I do not have experience with the class in game, but I did buy it out of curiosity. Giving it a look over, I think Mercer’s Fighter Subclass better design. Like a lot of third party content, I think there are some balance issues resultant from a “throw it all at the wall and don’t really edit to ensure consistency with official content” approach.
I particularly hate the High Roller subclass, which has a metagame-level bluffing component with the DM that I think is problematic from a game design stance (a meta mini-game influencing the game itself), likely slows down gameplay unnecessarily, and could lead to problematic DM-player encounters with some types of player.
I would be curious to see what others might think, but, I would be disinclined to allow access to this particular third party content and would instead steer folks toward Fighter-Gunslinger if that is what they wanted to play.
Not a fan of the Liar's Dice feature, I have to be honest. It's an interesting thing to have as say a flavour minigame within the story. like you go to a saloon and it's a game you can play with NPCs or the other players. But as a feature? Nah. It would slow things down way too much, and you basically negate the consequences of any low roll. In a large group (so you're rarely rolling anyway), it's ridiculously OP.
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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.
Did this class, the Gunslinger, come from Stephen King's 'Dark Tower' series?
I am NOT in favor of including firearms in the options available to the players. It does not matter if these things are initially restricted to NPCs, if an NPC has a unique item, eventually that unique item will wind up in a player character's hands. While the 2024 PHB shows what appears to be a muzzle loading flintlock musket and pistol, in a short matter of time, some maniacal cleric of Gond (Forgotten Realms deity that delights in creating mechanical gadgets) will improve the design by replacing the flint with a percussion cap, then by introducing the 'pepperbox' (a multi-barrel pistol capable of multiple shots before reloading), then by improving the design to a traditional revolver, then to a semi-automatic pistol (Luger Parabellum, M1911A1 etc.) and the game turns into either a James Bond frolic or a Maxwell Smart farce.
How does liar's dice work? (for anybody who doesn't want to drop 15 dollars on a random class, including me)
Essentially, you can hide your d20 roll, and say it's different to what it actually is. If the DM accepts your claim, you keep what you claim you rolled. If the DM challenges you, then you roll again and accept the worst roll (so basically, you'll have rolled at Disadvantage. If the DM challenges you but you were telling the truth, you get an even better roll.
So, if you roll a 1, you should always do it because at worst...you'll get a 1 anyway. Similarly low rolls are also no brainers because you'll likely just end up with the same result of challenged but you could improve the roll if not challenged.
Similarly, if you get a high roll, you should hide the roll and just tell the truth. If challenged, you could turn your nat19 into a nat20.
It's very flavourful, in a way, but it would drag things out a lot and just lead to frustration.
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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.
How does liar's dice work? (for anybody who doesn't want to drop 15 dollars on a random class, including me)
Essentially, you can hide your d20 roll, and say it's different to what it actually is. If the DM accepts your claim, you keep what you claim you rolled. If the DM challenges you, then you roll again and accept the worst roll (so basically, you'll have rolled at Disadvantage. If the DM challenges you but you were telling the truth, you get an even better roll.
So, if you roll a 1, you should always do it because at worst...you'll get a 1 anyway. Similarly low rolls are also no brainers because you'll likely just end up with the same result of challenged but you could improve the roll if not challenged.
Similarly, if you get a high roll, you should hide the roll and just tell the truth. If challenged, you could turn your nat19 into a nat20.
It's very flavourful, in a way, but it would drag things out a lot and just lead to frustration.
I have no idea how that could make any sense lore-wise. Are you basically trying to cheat god?
It doesn't try to justify itself lore-wise. It's a metagame that brings the flavour of gambling to the player (which is what the subclass is about) - think of that gambling game on Davy Jones' ship in the second PotC film.
It's one of the reasons I don't like it - it's taking up time at the table that inherently boots the other players from the play-space. At least there's value in players listening in on your turn during combat, even if they don't get to act. With this... it's a semi-amusing mini game that they can't participate in, influence or even tell it happened once it's over.
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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 am a little sad that one of the three New Feats "Iron Hero", is a Feat that was already released in the other Valda's book. Other than that the class looks fun, excited to try it. My DM already said I can swap over, since I was playing the Gunslinger Fighter.
Though as for the topic of the High Roller's Liar's Dice feature. Its only the Risk Die that is hidden, NOT the attack roll. And as someone who has played a different TTRPG that has a similar style of subclass you would be surprised by how little it actually sidetracks combat, slows things down or boot anyone from the play-space.
Its really no different then asking the DM to make a saving throw when you use a Combat Maneuver or Cast a Spell. Just instead of saying "Make a Save: you are saying "Do you call my bluff?".
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"Not getting cut into bloody littles slices, That's the key to a sound plan."
Though as for the topic of the High Roller's Liar's Dice feature. Its only the Risk Die that is hidden, NOT the attack roll. And as someone who has played a different TTRPG that has a similar style of subclass you would be surprised by how little it actually sidetracks combat, slows things down or boot anyone from the play-space.
Its really no different then asking the DM to make a saving throw when you use a Combat Maneuver or Cast a Spell. Just instead of saying "Make a Save: you are saying "Do you call my bluff?".
So, if I’m understanding this correctly, then it opens up a whole different problem. This isn’t about challenging a character or a monster, this is about a player challenging another player (who happens to be the DM). So if the person running the PC is a good or bad liar, or the DM happens to be extra gullible, that’s going to be what impacts how well the power works much more than anything else. Certainly there’s games where that kind of thing makes sense and could be really fun, but it doesn’t seem like a fit for D&D.
Please don’t take this as me attacking you. I’m not responding to you like this because I think you are responsible for inventing the mechanic, or because I think you need to answer for it. It’s more just quoting to give the appropriate context.
Though as for the topic of the High Roller's Liar's Dice feature. Its only the Risk Die that is hidden, NOT the attack roll. And as someone who has played a different TTRPG that has a similar style of subclass you would be surprised by how little it actually sidetracks combat, slows things down or boot anyone from the play-space.
Its really no different then asking the DM to make a saving throw when you use a Combat Maneuver or Cast a Spell. Just instead of saying "Make a Save: you are saying "Do you call my bluff?".
So, if I’m understanding this correctly, then it opens up a whole different problem. This isn’t about challenging a character or a monster, this is about a player challenging another player (who happens to be the DM). So if the person running the PC is a good or bad liar, or the DM happens to be extra gullible, that’s going to be what impacts how well the power works much more than anything else. Certainly there’s games where that kind of thing makes sense and could be really fun, but it doesn’t seem like a fit for D&D.
Please don’t take this as me attacking you. I’m not responding to you like this because I think you are responsible for inventing the mechanic, or because I think you need to answer for it. It’s more just quoting to give the appropriate context.
Oh you're fine, don't worry. Honestly I just view at as another one of those "If X condition is met do this instead" abilities. Cause the die being effected is d8, that doesn't look like it scales in size ever. Its a unique risk reward. Either you get lucky and between 2 - 16 damage, you get unlucky and deal 1 - 4 damage, or you even out at whatever number you said which is gonna be 1 - 8 damage. Either way you are squeezing out a little extra damage.
I will agree, its not going to be something everyone is going to like. I think it would be better received if it wasn't just some random ability that stands out from other abilities. If it was a Full Class with similar effects, instead of just a subclass. It'd probably be better received. I know from the class I have experienced, the whole class had cool little effects and abilities like this. Once you got used to it after a couple times, it was more of a "Ah ha!" and it gives the DM a new way interact with the player, maybe even come up with cool unique items or fight mechanics.
That's just me though
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"Not getting cut into bloody littles slices, That's the key to a sound plan."
Essentially, you can hide your d20 roll, and say it's different to what it actually is. If the DM accepts your claim, you keep what you claim you rolled. If the DM challenges you, then you roll again and accept the worst roll (so basically, you'll have rolled at Disadvantage. If the DM challenges you but you were telling the truth, you get an even better roll.
So, if you roll a 1, you should always do it because at worst...you'll get a 1 anyway. Similarly low rolls are also no brainers because you'll likely just end up with the same result of challenged but you could improve the roll if not challenged.
Similarly, if you get a high roll, you should hide the roll and just tell the truth. If challenged, you could turn your nat19 into a nat20.
It's very flavourful, in a way, but it would drag things out a lot and just lead to frustration.
Oh my Bulb that's awful. My opinion of Valda's was already low, but... damn
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Active characters:
Edoumiaond Willegume "Eddie" Podslee, Vegetanian scholar (College of Spirits bard) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator (Assassin rogue) Peter "the Pied Piper" Hausler, human con artist/remover of vermin (Circle of the Shepherd druid) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Though as for the topic of the High Roller's Liar's Dice feature. Its only the Risk Die that is hidden, NOT the attack roll. And as someone who has played a different TTRPG that has a similar style of subclass you would be surprised by how little it actually sidetracks combat, slows things down or boot anyone from the play-space.
Having now read the subclass, it's neither the attack roll NOR the Risk Die that's hidden; it's the entire damage roll
I still hate it, but slightly less than I did when it was the attack roll
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Active characters:
Edoumiaond Willegume "Eddie" Podslee, Vegetanian scholar (College of Spirits bard) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator (Assassin rogue) Peter "the Pied Piper" Hausler, human con artist/remover of vermin (Circle of the Shepherd druid) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
We will see. Prefer the classic settings over this type of class. Remember the original classes and races and guess I was just broke in with 1e so prefer it over some of these modern additions.
TLDR: It's not a good class. Poorly designed and poorly tested. Has potential to be very fun, but needs a lot of re-writing.
I'm playing the official Valda Gunslinger. Currently level 5. My DM is very RAW. Only experienced play in traditional Forgotten Realms flavor (maybe Gunslinger works in industrial/sci-fi mode). Playing with pretty much all official add-ons enabled.
If done RAW (official Valda's rules), it is not a good class. It is poorly designed and has clearly not been tested well. Smacks of popular homebrew stuff cobbled together, with an untested attempt at balancing it. It doesn't really work RAW.
My reasoning for stating that it doesn't work?
1. My own experience, echoed by what most people are saying on forums, is that the official RAW for firearms makes them redundant to bows. Most gunslingers end up using shortbow which, obviously, negates the flavor of the class. The average DPR of firearms is too low compared to bows: you can't add DEX or PB modifiers to firearm damage as you can with bows, and firearms mostly require reloading which reduces attack rate. The range of many firearms is laughable: 30 ft for a pistol, 40 ft for a musket, 80 ft for a hunting rifle,
2. The subclasses are widely agreed to be redundant because the vast majority of the subclass abilities rely on using the limited pool of risk die, but the default, level 2 risk die maneuvers are generally better than the subclass maneuvers, so why would you waste the risk die? Better to spend risk dice on non-subclass risk maneuvers, so the subclass bonuses are mostly redundant.
3. The most interesting subclass feature, Highroller's Liar Dice, actually turns out to not really work. It can be used to maximize huge damage on the slightly more frequent crits but, the bluffing mechanic only really works if you use Liar's Dice all the time (wasting the other risk die maneuvers) so that you can scramble your DM's read on when you're bluffing or not. Discussion and experience suggest that DMs get bored of engaging in the mechanic and fall into just always calling bluff or always ignoring it. Run the numbers through ChatGPT and it'll tell you that, on average, if you use all the risk die on Liar's Dice, you'll end up with an average return of just 1.25 x normal damage (having lost the ability to use the risk die for any of the other, more versatile risk die maneuvers). (3a. The one way to get around the risk die wastage problem is to use Risky Business, which allows you to deliberately impose disadvantage on your shots to reclaim a spent risk die. Obviously, if you play Risky Business in a sensible manner then you further reduce your already poor DPR. My DM and I both humorously identified that this rule can easily be broken by saying that you randomly take Disadvantaged potshots at "manufactured" enemies between encounters (though I realize that is very silly)).
4. Reiterating the firearms range issue: 40 ft for a musket and 80 ft for a hunting rifle is... ugh. For reference, 40 ft is 12 m, a school bus, a telephone pole. You can spit 40 ft. A modern 9mm handgun IRL is reliably accurate to 85 ft. I understand that the devs feel the need to balance weapons, but if you have to nerf reality that much then surely you're admitting that the weapon class doesn't work within the realms of the normal game.
5. A particular personal irritation of mine: Deadeye, the sniper subclass, could be great, should be easy to make this useful, but it's trash! "Fire While Prone. You don’t have Disadvantage as a result of the Prone condition on attack rolls you make with Ranged weapons."... What!? Deliberately lying down to take a stabilized shot grants you the sum bonus of... NOT HAVING DISADVANTAGE!?!?... and that's only at short range too! It's so easy to fix this: deliberately going prone to take a steady shot should give you Advantage at short range and remove Disadvantage at long range. (IMO the whole "Prone" mechanic is poorly written anyway.)
Making the best of it: After a fair bit of analysis and testing I believe that the best build is: elf (maybe Drow for the Advantage from Faerie Fire (Adv>crit multiplier), maybe High Elf for Misty Step's survivability), background Soldier for Savage Attacker damage buff (enhance crit multiplier), archery, shortbow (Vex for Adv>crit multiplier), feats: elven accuracy (ASI DEX (or Marksman's Luck to maximize the crit DPR if you can max out DEX some other way)), subclass: Spellslinger. I even went for Spellslinger with INT as my dump stat, choosing spells that don't rely on INT for spell attack or counter-saves. (Blade Ward, Shield, Jump, Resistance...) In that way you can gain a lot of options that aid survivability/mobility without having to dedicate any of your ability stats to use those options. That means you're getting lots of bonuses from the classically INT area whilst freeing up those stat points for other things (eg: HP). Combining Blade Ward, Shield (Reaction, +5 AC) and "Skin of Your Teeth" (Reaction, +1d8 risk die to AC) makes you satisfyingly invulnerable to massive boss hits (I recently had the satisfaction of informing the DM that the big bad legendary hit of 27 had in fact missed).
Additional notes: - I am actually enjoying the challenge of making something "good" out of what is clearly a poorly designed class/subclasses. I've even gone for Reborn (rather than elf) in an attempt to make a character that is damn near impossible to kill. To maintain a touch of gunslinger flavor, his musket was an integral part of his backstory, but when we realized that firearms suck compared to bows, his musket blew up in his hands and he had it rebuilt into a bizarre looking contraption (that uses the shortbow RAW). - It may work better in a sci-fi/industrial setting, but ultimately the subclasses are still rubbish due to the risk dice contradiction. - If your DM is willing to let you play around with gradually developing modifications to the weapons it might be a fun, flavored way to soften the nerfs of reloading/poor range/lack of damage mods. Eg: "discover" rifling to increase range, adapt a spyglass into a scope for to-hit bonuses on unsuspecting targets, or just some other way to add the "sighted" property.
Just my opinions, but they are informed. Happy to hear of ways that people have enjoyed this class.
TLDR: It's not a good class. Poorly designed and poorly tested. Has potential to be very fun, but needs a lot of re-writing.
I'm playing the official Valda Gunslinger. Currently level 5. My DM is very RAW. Only experienced play in traditional Forgotten Realms flavor (maybe Gunslinger works in industrial/sci-fi mode). Playing with pretty much all official add-ons enabled.
If done RAW (official Valda's rules), it is not a good class. It is poorly designed and has clearly not been tested well. Smacks of popular homebrew stuff cobbled together, with an untested attempt at balancing it. It doesn't really work RAW.
My reasoning for stating that it doesn't work?
1. My own experience, echoed by what most people are saying on forums, is that the official RAW for firearms makes them redundant to bows. Most gunslingers end up using shortbow which, obviously, negates the flavor of the class. The average DPR of firearms is too low compared to bows: you can't add DEX or PB modifiers to firearm damage as you can with bows, and firearms mostly require reloading which reduces attack rate. The range of many firearms is laughable: 30 ft for a pistol, 40 ft for a musket, 80 ft for a hunting rifle,
2. The subclasses are widely agreed to be redundant because the vast majority of the subclass abilities rely on using the limited pool of risk die, but the default, level 2 risk die maneuvers are generally better than the subclass maneuvers, so why would you waste the risk die? Better to spend risk dice on non-subclass risk maneuvers, so the subclass bonuses are mostly redundant.
3. The most interesting subclass feature, Highroller's Liar Dice, actually turns out to not really work. It can be used to maximize huge damage on the slightly more frequent crits but, the bluffing mechanic only really works if you use Liar's Dice all the time (wasting the other risk die maneuvers) so that you can scramble your DM's read on when you're bluffing or not. Discussion and experience suggest that DMs get bored of engaging in the mechanic and fall into just always calling bluff or always ignoring it. Run the numbers through ChatGPT and it'll tell you that, on average, if you use all the risk die on Liar's Dice, you'll end up with an average return of just 1.25 x normal damage (having lost the ability to use the risk die for any of the other, more versatile risk die maneuvers). (3a. The one way to get around the risk die wastage problem is to use Risky Business, which allows you to deliberately impose disadvantage on your shots to reclaim a spent risk die. Obviously, if you play Risky Business in a sensible manner then you further reduce your already poor DPR. My DM and I both humorously identified that this rule can easily be broken by saying that you randomly take Disadvantaged potshots at "manufactured" enemies between encounters (though I realize that is very silly)).
4. Reiterating the firearms range issue: 40 ft for a musket and 80 ft for a hunting rifle is... ugh. For reference, 40 ft is 12 m, a school bus, a telephone pole. You can spit 40 ft. A modern 9mm handgun IRL is reliably accurate to 85 ft. I understand that the devs feel the need to balance weapons, but if you have to nerf reality that much then surely you're admitting that the weapon class doesn't work within the realms of the normal game.
5. A particular personal irritation of mine: Deadeye, the sniper subclass, could be great, should be easy to make this useful, but it's trash! "Fire While Prone. You don’t have Disadvantage as a result of the Prone condition on attack rolls you make with Ranged weapons."... What!? Deliberately lying down to take a stabilized shot grants you the sum bonus of... NOT HAVING DISADVANTAGE!?!?... and that's only at short range too! It's so easy to fix this: deliberately going prone to take a steady shot should give you Advantage at short range and remove Disadvantage at long range. (IMO the whole "Prone" mechanic is poorly written anyway.)
Making the best of it: After a fair bit of analysis and testing I believe that the best build is: elf (maybe Drow for the Advantage from Faerie Fire (Adv>crit multiplier), maybe High Elf for Misty Step's survivability), background Soldier for Savage Attacker damage buff (enhance crit multiplier), archery, shortbow (Vex for Adv>crit multiplier), feats: elven accuracy (ASI DEX (or Marksman's Luck to maximize the crit DPR if you can max out DEX some other way)), subclass: Spellslinger. I even went for Spellslinger with INT as my dump stat, choosing spells that don't rely on INT for spell attack or counter-saves. (Blade Ward, Shield, Jump, Resistance...) In that way you can gain a lot of options that aid survivability/mobility without having to dedicate any of your ability stats to use those options. That means you're getting lots of bonuses from the classically INT area whilst freeing up those stat points for other things (eg: HP). Combining Blade Ward, Shield (Reaction, +5 AC) and "Skin of Your Teeth" (Reaction, +1d8 risk die to AC) makes you satisfyingly invulnerable to massive boss hits (I recently had the satisfaction of informing the DM that the big bad legendary hit of 27 had in fact missed).
Additional notes: - I am actually enjoying the challenge of making something "good" out of what is clearly a poorly designed class/subclasses. I've even gone for Reborn (rather than elf) in an attempt to make a character that is damn near impossible to kill. To maintain a touch of gunslinger flavor, his musket was an integral part of his backstory, but when we realized that firearms suck compared to bows, his musket blew up in his hands and he had it rebuilt into a bizarre looking contraption (that uses the shortbow RAW). - It may work better in a sci-fi/industrial setting, but ultimately the subclasses are still rubbish due to the risk dice contradiction. - If your DM is willing to let you play around with gradually developing modifications to the weapons it might be a fun, flavored way to soften the nerfs of reloading/poor range/lack of damage mods. Eg: "discover" rifling to increase range, adapt a spyglass into a scope for to-hit bonuses on unsuspecting targets, or just some other way to add the "sighted" property.
Just my opinions, but they are informed. Happy to hear of ways that people have enjoyed this class.
1st of all, if you're expecting realism...in a game where dragon people can build magic Iron Man armor & wield Moses's staff...you're going to be disappointed. 2nd of all...not everyone is minmaxing & powergaming, regardless of those play styles' inherent validity. So arguing about numbers doesn't matter as much. 3rd...where are you getting this "most" people on forums? That claim is impossible to verify w/o links. Finally...is there a non-convoluted way to fire a bow when prone & not have disadvantage?
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DM, player & homebrewer(Current homebrew project is an unofficial conversion of SBURB/SGRUB from Homestuck into DND 5e)
Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.
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Does anyone have any experience or knowledge on the Gunslinger Class that was added to D&D Beyond?
She/Her Player and Dungeon Master
I do not have experience with the class in game, but I did buy it out of curiosity. Giving it a look over, I think Mercer’s Fighter Subclass better design. Like a lot of third party content, I think there are some balance issues resultant from a “throw it all at the wall and don’t really edit to ensure consistency with official content” approach.
I particularly hate the High Roller subclass, which has a metagame-level bluffing component with the DM that I think is problematic from a game design stance (a meta mini-game influencing the game itself), likely slows down gameplay unnecessarily, and could lead to problematic DM-player encounters with some types of player.
I would be curious to see what others might think, but, I would be disinclined to allow access to this particular third party content and would instead steer folks toward Fighter-Gunslinger if that is what they wanted to play.
Not a fan of the Liar's Dice feature, I have to be honest. It's an interesting thing to have as say a flavour minigame within the story. like you go to a saloon and it's a game you can play with NPCs or the other players. But as a feature? Nah. It would slow things down way too much, and you basically negate the consequences of any low roll. In a large group (so you're rarely rolling anyway), it's ridiculously OP.
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.
The actual class is solid.
I can make Woody & James Pond with at least 2 of the subclasses.
But the Liar's Dice thing is EASILY found out via Maps & The game log on here, so it's not the most Beyond-friendly subclass.
(Here's hoping we get Witch at some point, because this gets my hopes up for more & more Valda's dripfeed)
DM, player & homebrewer(Current homebrew project is an unofficial conversion of SBURB/SGRUB from Homestuck into DND 5e)
Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.
Is the Liar's Dice only for the one (bannable-by-GM)subclass, or does it affect two or more?
Because a lot of the other subclasses look interesting, especially Spellslinger and DeadEye?
How does liar's dice work? (for anybody who doesn't want to drop 15 dollars on a random class, including me)
It's one subclass.
Basically, if you want to once per turn, you can try & BS your declared attackroll via a Risk Dice(The central mechanic of Gunslinger)
DM, player & homebrewer(Current homebrew project is an unofficial conversion of SBURB/SGRUB from Homestuck into DND 5e)
Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.
Did this class, the Gunslinger, come from Stephen King's 'Dark Tower' series?
I am NOT in favor of including firearms in the options available to the players. It does not matter if these things are initially restricted to NPCs, if an NPC has a unique item, eventually that unique item will wind up in a player character's hands. While the 2024 PHB shows what appears to be a muzzle loading flintlock musket and pistol, in a short matter of time, some maniacal cleric of Gond (Forgotten Realms deity that delights in creating mechanical gadgets) will improve the design by replacing the flint with a percussion cap, then by introducing the 'pepperbox' (a multi-barrel pistol capable of multiple shots before reloading), then by improving the design to a traditional revolver, then to a semi-automatic pistol (Luger Parabellum, M1911A1 etc.) and the game turns into either a James Bond frolic or a Maxwell Smart farce.
It's one subclass.
Essentially, you can hide your d20 roll, and say it's different to what it actually is. If the DM accepts your claim, you keep what you claim you rolled. If the DM challenges you, then you roll again and accept the worst roll (so basically, you'll have rolled at Disadvantage. If the DM challenges you but you were telling the truth, you get an even better roll.
So, if you roll a 1, you should always do it because at worst...you'll get a 1 anyway. Similarly low rolls are also no brainers because you'll likely just end up with the same result of challenged but you could improve the roll if not challenged.
Similarly, if you get a high roll, you should hide the roll and just tell the truth. If challenged, you could turn your nat19 into a nat20.
It's very flavourful, in a way, but it would drag things out a lot and just lead to frustration.
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 have no idea how that could make any sense lore-wise. Are you basically trying to cheat god?
It doesn't try to justify itself lore-wise. It's a metagame that brings the flavour of gambling to the player (which is what the subclass is about) - think of that gambling game on Davy Jones' ship in the second PotC film.
It's one of the reasons I don't like it - it's taking up time at the table that inherently boots the other players from the play-space. At least there's value in players listening in on your turn during combat, even if they don't get to act. With this... it's a semi-amusing mini game that they can't participate in, influence or even tell it happened once it's over.
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 am a little sad that one of the three New Feats "Iron Hero", is a Feat that was already released in the other Valda's book. Other than that the class looks fun, excited to try it. My DM already said I can swap over, since I was playing the Gunslinger Fighter.
Though as for the topic of the High Roller's Liar's Dice feature. Its only the Risk Die that is hidden, NOT the attack roll. And as someone who has played a different TTRPG that has a similar style of subclass you would be surprised by how little it actually sidetracks combat, slows things down or boot anyone from the play-space.
Its really no different then asking the DM to make a saving throw when you use a Combat Maneuver or Cast a Spell. Just instead of saying "Make a Save: you are saying "Do you call my bluff?".
"Not getting cut into bloody littles slices, That's the key to a sound plan."
So, if I’m understanding this correctly, then it opens up a whole different problem. This isn’t about challenging a character or a monster, this is about a player challenging another player (who happens to be the DM). So if the person running the PC is a good or bad liar, or the DM happens to be extra gullible, that’s going to be what impacts how well the power works much more than anything else. Certainly there’s games where that kind of thing makes sense and could be really fun, but it doesn’t seem like a fit for D&D.
Please don’t take this as me attacking you. I’m not responding to you like this because I think you are responsible for inventing the mechanic, or because I think you need to answer for it. It’s more just quoting to give the appropriate context.
Oh you're fine, don't worry. Honestly I just view at as another one of those "If X condition is met do this instead" abilities. Cause the die being effected is d8, that doesn't look like it scales in size ever. Its a unique risk reward. Either you get lucky and between 2 - 16 damage, you get unlucky and deal 1 - 4 damage, or you even out at whatever number you said which is gonna be 1 - 8 damage. Either way you are squeezing out a little extra damage.
I will agree, its not going to be something everyone is going to like. I think it would be better received if it wasn't just some random ability that stands out from other abilities. If it was a Full Class with similar effects, instead of just a subclass. It'd probably be better received. I know from the class I have experienced, the whole class had cool little effects and abilities like this. Once you got used to it after a couple times, it was more of a "Ah ha!" and it gives the DM a new way interact with the player, maybe even come up with cool unique items or fight mechanics.
That's just me though
"Not getting cut into bloody littles slices, That's the key to a sound plan."
Oh my Bulb that's awful. My opinion of Valda's was already low, but... damn
Active characters:
Edoumiaond Willegume "Eddie" Podslee, Vegetanian scholar (College of Spirits bard)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator (Assassin rogue)
Peter "the Pied Piper" Hausler, human con artist/remover of vermin (Circle of the Shepherd druid)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
Having now read the subclass, it's neither the attack roll NOR the Risk Die that's hidden; it's the entire damage roll
I still hate it, but slightly less than I did when it was the attack roll
Active characters:
Edoumiaond Willegume "Eddie" Podslee, Vegetanian scholar (College of Spirits bard)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator (Assassin rogue)
Peter "the Pied Piper" Hausler, human con artist/remover of vermin (Circle of the Shepherd druid)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
We will see. Prefer the classic settings over this type of class. Remember the original classes and races and guess I was just broke in with 1e so prefer it over some of these modern additions.
TLDR: It's not a good class. Poorly designed and poorly tested. Has potential to be very fun, but needs a lot of re-writing.
I'm playing the official Valda Gunslinger. Currently level 5. My DM is very RAW. Only experienced play in traditional Forgotten Realms flavor (maybe Gunslinger works in industrial/sci-fi mode). Playing with pretty much all official add-ons enabled.
If done RAW (official Valda's rules), it is not a good class. It is poorly designed and has clearly not been tested well. Smacks of popular homebrew stuff cobbled together, with an untested attempt at balancing it. It doesn't really work RAW.
My reasoning for stating that it doesn't work?
1. My own experience, echoed by what most people are saying on forums, is that the official RAW for firearms makes them redundant to bows. Most gunslingers end up using shortbow which, obviously, negates the flavor of the class. The average DPR of firearms is too low compared to bows: you can't add DEX or PB modifiers to firearm damage as you can with bows, and firearms mostly require reloading which reduces attack rate. The range of many firearms is laughable: 30 ft for a pistol, 40 ft for a musket, 80 ft for a hunting rifle,
2. The subclasses are widely agreed to be redundant because the vast majority of the subclass abilities rely on using the limited pool of risk die, but the default, level 2 risk die maneuvers are generally better than the subclass maneuvers, so why would you waste the risk die? Better to spend risk dice on non-subclass risk maneuvers, so the subclass bonuses are mostly redundant.
3. The most interesting subclass feature, Highroller's Liar Dice, actually turns out to not really work. It can be used to maximize huge damage on the slightly more frequent crits but, the bluffing mechanic only really works if you use Liar's Dice all the time (wasting the other risk die maneuvers) so that you can scramble your DM's read on when you're bluffing or not. Discussion and experience suggest that DMs get bored of engaging in the mechanic and fall into just always calling bluff or always ignoring it. Run the numbers through ChatGPT and it'll tell you that, on average, if you use all the risk die on Liar's Dice, you'll end up with an average return of just 1.25 x normal damage (having lost the ability to use the risk die for any of the other, more versatile risk die maneuvers).
(3a. The one way to get around the risk die wastage problem is to use Risky Business, which allows you to deliberately impose disadvantage on your shots to reclaim a spent risk die. Obviously, if you play Risky Business in a sensible manner then you further reduce your already poor DPR. My DM and I both humorously identified that this rule can easily be broken by saying that you randomly take Disadvantaged potshots at "manufactured" enemies between encounters (though I realize that is very silly)).
4. Reiterating the firearms range issue: 40 ft for a musket and 80 ft for a hunting rifle is... ugh. For reference, 40 ft is 12 m, a school bus, a telephone pole. You can spit 40 ft. A modern 9mm handgun IRL is reliably accurate to 85 ft. I understand that the devs feel the need to balance weapons, but if you have to nerf reality that much then surely you're admitting that the weapon class doesn't work within the realms of the normal game.
5. A particular personal irritation of mine: Deadeye, the sniper subclass, could be great, should be easy to make this useful, but it's trash! "Fire While Prone. You don’t have Disadvantage as a result of the Prone condition on attack rolls you make with Ranged weapons."... What!? Deliberately lying down to take a stabilized shot grants you the sum bonus of... NOT HAVING DISADVANTAGE!?!?... and that's only at short range too! It's so easy to fix this: deliberately going prone to take a steady shot should give you Advantage at short range and remove Disadvantage at long range. (IMO the whole "Prone" mechanic is poorly written anyway.)
Making the best of it:
After a fair bit of analysis and testing I believe that the best build is: elf (maybe Drow for the Advantage from Faerie Fire (Adv>crit multiplier), maybe High Elf for Misty Step's survivability), background Soldier for Savage Attacker damage buff (enhance crit multiplier), archery, shortbow (Vex for Adv>crit multiplier), feats: elven accuracy (ASI DEX (or Marksman's Luck to maximize the crit DPR if you can max out DEX some other way)), subclass: Spellslinger.
I even went for Spellslinger with INT as my dump stat, choosing spells that don't rely on INT for spell attack or counter-saves. (Blade Ward, Shield, Jump, Resistance...) In that way you can gain a lot of options that aid survivability/mobility without having to dedicate any of your ability stats to use those options. That means you're getting lots of bonuses from the classically INT area whilst freeing up those stat points for other things (eg: HP). Combining Blade Ward, Shield (Reaction, +5 AC) and "Skin of Your Teeth" (Reaction, +1d8 risk die to AC) makes you satisfyingly invulnerable to massive boss hits (I recently had the satisfaction of informing the DM that the big bad legendary hit of 27 had in fact missed).
Additional notes:
- I am actually enjoying the challenge of making something "good" out of what is clearly a poorly designed class/subclasses. I've even gone for Reborn (rather than elf) in an attempt to make a character that is damn near impossible to kill. To maintain a touch of gunslinger flavor, his musket was an integral part of his backstory, but when we realized that firearms suck compared to bows, his musket blew up in his hands and he had it rebuilt into a bizarre looking contraption (that uses the shortbow RAW).
- It may work better in a sci-fi/industrial setting, but ultimately the subclasses are still rubbish due to the risk dice contradiction.
- If your DM is willing to let you play around with gradually developing modifications to the weapons it might be a fun, flavored way to soften the nerfs of reloading/poor range/lack of damage mods. Eg: "discover" rifling to increase range, adapt a spyglass into a scope for to-hit bonuses on unsuspecting targets, or just some other way to add the "sighted" property.
Just my opinions, but they are informed. Happy to hear of ways that people have enjoyed this class.
1st of all, if you're expecting realism...in a game where dragon people can build magic Iron Man armor & wield Moses's staff...you're going to be disappointed.
2nd of all...not everyone is minmaxing & powergaming, regardless of those play styles' inherent validity. So arguing about numbers doesn't matter as much.
3rd...where are you getting this "most" people on forums? That claim is impossible to verify w/o links.
Finally...is there a non-convoluted way to fire a bow when prone & not have disadvantage?
DM, player & homebrewer(Current homebrew project is an unofficial conversion of SBURB/SGRUB from Homestuck into DND 5e)
Once made Maxwell's Silver Hammer come down upon Strahd's head to make sure he was dead.
Always study & sharpen philosophical razors. They save a lot of trouble.