The Gaming Den

Most people can't even fully agree how the D&D rules work for any edition. That is mostly true, and important, and also pretty fucking easy to fix with a professional editor from outside the immediate hobby. People do agree, for instance, on how Mentzer-D&D works, because Frank Mentzer was ...

I believe that your 'cure' is worse than the disease. Pretty much every 3.5 CR > 18 monster that people have cited as broken in 5e has enough DR to be immune to low-level NPCs in 3.5. DR is an obvious kludge to protect against low-level things, but I've always found it an annoying, pointless kludge...

The highest AC in the 5E MM (that I'm aware of) belongs to the Tarrasque at CR 30. Getting rid of autohit on 20 makes no sense in the context of 5e. None at all. Right, I'm not suggesting get rid of autohit as a house rule. I'm saying if it had never been introduced in the first place, there would ...

IMO it seems the real problem is they streamlined is they streamlined the patches out of the game that fixed the core mechanical problems of the system. The 20 = Hit mechanic introduced by 3rd is one of the biggest offenders. If you give everything a minimum 5% chance to hit, then you either have to...

But what I hate most is that there are a bunch of dumbasses who think finding a demon the size of an elephant around whom the air itself burns hot enough to kill an ordinary man in seconds and punching it in the face is a low power fantasy game. That would be a terrible decision, even in 5e. Assumi...

Regarding the fighters, I think once you factor in crits and AC, and Action Surge, it might take a few more than four L1 fighters to deal with an L20. But I think that's immaterial---the number certainly isn't even in the hundreds. I'm assuming in 3.5, there's some kind of special armor a 20th level...

Stuff Okay, so I can see how if you go by the numbers, a 5e dragon isn't the sort of thing that would attack a group of 200+ archers in the middle of a field. That definitely changes the feel of things. At the minimum, players in the know will have to suspend disbelief if the story has an ancient r...

For the curious, here's the 2nd ed blue dragon:

http://mmadnd.chat.ru/MM00055.htm#b265837e

Obviously, that's not the TRUE version of the blue dragon, since we all know D&D didn't really exist until 3.5 . Of course, resolving crits on this thing is about as fun as going to the dentist.

I was actually typing them up just now: 5e dragon: Frightful presence: All but incapacitates (drops to 0.0025 chance to hit) 95% of guards within 120 feet. Lightning Breath: Instantly kills all guards in 120'x10' line in front of the dragon. Recharge 5/6. Wing attack: Instantly kills 95% of guards w...

Several people have already mentioned the innate DR 15. Good job picking up on my oversight there.

Its a false equivalency.

5e dragons have some version of everything else you mentioned.

In a real situation, those 830 guards don't stand a chance for the same reasons.

The real difference isn't in exactly how many hundreds it takes to do something at high levels, because once you're into the hundreds, no one's counting. Okay, maybe you play at tables where the DM precisely enumerates the size of the king's army and makes sure that the number is always just large e...

No, it is not a choice or anything like that. If you want to create a system where everything can be killed by "more goons", you need to actually write that system. The problem is that DnD5 is NOT written like that. Neither is any edition of D&D. Everything has at least a 5% chance to...

The 20 orc calculation is probably a bit off since I don't know how 20 will engage simultaneously in melee. But DSM's point remains that DR is unimportant compared to the fuckery of bounded accuracy in shitting on the helms of heroes. To compare generously to 3.5, the shitty example 3.5 NPC level 1...

@Previn, I play about one draft game a year, and play Magic a total of about three or four times a year. In that one draft game, Wizards gets more money out of me than they do out of any of the players at my D&D table. Even if I don't buy in, someone else has to buy in for me. A friend can join ...

I'm not arguing that you can't sell books. I'm saying a TTRPGs won't ever match MTG in revenue. You can have a profitable, sustainable business model for a TTRPG. Paizo's proven that. But Magic is a $200m game. Pathfinder is a $10m game. I don't see how you can match card games' revenue without havi...

From the company's perspective, an edition is dead if sales have dropped off to the point of no return. I may be wrong, but I think 3.5 undersold 3.0, and subsequent expansions sold less and less. It seems to me, based purely on observing the shelf at the game shop, that Paizo has focused a lot more...

Card games have a much lower barrier to entry than TTRPGs. The rules are simpler, the per-unit cost is lower, you don't have to play with the same people every time, and you don't have to play regularly. So of course they're going to be more popular. So what about a 2 to 5 page booklet outlining a ...

Card games have a much lower barrier to entry than TTRPGs. The rules are simpler, the per-unit cost is lower, you don't have to play with the same people every time, and you don't have to play regularly. So of course they're going to be more popular. Insider rendered the books meaningless. Why buy a...

Good job on trading actual combat power at level 3 for the ability to fly at level 14. The Eagle Totem gives you the ability to Dash as a bonus action plus make enemies take disadvantage on OAs at Level 3. This seems like a useful ability. Also, the Berserker path has the Exhaustion penalty, which ...

I do not see why detailed tracking rules would be critical in players selection of certain character types (unless focus of game is the tracking) because I do not see why lack of such rules would forbade or prevent player to choose such skills or backgrounds to her character. Am I right assuming yo...

Hey look, there is an X, can I hide behind it? Tell us exactly where the line you draw is between "Obviously you can't hide behind a vase you idiot" and "Obviously you can hide behind a couch" is. Then explain how the things directly on each side of that line are so obviously on...

When you try to hide, make a Dexterity (Stealth) check. Until you are discovered or you stop hiding, that check’s total is contested by the Wisdom (Perception) check of any creature that actively searches for signs of your presence. You can’t hide from a creature that can see you, and if you make n...

if you knock over a vase. But... what determines whether you knock over a vase or not? There are no fucking rules for that. It's just, if the DM decides that you knock over a vase and give your position away, that's tough shit. If you have a DM who acts like this, he's a bad DM, and the players won...

The biggest problem with 5e there appears to be no coherent business plan. The fundamental mechanics are fine, I guess. Having at least read over them, they don't seem worse than any previous edition and any less patchable. Actually, they seem pretty sound. What the fuck are you on about? You've re...

But a TTRPG is inherently not mass-market. I don't think that's right. There's no particular reason for D&D to sell less copies than Monopoly or Risk, with computer versions that don't suck and a social version that someone pays out the ear for. Board games are mass-market products because the ...