I think I like the maneuvers in the order: precision (it just WORKS!), distracting, commander... then that's about it. The rest of them either depend on saves that are so hard to make land (menacing, goading) or are super-situational.
I just tested a theory crafted 10th lvl rogue reach character of mine against some tigers and was whiping the floor with them - added a dire tiger who pounced, raked and grabbed the poor bugger (down to 1 hp and grappled)... - then looked up what happened... 10th level should have had access to fly...
Boots of escape would have been nice but don't fit in the budget. But some fly potions definitively would have - though in this scenario rogue acted after being pounced by dire tiger... vest of escape is also too pricey and wouldn't help too much. -- got efficient quiver with wands... -- grease would be nice, but even if I got free I'd just die right after. Bandolier with a potion of gaseous form would work. I wonder how a tiger would react to that... - probably ignore the gas.
when the dire tiger gets his attack of opportunity while I'm grappled, does he get rake on it?
haha -- decided the last part of my inquery was actually a good question, so I asked formally... https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/134265/does-the-grappling-dire-tiger-get-to-rake-on-aoo
@HellSaint You're a 5e player/gm - but you've tried pathfinder, right? - What do you like better about the new system?
but from what I have seen/read, they took some of "make things simpler" mindset design of 5e and put it on PF, which makes sense since 5e tried to solve some complexity problems around from 3.5e which were probably shared by PF
@HellSaint almost the same thing :P - just saw you had some activity on pathfinder tag (2 questions) and assumed :D -- but should have noticed they were both answers not questions and 3.5 is very similar so...
fair enough :D
Oh for PF 2nd edition? yeah, downloaded that today but haven't tried it yet.
yeah, and probably easier not to obsess... I spend too much time thinking about interaction effects and building "builds" rather than characters. I hadn't played in years pretty much for that reason and this weekend I got back into it just a little - boom, like 20 h over a few hours spent researching magic items and what not
I still use a lot of time in concepts and builds, but yeah, worrying about magic items is especially something that left my mind
The design intent in 5e was that characters would be useful through their features, and any magic item they get is just a bonus. Although this is obviously optimistic for martial classes at high levels, you aren't worried about the best magic item for each slot
Does it increase options for players to just use creativity again like 1st and 2nd ed did? because then all the 3.5 e materials could still be used as inspiration for cool ideas...
Another very strong mindset in 5e is "Do whatever you want as long as everyone has fun and your DM is okay with that" :P
As a recent example, check Lead Designer answers on Animal companions - rpg.stackexchange.com/a/134261/43856 - essentially saying "yeah you don't need rules for that, just roleplay it duuude"
I never played past low levels, possibly why building this character took so damn long. Had to learn all about the big 6 etc. and little experience on what kind of things one would encounter... -- how would you go about testing the feasibility of a build? sofar I've been testing solo, but normally there'd be a party which kinda changes everything.
also take into account different encounter settings (terrain, visibility, etc.), as one of the most common mistakes in theorycrafting is the "we are in a vacuum" thinking
that one actually did experience play - and quite a bit of modification as the GM changed what rules where available part-way through
I considered wizards, but all players I've played with have been casual, so I want to play things that have to be optimized to even become viable (i.e. catching up rather than overshadowing)
but I get you, I started DMing because I would create so many characters I knew I couldn't play all of them as a player, so I would turn them into NPCs ;P
well, if it works, you don't go back to the drawing board, so it depends hahhaa
I think I get overly invested in characters in games (way beyond the build, i.e. rp wise) - and normally you can't just change the character details when you don't like them - so I want to make sure the mechanics don't get in the way of seeing the character through the story.
I guess GMing would be a good way to gather more experience about what kind of builds work or don't with what kinds of parties without having to get invested in my particular character making it...
like oh no that magic item only works with that specific person
damn.
or oh well the magic item desintegrated?
and then just reward an actual correct CR-wise treasure to the party
either way, NPCs don't have to follow the PC rules, so you can also just give them a magic item feature without having the actual magic item. There are lots of solutions that don't screw WBL
Feels to me like that would have to be pre-arranged with the players (i.e. "sometimes more magic items will be necessary to provide a good challenge than is appropriate to reward you afterwards, would you like me to acknowledge that in game with some desintegration spells or should I just add intrinsic bonuses where possible" and hand-wave it?) -- otherwise feels a little like cheating :P
Turn based rpg strategy/tacitcs game. There's a crazy detailed mod (called 1.13, since the last official patch was 1.12) and ... oh yeah I'll let you sleep :D
I guess end of the day I think the answer posted is sufficient. STR and DEX saving throws from spells may not be able to traget the hand but a collapsing ceiling would cause a dex save, a big rock might call for a str save so... those might be the most common environmentally triggered saves
its feasible for the hand to have to make one and it would fail
which is weird - but thems the rules
@NautArch Your answer on that Toll the Dead Q from yesterday is doing quite well
We had a classic D&D encounter during our session last night. Our Party had to face off against perfect clones of ourselves, stats abilities and all. =O
@NautArch The short version is that I Ensnared the Mirror!Rogue in place with an Ensnaring Strike, rotated around to get out of their range, and got to laugh as even with their paladin buff, they were helpless to break out. Then, with 40% of their damage gone, our Druid nuked them with Erupting Earth and Moonbeam a few times, the rogue and I cleaned up the Mirror!Druid and Mirror!Rogue, and then we spent like 10 more rounds trying to bust through the 20AC on Mirror!Me. XD
@NautArch Not even slightly. I don't know what he could have done about the Rogue getting stuck in place, but the Mirror!Paladin burned all their spell slots on smites on me. Which did a lot of damage.... that I then healed up with Lay on Hands.
Also, the moment her allies went down, Mirror!Paladin didn't bother to heal them up, and when they did use their healing, they spent all of it on themselves. It feels like one of those "This is who YOU are!" moments, except I usually save LoH points specifically to bring back allies. =/
@NautArch Yeah, most of my LoH points go to our 12AC rogue. That's been happening less now that she has her 'Reaction→Half Damage" feature, but she still takes quite a few hits if any of our enemies ever get too frustrated to bother trying to hit me.
@Xirema We just got a rogue in our party and I'm not overly fond of him IC because of some of his actions - but I'd heal him if necessary. He's more ranged anyway so I'm usually not at a spot that I can.
Mirror!Rogue was trapped in place for the entire combat session, so when they tried to fire a crossbow bolt at Real!Rogue (and managed to hit their 12 AC despite Disadvantage), they managed to deal 2-1==1 damage, which Real!Rogue was able to half to 0 with their Reaction.
Also: I suddenly have a newfound appreciation for how difficult it is to break a Paladin's Concentration. We unloaded against Mirror!Paladin with so many attacks, and she made her Concentration save every single time. Aura of Protection + Bless + CON basically means only a natural 1 guarantees concentration will be broken.
And I'm planning to pick up Resilient(CON) as a feat later on....
@Xirema yeah it's hard deal a lot of damage at once in 5e most characters just have multiple attacks. Paladin smites and sneak attack are the easiest ways to break concentration
@kviiri Oof. Our saving grace is in the fact that most of the enemies we fight are non-humanoid (or non-humanoids that just happen to look and act exactly like ourselves).
@DavidCoffron The best way to make friends is to knock people unconscious. Wait a minute...
It definitely reminds me of my first D&D character though. I played a Dwarf Cleric and I had written my character's backstory as a shell-shocked "veteran" (in that he fought in one battle) that vowed pacifism. That flew right out the front door when the campaign started. Eventually, the DM homebrewed a prestige class for me as a joke. I got a fancy transformation and magic beams that would only knock enemies unconscious.
@goodguy5 The question is asking if the DM should give out a class feature for free if someone takes a feat. The obvious answer is "No, you shouldn't".
+1AC, by itself, it less good than a stat bump, generally speaking... let's round it up to half as good.
and +1 damage (increasing from 1d6 to 1d8 is an average of 1 damage increase) is similarly, about half.
really, by the numbers, dual wielder LOOKS like a good feat, but it affects two weapon fighting, which is, inofitself, an underperforming game mechanic.
@goodguy5 Probably not, since you'd have to be ignoring the two-handed property to perform the bonus action attack. Which would mean it wouldn't benefit from GWF+GWM
I could reword it as "You may selectively ignore the two-handed property", but I think something like that would probably violate the 5e design ethos (...more than the original version of the feat itself, anyways)
But I'd agree with GWF not working- it doesn't actually care about the two-handed property, but it specifically says "When you roll a 1 or 2 on a damage die for an attack you make with a melee weapon that you are wielding with two hands[...]", and you certainly aren't wielding them in two hands.
(Anyone else find the Heavy property weird, btw? I'm get the logical reason why small characters shouldn't wield them, but designwise I don't understand why small races need to be restricted access from the strongest weapons.)
anyway.... how can we improve two weapon fighting?
my first impulse is to make the bonus attack actually a smaller die, but include your modifier base. a 1d4 maybe? Kind of like the polearm master secondary attack.
Then the twf style would "upgrade" to regular weapon damage? idk
@CTWind if nothing else, it's a holdover from 3.X
and I retract what I just said about twf. that ends up being the same combination as it is now with more confusing math
I just asked this question, about how to reference between the print and online versions of published 5e content, and quickly got a close vote with the following reason:
I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it isn't about gaming, it's about the user interface design for a we...
I'd be fine with a baseline +1 AC for dual wielding- it makes sense since, to me, dual wielding is a defensive/parry-focused style, where only one hand is really focused on offense. Then it's a halfway point between heavy weapons and sword n' board.
The other option is more significant 'on-each-hit' effects that scale the best with more attacks.
Third option is just removing it taking a bonus action, and allowing you to do it freely once per turn instead of costing part of your action economy.
Best-case scenario would be a rogue making that 2d6+Dex for one attack action with 2 shortswords, which is on-par with a greatsword's 2d6+Str. And the first one doesn't scale as well into the late game when extra attacks come out.
(which is why I think +1 AC'd be justified, even though it'd make the former stronger in the 1-4 level range)
But it'd require some thought and experimentation. I wouldn't want to disrupt things if that difference turns out to be significant.
Other option is an offhand gives +2 AC if you opt to give up the offhand attack instead of a constant passive +1
@doppelspooker just saw your comment, wanna make sure I get it. Meta questions are supposed to be reserved for, like, formally contesting things?
My thought process there wasn't like, "I'm being persecuted, I wish to lodge a complaint!" It was "I got a 'this is off-topic' comment, and I wanna ask the person about it but if I do it here I know it'll start a big comment chain, and we hate big comment chains, so I'll do it on the channel that's actually for asking if things are on topic instead."
Don't do that? Wait to see what the consensus is first?
@A_S00 Meta questions are a lot of work and energy to work through. One single person's close vote is not worth a meta. That single close vote has no effect whatsoever unless four other people agree, and is usually resolved trivially with a comment from someone else saying "no this looks fine and on topic".
If it becomes a big issue — a big chain emerges with a lot of disagreement, or the question actually gets closed — then it's worth a meta.
There's a lot of weird single close votes that get cast, most of the time they just age away because nobody agrees and nothing happens, and sometimes it's resolved in one, maybe three or four comments
Well, on today's episode of "Useless things Xirema has invented", I've written a program that can assemble a flattened table of odds for any combination of dice that you feed it.
@doppelspooker Yeah. You could use it to roll ("here, roll a 1d1679616, and look up on the table exactly how much damage you did with your 8d6 roll") but that's not terribly practical.
(Yes, it's using an arbitrary precision integer to track the outcome quantities)
One possible use for this? If your elven rogue is abusing cover mechanics to gain double-advantage on all their attack rolls, find out what the enemy AC needs to be to properly challenge them.
(Here, we see that assuming the presence of Bless, you need to set the enemy AC equal to a Tarrasque's in order to ensure that they only hit 50% of the time)