so much whining - a rant

[da newt]

It's very strange to me to see how many people believe that the players in an adventuring party are competing with each other for who is the best at D&D combat. I've always approached it as if we were all on the same team, so if one of the PC's is really good at something, I'm happy because it benefits the team.

But then I see all these posts about stuff like:

'Conjure Animals is too good. I play a fighter and the Druid is better at dealing damage than my PC. We need to reduce the effectiveness of that spell, because it makes me feel less powerful and I wanna be the best at killing stuff ...'

'Casters are too powerful. I hate it that spells are more powerful than my PC in tier 3 and 4...'

'I'm a DM, and my players are too good at beating my monsters. It's not fair. How do I nerf their abilities?'

'One of the players in my group has a PC who is stepping on my PC's toes. I want my PC to be special, but their PC can do the stuff mine can too. How do I make them stop?'

I don't get it. Why is there SO much whining? Recently, it seems like almost half of the posts are just folks wanking.

[Amnestic]

It's very strange to me to see how many people believe that the players in an adventuring party are competing with each other for who is the best at D&D combat. I've always approached it as if we were all on the same team, so if one of the PC's is really good at something, I'm happy because it benefits the team.


The examples in your post (with the exception of the DM-monsters-too-easy, which is a different issue) aren't about players not being the best, it's about players not having a niche, because someone else (typically a caster character in 5e) can also do that niche better than they can, along with being able to do other things pretty good as well.

Absolute barebones example:
Character 1's good at 'A' and that's about it
Character 2's good at 'A', 'B', 'C', and pretty okay at 'D'.

It seems pretty reasonable that character 1's player might be a bit offput by this, since we all want our time to shine while playing and DM's and player's should ask the question of "how can I make sure all the characters get their time in the spotlight", because that also benefits the team.

It's not always a problem - sometimes the person behind Character 1 is happy with doing what they do and don't mind some crossover, but some people do mind, and it's totally normal to do so. It's why people are a bit iffy about crossover of subclass/role in a party. Sometimes it can work, but often it just leads to players losing out on moments that feel like their character should get some cool stuff and just...don't.

[Sparky McDibben]

I don't get it either, but I think the fighter vs druid issue is saying, "Look, my PC is supposed to shine in combat, but the druid keeps stealing all their thunder."

That's my diagnosis, anyway. This shouldn't be a problem often, because the druid doesn't have many of those slots, and conjure animals is competing with other abilities. Unfortunately, if you only run one or two encounters (including non-combat encounters) per day, this will happen the whole campaign.

As for DMs who want to nerf abilities, I have zero sympathy.

My fix has typically been to up my game. Run more encounters per day. Include short rest options. Don't punish players for resting in the dungeon, just have the dungeon react naturally to them. Include challenges that no one party member can bypass, but they can together.

In short, be a better DM and play the game in such a way that its assumptions hold true. That's probably an unhelpful answer, but it worked for me.

[MrStabby]

Its about what people find fun.

If you play two games of D&D and enjoy one but not the other then you look for the difference. What made one time enjoyable and one not.

If a player finds out that there is something in the game that is sapping their fun, is that not worthy of complaining about?

More importanly is it not worth fixing.




So in my case I DM rather than have a PC so I have a different emphasis, but the kind of comments and complaints that come up here on the forum are increadibly useful to me. The let me spot issues before they arrise, they give me insight into how players are likely to feel, they help me design rewards that won't leave the players that didn't get them too upset.

People being frank here about the things that diminish their fun help me to give my players more fun at our table. This isn't something that they should feel ashamed about.

[Unoriginal]

It's not necessarily about competing. Few players like to have a PC who is "the one who stands there while the others do awesome stuff", or "the one who should be great at something but who get overshadowed every time".

That being said there is indeed a lot of theorycrafting discussions which have little bearing on or ressemblance to an actual D&D session.

[NorthernPhoenix]

Its about what people find fun.

If you play two games of D&D and enjoy one but not the other then you look for the difference. What made one time enjoyable and one not.

If a player finds out that there is something in the game that is sapping their fun, is that not worthy of complaining about?

More importanly is it not worth fixing.




So in my case I DM rather than have a PC so I have a different emphasis, but the kind of comments and complaints that come up here on the forum are increadibly useful to me. The let me spot issues before they arrise, they give me insight into how players are likely to feel, they help me design rewards that won't leave the players that didn't get them too upset.

People being frank here about the things that diminish their fun help me to give my players more fun at our table. This isn't something that they should feel ashamed about.

Exactly! It's incredibly ignorant to (ironically) whine about people trying to make things better. What do you gain from that OP?

[Trafalgar]

'I'm a DM, and my players are too good at beating my monsters. It's not fair. How do I nerf their abilities?'


This is a very bad DM. If the PCs are clearing your encounters too quickly, you make the encounters harder, not nerf their abilities. Nerfing abilities is only going to lead to hate and discontent.

[OldTrees1]

Um, where are these posts you are complaining about? I am sure some exist, but I have not seen them in the various critique or ranting threads I have read. It is quite possible that they are less common than you think, OR they were saying something different than how you represent them.

For example, "Martials do not have the support they need to act like tier 3 - 4 characters outside of combat."

[stoutstien]

This is a very bad DM. If the PCs are clearing your encounters too quickly, you make the encounters harder, not nerf their abilities. Nerfing abilities is only going to lead to hate and discontent.

The question is: does making the encounters harder or tougher have any real advantage than limiting player options if the net results are the same?

[Unoriginal]

The question is: does making the encounters harder or tougher have any real advantage than limiting player options if the net results are the same?

Depends if the scope of the encounters stays the same or not.

Ex: if you suddenly increase the HPs and damage outputs of all the zombies everywhere so they can keep up with the PCs, that's the same as nerfing the PCs, and it's poor form.

If on the other hand you have the PCs fight bigger threats for more epic combats and more interesting rewards, rather than keeping them as a big in a small pond, then it's normal and likely more enjoyable.

[OldTrees1]

The question is: does making the encounters harder or tougher have any real advantage than limiting player options if the net results are the same?

Adding capabilities, resources, etc can increase the complexity of the combat. Removing capabilities can decrease the complexity of the combat. Which is an advantage depends on the group's preferences in relation to the current level of complexity.

[Cheesegear]

It's very strange to me to see how many people believe that the players in an adventuring party are competing with each other for who is the best at D&D combat. I've always approached it as if we were all on the same team, so if one of the PC's is really good at something, I'm happy because it benefits the team.

Many players - for many reasons - often view DND - or any RPG - as an escapist power fantasy roleplay simulator.
Most of the time - in my experience, at my tables - a lot of...That Stuff...comes down to self-esteem.

1. If my character sucks, I feel bad. I want to try again. I don't feel like I'm contributing as well as I could - or maybe, should - be. The party, could be improved, if I played something different.

2. If my character can't do whatever I want it to do (usually, because of dice), my power fantasy is ruined. 'RPGs would be better without dice.' (All RP, no G)
3. If the DM gives me negative consequences for my actions, my power fantasy is ruined. (FIRST OFF, WHY IS YOUR POWER FANTASY TO HAMSTRING THE PEOPLE YOU TRAVEL WITH AND BE EVIL!?)
4. If another player's character is better than mine...I can't even shine anywhere, not even in a fantasy make-believe world.
5. My fictional, make-believe character is, essentially, my idealised self. Anything negative that gets said or done to my fictional, make-believe character, is an out-of-game, personal attack.

6. I had a cool story, and my players ruined it (by not following the rails). I hate my players because I didn't get to my story in their game.

[MrStabby]

Depends if the scope of the encounters stays the same or not.

Ex: if you suddenly increase the HPs and damage outputs of all the zombies everywhere so they can keep up with the PCs, that's the same as nerfing the PCs, and it's poor form.

If on the other hand you have the PCs fight bigger threats for more epic combats and more interesting rewards, rather than keeping them as a big in a small pond, then it's normal and likely more enjoyable.

Yeah, they get to fight bigger threats like zombies that rolled well for their HP.

I think that there are plenty of ways of making things harder or easier than just more/tougher creatures. Chellenging terrain, visability, traps and ambushes... I would tend to go to these first rather than Bigger Monsters to make things tougher.

[stoutstien]

Adding capabilities, resources, etc can increase the complexity of the combat. Removing capabilities can decrease the complexity of the combat. Which is an advantage depends on the group's preferences in relation to the current level of complexity.
In he same line of reasoning, reduced options can provide more complexity by removing no contested win features.
I'm not arguing that you need to limit what players can do but not everything that a DM chooses to remove from the game is a cause for players to cry foul about how horrid nerfs are.

[NaughtyTiger]

This is a very bad DM. If the PCs are clearing your encounters too quickly, you make the encounters harder, not nerf their abilities. Nerfing abilities is only going to lead to hate and discontent.

It isn't the fault of a power gamer at a casual table.
It isn't the fault of 1 player stealing all the glory, every time.
It isn't the fault of unbalanced spells exacerbated by a classes designed around 1 spell.

It is the DM's fault. And trying to balance the game for her table is offensive.
The only correct solution is to ramp up the challenge to satisfy that 1 player.

edit Blue

[Eldariel]

Um, where are these posts you are complaining about? I am sure some exist, but I have not seen them in the various critique or ranting threads I have read. It is quite possible that they are less common than you think, OR they were saying something different than how you represent them.

For example, "Martials do not have the support they need to act like tier 3 - 4 characters outside of combat."

Agreed. This smells like a misrepresentation of many perfectly reasonable positions. OP, in case I missed something, please link some threads that go approximately the way you described.

[NaughtyTiger]

I don't get it. Why is there SO much whining? Recently, it seems like almost half of the posts are just folks wanking.

Ultimately, someone at the table is not having fun.
The "whining" is trying to talk though the problem and the solutions.

[MrStabby]

It isn't the fault of a power gamer at a casual table.
It isn't the fault of 1 player stealing all the glory, every time.
It isn't the fault of unbalanced spells exacerbated by a classes designed around 1 spell.

It is the DM's fault. And trying to balance the game for her table is offensive.
The only correct solution is to ramp up the challenge to satisfy that 1 player.

Did I capture that right?


I don't think itneeds to be someone or somethings fault. Trying to find the culprit is a lot less interesting than trying to find a solution. If only one player creates an optimised character then it may be a problem, but it is just different game expectations rather than anything else.

But the solution, I think should rest with the DM.

It isn't about challenge so much as leting everyone shine. Finding those things that different PCs/players are better atand helping them shine and to have more fun.

If what is being framed as "whining" is what is needed to help DMs deliver a good game then I am all for more "whining". On a forum where the most common answer to any question is "hexblade" but other than that it is "its a communications issue, you should speak about it to the other people at your table", I think that pretty open discussions about what makes games more or less fun is fantastic.

[NaughtyTiger]

I don't think itneeds to be someone or somethings fault. Trying to find the culprit is a lot less interesting than trying to find a solution. If only one player creates an optimised character then it may be a problem, but it is just different game expectations rather than anything else.

But the solution, I think should rest with the DM.

I think you are replying to the wrong post . The person I quoted said "This is a very bad DM". This is laying blame at the foot of the DM for trying to find a solution.
(I have edited mine to make it clear I do not agree with the poster)

And no. The solution to a table problem is the table.

[Kyutaru]

It seems pretty reasonable that character 1's player might be a bit offput by this, since we all want our time to shine while playing and DM's and player's should ask the question of "how can I make sure all the characters get their time in the spotlight", because that also benefits the team.
This is how I feel as well. Old AD&D didn't have any cross-overlap of roles. The fighter was the one who wielded all the magic items and murdered things, the thief was the one with the skills, the cleric was the healer/undead manager, and the mage was the sorcerer supreme. Especially given the extreme restrictions magic users had to face back then there was no one could replace someone else's role. Now multi-classing did lead to some abusive characters but that's a different story. The core classes were all unique and had their time in the spotlight.

Today... what's the difference between a warlock, sorcerer, and wizard? I don't mean mechanically or fluff wise, I mean role wise. They all do the same thing in different ways. Bards and Rogues share much in common and everything from Fighters, Rangers, Paladins, Monks, and Barbarians is just a beefy meatstick. Granted some of these existed in AD&D too but they were SUB-CLASSES of the core Fighter.

[Segev]

There is a video on YouTube you can probably find by searching the terms “Angel Summoner and BMX Bandit”

That might be the title or it might only be close.

Fair or not, that video summarizes the emotional feeling that the people complaining about another character (usually a caster) doing their character’s “thing” better than they do.

[Darth Credence]

So in my case I DM rather than have a PC so I have a different emphasis, but the kind of comments and complaints that come up here on the forum are increadibly useful to me. The let me spot issues before they arrise, they give me insight into how players are likely to feel, they help me design rewards that won't leave the players that didn't get them too upset.

People being frank here about the things that diminish their fun help me to give my players more fun at our table. This isn't something that they should feel ashamed about.

I absolutely agree with this - I'm DMing again after a long time off, and reading a bunch of posts here about how games can go wrong has helped to keep my games on track. And I really, truly believe that all of the problems brought up here can be solved by a DM that wants to solve them, if they have access to the tools and support they need to do so.

I really like my players. I don't know how I stumbled on a group that has worked out so well this quickly, but I'm very lucky to have done so. But even then, there are some fundamental differences between playing styles that I have had to adjust to. Reading about things on here where people have complained about their characters not having time to shine has allowed me to make those adjustments before anything became a problem. I'm going to describe some events in my campaign that relate, but it is going to be long, so inside the spoiler box for anyone interested.

I have five players. I started with one friend that I have known since we were three, and two coworkers. They played the first session, then each of the coworkers asked to invite another person I had never met for the second session, and we have played weekly since. There are some very different styles in the group. My old friend is all about creating a character that he wishes he could be and role playing that character. Because of this, he paid absolutely no attention to trying to maximize his ranger, Mal, but just made the character he envisioned. The two coworkers did a little more optimization - one could be fairly called a min/maxer (Sif), while the other was in between, but closer to optimized (Carta). The two others they brought in (Durdeg and Sharlot) are both heavy on role playing, with Durdeg especially interested in having a backstory that affects the campaign, and Sharlot not particularly interested in combat.
They started in a conventional dungeon, to kick off a mystery. Since then, they have investigated why undead were attacking a village, eventually putting an end to it, then headed to a larger town. Once there, I started to truly cater to each individuals style, and the game has really taken off. I put in some hunting and trapping opportunities, because the ranger is not a city person and feels more comfortable in the forest. Sharlot, the bard, opted out of the hunt, instead remaining in town to do investigations. She even passed on joining them when they sent her a message that they would be gone longer than expected, because she wanted to do more things in town. We messaged back and forth during the hunt, so she still had things going on. Sif and Durdeg were also interested in the town exploration, so Sif's familiar was constantly winging back and forth with notes. I noticed that Carta often didn't have much to say when they were in the field but not actively fighting, but did like to talk to NPCs. So I adjusted the carnival going on in town to give him more of an opportunity to do so. I let him wander around the carnival, having barkers trying to interest him in their games, and eventually allowed him to spend a ridiculous amount of money treating various women to dinner, then walking them home with a blessing from his deity.
Everyone was conducting their own research into the mystery, from interrogating a prisoner and flirting with torture, to using their connection to the deities to speak with the town judge about the prisoner and what they may have done, to taking hallucinogenic drugs in an attempt to have a vision about it, and finally visiting a fortune teller to try and get some information. They each pursued their own priorities, and had their own moments in the sun, and then came back together to participate in a mile long race through mud just for the fun of it.

Is it easy to balance all of the players, especially when some are built better for things like combat? No, but DMing is likely never going to be easy. I fully believe that the DM is going to be responsible for the vast majority of problems. It would have to be a fairly extreme case (though I have read a few on here) where the problem is not the DMs to fix. But I think the rewards of doing so are worth it. If one player shines more in combat, and someone else wishes they could, design the occasional encounter where the normal method is not the best method, and a few others can show their worth. Design non-combat scenarios where characters not designed for combat can show why they are necessary to the party. Every PC is special, and the DM should find ways to make that clear.

[Unoriginal]

Yeah, they get to fight bigger threats like zombies that rolled well for their HP.

Way to miss my entire point.



I think that there are plenty of ways of making things harder or easier than just more/tougher creatures. Chellenging terrain, visability, traps and ambushes... I would tend to go to these first rather than Bigger Monsters to make things tougher.

...yes, of course, there are more factors to an epic fight than just "tougher creatures". What makes you think anything I said was against that idea?

I was specifically answering a question about if a DM making the creatures tougher was the same as nerfing the players.

[Xervous]

Way to miss my entire point.



...yes, of course, there are more factors to an epic fight than just "tougher creatures". What makes you think anything I said was against that idea?

I was specifically answering a question about if a DM making the creatures tougher was the same as nerfing the players.

To pull some video game examples in on monster scaling and player perceptions:

Game A: some old MMO. You are better geared for your level, you go fight stuff in higher level areas. You’ve skipped over a segment of monsters and know you have done this. You’re punching above your weight class and it’s your choice for going after this harder stuff.

Game B: the $&@! I heard they pulled a while back in WoW. Monsters that scale to your level. Generic guard had 2mil hp last week? Well good for you, you have better gear now, the guard is 3mil now. Find me a player that enjoys this and for the love of all that’s good, don’t let them publish anything.

[MrStabby]

I think you are replying to the wrong post . The person I quoted said "This is a very bad DM". This is laying blame at the foot of the DM for trying to find a solution.
(I have edited mine to make it clear I do not agree with the poster)

And no. The solution to a table problem is the table.

Yeah, sorry - issue with rewriting a message. I was kind of responding to you but only in the sense that what you had written had triggered my thinking on the response... comment being more in addition to what you said rather than opposed to it.


I absolutely agree with this - I'm DMing again after a long time off, and reading a bunch of posts here about how games can go wrong has helped to keep my games on track. And I really, truly believe that all of the problems brought up here can be solved by a DM that wants to solve them, if they have access to the tools and support they need to do so.

I really like my players. I don't know how I stumbled on a group that has worked out so well this quickly, but I'm very lucky to have done so. But even then, there are some fundamental differences between playing styles that I have had to adjust to. Reading about things on here where people have complained about their characters not having time to shine has allowed me to make those adjustments before anything became a problem. I'm going to describe some events in my campaign that relate, but it is going to be long, so inside the spoiler box for anyone interested.

I have five players. I started with one friend that I have known since we were three, and two coworkers. They played the first session, then each of the coworkers asked to invite another person I had never met for the second session, and we have played weekly since. There are some very different styles in the group. My old friend is all about creating a character that he wishes he could be and role playing that character. Because of this, he paid absolutely no attention to trying to maximize his ranger, Mal, but just made the character he envisioned. The two coworkers did a little more optimization - one could be fairly called a min/maxer (Sif), while the other was in between, but closer to optimized (Carta). The two others they brought in (Durdeg and Sharlot) are both heavy on role playing, with Durdeg especially interested in having a backstory that affects the campaign, and Sharlot not particularly interested in combat.
They started in a conventional dungeon, to kick off a mystery. Since then, they have investigated why undead were attacking a village, eventually putting an end to it, then headed to a larger town. Once there, I started to truly cater to each individuals style, and the game has really taken off. I put in some hunting and trapping opportunities, because the ranger is not a city person and feels more comfortable in the forest. Sharlot, the bard, opted out of the hunt, instead remaining in town to do investigations. She even passed on joining them when they sent her a message that they would be gone longer than expected, because she wanted to do more things in town. We messaged back and forth during the hunt, so she still had things going on. Sif and Durdeg were also interested in the town exploration, so Sif's familiar was constantly winging back and forth with notes. I noticed that Carta often didn't have much to say when they were in the field but not actively fighting, but did like to talk to NPCs. So I adjusted the carnival going on in town to give him more of an opportunity to do so. I let him wander around the carnival, having barkers trying to interest him in their games, and eventually allowed him to spend a ridiculous amount of money treating various women to dinner, then walking them home with a blessing from his deity.
Everyone was conducting their own research into the mystery, from interrogating a prisoner and flirting with torture, to using their connection to the deities to speak with the town judge about the prisoner and what they may have done, to taking hallucinogenic drugs in an attempt to have a vision about it, and finally visiting a fortune teller to try and get some information. They each pursued their own priorities, and had their own moments in the sun, and then came back together to participate in a mile long race through mud just for the fun of it.

Is it easy to balance all of the players, especially when some are built better for things like combat? No, but DMing is likely never going to be easy. I fully believe that the DM is going to be responsible for the vast majority of problems. It would have to be a fairly extreme case (though I have read a few on here) where the problem is not the DMs to fix. But I think the rewards of doing so are worth it. If one player shines more in combat, and someone else wishes they could, design the occasional encounter where the normal method is not the best method, and a few others can show their worth. Design non-combat scenarios where characters not designed for combat can show why they are necessary to the party. Every PC is special, and the DM should find ways to make that clear.

A good DM makes all the difference. And a good DM is the one that is right for the table and the adventure. How we get to be that DM is a learning process.


Way to miss my entire point.



...yes, of course, there are more factors to an epic fight than just "tougher creatures". What makes you think anything I said was against that idea?

I was specifically answering a question about if a DM making the creatures tougher was the same as nerfing the players.

Ah. I had been told blue text was for sarcasm. I may have been misinformed. Either that or your response is factoring in the sarcasm, in which case it is a genuine surprise as I thought I understood what you were getting at.

[Willie the Duck]

I don't get it. Why is there SO much whining? Recently, it seems like almost half of the posts are just folks wanking.

Exactly! It's incredibly ignorant to (ironically) whine about people trying to make things better. What do you gain from that OP?

Um, where are these posts you are complaining about? I am sure some exist, but I have not seen them in the various critique or ranting threads I have read. It is quite possible that they are less common than you think, OR they were saying something different than how you represent them.

Agreed. This smells like a misrepresentation of many perfectly reasonable positions. OP, in case I missed something, please link some threads that go approximately the way you described.

I've found that in any given online discussion topic or location, I've seen a similar behavior to the OP. It seems incredibly tempting to preemptively declare some position to which one is opposed as being voiced by a whiner. It sort of (if others go along with it, which clearly didn't happen here) declares one's position, and by extension oneself, to be the adult in the conversation. It rarely works, because, frankly, the rest of us aren't fools.

Like most similar things, there is some measure of truth to it. I'm sure we could go out to all the different threads on this board and find examples of people complaining about the way things are in the game that we (either unanimously or majority) agree are fairly whiny. That, of course, wouldn't make said complaints in any way wrong. As others have mentioned, regardless of whether everyone in the party is contributing towards the benefit of the team, that doesn't make the situation where one class or build far outshines the others in terms of contributing to that success any less frustrating to the less contributing build (particularly if it is the game rules, rather than luck of the draw or DM favoritism or the like).

To my mind, the fighter-druid scenario mentioned is a microcosm of the larger issue that relative class prowess has been balanced around an encounter frequency many-to-most groups either have a hard time replicating, or no interest in replicating. Actual play seems to have a bimodal distribution, where dungeon crawls have more encounters per rests, and most other playstyles have fewer. Exactly how to deal with that issue is, to my mind, exactly that about which forums like this ought to be discussing, since it has a genuinely positive impact on the enjoyment of the game.

[NaughtyTiger]

Exactly how to deal with that issue is, to my mind, exactly that about which forums like this ought to be discussing, since it has a genuinely positive impact on the enjoyment of the game.

It is more useful than pages of arguments about RAW.

[Xervous]

It is more useful than pages of arguments about RAW.

Or even just things left unwritten.

[patchyman]

Ex: if you suddenly increase the HPs and damage outputs of all the zombies everywhere so they can keep up with the PCs, that's the same as nerfing the PCs, and it's poor form.

If on the other hand you have the PCs fight bigger threats for more epic combats and more interesting rewards, rather than keeping them as a big in a small pond, then it's normal and likely more enjoyable.

I agree. Often, it’s about upping your game as a DM and this makes the players up their game. Maybe your characters are crushing your encounters because they are always coming from the front so the martials can protect the casters and the casters can fireball enemies. Just having the monsters ambush the players or attack from behind once in a while can force your players to change their tactics. Meaningful environmental effects are also a really fun way to challenge your players while engaging them.

Sometimes, as a DM, it can also make you examine your own biases about encounters. Maybe you notice that most of your encounters take place in massive rooms (or in nature with little cover) which benefits casters and ranged combatants to the detriment of melee fighters. Maybe you notice that your encounter design is too harsh on short rest classes and too forgiving on long rest classes (“static” dungeons are notorious for this).

[Man_Over_Game]

It isn't the fault of a power gamer at a casual table.
It isn't the fault of 1 player stealing all the glory, every time.
It isn't the fault of unbalanced spells exacerbated by a classes designed around 1 spell.

It is the DM's fault. And trying to balance the game for her table is offensive.
The only correct solution is to ramp up the challenge to satisfy that 1 player.

edit Blue

It's blue text, and it probably doesn't look too important, but NTiger actually made an excellent point:

We all have different expectations out of the game we're playing. And, unlike a video game or a movie, there is something that can be done about that.

So when you have one powergamer in a group of noobies that still want to pull their weight in combat without hyperoptimizing for it, it's easier to address the one than the many.

Personally, I want combat to be tactically complex and lethal, but easily mitigated by spending resources and powers out of combat. Not so much "Combat as War", but "spending more out of combat costs less in combat". This ends up rewarding players for worldbuilding and investigating out of combat while feeling like they're in a losing battle in combat due to the reduced resources despite being at a lower overall risk (which means that it's easier for me to balance combat, since I don't need to account for burst player-powers or overpowered enemies). It also means rewarding players for their actions (as they use tools and information they found out of combat) instead of their success being dependent on predefined stats and spells. Everything feels epic, all of the time.

Should I expect everyone to play that way? No! But that's why compromises are made.



That's what the whining is. The search for a compromise, so that one player has fun with the many. Or it's to find a way to have more fun for everyone, but from a single person's perspective. It's never about "I'm not having fun, so neither should you", but "These are things I prioritize that I don't have, and I think people will have overall more fun with more of it".

It's about making everyone's game better. Even if people disagree, they have the same goal.

And the fact is, the reason it's ever a problem is because it's based on the attempt of a single perspective; disagreements force you to acknowledge another's, making more of a compromise, making both sides consider just a little bit more than themselves.

The whining? That's the friction heat of two gears learning to work together. And, fun fact, the human brain is wired to deny having to change at any chance it gets, so you can imagine how hard it is to fight against that considering who's driving the debate.

Is that something we should not do?

[Miele]

It's not whining, it's discussing. D&D is not an MMO with a gazillion people playing on the same server and using the same exact rules: there is room for interpretation and thankfully things are like they are.

I found interesting points of view for managing casters vs martials, shepherd druids and other similar controversial topics, just by reading or writing about them, it's an interesting discussion as long as you approach it with the right mentality: improve the game for everyone in terms of "is it fun?".

[LudicSavant]

I don't get it. Why is there SO much whining?

It seems like you might be perceiving discussions in general about how to improve the balance and/or overall design of the game as whining, and assuming that motivations for doing so must be selfish.

People like to improve game design, and balance plays an important role in games. That's true not only of competitive games, but cooperative and even single-player games too, because 'fairness' is not the only gameplay purpose that game designers use balance for.

True, there are some people who complain about things being overpowered in a misguided or reactionary way, and a few really are motivated by redirecting the spotlight towards themselves. But there are many others who would just as happily advocate for nerfing themselves. For example, in a current campaign when simulacrum got nerfed, it was the person playing the Wizard with Simulacrum who suggested nerfing their own spell in order to make the game more interesting.

If people really were only motivated by being as strong as possible, then they wouldn't be talking about nerfing whatever they think is OP, they'd just be playing that thing.

[Christew]

I think there is some natural development at play here. The older the system that this board is designed to discuss gets, the more system mastery the board as a whole represents, the more thoroughly reviewed the underlying system is, the more specific and personal the critiques become. I suppose there may be a subjective horizon beyond which one might call these critiques whining, but I'm not sure how productive the attitude is.

[LudicSavant]

There is a video on YouTube you can probably find by searching the terms “Angel Summoner and BMX Bandit”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFuMpYTyRjw

Here it is.

Something this highlights is that it doesn't only feel bad to be BMX Bandit, it also feels bad to be Angel Summoner. Either he has a boring experience where he just waves his hand and the situation's solved, or he overshadows BMX Bandit to a degree that makes him feel guilty, or he purposefully holds himself back (in which case he gets to cringe as BMX Bandit fails, and still doesn't feel like there's any weight to his successes or failures because he's not actually being challenged by an external force, the only limitation is his own decision to 'go easy').

Which is why both are likely to critique the game they're in.

[Fnissalot]

It seems like you might be perceiving discussions in general about how to improve the balance and/or overall design of the game as whining, and assuming that motivations for doing so must be selfish.

People like to improve game design, and balance plays an important role in games. That's true not only of competitive games, but cooperative and even single-player games too, because 'fairness' is not the only gameplay purpose that game designers use balance for.

True, there are some people who complain about things being overpowered in a misguided or reactionary way, and a few really are motivated by redirecting the spotlight towards themselves. But there are many others who would just as happily advocate for nerfing themselves. For example, in a current campaign when simulacrum got nerfed, it was the person playing the Wizard with Simulacrum who suggested nerfing their own spell in order to make the game more interesting.

If people really were only motivated by being as strong as possible, then they wouldn't be talking about nerfing whatever they think is OP, they'd just be playing that thing.

I agree! and I am sorry if it has appeared as if I was whining.

As someone who works with designing for user experience (and programming, not that it matter for this), I would say (to me at least) a big part of the DM role has to do with facilitating the experiences the players expect to have. While a narrative mostly cooperative game does not need perfect balance to be enjoyable, a lack of balance might still sour the players' experiences. If you play with a group of friends, I at least value keeping my friends happy and satisfied so if one player causes another's experience to be something they didn't want, I argue it is worth discussing with the players. None of us want to take away from the others experience. (If you have players that want that, it needs to be clearly communicated to the group.) Since every table is unique (different players with different baggage and expectations, different locations, different social and cultural contexts), you need to know your players to know what levers you have available when tailoring the game for their experience. So what works for me, might not work for you.

My regular table consists of an optimizer that dislikes having to wait on dragged out discussions and long turns in combat as well as that he feels a need to pick the best options even if the options are against his character, a optimizer that skims the rules and regrets their choices once they understands how the abilities actually works, a player that knows exactly what he wants to experience (usually a power-fantasy with an internal conflict) but is constantly unconsciously suboptimal and nerfing himself and, as a result, is outshined which prevents him from having the experience he wanted and he then loses focus when things drag on, a schemer that only want to create deep plots and loves seeing the surprise on the others faces when a secret plot has come through and enjoys straightforward power-fantasies, and a player that wants to socialize and mingle in the world and is fine with combat as long as it is swiftly over and not too complex. For my group, the answer is rarely to increase the difficulty, frequency, size, or length of combat.

As a DM, I want to make everyone shine in the way they want and provide them with the space to do so. It is a balance act, but I can never anticipate all of this before a campaign starts even if session 0s helps a lot, I will have to be reactive and adapt myself and the game over time. The only option is often to discuss it between sessions as I don't want my friends to have bad experiences for the rest of the campaign and I don't want to be forced to restart the campaign. Planing the sessions, reacting to the mood, a lot of communication, balancing the rules, and allowing players to redo slight choices in character advancement are the tools I have to work with in facilitating their expectations.

Also, I thought the point of a forum was to discuss things?

[Eldariel]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFuMpYTyRjw

Here it is.

Something this highlights is that it doesn't only feel bad to be BMX Bandit, it also feels bad to be Angel Summoner. Either he has a boring experience where he just waves his hand and the situation's solved, or he overshadows BMX Bandit to a degree that makes him feel guilty, or he purposefully holds himself back (in which case he gets to cringe as BMX Bandit fails, and still doesn't feel like there's any weight to his successes or failures because he's not actually being challenged by an external force, the only limitation is his own decision to 'go easy').

Which is why both are likely to critique the game they're in.

It's also worth noting that real life is a game without DM but in D&D, the DM is ultimately the person in the worst position, because the discontent of both (all) parties ultimately falls on them and as the godking of the world capable of (theoretically) doing anything it's quite likely that if there's going to be a blame game much of it is going to fall on the DM in spite of their only fault having been potentially taking the game at face value and not trying to fix things. This goes double for living campaigns like Adventurers' League, where the DM's hands are actually tied by the loose rules written for the game and thus they cannot address the issues with Rule 0 even if the other qualifications for it were in place*.

Then there's the whole thing of "Should the DM fix it?" Just having the ability to fix things, which are not at all straight-forward to address without neutering the entire strategy or reducing wish fulfilment/character representation, doesn't mean the DM should. Players' expectations are generally set by the system and breaking those expectations comes at a cost of having to win the players over to your house rules. Furthermore, whether to balance up or down is not at all clear.


In short, it's a vastly more problematic matter than just having a DM handwave it away, but DM not handwaving it away is like to get blamed for it.

[Kyutaru]

As someone who works with designing for user experience (and programming, not that it matter for this), I would say (to me at least) a big part of the DM role has to do with facilitating the experiences the players expect to have.Yep, I agree. It's one of the issues that seems to keep making people think D&D is A or B, their personal subjective experience with their friend groups. Ones that are allured by optimization and dice-rolling combat simulators think that's what D&D is. Others that are fascinated by the framework that provides a place to envelop oneself in authoring fiction focus on the roleplaying and use the rules to handle interaction disputes. Player expectations vary wildly and each table has a different set of players with a different set of goals and wishes and wants.


Also, I thought the point of a forum was to discuss things?
Indeed but there's a difference between productive discussion and unproductive complaining. We just posted all the things we hated, subjective as they are, there's nothing others can do to convince us otherwise and all it serves is to become rallying flags for other haters. If something is to be criticized it should be done so constructively.

[NorthernPhoenix]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFuMpYTyRjw

Here it is.

Something this highlights is that it doesn't only feel bad to be BMX Bandit, it also feels bad to be Angel Summoner. Either he has a boring experience where he just waves his hand and the situation's solved, or he overshadows BMX Bandit to a degree that makes him feel guilty, or he purposefully holds himself back (in which case he gets to cringe as BMX Bandit fails, and still doesn't feel like there's any weight to his successes or failures because he's not actually being challenged by an external force, the only limitation is his own decision to 'go easy').

Which is why both are likely to critique the game they're in.

I think that cuts to the heart of the matter of why balance matters on the player side.

I have other ideas about why it matters on DM side, but they're not as directly represented by the video as the player side is.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I think that cuts to the heart of the matter of why balance matters on the player side.


I agree that balance matters.

I also think that, in general, 5e's balance is good enough that the video's complaint feels like over-the-top complaining about minutia when applied to 5e. Which makes sense, it was made for 3e where the intrinsic balance issues were really of that order.

Honestly, the biggest "imbalances" I see stem from a few DM-side decisions.

Treating magic in general as if it can do anything. Basically encouraging "creative" solutions using magic well beyond what the written spells say they do.
At the same time, holding non-magic things to a very tight "realism" standard. In fact, often one that is unrealistic in how confining it is (not letting people at peak performance do things that regular folks do all the time in the real world).
Wanting to have every adventuring day be one big fight against a single solo monster, instead of letting encounters vary both in number per day and number of foes per encounter.
Designing challenges (usually non-combat ones) such that they're trivial to solve with a single button press (usually a spell).


All of these have distorting effects and are unnecessary from a system perspective. Fixing them brings things into rough balance, to the point where everyone can contribute at least somewhat to everything.

Holding spells to "they do exactly and only what they say they do. Nothing more, nothing less" makes spellcasters have to pay a much higher price for versatility and makes them actually have to worry about spell selection. No imposing conditions with phantasmal force beyond what it says. No using damaging spells that don't target objects to break things down. Does it say it lights things on fire? No? Then it doesn't. Etc.

Letting heroic, larger-than-life, action heroes do action hero things (often by lowering those DCs and letting lots of stuff just automatically succeed) lets everyone, even non-specialists, contribute and feel like they're doing heroic things. Combine this with channeling information and outcomes through those whose backgrounds or skillsets are most suited (so the arcana specialist gets the knowledge for that combined Intelligence (Arcana) check, while the Noble Fighter is the one that the hoity-toity folks naturally talk and listen to even if the Urchin bard is more charismatic, etc), and everyone can contribute to out-of-combat/ability-check-based challenges. Some more than others, and specialization still brings rewards, but no one's left out. Unless they choose to be, in which case it's their fault.

Single-combat days, especially against solos, mean that those classes who can effectively turn resources into damage (ie Paladins) rule the day. And if the controller manages to lock down the boss, it's over. This makes combat much more swingy--you have to ramp up the difficulty tremendously, at which point a bad run of the dice can knock out several party members before they have a chance to even act effectively. And it means that short rest people (who generally have much less of the nova ability) get shafted. You don't need 6-8 encounters every day[0], but a nice variation of encounter numbers and encounter sizes lets different people shine in different ways at different times.

I've written about single-action challenges elsewhere. But they're basically never a challenge. They're a speedbump, at best. If the entire challenge is unlocking that locked door, you've goofed. And those classes with more "solve it" buttons (ie people with big spell lists, generally) dominate. If real challenges take multiple actions from multiple people, so the wizard is doing something Arcana-ish and the fighter is holding up the door and the rogue is twiddling the lock mechanism, etc, they're all contributing and no one is left out.

[Azuresun]

It's not necessarily about competing. Few players like to have a PC who is "the one who stands there while the others do awesome stuff", or "the one who should be great at something but who get overshadowed every time".

That being said there is indeed a lot of theorycrafting discussions which have little bearing on or ressemblance to an actual D&D session.

One thing I always notice is that in these comparisons, the PC's are never helping each other, and are always furiously fighting each other to have the highest damage stat. That in itself signals they're too based in theory rather than actual play t have value.

[Cheesegear]

Holding spells to "they do exactly and only what they say they do. Nothing more, nothing less" makes spellcasters have to pay a much higher price for versatility and makes them actually have to worry about spell selection. No imposing conditions with phantasmal force beyond what it says. No using damaging spells that don't target objects to break things down. Does it say it lights things on fire? No? Then it doesn't. Etc.

My favourite is:
"I use Command to tell him to attack his friends."
Cool. Not how the spell works.
"No, I say 'Attack', and then I point to his friends."
That's still not how the spell works.
"So...I just say 'Attack'?"
Yep. He's planning on doing that anyway. :smallwink:


Letting heroic, larger-than-life, action heroes do action hero things (often by lowering those DCs and letting lots of stuff just automatically succeed) lets everyone, even non-specialists, contribute and feel like they're doing heroic things.

I often find that a lot of DMs - sometimes, including myself, for what that's worth - will give an incentive (lowering the DC, giving 'free' advantage, etc.) to roleplaying well. If a player describes their action or speech or whatever really well, they get an incentive on the proceeding dice roll. I, personally don't see any issue with this, as it encourages roleplaying, and that's almost always a good thing (unless we're short on time and we really don't have time for your bulls*). However, I also understand that I have pretty good tables (it's luck, I guess), and at another table, that might be seen as incredibly beneficial towards outgoing and charismatic players who are more than willing to explain their plan in great detail and have great discussions with NPCs. Whilst players who are not as smart or charismatic IRL and have trouble explaining what they want to do and even get nervous even when confronted by a fake NPC...Are utterly reliant on dice rolls because they don't get the 'incentives' that the outgoing player gets.

[NaughtyTiger]

Holding spells to "they do exactly and only what they say they do. Nothing more, nothing less" makes spellcasters have to pay a much higher price for versatility and makes them actually have to worry about spell selection. No imposing conditions with phantasmal force beyond what it says. No using damaging spells that don't target objects to break things down. Does it say it lights things on fire? No? Then it doesn't. Etc.

i am explicitly whining in this post.
this one is hard for me, because the utility spells are soooo loosely worded that anything is possible (recently, minor illusion letting you replicate someone else's voice is allowable by RAW).
And often the stretching utility spells help the party in a way that even martials would be okay with (feather fall on the horse... saves the cart cuz they are attached)
combat and martial stuff is so strictly spelled out that magic has the edge by the rules...

basically, it is easier to apply RAW to non-magic than to magic, because non-magic is codified more.

[NorthernPhoenix]

i am explicitly whining in this post.
this one is hard for me, because the utility spells are soooo loosely worded that anything is possible (recently, minor illusion letting you replicate someone else's voice is allowable by RAW).
And often the stretching utility spells help the party in a way that even martials would be okay with (feather fall on the horse... saves the cart cuz they are attached)
combat and martial stuff is so strictly spelled out that magic has the edge by the rules...

basically, it is easier to apply RAW to non-magic than to magic, because non-magic is codified more.

I don't think that's true, especially in 5e. The RAW tells you to let people do whatever within your own personal reason and set a skill DC you think is appropriate. The only limits on non-magic come from what you think is reasonable. If someone asks if they can replicate someone else voice "just because", it's RAW to say hmm, Charisma (Deception) DC 5, after all. Non-magic is way less codified.

In combat or combat-equivalent scenarios however, this becomes less relevant.

[NaughtyTiger]

I don't think that's true, especially in 5e. The RAW tells you to let people do whatever within your own personal reason and set a skill DC you think is appropriate. The only limits on non-magic come from what you think is reasonable. If someone asks if they can replicate someone else voice "just because", it's RAW to say hmm, Charisma (Deception) DC 5, after all. Non-magic is way less codified.

would you use the same DC that is defined for Actor or Imposter?

[PhoenixPhyre]

i am explicitly whining in this post.
this one is hard for me, because the utility spells are soooo loosely worded that anything is possible (recently, minor illusion letting you replicate someone else's voice is allowable by RAW).
And often the stretching utility spells help the party in a way that even martials would be okay with (feather fall on the horse... saves the cart cuz they are attached)
combat and martial stuff is so strictly spelled out that magic has the edge by the rules...

basically, it is easier to apply RAW to non-magic than to magic, because non-magic is codified more.

Let's look at that particular example (minor illusion).

First, the relevant text:

If you create a sound, its volume can range from a whisper to a scream. It can be your voice, someone else's voice, a lion's roar, a beating of drums, or any other sound you choose. The sound continues unabated throughout the duration, or you can make discrete sounds at different times before the spell ends.

So yes, you can make someone else's voice. But it has to be one discrete sound at a time. Actual talking...isn't this. So you can have someone yell something unintelligible as one continuous, unchanging sound, or you can make a bunch of discrete sounds. Can you replicate speech? I'd be really really hard-pressed to say that you can make convincing speech with this. Maybe you could make one of those ultra-robotic voices (where they use syllables cut from recorded speech and it sounds awful). But not so you could actually convince anyone who pays any attention that it's really someone else. And it has to be within 30 feet of you, and (by RAW) doesn't extend outside that 30' area (spell effects for ongoing spells are bound by their area, can't place a fireball at the end of range and have it extend further, at least as I understand it). So someone 35' away can't hear it. Plus you're visibly casting a spell (somatic and material components are not subtle).

Plus, reading it so you get the benefit of the Actor feat or the Impersonation feature is ludicrous.

That's what I mean about reading spells narrowly. Basically, in my opinion, the default posture for a spell is deny. Unless it gives explicit permission to do something, it can't happen. If you can think of one thing that's not covered by the spell text, it fails.

On the other hand, non-magic things are wide open. Unless you can not (honestly) think of a single way it couldn't work, let them try. And I believe that DMs should be very generous with just letting people do things automatically based on their backgrounds and their experiences in the campaign. Even in social stuff--if you give a greedy guard the bribe he asks for (or something similar) or buy something from a shop at the asking price, it just works. If you say all the words the NPC wants to hear and only ask for things he's willing to give you already, it just works.

And this goes even more so for physical stuff. Someone with STR 20 and proficiency in Athletics darn well better be able to swim in armor--much weaker people do it routinely. Plus, of course, there's nothing saying that swimming in armor is even harder than not, so....

Basically, I find that the reverse is true--non-magic being less codified makes it easier to let them get away with a lot of things just by changing a point of view. Spells actually have text, and text means things. Especially when you read the whole context (ie the paragraph level, generally for most abilities).

[smp4life]

It isn't the fault of a power gamer at a casual table.
It isn't the fault of 1 player stealing all the glory, every time.
It isn't the fault of unbalanced spells exacerbated by a classes designed around 1 spell.

It is the DM's fault. And trying to balance the game for her table is offensive.
The only correct solution is to ramp up the challenge to satisfy that 1 player.

edit Blue

When you ramp up the encounters to deal with 1 player, then the players that aren't the power gamer get shredded extra quick & are therefore even more useless. How is that the correct solution?

[smp4life]

Way to miss my entire point.



...yes, of course, there are more factors to an epic fight than just "tougher creatures". What makes you think anything I said was against that idea?

I was specifically answering a question about if a DM making the creatures tougher was the same as nerfing the players.

Not really, as one upsets the players and the other doesn't. Changing monster stats is perfectly reasonable as long as you adjust their CR accordingly.

[NaughtyTiger]

When you ramp up the encounters to deal with 1 player, then the players that aren't the power gamer get shredded extra quick & are therefore even more useless. How is that the correct solution?

I do not believe that it is the correct solution. Blue text denotes sarcasm.

[smp4life]

It's not whining, it's discussing. D&D is not an MMO with a gazillion people playing on the same server and using the same exact rules: there is room for interpretation and thankfully things are like they are.

I found interesting points of view for managing casters vs martials, shepherd druids and other similar controversial topics, just by reading or writing about them, it's an interesting discussion as long as you approach it with the right mentality: improve the game for everyone in terms of "is it fun?".

Criticism I don't agree with = whining.

[Unoriginal]

Honestly, the biggest "imbalances" I see stem from a few DM-side decisions.

Treating magic in general as if it can do anything. Basically encouraging "creative" solutions using magic well beyond what the written spells say they do.
At the same time, holding non-magic things to a very tight "realism" standard. In fact, often one that is unrealistic in how confining it is (not letting people at peak performance do things that regular folks do all the time in the real world).
Wanting to have every adventuring day be one big fight against a single solo monster, instead of letting encounters vary both in number per day and number of foes per encounter.
Designing challenges (usually non-combat ones) such that they're trivial to solve with a single button press (usually a spell).



This is so true.


i am explicitly whining in this post.
this one is hard for me, because the utility spells are soooo loosely worded that anything is possible (recently, minor illusion letting you replicate someone else's voice is allowable by RAW).

That example isn't loosely worded, though, the spell explicitly says you can replicate someone's voice. As others have pointed out, though, replicating someone's voice after using a spell with verbal component isn't the same as replicating someone's speaking perfectly, nor does it skip the use of CHA (Deception) to make people believe it's actually the voice of the person if they're wary enough to think about it.

Could still be useful if you have to, say, fake someone yelling so their siblings would come to the rescue.



And often the stretching utility spells help the party in a way that even martials would be okay with (feather fall on the horse... saves the cart cuz they are attached)

As a DM I don't care if it helps the party, if you're stretching the spell past its power it doesn't work.


combat and martial stuff is so strictly spelled out that magic has the edge by the rules...

Disagreed.



basically, it is easier to apply RAW to non-magic than to magic, because non-magic is codified more.

Yet people keep saying skills are too vaguely defined in what you can accomplish with them

[IsaacsAlterEgo]

Let's look at that particular example (minor illusion).

So yes, you can make someone else's voice. But it has to be one discrete sound at a time. Actual talking...isn't this. So you can have someone yell something unintelligible as one continuous, unchanging sound, or you can make a bunch of discrete sounds. Can you replicate speech? I'd be really really hard-pressed to say that you can make convincing speech with this. Maybe you could make one of those ultra-robotic voices (where they use syllables cut from recorded speech and it sounds awful). But not so you could actually convince anyone who pays any attention that it's really someone else. And it has to be within 30 feet of you, and (by RAW) doesn't extend outside that 30' area (spell effects for ongoing spells are bound by their area, can't place a fireball at the end of range and have it extend further, at least as I understand it). So someone 35' away can't hear it. Plus you're visibly casting a spell (somatic and material components are not subtle).

Plus, reading it so you get the benefit of the Actor feat or the Impersonation feature is ludicrous.

That's what I mean about reading spells narrowly. Basically, in my opinion, the default posture for a spell is deny. Unless it gives explicit permission to do something, it can't happen. If you can think of one thing that's not covered by the spell text, it fails.
This is a minor point, but Minor Illusion can be used to perfectly replicate speech. It has been confirmed by Jeremy Crawford on twitter here (https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/693193549672636417?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw), and in the adventure Out of the Abyss, an NPC uses the spell to simulate several sentences. You may disagree that it should be able to do this, but it demonstrably can.

[MrStabby]

I agree that balance matters.

I also think that, in general, 5e's balance is good enough that the video's complaint feels like over-the-top complaining about minutia when applied to 5e. Which makes sense, it was made for 3e where the intrinsic balance issues were really of that order.

Honestly, the biggest "imbalances" I see stem from a few DM-side decisions.

Treating magic in general as if it can do anything. Basically encouraging "creative" solutions using magic well beyond what the written spells say they do.
At the same time, holding non-magic things to a very tight "realism" standard. In fact, often one that is unrealistic in how confining it is (not letting people at peak performance do things that regular folks do all the time in the real world).
Wanting to have every adventuring day be one big fight against a single solo monster, instead of letting encounters vary both in number per day and number of foes per encounter.
Designing challenges (usually non-combat ones) such that they're trivial to solve with a single button press (usually a spell).


All of these have distorting effects and are unnecessary from a system perspective. Fixing them brings things into rough balance, to the point where everyone can contribute at least somewhat to everything.

Holding spells to "they do exactly and only what they say they do. Nothing more, nothing less" makes spellcasters have to pay a much higher price for versatility and makes them actually have to worry about spell selection. No imposing conditions with phantasmal force beyond what it says. No using damaging spells that don't target objects to break things down. Does it say it lights things on fire? No? Then it doesn't. Etc.

Letting heroic, larger-than-life, action heroes do action hero things (often by lowering those DCs and letting lots of stuff just automatically succeed) lets everyone, even non-specialists, contribute and feel like they're doing heroic things. Combine this with channeling information and outcomes through those whose backgrounds or skillsets are most suited (so the arcana specialist gets the knowledge for that combined Intelligence (Arcana) check, while the Noble Fighter is the one that the hoity-toity folks naturally talk and listen to even if the Urchin bard is more charismatic, etc), and everyone can contribute to out-of-combat/ability-check-based challenges. Some more than others, and specialization still brings rewards, but no one's left out. Unless they choose to be, in which case it's their fault.

Single-combat days, especially against solos, mean that those classes who can effectively turn resources into damage (ie Paladins) rule the day. And if the controller manages to lock down the boss, it's over. This makes combat much more swingy--you have to ramp up the difficulty tremendously, at which point a bad run of the dice can knock out several party members before they have a chance to even act effectively. And it means that short rest people (who generally have much less of the nova ability) get shafted. You don't need 6-8 encounters every day[0], but a nice variation of encounter numbers and encounter sizes lets different people shine in different ways at different times.

I've written about single-action challenges elsewhere. But they're basically never a challenge. They're a speedbump, at best. If the entire challenge is unlocking that locked door, you've goofed. And those classes with more "solve it" buttons (ie people with big spell lists, generally) dominate. If real challenges take multiple actions from multiple people, so the wizard is doing something Arcana-ish and the fighter is holding up the door and the rogue is twiddling the lock mechanism, etc, they're all contributing and no one is left out.

So I think this is absolutely right in a lot of ways, but it's still a problem.

As a DM I find it ties my hands. I find that balance is telling me to run my campaign in a certain way, to ram in certain plot elements, to exclude others and those limits annoy me.

I cant have any kind of skill challenge be an effective chance for a skill monkey to shine if it is a challenge that a spell could accomplish.

Certain sets of events need a doom clock to push the PCs onwards quickly enough.

I cant run mummies (as a theme, rather than a one off) as the sorcerer and wizard can do so much more damage with their ready access to fire damage.

The problem isnt that I cant work around these things, the problem is that I have to. The result is that a lot of campaigns start to feel the same with too little change of pace and motivation.

We end up with a bit of a paradox when spells solve problems. If a spell solves a problem in a way that is too efficient/effective with no drama or risk of failure then it is quickly dealt with and becomes just a spell tax. Anything that would let a spell be that powerful sees less use as it doesnt provide a challenge for the party. It pushes the game into a space where if you are sufficiently good at something it's no better than being terrible at is as the use of those abilities is sufficiently lacking in enjoyment for the rest of the party to watch as to make we want to commit most of the opportunities for use.

As a DM I am pushed to move the game to a space where the characters are broadly balanced and to try and keep it there. This diminishes agency for the players; there are some things that they cannot change even if we pretend they can.

This is one of the reasons why my campaign worlds are all high magic worlds. A world where teleportation is common is a world where forbiddance is common. And a world where forbidance is common let's me put in more challenges for the party that are less easily sidestepped by a single spell.

I do think there is a point though, that as we comment on everything that we think is wrong in terms of the balance of flexibility of abilities in 5th edition, that we do acknowledge that it is better than some previous editions and that it is really, really tricky to get it even close to right with so many different moving parts and styles.

[Unoriginal]

I cant run mummies (as a theme, rather than a one off) as the sorcerer and wizard can do so much more damage with their ready access to fire damage.

Why make all the mummies as vulnerable to fire as the standard MM ones?

Monsters with a weakness will generally try to either avoid it or patch it up, or the people who control them will. And if you run a monster as a theme and not as an one-off, it's normal to have variations

Mummies placed in water-filled cases so that they can attack intruders while soaked. Mummies fighting underwater in a submerged room. Swamp mummies which are vulnerable to acid instead. Mummies made of the corpses Red Dragonborn or of Dragon Sorcerers. Mummy bosses with magic items. And the like.

[MrStabby]

Why make all the mummies as vulnerable to fire as the standard MM ones?

Monsters with a weakness will generally try to either avoid it or patch it up, or the people who control them will. And if you run a monster as a theme and not as an one-off, it's normal to have variations

Mummies placed in water-filled cases so that they can attack intruders while soaked. Mummies fighting underwater in a submerged room. Swamp mummies which are vulnerable to acid instead. Mummies made of the corpses Red Dragonborn or of Dragon Sorcerers. Mummy bosses with magic items. And the like.

OK, so maybe mummies was the wrong word - enemies with damage type immunities where they face a party where only some of the PCs have access to multiple damage types therefore getting to use their versatility to deliver an overwhelming advantage in terms of damage.

I cant use a challenge of keeping a torch lit to burn the mummies, or having a source of fire to give away the party's position or any similar challenge when one or two members of the party can conjure fire out of their fingers when they need to.

I think your response does illustrate my point well though - as a DM you can make things work, as long as you bend your adventure round the mechanics rather than laying out the world as you want to descrbe it. I am not aying there are not ways round the issues, but rather that the issues are still there and the issue is that it forces you to do things in a particular way.

[Unoriginal]

OK, so maybe mummies was the wrong word - enemies with damage type immunities where they face a party where only some of the PCs have access to multiple damage types therefore getting to use their versatility to deliver an overwhelming advantage in terms of damage.

If it's just one fight or a few fights, then it's just one/a few fights where one character gets to show they're awesome for once.



I cant use a challenge of keeping a torch lit to burn the mummies, or having a source of fire to give away the party's position or any similar challenge when one or two members of the party can conjure fire out of their fingers when they need to.

That's more of having an issue with the D&D world than having an issue with the game's balance.



I think your response does illustrate my point well though - as a DM you can make things work, as long as you bend your adventure round the mechanics rather than laying out the world as you want to descrbe it. I am not aying there are not ways round the issues, but rather that the issues are still there and the issue is that it forces you to do things in a particular way.

I don't see how it's "bending your adventure round the mechanics" to have monsters use reasonable measures to counter something they know about.

Also, if you want to describe the world a certain way, it is a certain way. There is nothing that can force you to do anything. If it bothers you that casters have fire spells, then remove them from your setting. If you don't like teleportation, remove it from your setting. If you think Barbarians being empowered by rage is against the themes of the campaign, remove them.

Now of course, yes, the fact of playing 5e means that there are certain things inherent to the system and the world. AC 30 is a lot, you're expected to have magic, and the game uses a d20 for most of its tests, for example. But if you don't like those inherent things, it's more a question of not liking the system than of the system having a problem.

[MrStabby]

If it's just one fight or a few fights, then it's just one/a few fights where one character gets to show they're awesome for once.




I cant run mummies (as a theme, rather than a one off) as the sorcerer and wizard can do so much more damage with their ready access to fire damage.


This is what I meant by a theme. This is the mechanics of the game telling me I can't run the adventure I want to run.

More broadly, it isn't just one thing. Its pretty difficult to have a diverse range of vulnerabilities and not have casters with their many more modes of interaction be better able to exploit them than the other players. It isn't world ending, butit doesmean that if I am to make a balanced campaign I need to throw out a lot of the things I might want to do - my rangeof options is so much narrower.





I don't see how it's "bending your adventure round the mechanics" to have monsters use reasonable measures to counter something they know about.

The bending of the adventure is that it must be set in a world where magic is sufficiently common that people take steps to defend against it. Like in most settings people swinging pointy bits of metal about is common enough that NPCs might pick up some armour or a shield.

Enchantment spells like dominate person are able to be absolutely overpowered, unless peoplein the world are aware that the person giving orders might have been dominated.

Fireball is hugely damaging if enemies behave as if it is not part of the set of threats they expect to face and all clump up together.

The problem isn't smart enemies adapting - the problem is I need to create a world in which these things are sufficiently common that it is reasonable that they be adapted to.



Also, if you want to describe the world a certain way, it is a certain way. There is nothing that can force you to do anything. If it bothers you that casters have fire spells, then remove them from your setting. If you don't like teleportation, remove it from your setting. If you think Barbarians being empowered by rage is against the themes of the campaign, remove them.

This is a very reasonable point. Now I don't like to cut down on player options - especially as many of my players plan characters well in avance of knowing what the next campaign will be - but it can work. There are other downsides, like you can kind of give away the plot a bit of you say "OK, well radiant damage might be a bit OP in this campaign so I am not allowing any spells or abilities that do that".



Now of course, yes, the fact of playing 5e means that there are certain things inherent to the system and the world. AC 30 is a lot, you're expected to have magic, and the game uses a d20 for most of its tests, for example. But if you don't like those inherent things, it's more a question of not liking the system than of the system having a problem.

I don't see the difference between not likeing an aspect of the system and the system having a problem. A system is intended to do many things - one of which is to please me, one of which is to please the next person and another the person after and so on. It will fail at some of these and succeed at some of these things. If the system fails at some of these things it is a problem with the system - which isn't to say it is a bad system, and it isn't to say that it is reasonable to expect it to please everyone, but it is saying that there is at least one person who would be more pleased if there were some adjustments. This would solve a problem with the system (specifically that aspect which isn't pleasing me) but might make others worse (displeasing others). For a game played for fun, something that diminishes fun for some or all the players is a problem with the system.

[NorthernPhoenix]

would you use the same DC that is defined for Actor or Imposter?

No because i forgot those exist.

[Unoriginal]

This is what I meant by a theme. This is the mechanics of the game telling me I can't run the adventure I want to run.

[...]

The bending of the adventure is that it must be set in a world where magic is sufficiently common that people take steps to defend against it. Like in most settings people swinging pointy bits of metal about is common enough that NPCs might pick up some armour or a shield.

Enchantment spells like dominate person are able to be absolutely overpowered, unless peoplein the world are aware that the person giving orders might have been dominated.

Fireball is hugely damaging if enemies behave as if it is not part of the set of threats they expect to face and all clump up together.

The problem isn't smart enemies adapting - the problem is I need to create a world in which these things are sufficiently common that it is reasonable that they be adapted to.

Ah, I understand, now. But once again, it's not a question of rules having problems, it's a question of expectations the designers had about what D&D 5e was.

Yes, indeed, magic is very powerful in a world where it's rare enough that people don't prepare against it. But it is not the assumption for 5e, or for any D&D setting. The D&D ruleset presuppose a world where magic is not everywhere but still common enough to be somewhat known. Same way that D&D expect martials to be heroes capable of fighting dragons with pointy sticks and winning.


It's entirely possible that D&D 5e isn't a system that support the world you want, but it's not a problem with 5e, the same way that you can't fault a shovel for being a bad hammer.



I don't see the difference between not likeing an aspect of the system and the system having a problem.

I don't like wine. That doesn't mean wine has a problem, it means wine isn't matching with my tastes.



A system is intended to do many things - one of which is to please me, one of which is to please the next person and another the person after and so on. It will fail at some of these and succeed at some of these things.[QUOTE=MrStabby;24674000]

A game system isn't designed to please you, or me, or anyone specific. It's designed to work as intended and to please people with certain tastes. If you don't have those tastes, you won't like it, even if the system worked perfectly.

[QUOTE=MrStabby;24674000]
If the system fails at some of these things it is a problem with the system - which isn't to say it is a bad system, and it isn't to say that it is reasonable to expect it to please everyone, but it is saying that there is at least one person who would be more pleased if there were some adjustments. This would solve a problem with the system (specifically that aspect which isn't pleasing me) but might make others worse (displeasing others). For a game played for fun, something that diminishes fun for some or all the players is a problem with the system.

If the system promises something and then fails to deliver, then it's a problem with the system. Ex: an Avatar the Last Airbender RPG which doesn't ressemble the show it's supposedly based on.

If the system has something that should work a certain way, but doesn't because of badly thought out rule interactions or other mechanical issues, then there is a problem with the system. Ex: a class designed to be the tough-as-nail tanky type, but which ends up ridiculously fragile in comparison to all the other classes because they're the only class without defense against firearms, everyone can use firearms, and firearms bypass the class's resistance features.


But if the game delivers what it promised, and the mechanics work as intended (or even mostly, as no game design is perfect), but the players or GM don't like it because they prefer something else, then it's not a problem with the game. Ex: if there is a Conan RPG which both captures the universe and feel of the Conan stories, and is playable as is, but the gaming group don't like the feel or the setting of the Conan stories and would rather have a Renaissance-style court intrigue game, it's not the fault of the Conan RPG for not fitting.

Call of Chtulhu is not a good system for playing D&D-style heroic adventures, and D&D is not a good system to play Exalted-style adventures with absurdly overpowered demigod-like beings fighting the makers and the destroyers of the world as the average Tuesday.


Of course every DM and every group should tailor 5e to make it more to their tastes. It's even written in the rules to do so. But we also have to acknowledge it doesn't fit every stories and every settings, doesn't pretend it does, and that while you can tailor it, cutting, changing and replacing things to the point where it supports something it's not meant to is less practical than just playing a different game altogether. It's like having a shovel and going "alright, if I change the head of the shovel with a sickle's head, I'll be able to cut with it, then I just have to replace the shovel's handle with a sickle's handle so I can use it with one hand easily".

[Willie the Duck]

This is a minor point, but Minor Illusion can be used to perfectly replicate speech. It has been confirmed by Jeremy Crawford on twitter here (https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/693193549672636417?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw), and in the adventure Out of the Abyss, an NPC uses the spell to simulate several sentences. You may disagree that it should be able to do this, but it demonstrably can.
I don't think you will find many people caring about Crawford tweets. The OotA example is a good find though. However, it should be noted that the published adventures have routinely made decisions which, if taken as precedent, favor XYZ in ways DMs might consider not doing. Examples being things like Curse of Strahd giving out most PHB spells to any enterprising wizard who enters a certain room, or many of the in-adventure dungeons not fostering the 6-8 encounter challenge structure, etc.

[NaughtyTiger]

recently, minor illusion letting you replicate someone else's voice is allowable by RAW



If someone asks if they can replicate someone else voice "just because", it's RAW to say hmm, Charisma (Deception) DC 5, after all. Non-magic is way less codified.

So yes, you can make someone else's voice. But it has to be one discrete sound at a time. Actual talking...isn't this

That example isn't loosely worded, though, the spell explicitly says you can replicate someone's voice. As others have pointed out, though, replicating someone's voice after using a spell with verbal component isn't the same as replicating someone's speaking perfectly


so NorthernPheonix, Unoriginal and PheonixPhyre disagree about whether or not you can talk with Minor Illusion.
This means that the spell is worded loosely enough that 3 people can have MAJOR disagreement about the ability of the spell.

[Trafalgar]

This is a very bad DM. If the PCs are clearing your encounters too quickly, you make the encounters harder, not nerf their abilities. Nerfing abilities is only going to lead to hate and discontent.


The question is: does making the encounters harder or tougher have any real advantage than limiting player options if the net results are the same?

If I go to a player and say "I am lowering your max hp by 10 and changing that +2 sword you have into a +1 sword", that player is going to be unhappy even if it does re-balance the game. If I tweak the next encounter to have an extra orc or three or give a monster more hp, the players might not even know.

[NorthernPhoenix]

so NorthernPheonix, Unoriginal and PheonixPhyre disagree about whether or not you can talk with Minor Illusion.
This means that the spell is worded loosely enough that 3 people can have MAJOR disagreement about the ability of the spell.

Some spells are very loosely worded, i won't deny that. I just don't think the non-spell stuff is more constrained, i think it's even more loose, which can be a benefit if you want it to be.

[stoutstien]

If I go to a player and say "I am lowering your max hp by 10 and changing that +2 sword you have into a +1 sword", that player is going to be unhappy even if it does re-balance the game. If I tweak the next encounter to have an extra orc or three or give a monster more hp, the players might not even know.

I personally detest smoke and mirror style DMing. It completely guts the game of player agency and is the same as fudging rolls in the name of keeping a good story or whatever new nonsense people are using to rationalize screwing the other players over.

You want to see upset player? Let them find out that the +1 weapon they found just means all the enemies have extra AC and HP.

[Kyutaru]

I personally detest smoke and mirror style DMing. It completely guts the game of player agency and is the same as fudging rolls in the name of keeping a good story or whatever new nonsense people are using to rationalize screwing the other players over.

You want to see upset player? Let them find out that the +1 weapon they found just means all the enemies have extra AC and HP.
But that is how RPGs are made. Whether level 17 or level 48 you are fighting enemies whose health and damage have scaled to keep relevant to your own. By the end of Final Fantasy VIII you are facing enemies with over 50,000 hp purely because you can do 9999 dmg on your attacks. Much of the early game was spent with enemies who had 50 hp or 500 hp. In fact, the game specifically scales monsters according to your level too, so the monsters level up alongside the party. This isn't an act of removing player agency but one of preserving balance. CR already scales with the party, you always fight something appropriate to your level. The progression makes old enemies easier but introduces new enemies that are harder to compensate. It's all smoke and mirrors because the new enemies could have been the old enemies. Who's to say a Vampire has to be CR 13 instead of CR 17 or CR 6? There's nothing inherent about creatures that dictate their power levels beyond where their abilities might be appropriate for the party's. Yet one can easily create greater vampires that threaten even high level parties or lesser vampires that threaten low level ones. It's all part of the illusion that your level even matters and it's not all just DM discretion and control behind the curtain.

[NaughtyTiger]

I personally detest smoke and mirror style DMing. It completely guts the game of player agency and is the same as fudging rolls in the name of keeping a good story or whatever new nonsense people are using to rationalize screwing the other players over.

You want to see upset player? Let them find out that the +1 weapon they found just means all the enemies have extra AC and HP.

Whoa. Now you are conflating fudging die rolls with scaling encounters to account for the new capabilities of players.
As a player, I guarantee that ff I am rocking a flame sword, i want those extra 3d6 to do something...

[stoutstien]

But that is how RPGs are made. Whether level 17 or level 48 you are fighting enemies whose health and damage have scaled to keep relevant to your own. By the end of Final Fantasy VIII you are facing enemies with over 50,000 hp purely because you can do 9999 dmg on your attacks. Much of the early game was spent with enemies who had 50 hp or 500 hp. In fact, the game specifically scales monsters according to your level too, so the monsters level up alongside the party. This isn't an act of removing player agency but one of preserving balance. CR already scales with the party, you always fight something appropriate to your level. The progression makes old enemies easier but introduces new enemies that are harder to compensate. It's all smoke and mirrors because the new enemies could have been the old enemies. Who's to say a Vampire has to be CR 13 instead of CR 17 or CR 6? There's nothing inherent about creatures that dictate their power levels beyond where their abilities might be appropriate for the party's. Yet one can easily create greater vampires that threaten even high level parties or lesser vampires that threaten low level ones. It's all part of the illusion that your level even matters and it's not all just DM discretion and control behind the curtain.

there is a big difference between a party facing bigger and more challenging threats as they progress versus changing encounters because you gave the party a wand of fireballs but realize they can use it to wipe out every encounter you have planned so you add more encounters.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I don't think you will find many people caring about Crawford tweets. The OotA example is a good find though. However, it should be noted that the published adventures have routinely made decisions which, if taken as precedent, favor XYZ in ways DMs might consider not doing. Examples being things like Curse of Strahd giving out most PHB spells to any enterprising wizard who enters a certain room, or many of the in-adventure dungeons not fostering the 6-8 encounter challenge structure, etc.

Two things--

I totally agree that using published adventures as official precedent isn't the best. They do tend to have very particular ideas and styles (based on who is writing them). Better to think of them as "this is one (meta)-DM's take on this. It's homebrew, just officially packaged.

But (as a pet peeve), the 6-8 encounter challenge structure isn't a thing. No matter how many times people want to force it. That's not what the DMG says, nor (by word of JC) is how the game was designed. Those numbers in that "Adventuring Day Budget" table came as after-the-fact reconstructions based on what play-test parties found was the maximum they could do safely. With some margin for error built in. Those numbers are entirely a "if you push past this point, you're likely[0] to see difficulty go non-linear" warning threshold. Not an expectation. Not a design requirement or assumption.

[0] assuming a baseline[1] party with average luck and a small modicum of tactics.
[1] no variants (including feats or multiclassing), no combat-effective magic items, no significant optimization.

[Kyutaru]

there is a big difference between a party facing bigger and more challenging threats as they progress versus changing encounters because you gave the party a wand of fireballs but realize they can use it to wipe out every encounter you have planned so you add more encounters.
Why do you believe that? Spell access already indicates otherwise, with new spells allowing you to destroy previous encounters yet have less effect on the newer challenges. You face poisonous creatures then get access to the neutralize poison spell. You face energy-draining beasties then get access to restoration. You deal with hordes of weaklings with low health then get access to fireball. You begin facing death effects and get access to death ward. The capabilities of the party have always dictated the encounters they find challenging or appropriate. This was how Gygax setup his campaign and how future RPGs mimicked the pattern. If the DM gives you a fireball wand then he's giving you a way to easily trivialize the encounters you have had up until now but then introduces encounters that are not made easy with AOE fire damage. This is how the power scale goes in this genre. Your toys are short lived and something that is Immune to Death effects is sure to be on the way shortly after getting access to Death effects.

[Unoriginal]

If you think there are several readings for a spell, you gotta ask yourself: is one of the readings more powerful than the scope of the spell?


Some people believe that since Mordenkainen's Faithful Hound can attack beings who are hostile to the caster, it means the Hound is a mind reader capable of detecting all hostile desires and that it attacks any creature that wishes harm on the caster regardless if they're acting non-hostile, if they're under a disguise or transformed into someone the caster wouldn't consider hostile, if they've fooled the caster into thinking they're a true friends for years, etc. Pick anyone, put them next to the Hound, and it'll tell you if that person wants harm to happen to you by biting them.

I don't subscribe to that interpretation, and think it's far too powerful for a 4th level spell designed to be a barking alarm system that deals damage if the caster is in clear danger, mostly useful to guard the camp during a long rest.

It's not "don't give the spells extra powers because everything is 100% clear and can't be read any other way", it's "don't give the spells extra powers if you think giving the casters an Easy Mode button isn't fun".

[PhoenixPhyre]

If you think there are several readings for a spell, you gotta ask yourself: is one of the readings more powerful than the scope of the spell?


Some people believe that since Mordenkainen's Faithful Hound can attack beings who are hostile to the caster, it means the Hound is a mind reader capable of detecting all hostile desires and that it attacks any creature that wishes harm on the caster regardless if they're acting non-hostile, if they're under a disguise or transformed into someone the caster wouldn't consider hostile, if they've fooled the caster into thinking they're a true friends for years, etc. Pick anyone, put them next to the Hound, and it'll tell you if that person wants harm to happen to you by biting them.

I don't subscribe to that interpretation, and think it's far too powerful for a 4th level spell designed to be a barking alarm system that deals damage if the caster is in clear danger, mostly useful to guard the camp during a long rest.

It's not "don't give the spells extra powers because everything is 100% clear and can't be read any other way", it's "don't give the spells extra powers if you think giving the casters an Easy Mode button isn't fun".

Agreed. If there are multiple interpretations, choose the one that is the least broken. Use other effects of similar levels (or accessed at similar levels) as comparisons. A 2nd level spell shouldn't be able to do what a 7th level spell can do. And even one second level spell shouldn't be able to replace another--an example of this is phantasmal force. I've heard lots of people say that by making it look like a blindfold you can impose the Blinded condition on someone in addition to the damage dealt. But that's covered by blindness/deafness. If you go with that interpretation, then no one should ever prepare blindness/deafness, when they can get the same effect, but better with phantasmal force.

So if an interpretation makes a spell equal to or better than a higher-level class feature or even completely obviates another similar level trait, spell, or ability, then it's a bad reading and you should prefer a different one. Even if both are plausible based on the text.

[Trafalgar]

I personally detest smoke and mirror style DMing. It completely guts the game of player agency and is the same as fudging rolls in the name of keeping a good story or whatever new nonsense people are using to rationalize screwing the other players over.

You want to see upset player? Let them find out that the +1 weapon they found just means all the enemies have extra AC and HP.

How is making an encounter more difficult the same as fudging a die roll? If your players go up in level, you are supposed to make the encounters more difficult. This is how the game is designed.

On the flip side, if the party repeatedly TPKs, you need to look at how you are designing encounters and make sure they are fair. This is, like, DMing 101 stuff.

My point is, changing a character sheet against a player's will should never be done. It's a good way to lose all your players.

[Eldariel]

Agreed. If there are multiple interpretations, choose the one that is the least broken. Use other effects of similar levels (or accessed at similar levels) as comparisons. A 2nd level spell shouldn't be able to do what a 7th level spell can do. And even one second level spell shouldn't be able to replace another--an example of this is phantasmal force. I've heard lots of people say that by making it look like a blindfold you can impose the Blinded condition on someone in addition to the damage dealt. But that's covered by blindness/deafness. If you go with that interpretation, then no one should ever prepare blindness/deafness, when they can get the same effect, but better with phantasmal force.

That's apples and oranges though. Blindness/Deafness and Phantasmal Force differ in four huge aspects:
- Blindness doesn't take Concentration
- Blindness lacks an additional clause to end the effect with a check as opposed to save (Phantasmal Force has the Investigation check)
- Blindness can multitarget while Phantasmal Force basically has no upcast functionality
- Blindness can't deal damage

So that's a completely invalid comparison, like most comparisons of this kind people try to fancy up. Generally people stop at a surface level similarity without actually scrutinising the mechanics and their inevitable repercussions properly. In fact, I'd much rather prepare Blindness than Phantasmal Force regardless of your PF reading already just because Blindness can multitarget.


Similarly, people often complain that Minor Illusion blocking line of sight somehow steps on Blindness's toes even though Blindness has a duration while Minor Illusion is generally defeated by moving 5'. They're such different effects that there's no point in the comparison.

Which is why you just don't use Illusions with DMs who are going to nerf them to uselessness (which feels a bit silly to me since even with the most permissive readings, illusions are still the least reliable of spells simply because they all come with built-in defeat/failure mechanisms and a number of enemies have outright immunity through True Sight, or near-immunity through senses not fooled by Illusions).

[MrStabby]

Agreed. If there are multiple interpretations, choose the one that is the least broken. Use other effects of similar levels (or accessed at similar levels) as comparisons. A 2nd level spell shouldn't be able to do what a 7th level spell can do. And even one second level spell shouldn't be able to replace another--an example of this is phantasmal force. I've heard lots of people say that by making it look like a blindfold you can impose the Blinded condition on someone in addition to the damage dealt. But that's covered by blindness/deafness. If you go with that interpretation, then no one should ever prepare blindness/deafness, when they can get the same effect, but better with phantasmal force.

So if an interpretation makes a spell equal to or better than a higher-level class feature or even completely obviates another similar level trait, spell, or ability, then it's a bad reading and you should prefer a different one. Even if both are plausible based on the text.

So this is something that I think is closely balanced - I don't so much have a problem with the blindfold thing - that is a 2nd level non concentration spells vs a 2nd level concentration spell. It seems about the right power level. Where I do have an issue is with something like restraining them - can you have them sense manacles on themselves? Again, yes... sure, but that won't stop reflexive movement made involountarily.

When we look at chosing an interpretation of the spell we absolutely should ask what interpretation is most in line with other spells of the same class and level. So Phantasmal Force should be a similar power to Blindness, Hold Person, levitate etc.. If you don't allow some kind of controll effect - either by an explicit condition or a reasonably generous interpretation of what it can do then it is just doing d6 damage per turn which is far, far below what a 2nd level concentration spell should be doing.

[NaughtyTiger]

Agreed. If there are multiple interpretations, choose the one that is the least broken. Use other effects of similar levels (or accessed at similar levels) as comparisons. A 2nd level spell shouldn't be able to do what a 7th level spell can do. And even one second level spell shouldn't be able to replace another--an example of this is phantasmal force. I've heard lots of people say that by making it look like a blindfold you can impose the Blinded condition on someone in addition to the damage dealt. But that's covered by blindness/deafness. If you go with that interpretation, then no one should ever prepare blindness/deafness, when they can get the same effect, but better with phantasmal force.

So if an interpretation makes a spell equal to or better than a higher-level class feature or even completely obviates another similar level trait, spell, or ability, then it's a bad reading and you should prefer a different one. Even if both are plausible based on the text.

Phantasmal Force specifically discusses falling off a bridge into a chasm, are you contending that the target can still see all the creatures 100 ft up? I don't think that is your argument.

You are moving away from "Basically encouraging "creative" solutions using magic well beyond what the written spells say they do" is bad,
toward "interpreting or ignoring what the written spells say they do in favor of balance"
This I completely agree with.

[Segev]

I cant use a challenge of keeping a torch lit to burn the mummies, or having a source of fire to give away the party's position or any similar challenge when one or two members of the party can conjure fire out of their fingers when they need to.


This sounds more like you just don’t want magic in the hands of the party. I’m not trying to be snarky, here, but this isn’t really something that is unique to D&D as an obstacle to that specific scenario.

That said, you can make that a challenge: provide the torches as means for the non-casters to fight effectively, and establish that soaked torches won’t relight, and they still need to keep them dry.

The concern about a light source is less if they can just relight dry torches, but that’s an extra action. Sure, the wizard with fire bolt is ready for each fight, but is he really going to be enough?

[NaughtyTiger]

there is a big difference between a party facing bigger and more challenging threats as they progress versus changing encounters because you gave the party a wand of fireballs but realize they can use it to wipe out every encounter you have planned so you add more encounters.

There is not a big difference between "a party facing bigger and more challenging threats as they progress" vs "a party facing bigger and more challenging threats [aka changing encounters] because you gave the party a wand of fireballs [aka as they progress]"

Unless you are saying that giving a non-magic martial a magic weapon is not progression. That is a whole other thing.

[Zanos]

But that is how RPGs are made. Whether level 17 or level 48 you are fighting enemies whose health and damage have scaled to keep relevant to your own. By the end of Final Fantasy VIII you are facing enemies with over 50,000 hp purely because you can do 9999 dmg on your attacks. Much of the early game was spent with enemies who had 50 hp or 500 hp. In fact, the game specifically scales monsters according to your level too, so the monsters level up alongside the party. This isn't an act of removing player agency but one of preserving balance. CR already scales with the party, you always fight something appropriate to your level. The progression makes old enemies easier but introduces new enemies that are harder to compensate. It's all smoke and mirrors because the new enemies could have been the old enemies. Who's to say a Vampire has to be CR 13 instead of CR 17 or CR 6?
You don't replace all the goblins lurking outside a 40 person hamlet with super goblins jacked up on designer steroids and possessed by demons just because the party is higher level. The party should organically encounter more difficult foes because the scope of their goals change, not because reality bends around them so they always fight foes that are approximately their level.


There's nothing inherent about creatures that dictate their power levels beyond where their abilities might be appropriate for the party's.
What? Yes there absolutely is. An ancient lich is more dangerous than an apprentice wizard. A massive dragon is more dangerous than a kobold. A pit fiend is more dangerous than a lemure. A level 20 party shouldn't be randomly attacked by any of the former creatures just by walking down a well traveled path.


Yet one can easily create greater vampires that threaten even high level parties or lesser vampires that threaten low level ones. It's all part of the illusion that your level even matters and it's not all just DM discretion and control behind the curtain.
I mean, you could, but I'd balk pretty hard at the setting implications of, say, a 'lesser lich' that's an appropriate challenge for a first level party.

[Willie the Duck]

But (as a pet peeve), the 6-8 encounter challenge structure isn't a thing. No matter how many times people want to force it. That's not what the DMG says, nor (by word of JC) is how the game was designed. Those numbers in that "Adventuring Day Budget" table came as after-the-fact reconstructions based on what play-test parties found was the maximum they could do safely. With some margin for error built in. Those numbers are entirely a "if you push past this point, you're likely[0] to see difficulty go non-linear" warning threshold. Not an expectation. Not a design requirement or assumption.

Good lord. I was just looking for a term which everyone would understand. Yes, you are correct that there isn't some requirement that all days adhere to it. It does, however, vaguely approach the point where the LR and SR type classes both feel like they have contributed yet felt constrained. Regardless, my actual point was that --given the difficulty that many seem to have (if they care to at all) towards fitting enough encounters (and short rests) into a day to make the martials and warlocks and such feel like their PCs contribute at a rate similar to the LR-casters -- it would be advantageous if the published adventures made a greater effort to map to something along those lines... and their not doing so a reason to consider them, as you say, one (meta)-DM's take on things (and perhaps not even one someone should try to emulate).

[PhoenixPhyre]

Good lord. I was just looking for a term which everyone would understand. Yes, you are correct that there isn't some requirement that all days adhere to it. It does, however, vaguely approach the point where the LR and SR type classes both feel like they have contributed yet felt constrained. Regardless, my actual point was that --given the difficulty that many seem to have (if they care to at all) towards fitting enough encounters (and short rests) into a day to make the martials and warlocks and such feel like their PCs contribute at a rate similar to the LR-casters -- it would be advantageous if the published adventures made a greater effort to map to something along those lines... and their not doing so a reason to consider them, as you say, one (meta)-DM's take on things (and perhaps not even one someone should try to emulate).

As I noted, that's a pet peeve of mine. I get irritated when people try to make it seem like the game was designed around a specific number of encounters when it wasn't and the evidence from the DMG even says otherwise. Plus that that number was a ball-parked summation of a table, for the case where all the encounters are Medium (no, not Hard like it says). The median (across the levels) number of Hard encounters per Adventuring Budget day is somewhere around 4.X, depending on exactly where you put the breakpoint. But not 6 (and certainly not 8) except at a single level where it hits 5.9 or so.

So basically you hit one of my personal trigger phrases. Nothing more.

A better measure would be rounds of combat. The balance point seems to be (based on reverse engineering) an assumption that most people will be able to use their "big guns" about half the time. So having a big concentration spell active for half the rounds of combat in a day. Being able to use a smite half the rounds per day, using about half the spell slots. Being able to be in rage about half the rounds per day. Etc.

[MrStabby]

This sounds more like you just don’t want magic in the hands of the party. I’m not trying to be snarky, here, but this isn’t really something that is unique to D&D as an obstacle to that specific scenario.

That said, you can make that a challenge: provide the torches as means for the non-casters to fight effectively, and establish that soaked torches won’t relight, and they still need to keep them dry.

The concern about a light source is less if they can just relight dry torches, but that’s an extra action. Sure, the wizard with fire bolt is ready for each fight, but is he really going to be enough?

It's not that I never want magic, its just that I am denied the choice if I want to play a certain type of game or use certain enemies. Maybe I just have experience of bad tables where players will complain if I field a mummy and they don't do double damage with their firebolts.

[PhoenixPhyre]

It's not that I never want magic, its just that I am denied the choice if I want to play a certain type of game or use certain enemies. Maybe I just have experience of bad tables where players will complain if I field a mummy and they don't do double damage with their firebolts.

This is one place where I'm really really grateful for my players. I've played with lots of players, 90% of them brand new, over the last 6 years or so. Simply warning them that "my world is largely custom, things may not be what you expect" was enough to remove all that meta-thinking. OK, my nephews (my most recent group) all memorized most of the monster manual and could identify things from a basic description, but they were fine with me switching things up and never focused on the actual mechanics.

I've never had anyone seriously try to murder-hobo, I've never had any "I'm a loner edge-lord" characters, all the characters have been reasonably well suited for working together (and when they weren't, they changed the issues without fighting), and I've never had any obvious cheaters or rules-lawyers/meta-game-mechanics or lore-nerds.

It's been a blessed existence so far.

[MrStabby]

This is one place where I'm really really grateful for my players. I've played with lots of players, 90% of them brand new, over the last 6 years or so. Simply warning them that "my world is largely custom, things may not be what you expect" was enough to remove all that meta-thinking. OK, my nephews (my most recent group) all memorized most of the monster manual and could identify things from a basic description, but they were fine with me switching things up and never focused on the actual mechanics.

I've never had anyone seriously try to murder-hobo, I've never had any "I'm a loner edge-lord" characters, all the characters have been reasonably well suited for working together (and when they weren't, they changed the issues without fighting), and I've never had any obvious cheaters or rules-lawyers/meta-game-mechanics or lore-nerds.

It's been a blessed existence so far.

It does sound like I am doing my players a bit of a disservice here. They are generally really great and not complainey at all, but despite similar warnings from me they still have certain expectations toget past. I think some are deep - goblins are weak, zombies are dumb - things I wouldn't change without notification, but others I have felt free to be flexible on and it has been unexpected to my players.

[NaughtyTiger]

You don't replace all the goblins lurking outside a 40 person hamlet with super goblins jacked up on designer steroids and possessed by demons just because the party is higher level. The party should organically encounter more difficult foes because the scope of their goals change, not because reality bends around them so they always fight foes that are approximately their level.


What? Yes there absolutely is. An ancient lich is more dangerous than an apprentice wizard. A massive dragon is more dangerous than a kobold. A pit fiend is more dangerous than a lemure. A level 20 party shouldn't be randomly attacked by any of the former creatures just by walking down a well traveled path.


I mean, you could, but I'd balk pretty hard at the setting implications of, say, a 'lesser lich' that's an appropriate challenge for a first level party.

I will just note that your response is taking Kyutaru's out of context and unfairly distorting it.

[NaughtyTiger]

Simply warning them that "my world is largely custom, things may not be what you expect" was enough to remove all that meta-thinking.

i miss not knowing that fire keeps a troll from regenerating when i start over with a level 1 toon... the meta ruins the discovery aspect.

[Fnissalot]

i miss not knowing that fire keeps a troll from regenerating when i start over with a level 1 toon... the meta ruins the discovery aspect.

Yeah! Knowing too much changes the experience! I guess we could write rules for monsters that are random similar to how some magical items in earlier editions had random properties that you roll once the item appears? Colville did a video on how the old hand of Vecna was unique for each game. Writing rules that allow for unique monsters could work as well. I my setting trolls regenerate without fire damage but in yours you could have rolled that they have a chance to grow an extra arm when they are wounded giving them more attacks, while a third person could roll that they are healed from fire damage. The chimera in Mythic Odysseys of theros was similar to that and one of the more inspiring monsters in the book. You can randomize each part of it, changing what it can do.

Edit: or play monster hunters and use that knowledge as a part of your character. " I am Sir Montgomery McMonty, Trollbane of the Trollslayers, and I assure you that fire is the way to go when dealing with these vigorous trolls, so don't just stand there and bring the torches squire!

[PhoenixPhyre]

i miss not knowing that fire keeps a troll from regenerating when i start over with a level 1 toon... the meta ruins the discovery aspect.

I don't. Because I don't find that kind of "puzzle monster" entertaining or meaningful at all. I feel the same way about actual puzzles. Too often they rely on things that are "obvious" to the DM but not to anyone else or are completely immersion-breaking.

I'm a fan of giving lots of information and then watching what people do with that information. Of making it so they have to knowingly choose between sub-optimal options. With the possibility of finding an unexpected 3rd way that actually gives them everything they want left wide open. I've actually intentionally set up my campaigns so that everyone has (by default, unless they explicitly disclaim the knowledge) a basic knowledge of the more common monster types. Something like (standard) trolls and fire? Absolutely. Ok...now how do they use that information? Do they remember? How do they find fire? And more so, I'm not going to just throw a situation where a single troll (or even group of trolls) is the primary challenge. They'll be mixed in with other things. Does the wizard firebolt the downed troll or fireball the horde of goblins?

In my experience, DMs lean way too far on the side of restricting information that the characters would reasonably have if they haven't been shut-ins their entire life. Puzzles or challenges that rely on the DM not telling people obvious things are poor challenges, in my opinion. Without information there is no agency. There's just trial and error and frustration.

[NaughtyTiger]

I don't. Because I don't find that kind of "puzzle monster" entertaining or meaningful at all.

we like different aspects of gaming.

[stoutstien]

I think puzzle monsters can still be included regardless of what meta knowledge you know as long as they're handled correctly. it's not the fact that fire is going to be very effective against the troll that's the new puzzle as how much how you get it out of the marshy area where it spends its time submerged and ambushing travelers. shambling mound aren't that big of an issue unless you got a druid using call lightning to heal them while simultaneously zapping you.

[Segev]

It's not that I never want magic, its just that I am denied the choice if I want to play a certain type of game or use certain enemies. Maybe I just have experience of bad tables where players will complain if I field a mummy and they don't do double damage with their firebolts.

I suppose I should rephrase: It sounds like you sometimes want to run a game that isn't D&D. One where there are no casters, and magic is something rare, or at least obtained by means other than, well, casting spells. It's in items, or in rituals, or otherwise more of a plot macguffin thing than a tool the PCs can use to their own design.

There's nothing wrong with that, and I'm not saying "you shouldn't play D&D at all." I'm just saying that "I want to run a game where the fire has to be carefully protected and is a risk factor for stealth because mummies are hard-to-impossible to kill without it, and nobody has easy access to it," is not really playing to D&D's strengths. The assumption that a party will have at least one, probably two or more spellcasters, and that at least one will have some sort of ready-to-hand fire damage, is pretty thoroughly engrained in 5e. Fire is the most common damage type, and the iconic 4-man party is fighter/mage/cleric/rogue. While none of those are critical in 5e, you'll probably still see something close to that if you squint at most parties.

It would take almost deliberate effort to make sure the mage and the cleric do not have fire to hand. And I know that's your complaint, but it's simply not what D&D is meant to emulate. World of Darkness, especially using mortals or nWoD's Innocents, would serve you a lot better, here, I think.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I think puzzle monsters can still be included regardless of what meta knowledge you know as long as they're handled correctly. it's not the fact that fire is going to be very effective against the troll that's the new puzzle as how much how you get it out of the marshy area where it spends its time submerged and ambushing travelers. shambling mound aren't that big of an issue unless you got a druid using call lightning to heal them while simultaneously zapping you.

Agreed. For me, it's like simple traps. If they're all by themselves and knowing the solution (or knowing the trap is there) is enough to eliminate the challenge, then it's not a well-designed challenge. I like obvious traps...that can't simply be disarmed or walked past once you know they're there. Often as part of the terrain for a bigger fight, or where bypassing them itself causes other consequences.


we like different aspects of gaming.

It does appear to be so. And that's totally fine--the game is big enough for both styles (as long as neither tries to force our preferred style on the other).

Which does lead to a personal rant.

I strongly dislike when people say "I don't like X about the game, so that means the game is bad". They don't usually say it in that many words, but that's what they seem to mean. "Things I like" and "things that are good" (or the contrapositives[0]) are not identical sets. I like some things that are bad (a lot of shonen anime, for instance). I don't like some things that are (objectively) good. Lots of things that are perfectly fine just aren't to my taste. Horror movies, for instance. Or sports movies (or sports in general). I don't like it when people insist that the game (in this context) has to bend to their preferred style or its wrong. Basically, de gustibas non est disputandum (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_gustibus_non_est_disputandum).

[Kyutaru]

I suppose I should rephrase: It sounds like you sometimes want to run a game that isn't D&D. One where there are no casters, and magic is something rare, or at least obtained by means other than, well, casting spells. It's in items, or in rituals, or otherwise more of a plot macguffin thing than a tool the PCs can use to their own design.
I wouldn't go that far. Early D&D was very much such a magic deprived experience and players jumped for joy at receiving a +1 dagger. 5E has somewhat restored such enthusiasm over the days of 3E where they were chump change abused by wealth stat rules. It was only settings like the Forgotten Realms that were magic rich and capable of attending to all needs through simple spells. The DMG even had examples of healers being rare or nonexistent because there simply weren't any other clerics as high level as the party was. It certainly made excellent sense when the level cap was effectively 6-9 in ancient days but carried over to future books too as the gritty realism campaign setting. Only the party's heroes were special and capable of being the heroes the world needs, brought together by fate specifically because of their extraordinary abilities. Today with the level range and magical NPCs of all kinds of levels it may seem like stretching reality but it remains a valid option for the world and the source material is balanced assuming no magic items at all are awarded to the party. You can play D&D using starting equipment only because it's structured under the assumption that magic items are not required. Frankly, not doing so makes the heroes seem like one of many and not special at all.

[Segev]

I wouldn't go that far. Early D&D was very much such a magic deprived experience and players jumped for joy at receiving a +1 dagger. 5E has somewhat restored such enthusiasm over the days of 3E where they were chump change abused by wealth stat rules. It was only settings like the Forgotten Realms that were magic rich and capable of attending to all needs through simple spells. The DMG even had examples of healers being rare or nonexistent because there simply weren't any other clerics as high level as the party was. It certainly made excellent sense when the level cap was effectively 6-9 in ancient days but carried over to future books too as the gritty realism campaign setting. Only the party's heroes were special and capable of being the heroes the world needs, brought together by fate specifically because of their extraordinary abilities. Today with the level range and magical NPCs of all kinds of levels it may seem like stretching reality but it remains a valid option for the world and the source material is balanced assuming no magic items at all are awarded to the party. You can play D&D using starting equipment only because it's structured under the assumption that magic items are not required. Frankly, not doing so makes the heroes seem like one of many and not special at all.

The issue that I am seeing in the specific complaint, though - which I take to be emblematic of a broader discontent - is one of casters vs. non-, with casters ruining the kind of game desired. And that's not fixed with "magic item rarity" being increased.

[Kyutaru]

The issue that I am seeing in the specific complaint, though - which I take to be emblematic of a broader discontent - is one of casters vs. non-, with casters ruining the kind of game desired. And that's not fixed with "magic item rarity" being increased.
Truly, though if D&D requires wizards and clerics but does not require fighters and rogues then that's a problem. It should very much be considerable to have a campaign where magic casters are rare or nonexistent. The DM has to ensure the challenges he throws against the party are sufficiently doable without depending on spells which magic item rarity being increased may actually solve. They're just replicating spells after all, +1 dagger is like having permanent Bless.

[Unoriginal]

Truly, though if D&D requires wizards and clerics but does not require fighters and rogues then that's a problem. It should very much be considerable to have a campaign where magic casters are rare or nonexistent. The DM has to ensure the challenges he throws against the party are sufficiently doable without depending on spells which magic item rarity being increased may actually solve. They're just replicating spells after all, +1 dagger is like having permanent Bless.

The situation in question isn't "DM has troubles making challenges that are doable without magic", it's "DM wants to run a Mummy adventure doable without magic but the fact that casters can throw fire from their hands gives them too much of an advantage, and DM think it's forcing their hand".

[Segev]

Truly, though if D&D requires wizards and clerics but does not require fighters and rogues then that's a problem. It should very much be considerable to have a campaign where magic casters are rare or nonexistent. The DM has to ensure the challenges he throws against the party are sufficiently doable without depending on spells which magic item rarity being increased may actually solve. They're just replicating spells after all, +1 dagger is like having permanent Bless.

Where did I say it could be run without rogues and fighters? I said it isn't really D&D if you're insisting that it must lack mages and clerics.

Whether it can run without fighters and rogues is a separate issue; I disagree and think it doesn't work very well without them, and won't feel much like D&D, either.

[Eldariel]

Where did I say it could be run without rogues and fighters? I said it isn't really D&D if you're insisting that it must lack mages and clerics.

Whether it can run without fighters and rogues is a separate issue; I disagree and think it doesn't work very well without them, and won't feel much like D&D, either.

I dunno, in this edition neither of those classes actually does anything special. That is, there is no subset of skills unique to either class other than "deal damage in a certain way" (Sneak Attack, Extra Attack) both of which are replicable through millions of other means. Far as having their class identity trodden upon, Rogue basically gets mostly blanked by backgrounds granting access to any skills and then Expertise being accessible through magic and Bards and feats. Meanwhile, as attacking a bunch of times is just one of the ways to do a decent amount of damage, Fighters' shtick is basically being one among many in harming things with a certain level of efficiency. Far as the least irreplaceable classes in the game, I think both are at the bottom.

Even Barbarian (though their tankiness can be replicated via shapechanging easily enough, but that's more rare than what replicates what Fighter/Rogue can do), Ranger (their wilderness stuff is fringe but it's unique) and Monk (only non-magical stun proper with quad application) have abillities more difficult to replicate for the higher powered classes. Then Paladin veritably has irreplicable abilities in their auras and then you get to casters proper who have 9 tiers of irreplicable or almost irreplicable abilities.

[Kyutaru]

The situation in question isn't "DM has troubles making challenges that are doable without magic", it's "DM wants to run a Mummy adventure doable without magic but the fact that casters can throw fire from their hands gives them too much of an advantage, and DM think it's forcing their hand".
I'm aware of this and that situation was not my objection but the statement that not having casters and magic being rare would be a game that isn't D&D. Especially given that the original material for the game had wizards as exceedingly rare and fighters/rogues made up the bulk of a party. Settings can fluctuate one way to another for sure but the game works even devoid of magic. Likewise, the spell and magical item sections are mere indexes of options rather than what the world actually contains. One does not assume an entire dictionary's catalogue is to be used in every novel.

Campaign settings are what lend the flavor of class availability and magical dispersion and D&D has many to choose from. Curse of Strahd practically hands out magic spells while Dragonlance finds wizards to be in very short supply. Much of the game borrows from Lord of the Rings where there are a handful of magic users in all of existence while Greyhawk was created to be a low magic world where it was powerful but rare. While only mentioned related to psionics so far, when Dark Sun releases it too will be a world of few wizards because magic is reviled. It's entirely plausible to have a game where no one is allowed to play a wizard and it'd still be D&D.

[Miele]

I played both low and high magic worlds, I can easily say that for us low magic was more challenging and a lot easier to DM. Giving a very limited spell selection to players seems unfair and/or unfun, but it makes things easier for everyone at the table. Usually the biggest problems are the divine casters, because they hold the solution to the biggest threats: wounds, downed state and ultimately death.

If the stars will align, I'll start a new campaign in a couple months, probably going for a heavily modified Descent into Avernus, so standard FR magic pack, but I was going to see if the group will accept a spell-less composition. I hope they'll be okay with it, especially if we manage to find something thematic for the group background (all barbarians would be gold!).
Else I'll see if we can avoid divine casters :grin:

[Segev]

I dunno, in this edition neither of those classes actually does anything special. That is, there is no subset of skills unique to either class other than "deal damage in a certain way" (Sneak Attack, Extra Attack) both of which are replicable through millions of other means. Far as having their class identity trodden upon, Rogue basically gets mostly blanked by backgrounds granting access to any skills and then Expertise being accessible through magic and Bards and feats. Meanwhile, as attacking a bunch of times is just one of the ways to do a decent amount of damage, Fighters' shtick is basically being one among many in harming things with a certain level of efficiency. Far as the least irreplaceable classes in the game, I think both are at the bottom.

Even Barbarian (though their tankiness can be replicated via shapechanging easily enough, but that's more rare than what replicates what Fighter/Rogue can do), Ranger (their wilderness stuff is fringe but it's unique) and Monk (only non-magical stun proper with quad application) have abillities more difficult to replicate for the higher powered classes. Then Paladin veritably has irreplicable abilities in their auras and then you get to casters proper who have 9 tiers of irreplicable or almost irreplicable abilities.

While Expertise is replicable, Rogues have easiest access to it. Arcane Tricksters have unique tricks nobody else gets with mage hand. Thieves and assassins are kinda disappointing, though, yeah.

Fighters get Action Surge, which is flat-out amazing, and one of my biggest disappointments in 5e is that the Battle Master's martial initiation toolkit hasn't been expanded upon and expanded to other subclasses.

[Eldariel]

While Expertise is replicable, Rogues have easiest access to it. Arcane Tricksters have unique tricks nobody else gets with mage hand. Thieves and assassins are kinda disappointing, though, yeah.

Fighters get Action Surge, which is flat-out amazing, and one of my biggest disappointments in 5e is that the Battle Master's martial initiation toolkit hasn't been expanded upon and expanded to other subclasses.

While true, I just don't find that enough. Both of those things are accessible with 2 levels in the class (3 for Mage Hand - though I don't think the Mage Hand tricks really amount to that much), and the class ceased receiving interesting and useful stuff with levels. Rogue a bit less terrible in this sense as they at least have Reliable Talent on 11, which is a genuinely useful ability, but otherwise it's just sad.

I completely agree, Battle Master is just a massive lost opportunity and both classes in general could just afford to get way more stuff over their careers and especially something to look forward to beyond Tier 1.