me. Others have already stated this.
A tier 4 character is suppose to be succeeding at impossible things. They already succeeded at getting passed not only teir 2, but tier 3 also.
Your argument gets voided because we are talking about tier 4. You know the tier were a wizard could literally open your plot device no set DC lock with a wish spell. The wizard only had to reach level 17 and choose wish. The rogue still can’t open that lock. As for a level 30 lock, the rogue needed to focus on dex which they likely would anyway. Take expertise in thieves tools which takes away from choosing a more often used skill. So the rogue had to try a lot harder than the wizard. Oh and let’s forgot the wizard opening the plot device with wish, they can open the DC 30 lock with a 2nd level spell. Talk about not trying.
20 Dexterity and Expertise with Thieves' Tools gives you +17 to your roll. So you need to roll at least 23 on a d20. Cool, cool. I assume you set enemy saving throws at at least +20, you know, so that spellcasters that are designed to cast spells can feel some challenge)