The alternative argument is, why should I bother trying to unfuck the more unbalanced parts of the game's design from WotC when I can just ban the broken shit? How do you balance flight and allow Arakocra to be playable characters at early levels where flight is otherwise impossible for them to attain? Why should you go through the effort of rebalancing all of the expansion books to put them at the same power level as core? If I wanted to design my own game to play with my friends, I would.
Because I care about the players. I do not care about WotC at all this is a hobby that my friends and I share. WotC may own the rights, but the players own the game. It is ours to shape and play how we see fit. The reason people play is due to the fond memories they shared playing with their friends not the game itself.
If I like something I will take it if not it will be cast aside. With all the fiction that is out there the sky is the limit you don't just have to purely focus on DnD it's just that DnD is what we played so out of nostalgia we stuck with our own alternate version.
The shorts and rants I constantly get bombarded by that annoys me is the 1st level spell Silvery Barbs. Now I like Silvery Barbs it is a very good spell that can be used in and outside of combat. I like support spells or actions and I would never forbid things that get players to work together and build trust in game.
I like not even having to give a shit about this newfag crap because Magic Missile should be good enough for anyone. Fuck this Buggery Barbs faggotry. I'm never even going to have to deal with that shit. Just cast Magic Missile.
Silvery barbs is the result of dumb fuck WotC executives thinking that MTG style power creep is something that D&D needs in order to sell supplements (edit: spelling)
My WoD party uses music quite a lot; that said, we have had some difficulty getting certain songs to fit. We've been trying to put "My Way" into a Werewolf campaign, for instance.
In a Shadowrun game I was in on Roll20 the GM the music bugged out and we had the starting intro soft sax playing non stop mixed in with the occasional gun fx in the background even as the combat music played.
And yes it was the the Stuffer Shack scene where the party members are all conveniently getting a midnight snack as the place gets held up, so all the players were making jokes about this deaf and blind sax player doing his thing in the parking lot even as a massive gun battle raged around him.
And then of course next session the GM mixed up testudo and tetsubo when it came to the Yakuza we were up against leading to even more jokes by us players, this time about Japanese gangsters hiding behind their giant shields in a turtle formation.
The shorts and rants I constantly get bombarded by that annoys me is the 1st level spell Silvery Barbs. Now I like Silvery Barbs it is a very good spell that can be used in and outside of combat. I like support spells or actions and I would never forbid things that get players to work together and build trust in game.
I generally don't ban stuff unless it doesn't fit the setting. But I made an exception for Silvery Barbs. One of my players who also dm's did it first and I didn't get why until he used it in my Dark Sun game. It just slows combat down. It probably is fine at lower levels, but a full caster with it is kind of obnoxious. Especially if they have any way of quickly getting spell slots back. If it wasn't a 1st level spell, I think it would be more reasonable. But it's a 1st level spell that does something very similar to the Lucky feat and gives a buff to another party member. Heck if it just did one thing or the other I'd say it's fine at first level. But both?
I don't. When I was still advertising my game online, I put quite clearly that all animal-people races were banned. Somebody emailed me to complain that I was limiting his choices and freedom. I told him that he was free to find another table. He sent me a long, autistic email about how I didn't care about players' self-expression. It felt pretty good to read, I won't lie. I hate fags like that and am glad he got filtered.
Silvery barbs is the result of dumb fuck WotC executives thinking that MTG style power creep is something that D&D needs in order to sell supplements (edit: spelling)
But it's a 1st level spell that does something very similar to the Lucky feat and gives a buff to another party member. Heck if it just did one thing or the other I'd say it's fine at first level. But both?
It's a 1st-level spell that fills the same role as a different 1st-level spell, Shield, and then some. Nobody uses Shield with Silvery Barbs available, like how pretty much every other damage cantrip disappeared when Toll the Dead hit. That perfectly encapsulates power creep.
Because we actually have no intuition at all for what the world would look like if random people could just take off and fly. The Grand Canyon is an impassible barrier to humans and just nice scenery to a hawk. At-will flying is fundamentally intuition-breaking, trivializing all kind of barriers and designs, makes hash out of lots of premade dungeons, and generally makes running the game world more a pain the ass, because now I have to rethink things, and I can't just pull a module out of a sheaf and run it.
And yet, the players would probably object if I redesigned the game world on the fly so that things like security made sense, e.g. every walled city having tall watchtowers throughout with sharpshooters who shoot airspace violators on sight, so you can't just bypass the gate guards.
Stuff like this is part of the reason why I brought up the Aarakocra bit earlier; the new guy was being more concerned about the "Flight" problem than our DM was. Granted, our group is A: all made up of close IRL friends, and B: extremely casual in general, so we tend to let anything go, but...
Funnily enough, he admitted he wanted to style the bird's "Flight" ability to being more of an extended jump; he was essentially trying to recreate this guy:
The Guardian from the currently-upcoming Elden Ring: Nightreign. An avian paladin focused heavily on team support and tanking; can't actually fly due to a malformed wing, though it can get some good height to perform a high-powered diving attack. Basically, the new guy wanted his bird to be crippled because it's more balanced, and according to him it's also more fun. He said that he considered running a Kenku for the character instead, but he really hates the Mimicry thing they got saddled with.
If you can't tell, he's a REALLY big Souls fan.
I will say that it's sad that WotC's balancing is so shit that everyone sane has to essentially ban so many races just to get something figured out. It's like this:
When I was still advertising my game online, I put quite clearly that all animal-people races were banned. Somebody emailed me to complain that I was limiting his choices and freedom. I told him that he was free to find another table. He sent me a long, autistic email about how I didn't care about players' self-expression. It felt pretty good to read, I won't lie. I hate fags like that and am glad he got filtered.
I admit that I want to say that it's a dick move to ban everything - DnD is supposed to be a fantasy world after all - but I also completely get it entirely. The game's balance is so utterly shit that the best/only way to filter out all the powergamers is to essentially allow only humans, elves, or dwarves, and that's not even getting into all of the woketards, furfags, and other types of degenerates that infest the game these days. Even worse is that WotC is fully aware and actively cultivating this type of shit, just take a look at this:
This is supposed to be an Orc, by the way. The other races are even worse; even the Dragonborn looks like some shitskin, and that's probably the "best"-looking one. Every race has to look like some kind of faggot or minority.
Seriously, there's so much potential here to create an interesting setting, and they instead focus on creating "safe spaces" for fags; just take a look at the Radiant Shitadel. There's no balance, no grit, no nothing... unless you're based and/or running an evil campaign where you and your party get to kill/enslave all the degenerates.
There aren't any bird-people in Middle-Earth, Westeros, Roshar, or any number of fantasy settings you might want to run a game in. There's a common mentality in the D&D community that if WotC published it in a splat, you have to include it in your setting. I completely reject that, because it means that I really have no power to determine what sort of world I'm running games in. The DM is the absolute authority over his own setting. If you decide elves don't exist in your world, then they don't exist, the end.
Powergamers are somewhat easy to deal with in 5e, in part because the power curve isn't that steep. The really annoying players are the ones who think you should care about their special snowflake character and their gay back story. The world does not care about your personal quest. There are tons of young men with interesting back stories who were turned into meat chunks at the Somme. So your really interesting character, who carries his grandfather's sword with him on a quest to clear his family name due to an evil wizard blah blah blah might just be the next Geoffrey Bach Smith. Who knows what that man could have been were it not for a stray piece of steel.
There aren't any bird-people in Middle-Earth, Westeros, Roshar, or any number of fantasy settings you might want to run a game in. There's a common mentality in the D&D community that if WotC published it in a splat, you have to include it in your setting. I completely reject that, because it means that I really have no power to determine what sort of world I'm running games in. The DM is the absolute authority over his own setting. If you decide elves don't exist in your world, then they don't exist, the end.
Oh, I get that entirely, having a solid idea of what to run is extremely important; what I mean is that it's fun to really cut loose and experiment with what races and such exist in a setting sometimes. Sure, it might not be as "grounded" as Middle Earth, but it's fun to experiment. I will say that the race balancing is a problem, though, and not just for running DnD; as someone with an interest in writing myself, I have to keep in mind all the advantages/disadvantages of different races. It's a bit frustrating.
This is why I'm always just a merc; you don't have to deal with any of that bullshit, you just pop in looking for loot, sometimes getting hired by the other party members.
But then I don't play this edition really. I also know that I can just sometimes not play DnD and play something else, which works out beautifully every time.
That spell is so obviously evil that it would be restricted to evil-aligned characters if 5e alignment wasn't shit and had any real implications for the game. Imagine a cleric of Lathander using that spell.
Fuck balance. That shit is to mollify players who would whine when they forfeit Xp/treasure because they had to flee an enemy that was too powerful. Not every fight needs to be winnable!
That spell is so obviously evil that it would be restricted to evil-aligned characters if 5e alignment wasn't shit and had any real implications for the game. Imagine a cleric of Lathander using that spell.
First, why is necromancy not automatically evil? Also, how is that even a fucking cantrip? Back when sanity prevailed, a cantrip was some minor usually harmless spell (unless you could do something in context with it), shit like heating up a nice cup of Earl Grey instantly or lighting up a room.
Depends. I actually made a couple campaigns literally around some player generated idea, and most campaigns at least had some modifications to fit the characters.
Of course the back stories justifying whatever were actually good.
My favorite CoC campaign (that went on years) actually started with a couple scenarios specifically made to tie up some loose ends in a lead character's back story.
Fuck balance. That shit is to mollify players who would whine when they forfeit Xp/treasure because they had to flee an enemy that was too powerful. Not every fight needs to be winnable!
Not only every fight doesn't need to be winnable, players by right should get experience for avoiding fights that are obviously above their pay grade.
Experience isn't just about grinding out fights and slaughtering goblins until you suddenly get better at withstanding poison, or become able to cast stronger spells. It's about going through various situations and developing as an adventurer.
First, why is necromancy not automatically evil? Also, how is that even a fucking cantrip? Back when sanity prevailed, a cantrip was some minor usually harmless spell (unless you could do something in context with it), shit like heating up a nice cup of Earl Grey instantly or lighting up a room.
Man, I know a lot of players who would throw all their toys out of the pram if you had certain spells (or certain uses for certain spells) ding their alignment or have them tainted or discriminated against by witnesses. How dare a GM incorporate in-universe consequences to rules-based decisions the players made, am I right? It's like the people who bitch when their Fire Bolt misses the evil sorcerer and ignites the huge pile of scrolls he was very deliberately described as standing in front of.
Anyway, cantrips deal damage because God (pick one) forbid a spellcaster run out of spells to cast. They might have to actually consider their options and not cast a spell every turn. Or carry a wand with limited charges. Or learn how to use a ranged weapon. Or position themselves and ready an action to pull a lever when an enemy walks in front of a trap. Nope, gotta fling d12 at the most dangerous target every single turn or their time around the table is wasted.
Really, I'd argue one of the many reasons 5e runs so slowly is that spellcasters feel like they have to keep casting spells. Experienced players have quick mental algorithms for what they'll do depending on the situation at hand, but I've seen so many new people spending half a minute hemming and hawing on what they're going to do... and end up just using their default cantrip anyway.
They started to include powerful offensive cantrips like Toll the Dead to please the whiners who burn through their spell allotments in the first encounter and don't want to play a minor role in combat after that. DMs who handwave post-action healing and rest rules exacerbate the problem by making the special healing abilities of certain classes superfluous.
That spell is so obviously evil that it would be restricted to evil-aligned characters if 5e alignment wasn't shit and had any real implications for the game. Imagine a cleric of Lathander using that spell.
5e cantrips are roughly 1/2 a weapon-user's attack damage and are there to give the wizard something to do from levels 1-4 besides stand around. Never really had an issue with them, because they're just not that powerful, but before Xanathar's was published, Firebolt was the hardest-hitting cantrip, and it came with the usual downsides of ranged attacks, like cover penalties. Toll the Dead is superior in every way. The basic problem is they thought that making it do a d8 against undamaged creatures compensated for how hard it hits damaged creatures, but in practice, parties focus-fire, so it doesn't matter at all and is just a d12 cantrip. Should have been d8/d10.
5e wizards have proficiency with light crossbows. If you have 14 DEX, it's actually not a bad option vs a cantrip. When I play wizards, I often keep a cbow handy.
Not only every fight doesn't need to be winnable, players by right should get experience for avoiding fights that are obviously above their pay grade.
Experience isn't just about grinding out fights and slaughtering goblins until you suddenly get better at withstanding poison, or become able to cast stronger spells. It's about going through various situations and developing as an adventurer.
Here the problem becomes module-based advancement. DMs and players have to do a little less paperwork, but there are fewer incentives to do anything except bash your way through the dungeon. If your elf sneaks into a town guard's barracks, gets caught, and manages to talk his way out, there is absolutely no way to reward you.
In a Shadowrun game I was in on Roll20 the GM the music bugged out and we had the starting intro soft sax playing non stop mixed in with the occasional gun fx in the background even as the combat music played.
And yes it was the the Stuffer Shack scene where the party members are all conveniently getting a midnight snack as the place gets held up, so all the players were making jokes about this deaf and blind sax player doing his thing in the parking lot even as a massive gun battle raged around him.
And then of course next session the GM mixed up testudo and tetsubo when it came to the Yakuza we were up against leading to even more jokes by us players, this time about Japanese gangsters hiding behind their giant shields in a turtle formation.
I'm reminded of my very hilarious Paladin player who legitimately once ordered 80 GP worth of carnival fair food. He really did not get just how much food that really was, and it made the table crack up. Thankfully the followers, the poor, and quite a few other people partook in the accidental feast. It made that cook a killing however, though it also meant he had to close his stall due to massive success early.
In the same game, I ruled the party earned its 10th level milestone for surviving a thing that absolutely beat the shit out of the Warblade NPC several levels higher than them and with some snazzy magic items via time bullshit. They had to go through one hell of a gauntlet to get out of the dead city run by artificial life forms plotting something nefarious.
Here the problem becomes module-based advancement. DMs and players have to do a little less paperwork, but there are fewer incentives to do anything except bash your way through the dungeon. If your elf sneaks into a town guard's barracks, gets caught, and manages to talk his way out, there is absolutely no way to reward you.
That's where objective or milestone-based experience shines. Hell, that's now D&D was way back in the beginning: the objective was to leave the dungeon with all the treasure you could find and all that gold defined how much experience you got. If you could do that by sneaking around and picking off enemy patrols piecemeal so they didn't even have a chance against the party, more power to you. I mentioned I before in this threat, but the game makes a lot more sense (and becomes a lot more fun, IMO) when taking fair fights is considered a failure state for the party.
None of that cookie-cutter "five encounters, each expected to consume 20% of the party's resources" approach that usually results on the GM having to make adjustments on the fly because the players expect to be able to get to the end of the dungeon in a single try but the dice aren't cooperating. Have a bunch of fights ready, roll for random encounters and patrols, offer a couple branching paths through the dungeon, then let the players evaluate their options and decide whether or not they're going to push on or pull back to recover and replenish their resources. The final room of the dungeon could be just up ahead, or there could be 3+ encounters along the way. They don't know, and that should be part of the game. 5e characters are already borderline impossible to kill, and Pathfinder 2e characters aren't that far behind, so you might as well give them some level of risk management to play with.
