D&D 5e Overflow

wax eagle

00:04

I don't see any need to make the DC easier. I feel like the intent is if you know the spell and level you can cast at higher level, but if you don't then you cast as normal and have to make the DC

Miniman

It depends if you want to reward correct judgement or mitigate incorrect judgement, I guess.

wax eagle

yeah. Honestly, I like the suggestion in the answer that just came through, but I think the DCs are way out of whack

I'd go 10 you know the school, 15, the spell and 20 the spell level

with adv disadv depending on how many components you observe.

1 dis adv, 2 normal, all 3 adv

Khashir

00:30

hmm, fair enough

the alternative thought was that, just like the higher level spell can counter without a roll, so can it facilitate the roll

i.e., it's simply a more powerful counter

Miniman

@Khashir I can see the reasoning, and it makes sense

Just seems like a difficult thing to keep balanced

Khashir

will, you're basically bridging the gap between the spell and CS

doesn't seem so outlandish

moreover, I don't like the idea of an 'arbitrary' leap in counter potential

imho, doesn't feel right: CS L3 has the same chance as CS L8 to counter L9 spell

Miniman

Again, I can see your reasoning, and it makes sense

Khashir

ah, sorry

was trying to defend the 'balance' part

in good spirit, of course

Miniman

@Khashir Yeah, I guess I'm just not comfortable with houseruling, personally

Khashir

00:38

ah, but there are so many things that need errata atm

Miniman

Yeah, but I almost made a ruling that would have turned my Assassin player into a god

Khashir

we're merely filling-in the gaps left by the devs (not to mention that such is 5e's spirit

oh... do tell?

spare me the mistake

8)

Miniman

Well...you know how the Assassin rolls enough dice on a surprise attack to kill a dragon with minimum damage?

I almost said that attacking from Invisibility would be a surprise attack.

wax eagle

@Miniman oh yikes no. just adv

Miniman

@waxeagle Yeah, that was where the Invisibility question came from

Khashir

00:43

yeah

wax eagle

speaking of which, I owe someone a better answer on an R20 question. firing it up

Khashir

Surprise has very specific constraints... not to mention that dragons have blindsight anyway

so, unless the rogue is attacking from at least 60 feet away

*more than

Miniman

@Khashir Does blindsight let you see through invis? It hasn't come up at all, so I barely looked at the ability yet

wax eagle

huh, why did R20 actually launch...I'm signed into our VPN....shouldn't have worked...

Khashir

well, it means that depriving the monster of visual input doesn't affect how it perceives its surroundings

whether it's blindness, invisibility

the flavour varies from one monster to another, but presumably, a dragon's is based on smell and hearing

(oh, thank you :))

Miniman

00:48

@Khashir Nah, dragon senses are like an awesome radar. The dragon continually sends out waves of awesomeness. It can read its surroundings by how much bounces back from mundanity.

That's why if you want to hide from a dragon, you have to be as awesome as possible.

Khashir

jajajajaja

Khashir

01:08

@waxeagle: I just heard back from the R20 forums, it seems that I'd need a subscription, + tinkering with the API

to do the fancy initiative rolling thingamajig

wax eagle

yeah, I gathered that from the answer that was there. withdrew my answer...though I'm thinking about undeleting and editing that it looks like it should be possible, but it doesn't actually work

Khashir

so, what's the best way for a sorcerer to have a decent melee attack?

the options i've seen so far

(for the purpose of anti-caster, with the Mage slayer feat)

dip 1 lvl in monk, gets unarmed strike

dip 1 lvl in druid, get shillellagh

dip 1 lvl in rogue, get sneak attack

*melee weapon attack

(or does this question qualify for SE?)

Miniman

@Khashir Cast polymorph?

wax eagle

@Khashir do they get magic weapon?

Miniman

And that question would definitely be edgy

Khashir

01:23

who gets magic weapon?

wax eagle

best melee weapon for a sorcy? shocking grasp.

Khashir

yes, but it's not melee weapon :(

wax eagle

(who needs a weapon)

Khashir

so, I can't use it with Mage Slayer

Miniman

@Khashir If you're looking for mage slayer, you'd be crazy not to use a reach weapon

Khashir

01:24

hmm, how so? 2 of the 3 perks require you to be within 5 ft of the caster

wax eagle

@Miniman why? doesn't help anything

Khashir

• When a creature within 5 feet of you casts a spell, you can use your reaction to make a melee weapon attack against that creature.
• You have advantage on saving throws against spells cast by creatures within 5 feet of you.

Miniman

Oops, my bad. I was thinking in terms of OAs, but that's not how it's phrased

Khashir

yeah

unfortunately

Miniman

If you're looking for mage slayer, you'd be crazy ~~not~~ to use a reach weapon

there, fixed!

Khashir

01:25

LOOOL

wax eagle

lol

Khashir

smooth

wax eagle

there really isn't going to be a way for a sorcy to have a competitive melee attack without a hefty (5 levels) dip into something else

Miniman

@waxeagle Yeah, the problem is that every class is reasonably good with any weapon they are proficient in

Bonuses above proficiency + stat are basically only obtainable from class features

Khashir

gotcha

man, 5e has been really cramping my style :(

wax eagle

01:28

yeah, I'm more thinking of scalability though. having a tier 1 attack is great...but if you don't have a way to boost the damage significantly, it's not worthwhile past there

Khashir

(well, shillelagh scales pretty well)

i've had to rework my char 4-5 times now

wax eagle

not really....

Khashir

?

wax eagle

it's still 1 attack

and no bonus damage

Miniman

The thing is, any character in 5e is reasonably optimised just by being in 5e. The higher levels of optimisation that existed in 3.5 are almost impossible to obtain

Khashir

01:29

oh wait shit

sorry

Miniman

But to match that, it's difficult to accidentally make a character suck

wax eagle

exactly

Khashir

when I cast shillelagh, it's Wis mod bonus

not cha

well, actually, the 3-4 concepts I had in mnid

sucked

or rather, the 3-4 iterations of the concept

hence, having to scrap them

wax eagle

@Khashir yes it would be...but even still, 1 attack is good at tier 1, will lag throuhg tier 2 and will abysmal by tier 3

Khashir

still, I was thinking Cha Mod

which at least goes up

wax eagle

01:31

right

Khashir

so, no luck

Miniman

Your best bet for a 1 level dip is probably monk for 1st level multiple attacks, then find spells to buff your damage

Khashir

oh well...

wax eagle

@Miniman that might work

Khashir

yeah, originally I had monk, but then realised unarmored defense doesn't stack with Draconic Resilience... so, I was stuck with a 16 AC char

wax eagle

01:32

and it's dex which you want to boost

Khashir

unless there's a way to boost AC taht I haven't seen?

*that

Miniman

@Khashir Shield is op, but the short duration hurts

wax eagle

@Khashir not really, no...

Khashir

I mean, if I could have a Black Dragon Mask, that would solve all my problems

wax eagle

single level dips into specific things (fighter), defensive duelist feat...better armor

Khashir

01:34

yeah, i dipped into cleric

Miniman

The problem there is that most things overwrite your AC calculation rather than adding additional bonuses

Khashir

for Shield prof, Shield of Fait

h

wax eagle

good call, both highly useful

Miniman

Cleric is definitely the best 1 level dip (again)

wax eagle

agreed

Miniman

01:35

Especially since it gets you all the proficiencies

even fighter doesn't do that

wax eagle

yeah, that seems ripe for some errata...

Khashir

what?

i thought cleric only gave light, medium, shield prof

ah nvm

i you mean the actual mc

rather than starting Fighter/Cleric

Miniman

yep, domains too op (again)

Khashir

yep... dat Life Domain

Miniman

@Khashir Honestly I'd say Life is weaker than War or Tempest

Khashir

01:39

why? I looked at both

thought life seemed ebtter

might be wrong

Miniman

@Khashir Life doesn't give martial weapons

(This is all from memory, so take it with several grains of salt)

Khashir

yeah, that's true for war, and probably tempest

still, at most that would get me a rapier

which I have to stow to cast spells

Miniman

True, I was speaking in general

Khashir

ah yeah

gotcha

Miniman

That said, the other Life features are gonna be pretty useless to a guy with no healing spells

Khashir

01:41

?

you can grab cure wounds

at L1

and it heals 3 more than non-life... and scales from there

Miniman

Cure wounds isn't too useful

Khashir

oh

Miniman

in battle, healing word-style healing is way more useful

out of battle, there are better ways to heal

Khashir

i see what you're doing... you come to crush my dreams again?

(I kid, do tell)

hmm, for a sorcerer, CW is probably better than HW because I can't cast a spell

after HW anyway

so, might as well use my action to heal as much as possible

no?

Miniman

Lunch soon, I'll check my books so I have some idea of what I'm talking about

wax eagle

01:43

@Khashir cantrip after

use your cantrips, they are awesome

Khashir

oh that's right!

nvm, I said nothing

i forgot you can cast cantrips

what are these out-of-battle healings you speak of, @Miniman?

Miniman

@Khashir Short rests

There's a few ways to make them more effective

Khashir

-_- lol

Miniman

I'm super hungry, (wax's fault) so I'll be back after lunch with refreshed knowledge

Khashir

02:01

bon appetit

Miniman

03:14

Ok, with my newfound knowledge, I can say that Life domain was probably a good call

Magician

04:44

Rust monster.

It's not bad, and can act totally non-violently but still destructively, as its description implies. Though I never was a fan of the creature itself. A couple of notes. First, this really could use a quick rule on fixing things, say, a blacksmith would do it for 5gp per point of penalty. Second and more importantly, once it has touched an item it is immediately ruined, which removes any further concerns.

I'd rather see, for instance, a DC 10 check made at the end of the encounter with -2 per each point of rust, to see if the weapon just needs cleaning or if it's gone. That way, each round of fighting is further risk and further choice.

Or, even, DC 0 +4 for every point of rust penalty, to really drive it home.

Magician

05:22

Another point to make is that at the level you'd be fighting it, the damage penalty would soon make the weapon less useful than fists. d8-2 averages to the same as d4. Perhaps... Yeah. I'm going to rewrite the bloody rust monster right now. Should probably do it for 13th Age, but lets start with 5e as an exercise.

Rust metal: Each time a metallic object is said to become *rusted*, make an unmodified d20 roll DC 0 +4 per each point of rust the object already has (each metal object has 0 points of rust by default). On success, the object gains another point of rust. On failure, the object is corroded into a pile of useless rusted metal flakes and is gone forever. At the end of a fight in which at least one point of rust has been inflicted, all rusting objects make the check with same modifiers. On success, rusting is superficial and can be cleaned up during a short break. On failure, the object disinte…

For a nastier monster, let it heal whenever an object corrodes (though healing monsters are generally to be avoided).

I think such creature would be much more interesting to fight, as there are multiple layers of risk vs reward decisions present, some of which can be mitigated via other game mechanics.

BESW

05:47

Indeed.

Though... I might be inclined to have the DC 0+ save only at the end of combat.

[shrug] That's really a style choice.

Magician

It definitely can be fiddled with.

Miniman

06:25

dnd-5e is no. 7!

Khashir

11:12

@Miniman ;)

@Miniman life is sweet for non-dedicated healer: the trickle starts to add up. The only downside I have with the domain atm is that, with 8 str, heavy armor prof is not useful. And Knowledge is so so sweet (just because I like polyglot PCs and proficient PCs)

Khashir

11:38

@Miniman also, Healing Word is so much better than Cure Wounds: it's not just a bonus action, but no S component, and range 60 ft, rather than touch.

wax eagle

12:57

@Magician fists are only 1 point of damage, but agreed

personally, I'd keep a staff around for the rust monsters

Magician

@waxeagle Actually, that raises an interesting point. Rust monsters, historically, are only interesting as a meta-creature. It's a check: do you know about them and have you prepared accordingly? In many ways weapon damage types are the same, though less reliant on D&D mythos.

Khashir

hmm

how many monsters has WotC released?

Magician

By demonstrating your knowledge of D&D, you trivialize a vast swath of creatures.

@Khashir ...ever?

Khashir

oh no

just leading up to MM/DMG

Intellect Devourer thingo

this one

Magician

@Khashir Oh, haven't seen that one. Do you have a link?

Khashir

13:05

now i Do

media.wizards.com/2014/downloads/dnd/MM_IntellectDevourer.pdf

;)

wax eagle

@Magician huh, good point.

I guess the proper play here is "is my character aware of the existence of rust monters?" Y: you have a staff; N: you do not have a staff

Khashir

yeah

Magician

But if the party is aware and prepared, the encounter with rust monsters becomes pointless!

Khashir

hmm, not really

they can still rust armor

so, unless the medium/heavy wearers are gonna doff in the underdark

read: bad idea

Magician

They'd have to purposefully try to feed and not fight for survival, which is a very odd behavior for an actual creature.

Khashir

13:09

lol

or they can send the monk to FoB it

or the shapeshifted Druid

the thought was that, without meta-gaming (as you said), some of these monster encounters are brutal

and can take down a low-level party

the little i've heard/read involves GMs making monsters 'easier'

wax eagle

@Magician lol, now I'm picturing a rust monster stalking the metal critters, and gnawing on their armor when they sleep...

Magician

@waxeagle See, that's actually fun. "You wake up to slobber on your naked torso." "I thought we've established dwarves always sleep in armor!" "Yup!"

Khashir

i wonder how many monsters will require such tweaks, and what it reveals about the 5e design =P

Magician

I've read Intellect Devourer (thanks, btw). If it's not a party killer, I don't know what is. CR2!

wax eagle

@Magician yeah. Rob Donoghue had some excellent comments on it and how it could be a group breaker if used badly

not just a TPK, but an end to your RP group

Magician

13:14

Badly? I don't see how it won't be used badly.

wax eagle

> Bottom line, this is a scary monster. Like, maybe crossing the threshold of the implicit GM/Player understanding scary. Some tables will be fine with that. For others, this is one of those monsters that will probably be made more scary by it attacking NPCs, or otherwise used very cautiously. But figure out which way your GM leans before deciding to use intelligence as your dump stat.

walkingmind.evilhat.com/2014/09/08/…

Khashir

well, one GM said that a party unaware of it could face the following situation: the cleric gets its brain devoured, and the only notice to the player is a paper slip saying: role play a cleric that's now hostile to the party, without giving it away unnecessarily (stylistic flourish added for effect)

8|

Magician

Yeah. It does damage enough to kill outright, has a secondary save-or-die in case that wasn't enough, and can then take over the body and be a dick to the rest of the party, taking 5 feet out of its movement to leave the victim without the brain.

Khashir

also, i'm confused by the Senses entry (blind beyond 60 ft), vs. Detect Sentience

Magician

And now imagine facing 4 of these puppies in dark caverns, where they're lying in ambush.

Khashir

13:18

yep

wax eagle

actually, at CR 2, it's going to have a tough time hitting L2 characters, and that's not much damage at that point

Khashir

detect sentience clearly says 'presence and location'... so, it's not really blind beyond 60 ft

Magician

18 damage not much? I thought the hp went down compared to 4e.

wax eagle

but it's intellect devour attack will be rough

Khashir

@waxeagle yes, but it doesn't have to hit to get the Int attack

exactly

Magician

13:19

@Khashir It knows where you are, but probably can't attack you without penalties. Not that it'd help against Devour Intellect.

wax eagle

@Magician missed the multi-attack

Magician

@waxeagle Yeah, the melee attack is basically irrelevant.

Khashir

:P

wax eagle

ok, let's figure out the odds that it eats your brain

Magician

But given Int as usual dump stat, I don't like the chances of the party.

Khashir

13:20

@Magician it knows where you are from a distance of 300 ft. It can't attack from that far, but I wouldn't say it's blind

Metool

@Magician Why is Charisma not worth dumping?

Magician

It has actual skills attached to it!

@Khashir It knows you're coming, which gives it plenty of time to hide.

Oh, also, 2d10 damage. Potentially 20, unless averages are used. What's the expected hp at level 2?..

Khashir

@Magician yes. what i'm getting at is that, for all intents and purposes, it's not blind beyond 60 ft.... it can see up to 300 ft, unless your char is lucky enough to get feebleminded

wax eagle

@Magician with a d8 HD, 16

I don't know about other folks, but I use averages in my campaigns

Magician

@waxeagle So, very real chances of one-shotting with that attack.

wax eagle

13:23

@Magician yes

and a crit basically makes it a definite

Khashir

our group likes rolling dice... thrill of randomness

Magician

@Khashir Sight is not just knowledge of presence, though. But yeah, it's not exactly limited.

Khashir

and, as one poster pointed out, a L20 char not proficient in Int saves almost just as screwed as a L1 char not proficient in int saves

wax eagle

Int 8 no prof, at L2, you need to roll at least a 13 to save. So 60% failure chance. Then it has to roll at least an 8 on it's dice which anydice indicates has a 83% chance of success. multiplying those together because they are dependent leads to a 50% chance of turning an int dumping fighter into a blithering idiot

Other end of spectrum now

Magician

Not much point. After it takes over fighter's body, it stabs the wizard repeatedly.

wax eagle

13:28

int 16, int save prof, needs to roll a 6 to save. So a 25% failure chance, and anydice indicates that on a failure they have a 4.6% chance of getting stunned. A 1% chance

Khashir

fun fun

at the same time

Magician

Right. So, claw the wizard while thinking at the fighter until fighter starts drooling (or just dies).

Khashir

well, nvm...

wax eagle

@Magician takes it a second round, and a good chance it's already dead

Magician

Not if there's two of these :D

Also, when your good news is "at least the fighter died on the first round"...

Khashir

13:30

was going to say that int devourer would probably be attracted to highest int (similarly to how it can't detect below 3 int), but it's an intelligent creature: it'll target whoever has the greatest chance of falling to it

wax eagle

agreed, it's a nasty beastie

@Khashir it's not that smart

only has an int of 12. It eats intelligent beings, it is not itself smart

Khashir

@waxeagle well, maybe not that smart, but it won't go for the wizard either (it's why I said "nvm")

Magician

Eh, Int of 12 is above average intelligence. It's enough to know pointy hats = smart.

Khashir

jajajaaja

it's above Commoner intelligency!

intelligence

wax eagle

@Magician true

Metool

13:33

@Magician What happens when you have dwarves in heavy armour?

Khashir

@Metool rust monsters eat the armor while the dwarf sleeps

wax eagle

the flavor of this monster seriously leads me to believe it should be controlling an NPC...

to be honest, as written, if it consumes the fighter, it should do so behind closed doors and not attack his buddies, but lead them into the layer of his masters

Khashir

rather than waiting in ambush for the party?

wax eagle

@Khashir more of a skulky tpe

hit the party while it rests, get a surprise round and eat the fighter. Have him lead the party to his masters

gotta be done in concerts with the player though

Magician

All the better for that coveted TPK, and all the more fun for the fighter.

Khashir

13:41

so, is your idea that, given the power and natural inclination, it should have already succeeded at finding a host? in which case, after killing the host (hello, adult blue dragon! Int save +0), the devourer steps out?

Magician

Yeah, that's also what I'm thinking.

Or it can "lead" a tribe of goblins through their shaman.

Khashir

(yeah, someone also suggested that... would be horrible if the fighter is the one normally leading the party... no one would suspect anything. if not the party leader, at least it would raise a bit suspicion when it tries to take the lead)

ah cool

wax eagle

@Khashir yes

Magician

I was going to say that the D&D world would be split: Cambions rule cities while Intellect Devourers rule caverns, but I was wrong. Intellect Devourers within Cambions rule everything. They also ride rust monsters, because why not.

2

Khashir

14:03

cambions?

Magician

I had a similar go at them a week or two ago in this chat.

Here.

Khashir

but why?

ahh

ok, lemme read

lol

sounds right

wax eagle

odds of a Cambian getting munged by an int devourer: 4%

Magician

I reckon that needs to be automated, and added to every monster entry. Odds of finding an Intellect Devourer within this enemy: X%.

wax eagle

absolutely!

lol

at least for certain campaigns

Magician

14:14

Concept for a website: intellectdevourerodds.com. Very simple page, prompts user to enter monster's Int and whether they're proficient with Int saves or not. Calculates percentage (rounding up), and also rolls for them.

wax eagle

should add "odds of random appearance of ID in your campaign world" or something

that scales it

Magician

That's probably mitigated by chances of multiple run-ins and more than a single round of combat.

wax eagle

true

Magician

It's all very handwavy, while also very scientific.

wax eagle

so it's D&D :)

Magician

14:16

IDOdds. I wonder if that's taken.

wax eagle

$12/yr

Magician

Do you know anything about web design? :)

wax eagle

check that, IDOodds is available, checking idodds

@Magician design...not really. development...that's my day job

Magician

Hah. Guess I can recruit someone to make a pretty page. Would you say idodds.com is a good name for a website?

wax eagle

darn idodds is taken

idoodds is free :(

Magician

14:22

.org is free

wax eagle

aye, it would be a free service...right :)

Magician

Premium subscription models available!

wax eagle

the fremium version tells you the odds that you are currently being consumed by an ID

Magician

14:33

Welp. I'm now a proud owner of idodds.org for a year. Clearly a brilliant financial decision on my part. But I can see having fun with it.

There'd be a simple version of the page, and the advanced one: the Drake equation of Intellect Devouring.

wax eagle

@Magician should be pretty easy to write up a basic HTML page with JS to generate the odds

Magician

And theoretically I can stick it on the same host as my blog.

Stay tuned :)

Metool

15:33

11 HD only translates to a +3 proficiency bonus? Or do monsters not have those?

(looking at cambion page)

wax eagle

@Metool no, monsters get prof

Metool

Right, just wondering why the cambion only has +3. Is that roughly in line with PCs?

wax eagle

it goes up to 4 at L9, so it looks to me like the Cambian has 2 HD too many. (you subtract 1 since monsters always roll instead of getting the first HD maxed)

that's probably accounted for in his CR being slightly lower, or his damage being higher

Khashir

or his crazy powers?

its

wax eagle

yeah

very possible that he gets less prof for his crazy powers...or has slightly higher overall ability scores?

I haven't spent as much time as I'd like as of yet trying to tease apart monster construction yet. I'll spend some more time when the MM comes out

Khashir

15:41

i just realised that the charm ability allows for suicidal commands on a save

wax eagle

yep

Khashir

so... warrior with -1 Wis: kill yourself

wax eagle

yes.

Khashir

lovely

wax eagle

that's boring though

Khashir

15:42

but effective

in combat

turning the warrior against the party allows for the warrior to save every time it takes damage

if the suicide is 'guaranteed'

one less pc to worry about it

wax eagle

oh it wouldn't be garunteed at all. He'd still be subject to normal attack rules. Probably not even a coup de grac (since he's not technically incap'd)

Khashir

hmm... i guess you're more benevolent than i am

8)

wax eagle

out of combat is another matter entirely

Khashir

well, the thought is that an intelligent humanoid knows and has unimpeded access to its critical points

a benevolent gm can impose mechanical restrictions

wax eagle

@Khashir sure, but there are significant other factors

Khashir

15:47

@waxeagle what do you mean?

wax eagle

like the fact that someone else is controlling your actions, the fact that you're using something that is probably not a weapon designed to inflict self harm (in fact, just the opposite), the fact that you're wearing armor etc

luck, accuracy etc still should be factored in

Khashir

hmm

oh well.

@waxeagle: if you have mentor subscription, there's a script for auto initiative

app.roll20.net/forum/post/207066/script-auto-initiative/…

(just got a response from r20 forums)

also, there's a pretty cool Power Card script, formats attack/spell macros like so

s3.amazonaws.com/files.d20.io/images/3270564/…

and so

s3.amazonaws.com/files.d20.io/images/3270648/…

anyway, i'm out for a while--take care fellas, see you later

Khashir

20:16

@waxeagle, are you around? I was thinking a bit more about our earlier conversation re: mage slayer, I think we overlooked something

Khashir

20:28

the thought is that, with mage slayer, you only get 1 melee attack as a reaction anyway. given that concentration check is max(10, damage/2), and no one (unless I'm missing something) can deal 22 damage in one attack (without a critical)

a sorcerer with 16 dex and a dagger is only +2 hit below a dedicated fighter mage slayer, from imposing a DC 10 concentration check (with disadvantage)

wax eagle

@Khashir rogue with adv can.

what level? cuz several classes would be able to

Khashir

well, Mage Slayer says 'use your reaction to make a melee weapon attack"

(when an enemy casts a spell within 5 of you)

most multi attacks I remember say 'when you use your action'

(ah, true, we talked about rogues dealing sneak attack damage outside their turn)

so, is the thought that mage slayer is only worthwhile for rogues? anyone else that can hit imposes 75% of breaking concentration

rogues can impose much higher, obv, due to sneak attack

actually, (11/20)^2%

my bad

70% chance

Miniman

22:54

@Khashir I knew that! Why do you think I said it's so much more useful?

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