Thoughts on the loss of PC/NPC transparency.

[strangebloke]

So, one of the things I really like about third edition was the PC/NPC transparency. Everybody has a class, everybody has a level. Event the mosters can be translated into PCs.

In 5e, we don't have that. Your BBEG sorcerer doesn't actually need to be a sorcerer, or even a spellcaster of any class. Just given him appropriate abilities and call it a day.

On the one hand, this is less work for the DM, and it avoids the dreaded moment where the player says that your BBEG can't do what you described him as doing, but...

I like feeling that the whole world works on one set of rules. It offends my sensibilities that the sorcerer I grew up with as a kid and is now the BBEG somehow has a completely different set of abilities than me, the sorcerer who got his powers the exact same way.

[coredump]

Thats only because you are viewing the world through the eyes of someone reading the PHB. Everyone in the campaign world is different, the *only* people in the entire campaign that follow the rules in the PHB are the 4-8 people in the adventuring party, and they are likely following different rules from each other.

Its not like promising adolescents are given a 'college catalog' defining each class and subclass. They learn what they learn... its just a 'happy coincidence' that what your PC learns is detailed in the PHB so accurately...

Your Paladin isn't sitting around thinking "hmmmm... Devotion or Vengeance... what should I do....", he is just following his God, and acting as he has been guided in the best way he can.

[dropbear8mybaby]

I vastly prefer the 5e way. I think that comes from my strongly held viewpoint that the PC's are different. They are a step above the norm and exist outside of normal structures, both social and mechanical, from a game perspective. Not only that, but I find it boring when NPC's just replicate PC abilities and also feel like it takes something away from the player's enjoyment of being special and unique.

Having said that, if I have a powerful NPC or a very important NPC, I'll tend to make them a PC classed character to signify that they're on the same level as the PC's. It marks them as breathing the same rarefied air, which is a thing to be feared and respected.

[Thisguy_]

I vastly prefer the 5e way. I think that comes from my strongly held viewpoint that the PC's are different. They are a step above the norm and exist outside of normal structures, both social and mechanical, from a game perspective. Not only that, but I find it boring when NPC's just replicate PC abilities and also feel like it takes something away from the player's enjoyment of being special and unique.

Having said that, if I have a powerful NPC or a very important NPC, I'll tend to make them a PC classed character to signify that they're on the same level as the PC's. It marks them as breathing the same rarefied air, which is a thing to be feared and respected.

I was going to say something in that precise vein. You beat me to it; congratulations.

That said, the BBEG of any campaign I run is almost surely going to be PC classed. If he can do something special, there's going to be a mechanical, PHB reason he can do it.

[Waazraath]

I like the 5e way. As a DM, because at mid to high levels, building NPC's was a lot of work in 3.5. But also as a player. Because it's much easier to tweak the stats of a creature or create an NPC, you can more often encounter stuff of which I (out of character) don't know what it does. That adds to the exitement.

[Nifft]

So, one of the things I really like about third edition was the PC/NPC transparency. Everybody has a class, everybody has a level. Event the mosters can be translated into PCs. 3e NPC transparency was a lie.

Monster abilities did not cost the same as PC abilities.

ECL did not equal CR.

Most monsters could not be statted up as PCs, due to lack of LA, because they were judged inappropriate for use by players.

The ones that did have classes paid more or less (in terms of CR) depending on which class. PCs didn't get to do that. PCs had to pay the same XP no matter which class they picked for that level.

I repeat, 3e NPC transparency was a lie.

[MrConsideration]

I much prefer it. Monsters, demons and the undead should be able to do things differently. I have a rules-lawyer-player in my game and I simply told him up front that the monsters he'd be fighting might not even be in the Manual, or that they might be different from expectations.

And much of it is about expediency: when I have a spellcaster monster, they'll get, at most, a grab-bag of 5 or 6 spells written down: chosen for flavour or strategy, not from any list. Why only 5 or 6? They are almost certainly going to die before they cast them all in a combat with PCs. Why bother specifying all those choices? The 3.5 idea that enemies would be fully realized characters as complex as a player-character is insane.

[Thisguy_]

The 3.5 idea that enemies would be fully realized characters as complex as a player-character is insane.

I haven't DM'd for long, but nearly everyone who's occured in the campaign thus far at least has a grab-bag backstory and some kind of motivation to act the way that they do. If they didn't, I'd just be speculating about my own characters, anyway.

Dyeoue and ClaudianRobin, stop reading here.

Yes, that even means meaningless side characters have, well, a character. In fact, some particularly badass NPCs (of which there are actually quite a few in just this specific area of the overall world map) have real-assed character sheets and completely mechanically sound builds, and this seems to be the way I like it.

I admit that I didn't check the point-buy possibility of each one, but that's because big numbers and lots of medium-sized ones are for PCs, and NPCs stick close to 10s unless they're exceptional in a particular thing. That's the way I do it, but the setting I have isn't privvy to last, as it being my first one is noted upon in somewhat subpar manner and isn't fleshed out as much as I'd like it to be.

Too many moving parts... too much going on... downtime placed oddly due to the characters driving the story from behind the scenes just not being ready to make their various moves...

[HammeredWharf]

I haven't DM'd for long, but nearly everyone who's occured in the campaign thus far at least has a grab-bag backstory and some kind of motivation to act the way that they do. If they didn't, I'd just be speculating about my own characters, anyway.

Motivations, sure, but not builds. Making a by-the-rules encounter with a competitive party in 3.5e can take hours of DM time, especially in high-level campaigns. It's just not realistic in the long run. Besides, making the process easier gives you time to make those motivations deeper and more interesting, too.

[Daishain]

Classes are constructs for players that are convenient for the sake of maintaining balance and ease of character creation, nothing more, nothing less. They do not actually exist within the context of the game.

That mage NPC over there? He might bear some resemblance to the player's sorcerer in terms of ability, but to have the NPC limited to exactly the same choices the PC has is actually very unrealistic. In the 'real fantasy' world, you'd see a mashup of skills and abilities, with no two people being exactly alike. Hell, half the spellcasters I have my players encounter use a custom spell or two, (not all of which are as efficient as existing ones) to represent how different people approach magic.

[KorvinStarmast]

They do not actually exist within the context of the game.
Yes, they do exist, but you can choose not to at your table. If you read the PHB, you will even find mechanical distinctions within the game arise due to what class you choose.

(Your second paragraph I don't disagree with, however in my DMing days most NPC's I made were built on the chassis of a character class, because the C in NPC means character. For me it was easier than to make stuff up except in a few cases like you mention).

You raise an interesting point, which goes back to the "name level" idea that the original game had ... they picked a bunch of synomyms or names for the archetypes, and used that to indicate how skilled. This all started with the Hero and Superhero from Chainmail (4 HD and 8 HD) and they began to fill in the blanks in between. I've always wondered how much military rank structure influenced this, given how war games were the founding model of the whole thing. From 1 - 9 ... Veteran, Warrior, Swordsman, Hero, Swashbuckler, Myrmidon, Champion, Superhero, Lord.

Translate that to role playing a bit, and you get the bar discussions. "That guy is a Warrior. Sure, he's tough, but that Hero overthere would wipe the floor with him ... "

Rough cut, and inexact. It was eventually dispensed with as more classes and sub classes were developed in subsequent editions.

[Ardantis]

I vastly prefer the 5e way. I think that comes from my strongly held viewpoint that the PC's are different. They are a step above the norm and exist outside of normal structures, both social and mechanical, from a game perspective. Not only that, but I find it boring when NPC's just replicate PC abilities and also feel like it takes something away from the player's enjoyment of being special and unique.

Having said that, if I have a powerful NPC or a very important NPC, I'll tend to make them a PC classed character to signify that they're on the same level as the PC's. It marks them as breathing the same rarefied air, which is a thing to be feared and respected.

Hear hear. I've seen it this way too, including using PC baddies when appropriate.

In other systems, especially those which focus on roleplaying, enemies are basically PCs (I'm looking at you, White Wolf), but in DnD lots of the enemies are "monsters" and simplified stat blocks reflects their intended use.

[Daishain]

Yes, they do exist, but you can choose not to at your table. If you read the PHB, you will even find mechanical distinctions within the game arise due to what class you choose.

Are we speaking of two different things? I have never seen anything of the sort.

The Fighter class is one very narrow path that a person who could be identified as a fighter might take. A character in the D&D world might describe someone else as a fighter, someone trained to win battles. But that term could be applied to a wide variety of skillsets, including to PCs with Barbarian, Rogue, or other classes.

Even if you had a school that taught skills identical to the Champion archetype, no two of its students would have exactly the same skills like two PCs with the Champion archetype can be.

[Hawkstar]

I'm torn. On one hand, I like that monsters are able to be monsters, and Elite Guards and similar don't have to be Adventurers.

But it does cause problems for my homebrewed world that's supposed to have NPCs as Examples of What PCs Can Be, encouraging players to conquer and carve out parts of the world as their own, and forge their own legends in the vein of those who came before.

[Daishain]

I'm torn. On one hand, I like that monsters are able to be monsters, and Elite Guards and similar don't have to be Adventurers.

But it does cause problems for my homebrewed world that's supposed to have NPCs as Examples of What PCs Can Be, encouraging players to conquer and carve out parts of the world as their own, and forge their own legends in the vein of those who came before.
Nothing is stopping you from statting up a particular NPC using PC class levels. Some of us are just saying that such is not and should not be the norm.

[MrConsideration]

I haven't DM'd for long, but nearly everyone who's occured in the campaign thus far at least has a grab-bag backstory and some kind of motivation to act the way that they do. If they didn't, I'd just be speculating about my own characters, anyway.


Yeah, that is easy to invent and requires minimal preparation. I meant complexity in the sense that this Ogre the party are most likely going to murder doesn't need me to select feats for him, or to have an optimised 'build'. He has AC, damage, some special combat stuff, and stats. No feats, no skills, no leveling-up, spell selections. Just enough detail for them to have their walk-on appearance in the show.


Apart from some examples with excellent implied fluff (Warlock, for example) in my world most classes aren't recognised 'in-game'. People in magic school aren't necessarily a Wizard who starts at first level. That chassis exists to delineate advancement for player-characters. Your 'Ranger' might be a bounty-hunter, a woodsman, an assassin, a bandit.

[mephnick]

I disliked a lot of things about 3.5, but the idea that I had to spend hours statting up every single entity in my campaign was the worst. If I had to make a level 12 Anti-Paladin as an enemy, that was like..a session's worth of prep for one guy. I don't have time for that crap any more.

I've mostly thrown away the transparency for 5e. I'll take a monster stat block of the CR I want and maybe add a couple spells or class abilities. I've had players fight Eldritch Knights that were really just demon statblocks refluffed and no one knew the difference. It took me like 30 seconds to prep that encounter.

I've decided my next bad guy is going to be a gish that's really in tune with the plane of earth (magic in my setting all comes from the various planes), so I gave him Oni stats and threw in earth glide, one use of wall of earth and a fireball that does blunt damage. No one is going to care and it'll likely be sweet encounter.

[Ardantis]

I disliked a lot of things about 3.5, but the idea that I had to spend hours statting up every single entity in my campaign was the worst. If I had to make a level 12 Anti-Paladin as an enemy, that was like..a session's worth of prep for one guy. I don't have time for that crap any more.

I've mostly thrown away the transparency for 5e. I'll take a monster stat block of the CR I want and maybe add a couple spells or class abilities. I've had players fight Eldritch Knights that were really just demon statblocks refluffed and no one knew the difference. It took me like 30 seconds to prep that encounter.

I've decided my next bad guy is going to be a gish that's really in tune with the plane of earth (magic in my setting all comes from the various planes), so I gave him Oni stats and threw in earth glide, one use of wall of earth and a fireball that does blunt damage. No one is going to care and it'll likely be sweet encounter.

THAT'S the mechanical reason that non-transparency is desirable, at least from a practicality standpoint.

[obryn]

You guys are late to the party. I've been preaching this since 2008. :smallwink:

The only thing I ever got out of statting up NPCs (and monsters) like PCs was a degree of skill in HeroForge, and a desire never to run/play 3.x or any of its immediate family ever again.

[georgie_leech]

I would agree. I never felt like trying to shoehorn the character creation rules onto every character lead to any particularly interesting world bending.

But then, I mostly play 4e which already did away with it, so... :smallbiggrin:

[JNAProductions]

I actually like to build big bad boss monsters as players-somewhat. For instance, I recently made Goultard (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?433028-Goultard-Iop), who is treated basically as a level 20 Monk, then after that form dies, he comes back as a level 20 Fighter, then Paladin, then Barbarian, with a few minor bonuses over what a player can have. (Proficiency +8, for instance.)

[INDYSTAR188]

You guys are late to the party. I've been preaching this since 2008. :smallwink:

Encounter, NPC and monster creation in 4E was my favorite part of the edition. It was so simple to take the appropriate level/role monster I wanted to use as a base and give it AW and Encounter powers from classes or other monsters. I suspect that 5E will be similar for me. Incidentally, I'm thinking about creating a wizard anti-party for my pc's. Should I make them with the monster creation rules from the DMG or the PC rules from the PHB?

[Knaight]

I'd consider PC/NPC transparency a luxury that the fundamentals of the 5e system just can't afford. Take something like GURPS, by comparison - you can just buy up a whole bunch of different things, spread them out how you see fit, so on and so forth. The players have to keep precise track of point costs and that makes things convoluted, but on the GM side the system basically lets them just whip up an NPC, including letting them have just part of the stats worked out at any given time.

D&D is a class and level system though, and as such making an NPC PC style will inherently involve working within a class-level framework. That's a huge amount of work, and it's an entirely unreasonable demand to make of the DM, who is guaranteed to have better things to do with their time. It also used to be applied to monsters, which is where it gets really ridiculous. There's no particular reason to have a "dragon" class or similar, these aren't particularly playable anyways, and it just makes monster creation take more effort and be more limiting than it otherwise would be. PC/NPC transparency tends to emerge from systems where you can work straight from the end effects, and the existence of monster classes and mandating of player classes for NPCs gets in the way of this. It also either drastically limits the possibilities, or dramatically increases the workload yet further when something new happens. Suddenly to have a villain with abilities outside the narrow range presented in the PHB, you have to make a new class for them. That's ridiculous.

[Princess]

Class levels for NPC's slows things down - my approach to monster and NPC building when I ran 3.5 is closer to how things were officially done in 4e and 5e anyway, because that method is faster, and easier, and "No the NPC is not a PHB sorcerer, they're something custom" is a decent way to get the milder rules lawyers at your table to calm down a little bit.

[EvilAnagram]

From a game design perspective, having NPCs and PCs level according to the same rules did nothing for the game. It did not aid in making encounters as a DM, playing as a PC, or worldbuilding. In fact, it was restrictive because two separate entities that serve completely different purposes within the game (PC classes and NPC creatures) had to fit within the same bloated rule structure.

[obryn]

I like feeling that the whole world works on one set of rules. It offends my sensibilities that the sorcerer I grew up with as a kid and is now the BBEG somehow has a completely different set of abilities than me, the sorcerer who got his powers the exact same way.
Well, the easiest way I can put it is this... The rules of the game are not the physics of the game universe. This is obvious in any RPG if you care to look deeply at it; 3.x just hides it under several layers of BS, obfuscating the issue with enough processes and complexity that a lot of people decided that it must be more realistic that way. Most other RPGs, including both 4e and 5e, focus on the outcomes, instead - so you end up with a perfectly reasonable, say, Ogre Shaman, but don't need to go through the rigamarole of deciding how you got there.

[dropbear8mybaby]

Well, the easiest way I can put it is this... The rules of the game are not the physics of the game universe.

You actually don't need a gamist justification for variable levels of ability and methods of gaining skills and knowledge.

Maybe his sorcerer just went to a different university? Or had different influences growing up? I'm very different from my friends even though we grew up together. Their parents shaped a lot of their personality, as did mine. Even with people who I studied the same subjects with, had different results to me.

The real world is far more complex and involved than any game system could possibly ever be. No need to justify complexity within a game system when if your basis for verisimilitude is reality, then just use reality.

[MaxWilson]

So, one of the things I really like about third edition was the PC/NPC transparency. Everybody has a class, everybody has a level. Event the mosters can be translated into PCs.

In 5e, we don't have that. Your BBEG sorcerer doesn't actually need to be a sorcerer, or even a spellcaster of any class. Just given him appropriate abilities and call it a day.

On the one hand, this is less work for the DM, and it avoids the dreaded moment where the player says that your BBEG can't do what you described him as doing, but...

I like feeling that the whole world works on one set of rules. It offends my sensibilities that the sorcerer I grew up with as a kid and is now the BBEG somehow has a completely different set of abilities than me, the sorcerer who got his powers the exact same way.

Then don't do it that way. I mostly don't. That is, an evil vampire Necromancer 9 will have some extra stuff on top that a normal Necromancer wouldn't get due to vampirism, and some extra weaknesses, but he will have everything that a Necromancer 9 does. A Rakshasa Assassin would have everything that an Assassin does. Etc.

Just because the MM lists a generic "CR 13 archmage" without wizard abilities doesn't mean you have to use it. In my game, an archmage is significant enough that I would always stat him up as an actual wizard.

The trick is to realize that you can underspecify (N)PCs. When a new player creates a character, I don't always make him choose his skills right off the bat. He can just say "I have two more barbarian skills", and then when we come to a challenge like swimming or climbing he can decide then if he knows how to swim/climb/track/etc. You can do the same thing for NPCs. You can make an archmage without choosing his magical specialization, and then if he's still an important part of the game next session you can decide if he is an Enchanter or an Illusionist. Etc.

[strangebloke]

I suppose in some sense its an inherent improvement insofar as it doesn't have an 'official' way for DMs to make their own characters and monsters, so the rules-lawyers can't argue against your bs BBEG.

But honestly I really liked the flexilibility of adding character levels and feats to different types of monsters, and still maintaining some semblance of an understanding of what CR the encounter was. It was a lot of work, but I got to reuse a lot of it, for instance for one campaign the central enemy was a stratified ithillid cult with wide and ranging minions and specialties. It allowed me to have a unified group of enemies from 5-15, but still have varied and interesting encounters.

Sure in 5e I could just slap hp and spells and things onto a couple characters, but ultimately it actually becomes more work for me to get the same level of variety and balance. (Not that 3e was balanced, but that's a separate issue.) I could just put PC levels on the minotaurs that are coming after the heroes, but mixing monster abilities and PC abilities in 5e is, in my experience, generally overpowered.

I should say that, mostly, I like the way things are now. But I did use and abuse monstrous characters as a DM to get more interesting encounters. (How many MM entries were essentially 'I hit things with my club/rock/claw and sometimes fart acid.' Very boring. 5e is better about this but there are still some entries that leave me underwhelmed)

[strangebloke]

You actually don't need a gamist justification for variable levels of ability and methods of gaining skills and knowledge.

Maybe his sorcerer just went to a different university? Or had different influences growing up? I'm very different from my friends even though we grew up together. Their parents shaped a lot of their personality, as did mine. Even with people who I studied the same subjects with, had different results to me.

Sorcerer's aren't trained, they are born. If that other spellcaster has weird, possibly better abilities than me, than why didn't I get the option to choose those abilities? Think of it in character. Bob grew up with Joe. Joe now can summon comets made of frogs or something, has way too many hit points and somehow has legendary resistance, even though they both have the same draconic ancestor.

Why does my character suck so much, that he could never possibly obtain the skills and powers that Joe has? It's doubly bad if we're both wizards. I can kill him, steal his spell book, and make exactly zero progress towards mimicking his skills. This breaks verisimilitude.

[dropbear8mybaby]

Sorcerer's aren't trained, they are born.
That's disingenuously pedantic.


If that other spellcaster has weird, possibly better abilities than me, than why didn't I get the option to choose those abilities?
Because if everything tasted of vanilla, the world would be a very boring place.

[pwykersotz]

I suppose in some sense its an inherent improvement insofar as it doesn't have an 'official' way for DMs to make their own characters and monsters, so the rules-lawyers can't argue against your bs BBEG.

But honestly I really liked the flexilibility of adding character levels and feats to different types of monsters, and still maintaining some semblance of an understanding of what CR the encounter was. It was a lot of work, but I got to reuse a lot of it, for instance for one campaign the central enemy was a stratified ithillid cult with wide and ranging minions and specialties. It allowed me to have a unified group of enemies from 5-15, but still have varied and interesting encounters.

Sure in 5e I could just slap hp and spells and things onto a couple characters, but ultimately it actually becomes more work for me to get the same level of variety and balance. (Not that 3e was balanced, but that's a separate issue.) I could just put PC levels on the minotaurs that are coming after the heroes, but mixing monster abilities and PC abilities in 5e is, in my experience, generally overpowered.

I should say that, mostly, I like the way things are now. But I did use and abuse monstrous characters as a DM to get more interesting encounters. (How many MM entries were essentially 'I hit things with my club/rock/claw and sometimes fart acid.' Very boring. 5e is better about this but there are still some entries that leave me underwhelmed)

Interestingly, I was about to claim the opposite, that the increased flexibility while still being able to have an accurate CR is what makes 5e so good for me.

I like the system that's in place to calculate the CR of creatures and the ability to apply it to any kind of ability I make for the creature. If I made a creature that could cast by the book in 3.5, I might have something that was pathetic, or it might curbstomp an epic party...both at the same CR. The shenanigans were intense, and it made the CR system so worthless I stopped caring about it entirely.

I'm a big fan of boiling CR down to "How quick can it kill you" vs "How quick can you kill it" and averaging them. Other special abilities that inconvenience or delay are great and all, but they seldom matter. And if I want to pull some shenanigans, say I have an NPC summon 8 pixies to his aid ( :smallwink: ), I recalculate the damage with the expectation that someone will fail a save against one of the spells, and I have a new CR and a new amount of exp to toss the party. Clean and simple for results-oriented gaming.

Admittedly though, I do fondly remember combing through splatbooks and dragon magazine and finding fun combos to try out against the party. I don't have that time anymore, but it definitely has it's place.

[strangebloke]

That's disingenuously pedantic.

I don't see how. Yes, they develop differently, but there certainly aren't 'sorcerer universities' as suggested. I get my power from a brass dragon ancestor, so do you. But we don't resemble each other to any meaningful extent.


Because if everything tasted of vanilla, the world would be a very boring place.

Which is exactly why I'd like for the players to have more options. I could make a centaur cleric in 3e. Unoptimal, yes, but fun as anything.


Interestingly, I was about to claim the opposite, that the increased flexibility while still being able to have an accurate CR is what makes 5e so good for me.

I like the system that's in place to calculate the CR of creatures and the ability to apply it to any kind of ability I make for the creature. If I made a creature that could cast by the book in 3.5, I might have something that was pathetic, or it might curbstomp an epic party...both at the same CR. The shenanigans were intense, and it made the CR system so worthless I stopped caring about it entirely.

I'm a big fan of boiling CR down to "How quick can it kill you" vs "How quick can you kill it" and averaging them. Other special abilities that inconvenience or delay are great and all, but they seldom matter. And if I want to pull some shenanigans, say I have an NPC summon 8 pixies to his aid ( :smallwink: ), I recalculate the damage with the expectation that someone will fail a save against one of the spells, and I have a new CR and a new amount of exp to toss the party. Clean and simple for results-oriented gaming.

Admittedly though, I do fondly remember combing through splatbooks and dragon magazine and finding fun combos to try out against the party. I don't have that time anymore, but it definitely has it's place.

I should clarify that I worked form a pretty limited set of splatbooks when I DMed. CR shenanigans did exist with MM1, but I think the worst stuff came with the later books. And I was obviously limited with regards to options, so the customization helped a lot.

I guess a relevant point here is not to confuse 3e's balance issues with its transparency. Certainly an amount of the balance issues spring from the transparency. Most notably with means to get the Supernatural abilities from monsters. (Pun-Pun) But I don't think that's completely a flaw of the system itself.

[JNAProductions]

You can make a Centaur Cleric in 5E too. The only reason you need homebrew to do it is because 5E is still relatively new.

[strangebloke]

You can make a Centaur Cleric in 5E too. The only reason you need homebrew to do it is because 5E is still relatively new.

Such opportunities are never going to be as widespread as they were in 3e, though, where many of the rules were built in. True, not every monster had LA, but a lot did, very early on. Of course, racial hit dice were a very messy system, but there are better ways to manage it. So far we've no indication that Wizards will ever release a means for turning a MM entry into a player race.

[georgie_leech]

I don't see how. Yes, they develop differently, but there certainly aren't 'sorcerer universities' as suggested. I get my power from a brass dragon ancestor, so do you. But we don't resemble each other to any meaningful extent.


My brother and I share 100% of our ancestry yet have completely different personalities and talent sets. Why should these two sorcerers not be different? Maybe Joe has a thing for frogs and Bob spent more time learning how to go 'pew pew' and set things on fire with firebolts.

[JNAProductions]

The aracoka... Aarroocka... The ara... The bird-people went from a MM entry to a player race.

And let's be honest-the system for turning any random monster into a player race was garbage. It was not balanced at all.

[obryn]

But honestly I really liked the flexilibility of adding character levels and feats to different types of monsters, and still maintaining some semblance of an understanding of what CR the encounter was. It was a lot of work, but I got to reuse a lot of it, for instance for one campaign the central enemy was a stratified ithillid cult with wide and ranging minions and specialties. It allowed me to have a unified group of enemies from 5-15, but still have varied and interesting encounters.

Sure in 5e I could just slap hp and spells and things onto a couple characters, but ultimately it actually becomes more work for me to get the same level of variety and balance. (Not that 3e was balanced, but that's a separate issue.) I could just put PC levels on the minotaurs that are coming after the heroes, but mixing monster abilities and PC abilities in 5e is, in my experience, generally overpowered.
Erm, this doesn't follow at all. If you want your Illithid to have a few spells, you just give him a few spells. It's not like adding wizard levels in 3.x gave you any realistic sense of the challenge rating afterwards, anyway. That's part of the illusionism behind 3e's process consistency. It's less work, not more, because those added spells don't need to carry with them additional hit dice, adjustments to BAB/saves, feats, skill points, stat points, etc.


Sorcerer's aren't trained, they are born. If that other spellcaster has weird, possibly better abilities than me, than why didn't I get the option to choose those abilities?
I dunno. Why aren't I a billionaire? Why don't I have an Olympic-level physique? People are different from one another, and I'd say it strains verisimilitude even more to assume that I would have the ability to be just like anyone else I choose.

I think you're mistaking the consistency of the rules process for in-setting verisimilitude, which is pretty common among folks who've internalized 3.x/PF's way of doing things.

[LordBlades]

I dunno. Why aren't I a billionaire? Why don't I have an Olympic-level physique? People are different from one another, and I'd say it strains verisimilitude even more to assume that I would have the ability to be just like anyone else I choose.



Why people are indeed different, they're not that different. Expose people to similar circumstances amd usually the results will be pretty consistent.

If you send 5 people to 5 civil engineering universities across the country, the logical expectation is that you will obtain 5 civil engineers of roughly equivalent skill set, not 3 engineers, a Latin teacher and a world-class violin player.

This is what breaks the in-world consistency IMO, the fact that the same circumstance applied to NPCs constantly produces a result, while the same circumstance applied to PCs constantly produces another.

Take for example the Parry action (add +x to your AC vs. an attack as a reaction). It's a common skill among more experienced brigands and gladiators (available to the Bandit Captain and Gladiator npc) as well as a part of basic combat training of the highborn (available to Knight and Noble). However, EVERY SINGLE PC you will ever play, will be the exception guy that somehow never got to learn this trick.

Necromancy: according to the MM fluff text, 'skeletons can be created from the bones of other creatures beside humanoids', and yet no PC Necromancer,no matter how powerful can learn how to do it.

Lair actions: many creatures fortify their lairs, gaining a set of lair actions to show for it. No PC, even if they commit 1000x the effort in building a lair will get even a single lair action.

The list can of course continue.

[dropbear8mybaby]

If you send 5 people to 5 civil engineering universities across the country, the logical expectation is that you will obtain 5 civil engineers of roughly equivalent skill set, not 3 engineers, a Latin teacher and a world-class violin player.

This is where your analogy, and argument, breaks down. It's a strawman fallacy for a start but it also highlights the problem with this line of reasoning. Nobody is saying that if both types of caster have the same training that they're going to be radically different to the point of absurd disparity and delineation. We're saying that if a PC sorcerer has powers as per the PHB, that doesn't mean that an NPC sorcerer has to, or even should be, exactly the same. Having a variant like, say, the Unearthed Arcana storm sorcerer pop up isn't a bad thing. Nor is it a bad thing if it's a monster statted variant with different stats. At the end of the day, it lasts for one encounter and it's variations are only relevant to make that encounter interesting and different from coming up against the same options as those in the PHB. Further, it doesn't break verisimilitude to have variations in a diverse world, nor is it in any way unfair to limit players to PHB options whilst giving NPC's different things. After all, the NPC's exist to be a challenge, and hopefully an interesting one, to the PC's. Would you really find it as interesting if you just came up against a mirror-match version of yourself, every single encounter?

As for the ability to variate, I think obryn covered that well enough to end the argument entirely, quite frankly.

[LordBlades]

Further, it doesn't break verisimilitude to have variations in a diverse world, nor is it in any way unfair to limit players to PHB options whilst giving NPC's different things. After all, the NPC's exist to be a challenge, and hopefully an interesting one, to the PC's. Would you really find it as interesting if you just came up against a mirror-match version of yourself, every single encounter?



I never said variations break verisimilitude, I said variations that players can never get do.

For example, a Wild Magic sorcerer fighting a Storm sorcerer is more fun than a Wild Magic sorcerer fighting a clone of himself. What if Storm sorcerer was not an UA class but a bunch of NPC only abilities and a player was so impressed by how fun it was that he said 'whoa dude, that was so fun! I want my character to do that'?

I view it as deeply unfair and immersion-breaking to have players meet NPCs with abilities they can never get without there being any solid in-game reasonsfor why they can't get them.

I also think that NPCs exist to populate a world and make it believable, not just to be a challenge, and right now that doesn't really happen. Unless I fully dissociate the mechanics of my character from the fluff, 5e brings to my mind the image of the bug in MIB 'wearing' Ed. The book tells me I'm a human fighter, I look like a human, my backstory is filled with stuff that a human would do, but when you look under the hood, my internal workings are so different to almost every other human in the setting that I most definitely don't feel human.

[JoeJ]

Take for example the Parry action (add +x to your AC vs. an attack as a reaction). It's a common skill among more experienced brigands and gladiators (available to the Bandit Captain and Gladiator npc) as well as a part of basic combat training of the highborn (available to Knight and Noble). However, EVERY SINGLE PC you will ever play, will be the exception guy that somehow never got to learn this trick.

Unless you choose the Defensive Dualist feat.



Necromancy: according to the MM fluff text, 'skeletons can be created from the bones of other creatures beside humanoids', and yet no PC Necromancer,no matter how powerful can learn how to do it.

Who says they can't? AFAIK, there's nothing out yet that says how it's done at all. Maybe it requires a special magic item or lost spell that PCs could get.


Lair actions: many creatures fortify their lairs, gaining a set of lair actions to show for it. No PC, even if they commit 1000x the effort in building a lair will get even a single lair action.

PC's don't get eye rays like beholders or grow to gargantuan size like dragons either. There are a lot of monster races that just don't work as PCs. Some of them have lair actions as a racial ability.

It is possible for a PC to gain lair actions, however. All they have to do is become a lich (at which point any sane DM will also turn them into an NPC, but at least the player knows they got there).

[dropbear8mybaby]

I view it as deeply unfair and immersion-breaking to have players meet NPCs with abilities they can never get without there being any solid in-game reasonsfor why they can't get them.
This smacks of entitlement. Plus you're still using fallacious arguments by means of gross exaggeration and inaccuracies to support your case.

[LordBlades]

This smacks of entitlement. Plus you're still using fallacious arguments by means of gross exaggeration and inaccuracies to support your case.

So desiring a level playing field s entitlement nowadays? Also, what one considers immersion-breaking is purely subjective, so I fail to see how that can be considered entitlement either.

Also, what exactly was inaccurate in the actual game mechanics examples I provided in previous posts?

[Daishain]

I view it as deeply unfair and immersion-breaking to have players meet NPCs with abilities they can never get without there being any solid in-game reasonsfor why they can't get them.
Except that solid in game reasons DEMAND that there be abilities that PCs can never get. That is real life, any one individual is never going to be capable of mastering some skills. Hell, take a hundred exceptional individuals who specialize in different fields, train them to master as many various skills as you can manage, and there will still be gaps. This isn't just a matter of not having the time or ability to learn everything, but rather an admission of the fact that talents and the lack thereof will forever preclude learning

Toss in multiple species with unique abilities, and a magic system that is incredibly varied, complex and unpredictable, and this effect is amplified exponentially. Frankly, if we're really concerned about verisimilitude, very very few spellcasters should ever be capable of exactly copying each other, and nearly all of them are going to have some kind of trick that literally no one else can do (whether or not this trick is actually something worth bragging about is often another question "I can change my toenail color as a side effect of casting evocations!").

Now, PCs are exceptional individuals. One should avoid having all of the best 'toys' locked out of their reach, even given the above. But some things should not be possible to obtain, and others should be very difficult to obtain ("he got that spell via heavy and extremely unethical research conducted over the course of 900 years as a Lich, what are you willing to do to learn it?")

[obryn]

I view it as deeply unfair and immersion-breaking to have players meet NPCs with abilities they can never get without there being any solid in-game reasonsfor why they can't get them.
Well, I have two pretty easy answers for this. Pick your poison. Either/or.

(1) There are in-world reasons, be they genetic heritage, personal discovery, pacts with otherplanar entities, background, and/or magic. This is just like the real-world where I am neither Nobel prize-winner, nor Olympic athlete, just a happy dad with great kids.
(2) If there's something an NPC does that you want your PC to do, you and the DM work together to see if you can figure out a way to fairly implement something that captures the same flavor without stressing the mechanics too much. Just like you would if you wanted your proposed Centaur. I did this recently in my 4e Zeitgeist game, actually, where there was an awesome bad guy with a unique and incredibly clever weapon set.

It comes down to this. If there's suddenly a requirement that everything a bad guy can do, a PC can do, too, it severely narrows the potential design space for adversaries. Suddenly it's not enough to say, "I want the Grandmaster of Assassins to have a special weapon trick with his dagger," you need to say, "This is how he learned it, this is how a PC could learn it, and gosh let's make sure this won't break the game if a PC picks it up as-is." That's a nightmare. That turns all the DM's resources into player resources, while simultaneously requiring the DM to muck around with player resources in order to properly DM. That's exactly the clusterfail that turned DMing 3.x/PF into such a burden. That's a steep price to pay in the name of process simulation.

[LordBlades]

It comes down to this. If there's suddenly a requirement that everything a bad guy can do, a PC can do, too, it severely narrows the potential design space for adversaries. Suddenly it's not enough to say, "I want the Grandmaster of Assassins to have a special weapon trick with his dagger," you need to say, "This is how he learned it, this is how a PC could learn it, and gosh let's make sure this won't break the game if a PC picks it up as-is." That's a nightmare. That turns all the DM's resources into player resources, while simultaneously requiring the DM to muck around with player resources in order to properly DM. That's exactly the clusterfail that turned DMing 3.x/PF into such a burden. That's a steep price to pay in the name of process simulation.

In the end, it all comes down to what's more important to you and your group. For me personally, narrowing the design space to make sure the DM and players are playing with the same toys when appropriate is a well worth trade-off for a more believable world.

It's also not as hard as it seems IMO. The whole series of 40k RPGs from FFG for example has this approach (the gear and skillset of human opponents is drawn from the same pool players are using) and it isn't that incredibly cumbersome to DM, nor does it present significant balance issues beyond Dark Heresy.

D&D 5e's approach to this is IMO just lazy.

[Daishain]

In the end, it all comes down to what's more important to you and your group. For me personally, narrowing the design space to make sure the DM and players are playing with the same toys when appropriate is a well worth trade-off for a less believable world.

fixed that for you.

Simplifying an already oversimplified world is not believable at all, quite the opposite.

The only reason I can think of to do this is not verisimilitude, it is dealing with greedy players who want everything they see, and frankly, this is the greatly inferior solution to that problem

[LordBlades]

fixed that for you.

Simplifying an already oversimplified world is not believable at all, quite the opposite.

The only reason I can think of to do this is not verisimilitude, it is dealing with greedy players who want everything they see.


So for you a world where NPCs frequently have abilities PCs can never access (on the sole reason they are PCs), even though said PC might have experienced the exact same things in life is more believable?

[Daishain]

So for you a world where NPCs frequently have abilities PCs can never access (on the sole reason they are PCs), even though said PC might have experienced the exact same things in life is more believable?
As opposed to there being a few hundred distinct abilities that are all that is available to anyone anywhere, the answer is absolutely yes.

I'm an engineer, and a damn good one. In spite of having the same exact training as some of my peers, several of them have talents related to the field that I will never have, and I can do some things several of them cannot. That is life, any one person will have things that they cannot do in spite of others not having that problem, even in cases where the core abilities are quite similar. As mentioned before, the D&D world is a FAR more complex beast when it comes to unique skills and abilities. Insisting that it becomes far less complex than the real world is a detriment to verisimilitude, not a benefit at all.

(discounting stuff that wouldn't be available to a PC suitable creature at all) The only reason that there are quite a few abilities that PCs cannot ever access no matter what is that the classes are too rigid to allow for realistic levels of flexibility. The answer does not involve pretending that the rest of the world is just as inflexible.

[obryn]

In the end, it all comes down to what's more important to you and your group. For me personally, narrowing the design space to make sure the DM and players are playing with the same toys when appropriate is a well worth trade-off for a more believable world.

It's also not as hard as it seems IMO. The whole series of 40k RPGs from FFG for example has this approach (the gear and skillset of human opponents is drawn from the same pool players are using) and it isn't that incredibly cumbersome to DM, nor does it present significant balance issues beyond Dark Heresy.

D&D 5e's approach to this is IMO just lazy.
Eh? Lazy? It's an intentional design decision to allow players more complex ways to develop their characters, while not sweating the details for NPCs and monsters, and leaving open plenty of free space for the DM to do whatever they need.

There's plenty of laziness in 5e's design, but this isn't part of it. (I actually think 5e doesn't go quite far enough with monster/NPC design; individual stats are still altogether too important, wizard spells are the basis for most magical effects, and attack/save bonuses are still calculated with proficiency bonuses just like they are for characters. It's a mushy middle approach, like a lot of the edition's design, but cutting loose most of the 3e process-sim cruft was a very smart decision.)

The 40k RPGs aren't D&D. I could just as easily bring in examples from WFRP3, Fate Core, Apocalypse World, Savage Worlds, Feng Shui 2, etc., while pointing out how they're even less burdensome to run.

[dropbear8mybaby]

Here's an NPC I made up that is going to be going up against the PC's in a couple of nights time. They were somewhat directly but mostly indirectly responsible for him losing his hand, foot and eye. He was their ship's captain but they inadvertently betrayed him by... well... by being PC's. They also let a particular companion of theirs (a former PC) die, one which this guy had a vested interest in as he was meant to be the vessel for which his dread lord, the unknowable Zargoth of the Deeps, was to return to the mortal realm.

Anyway, long story short, he's going to be an ongoing (unless they manage to off him... I've stopped trying to predict what or how they'll manage to surprise me) antagonist. I gave him a hook for a hand as a special weapon, and used the DMG limb/eye loss rules. These are things I wouldn't give a PC.

Yuel Granger, now known as the Pirate Captain Sea Dog. (http://www.mediafire.com/view/b9cx2aqqws4qsbr/Seadog.pdf)

[Hawkstar]

If you send 5 people to 5 civil engineering universities across the country, the logical expectation is that you will obtain 5 civil engineers of roughly equivalent skill set, not 3 engineers, a Latin teacher and a world-class violin player.I take it you've never actually seen this work?

No, you won't get "5 civil engineers of roughly equivalent skill set" - You'll get 5 dramatically different people, even with their similar education. In fact, you're probably likely to get an engineer with a strong aptitude toward accurate and precise mathematic aptitude but little creativity in coming up with unique solutions to problems and branches out into another engineering field as well (And possibly some political experience as well), an engineer who has a strong aptitude for coming up with unique and effective solutions, but has a harder time getting the actual math to implement them completely right, an artist who spent most of his time and effort on the extracurriculars while possessing functional knowledge of civil engineering, an engineering professor with some impressive credentials but no idea how to actually apply them, and a dropout with a pile of debt he can't escape from while stuck working as part-time unskilled labor for his brother's landscaping company (Or, depending on how much you try to push him through these engineering programs, a dead body).

Or, you get one excellent engineer, a mediocre engineer, a 'has the paper but can't do anything with it", and two dropouts/suicide victims, as the grossest of simplifications.

[rlc]

It is possible for a PC to gain lair actions, however. All they have to do is become a lich (at which point any sane DM will also turn them into an NPC, but at least the player knows they got there).

I'd also go out on a limb and say that, if and when we get rules for post-level 20 play, PCs will be able to get at least legendary actions, if not also lair actions.

[LordBlades]

(discounting stuff that wouldn't be available to a PC suitable creature at all) The only reason that there are quite a few abilities that PCs cannot ever access no matter what is that the classes are too rigid to allow for realistic levels of flexibility. The answer does not involve pretending that the rest of the world is just as inflexible.

This is what I've been trying to say. 3.5 alliwed you to play anyone and anything. Not everything was created equal, but if something was possible in the world, you could do it too.

5e on the other hand gives you a fixed set of options and that's it. You can't get off the rails, and that rubs me the wrong way.

[obryn]

This is what I've been trying to say. 3.5 alliwed you to play anyone and anything. Not everything was created equal, but if something was possible in the world, you could do it too.
...And there are steep costs to this approach, on the design side, the player side, and (especially!) on the DMing side. You end up with a different set of design priorities, that's all. Don't mistake this for increased verisimilitude or world-appropriateness.

[LordBlades]

...And there are steep costs to this approach, on the design side, the player side, and (especially!) on the DMing side. You end up with a different set of design priorities, that's all. Don't mistake this for increased verisimilitude or world-appropriateness.

The world does feel more believable (to me at least) when everything is working by the same rules and there are less mechanics that make little/zero sense fluff-wise.

[obryn]

The world does feel more believable (to me at least) when everything is working by the same rules and there are less mechanics that make little/zero sense fluff-wise.
Sure they do, once you reach the revelation that the rules of the game are imperfectly describing a self-consistent narrative world, and aren't the actual physics of said world.

Quick example. "A guy parrying" is a narrative event that can be described in multiple ways in the rules. A short list? (1) A mechanic where he takes a penalty to attack bonus to increase his AC. (2) A decision to use a limited-use ability to increase AC before a die is rolled. (3) An after-the-fact decision to use a limited-use ability to increase AC after an attack that would have hit. (4) A decision to skip an attack roll to make an attack roll against the enemy's attack roll, comparing the two and negating an attack. (5) A narrative description of the result of a low attack roll against him, insufficient to hit his AC. All of these describe the same in-game event, but their mechanical implementation is substantially different.

[JoeJ]

The world does feel more believable (to me at least) when everything is working by the same rules and there are less mechanics that make little/zero sense fluff-wise.

I've never heard of that actually working in any class/level based game. For something like that you need a completely point based system, like GURPS, and even there the GM will quite correctly rule certain options off limits. Even in real life, path dependence is a thing: for example, you lose forever the ability to grow useable wings when you're born as a human instead of a bird.

[Vogonjeltz]

So for you a world where NPCs frequently have abilities PCs can never access (on the sole reason they are PCs), even though said PC might have experienced the exact same things in life is more believable?

What ability do regular, as opposed to super special, NPCs have access to that PCs do not? (that isn't a lair or legendary ability, I'm pretty certain those don't count) Like, what is our case example where someone finds it excruciating that a PC can't acquire said ability?

[dropbear8mybaby]

Even in real life, path dependence is a thing: for example, you lose forever the ability to grow useable wings when you're born as a human instead of a bird.
But I wanna fly! I wanna, I wanna, I wanna!

I believe I can fly! I believe I can touch the sky...


What ability do regular, as opposed to super special, NPCs have access to that PCs do not? (that isn't a lair or legendary ability, I'm pretty certain those don't count) Like, what is our case example where someone finds it excruciating that a PC can't acquire said ability?
I somewhat intimated at this earlier by saying that LordBlades examples are grossly exaggerated or didn't exist. So I'd like to hear that answer too.

[Pex]

Originally I was in favor of PCs and NPCs being made with the same rules. However, it was after I came home from running a Pathfinder game that I discovered I inadvertently erred in creating some of the foes the party fought. They couldn't have everything I gave them by the rules. The party defeated them, no harm done, but I was irked at myself. It was then I was able to see the other point of view. NPCs and monsters are generally only going to be on camera for that one encounter/combat. Exacting detail isn't necessary. They're going to be killed off by the party anyway. Make the foe plausible, and for foes you intend the party to fight don't go for the kill those stupid PCs tyrant DM syndrome and it will be alright. If you're off by a +1 somewhere it's no big deal. If you find you Honest True made an encounter too tough by mistake, you can fix it. The monster fails a saving throw, ignore the 18. The monster misses on his attack, ignore the 20. An encounter interrupts the fight that's a sincere threat to the bad guys, random monster arrives, mother nature interrupts with a storm or earthquake, etc. Make it seem like that was the intent all along.

[strangebloke]

As opposed to there being a few hundred distinct abilities that are all that is available to anyone anywhere, the answer is absolutely yes.

Sheep look different to other sheep, and to shepherds, but not to most people. I'm an engineer and you're absolutely right. We specialize like crazy. I barely understand my cubemates line of work and we graduated from the same college and work on all the same projects. But if I had to describe my skill set to a person, even someone not entirely ignorant, I'd say, "Numerical methods, Programming in these five languages, and Physics, with a focus in circuits and radio propagation."

Since DnD is a general fantasy system, and not one with a huge amount of granularity, I'd expect a wizard to describe himself to a sorceror as "A Wizard, specializing in abjuration and general utility magic."

If we have identical twins, who spend all their time together and learn all the same things, we'd expect them to be similar in skill set. But if one is a PC and one is an NPC... they will have totally different stats and abilities. Ultimately this means that, in relation to the world, I'm a PC first and a fighter/monk/sorcerer/elf second. I don't like that. It might not bother you, and I'm happy to hear your thoughts.


(discounting stuff that wouldn't be available to a PC suitable creature at all) The only reason that there are quite a few abilities that PCs cannot ever access no matter what is that the classes are too rigid to allow for realistic levels of flexibility. The answer does not involve pretending that the rest of the world is just as inflexible.

The classes are too rigid. Yes, that's what we're arguing. And actually, the ability to make things like lair actions and legendary actions is my favorite part of the way things are run now. Legendary actions would get abused to high heaven in 3e, but here they just make boss fights fun. Love it.


What ability do regular, as opposed to super special, NPCs have access to that PCs do not? (that isn't a lair or legendary ability, I'm pretty certain those don't count) Like, what is our case example where someone finds it excruciating that a PC can't acquire said ability?

Divine Eminence, from the lowly CR 2 priest. It's basically a high-floor, low ceiling versions of smite, but its still a pretty unique ability.

Permanent Magic resistance from the Archmage and several other classes. The archmage also has WAY more HP than a normal wizard, with only a +1 to CON. He'd need to roll max to get those kinds of numbers.

It isn't huge, but it is there. Also the options for PCs are crazy limited.

[JNAProductions]

Also the options for PCs are crazy limited.

We have quite a lovely homebrew section if you feel that way. There is a LOT of 5E homebrew to expand your options with.

[Hawkstar]

If we have identical twins, who spend all their time together and learn all the same things, we'd expect them to be similar in skill set.You might expect that, but you'd be wrong.

Do you have absolutely no experience with real people whatsoever?

And even then... for this to have any relevance to PC/NPC transparency at all, it would require absolutely everyone in the world to be identical twins to a single character. If you really do have someone who's supposed to be the same as a PC, you ignore the lack of NPC/PC transparency, and just make them as a PC character.

[Ballbo Big'Uns]

So, one of the things I really like about third edition was the PC/NPC transparency. Everybody has a class, everybody has a level. Event the mosters can be translated into PCs.

In 5e, we don't have that. Your BBEG sorcerer doesn't actually need to be a sorcerer, or even a spellcaster of any class. Just given him appropriate abilities and call it a day.

On the one hand, this is less work for the DM, and it avoids the dreaded moment where the player says that your BBEG can't do what you described him as doing, but...

I like feeling that the whole world works on one set of rules. It offends my sensibilities that the sorcerer I grew up with as a kid and is now the BBEG somehow has a completely different set of abilities than me, the sorcerer who got his powers the exact same way.

Ease of prep, flexibility and streamlined tableplay is more important than your verisimilitude. Take your Fluvoxamine and stop being such a bureaucrat. D&D is for creatives, not pencil pushers.

[georgie_leech]

Ease of prep, flexibility and streamlined tableplay is more important than your verisimilitude. Take your Fluvoxamine and stop being such a bureaucrat. D&D is for creatives, not pencil pushers.

Wow, hostile.:smallconfused: What happened to whatever's right for your own table?

[JoeJ]

Divine Eminence, from the lowly CR 2 priest. It's basically a high-floor, low ceiling versions of smite, but its still a pretty unique ability.

PCs can get that. It's just the paladin's smite ability with slightly different numbers.


Permanent Magic resistance from the Archmage and several other classes. The archmage also has WAY more HP than a normal wizard, with only a +1 to CON. He'd need to roll max to get those kinds of numbers.

An abjuration wizard gets magic resistance at 14th level. The archmage's 99 hit points are absolutely average: 4.5 per d8 with a +1 CON bonus. Yes, that's more than the average for a wizard with the same CON, but an archmage doesn't get Arcane Recovery, an Arcane Tradition, or any ASI/Feats. Does that really sound like a good trade to you?


It isn't huge, but it is there. Also the options for PCs are crazy limited.

??? For a class/level based game they don't seem very limited to me. If you want unlimited mix-and-match abilities you need to use a classless system such as GURPS or M&M.

[Ballbo Big'Uns]

Wow, hostile.:smallconfused: What happened to whatever's right for your own table?

His table is obviously a soulless boardroom meeting with people dispassionately reciting numbers back and forth.

[LordBlades]

What ability do regular, as opposed to super special, NPCs have access to that PCs do not? (that isn't a lair or legendary ability, I'm pretty certain those don't count) Like, what is our case example where someone finds it excruciating that a PC can't acquire said ability?


Necromancy, which I brought up before: skeletons/zombies of other stuff than small/medium humanoids exist in the game (MM provides sample statblocks for several such creatures, like warhorse and minotaur skeleton) and, per MM entry 'can be created'. Yet, without DM fiat, PCs can only animate medium and small humanoids. Consequently, if something can be done but PCs can't do it, the logical conclusion is that only NPCs can.

It's also an ability that I did find 'excruciating' a PC could not acquire, because it would make playing a high level necromancer a much less tedious affair. As it is currently, I don't think high level necromancers(assiming you want to focus on Animate Dead) are very playable. At level 10 you would have about 25 animated undead, and at level 20 over 80 and odds are the rest of the gaming group wouldn't be too thrilled about the length of your turns.

[georgie_leech]

His table is obviously a soulless boardroom meeting with people dispassionately reciting numbers back and forth.

Seriously, there's no point in complaining about how someone else plays the game.:smallannoyed: So OP prefers PC/NPC transparency, what's it to you?

[Ballbo Big'Uns]

Seriously, there's no point in complaining about how someone else plays the game.:smallannoyed: So OP prefers PC/NPC transparency, what's it to you?

He's advocating for a design paradigm that I would rather see die in a fire.

[georgie_leech]

He's advocating for a design paradigm that I would rather see die in a fire.

That justifies name calling? :smallconfused:

[Ballbo Big'Uns]

That justifies name calling? :smallconfused:

How is he supposed to grok how wrong he is without sufficient vitriol?

[georgie_leech]

How is he supposed to grok how wrong he is without sufficient vitriol?

:smallannoyed:
:smallmad:
:smallsigh: Good day. I hope you eventually realise that being hostile is one of the worst ways to convince someone to change.

[Ballbo Big'Uns]

:smallannoyed:
:smallmad:
:smallsigh: Good day. I hope you eventually realise that being hostile is one of the worst ways to convince someone to change.

One of the best? Claw hammer.

[strangebloke]

How is he supposed to grok how wrong he is without sufficient vitriol?

You realize that I'm playing devil's advocate to a certain extent here, right? Like, in the post you quoted, I noted that I like the ease of prep and the sped-up combat. I just think verisimilitude adds a certain level of consistency, and since I'm posting in the 5e forum, of course that half of my dialogue is on the defensive.

A lot of people still like 3.5 so you're being a complete a-hole to a significant portion of the community. There aren't enough tabletop gamers out there that we can really afford to alienate each other.

[dropbear8mybaby]

I just think verisimilitude adds a certain level of consistency, and since I'm posting in the 5e forum, of course that half of my dialogue is on the defensive.

The disconnect I have with this logic is that verisimilitude is greater with lack of transparency.

[strangebloke]

The disconnect I have with this logic is that verisimilitude is greater with lack of transparency.

How is it not? Everything in the world functions on one set of rules. PCs are exceptional because PC classes are better than other classes, but also because the heroes dare to do dangerous things and need to dig deep and rise to new heights.

(An aside:Was I the only one who used the NPC classes? making up a statblock for a 10th level NPC was dead simple. I could do it in like a minute as a DM.)

As opposed to 5e, where you're some weird abberation that functions according to different rules, alongside legendary creatures, which also function according to different rules.

Overall in 5e, I would say verisimilitude is way better, what with bounded accuracy, less dominant spellcasters, and no ye old magic item shop where people routinely dump a kingdom's worth of gold. I just think it makes sense that I, the exceptional hero, could learn to do things that apparently other people can.

[gameogre]

I'm going to be honest here.

I wish I could get the way 3.5 Did Things in a 5E rules lite form.

There are tons and tons of things I liked better about 3.5 and Pathfinder. It's almost magical in fact. I loved EVERYTHING about 3.5 and Pathfinder more except actually playing and running it.

5E is MUCH more fun to actually play and run for me but I still pine fro all my Pathfinder options and books. Twice I even picked back up the game and thought about going back, both times I abandoned the attempts after spending a hour working on a encounter.

I am my own worst enemy as far as this goes. I seem to crave games that I enjoy less.

[LordBlades]

The disconnect I have with this logic is that verisimilitude is greater with lack of transparency.


Yes and no.

On the one hand,I must say that the line of reasoning that the skillset avaliable to PCs is only a subset of the skills available to the humanoid races at large makes a lot of sense.

On the other, players must agree to be content to stay in the box that consists of their PC abilities, otherwise the credibility starts to break down, as there is great difficulty to offer in-game justifications regarding why PCs could not acquire NPC-only abilities on a new character.

[MeeposFire]

When 3e came out I was originally really excited by the idea of monsters and PCs using the same concepts and being mostly interchangeable. It seemed like a great idea and I ran with it.


After finishing a level 1-20 campaign this was one of the biggest reasons I told my group I would not like to do 3e anymore as a DM. NPCs that are meant to be fought do not take 5 minutes to create especially if you want them to be worth anything at all. They take work, often more work than my typical PC character because I have to not just get a theme but I need to make him a viable threat to a party of PCs who were made decently. Also note that I had to do this a lot because most monster manual monsters were not even close to cutting it without an extreme tactics and crazy situations which once again strained plausibility at times and made for a lot more work.

Near the end of the game 4e was being previewed and I was about to start the part of the story where an undead army would sack Sharn and the players had to stop the army before they took on Atropis (yes I had just bought Elder Evils). At that point the 4e preview for minions came out and I saw how it would allow me to have hordes of enemies on the table but not have it be so overwhelming to use, I would not have to use silly tactics to make them useful (such as having 5 troopers use aid another to give one trooper a big enough bonus to even think about hitting with an attack), and they would be legitimately dangerous. The players loved it. They dreaded the hordes of undead soldiers coming for them but also loved the fact that while they were dangerous in packs they could be killed easily. I enjoyed the lack of book keeping and the ease of use that they gave me.

As 4e came out the easier use of monsters and their ability to more accurately fit their ratings meant I could concentrate on other aspects of DMing and not having to spend so many hours just creating enemies to fight. As a bonus while a bunch of people tried and failed at DMing 3e I had three people in my group try DMing 4e and actually found success and enjoyed it and it was very much because of the lesser burden on trying to build encounters (in 3e they would often could not handle the the sheer options while trying to follow any sort of rules and then would often be frustrated because it would often be way too weak or powerful from what they meant to make).

After all this time I have come to see that while the 3e way sounded like it would be great in terms of practicality I find the current way to be much easier. Indeed I can give enemies any ability I want and the players have no issues because they know they have not seen everything. If they like a skill that an enemy shows I can potentially come up later with something that will work for a PC but it may not use the same exact mechanic because that mechanic may not work for a PC.

Do note that essentially all editions of D&D operate on various flavors of teh current 5e model. D&D, AD&D, and 4e all had monster creation rules that were not using the basic PC rules. Yes specific NPCs may use the player rules if they were important enough (which is fine for the very few important NPCs) but by and large most enemies would use the monster creation rules and that kept things easier on the whole.


If you like the extra work more power to you of course but I am glad that monsters in general do not use such a direct variation of the PC rules in 5e.

[JFahy]

How is it not? Everything in the world functions on one set of rules. PCs are exceptional because PC classes are better than other classes, but also because the heroes dare to do dangerous things and need to dig deep and rise to new heights.


Everything in the world functions on one set of rules at the
physics/chemistry level, but not much further than that -
do you really think things would be even as consistent
as Earth in a multiverse full of gods and fairies and magic?

Getting offended because another character in the story has
a unique trait completely mystifies me. Those things make the
world richer. What makes the world poorer is stuffing all the
characters, PCs and NPCs, into one framework where you get
one thing from column A and two from column B and the players
can Google optimal builds. Gag.

"Full transparency" was the driving force behind midichlorians,
and the transition from "why does the sun come up, or are the
stars just pinholes in the curtain of night? Who knows?" to
"we're exiled aliens from the planet Zeist". :smalltongue:

[JFahy]

On the other, players must agree to be content to stay in the box that consists of their PC abilities, otherwise the credibility starts to break down, as there is great difficulty to offer in-game justifications regarding why PCs could not acquire NPC-only abilities on a new character.

Well, it's not so bad on a new character. "You're relatively inexperienced, and that
particular opportunity hasn't come your way...yet!"

If a PC witnessed some kind of "NPC-only" ability and wanted it and put in an appropriate
amount of effort, letting them earn it (spell/customized feat/tweaked class feature) sounds
like a fun and reasonable outcome to me. But the more we codify that kind of thing, the
more we're accommodating an entitled kind of playstyle that I think we're better off without.

[Daishain]

Necromancy, which I brought up before: skeletons/zombies of other stuff than small/medium humanoids exist in the game (MM provides sample statblocks for several such creatures, like warhorse and minotaur skeleton) and, per MM entry 'can be created'. Yet, without DM fiat, PCs can only animate medium and small humanoids. Consequently, if something can be done but PCs can't do it, the logical conclusion is that only NPCs can.

It's also an ability that I did find 'excruciating' a PC could not acquire, because it would make playing a high level necromancer a much less tedious affair. As it is currently, I don't think high level necromancers(assiming you want to focus on Animate Dead) are very playable. At level 10 you would have about 25 animated undead, and at level 20 over 80 and odds are the rest of the gaming group wouldn't be too thrilled about the length of your turns.Vague=/=Verboten You're forgetting the edition we're working with here. PCs are perfectly capable of raising undead other than the standard trash mobs. Yes, it technically takes DM fiat to determine the method, but otherwise nothing prevents you from doing so, and 5E is a wonderful place where DM fiat is not to be feared, but encouraged.

Now, as both a DM and a player, I actually prefer that the means of PCs becoming a necromancer beyond raising a few skellys are left vague. As a player, it leaves flexibility in what can and can't be done ('hey, what would it take to spend some crafting and ritual time turning this mammoth corpse into an APC for the party?'). As a DM, it grants control over the impact of a necromancer on the campaign, because one player stealing the show all the time with his massive army composed of Dracoliches and Death Tyrants is no fun for anyone.


Yes and no.

On the one hand,I must say that the line of reasoning that the skillset avaliable to PCs is only a subset of the skills available to the humanoid races at large makes a lot of sense.

On the other, players must agree to be content to stay in the box that consists of their PC abilities, otherwise the credibility starts to break down, as there is great difficulty to offer in-game justifications regarding why PCs could not acquire NPC-only abilities on a new character.Not really.

'your training/experiences/skills/species don't provide the foundation required to do that' is a simple and believable excuse for the vast majority of such cases. If the DM determines that this is something that wouldn't be gamebreaking to allow, he/she could follow it up with 'if you really want it, this is what you need to do to learn it', and possibly 'and this is what you would have to give up'

[Daishain]

Divine Eminence, from the lowly CR 2 priest. It's basically a high-floor, low ceiling versions of smite, but its still a pretty unique ability.

Permanent Magic resistance from the Archmage and several other classes. The archmage also has WAY more HP than a normal wizard, with only a +1 to CON. He'd need to roll max to get those kinds of numbers.

It isn't huge, but it is there. Also the options for PCs are crazy limited.
-A smite with slightly different stats doesn't really strike me as being unique
-Several ways for PCs to get magic resist, including abjurer wizard
-Archmage has less HP than a normal wizard with +1 con if the latter takes the suggested average of 5 HP per level, and about the same if the wizard rolls and gets the true average of 4.5 per level. The abjurer wizard from the last example is doing even better thanks to his ward. (did you think the archmage's CR was his level? it doesn't work that way)

[LordBlades]

'your training/experiences/skills/species don't provide the foundation required to do that' is a simple and believable excuse for the vast majority of such cases.

What if the player is not happy with the answer and counters with 'then I want this next character to be somebody with the necessary training/experiences/skills/species'. Assuming he saw the ability in a NPC of a playable race and appropriate level range.

[HammeredWharf]

Everyone keeps talking about engineers with different backgrounds, but as I see it, humanoid races and encounters are only a small part of the problem. The biggest problem in 3.5 is that EVERYTHING uses the same rules. That cat guy from another dimension? He's a sorcerer. That colossal tentacle monster from outer space? It has 3 dex, so the DM should watch out for that Shivering Touch.

When something like an Uvuudaum - a creature that's supposed to defy all reason - has to abide by the same rules as Bob the peasant and Molly the pheasant, it doesn't have a positive effect of verisimilitude. Quite the contrary. It makes no sense. Moreover, 3.5e's rules for creating and advancing monsters feel like they were written because of a design paradigm that was hopeless to begin with and the designers gave up midway through. They threw some numbers at the DM, then when those numbers made no sense, they told the DM to figure things out by himself. If you have to figure things out by yourself, what are the rules for?

[Nifft]

Everyone keeps talking about engineers with different backgrounds, but as I see it, humanoid races and encounters are only a small part of the problem. The biggest problem in 3.5 is that EVERYTHING uses the same rules. That cat guy from another dimension? He's a sorcerer. That colossal tentacle monster from outer space? It has 3 dex, so the DM should watch out for that Shivering Touch. This is a good point.

But, it's also valid to insist that PC tools can interact with alien space cats, because at some point you may want the PCs to fight the alien entity. Unless you're going to go through every spell or category of effect and give it different behavior -- like what 3.x Golems do, where only a few spells are white-listed, and their modified behavior is explicitly written out -- unless you're going to go through that much effort, I'm not sure how else you can model alien space cats than say "your spells behave like usual".


Bob the peasant and Molly the pheasant That's my OTP.


If you have to figure things out by yourself, what are the rules for? They're for sale.

[HammeredWharf]

But, it's also valid to insist that PC tools can interact with alien space cats, because at some point you may want the PCs to fight the alien entity. Unless you're going to go through every spell or category of effect and give it different behavior -- like what 3.x Golems do, where only a few spells are white-listed, and their modified behavior is explicitly written out -- unless you're going to go through that much effort, I'm not sure how else you can model alien space cats than say "your spells behave like usual".

Well, this topic is about enemy-making rules, so naturally I meant enemy-making rules in my post. How they interact with PC abilities is a different matter and there should be clear rules for that, but that's not related to PC/NPC transparency.

[Daishain]

What if the player is not happy with the answer and counters with 'then I want this next character to be somebody with the necessary training/experiences/skills/species'. Assuming he saw the ability in a NPC of a playable race and appropriate level range.
If the request is reasonable, that's what homebrew is for. If the request is not reasonable, then the DM needs to have a chat with the player about trying to break the game.

Even if the designers for 5E were foolish enough to try and make content for every such request like they did with 3.5E, they haven't had the book space or the time.

[LordBlades]

If the request is reasonable, that's what homebrew is for. If the request is not reasonable, then the DM needs to have a chat with the player about trying to break the game.

Even if the designers for 5E were foolish enough to try and make content for every such request like they did with 3.5E, they haven't had the book space or the time.

The point I was trying to make was that ultimately these abilities will be avaliable or not based almost exclusively on out of game reasons.

[Daishain]

The point I was trying to make was that ultimately these abilities will be avaliable or not based almost exclusively on out of game reasons.
Given that the same holds true for every bit of content you could possibly name, I'm having a hard time seeing that as a problem inherent to 5E and not to simulation games in general.

[obryn]

The point I was trying to make was that ultimately these abilities will be avaliable or not based almost exclusively on out of game reasons.
D&D is a game. Games have rules. This is okay.

[LordBlades]

D&D is a game. Games have rules. This is okay.

Except some games try to make their rules make some sense from an in-world perspective. 5e does not, and not only with the PC vs. NPC aspect. This is not okay.

[Daishain]

Except some games try to make their rules make some sense from an in-world perspective. 5e does not, and not only with the PC vs. NPC aspect. This is not okay.
They did a decent job of it given the crazy lore they have to work within. Frankly, the only major exceptions I can think of were due to preserving game balance, which is worth such consideration. If you can work out something more in line with the lore that solves the balance problem, great! Get it up in the homebrew forum so the rest of us can use it. If not, don't criticize.

[dropbear8mybaby]

Except some games try to make their rules make some sense from an in-world perspective. 5e does not, and not only with the PC vs. NPC aspect.
Yes it does. You just don't like how it makes sense.


This is not okay.
Sure it is. To all the people playing it and enjoying it and thinking it's just fine as is.

[weaseldust]

The following are two very different complaints:


There are abilities that are possible in the game world that PCs don't have a way to learn (yet)
PCs and NPCs aren't built on the same chassis


(1) was true even in 3.5 at the start. It's really (2) that marks the difference between the 3.X editions and the later ones. Not being able to zombify a dragon falls under (1), and as such is more a result of the youth of the edition. It might become possible if/when more rules for epic play are published.

I'll also note that two creatures having different mechanical representations of their abilities doesn't mean that they have different abilities in the game world. It's entirely possible in 5th that a player abandons the game and their PC is adopted as an NPC by the DM in such a way that their mechanics change, even though they neither gain nor lose abilities. For instance, they might deal averaged damage all the time - that doesn't mean that in the game world they have become more consistent, just that their ability to deal damage is being represented differently for convenience. After all, in the game world people don't even have HP, attacks, saves, and so on.

[georgie_leech]

Except some games try to make their rules make some sense from an in-world perspective. 5e does not, and not only with the PC vs. NPC aspect. This is not okay.

Hp. 'I have fallen into lava, but since the bard said a lovely speech this morning, I'm still alive! But you should see my Fighter buddy. This one time during a long battle he was grabbed by a dragon and shaken 'till half dead, then bit nearly in half. He mumbled something about not giving up, and it's like it never happened. In fact, the dragon tried it again in about twenty seconds, and it still didn't take.'

[obryn]

Except some games try to make their rules make some sense from an in-world perspective. 5e does not, and not only with the PC vs. NPC aspect. This is not okay.
Sure it is. That's how most RPGs work. Most RPGs have way more abstractions than 5e does.

It's not the rules' job to model the physics and nature of the game-world. It's the rules' job to help everyone at the table play a fun game in the imagined game-world.

These are very, very different goals, which are often at odds with one another.

[LordBlades]

It's not the rules' job to model the physics and nature of the game-world. It's the rules' job to help everyone at the table play a fun game in the imagined game-world.



But if the imagined game-world's believability falls apart whenever you try to think about what the rules would mean in-world, then the game might not be all that fun to play for everyone.

In the end a fun game is all that matter, and fun is 100% subjective. What impacts my fun might not matter at all for you and viceversa.

[georgie_leech]

But if the imagined game-world's believability falls apart whenever you try to think about what the rules would mean in-world, then the game might not be all that fun to play for everyone.

'I shot fire at goblins for a while, and now have a deeper understanding of the mechanics of the arcane forces underwriting all of reality on a fundamental level.' D&D has always had loads of rules that don't make sense in universe. I can think of a popular webcomic that frequently lampoons such rules.

[LordBlades]

'I shot fire at goblins for a while, and now have a deeper understanding of the mechanics of the arcane forces underwriting all of reality on a fundamental level.' D&D has always had loads of rules that don't make sense in universe. I can think of a popular webcomic that frequently lampoons such rules.

This doesn't change the issue that, IMO, 5E has even MORE rules that don't make sense than 3.5, and has brought these rules to fields that bother me.

[Daishain]

This doesn't change the issue that, IMO, 5E has even MORE rules that don't make sense than 3.5, and has brought these rules to fields that bother me.
Such as?

If you're referring to the simplified way they handle most NPCs, that is a matter of convenience, it greatly cuts down on the time necessary to create an NPC in the first place. There's no point, either in game or out of it, to bringing in the same rules as for PC creation. Presumably, the NPC grew and gained skills much like the PCs do, we just don't need to bother listing out the details because they never matter to anyone involved.

[LordBlades]

Such as?

If you're referring to the simplified way they handle most NPCs, that is a matter of convenience, it greatly cuts down on the time necessary to create an NPC in the first place. There's no point, either in game or out of it, to bringing in the same rules as for PC creation. Presumably, the NPC grew and gained skills much like the PCs do, we just don't need to bother listing out the details because they never matter to anyone involved.

This PC vs. NPC is more of an academic thing. I wish they would have kept it the way it was in 3.5, but as a player it doesn't actually bothers me all that much. My DM kinda hates it though as far as he told us.

What I hate is stuff like:

-Why can't my familiar attack? It is profficient with it's claws just chooses not to because it's a pacifist spirit?

-Why does a ranger's amimal companion does nothing unless commanded? If I poke a dog it bites me. If I poke a ranger's dog it does nothing.

-Legendary actions: Up to a point, creatures grow swifter (take more actions per round) proportionally with the number of attackers
attackers.

[obryn]

But if the imagined game-world's believability falls apart whenever you try to think about what the rules would mean in-world, then the game might not be all that fun to play for everyone.
But it doesn't fall apart. Not even close. It only falls apart if you've been conditioned to see every element of the rules in an inappropriate process-simulation sense.

As I said a page or so back, an event in the world doesn't need to be modeled by one rules token. The rules are an abstraction that generates results, and these results inform the events that occur in the narrative. If Gutboy Barrelhouse attacks Bobby the Barbarian and misses, it can be because Bobby parried, because Uni distracted Gutboy, or because it glanced off Bobby's formidable hide armor. Regardless, it's a miss.

You're looking for a specific rules token, but ignoring the narrative surrounding it.

[INDYSTAR188]

This PC vs. NPC is more of an academic thing. I wish they would have kept it the way it was in 3.5, but a player it doesn't actually bothers me all that much. My DM kinda hates it though as far as he told us.

What I hate is stuff like:

-Why can't my familiar attack? It is profficient with it's claws just chooses not to because it's a pacifist spirit?

-Why does a ranger's amimal companion does nothing unless commanded? If I poke a dog it bites me. If I poke a ranger's dog it does nothing.

-Legendary actions: Up to a point, creatures grow swifter (take more actions per round) proportionally with the number of attackers
attackers.

I think all of your examples are places where the rules have to accommodate the 'game mechanics and balance' over the 'simulation' aspect of the game. When you summon a creature generally the DM has it's stats and plays the creature as per the specific situation. Allowing familiar or companion to take those actions has implications on game balance and action economy. I mean, to me, running a smooth, consistent game is most important. It's not the real world nor do they claim that, you just have to accept some compromise for the good of the game.

[obryn]

What I hate is stuff like:

-Why can't my familiar attack? It is profficient with it's claws just chooses not to because it's a pacifist spirit?

-Why does a ranger's amimal companion does nothing unless commanded? If I poke a dog it bites me. If I poke a ranger's dog it does nothing.

-Legendary actions: Up to a point, creatures grow swifter (take more actions per round) proportionally with the number of attackers
attackers.
Well, apart from wondering why a squirrel isn't attacking a frost giant ... These are all rules conveniences that help with gameplay and balance. In specific, it's an acknowledgment that the action economy is a real thing, and that it's vitally important. 3.x often ignored it, and that's where most of the biggest exploits happened to be found. (Summons, hegemonizing ursine swarms, etc.) In 5e with bounded accuracy, the action economy is even more important.

e: Also, if you want to talk 'crazy, immersion-breaking rules that are there for smooth gameplay' I think Initiative itself should be near (if not at) the top of this list. Legendary actions are maybe more ... er ... verisimilitudinous ... than a dragon standing around while everyone else runs around him and smacks him.

[Daishain]

-Why can't my familiar attack? It is profficient with it's claws just chooses not to because it's a pacifist spirit?

-Why does a ranger's amimal companion does nothing unless commanded? If I poke a dog it bites me. If I poke a ranger's dog it does nothing.

-Legendary actions: Up to a point, creatures grow swifter (take more actions per round) proportionally with the number of attackers
attackers.
Familiars and animal companions were among the more abusable features out there in previous editions, so one can understand an attempt to curtail such. And the legendary actions help offset dealing with major threats via sheer numbers.

That stated, I really really dislike the first two. A one damage attack is not abusable, and it would not break the game to allow the companion to act without input. (Perhaps it should simply be simply less effective without direction)

[MaxWilson]

This PC vs. NPC is more of an academic thing. I wish they would have kept it the way it was in 3.5, but as a player it doesn't actually bothers me all that much. My DM kinda hates it though as far as he told us.

What I hate is stuff like:

-Why can't my familiar attack? It is profficient with it's claws just chooses not to because it's a pacifist spirit?

-Why does a ranger's amimal companion does nothing unless commanded? If I poke a dog it bites me. If I poke a ranger's dog it does nothing.

-Legendary actions: Up to a point, creatures grow swifter (take more actions per round) proportionally with the number of attackers
attackers.

FWIW, other simulationists (like myself) have houserules for one or more of these issues. I haven't done anything about familiars but I let a beastmaster's animal act independently, it just doesn't get his proficiency bonus to everything while independent. And I use a Speed Factor Initiative variant where legendary actions, instead of being keyed to certain creature's turns, simply happen 5/10/15 initiative counts later than the main action.

[LordBlades]

Don't get me wrong, I understand why most of that stuff was done asfar as game balance is concerned, except ranger ( I think they went overboard with this one, Beastmaster is one of the bottom 2 classes power wise). I just wish they would have spent some thinking about how to solve these problems in ways that make some sense from an in-game perspective.

[Ballbo Big'Uns]

You realize that I'm playing devil's advocate to a certain extent here, right? Like, in the post you quoted, I noted that I like the ease of prep and the sped-up combat. I just think verisimilitude adds a certain level of consistency, and since I'm posting in the 5e forum, of course that half of my dialogue is on the defensive.

A lot of people still like 3.5 so you're being a complete a-hole to a significant portion of the community. There aren't enough tabletop gamers out there that we can really afford to alienate each other.

*bleepblorp bleepblorp* I am a robot...i have a robot brain...unauthorized imagination is a violation of sourcecode...err-or err-or...what is love? Mal-func-tion...initiating shut down...*blooooooop*

[obryn]

Don't get me wrong, I understand why most of that stuff was done asfar as game balance is concerned, except ranger ( I think they went overboard with this one, Beastmaster is one of the bottom 2 classes power wise). I just wish they would have spent some thinking about how to solve these problems in ways that make some sense from an in-game perspective.
They do make sense from an in-game perspective if you're not focused on a 1:1 correspondence of rules events and world events.

If anything, Legendary Actions make more narrative sense than the staccato you-go/i-go/you-go sort of initiative that we have in D&D.

Beastmasters do need help, though. I don't think the action economy should be broken to give them a leg up, though.

[YossarianLives]

*bleepblorp bleepblorp* I am a robot...i have a robot brain...unauthorized imagination is a violation of sourcecode...err-or err-or...what is love? Mal-func-tion...initiating shut down...*blooooooop*
You know 5e isn't really that different from 3.5 And you calling everyone who like's 3.5 a mindless drone is really quite rude. It's a perfect case of Bad-Wrong-Fun.

[LordBlades]

They do make sense from an in-game perspective if you're not focused on a 1:1 correspondence of rules events and world events.

If anything, Legendary Actions make more narrative sense than the staccato you-go/i-go/you-go sort of initiative that we have in D&D.

Beastmasters do need help, though. I don't think the action economy should be broken to give them a leg up, though.

I don't dislike the concept of legendary actions (apart from Legendary Resistance but that's a different story), I dislike tying them to the number of attacking enemies, as
opposed to just giving the monster X actions to do outside of turn.

Also, if going so far with not equating rules events with fluff events as to not equate a rules 'hit' with a fluff 'hit', then that's a level of abstraction I've never played with, nor would I be interested to.

If a rules 'hit' does equals a fluff 'hit', then a dragon fighting a paladin can do his normal routine as well as tail slap him once in 6 seconds. Now if the paladin brought along his wizard friend to support from long range, he gets slapped twice in the same timespan. If he also brought along an Archery ranger, he gets slapped 3 times. That really makes no sense, to me at least.

The action economy is already broken for some classes:
Fighter gets Action Surge reasonably often, casters have familiars (which can make great use of the Help action) summons and Animate Dead or Objects, Paladin gets a semi-intelligent Warhorse but Beastmaster is where they draw the line regarding action economy...

[Telok]

My only problem with different systems for PCs and NPCs is those times when the NPCs become allies of the PCs and end up fighting or training with them. In 3e it wasn't an issue because they shared the same mechanics. If someone changed sides in the middle of a fight or got hold of the enemy's spellbook I didn't have to change anything. In 4e PCs and NPCs were so far apart in their mechanics that you couldn't let that happen. Because PC vs PC and NPC vs NPC combat didn't work if someone was offered a deal he couldn't refuse and changed sides you had to stop play and rebuild that character by the other mechanic.

I want the system to be able to encompass mind control, conflicted loyalties, mistaken identities, doppleganger replacements, betrayals and allegiences. If an equal CR/level NPC archer has some trick shot and the PC archer wants to learn that I don't want to have to tell the player they can't do that because NPC abilities are broken or unbalanced for PCs. I want enough transparency so that PC/NPC interactions have more choices than talking to them or killing them.

[Doug Lampert]

Do note that essentially all editions of D&D operate on various flavors of teh current 5e model. D&D, AD&D, and 4e all had monster creation rules that were not using the basic PC rules. Yes specific NPCs may use the player rules if they were important enough (which is fine for the very few important NPCs) but by and large most enemies would use the monster creation rules and that kept things easier on the whole.
And this PCs and NPCs use different rules is also true in 3.5.

For example NPCs used totally and completely different rules for when they were eligible for epic feats, the game didn't even try to maintain the illusion of PC/NPC transparency there, there was simply an entirely separate rules section for "monsters" and NPCs than for PCs. (PCs use ECL, which doesn't even exist for anyone else.) A PC with LA qualified for epic feats at a number of HD where no NPC could do so.

This was a real, in game, noticeable difference. I'm not at all convinced that 5th has anything as bad, because in 5th edition I CAN build an NPC as a PC and then give him a CR without violating any rules, thus completely reproducing any PC build with an NPC.

So yeah for PC/NPC transparency! Since 5th edition has rules to determine the CR of a PC build and allows any PC build as an NPC it seems that 5th edition has the best transparency in D&D history! Yeah, and, you can just build a monster if you want to.

[Doug Lampert]

My only problem with different systems for PCs and NPCs is those times when the NPCs become allies of the PCs and end up fighting or training with them. In 3e it wasn't an issue because they shared the same mechanics. If someone changed sides in the middle of a fight or got hold of the enemy's spellbook I didn't have to change anything. In 4e PCs and NPCs were so far apart in their mechanics that you couldn't let that happen. Because PC vs PC and NPC vs NPC combat didn't work if someone was offered a deal he couldn't refuse and changed sides you had to stop play and rebuild that character by the other mechanic.

I want the system to be able to encompass mind control, conflicted loyalties, mistaken identities, doppleganger replacements, betrayals and allegiences. If an equal CR/level NPC archer has some trick shot and the PC archer wants to learn that I don't want to have to tell the player they can't do that because NPC abilities are broken or unbalanced for PCs. I want enough transparency so that PC/NPC interactions have more choices than talking to them or killing them.

Untrue, my PCs almost always had NPC allies with them, and it worked fine. For elite NPCs I had to drop the size of a surge and increase the number. That's it though.

[INDYSTAR188]

In 4e PCs and NPCs were so far apart in their mechanics that you couldn't let that happen. Because PC vs PC and NPC vs NPC combat didn't work if someone was offered a deal he couldn't refuse and changed sides you had to stop play and rebuild that character by the other mechanic.

I disagree with this wholeheartedly. I currently DM a 4E game and I constantly build ally npcs with monster stat-blocks. Or I refluff another monster or I take a monster of the same 'role' and give it a class encounter and daily power.

For example, my players ran into a dwarf prime underdark guide but in actuality I used the stats for an artillery monster of the same level I wanted the guide to be and gave her twin strike, manticore volley and weave through the fray from the Ranger class. None of my players knew or noticed and only took me 10 minutes.

[JoeJ]

If a rules 'hit' does equals a fluff 'hit', then a dragon fighting a paladin can do his normal routine as well as tail slap him once in 6 seconds. Now if the paladin brought along his wizard friend to support from long range, he gets slapped twice in the same timespan. If he also brought along an Archery ranger, he gets slapped 3 times. That really makes no sense, to me at least.

From a simulationist POV that's completely reasonable if what you're simulating is not reality but heroic action fantasy. The BBEG in that genre is frequently quite a bit tougher when fighting a group of heroes than when dueling with just one. Look at, for example, how Darkseid can sometimes lose a one-on-one slugfest against Superman, and in another story fight the the entire JLA to a standstill.

In-world the difference you note doesn't even exist unless you fight the same dragon more than once with differently sized parties. If you do, then it's not the size of the party that made the dragon fight better, it was just better rested, more confident, feeling healthier, luckier, etc.

If you're concerned about the number of legendary actions, then your paladin should (with the agreement of the other players) say something like, "The rest of you get the hostages to safety. I'll hold back the dragon." Then take it on singly - possibly after a dramatic "world of cardboard" speech. Once the others are gone, then mechanically the dragon gets fewer legendary attacks. Within the narrative, however, those extra attacks are still being made but the paladin is able to avoid them because they're not distracted by worrying about anybody else.

[Xetheral]

D&D is many things. One of those things is a model: a method for abstracting a complex system. Different users of the model inevitably have different priorities, which leads to debates like this one.

When choosing how to model PCs and NPCs, the designers have to decide whether they want to treat them as the same class of object, or as different classes. And here we’ve already reached a major point of contention. Some people are going to say of course they’re ultimately different things: they have different labels, they have different roles in the game, and they inevitably receive different levels of attention. Others are going to say of course they’re ultimately the same thing: they’re both fictitious characters in a game world, and which ones are which is entirely arbitrary based on the choices of the players and the DM.

Both groups are, of course, correct: they’re simply approaching the question with a different set of preferences and values.

For the first group, treating PCs and NPCs as the same class of object will damage enjoyment both by 1) restricting options for PC-raced NPCs only to the options available to NPCs and 2) overly complicating the process for creating NPCs. For the second group, treating PCs and NPCs as different classes of objects will damage enjoyment both by 1) leading to the players feeling that they aren’t playing characters from the world like any others and 2) creating the potential for encounter results to vary based on the arbitrary assignment of which characters are PCs. (Importantly, the latter situation need not come up at the table: the mere abstract potential is enough to detract from these players’ enjoyment.)

I feel that 5e has done an excellent job splitting the difference by permitting NPCs to be modeled both ways yet still producing compatible results. That being said, players with distinct preferences either way may be unhappy at a given 5e table.

[Vogonjeltz]

Necromancy, which I brought up before: skeletons/zombies of other stuff than small/medium humanoids exist in the game (MM provides sample statblocks for several such creatures, like warhorse and minotaur skeleton) and, per MM entry 'can be created'. Yet, without DM fiat, PCs can only animate medium and small humanoids. Consequently, if something can be done but PCs can't do it, the logical conclusion is that only NPCs can.

It's also an ability that I did find 'excruciating' a PC could not acquire, because it would make playing a high level necromancer a much less tedious affair. As it is currently, I don't think high level necromancers(assiming you want to focus on Animate Dead) are very playable. At level 10 you would have about 25 animated undead, and at level 20 over 80 and odds are the rest of the gaming group wouldn't be too thrilled about the length of your turns.

Actually, a PC can already animate humanoid zombies of any size, it just requires that they use Finger of Death.

As for beasts, I see no reason players couldn't develop such a spell, or make use of a non-standard casting of Wish. Regardless, you admit there's no NPC listed with the ability to create these things, so I'm still not seeing any double-standard here.


This doesn't change the issue that, IMO, 5E has even MORE rules that don't make sense than 3.5, and has brought these rules to fields that bother me.

I think first we should try to get at least one example of there being an NPC who has an ability that a PC could not have before going on trying to find a 5e rule that doesn't make sense. Necromancy is clearly a bust as an example of the former.


This PC vs. NPC is more of an academic thing. I wish they would have kept it the way it was in 3.5, but as a player it doesn't actually bothers me all that much. My DM kinda hates it though as far as he told us.

What I hate is stuff like:

-Why can't my familiar attack? It is profficient with it's claws just chooses not to because it's a pacifist spirit?

-Why does a ranger's amimal companion does nothing unless commanded? If I poke a dog it bites me. If I poke a ranger's dog it does nothing.

-Legendary actions: Up to a point, creatures grow swifter (take more actions per round) proportionally with the number of attackers
attackers.

My take:
1) Familiars are magical fey, the rules they operate under are a consequence of being a magical construction and not a real everyday creature.

2) It doesn't do nothing, it actively tries to avoid your attack. That being said, it's a well-trained animal and not some ravenous beastie, so it follows the orders its given and doesn't charge off on its own attacking things. That would be a pretty poorly trained animal that attacks people before its told to do so.

edit: checked the errata, the beast actively fights if you aren't around I or can't command it, and can use it's reaction to make opportunity attacks absent any command. So no problem there.

3) Ok? What's the problem? They are legendary after all, not ho-hum everday actions.

[Telok]

Untrue, my PCs almost always had NPC allies with them, and it worked fine. For elite NPCs I had to drop the size of a surge and increase the number. That's it though.

Untrue, we convinced a succubus and her charmed bandit archer to join us halfway through a fight. The succubus systematically destroyed enemies better than we could while the bandit archer got into a solo fight with another bandit archer that went nine rounds before they bloodied each other. Then they both had to be rebuilt as NPCs instead of monsters to accompany us, especially the bandit had to lose a recharge attack power because it was "too good" on PCs and the ranger who wanted to learn it couldn't because it wasn't an allowed PC power. The DM made a mistake later and introduced a custom monster's charm power that could get PCs to attack each other, we lost a PC every round and had to retcon the encounter.

I'm sure you could make NPCs to adventure with PCs, but people can't switch sides without problems arising.

[Ballbo Big'Uns]

You know 5e isn't really that different from 3.5 And you calling everyone who like's 3.5 a mindless drone is really quite rude. It's a perfect case of Bad-Wrong-Fun.

I don't see what the problem is. Soulless, bureaucratic drones are the target demographic of 3.5. Would you think I was rude if I said Justin Bieber fans are adolescent girls?

I would remind you that Bleepblorp the Accounts Payable Droid started this thread to complain that he MISSES the part in 3.5 that felt like filling out tax forms, and the argument here is whether people want a fun game, or one that involves more meticulous number crunching. I say that my comparison is apt.

[Doug Lampert]

Untrue, we convinced a succubus and her charmed bandit archer to join us halfway through a fight. The succubus systematically destroyed enemies better than we could while the bandit archer got into a solo fight with another bandit archer that went nine rounds before they bloodied each other. Then they both had to be rebuilt as NPCs instead of monsters to accompany us, especially the bandit had to lose a recharge attack power because it was "too good" on PCs and the ranger who wanted to learn it couldn't because it wasn't an allowed PC power. The DM made a mistake later and introduced a custom monster's charm power that could get PCs to attack each other, we lost a PC every round and had to retcon the encounter.

I'm sure you could make NPCs to adventure with PCs, but people can't switch sides without problems arising.

You're still wrong, less than a year into the campaign I made the exact same fix to NPC damage as the MMIII errata, and the NPCs can kill each other FASTER than they can kill PCs, because PCs have so many healing powers. Your claim that they can't hurt each other is simply wrong.

You then turn around, AFTER claiming that the bandit COULD NOT kill another NPC in a reasonable time; and claim that his recharge power was "TOO GOOD" to allow for a PC ally. Utter nonsense, if it's an attack power and too good and recharge then how come two of them couldn't hurt each other? At least try to be consistent in your claims.

And your DM's custom powers are his problem. A BtB succubus's powers are almost utterly useless to a PC party. Seriously, she can't dominate without attacking, which voids her protection from attacks; the dominate doesn't become permanent unless maintained at the end of the encounter.

In fact: Recharge powers are utter and complete crap compared to encounter (much less daily) powers. My players found at least three ways in the character builder to get the same encounter power multiple times per encounter, and they didn't need to wait for a lucky die roll to do it either! They'd far rather have their encounter powers than a rebuild as a monster with recharges.

Monster powers in the books aren't a problem to give to PC parties, as long as they're on a monster chassis, because monsters are DESIGNED TO LOSE! Even an elite monster at level is crap compared to a PC, even when fairly massively upgraded from MMI standards.

[dropbear8mybaby]

You know 5e isn't really that different from 3.5 And you calling everyone who like's 3.5 a mindless drone is really quite rude. It's a perfect case of Bad-Wrong-Fun.

It has been scientifically proven that people who like 3.5 are unsmarterer than people who like 5e. I would provide you with links to the empirical evidence however I'm convinced that you wouldn't understand the information (given that you like 3.5) so you'll just have to take my word for it.

[georgie_leech]

It has been scientifically proven that people who like 3.5 are unsmarterer than people who like 5e. I would provide you with links to the empirical evidence however I'm convinced that you wouldn't understand the information (given that you like 3.5) so you'll just have to take my word for it.

Might want to stick that in blue, Poe's Law can be a cruel master.

[dropbear8mybaby]

Might want to stick that in blue, Poe's Law can be a cruel master.

Blue? I'm not sure what that means. Is that this forum's method of delineating sarcasm?

[JNAProductions]

It's the unofficial method.

[georgie_leech]

Blue? I'm not sure what that means. Is that this forum's method of delineating sarcasm?

What the other guy said. It's not a hard and fast rule, per se, and it's not a horrible crime to not, but it's fairly widely accepted on most of the forums and is a decent way to indicate sarcasm.

[Gnomes2169]

What the other guy said. It's not a hard and fast rule, per se, and it's not a horrible crime to not, but it's fairly widely accepted on most of the forums and is a decent way to indicate sarcasm.

Still doesn't protect you from being punished for being a Richard, however. So the best policy when ig comes to real life people with real life preferences is to not and skip the blue. (Heck, it even calls out blue text in the forum rules as not providing protection)

[gameogre]

Nothing like the smell of nerd rage in the morning! Ahh! it's good to be alive!

[JAL_1138]

I rather like not needing to look up what a half-dozen Su and Ex abilities and another half-dozen feats do in order to run a monster. So I can't say I miss it overmuch. That said, I wish there were more PC racial options, particularly things currently listed as monsters, without needing to homebrew.

[dropbear8mybaby]

Still doesn't protect you from being punished for being a Richard, however.

So... you're calling me a... "Richard"?

[Knaight]

So... you're calling me a... "Richard"?

It's more that you come off as rude if the sarcasm is ignored, and there's a tendency to ignore sarcasm on the parts of the mods. I've been hit with that before, and it was with facetiousness even more transparently obvious than yours.

[mephnick]

Yeah, I get warned all the time about stuff that I figured would be taken in jest.

But maybe I'm actually just a jerk and don't know it.

[LordBlades]

Actually, a PC can already animate humanoid zombies of any size, it just requires that they use Finger of Death.

Fair point, I missed that.


As for beasts, I see no reason players couldn't develop such a spell, or make use of a non-standard casting of Wish. Regardless, you admit there's no NPC listed with the ability to create these things, so I'm still not seeing any double-standard here.

First of all, 'you can DM fiat/homebrew PC access to ability X' does not in any way refute 'players don't have access to ability X'.
Secondly: non-humanoid and/or larger than medium skeletons exist in the MM, so presumably they also exist into the world. Their MM entry specifically states they 'can be created'. PC's cannon create them (outside DM fiat/homebrew spells). Who else but NPCs can create them?




I think first we should try to get at least one example of there being an NPC who has an ability that a PC could not have before going on trying to find a 5e rule that doesn't make sense. Necromancy is clearly a bust as an example of the former.

So you think. but if you want more examples, here they are:
Looking at the MM and Elemental Evil Player companion entries for Aarakocra:
First of all, the monsters in the MM is named simply Aarakocra, which probably means they were meant to be representative for a significant segment of the species, so one could argue their abilities are racial, but I don't need to.

The NPC is 5 ft. slower while walking and can't speak Aarakocra (WTF?) but it gets Dive Attack and the ability to summon air elementals with 4 other buddies, two abilities completely outside the reach of the PCs




My take:
1) Familiars are magical fey, the rules they operate under are a consequence of being a magical construction and not a real everyday creature.
So familiars are:
-proficient with their natural weapons (it has the statistics of the form you've chosen)
-can physically interact with objects
-has the necessary claw-eye coordination to make attacks since it can deliver touch spells
-has no moral qualms about hurting stuff since it can deliver touch spells
but somehow can't combine all 4 to make a simple attack because reasons?



2) It doesn't do nothing, it actively tries to avoid your attack. That being said, it's a well-trained animal and not some ravenous beastie, so it follows the orders its given and doesn't charge off on its own attacking things. That would be a pretty poorly trained animal that attacks people before its told to do so.

edit: checked the errata, the beast actively fights if you aren't around I or can't command it, and can use it's reaction to make opportunity attacks absent any command. So no problem there.

It's an animal so well-trained that it needs its master to repeat the commands every 6 seconds. An animal whom, when ordered to 'attack that guy' will only do so for one round, after which it stops, unless ordered 'attack that guy' again.


3) Ok? What's the problem? They are legendary after all, not ho-hum everday actions.

So 'it's legendary' should be a blanket excuse allowing stuff to not make any sense whatsoever?

[Daishain]

First of all, 'you can DM fiat/homebrew PC access to ability X' does not in any way refute 'players don't have access to ability X'.
Secondly: non-humanoid and/or larger than medium skeletons exist in the MM, so presumably they also exist into the world. Their MM entry specifically states they 'can be created'. PC's cannon create them (outside DM fiat/homebrew spells). Who else but NPCs can create them?Technically, NPCs don't have a means of creating them without DM fiat either. Once a method of creating them is determined, it is entirely up to the DM whether or not the players get access, not the game. The point is pointless.


So you think. but if you want more examples, here they are:
Looking at the MM and Elemental Evil Player companion entries for Aarakocra:
First of all, the monsters in the MM is named simply Aarakocra, which probably means they were meant to be representative for a significant segment of the species, so one could argue their abilities are racial, but I don't need to.

The NPC is 5 ft. slower while walking and can't speak Aarakocra (WTF?) but it gets Dive Attack and the ability to summon air elementals with 4 other buddies, two abilities completely outside the reach of the PCsOh noes, the devs decided to curtail abusable abilities while creating a player race! The Aarakocra is troublesome enough as a PC race without keeping stuff like that. I'd rather the race not be available at all than risk game balance by not doing some editing.



So 'it's legendary' should be a blanket excuse allowing stuff to not make any sense whatsoever?
Its a creature that produces highly destructive magical energy from within its body while flying around on wings that wouldn't be capable of producing enough lift to allow it to fall at a safe pace, much less actually go up at all, and you're worried about a few extra tail slaps?

Legendary abilities are an excellent tool to moderate the difficulty of encounters with creatures that are supposed to be incredibly tough. They also make much more sense than many of the other things taken for granted in the setting

[Gnomes2169]

So... you're calling me a... "Richard"?

Yes, I am saying you are a mass-murderer of smurf and gnome, the mayor of a small town by the sea, lord of the dance and darkness, and are a warlock who may just be morally straighter than he seems. (That was for all of you LFG fans out there. ;) )

[LordBlades]

Oh noes, the devs decided to curtail abusable abilities while creating a player race! The Aarakocra is troublesome enough as a PC race without keeping stuff like that. I'd rather the race not be available at all than risk game balance by not doing some editing.


How do game balance consideration have ANY bearing whatsoever on how the fact that NPCs possessing abilities unavailable to PCs affects setting verisimilitude?

[Daishain]

How do game balance consideration have ANY bearing whatsoever on how the fact that NPCs possessing abilities unavailable to PCs affects setting verisimilitude?
Oh for F***s sake...

Because this is a game! No matter what you do, game balance considerations are going to have a massive impact on this kind of thing. That is not something that you're going to be able to prevent short of making every PC/NPC conversion identical, which would be either boring or unbalanced as hell.

[LordBlades]

Oh for F***s sake...

Because this is a game! No matter what you do, game balance considerations are going to have a massive impact on this kind of thing. That is not something that you're going to be able to prevent short of making every PC/NPC conversion identical, which would be either boring or unbalanced as hell.


I understand this, and I support a more balanced game (lack of balance is my main gripe with 3.5). This doesn't mean I can't be bothered by the fact that they didn't seem to have put in the slightest amount of effort to provide any kind of in-game logic for some of those game balance decisions.

[Vogonjeltz]

First of all, 'you can DM fiat/homebrew PC access to ability X' does not in any way refute 'players don't have access to ability X'.
Secondly: non-humanoid and/or larger than medium skeletons exist in the MM, so presumably they also exist into the world. Their MM entry specifically states they 'can be created'. PC's cannon create them (outside DM fiat/homebrew spells). Who else but NPCs can create them?

Well, again, wish is a spell that could create anything, hypothetically speaking. And the creation of spells by players and DMs is anticipated on page 201 of the PHB. The DMG has guidelines for creating new spells on page 283. DM fiat and Homebrew would be if the DM had to invent it whole-cloth, instead they've been given tools to expand upon the basic information, making this effectively rules sanctioned.


So you think. but if you want more examples, here they are:
Looking at the MM and Elemental Evil Player companion entries for Aarakocra:
First of all, the monsters in the MM is named simply Aarakocra, which probably means they were meant to be representative for a significant segment of the species, so one could argue their abilities are racial, but I don't need to.

The NPC is 5 ft. slower while walking and can't speak Aarakocra (WTF?) but it gets Dive Attack and the ability to summon air elementals with 4 other buddies, two abilities completely outside the reach of the PCs

I have to actually look up the PC allowed version vs the Monster manual version, but I'd imagine the distinction is because neither of those abilities is balanced for a player character. Which is why most every monster is inappropriate for a player character.


So familiars are:
-proficient with their natural weapons (it has the statistics of the form you've chosen)
-can physically interact with objects
-has the necessary claw-eye coordination to make attacks since it can deliver touch spells
-has no moral qualms about hurting stuff since it can deliver touch spells
but somehow can't combine all 4 to make a simple attack because reasons?

Well, it has the statistics, that doesn't make it capable of inflicting harm on its own.
And serving as a conduit for your spells (which use your spell attack modifiers) has no bearing on its moral sensibilities if any exist (it is after all, not a real beast, just a faux one).

The spell itself provides the prohibition, so you could say it's magically prevented from inflicting harm on its own.

The one loophole is that the owner can effectively channel their spells through it, but it's not the Familiar causing the harm per se.


It's an animal so well-trained that it needs its master to repeat the commands every 6 seconds. An animal whom, when ordered to 'attack that guy' will only do so for one round, after which it stops, unless ordered 'attack that guy' again.

Yes, the animal makes an (singular) attack, in the same way that a well-trained animal fetches one stick, not twenty.


So 'it's legendary' should be a blanket excuse allowing stuff to not make any sense whatsoever?

They make perfect sense, these are actions beyond the ken of all the normals. Think of them as comparable to Supernatural Gifts (DMG 227) or Epic Boons (DMG 231).

[obryn]

I understand this, and I support a more balanced game (lack of balance is my main gripe with 3.5). This doesn't mean I can't be bothered by the fact that they didn't seem to have put in the slightest amount of effort to provide any kind of in-game logic for some of those game balance decisions.
That's your job, actually. Don't let your experiences with 3.x convince you that you don't need to exercise your imagination while running or playing the game. Think of the narrative, not the mechanics.

[Lucas Yew]

So, one of the things I really like about third edition was the PC/NPC transparency. Everybody has a class, everybody has a level. Event the mosters can be translated into PCs.

In 5e, we don't have that. Your BBEG sorcerer doesn't actually need to be a sorcerer, or even a spellcaster of any class. Just given him appropriate abilities and call it a day.

On the one hand, this is less work for the DM, and it avoids the dreaded moment where the player says that your BBEG can't do what you described him as doing, but...

I like feeling that the whole world works on one set of rules. It offends my sensibilities that the sorcerer I grew up with as a kid and is now the BBEG somehow has a completely different set of abilities than me, the sorcerer who got his powers the exact same way.

I generally agree with your ideas. But, oh well, at least it has WAY more verisimilitude than the last edition.

It always irked me when a monster's ability score modifier didn't matter a bit on that Lv.21 Solo Soldier's +26 attack roll. And don't get started on NPC stat blocks "transforming" into monster ones, like that old paladin from Madness at Gardmore Abbey; in fact, it actually made me ragequit my first D&D edition...

As such, I am personally working on generic classes for humanoid characters (stronger class features for PC ones and the bland NPC ones) that actually work with the rest of the 5E world. Like most of them having d8's for Hit Dice for being Medium sized and such. Currently, the Small sized races are my biggest issue, in how to have them justified with getting d8 HDs...

Edit: After reading thru the whole post I decided to further clear up my ideas. As the problem for the OP is that there are NPC only options, that while being inferior or quirky compared to similar ones PCs get, they should have made actually CODIFIED NPC classes in the rules. Like a d8 HD class with meh equipment proficiencies that shares the Wizard's Spellcasting class feature, but nothing else, HARD CODIFIED into the rules so that PCs theoretically can take levels but choose not to for the options genuinely stink. But the ones like advanced super skeletons, well, I have no idea how to clear up that mess for PC necromancers, sorry.
The bad thing is, that whatever good ideas anyone produces to further promote in-game-universe functional consistencies, IT AIN'T OFFICIAL. Just a houserule. That's really depressing.

[obryn]

As such, I am personally working on generic classes for humanoid characters (stronger class features for PC ones and the bland NPC ones) that actually work with the rest of the 5E world. Like most of them having d8's for Hit Dice for being Medium sized and such. Currently, the Small sized races are my biggest issue, in how to have them justified with getting d8 HDs...

Edit: After reading thru the whole post I decided to further clear up my ideas. As the problem for the OP is that there are NPC only options, that while being inferior or quirky compared to similar ones PCs get, they should have made actually CODIFIED NPC classes in the rules. Like a d8 HD class with meh equipment proficiencies that shares the Wizard's Spellcasting class feature, but nothing else, HARD CODIFIED into the rules so that PCs theoretically can take levels but choose not to for the options genuinely stink. But the ones like advanced super skeletons, well, I have no idea how to clear up that mess for PC necromancers, sorry.
The bad thing is, that whatever good ideas anyone produces to further promote in-game-universe functional consistencies, IT AIN'T OFFICIAL. Just a houserule. That's really depressing.
I don't have the foggiest idea what you'd expect to gain from this that wouldn't be better served by spending 10 minutes with your player working something out. Why would you go through all this trouble in order to create a class that's so bad a player would never take it?

[LordBlades]

That's your job, actually. Don't let your experiences with 3.x convince you that you don't need to exercise your imagination while running or playing the game. Think of the narrative, not the mechanics.

Who said anything about not exercising imagination? D&D is a game of imagination at it's core. I just think mechanics should as much as possible not be dissociated from the narrative. I agree this will be impossible sometimes (although it's debatable whether game balance or in-setting logic should take priority in such cases) but I think that, as long as designers provide fluff (and charge you for it), it should be their job to explain how their mechanics fit into their fluff. Not mine.

[Haruki-kun]

The Winged Mod: Thread closed for review.