D&D 5E Discussion

[DavidBVal]

I'm starting a 5e game set on Dark Sun!

I always wanted to give a try to DS back in the day, but never got a chance. Now I'm preparing a game for my old group from 25 years ago, and it was the perfect chance. But man, I soon realized it'd take some work to set things into motion.

First I had to deal with the rules. Defiling, psionics, class twisted like the Bard, and lots of non-standard stuff not covered by 5e. Of course there's no official 5e support for Dark Sun, so I gathered 3 different homebrew adaptations and picked from each the rules I liked the most, then added my own. I think I got it all covered now, with the UA Mystic class and my own Defiling rules. Community has also adapted a Monster Manual, which seems to be decent.

Then there's the problem with how the setting "evolved". Originally I find it fantastic, but the novels (Prism Pentad) basically ruin it, so I decided to ignore them entirely. I'm preparing my own starting adventure and (if succesful) already planning a longer story arch for a campaign

Now if someone here has experience with Dark Sun and the old AD&D setting, I'd like some advice. I wasn't very familiar with Dark Sun myself and find the setting incredible, lots of potential everywhere. But even if I'm writing my own adventure, my knowledge of the setting is still limited. I'd certainly be glad to "steal" some interesting locations, characters and scenes from the old modules and sourcebooks. If you remember particularly fun ones, I'd like to know, because I'm underwhelmed by the modules I've read so far. For instance, in the adventure recommended for starting characters (Freedom), the players just wander around as slaves in a pit (some good ideas there, some terrible ones) and at the ending they become "spectators" of how the heroes of the novels kill a Sorcerer-King. Not very exciting, is it. So please share your Dark Sun ideas!

 

[Night Goat]

For psionics, you might have a look at this fanmade expansion of the psionics UA:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2...tzLFHvdYZRS3gfFa6qgGsOWaHtSOGEtRVRxoymFB49w3E

 

[Cael]

Dark Sun has a different take on psionics in that it is not restricted to a particular class, but everyone had some form of it. Makes it difficult to adapt into different game mechanics.

 

[Fairfax]

How would you guys rank the 5e adventures paths?

Hoard of the Dragon Queen is the worst published module I've seen in a very long time. My group played it for a few sessions and decided to end it and play a new one. Rise of Tiamat (the sequel, second part of Tyranny of Dragons) is supposedly better, but I don't see the point in giving it a shot when the first one is so bad and there are good alternatives.

I've been running Storm King's Thunder for roughly a year now. It's a good sandbox with plenty of interesting content, but also a lot of gaps for the DM to fill (such as lack of motivation for PCs). If you want to pick up a module and run it as written, avoid this one. Keep in mind it's also very long. There's one chapter where the party is supposed to explore the Sword Coast doing a bunch of side quests, and the book essentially says that you should do that until the group is tired of it. I chose to do it in half a dozen sessions, but I've heard of groups taking 6 months in that chapter alone. Anyway, SKT is a good module if the DM puts in the work and if players like the premise and exploration. The first chapter sucks, though. It's dull and takes PCs from level 1 to 5 too quickly. It's better if you run an actual 1-5 adventure (like LMoP, which is good) and then link the modules. The SKT book even offers some story hooks for it.

Tales from the Yawning Portal is a safe pick. 5E is a lot less lethal and easier, but I'm sure the AD&D adventures in the book are still a blast.

 

[Cael]

How would you guys rank the 5e adventures paths?

Hoard of the Dragon Queen is the worst published module I've seen in a very long time. My group played it for a few sessions and decided to end it and play a new one.

You could always have said "It is a fucktards of the coast product" and it would mean the same...

 

[udm]

How would you guys rank the 5e adventures paths?

I only know in detail Curse of Strahd.

Nice scenes, nice ideas all around, but I think it lacks a backbone. There's no clear motivation for players other than escaping Barovia and do generic do-gooder stuff along the way, which feels a bit bland. Some of the locations/encounters are great, other suck or feel like a pointless drag. It'll require some work on your part to alter it if you want it to feel like a truly thematic adventure that motivates players and where everything feels connected and with an adequate pace. Still I'd say it is a good sourcebook and an entertaining read.

Agree with what you said, kinda. I really disliked Curse of Strahd. It had some nice ideas and some pretty interesting hooks, but it was written like a complete mess for the DM, with a whole bunch of lolrandom things happening to pad the adventure. Ravenloft was the worst. Holy shit, the isometric maps were all but fucking useless since they were chock full of traps that teleported you to some other obscure part of the castle which you then have to slowly sift out from the pile of maps, and even if you organised them perfectly, how do you even use isometric maps properly at the table with traditional tokens and minis?

But yeah power to those who enjoy it, I guess. From general feedback, most liked it, so I must be the outlier. Personally, I prefer something that's either written as a linear dungeon romp, or a full-blown sandbox with options left open-ended for the GM to piece together.

 

[DavidBVal]

For psionics, you might have a look at this fanmade expansion of the psionics UA:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2...tzLFHvdYZRS3gfFa6qgGsOWaHtSOGEtRVRxoymFB49w3E

Yeah I see that's the same as the Unearthed Arcana Mystic class I was using.

 

[TheDiceMustRoll]

I hacked my 5e games into a very OSR-esque game. What kind of houserules do you idiots use?

 

[Cael]

I hacked my 5e games into a very OSR-esque game. What kind of houserules do you idiots use?

I only have one: Don't use 5th Ed.

 

[Fairfax]

I hacked my 5e games into a very OSR-esque game. What kind of houserules do you idiots use?

Roll 4d6, drop lowest, any order for character creation.
The original falling damage by Gygax: 1d6 per 10 feet fallen, cumulative. 3d6 for 20ft, 6d6 for 30ft, and so on.
Hit points are rolled, reroll on 1s.
Feats are allowed, but Lucky is banned.
Warlocks can be INT-based.
Falling to 0hp adds one level of exhaustion.
Greyhawk Initiative with Spell Disruption and Weapon Speed.
Mixing Potions [DMG p. 140]
Massive Damage [DMG p. 273]
Diagonals [DMG p. 252]
Skills with Different Abilities [PHB p. 175]

 

[TheDiceMustRoll]

- backgrounds: no more features, i hate this, skills and items only
- no inspiration
- initiative I stole from LOTFP(each side rolls 1d6 and highest wins)
- melee only classes add naked d20 roll to hit damage past level 5
- FUCK DEATH SAVING THROWS, roll on my custom death and dismemberment table
- Replaced advantage and disadvantage with the DCC Dice Chain system
- LotFP encumbrance
- Potency: permaburn 1 ability score point to autohit with an attack spell, then either a) max effect or b) cast it at a higher spell slot

 

[Morblot]

Lucky is a great feat. My character has it in the 5e campaign I play in. It's obviously broken but my DM allows it so of course I use it all the time.

My buddy has some feat that lets him attack twice with his glaive every round. We're pretty much unstoppable.

Overall I'm liking 5e to my surprise. It's simple and fun, but not mindless. Balances out my own Mathfinder 1e campaign quite nicely.

 

[DavidBVal]

Hit dice and healing. What's this shit about sleeping one night leaving you healed and being also able to heal often during the day? screw that. Especially on Dark Sun, where I think wounds, exhaustion and general weariness of a party should be a factor.

I mean, maybe if you run a game with 12 combats per day, it'd be ok. But with 1-2 daily fights, it just means your chars are always at full health. So I do this:

short rest: can only use 1hd for healing
long rest: can only use 2hd for healing.

you only recover 2 hd in a long rest if you were fully healed and had no exhaustion levels. Otherwise the long rest restores no hd, and heal up to two hd and recover 1 exhaustion level.

 

[Cael]

Hit dice and healing. What's this shit about sleeping one night leaving you healed and being also able to heal often during the day? screw that. Especially on Dark Sun, where I think wounds, exhaustion and general weariness of a party should be a factor.

I mean, maybe if you run a game with 12 combats per day, it'd be ok. But with 1-2 daily fights, it just means your chars are always at full health. So I do this:

short rest: can only use 1hd for healing
long rest: can only use 2hd for healing.

you only recover 2 hd in a long rest if you were fully healed and had no exhaustion levels. Otherwise the long rest restores no hd, and heal up to two hd and recover 1 exhaustion level.

I would hate to be a player in your game. Making a PC exhausted is as simple as one or two castings of a level 0 spell.

 

[DavidBVal]

Hit dice and healing. What's this shit about sleeping one night leaving you healed and being also able to heal often during the day? screw that. Especially on Dark Sun, where I think wounds, exhaustion and general weariness of a party should be a factor.

I mean, maybe if you run a game with 12 combats per day, it'd be ok. But with 1-2 daily fights, it just means your chars are always at full health. So I do this:

short rest: can only use 1hd for healing
long rest: can only use 2hd for healing.

you only recover 2 hd in a long rest if you were fully healed and had no exhaustion levels. Otherwise the long rest restores no hd, and heal up to two hd and recover 1 exhaustion level.

I would hate to be a player in your game. Making a PC exhausted is as simple as one or two castings of a level 0 spell.

Since when does spellcasting grant exhaustion?

 

[Cael]

Hit dice and healing. What's this shit about sleeping one night leaving you healed and being also able to heal often during the day? screw that. Especially on Dark Sun, where I think wounds, exhaustion and general weariness of a party should be a factor.

I mean, maybe if you run a game with 12 combats per day, it'd be ok. But with 1-2 daily fights, it just means your chars are always at full health. So I do this:

short rest: can only use 1hd for healing
long rest: can only use 2hd for healing.

you only recover 2 hd in a long rest if you were fully healed and had no exhaustion levels. Otherwise the long rest restores no hd, and heal up to two hd and recover 1 exhaustion level.

I would hate to be a player in your game. Making a PC exhausted is as simple as one or two castings of a level 0 spell.

Since when does spellcasting grant exhaustion?

Touch of Fatigue twice on a PC or once on any already fatigued character = exhausted. With your rules in place it also = fucked.

 

[DavidBVal]

Hit dice and healing. What's this shit about sleeping one night leaving you healed and being also able to heal often during the day? screw that. Especially on Dark Sun, where I think wounds, exhaustion and general weariness of a party should be a factor.

I mean, maybe if you run a game with 12 combats per day, it'd be ok. But with 1-2 daily fights, it just means your chars are always at full health. So I do this:

short rest: can only use 1hd for healing
long rest: can only use 2hd for healing.

you only recover 2 hd in a long rest if you were fully healed and had no exhaustion levels. Otherwise the long rest restores no hd, and heal up to two hd and recover 1 exhaustion level.

I would hate to be a player in your game. Making a PC exhausted is as simple as one or two castings of a level 0 spell.

Since when does spellcasting grant exhaustion?

Touch of Fatigue twice on a PC or once on any already fatigued character = exhausted. With your rules in place it also = fucked.

Touch of fatigue is a D&D 3.5 spell. We're talking 5e, ain't we? Exhaustion works differently in 5e, and it's one of the best changes btw.

EDIT: even if you houserule that spell into 5e, the fatigue was gone after 1min/level

 

[Cael]

Hit dice and healing. What's this shit about sleeping one night leaving you healed and being also able to heal often during the day? screw that. Especially on Dark Sun, where I think wounds, exhaustion and general weariness of a party should be a factor.

I mean, maybe if you run a game with 12 combats per day, it'd be ok. But with 1-2 daily fights, it just means your chars are always at full health. So I do this:

short rest: can only use 1hd for healing
long rest: can only use 2hd for healing.

you only recover 2 hd in a long rest if you were fully healed and had no exhaustion levels. Otherwise the long rest restores no hd, and heal up to two hd and recover 1 exhaustion level.

I would hate to be a player in your game. Making a PC exhausted is as simple as one or two castings of a level 0 spell.

Since when does spellcasting grant exhaustion?

Touch of Fatigue twice on a PC or once on any already fatigued character = exhausted. With your rules in place it also = fucked.

Touch of fatigue is a D&D 3.5 spell. We're talking 5e, ain't we? Exhaustion works differently in 5e, and it's one of the best changes btw.

EDIT: even if you houserule that spell into 5e, the fatigue was gone after 1min/level

I point you to my house rule above.

 

[Fairfax]

Lucky is a great feat. My character has it in the 5e campaign I play in. It's obviously broken but my DM allows it so of course I use it all the time.

It's not even that broken, I just think goes against the spirit of the game. Though I feel that way about feats in general, Lucky is the most extreme.

Hit dice and healing. What's this shit about sleeping one night leaving you healed and being also able to heal often during the day? screw that. Especially on Dark Sun, where I think wounds, exhaustion and general weariness of a party should be a factor.

I mean, maybe if you run a game with 12 combats per day, it'd be ok. But with 1-2 daily fights, it just means your chars are always at full health.

The game is balanced around 6-8 medium or hard encounters (traps and hazards included) in a day, which is one of the most common complaints about it.

 

[TheDiceMustRoll]

Lucky is a great feat. My character has it in the 5e campaign I play in. It's obviously broken but my DM allows it so of course I use it all the time.

It's not even that broken, I just think goes against the spirit of the game. Though I feel that way about feats in general, Lucky is the most extreme.

Hit dice and healing. What's this shit about sleeping one night leaving you healed and being also able to heal often during the day? screw that. Especially on Dark Sun, where I think wounds, exhaustion and general weariness of a party should be a factor.

I mean, maybe if you run a game with 12 combats per day, it'd be ok. But with 1-2 daily fights, it just means your chars are always at full health.

The game is balanced around 6-8 medium or hard encounters (traps and hazards included) in a day, which is one of the most common complaints about it.

I only let players spend their hit dice that they actually have.

 

[Akratus]

In my experience I would agree that with all the death saves, benefits from short and long rests, and general qol features there's a lack of challenge. The players become dulled to challenge somewhat because there's no general sense of danger and realistic consequences. What optional/homebrew rules could best remedy this?

And besides, people kind of narrowly define challenge as just damage or running out of resources. In the games I've played so far things like exhaustion, food/water intake, general wilderness survival issues, the need for tactics/strategy or planning rarely come into play if ever. Does anyone have any experience with the gritty realism optional rule? The slow natural healing rule seems like a must have.

 

[TheDiceMustRoll]

In my experience I would agree that with all the death saves, benefits from short and long rests, and general qol features there's a lack of challenge. The players become dulled to challenge somewhat because there's no general sense of danger and realistic consequences. What optional/homebrew rules could best remedy this?

And besides, people kind of narrowly define challenge as just damage or running out of resources. In the games I've played so far things like exhaustion, food/water intake, general wilderness survival issues, the need for tactics/strategy or planning rarely come into play if ever. Does anyone have any experience with the gritty realism optional rule? The slow natural healing rule seems like a must have.

See my houserules, but here's some fun tips:
At level 5, non-casting monsters and martial only classes add their naked 1d20 roll to their attack damage. Give people minibosses to fight and have them roll with 1d30 for attack dice.
Death and Dismemberment tables: grab one off of the web and make it a rule that if you roll a result that would result in you losing a limb you already lost, you die instead.
Eight hours of rest replenishes resource, but only gives a single hit point, fuck hit dice and fuck you.
Use the Lamentations of the Flame Princess esque encumbrance, and force them to use it. Hobble them if necessary.
Introduce monsters that poison people's stats away. Use the monsters from shit like Veins of the Earth, which has a caveman monster that can make your soul come out of your body and eat it, instantly crippling any divine spellcaster and having you be seen by other creatures as a construct.
Add in exploration rules that actually force strategy. Remove retarded shit like Darkvision. Make people eat a pound of food every eight hours or they take a level of exhaustion. Do not allow anyone to take the one background that lets you spawn food for each person, whoever came up with that is an idiot.
Finally, make monsters give zero XP for kills, and make it all about recovery of gold.

Welcome to Dungeons and Dragons: Rob tombs. Deal with traps. Hide from monsters. Return to the world richer than anyone you know or ever will know, and level up in the process. Try not to die.

And generally only allow a single save for each monster. Beholders are not served well by having three fucking saves for petrification ray. You get one save or you're done.

Seriously: Throw out your monster manual or rewrite the entire thing. You should be providing people custom monsters anyway, it's not hard to do. The Dungeon Masters Guide is similarly complete garbage.
AC: Never go lower than 14
HP: 1d8 per hit die. You can either roll or pick 4(easy) or 5(asshole) or higher(risk turning the game boring)
Special Abilities: give each monster something horrifying, give it a save, and roll with it.
Attack: Use # of hit dice as attack bonus, any HD after 3 adds an additional +1 to the damage die.

 

[nikolokolus]

Good call about throwing non-standard creatures at players.

To that end, I've gotten some decent mileage out of this thing: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/produc...ePlaying-Games-and-Their-Modern-Simulacra-The

I even coded up an Inspiration Pad Pro generator for it, so it's one-click and you're done.

 

[TheDiceMustRoll]

Good call about throwing non-standard creatures at players.

To that end, I've gotten some decent mileage out of this thing: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/produc...ePlaying-Games-and-Their-Modern-Simulacra-The

I even coded up an Inspiration Pad Pro generator for it, so it's one-click and you're done.

Raggi's book is very okay, but it doesn't work all the time and only generates ooga ooga killing machines.

 

[DavidBVal]

If you ask me, they need to release a 5.5e with:

- better saving throws balance. Right now a few level 3 casters can perma-hold a level 20 fighter.
- Better "wow factor" for spells and attacks. Something that makes stuff feel more deadly. Maybe a different critical hits system.
- A slight improvement on skill system. It's boring to have all your skills defined at creation. l don't want the old skill point spam from 3e, but maybe a two-step system like proficiency/mastery plus less proficiencies gained initially and more gained over levels.
- Get rid of QoL principles that make things inane and trivial to build and force players to make hard choices when building chars. Make some classes depend on multiple attributes like good old paladin, bring back race penalties, bring back forbidden magic schools, etc etc.
- Do something with healing HD, or offer several alternatives for a vast majority of DMs that won't make their players fight 10 times/day.
-Get rid of all artists and hire a bunch of mysoginic artists from the 80s to replace all the insanity.

Now don't get me wrong, I like 5e. Bounded Accuracy is good, simple rules make combat fast and easy to learn. I think they really have something going with this edition but I feel it needs an iteration to reach full potential. And many of the problems above clearly go beyond houseruling, they affect the core system.