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Shalvenay

00:32

hey there @linksassin, how're things going?

linksassin

@Shalvenay G'day. Not too bad.

Shalvenay

@linksassin good to hear it, doing OK here, even if I'm a bit short on campaigns atm as technical issues have derailed the one I was playing in

@linksassin how's the campaign you're running coming along?

linksassin

@Shalvenay Both are going well. Though my 5e group tried to get themselves executed last session.

I had to give them some undeserved leniency to keep the campaign going.

Shalvenay

@linksassin how'd they manage to pull that off?

linksassin

@Shalvenay Got caught trying to break a prisoner out of jail. Basically were breaking into the dungeon's of the town leader's estate. Somewhere they are no good reason to be. Could have talked their way out of it if they hadn't tried to fight as their first instinct.

Shalvenay

00:44

@linksassin yeesh. were they sent down there to pull a jailbreak or...?

linksassin

One round into combat they realised they probably weren't going to win, and surrendered.

@Shalvenay Sort of, yes. It's a bit of a complicate scenario. Basically they are in a region called the Loxian Federation. A union of Loxodon, Giff and Lizardfolk and one of the major factions on the continent.

V2Blast

@Sciborg I don't think there's any such rule. The target of the spell just has to be within the spell's range, generally. For area-of-effect spells, whether the point of origin is included in the effect depends on the type of AoE: dndbeyond.com/sources/basic-rules/spellcasting#AreasofEffect

linksassin

In this society, Yuan Ti (previously an unwilling member of the union) are outlawed for past crime (blood magic, murder of the Tzar's son) and should be killed on sight.

The party met a group of Yuan Ti, who told them that the Loxian's had capturer one of them and asked the party to rescue them, and more importantly the artefact they were carrying.

Shalvenay

@linksassin ah

linksassin

Basically it was set up as a difficult political choice between the powerful Loxian oppressors and the Yuan Ti. The campaign is focused around this kind of faction system. Where the party is offered quests from all sides, but they have to think about the implications completing it might have with other factions.

I've got a 5 step faction relationship system. Hostile -> Unfriend -> Neutral -> Friendly -> Allied. Where depending on the status different factions will be different levels of helpful or harmful to the party. Including how easily gold can be spent and healing is available.

At the moment the party at Neutral with all factions. But I set it up that they had the chance to become Friendly with either the Yuan Ti or the Loxians. After getting caught, they are now fighting to remain neutral with the Loxians and have lost the chance to be Friendly with the Yuan Ti.

A night of setbacks all round.

Shalvenay

00:57

@linksassin mind if I toss you something on Discord btw?

linksassin

@Shalvenay Sure, I am working so might not be super quick to respond but always happy to chat.

1 hour later…

Hot RPG Questions

02:17

Q: Does flame blade count as a melee weapon that can be used with divine smite?

With the release of the new Mordekainen's Monsters of the Multiverse, the revamped feature of the Fire Genasi now allows the race access to the Flame Blade spell. Reach to the Blaze. You know the produce flame cantrip. Starting at 3rd level, you can cast the burning hands spell with this trait. ...

goodguy5

Man, did anyone else translate this? because it's a wild ride.

rpg.stackexchange.com/posts/198882/revisions

I don't even know what they're pitching

BESW

02:33

May 31 at 13:17, by Thomas Markov

If you have 10k rep and some time to waste, this spam post, when translated, is a pretty interesting read.

5 hours later…

SmokeDetector

07:33

[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Bad keyword in body, bad keyword in title, potentially bad keyword in body, potentially bad keyword in title, blacklisted user (265): Lost love spells caster +27737053600 Mama Shamie Canada USA Germany Ukraine‭ by Mama Shamie‭ on rpg.SE (@Rubiksmoose @ThomasMarkov @linksassin)

5 hours later…

AncientSwordRage

12:24

Hows tricks, fellow stackizens?

goodguy5

12:59

@AncientSwordRage for kids?

I was talking in a discord server and someone was like
"My DM is frustrated that I can do 25 damage with my level 3 fighter"

I question them on it, and obviously some things are happening.

They rolled stats, so they have a +5.
Great Axe (sure, as one does)
And the kicker - The DM is letting them apply shocking grasp to a melee hit. or rather, use a melee weapon attack to apply shocking grasp.

1 hour later…

AncientSwordRage

14:06

@goodguy5 huh

Assuming they're playing D&D 5e (and not anything else at all) that's a hold over from an earlier edition

BESW

And one that was usually a terrible idea unless you built for it specifically.

Adding the weapon's to-hit modifier was an unreliable benefit because you're no longer aiming for touch AC, but base AC.

(And the action economy was unfavorable, and the stat split was tough)

goodguy5

14:30

yea. 5e
It didn't hit me as edition baggage, but rather just misunderstanding the rules. coulda been though, not sure

GcL

15:05

@goodguy5 DM seems like a good fit for the "Why would they do this" meme.

goodguy5

I'm guessing that they just didn't think about the interaction

GcL

Likely the case. It's the pain and pleasure of homebrew.

Homebrew is like the wish of AD&D, you get what you want in the worst way.

AncientSwordRage

15:55

@goodguy5 I feel like WotC deliberately blur those two things and call it a design feature

GcL

Why attribute to malice what can be explained by ineptitude?

AncientSwordRage

@GcL what malice?

GcL

Deliberately blurring a bug to call it a feature.

AncientSwordRage

@GcL the thing is, I don't think they consider it a bug

"Let's leave it ambiguous enough that if people have expectations from earlier editions we don't explicitly rule it out"

it's like the worst bits of backward compatibility

GcL

Backward obligation? Dependency?

AncientSwordRage

16:05

@GcL compatibility

Backward compatibility

Backward compatibility (sometimes known as backwards compatibility) is a property of an operating system, product, or technology that allows for interoperability with an older legacy system, or with input designed for such a system, especially in telecommunications and computing. Modifying a system in a way that does not allow backward compatibility is sometimes called "breaking" backward compatibility.A complementary concept is forward compatibility. A design that is forward-compatible usually has a roadmap for compatibility with future standards and products.A related term from programming jargon...

GcL

I would expect backwards compatibility to be I can drop a 5e feature back into some previous edition like 3.5

I would say it's a dependency to be expected to know how a feature worked in a previous edition to get the full experience of the current edition.

It would also be a backward compatibility of 5e could accept the inputs of a previous edition and continue to operate... like being able to handle the stat blocks or tables from previous editions.

4 hours later…

AncientSwordRage

20:38

@GcL thats not what the phrase means

The definition is in that article

GcL

That is one form of interoperability. New libraries or packages sometimes have legacy operating methods so they can still be dropped in to for whatever package they were replacing.

Another form is handling legacy inputs gracefully.

When you're replacing lib_foo with your lib_new_hotness, better make sure that the do_stuff method still works when called by the legacy systems.

Alternatively, when replacing old_busted with new_thing it may be required to still handle the pathological output of the legacy systems.

Both of those modes would come up under backwards compatibility. Either take the input from the legacy system, or operate in a way that the new work doesn't break the legacy system when it calls.

AncientSwordRage

21:41

@GcL in my head the old Shocking Grasp is like a PS1 game, and 5th edition is like a PS2. My analogy was that the fact that nothing in 5E prevents you trying to run with the old version but that doesn't mean it works out ok either

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