@OneCritWonder because bards are OP in ToA. Expertise and BI break lots of challenges

Bards are OP in general in 5e. Magical secrets is SO strong

And here I thought it was because in SKT I cut off a goblin's ear and then told him "Hey, OneEar, you can Vincent Van Gough f___ yourself"

>_>

Hahahaha

Best vicious mockery ever. You would have definitely got inspiration from me

@DavidCoffron Yup, my bard is a coupe levels below the rest of the party and is still more powerful generally

Yeah, I went from a Wizard and a Bard and for a few levels a Warlock in other adventures and am now currently a Barbarian for ToA

@OneCritWonder ew barbarians

I make it as interesting as I can, but a lot of turns are just "guess I try to hit him again" which is quite a bit of a change to my usual style.

@OneCritWonder I've got a Wizard lined up for my next adventure. Just waiting for the current one to end

The group needed a meatshield and the folks who had been martials in previous campaigns wanted to be things like Druid and Warlock.

@OneCritWonder druid is a meat shield tho

Moon druid at least

They're Shepherd

If I ever need to be the party meat shield I go moon druid or monk. Way more fun

I was Moon Druid in a recent IRL game and am looking forward to doing more of it.

Hopefully something starting around level 5 or so.

You don't need a meat shield if you kill all the baddies before they get close to the deliciously squishy wizards (I'm just not fond of the generic party structure in the first place though)

We're playing ToA with meatgrinder rules. I'm not at all sad about my massive CON score.

Or my large pool of hit points and damage resistance.

@OneCritWonder which barbarian type?

Eh, characters are meant to have interesting stories, not necessarily long ones.

@NautArch Ancients

@OneCritWonder ooooh, neat!

@Delioth agreed. Every time my players say "we need a healer" I want to throw a brick

I'm a seven foot tall tiger that speaks with a Russian accent stuck in a jungle with a pretty boy paladin who things he's better than everyone else, a contract killer with the most annoying bubbly personality you can fathom, Karen from Mean Girls if she was also into necrophilia, and a poor druid who's trying not to be killed by any of us being ...ourselves.

I think healers discourage tactical play and positioning (or at least serve as a counter to poor play)

It will certainly be a interesting story regardless of the length of it...

@DavidCoffron I usually have this issue in Pathfinder. Especially because in-combat healing is terrible (outside of a few niche builds) and way less efficient than just killing the enemy. And out-of-combat healing... well, just about everyone can use a wand of cure light wounds, and those suckers are cheap

@Delioth I still need to try out Pathfinder

@DavidCoffron Healer's are overrated. My current party in the group I'm DMing has a bard, ranger, and paladin - and they're complaining about not having a healer. DUDES, You're ALL healers!

and I'm still going to make healing potions common!

@NautArch I hate healing as a mechanic. I might even try a game where it's just banned. It is boring

It's a Get out of jail free card above anything else

@DavidCoffron no potions/no spells?

@DavidCoffron Do it. Roll20 often has a bunch of Pathfinder campaigns. Though Pathfinder 2e is coming out in the next year or so (Playtest in August, I think?)

If you have no healing, then you need to do something else going on in your game

Stopping damage from ever happening > reacting to damage that has already happened.

@NautArch yeah. When have you used a healing potion or spell and felt more satisfied than "good now i won't die"

Healing: either it's strong and stalls combats, or it's weak and generally only useful as an emergency option :-) (or then we depart from the traditional DnD fare)

@DavidCoffron That's still a pretty satisfying feeling!

and allows the DM to throw more stuff at you.

@NautArch I can throw the same amount of stuff against nonhealers as healers if they play tactically

Brb

I think if you want to ban regular healing, then you might need to increase hit points?

@DavidCoffron Do you mean thorw the same stuff at a party whether or not they are healing?

@kviiri Yeah. Pathfinder took the weak option. The only in-combat healing that's worth it is a Paladin that gets to life-link to donate hp to allies every turn (for no action), and then can heal themself as a Swift action (that a paladin wasn't using anyways), so they can still do whatever they want

@goodguy5 if I use the core balance options, or I could just reduce enemy hit points and make the game more tactical

Five Rogues will do just fine if they play smart.

@DavidCoffron more or less same effect.

@OneCritWonder Party balance is also something I Never understood. The party is the party. It's up to the DM to balance for the enjoyment of all.

@goodguy5 not the same. Big difference between dark souls and morrowind

And the DM of the Five Rogues should look at what they have at the table and adjust accordingly.

so, I stand by my "more or less the same effect"

@goodguy5 only reason that's necessary is because monsters don't use healing. Another reason the mechanic seems generally un-fun. Feels like it makes it so mistakes aren't punished as much

@DavidCoffron Roughly the same. If you add PC hit points, there's more of a buffer for them to draw from (and you only have to modify one set of stats); if you subtract enemy hit points, they have to draw from the buffer less (but you have to adjust it for every encounter, and if the math just doesn't work out they're boned)

Just play Edge of the Empire and call it a day.

I'd personally err towards adjusting PC hit points, since that softens the blow of a really lucky crit (since a 5 hp monster can still crit for full damage exactly the same way a 500 hp monster can)

Apocalypse World doesn't have HP in the traditional sense. Each character has six slots for harm, roughly equivalent to getting AK47'd twice. Harm is rather long-term and Angels (medic guys) are usually better at medicine than snap healing.

Or play Cypher and explain to PCs that everything they do is essentially costing them 'hit points'

In AW2e, characters won't even die after reaching full harm. Always, at least. The player can decide if the character comes back weaker, weirder, as a different playbook or dies for real.

@DavidCoffron or you could institute angry DM's fighting spirit thing

they basically have a small health bar hidden inside of their regular hit bar... which basically gives them one more "hit"

Is there an RPG that is more... lethal? Like actually challenging in a fun way? I enjoy the "we are the heroes" storyline like anyone but what about a more gritty "can we even survive" idea. D&D does that poorly.

@DavidCoffron Paranoia?

@DavidCoffron 2nd edition.

@DavidCoffron Call of Cthulhu?

@DavidCoffron Torch Bearer or Burning Wheel

@DavidCoffron You absolutely needed henchmen in order to survive in Greyhawk. The encounters were pretty quick too. Either it died, or you died. Not a huge amount of extended combat.

Aren't all pre-4E D&D editions pretty lethal?

@A_S00 not the same way

Oh yeah. I'm talking to rpg experts... I'll look into those other rpgs

@A_S00 3.5 was lethal for everything but the PCs

@ColinGross first level was still dangerous

I think Wizards still had a d4 hit die

could be wrong on that

My experience with 3.5 was that it was very lethal to PCs unless they were optimizing heavily without the DM upping ELs to match, or the DM was sandbagging.

e.g., this post summarizing PC deaths from Saph's pretty popular RHoD campaign journal is typical of my time with the game.

My 3.5 days were lethal, but a lot of that came from never knowing if the DM was just kneejerk playing with the monsterstats to try and adjust to the PCs.

@DavidCoffron You can make Savage Worlds pretty deadly. It's got exploding dice, so people can just die relatively easily.

@AVeryLargeBear A buddy of mine was planning on playing SW: Tomorrow Legion, but never got his act (or group) together. Looked amazingly awesome, though.

I wish I lived in a town where I could get other systems together but I have to spend unprecedented amount of effort just to get D&D going most of the time.

Looking forward to my next move greatly.

@AVeryLargeBear Any game can have exploding dice if you have the right chemicals.

@OneCritWonder military?

Something like that.

@NautArch I've only ever played the core game, but it was pretty good. I really want to run one of the Space Mars 1889 campaigns in it.

@Rubiksmoose That's the spirit!

@Rubiksmoose The trick is handling the shrapnel

You might be on to something here. BRB I'm going to grab some d6s

@GreySage Hmmm yeah. I vote hosting at not my house lol.

@GreySage protip: don't handle the shrapnel.

@DavidCoffron dread.

Like Jenga?

@OneCritWonder there was a submission to the 200 word rpg that involved jenga

I was asking if @nitsua60 was talking about the Dread system that uses Jenga.

Boo!

that's all you say!

also hai hobo

also, I just put one of these in my cart. I'm tired of finding jammed dispensers.

smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00DDULFPS

It was me. I jammed all your dispensers.

Something something spy something something pootis.

that's impressive.

Most impressive.

if you can name one of the cities I've worked in, I'll give you an internet cookie

which should be easy, as you've been jamming my dispensers.

@Rubiksmoose does that 3rd party caster class count as shopping?

@goodguy5 oh actually it might be.

Though as my comment tries to point out that isn't even the biggest issue it has IMO.

it's a weird one

I THINK they want someone that deals area damage with "magic", but doesn't use a spell list.

kind of like the alchemist that's out there

it's double weird because I expect better of someone with that much rep and that many questions/answers

I was about to flag as "unclear" because it looks like an XY problem at first glance

The whole thing doesn't make any sense. All we can do is wait to see if it gets edited into something reasonable

@Delioth The UA mystic would almost work.

we could invite them here

Though it is not 3rd party (we don't know why that is important) and some of the abilities are spell-based (we don't know where they draw the line there).

(I'm on that invite)

@goodguy5 Absolutely.

I assume this is about the casters who don't cast spells?

yes

@goodguy5 philadelphia

technically, I've never worked IN philadelphia and you're not onecrit

@goodguy5 Earth

@goodguy5 :D

Boo!

:D

Charlotte?

North Carolina

@Delioth Earth has people and buildings. It is thus a city.

@Rubiksmoose i don't understand what 3rd party has to do with the question at all. Technically a paladin could qualify if they chose not to cast spells but only use divine smites

@NautArch Or a wizard who forgot to prepare spells

@NautArch "caster that doesn't cast spells" is a weird question all by itself

Yeah, I can think of a few interpretations of the actual issue they're trying to solve

The whole thing is very confusing.

I wonder what they actually want to do.

I think they want a character that uses magical effects, without having to flip through the spell section.

Where all of their abilities are on 2-3 pages

Those both kinda make sense as questions someone would want to ask (and I'm sure there are more), but the question... fails to actually ask either.

@goodguy5 sounds very monk

I'm hyperinterested in finding out what they're actually looking for.

@goodguy5 But generally this applies to basically every class lol. Almost every class has a magical ability of some type.

@NautArch Which, ironically is one of the subclasses they've already ruled out.

@NautArch it IS very Monk. I think they're looking for something very much like the way of the four elements, that does not refer to spells.

@KorvinStarmast can you explain the history of gaming tag in that question? I don't understand how it is relevant at all honestly.

That's my best guess anyway

@Delioth Honestly most Avatar stuff is just "shoot elemental laser beam for damage"

Which is just Dragonfire Adept refluffed

Or Warlock, refluffed

@SPavel Yeah, that's why pathfinder's kineticist pulls it off so well. They just get damage that scales roughly the same as sneak attack, but it's elemental (or physical, depending on your element) that they can blast at people. It's super-similar to 3.5e's Warlock class

@NautArch I get the idea that "party balance" is linked to the 3.x tier system. If there's a Tier 1 and a bunch of Tier 4's, that seems to create some problems. (That's a guess ...)

@Rubiksmoose See HeyICanChan's comment. All I did was put his words to action. I also edited the crappily written question.

@KorvinStarmast ah, that may be why I don't get it :) I pretty much went from AD&D to 5e (25 years later)

@NautArch me too.

@Delioth Legend of Korra really dropped the ball on creative bending IMO

@KorvinStarmast I mean I saw his comment, but that is not what the question is asking. It might be a potential answer, but it seems like OP is only asking about clerics in this edition of D&D not throughout the entire history of it.

@SPavel Never got around to Korra, in any case.

@Rubiksmoose I think KRyan and HeyICanChan raise a couple of interesting points in the comments. I have a suspicion that we may have some answers that are related .... but my search has so far turned up nothing

@KorvinStarmast In order for that tag to be appropriate though the question would have to be edited to be asking about multiple editions or cleric popularity through history.

@Rubiksmoose I think you are making a narrow assumption, and in all honesty, I think it's a bit fruitless to try and read the mind of the querent, as badly as the question was in raw form. Since HICC and KR are very expert in 3.x, and since I played various clerics from way back (the bonus spells in 1e were a huge boost in terms of incentive), I would have to read up on bothPH1 and PH2 of 3.x to see if I could dig something out. Sadly, I have neither of those two books anymore.

@Delioth The first half of season 1 is pretty good, as is season 3

Season 4 starts off really good (think 1920s Chinese warlords era but with bending) but ends weaksauce

@Rubiksmoose In your opinion... which differs from mine ... if you feel that strongly about it, then by all means edit that tag out.

We don't talk about season 2

@SPavel That doesn't sound worth it though. Might just re-watch ATLA instead

It's only 3 seasons, so might as well

@Delioth AtlA has a lot of bad episodes too, but they are not quite so compressed

My pay raise isn't influenced by that tag being there. ;)

@KorvinStarmast ok. well I did. If OP wants a history of gaming question, IMO, they will have to make that point clearer in the question before the tag should be added. As you said, we should not try to read their mind.

OK, stack works as it should, team effort. :) Hopefully, reopen can happen ... we'll see.

I am still gonna look about for some cleric questions ... I could have sworn I saw one a lot like this .... but I may be recalling a GiTP thread last year ...

@KorvinStarmast Yeah I think the question is... ok now. Still seems dangerously likely to attract bad answers. But good enough for a reopen vote.

@doppelgreener your stance in tagging the system even if the problem is not system-specific makes me confuse :P Hope you can clarify it for me: when is the system-agnostic (or no-tag at all) relevant/appropriate, then? Is it only relevant when the person asking went through this problem more than once and across different systems?

Retracted. I think I was incorrect.

@doppelgreener In particular, your first sentence states "if you're asking a question to help you out in a problem about your system and you're only really interested in answers relevant to your system." - for me, this strongly reads as "anyone not experienced with the game system should not be answering". In the example given in the meta (making a pirate adventure), I agree that it's always better to tag the system where you want to make it, because the problem itself is system relevant.

Playing a pirate adventure in 7th Sea is playing 7th Sea. Playing a pirate adventure in D&D requires some changes and house-rules.

@Rubiksmoose Yeah, we have uses for that tag, in special for social problems.

@HellSaint Constitution saving throw vs scurvy

@HellSaint wait, howso?

it seems like you can do all of the regular things

@goodguy5 as far as I am aware, there aren't any mechanical rules for, for example, ship battles

@HellSaint There were in 3.5 (one of the benefits of having a million splatbooks)

Probably also 1e and 2e

D&D is more about... well... dungeons... and... dragons... than open sea exploration and raiding. I've tried playing a One Piece-based campaign and it ended requiring some house rulings now and then.

@SPavel Let's be fair there are rules for anything in 3.5e because in so many years and with open license, someone made it

@HellSaint How does 7th Sea do it? I'm running a pirate pathfinder game with ship battles, and I've thrown out the published sea combat rules in favor of a homebrew approach. I don't really know what works well though... Any sort of reference point would be very helpful.

@MikeQ I've played 7th Sea with friends without ever reading the rule books, but the approach (that seemed to be official - the DM was explaining the rules on the run) was: ships are a character. They have a sheet, attacks, HP, etc

sorry for not being as helpful as you thought :P

@HellSaint Right, that's how 3.x/PF also do it

PF's version is really boring. The two ships are basically massive creatures with really high attack, high HP, low defense, and low damage. So when two ships start fighting, they just trade attacks... back and forth... forever... The players then fall asleep

Having never run or played a DnD ship-based adventure, how I would handle ship combat is have the PCs doing stuff on the ship and have that stuff affect the ships performance. Like, PCs have to load cannon balls, and if they succeed (either through skill check or creativity), their ship does more damage.

Or have a PC at the helm, and their skill/decisions affect the outcome

@GreySage Yes, that's how it works in the rules, on paper. In practice though, it can get repetitive because all the ships can do is damage to each other's hulls - basically the PCs are assisting one big Fighter versus another big Fighter

One of the main problems of the "ship as a creature" approach is that attacking a creature (the ship) doesn't necessarily pose any immediate risk to the passengers, so you end up with several rounds of combat with no risk or reward

@MikeQ I can imagine that. I meant to run the ship-battle encounter as a series of challenges or environmental hazards, rather than a 1v1 combat.

Of the systems I've played, I think Rogue Trader does it the best. Think Star Trek battles. Basically, it assumes the ship is going to get hit anyway, so in addition to damaging the hull, each hit causes stuff to happen inside the ship, like explosions or life support failures.

Like, round 1: nothing bad happens. round 2: If the PCs did badly last round, now there are deck fires.

@GreySage Exactly. The risk makes it meaningful.

Also, participating in attacks is more rewarding, because the players can impose similar effects against the crew of the enemy ship.

7th Sea. I hope you like D10s.

Huh. This answer has a very good point. Does the bugbear's long-limbed ability apply to melee spell attacks like shocking grasp?

Anybody see a counterargument to this?

@MikeQ add "bleeding mechanics" to the ships - which is water entering instead of blood leaving

@Rubiksmoose nah, because he's right :P

@HellSaint That is kind of what I am thinking as well.

@Rubiksmoose "Some spells can target only a creature (including you) that you touch."

There is no explicit range for touch spells. You just have to touch them. since 5e doesn't use a grid as default, whether you can toich the target depends in arm length (of which bugbear DO have longer arms)

@DavidCoffron Though only when they are making melee attacks according to the rules.

@Rubiksmoose they only have reach when making a melee attack. They have long arms all the time

@goodguy5 brilliant energy doesn't damage undead. Definitely not a paladin

This is probably a case where I'd just allow it since it seems really hair-splitting not to.

@DavidCoffron lol fair enough.

oh, you're right @DavidCoffron I was thinking of the other thing

@Rubiksmoose if I'm a giant octopus wild shape can I cast touch spells at 15 feet?

@DavidCoffron Yes

Id say yes just like how you can attack octopus tentacles that are grappling you

@DavidCoffron Do octupuses say that? Or is that your house rule?

@DavidCoffron ok, fair enough, but that's somewhat a house rule since you don't know how long the arms are.

but I can see your point, and, in particular, it makes sense for Touch spells

@Rubiksmoose Crawford does

Since grid play is not the default, the tentacle IS within 5 feet for the melee attack

@HellSaint it's DM adjudication but not a house rule. The core rule is you have to touch. how long your arms are is up to your character (which the DM helps craft in accordance to the game world)

So touch is limited only by what you can touch

@GreySage This is why bards are OP.

Sad songs say so much.

@Yuuki because they can touch the hearts of anyone who hears their poetry?

@Yuuki Unfortunately, they also open you up to charges of inappropriate contact.

Grumble, maybe I need to edit my answer then.

@GreySage Between sad songs and tentacles, I think it's pretty clear who is in more violation of inappropriate contact.

@Rubiksmoose yeah. Mention that they can but only because they can touch the target at a greater range then 5 feet (I think that's right)

@Yuuki what if my sad song is played on a tentacle guitar

(I know it a bass, but that's the best I could find)

I want THIS for my Valor Bard V

@DavidCoffron How does that look?

@Rubiksmoose looks good although now I'm not sure if you even need the first section since you can make melee spell attacks at longer ranges even without long-limbed (see thorn whip)

@DavidCoffron Ugh you're right I think.

@BESW Sadly enough, I'm playing in a Pathfinder game where my DM removed XP and we level up when it is appropriate... so we can feel free to skip content and progress faster. Until the point where, trying to rush some enemies that were doing a ritual, we skip half the building and miss the opportuinty to do some good deeds that were worth two ability points and a feat.

@Rubiksmoose I'd be pretty annoyed if my DM said that a creature with long arms didn't have an extended touch range.

@NautArch Me too lol.

@NautArch They have long arms, but only for punching. If the arms are involved in any non-punching activity, then they are half as long.

Quantum owlbear arms

@Rubiksmoose I have some ideas on that cleric question, based on some research I did and the baggage that the class accumulated over the years. My problem is that the AD&D 2e priest class I didn't play enough of to speak to with confidence. :(

@MikeQ I played a super hero one shot where I was mr. Fantastic (based on the bugbear but longer reach) and my GM wouldnt let me pull myself up the cliff and I was very sad

@KorvinStarmast I have the players handbook but never played priest so I can't help beyond quoting the book

@DavidCoffron Do you mean 23, or 3.x PH II?

2E, not 23, sorry

@KorvinStarmast 2e

I have the book, and some good reference material, but my dragons mags still available don't have a lot of priest/cleric articles from the 2e era. :( Sigh. Not sure if I have enough for a good answer.

Based on a post by aramis, by Brian BallsonStanton, and some Dragon Mag articles on common attitudes at tables .... I think I am on to something. Lack of 3e depth of experience (heh, my first ever 3e char was a cleric, my second was a Divine Soul) also makes me wary of answering.

@NautArch How does my answer look now?

I'll think on it, rather than rush at it. Hmmm.

@KorvinStarmast is there still that article on most played characters on WotC

@Rubiksmoose oooh, much cleaner!

@KorvinStarmast :( well you have me beat already. I hope you can come up with something. It is an intriguing question.

@Zachiel That's the problem with a static universe and a lack of improvisation. Start at level 1, accidentally walk into the BBEG's lair, and the GM is forced to go "Uh oh I guess you are all level 17 now"

@MikeQ Or the BBEG has a snack (next session = roll new characters) or BBEG has some new slaves. next session=Jail Break!

@NautArch Thanks :)

@KorvinStarmast Prepared adventures often say "the players should be level X by this point" because it's assumed they went through most of the content (which would have given them XP) up until then

@DavidCoffron Hmm, got a link? (Is it 3e or 2e specific, or all time?)

@KorvinStarmast Right, that's the improvisation part. The show must go on, so the GM comes up with new content for the party at their current level.

@MikeQ No, we already were at the level we should have been