Worst 5e Book

[5eNeedsDarksun]

So I find most of the 5e published material fairly solid. There are things I would do differently, but for the most part I haven't bought something and thought, "They really phoned that one in", with one exception.

The Monster Manual is just a lazy effort. There is very little lore about the monsters, in some cases no descriptions, and you are often left wondering what would be typical society or numbers for these creatures. There isn't even an index where you can look up a monster by name, so if you (for example) can't remember that an Arcanaloth fits under a class of monsters called Yugoloths there is absolutely no way to find it without flipping through the entire book.

Given that there have been numerous superior attempts before 5e I just find the whole thing inexcusable and I give it an 'F'. There just isn't a passing grade I could give.
Thoughts?

[Libertad]

Does 3rd party count? If so, I did a review a while ago for 5e: HARDCORE MODE (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?611882-Let-s-Read-5e-HARDCORE-MODE) whose rules variants break the game in some pretty basic ways.

[Avonar]

So I find most of the 5e published material fairly solid. There are things I would do differently, but for the most part I haven't bought something and thought, "They really phoned that one in", with one exception.

The Monster Manual is just a lazy effort. There is very little lore about the monsters, in some cases no descriptions, and you are often left wondering what would be typical society or numbers for these creatures. There isn't even an index where you can look up a monster by name, so if you (for example) can't remember that an Arcanaloth fits under a class of monsters called Yugoloths there is absolutely no way to find it without flipping through the entire book.

Given that there have been numerous superior attempts before 5e I just find the whole thing inexcusable and I give it an 'F'. There just isn't a passing grade I could give.
Thoughts?

I'm confused here. There very much is an index in the Monster Manual that does exactly what you want it to do.

As for the lore, I've always been content with how much is provided. Granted, Volo's and Mordenkainen's are superior into just how much detail they go into but it makes sense, they can't have pages of lore for each creature when they need to include a lot of creatures.

Personally I think the worst book they've released is Princes of the Apocalypse. I was interesting in DMing this for friends, but the book is bad. The story behind the adventure is good but the setup and layout, no. It's supposedly a sandbox where players can go wherever they like, but there is a specific order to do things in. It's entirely possible to end up somewhere your party is vastly underlevelled for and for it to kill them. And a few of the plot hooks seem to come from random encounters which I didn't like either. Overall, I figured that if I was going to run it as a campaign I would have had to rewrite/rearrange half of it to form something fun and coherent, and for a published adventure that's a failing.

[Toadkiller]

The Monster Manual really isn’t a lore book. It’s a here is a variety of adversaries to get you started book. There is a sketch of information but it’s deliberately vague so it can go across settingA. I have found it useful.

While I haven’t looked at the Princes book the description above more or less described how I felt as a player in that campaign.

[Merudo]

Hoard of the Dragon Queen has the reputation of being the worst 5e official module.

[Tawmis]

As noted - the Monster Manual does have an Index - at the very back. Lists all the monsters, by the page of their stat blocks.
As for the lore, never cared for it much - since I homebrew and come up with my own lore how creatures are made. Sometimes, I use the basic information - and develop it further.
As for the number of appearing, I'd chalk that up to your party size vs the DC of the monster(s).
And you can chalk up that most humanoids (goblins, orcs, kobolds, hobgoblins, kuo-toa, etc., probably all have villages somewhere - but it's probably unlikely the party will march into a village of orcs, unless there's some kind of alliance).

[HappyDaze]

It's supposedly a sandbox where players can go wherever they like, but there is a specific order to do things in. It's entirely possible to end up somewhere your party is vastly underlevelled for and for it to kill them.

Being able to blunder into places beyond your ability to handle is a feature of a true sandbox, not a bug. The GM may realize there is an order that is more likely to lead to success, but there is no order that things must be done. If they die, so be it; you should probably expect some deaths (even TPKs) in an apocalypse.

But as for crap 5e books...

Acquisitions Incorporated is trash (and I literally threw my copy into the trash).
Sword Cost Adventurer's Guide is pretty bad, so once Tasha's comes out, it goes in the trash too.

[Waazraath]

So I find most of the 5e published material fairly solid. There are things I would do differently, but for the most part I haven't bought something and thought, "They really phoned that one in", with one exception.

The Monster Manual is just a lazy effort. There is very little lore about the monsters, in some cases no descriptions, and you are often left wondering what would be typical society or numbers for these creatures. There isn't even an index where you can look up a monster by name, so if you (for example) can't remember that an Arcanaloth fits under a class of monsters called Yugoloths there is absolutely no way to find it without flipping through the entire book.

Given that there have been numerous superior attempts before 5e I just find the whole thing inexcusable and I give it an 'F'. There just isn't a passing grade I could give.
Thoughts?

I think you have a solid point. F may be a bit harsh, cause it does fulfill its function once you get to know how to use it, but it is lacking in a lot of points.
- descriptions lack details. How large a monster is for example; and yeah, they have a 'size category', but they don't tell me anything concrete.
- not all monsters have artwork. That sucks, these are fantasy creatures, visuals are needed for people not familiar with the type of monster.
- the formatting sucks, and tables aren't set up in logical way. Sometimes there is a line with 'saves' (when monsters ar proficient), but not always when they are not then you need to check ability scores, so there are 2 different places in which you might check for saves. That's bloody bad design.

When I compare with earlier editions, those are vastly superior. Especially 3.5, it provided a lot of concrete and detailed information, background info with suggestions how to use them in a campaign and how they are organised, and much more complete tables.

Princes of the apocalyps was fun to run (didn't finish it alas). It had some issues, but mostly the need to flip between pages all the time, and maps being off-scale. It's a pretty decent sandbox, and while my 3 man party deceided to clear a dungeon 'too early' they still managed to pull it off with smart playing (and some luck). And as somebody said: that's a feature of a sandbox.

As for the worst books: I was less than impressed with Theros, despite the cool artwork. As campaigns, I don't think hoard of the dragon queen and rise of tiamat are very good. I can't imagine playing them in total anytime soon.

[Tawmis]

- not all monsters have artwork. That sucks, these are fantasy creatures, visuals are needed for people not familiar with the type of monster.


Which ones? Not all the Blights do - but they give you some photos.
A few dinosaurs don't.
The different Drow don't, but again, give you some photos of Drow.
Off the top of my head, that's all I can think of.

[Waazraath]

Which ones? Not all the Blights do - but they give you some photos.
A few dinosaurs don't.
The different Drow don't, but again, give you some photos of Drow.
Off the top of my head, that's all I can think of.

I think this is mostly it, plus the beast appendix (yeah, I know how a dog looks like but no, without a picture I don't known how an 'axbeak' or whatever looks like, and certainly a flying snake could have been pictured as well since it doesn't exist in rl), plus only 1 dragon depicted despite different age categories. It just feels sloppy and lazy. And worse, because MM is the template for later monster books, this got carries over, and for example starspawn in Mordenkainen's have 5 totally different types, with only 3 of them illustrated. Goog luck imagining how this unimaginable horror from the far realm looks like then... =/

[ff7hero]

Hot take, Xanathar's solely for the waste of perfectly good paper on a list of fantasy names.

[micahaphone]

Hot take, Xanathar's solely for the waste of perfectly good paper on a list of fantasy names.

ooooh lookit mr pro DM, always has names ready for NPCs

[Segev]

Funny anecdote: I used Xanathar’s NOC quirks tables to help build a gang of urchins in an Exalted game. (I heavily modified the results to make cohesive and interesting characters with neat interpersonal relationships, but the tables were invaluable for inspiring ideas and overcoming the blank page problem.)

[TrueAlphaGamer]

In some ways, I agree that the Monster Manual is very "eh" in hindsight. It does what it sets out to do, but I feel as though it doesn't get me very excited or engaged with the monsters in it. It especially pales in comparison to something like MToF, whose bestiary has some really cool monsters/art.

I guess for me the worst book would have to be something like Theros. Might be that I don't go gaga for Greek stuff like other people, but that book is decidedly the most "damn, I kinda . . . don't care" out of the entire library.


Hot take, Xanathar's solely for the waste of perfectly good paper on a list of fantasy names.

Haha. Yeah I feel you. IMO some books go way too big on the fluff or other inconsequential things.

I think a large issue I have is that Wizards is so careful to release too much of content, that when content does come out and half the pages are filled with descriptions/tables about settings or places or wacky stuff that have no bearing for 80% of campaigns, it feels like a wasted opportunity.

[MrStabby]

ooooh lookit mr pro DM, always has names ready for NPCs

Yeah, might have been more appropriate in the DMG or some more targeted setting specific stuff.

I think it also gets a vote for being the Worst Book for the introduction of the 1st level hexblade abilities. I dont think there is a single level of a single class that has done as much to undermine the credibility of the authors in terms of the belief that additional time and feedback will enable a better balanced game rather than a worse one.

OK they could have probably trashed their reputation a bit harder if they had devoted that space to nothing but racist and misogynistic slurs, but they would have had to work at it.

[loki_ragnarock]

But as for crap 5e books...

Acquisitions Incorporated is trash (and I literally threw my copy into the trash).


I'm pretty fond of Acquisitions Incorporated because it's the only of these books I've read that had a distinctive voice.

Sure, that voice is a spice that's not to everyone's taste, but it's not *bland.*

As someone who gets tired of Applebee's almost instantly, though, the introduction of some flavor was deeply appreciated.

Worst 5e book for me is Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica. Lopsided backgrounds, mechanics that aren't balanced against the rest of the game at all, recycled art assets, and operating so completely in the conceptual space of Sigil that it ensures I'll never see a 5e Planescape setting leaves me with a clothespin on my nose. P. U.

[Satori01]

Hoard of the Dragon Queen has the reputation of being the worst 5e official module.

I read this module for the first time two weeks ago. It was a decent product.
Much better than Storm King's Thunder.

As for flavor text in the MM vs the approach taken in Volo's etc....different people obviously have different needs. I typically ignore the flavor text in Monster Manuals.

The approach taken in Volos and Mord's, means less pages on new monsters and mechanics that make running the creatures easier, or more evocative, instead the books have more pages of text that may hold no value AT ALL for the reader.

Official culture write ups, organizational stats: terrain, number of appearing etc leads some in the D&D community to Rules Lawyer those aspects.

The 2e Monstrous Compendium is my favorite Monster book...but the expanded ecology section and #of appearing meant placing 3 Bulettes in an encounter might lead to someone claiming you are "Playing Wrong".

I can handle flavor on my own. I just want innovative and cool stats.
Others clearly want different aspects to be emphasized.

[Teaguethebean]

I'm gonna agree with Happy Daze that Acquisitions Incorporated is a simply horrendous book. Zero useful content for dm's and players get spells that are simply game breaking, or laughably useless at the levels they receive them.

[Amechra]

ooooh lookit mr pro DM, always has names ready for NPCs

They're the most boring kind of name generators, though, because they don't incorporate any of the deeper structure that goes into real naming. Like, in the real world names vary greatly in structure based off of your culture of origin (https://www.fbiic.gov/public/2008/nov/Naming_practice_guide_UK_2006.pdf). In 5e, you basically just have a paragraph of information in each racial description that tends to boil down to "there are distinctinctly masculine and feminine names".

They could've spent those 17 pages fleshing out naming practices or the kind of day-to-day life that your character might have grown up with... but nope! You get 17 pages of d100 random name charts - and that's before getting into how mixed up the "real world inspired" names are. Quite frankly, it reminds me a bit of this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oymWAeqv_-c).

...

Plus, we have this strange thing called "the Internet" that you might've heard of, where there are already a ton of resources for name generation.

[ProsecutorGodot]

My order would be:
1-Tyranny of Dragons (the campaign as a set) - it really shows that it was written before the DMG, without relevant information.
2-SCAG - I literally bought it for 2 cantrips.
3-Storm Kings Thunder - it's a very cleverly disguised railroad where I feel like you're given a lot of freedom on the surface but all of that freedom is empty space that is meant to steer you towards the interesting events of the campaign. It's a bit too large.

[Tanarii]

5e MM lore is plenty. Almost too much really. If they'd had more, I'd have skipped the book entirely and just downloaded PDFs of stat blocks as needed. It's a reference guide, not a read-at-home book.

The 5e PHB has some issue. The feats and Multiclassing rules should have been in the appendix, not before ability checks. They're optional rules, and as such much less important than the core mechanic. Also, the spells should be organized alphabetically by spell level. Comparing options in a given level requires flipping back and forth between huge chunks of pages.

5e DMG has one HUGE flaw. The absolute most important section that every DM needs to read is all the way in Chapter 8. "Running the Game" should be the very first chapter.

[Boci]

Also, the spells should be organized alphabetically by spell level. Comparing options in a given level requires flipping back and forth between huge chunks of pages.

Yes, but finding a spell you don't know the level of by name only would be a pain. Imagine a DM running a lamia needing to check mid-encounter what these spells do:

Innate Spellcasting. The lamia's innate spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 13). It can innately cast the following spells, requiring no material components. At will: disguise self (any humanoid form), major image 3/day each: charm person, mirror image, scrying, suggestion 1/day: geas

[heavyfuel]

Worst 5e book is probably the Player's Handbook.

For one, it has the balance of a drunk two-legged giraffe. Not even talking about different classes and martial-caster disparity, but even the subclasses are wild in their effectiveness. Thief x Assassin, BM x Champion, Literally any other subclass x Berseker.

Then for two, it's extremely apathetic everywhere else, relegating everything to Rule 0 in a lazy attempt to justify not having to write the book. What's the DC for breaking open a locked door? The DM decides. Do we get any guidelines? Nope. Isn't the Alert feat too strong? Well, it's a variant rule. Cleric dip is too strong? Well, it's also a variant rule.

[Corsair14]

MM I loved the old monster manuals with such great artwork and fluff that described the creatures society and habits in depth. The 5e book has the required blocks but thats about it, and I hold all artwork and monster manuals up to the high standards of 2e. In general artwork in 5e has been horribly lacking and stupidly cartoony so since its an edition thing I cant really hold it against any individual book. SCAG is a close second as it has maybe 2 pages of generally useful stuff and the rest is boring Forgettable Realms crap.

[Tawmis]

Worst 5e book is probably the Player's Handbook.
Then for two, it's extremely apathetic everywhere else, relegating everything to Rule 0 in a lazy attempt to justify not having to write the book. What's the DC for breaking open a locked door? The DM decides. Do we get any guidelines? Nope.

Interesting take. I actually enjoy that it's up to the DM. Because, to me, locks vary. Is made by a human? Maybe DC 12. Made by a Dwarf? Might be more study. DC 15. Is it rusty? DC 8. That type of stuff. I often make up the DC based on the party, and what the situation is, which I enjoy - rather than flipping through a book to see what the DC to bend bars might be.

[MaxWilson]

They're the most boring kind of name generators, though, because they don't incorporate any of the deeper structure that goes into real naming. Like, in the real world names vary greatly in structure based off of your culture of origin (https://www.fbiic.gov/public/2008/nov/Naming_practice_guide_UK_2006.pdf).
...

Plus, we have this strange thing called "the Internet" that you might've heard of, where there are already a ton of resources for name generation.

You're totally right about structures in naming. That's why I love mapping D&D cultures to cultures in the Onomastikon. Even if players never learn where I got the names, they'll pretty quickly learn that Devlin, Eimar, and Tiamhdha "sound like" Elvish names, whereas an elf named Torsten or Hagen probably has some Dwarvish ties (or at least his parents did). A virulently anti-dwarf racist elf named Hagen is therefore more interesting than an anti-dwarf elf named Legolas.

[heavyfuel]

Interesting take. I actually enjoy that it's up to the DM. Because, to me, locks vary. Is made by a human? Maybe DC 12. Made by a Dwarf? Might be more study. DC 15. Is it rusty? DC 8. That type of stuff. I often make up the DC based on the party, and what the situation is, which I enjoy - rather than flipping through a book to see what the DC to bend bars might be.

I never said the PHB should have rules for everything. But one thing is saying "The average door requires a DC 12 Strength check to break open" and then allowing DMs to figure it out from there, another is saying nothing at all.

Leaving it entirely up to DMs can mean that while some DMs think the average door should be a DC 10, breakable by almost anyone, while other DMs will have it as DC 22, which means you need to be stronger than average and you have to take your time by trying until you roll a 19 or 20.

To me, this constant relegation to DMs screams "I don't want to do my job as a game designer".

For all the faults Hoard of the Dragon Queen had, I mostly blame them on the PHB not giving adequate support to the writers, who were still in the "figuring it out" phase of adventure modules.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I never said the PHB should have rules for everything. But one thing is saying "The average door requires a DC 12 Strength check to break open" and then allowing DMs to figure it out from there, another is saying nothing at all.

Leaving it entirely up to DMs can mean that while some DMs think the average door should be a DC 10, breakable by almost anyone, while other DMs will have it as DC 22, which means you need to be stronger than average and you have to take your time by trying until you roll a 19 or 20.

To me, this constant relegation to DMs screams "I don't want to do my job as a game designer".

That's a fundamental disagreement with the edition as a whole (which shies away from such things), not with a particular book. And particularly not with the PHB, as that's all DM-facing info.

[Lyracian]

For me the worst book is SCAG because of the horrible blade cantrips. I know a lot of people love them but for me the game would be better without them.

[heavyfuel]

That's a fundamental disagreement with the edition as a whole (which shies away from such things), not with a particular book. And particularly not with the PHB, as that's all DM-facing info.

Even if was their intention, for a book supposed to tell players what their characters do, the PHB does a terrible job at it.

Player: "Can my character open doors?"
PHB: " ¯\_(ツ)_/¯"


For me the worst book is SCAG because of the horrible blade cantrips. I know a lot of people love them but for me the game would be better without them.

I mostly dislike how Booming Blade is just so much better than GFB and how they are the only two blade cantrips

[PhoenixPhyre]

Even if was their intention, for a book supposed to tell players what their characters do, the PHB does a terrible job at it.

Player: "Can my character open doors?"
PHB: " ¯\_(ツ)_/¯"


This is a fight we've had many many times here, with no progress. One side considers the DM-heavy design a feature, the other a bug. And neither will be moved.

And no, that's not the fault of the book, even if it's a developer problem. "Does not do what I wished it did, even though that would be against the design" is not identical to "is bad" or "has failed" or "does a terrible job." It does what it set out to do, which is different from what you want it to do.

Oh, and you might want to pick a different example. The item "Lock" has a listed DC of 15 right there in the PHB.

[heavyfuel]

Oh, and you might want to pick a different example. The item "Lock" has a listed DC of 15 right there in the PHB.

IIRC, the DC 15 is for opening it with a Dexterity check modified by Thieves' Tool proficiency, not for a Strength check to burst open.

[Skylivedk]

Worst campaign (that I've tried):
Storm King's Thunder

Worst splat:
Ravnica (for the overly op backgrounds)

Worst core:
PHB.

Horrible reference system (referring me to another index entry? Come on! In general not having page reference numbers on pages - same!)

Wonky balance and I really dislike that they made feats and multiclassing optional and then hid their bad balancing behind that.

DC and skills... Meh at best, straight up bad most of the time. Scrying gets more space than several skills combined.

Agreed with Tanari that chapter 8 in the DMG should be chapter 1.

[PhoenixPhyre]

IIRC, the DC 15 is for opening it with a Dexterity check modified by Thieves' Tool proficiency, not for a Strength check to burst open.

Again, this is a fight that's been had a million times.

For me, listed DCs (especially 3e-style ones) are some combination of
* over-precise (and thus useless)
* immersion breaking (CF bear lore, as well as the idea that all wooden doors are the same, everywhere in the multiverse)
* so vague as to also be useless
* rules-lawyer/munchkin-fuel.

YMMV. But it's not a problem with the book. It's a difference of taste about the design of the system.

[PhoenixPhyre]

On the actual topic, the books I've found to not be worth buying are:

* Campaign setting books. I run in a homebrew world, so spending $50 on something I'll never use is a hard pass. Yes, this includes the SCAG, which is just bad from an internal standpoint (little useful information, poor balance on player options).
* Campaign books--I'm rarely if ever going to run them, so same cost-benefit problem arises there.

Volos and Mordenkainen's both have great monsters in them. Pity that only takes up about 1/3 of the books, with the rest devoted to stuff that presumes a particular design of campaign setting and isn't useful at all to me. That doesn't make it bad, just not useful for my case.

Of the published books, SCAG is the only one that I would actively refuse to buy (if someone were having me run in a different setting or using a hardcover adventure), just because it's bad. I'd wing the FR rather than wade through that.

[Pex]

That's a fundamental disagreement with the edition as a whole (which shies away from such things), not with a particular book. And particularly not with the PHB, as that's all DM-facing info.

Since it's the PHB's job to have provided the rules it is the book's fault. It's not enough of a problem for me to say the PHB is the worst book, but if it is for others I won't stand in their way.

[Tanarii]

Since it's the PHB's job to have provided the rules it is the book's fault. It's not enough of a problem for me to say the PHB is the worst book, but if it is for others I won't stand in their way.
It provides the rules. Some folks just don't like the design intent.

[Ortho]

What's the DC for breaking open a locked door? The DM decides.

Yes? The DM decides how the world is made, and that includes the DC of whatever locks the players pick.



For me, listed DCs (especially 3e-style ones) are some combination of
* over-precise (and thus useless)
* immersion breaking (CF bear lore, as well as the idea that all wooden doors are the same, everywhere in the multiverse)
* so vague as to also be useless
* rules-lawyer/munchkin-fuel.

YMMV. But it's not a problem with the book. It's a difference of taste about the design of the system.

Agreed. The more tightly defined the rules, the easier it is to exploit them. I'm quite glad that DCs aren't explicitly listed; it makes DMing a whole lot easier when I don't have to limit my player's challenges by an arbitrary number.

[heavyfuel]

IIRC, the DC 15 is for opening it with a Dexterity check modified by Thieves' Tool proficiency, not for a Strength check to burst open.

Again, this is a fight that's been had a million times.

For me, listed DCs (especially 3e-style ones) are some combination of
* over-precise (and thus useless)
* immersion breaking (CF bear lore, as well as the idea that all wooden doors are the same, everywhere in the multiverse)
* so vague as to also be useless
* rules-lawyer/munchkin-fuel.

YMMV. But it's not a problem with the book. It's a difference of taste about the design of the system.

I'm trying to figure out exactly if anything you said has anything to do with what I said. And if there's nothing to do, then why did you quote me?

You said locks were DC 15 to break, I said they were DC 15 to pick, not to break, you then started talking about overly specifc DCs, which is something I never advocated for


Yes? The DM decides how the world is made, and that includes the DC of whatever locks the players pick.

People seem have lost their grasp on nuance. Yes, of course the DM decides. I never said the DM didn't decide. There's a huge gap between "no DCs anywhere" and "a set and immutable DC for literally every possible situation that could ever come up in a game".

All I'm asking for is a guideline. How the hell is a new DM supposed to decide if something should be a DC 20 or a DC 10 if there are no parameters? If the book said that a regular door requires a DC 15 strength check to break open, then even a new DM can think "well this door is a bit stronger, so maybe a DC 18 is in order".

[Jophiel]

MM I loved the old monster manuals with such great artwork and fluff that described the creatures society and habits in depth. The 5e book has the required blocks but thats about it, and I hold all artwork and monster manuals up to the high standards of 2e.
I was also familiar with the earlier Monster Manuals and also very disappointed in the 5e version. The earlier editions were worth reading on their own merits even if you didn't really understand the game and flipping the pages inspired tons of ideas. In contrast, the 5e MM is dull even if you understand what the stat blocks mean. The major 3rd party monster books put it to shame.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I was also familiar with the earlier Monster Manuals and also very disappointed in the 5e version. The earlier editions were worth reading on their own merits even if you didn't really understand the game and flipping the pages inspired tons of ideas. In contrast, the 5e MM is dull even if you understand what the stat blocks mean. The major 3rd party monster books put it to shame.

My experience is different. I have both 5th Edition Foes and the Kobold Press Tome of Monsters. Both of those...suck, frankly. The stat blocks are poorly (if at all) balanced, and the monster descriptions are beyond bland and worse are heavily setting-bound (in the ToM case). And the art is no better than the MM art, although I'm not super art-focused anyway. And the 5EF ones are in that old-school style that just looks like it was drawn by a rank amateur.

But that's all a matter of taste.

[MaxWilson]

I was also familiar with the earlier Monster Manuals and also very disappointed in the 5e version. The earlier editions were worth reading on their own merits even if you didn't really understand the game and flipping the pages inspired tons of ideas. In contrast, the 5e MM is dull even if you understand what the stat blocks mean. The major 3rd party monster books put it to shame.


My experience is different. I have both 5th Edition Foes and the Kobold Press Tome of Monsters. Both of those...suck, frankly. The stat blocks are poorly (if at all) balanced, and the monster descriptions are beyond bland and worse are heavily setting-bound (in the ToM case). And the art is no better than the MM art, although I'm not super art-focused anyway. And the 5EF ones are in that old-school style that just looks like it was drawn by a rank amateur.

But that's all a matter of taste.

FWIW, I'm with Jophiel on this one. Fifth Edition Foes is more useful to me than the MM. The text description of each monster is more useful than artwork, although the artwork doesn't hurt, because it gives me an easy way to describe each monster when it's first encountered without having to pull out a book and tell the players, "Look at this picture." Fifth Edition Foes also does a much better job presenting the monster in an adventuring context (habitat, ecology, etc.) instead of just a roll-initiative-and-attack-rolls combat context. The monsters tend to be interesting and thought-provoking, monsters I'd want to actually use in my games.

I haven't been as impressed by the Tome of Monsters. It feels similar to the MM in being very combat-oriented, except that I don't trust the CR calculations. (E.g. Ancient Mithril Dragons probably should not be CR 18.) As far as adventuring context goes, Tome of Monsters is about as minimal as the MM: a couple of paragraphs of cliched text that doesn't feel like it does me any good at all. I don't want to read paragraphs about how XYZ monster is driven by greed and bloodlust, "pursues its own interests," etc.--that's commonplace in D&D and not worth my time. Give me something interesting and unique about the monster--the Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes info on Skulks is great, I want to see more stuff like that! It's probably not relevant to any given encounter, since the PCs aren't ten-year-old children, but it's something that immediately grabs my attention and tempts me to add a dead man's candle or a young child to any adventure with skulks in it.

Give me rumors about monsters that may or may not be true.

Anyway, I think Fifth Edition Foes does this well and I really like it. I rather like Volo's Guide and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes as well, although not as much.

[Jophiel]

The stat blocks are poorly (if at all) balanced, and the monster descriptions are beyond bland and worse are heavily setting-bound (in the ToM case).
As you said, different tastes and all. I'm not worried about my ability to read the stats and balance an encounter accordingly. But, setting aside any arguments about the usefulness of the 3rd party material, the 5e MM was still a big boring disappointment to me compared to earlier editions. I think I regretted buying SCAG more just because you sort of "need" the MM whether it's awful or not whereas SCAG just felt pointless (esp if you own XGtE) but I think MM was the biggest actual let down vs expectations I got from a 5e book.

[Ganryu]

The sheer fact that the Storm King's Thunder has the Lifferlas makes me want to put it at the top.

It's a CR0 that can beat the crap out of any party lvl 3 and below.

[Tanarii]

My experience is different. I have both 5th Edition Foes and the Kobold Press Tome of Monsters. Both of those...suck, frankly. The stat blocks are poorly (if at all) balanced, and the monster descriptions are beyond bland and worse are heavily setting-bound (in the ToM case). And the art is no better than the MM art, although I'm not super art-focused anyway. And the 5EF ones are in that old-school style that just looks like it was drawn by a rank amateur.

But that's all a matter of taste.
I checked out 5th edition foes after reading your comment, and frankly it looks fine. Possibly even better than the MM, if lower quality art. One page per creature, a small amount of simple and useful information. I can't speak to balance of the stat blocks, but the information provided seems like what's needed.

The "ecology of ..." stuff a la Mordenkain's Tome of Foes (and old Dragon Magazine articles) is all very well, but it's mostly useful if you plan to have, for example, an in depth campaign battling goblinoids. And if that's the case, nowadays that's what the internet is for. Or splat books like MToF. Or a 'zine with articles. I certainly doesn't need to be in the MM. If anything, the MM has too much blurb for each creature.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I checked out 5th edition foes after reading your comment, and frankly it looks fine. Possibly even better than the MM, if lower quality art. One page per creature, a small amount of simple and useful information. I can't speak to balance of the stat blocks, but the information provided seems like what's needed.

The "ecology of ..." stuff a la Mordenkain's Tome of Foes (and old Dragon Magazine articles) is all very well, but it's mostly useful if you plan to have, for example, an in depth campaign battling goblinoids. And if that's the case, nowadays that's what the internet is for. Or splat books like MToF. Or a 'zine with articles. I certainly doesn't need to be in the MM. If anything, the MM has too much blurb for each creature.

One thing about 5eF is that it was made using the playtest, so the stat blocks are completely different in format and content than you'd expect for 5e. And they tend to throw in wacky abilities that are really hard to adjudicate at the table.

But even talking about the other stuff, it's better for content than the Kobold Press one, if just because it's not so firmly bound to one setting. I do like the Ecology statement. But they also have a tendency to throw mechanical notes into the body text, which makes it hard to use because you have to have it open and pay attention to that when running the monsters, instead of putting that info into the stat block itself.

But I totally agree with you about the "ecology of" longer notes in MToF and Volo's. One of the curses of running a fully-custom world is that 90% of that is totally useless to me. Beyond the most generic entries (ie Skeleton, Zombie, etc), I'm mainly mining the books for relevant stat blocks but then changing all the lore and ecology stuff to fit my world. So having stat blocks available, in a nice, easy-to-read fashion, with reasonable organization is important to me.

I do wish the MM didn't spend so much space on different dragons, however. Dragons are capstone monsters not common fodder. Having 3 statblocks each of roughly 10 different types of dragons, most of them pretty much identical (really, lots of them are copy-paste with element changes where appropriate) is a total waste IMO.

[Willie the Duck]

Then for two, it's extremely apathetic everywhere else, relegating everything to Rule 0 in a lazy attempt to justify not having to write the book. What's the DC for breaking open a locked door? The DM decides. Do we get any guidelines? Nope. Isn't the Alert feat too strong? Well, it's a variant rule. Cleric dip is too strong? Well, it's also a variant rule.
I can see both sides of this issue on the decision. However, I will say that laziness clearly was not the motivation. This was a very deliberate choice done for reasons based on a specific design philosophy.


The Monster Manual really isn’t a lore book.

MM I loved the old monster manuals with such great artwork and fluff that described the creatures society and habits in depth. The 5e book has the required blocks but thats about it, and I hold all artwork and monster manuals up to the high standards of 2e. In general artwork in 5e has been horribly lacking and stupidly cartoony so since its an edition thing I cant really hold it against any individual book. SCAG is a close second as it has maybe 2 pages of generally useful stuff and the rest is boring Forgettable Realms crap.

I'm looking at Monster books or sections from previous editions. Pretty much 2e and just 2e has this. 1E AD&D and 3E D&D usually have very brief discussions about the where and why of the creature, but not clearly better than 5e. oD&D and the basic/classic line had very little art, often leaving all but the most cursory descriptive information (plus some genuinely unhelpful art, such as the pumpkin-headed bugbear or the module depicting hobgoblins as baboon-esque). So, to my mind, this critique becomes 'why did they not continue the 2e trend (in any edition, not just 5e)?' My guess is maybe page count? Give cursory overviews of most monsters, and then do focus books like Volo's for a few. I'm not sure what I think the best answer is, but it would be interesting to hear the designer reasoning.

As for worst book... I think I would have to say SCAG simply because it, more than any of the others, seems to have no idea what it wants to be or why it exists.

[Tanarii]

Dragons are capstone monsters not common fodder.
Eh. One per adventuring day sounds about right.

Seriously though I've run plenty of campaigns where Dragons were extremely common. And D&D has a long tradition of having dragons available to fight at all levels, as well as being relatively commonly encountered (per the encounter tables). Even Dragonlance followed the idea of "1 per adventuring arc".

More outlandish is the preponderance of demons and devils. Unless you go into the outer planes or constantly fail to stop cultists from performing summons, they're far less common in the prime. OTOH, that's also a sacred cow MM monster at this point.



I'm looking at Monster books or sections from previous editions. Pretty much 2e and just 2e has this. 1E AD&D and 3E D&D usually have very brief discussions about the where and why of the creature, but not clearly better than 5e. oD&D and the basic/classic line had very little art, often leaving all but the most cursory descriptive information (plus some genuinely unhelpful art, such as the pumpkin-headed bugbear or the module depicting hobgoblins as baboon-esque). So, to my mind, this critique becomes 'why did they not continue the 2e trend (in any edition, not just 5e)?' My guess is maybe page count? Give cursory overviews of most monsters, and then do focus books like Volo's for a few. I'm not sure what I think the best answer is, but it would be interesting to hear the designer reasoning.

Yeah 2e Monstrous Compendium wasn't the best. Huge binders stacked up lol

But it had one huge advantage. You could open the binder and remove the pages for whatever creatures you needed for the current session, and leave the others at home or whatever.

[ProsecutorGodot]

Eh. One per adventuring day sounds about right.

Seriously though I've run plenty of campaigns where Dragons were extremely common. And D&D has a long tradition of having dragons available to fight at all levels, as well as being relatively commonly encountered (per the encounter tables). Even Dragonlance followed the idea of "1 per adventuring arc".

More outlandish is the preponderance of demons and devils. Unless you go into the outer planes or constantly fail to stop cultists from performing summons, they're far less common in the prime. OTOH, that's also a sacred cow MM monster at this point.
5E has been very heavy into the Blood War.

In our Dungeon of the Mad Mage campaign, we've encountered roughly 6 dragons, 2 of them Ancient, and we've killed/fought at least 4 of them. Demons and Devils might as well be the new Bandits and Highwaymen with the frequency we've run into them since about level 11. I legitimately cannot remember the last time I've smited something without getting the bonus to damage against a fiend, it's nearly every session. Granted we have an added on plotline tied to a cult of devil worshippers but I am aware that the adventure already features a huge amount of them on its own.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Eh. One per adventuring day sounds about right.

Seriously though I've run plenty of campaigns where Dragons were extremely common. And D&D has a long tradition of having dragons available to fight at all levels, as well as being relatively commonly encountered (per the encounter tables). Even Dragonlance followed the idea of "1 per adventuring arc".

More outlandish is the preponderance of demons and devils. Unless you go into the outer planes or constantly fail to stop cultists from performing summons, they're far less common in the prime. OTOH, that's also a sacred cow MM monster at this point.


I guess I'm just an outlier. I try to include one in every campaign (because I'm mostly playing with new players, and Dungeons and Dragons needs both dungeons and, well, dragons). But so far they've actually fought...3? Two in my earliest two campaigns (both 4e versions actually) and one crazy one in a later campaign. There's been two others that have been antagonists, but one universally[0] got pity and help, not attack and the other (who came into two campaigns) was at such an extreme power differential[1] that they mostly schemed against him rather than faced him in direct combat. All the other dragons have been quickly befriended. Even the crazy ones. Seriously, my players love dragons. Not fighting them, working with them.

Honestly, it's a pretty standard thing for my parties to talk to everything. Even the crazy, mutated green (the 3rd one mentioned) was the subject of a persuasive effort, the failure of which gave rise to the saying "don't talk to dragons with tentacles growing out of their backs".

Fiends show up pretty frequently for me, mainly due to the nature of my setting's planar structure. Both as allies and as foes.

[0] I ran that scenario for 3 different groups. Not a single one even contemplated attacking him. Two of them spent significant resources to aid him. It was a black wyrmling who had escaped from captivity (raised from an egg in a blood-magic research lab) and had taken up with some goblins who were raiding other, friendly goblins' flocks. He would have fought if they attacked, but mainly wanted to stay free. I described him as having worn spots on his wrists and neck from the chains and moving with a small limp.

[1] An ancient Black vs parties at level 3 and level 8-ish. He was designed as a manipulator-type and coward--he never gets his own claws dirty but instead travels around shapeshifted[2] and pulling strings from afar. He runs from direct conflict if they could actually pose any kind of real threat.

[2] My dragons are somewhat different; black is more necrotic and may or may not be able to shapeshift like the metallics. I've done a lot of work altering the lore of dragonkind.

[MaxWilson]

Yeah 2e Monstrous Compendium wasn't the best. Huge binders stacked up lol

But it had one huge advantage. You could open the binder and remove the pages for whatever creatures you needed for the current session, and leave the others at home or whatever.

The binders would have worked better if they had avoided putting different monsters on the front and back side. It made it impossible to actually alphabetize across different MCs, making the binder format mostly pointless.

[ff7hero]

ooooh lookit mr pro DM, always has names ready for NPCs

Yeah, because I realized ten years ago I'm terrible at making up names on the fly and realized the internet is full to the brim of fantasy name generators.

[Pex]

It provides the rules. Some folks just don't like the design intent.

So does Acquisitions Incorporated, Theros, SCAG, etc. They provide the rules for people to use, but apparently it's ok for people not to like those books. What some people aren't liking is other people aren't liking something they like how dare they.

You can disagree the PHB is the worst book, but those who find it the worst book are not wrong on the internet. The topic is opinion, not fact.

[Waterdeep Merch]

Of the official books I've read, I'd say Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide is the worst one. Not because of perceived balance issues or anything, but because it was barely useful as a primer for the setting. While the Forgotten Realms is ridiculously dense and impossible to sum up in a single book, SCAG is so bare bones that it's of little use to anyone at all. That's not an idle condemnation; I actually did hand it to newcomers as a primer, and it proved useless. I had to talk about it myself.

For the official adventure books, I really don't like Hoard of the Dragon Queen. Something about how linear it was, and how that whole opening dragon attack was just awful to run on the DM's side of things. I've managed to run House on Gryphon Hill with it's weird temporal tracking without too much trouble once I got to the table, while HotDQ's first chapter broke my brain.

For third party books, Mystical Companions from Troll Lord Games is easily my least favorite. It has a lot of good ideas, but it's so poorly balanced that I've never been able to seriously use it at the table. I just use it for inspiration sometimes when I want to give a player a cool reward. While I love Troll Lord Games and can usually recommend their stuff, I'd steer clear of this one.

[Satori01]

When Dragon magazine was in print, the old Ecology monsters gave lore and often a short story like description, without printing the monster stats.

A stand alone monster Ecology book, without stats..could work fine.

My largest gripe about the MM, it is running on late 70's technology.
The books should summarize spells, provide boxes that one could check to indicate expended spell slots, maybe even script out the first few rounds of what actions the creature takes...in short make the product more workbook like, so a brand new DM can grab the MM, open a page and run a monster.

At the very least, NPC spell casters should have several different spell load outs listed.

The Cypher system is very different from 5e, but in a very small amount of space, I can get a clear idea of how powerful a creature is, what it's motivations are, and what it does.

D&D in the 21st Century needs to do a better job, then keeping the same old monster book format from 45 years ago.

[Glorthindel]

Volo's Guide is a giant pile of wasted paper. I suspect the only reason it hasn't been mentioned more is most people have forgotten it exists

[ProsecutorGodot]

Volo's Guide is a giant pile of wasted paper. I suspect the only reason it hasn't been mentioned more is most people have forgotten it exists

Alternatively, it's a well received mix of player and DM options. Many of the player races it added are quite popular.

[Boci]

You can disagree the PHB is the worst book, but those who find it the worst book are not wrong on the internet. The topic is opinion, not fact.

If you can only play a game by using the worst book, at that point don't you just not like the game? I'm not trying to be snarky, maybe its more "X is worst book" is maybe a poor way of describing a idsliked mechanic of a game, if you play the game and have to use X to do so.

[Willie the Duck]

Yeah 2e Monstrous Compendium wasn't the best. Huge binders stacked up lol
But it had one huge advantage. You could open the binder and remove the pages for whatever creatures you needed for the current session, and leave the others at home or whatever.

The binders would have worked better if they had avoided putting different monsters on the front and back side. It made it impossible to actually alphabetize across different MCs, making the binder format mostly pointless.

I think the base concept is perfectly fine, but the implementation was kinda half-assed (not unlike many ideas tried with 2E). Make each monster one page (front and back). If you have a subsection of creatures (such as dragons) make the headers section fill whole pages as well (so you can add dragons as you get new compendiums). Of course please print it on heavy duty paper and make the binder size and format best for not ripping the holes up. The whole thing could be a very good product... for the subset of gamers that want huge binders full of monsters (self included). Perhaps now that there are so many people gaming remotely, trends will change, and being able to get your game materials into one backpack/briefcase/duffel bag being less of a concern, larger format materials might make a comeback.


You can disagree the PHB is the worst book, but those who find it the worst book are not wrong on the internet. The topic is opinion, not fact.
And Tanarii was expressing theirs, same as you.

[heavyfuel]

If you can only play a game by using the worst book, at that point don't you just not like the game? I'm not trying to be snarky, maybe its more "X is worst book" is maybe a poor way of describing a idsliked mechanic of a game, if you play the game and have to use X to do so.

Nope. I quite like 5e. Despite all its flaws, I think the designers had actually really good ideas. Of all the 5e books I've read, the only book with what I would call "major flaws" is this one core rulebook. Every other book has been at least "okay". The PHB is only "the worst" in the sense that every other book doesn't have any of these major flaws.

I quite like bounded accuracy. I quite like the dis/advantage system. They're not perfect, but I like them.

I quite like the balance between classes. I have gripes about every martial being more one-note than an AC/DC album, but I do think balance is as good as its been in D&D history.

However, we do come back to my two part complaint:

The current balance is good, but WotC insists on having trap options - almost as if they lazily didn't playtest their game. The Berserker is trap option poster boy, but every martial class has stupid trap options.

Then the DC problem is also one that I think is substantial enough flaw that it makes the book "the worst book". Clearly they didn't intend DMs to decide everything. There are definitely some hard and set DCs. The argument that they wanted DMs deciding everything is - therefore - bollocks.

But the lack of examples does encourage "guy at the gym" mentality, which is a horrible thing for a game with dragons in it to encourage.

[Boci]

Nope. I quite like 5e. Despite all its flaws, I think the designers had actually really good ideas. Of all the 5e books I've read, the only book with what I would call "major flaws" is this one core rulebook. Every other book has been at least "okay".

I quite like bounded accuracy. I quite like the dis/advantage system. They're not perfect, but I like them.

I quite like the balance between classes. I have gripes about every martial being more one-note than an AC/DC album, but I do think balance is as good as its been in D&D history.

However, we do come back to my two part complaint (the first part people have been ignoring).

The current balance is good, but WotC insists on having trap options - almost as if they lazily didn't playtest their game. The Berserker is trap option poster boy, but every martial class has stupid trap options.

Then the DC problem is also one that I think is substantial enough flaw that it makes the book "the worse book". Clearly they didn't intend DMs to decide everything. There are definitely some hard and set DCs. The argument that they wanted DMs deciding everything is - therefore - bollocks. But the lack of examples does encourage "guy at the gym" mentality, which is a horrible thing for a game with dragons in it to encourage.

Sure, but I'd differentiate between "I like 5e, but disagree with some of the design intent" and "PHB is the worst book, despite it being neccissary to play the game I enjoy, because in addition to all the parts I enjoy and let me play the game, it also has some design elements I dislike".

[Hal]

You're totally right about structures in naming. That's why I love mapping D&D cultures to cultures in the Onomastikon. Even if players never learn where I got the names, they'll pretty quickly learn that Devlin, Eimar, and Tiamhdha "sound like" Elvish names, whereas an elf named Torsten or Hagen probably has some Dwarvish ties (or at least his parents did). A virulently anti-dwarf racist elf named Hagen is therefore more interesting than an anti-dwarf elf named Legolas.

Man, I feel this hard. I'm running a game where I've introduced the Bhuka, desert goblins from the 3.5 Sandstorm book. The Bhuka have a complicated naming structure, so the few example names get used up very fast. It'd be great if I knew which culture those names came from so I could generate my own, but . . . darned if I know who those were, and darned if I can find anyone out there who worries about such things.

[heavyfuel]

Boci, allow me edit your quote to more accurately reflect my views:


Sure, but I'd differentiate between "I like 5e, but disagree with a couple major parts of the design intent" and "PHB is the worst book, despite it being neccissary to play the game I enjoy, because in addition to all the parts I enjoy and let me play the game, it also has some design elements that make the game completely unplayable and unenjoyable in 90% of tables".

That's more my problem with 5e's PHB. A really good DM is now absolutely necessary to enjoy the game. And the book should really support newer players who are just starting out and haven't gotten their heads around the nuances of the system.

I'm currently playing a 3.5 game with a DM that I would never play with if it was a 5e game instead.

He's a great storyteller, but also a stickler for RAW and "guy at the gym". As such (the game being 3.5) I can point to a DC in a book and/or optimize my character to have +50 in a skill and not worry about him. I enjoy his stories and can reasonably contribute to them by not having a useless character. I still have my fun even if DM is far from perfect.

[Boci]

Boci, allow me edit your quote to more accurately reflect my views:



That's more my problem with 5e's PHB. A really good DM is now absolutely necessary to enjoy the game. I'm currently playing a 3.5 game with a DM that I would never play with if it was a 5e game instead. This DM is a stickler for RAW and "guy at the gym", but I can point to a DC in a book and/or optimize my character to have +50 in a skill and not worry about him. I still have my fun even if DM is far from perfect.

Again though, I personally would differentiate between something being the worst book, and the core mechanics of a game you enjoy but don't like one aspect of being in one of the core books. To me, the worst book is the one you feel shouldn't have been printed (or would miss the least if it hadn't been), so core is usually out unless you hate the game in question.

[KorvinStarmast]

Sword Cost Adventurer's Guide is pretty bad, so once Tasha's comes out, it goes in the trash too. Font too small. Maps nearly unreadable and incomplete. The PC options needed one more bit of polish each before going live. It was a disappointing book, but I did like how the added backgrounds fit the setting. Low value per dollar, though.

Worst 5e book for me is Guildmaster's Guide to Ravnica mechanics that aren't balanced against the rest of the game at all Having read through the previous Plane Shift stuff from WoTC I had a good idea that they had not bothered with balance ...

I'm gonna agree with Happy Daze that Acquisitions Incorporated is a simply horrendous book. I do not think that Scott, Mike, and Jerry are necessarily good at creating a D&D setting that meets the standard, no matter how successful their web comics have been. (PvP was probably the first web comic I ever got into and enjoyed ...). But given the location of WoTC, RPG/Geek community links, and locataion of PA's authors, and Kurtz' move to Seattle a few years back, I think that the relationships may have had a lot to do with that coming together.

5e MM lore is plenty.
I agree.
On the other hand, I feel that the prose of the PHB is bloated in terms of meeting a design goal of being Newbie Friendly.
Low barrier to entry? Not with that writing style.

The 5e PHB has some issue. The feats and Multiclassing rules should have been in the appendix, not before ability checks.
Totally agree. See psionics and bards from AD&D 1e PHB.

Also, the spells should be organized alphabetically by spell level.
They are, within each class. But you are echoing a complaint a friend of mine has: if they were going to do spells by class, then put the spell list at the end of each class section. Put all of the stuff you need for a class into one place. I think his reasoning was sound.
5e DMG has one HUGE flaw.
The absolute most important section that every DM needs to read is all the way in Chapter 8.
"Running the Game" should be the very first chapter. Yep.

Worst 5e book is probably the Player's Handbook. Nope, but it could have used some more feedback on what is or isn't user friendly for a new player. (We already have a large number of threads disagreeing about a core system design issue that is available in the Basic Rules, so maybe your complaint needs to be placed in one of those threads).

For me the worst book is SCAG because of the horrible blade cantrips. Why they didn't put those into Xanathar's confuses me. Maybe they were afraid nobody would ever buy the back log of SCAG copies ever again?
I'm looking at Monster books or sections from previous editions. Pretty much 2e and just 2e has this.
A picture of each monster, to include the beasts in the PHB, would be nice. The year of publishing is 2014, and it's not like the can't get art done. (remainder of rant not indulged in)
Of the official books I've read, I'd say Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide is the worst one. Not because of perceived balance issues or anything, but because it was barely useful as a primer for the setting. Agree. But it was written I think to support, fold into, the public play aspect of Adventurer's League. I belive that was its purpose.

The Cypher system is very different from 5e, but in a very small amount of space, I can get a clear idea of how powerful a creature is, what it's motivations are, and what it does.
D&D in the 21st Century needs to do a better job, then keeping the same old monster book format from 45 years ago. It didn't. I have the original Monster Manual. (Your point on Cypher system is a fair point, though).

[Amechra]

Man, I feel this hard. I'm running a game where I've introduced the Bhuka, desert goblins from the 3.5 Sandstorm book. The Bhuka have a complicated naming structure, so the few example names get used up very fast. It'd be great if I knew which culture those names came from so I could generate my own, but . . . darned if I know who those were, and darned if I can find anyone out there who worries about such things.

As far as I can tell, the individual components of the names aren't from a specific culture (or, if they are, they're mangled enough) - they're just strings of syllables that sound alright together. I'm not sure if I can help you that much without going into conlanging.

I will say that the clan names are probably going to be repeated a lot, even with taboos against marrying within the same village. As far as I can tell, though, if Steve kha Owl marries Daisy kha Sparrow¹, the result is one of the following:

• Steve marries into the Sparrow clan, and changes his name to Steve kha Owl gi Sparrow. Daisy doesn't change her name, and any children they have will be kha Sparrow.
• Daisy marries into the Owl clan, and changes her name to Daisy kha Sparrow gi Owl. Steve doesn't change his name, and any children they have will be kha Sparrow.

Given that they're matriarchal, it's probably going to be the former rather than the latter. So if you go over and visit the Sparrow clan, you're probably going to find that women and unmarried men have names like "PERSONAL kha Sparrow", while married men have names like "PERSONAL kha MOTHER'S CLAN gi Sparrow". So really, you just need a handful of clan names for the system to be workable. Plus, you'll need fewer male names than female names, since a man adopting his father's name won't cause any confusion (since they have distinct clan names).

...

But yeah - I hate to say it, but you're probably best off taking the few recognizable roots (like TAKI- "speaks") and slapping a couple nice-sounding syllables before or after them. Because I'm guessing that that's basically what they ended up doing when they created those lists of example names.

¹ Using more familiar names/words for simplicity here.

[TrueAlphaGamer]

I think regardless of opinion on 5e PHB rules/design, there's one thing that can't be argued: the art sucks! I mean, have you seen how they drew the halflings?!

There's such an inconsistency in the illustrations that it feels bland and unpolished, especially with the strange decision to just slap small sketches and drawings haphazardly on the page.

[Tanarii]

You can disagree the PHB is the worst book, but those who find it the worst book are not wrong on the internet. The topic is opinion, not fact.Its not an opinion when you claim or imply it doesn't provide rules.

[Waazraath]

I think regardless of opinion on 5e PHB rules/design, there's one thing that can't be argued: the art sucks! I mean, have you seen how they drew the halflings?!

There's such an inconsistency in the illustrations that it feels bland and unpolished, especially with the strange decision to just slap small sketches and drawings haphazardly on the page.

They compensated with Ravnica and Theros - though in the latter case, the contents sucked (and according to quite a few folks, the content of the first sucked as well. I personally liked it a lot though, disregarding the power creep background).



Can somebody explain to me btw in a bit more detail what's wrong with SCAG? I mean, some people complain there are cantrips, others that there are too few cantrips, so I guess it won't be a consistent story, but afaic:
- the descriptions of the lands, peoples, kingdoms and adventuring sites are well written. There's plenty of inspiration there to design adventures or even a campaign, and they are fun to read even when not using them;
- the racial options are diverse and some of them very good, without being broken (half-elf variants, ghostwise halfling, deep gnome, tiefling variants - with only the winged one being a bit over the top)
- subclasses were fun; some a bit weak, but even those had redeeming features (the battlerager having extra hp on a class with resistance to damage; expertise in persuasion for the banneret; spirit guardians for the crown paladin), with some others being just decent to good (both monks, arcana cleric, bladesinger wizard, swashbuckler rogue);

So of course, it's not perfect, but is it that bad?

[Jophiel]

Why they didn't put those into Xanathar's confuses me. Maybe they were afraid nobody would ever buy the back log of SCAG copies ever again?
My guess is that the Powers That Be felt the cantrips were too powerful and keeping them SCAG exclusive would cut down on their usage in AL play since you're giving up a lot to make SCAG your PHB+1. Especially if you're a caster since you're locked out of the XGtE spell list.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Can somebody explain to me btw in a bit more detail what's wrong with SCAG?

The power level is all over the map. Both some really strong options and some really really weak ones.

But more than that, the little bit I skimmed through was just...vapid. Not enough information to actually help a DM do anything he couldn't do with a quick google search or to help a player figure out what's really there. But a lot of words that don't really say anything. Of course that's a complaint I have about most setting books I've read--there just isn't enough depth there. And you really can't get enough depth in a printed work--page limits are kinda brutal. So :shrug:

[HappyDaze]

I'm gonna agree with Happy Daze that Acquisitions Incorporated is a simply horrendous book. Zero useful content for dm's and players get spells that are simply game breaking, or laughably useless at the levels they receive them.

It's the only book I actually enjoyed taking a hatchet to and chopping up before I threw it in the trash (disposable income is a great thing, and you can't take it with you when you go, so destroy everything and leave nothing for others to loot). I will say this though, WotC rulebooks are pretty well-made even when the rules themselves are not.

[Luccan]

I haven't actively hated any of the books I've owned and the ones I don't I have no real reason to hate. So my rating for "worst" will go by how often it's used. And that award clearly goes to the DMG, a book that, IME, many DMs never actually bother reading.

I can't hate SCAG, despite the problems with the blade cantrips (problems that don't always outweigh the benefits of getting some nice melee cantrips, just gotta be careful). It has a few subclasses I enjoy, some of which aren't getting reprinted in Tasha's and haven't been reprinted elsewhere. Maybe I'd be more upset if I bought it full price.

If I had to pick a least favorite, it's honestly probably Mordenkainen's. Gith got a raw deal, elves got special treatment, and they reprinted two other subraces (one of which is available for free online!). Oh, and there were 8 tiefling subraces, which was alright if a bit excessive. The DM stuff isn't too interesting if you aren't currently into elves or the Blood War. I don't hate the new options, but they felt pretty narrow for the most part and that's a shame, because I like that Volo's had a diverse array of PC options and usable material for DMs.

[Cyclops08]

I thought Ravinica was bad.

Mythic Odysseys of Theros is far and away the worst book out there. it is a campaign setting that ties and manipulates the players into either playing a cleric or sucking up to a deity patron.

the race selection is limited and poor. The map is an uninspired brown blob with no wondrous sites or features. there are just three cities, all human, and then the writing team went home.

the entire book is a knockoff Greek mythology setting. But all the names are changed to a make believe culture that seems afraid it might get sued by ancient Greeks. (There is no copyright on Greek mythology). The only real work was done on the deity system and the rest was just lazy.

I find the book 100% useless.

[Witty Username]

Being able to blunder into places beyond your ability to handle is a feature of a true sandbox, not a bug. The GM may realize there is an order that is more likely to lead to success, but there is no order that things must be done. If they die, so be it; you should probably expect some deaths (even TPKs) in an apocalypse.

But as for crap 5e books...

Acquisitions Incorporated is trash (and I literally threw my copy into the trash).
Sword Cost Adventurer's Guide is pretty bad, so once Tasha's comes out, it goes in the trash too.

Will Tahsa's have the Sword coast stuff in it? If so that will make my upcoming purchase decisions much easier.

[Pex]

I thought Ravinica was bad.

Mythic Odysseys of Theros is far and away the worst book out there. it is a campaign setting that ties and manipulates the players into either playing a cleric or sucking up to a deity patron.

the race selection is limited and poor. The map is an uninspired brown blob with no wondrous sites or features. there are just three cities, all human, and then the writing team went home.

the entire book is a knockoff Greek mythology setting. But all the names are changed to a make believe culture that seems afraid it might get sued by ancient Greeks. (There is no copyright on Greek mythology). The only real work was done on the deity system and the rest was just lazy.

I find the book 100% useless.

People have expressed support for the Piety System. They like the connection to the gods. Obviously it's a taste issue. It can inspire being adopted into other settings where appropriate. It would work in Forgotten Realms. It would not work in Eberron. It's a means to delve deeper into faith and have a mechanical benefit to go along with the roleplay. The Piety System can be used to show you don't have to be a cleric to gain a god's favor.

[Aussiehams]

More outlandish is the preponderance of demons and devils. Unless you go into the outer planes or constantly fail to stop cultists from performing summons, they're far less common in the prime. OTOH, that's also a sacred cow MM monster at this point.

I think the large amount of fiends might be because of the ridiculous "not all orcs" and "killing goblins is racist" stuff.
If the traditional humanoid enemies aren't legitimate targets any more, now you have more options of purely evil fiends to kill which shouldn't upset any vocal groups.

[Boci]

I think the large amount of fiends might be because of the ridiculous "not all orcs" and "killing goblins is racist" stuff.

I've seen a group implode over that. My friend was an old school player, and refused to accept that killing an orc sight because they were orcs and therefor it was the dity of a good character to kill them wasn't acceptable. This led to a number of arguments that eventually resulted in the DM ending the campaign.

[rooneg]

Will Tahsa's have the Sword coast stuff in it? If so that will make my upcoming purchase decisions much easier.
Tasha’s is supposed to have a “new version” of the Bladesinger. It is 100% unclear what that means at this point though. It could be an entire new subclass, it could just be the same one we got in SCAG (including the cantrips) but without the “you gotta be an elf” bit, nobody has any idea. Other than that none of the reprinted subclasses are from SCAG.

[Waazraath]

If I had to pick a least favorite, it's honestly probably Mordenkainen's. Gith got a raw deal, elves got special treatment, and they reprinted two other subraces (one of which is available for free online!). Oh, and there were 8 tiefling subraces, which was alright if a bit excessive. The DM stuff isn't too interesting if you aren't currently into elves or the Blood War. I don't hate the new options, but they felt pretty narrow for the most part and that's a shame, because I like that Volo's had a diverse array of PC options and usable material for DMs.

Oh yeah, Mordenkainen's. Bloody terrible fluff. Especially Corellan Laralalalala who as main god of elves comes down like a chaotic evil god of WRATH to punishes his entire race for the fault of a few of their ancestors. Seriously...

To be honest, reading through this thread: I really like 5e. I like the core mechanics, its simplicity, and its relative balance. But seeing everything published up to now, I can't help thinking that while the edition is very good, and maybe even the best so far, the books they publish are pretty piss-poor. I mean, ask me about great books in AD&D, and I immediately think about (for example) the planescape series, with great artwork and interesting monsters and stories; ask me about 3.5, and I immediately think about the Draconomicon, Libris Mortis, both Fiendish Codexes, the Shackled City campaign book, and some of the (later) Complete's who had genuine interesting options, with decent efforts to bring some balance back in the game.

But 5e? I mostly use Xanathar and SCAG, aside from the core books, they have decent player options but aren't 'great'. The campaign books go from bad (hoard of the dragon queen) to decent (elemental evil). The best book so far is probably Eberron, which has a decent amount of both character options, lore, interesting stories and adventure hooks, and items. I like Ravnica as well, but it's usability is debatable. So quite a few books published are 'meh'.

And all the above is (obviously) my opinion and opinions tend to differ, but a lot of folks in this thread are critical of the stuff I like as well. And the general tone in this thread is quite critical.

It makes me wonder: does 5e has decent designers and writers at this point? Do they rush books too much? (hardly plausible, given the slooooow release schedule). Is the team working on D&D (too) small atm?

[KorvinStarmast]

To a certain extent, they may listen to the fans a little too much. (See the video in MaxWilson's sig). For example, making the Warlock not an Int class was a conceptual mistake (IMHO).

But there is another problem that is, IMO, bad editing. The longer I read the books, the more I find the prose bloated, the indexing horrific, and the organization questionable.

[Tanarii]

I agree.
On the other hand, I feel that the prose of the PHB is bloated in terms of meeting a design goal of being Newbie Friendly.
Low barrier to entry? Not with that writing style.
Yeah. I'm a RPG reader and I found the PHB to be a serious project. Almost no new players read the PHB. In fact, it's hard to get them to read their class and spells. :smallamused:

Another reason that I find it utterly ludicrous that the section on spells is organized alphabetically across 9 levels instead of by level. (By class and level would be best but special spell lists are a thing.) it wouldn't be so good for me as a DM looking up one off NPC and monster spell casters. But it'd be FAR superior for new players trying to build a character or gain a level.


I think the large amount of fiends might be because of the ridiculous "not all orcs" and "killing goblins is racist" stuff.
If the traditional humanoid enemies aren't legitimate targets any more, now you have more options of purely evil fiends to kill which shouldn't upset any vocal groups.
Demons and Devils have been a prominent part of D&D since old school, and 2e had a huge campaign world (Planescape) that prominently featured them. My complain doesn't really have much basis.

[Boci]

Also they were the source of the 80s Satanic Panic long before this Johnny come lately Orc Moral Panic (we need a catchy name for it) that usually results in portrayals of Orcs and goblins in a more racist fashion. Noble savage and all that.

I don't think noble savage is more racist. It's not good, don't get me wrong, but its better than subhuman menace that needs to be put down.

[Willie the Duck]

Can somebody explain to me btw in a bit more detail what's wrong with SCAG?

Firstly, it is just the first mechanical supplement to the edition, and it kinda shows. Lots of hits and misses in the rules stuff, including some 'I totally forgot this existed, people use it so infrequently' stuff along with some massively-changes-the-balance stuff (the SCAG cantrips, in general, I feel should have either been a core rule structure, or never shown up).

However, for me, the primary issue is actually this -- this is apparently the primary Forgotten Realms guide that we are going to get for this edition. And as the filler of that role, it really under-performs. 3E's Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting book was an equally early-to-the-edition book (examples: actually used post-20th-level rules which would be superseded with the Epic Level Handbook, mostly useless feats and prestige classes, etc.). However, the job it did in consolidating a setting, which had previously been introduced in boxed sets (upon which dozens of novels worth of lore had been added) in a mere 320 pages (including, as mentioned, a bunch of bad rules stuff as well) was pretty amazing. SCAG is half that size, so it is unsurprising that it doesn't measure up. However, it has just enough of the campaign-setting material (which deities go with which cleric subclass, as an example), that we are unlikely to actually see a campaign setting book. Mind you, Forgotten Realms is no longer a setting in which I have much interest, but if they are going to make it the flagship of the edition, new gamers really ought to get a decent overview of the setting in one discreet source.

[Segev]

Yeah. I'm a RPG reader and I found the PHB to be a serious project. Almost no new players read the PHB. In fact, it's hard to get them to read their class and spells. :smallamused:I didn't have too much trouble getting my players to read the PHB when we started. Half of them were old-school gamers (they play a LOT of Rifts), but hadn't seen 5e before, and the other half were new to gaming. Not sure what the difference was, there; I guess I was just lucky.


Another reason that I find it utterly ludicrous that the section on spells is organized alphabetically across 9 levels instead of by level. (By class and level would be best but special spell lists are a thing.) it wouldn't be so good for me as a DM looking up one off NPC and monster spell casters. But it'd be FAR superior for new players trying to build a character or gain a level.I had this complaint back in 3e, because I'd been used to 1e and 2e where they listed every class's spells by level in separate lists (with a lot of "see spell of the same name in [class] list" to save space). I have, however, grown used to it and actually find it much more useful organized in pure alphabetical order when I want to look up the spell when it's referenced in a monster's statblock or similarly named with no additional information.

My only complaint about 5e is that it doesn't provide, in the spell description or header, any listing of what classes get it. I understand why they simplified it so that a spell's level is its level no matter which class is casting it, but that doesn't mean printing which classes get it wouldn't be extremely helpful in perusing the spells. Having to flip to the middle of the spell chapter (or front; I actually forget if there's technically a chapter-break, but it's not like there being one makes it easier to flip to) to check each spell list to see if the spell is present is irritating, at best.


Demons and Devils have been a prominent part of D&D since old school, and 2e had a huge campaign world (Planescape) that prominently featured them. My complain doesn't really have much basis.My big complaint about a lot of the fiends in Mordenkainen's Tome is that they're...boring. They don't really fill niches that are exposed as needing filling. And because they're in a splat book, if they ever show up in a printed module, that module will have them, as well. I found the monsters in Volo's Guide to generally have more interesting features and roles in a setting or a fight, making them more interesting to add in.

Of all the books I have, I think I am least excited abut Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes. Much of the time, if I think I should check Mordenkainen's for a monster that I remember being interested in, it turns out to actually be in Volo's. The elf lore in it is...disappointing. It feels like somebody's fanfic alternate interpretation. (I feel much the same about Volo's Guide's beholders lore. The whole dream reality-warping thing is so out of nowhere as an addition to them and doesn't fit anything about them.) And as noted, the elf lore makes the elf god's far less sympathetic and seem more like petty, semi-modern versions of Zeus and the Greek Pantheon. I do not view "pantheons as frat houses" as a good thing for my fantasy fiction. The worst part is, I know that's not the tone they were going for, but the supposedly grand way they behave comes off to me very much as a sub-25-year-old getting into an "I'll show THEM" snit. All of them. Lolth and Corellan included. It diminishes Lolth's pathos and her awe-inspiring menace, and Corellan's wisdom and ancient grace.

Admittedly, my own interpretation of Lolth has her being extremely petty and cruel, but not in quite so...high school drama a way.

My runner-up is Storm King's Thunder, but that's more because I am not running it and don't know that I'll get opportunity to. I don't know that it's BAD, as long as you know what you're getting when you get it. (It's very much modular, meant to be run different ways so you can run it for different groups or even some of the same players and get different adventures out of it. I think this also means you could pick it apart and use individual portions in other campaigns pretty easily.)

[Skylivedk]

What I read Tanarii write about spells is to me part of a bigger reference issue.

In the class spell list, each spell should have a page number (and then yes, please organise by level and list spell levels in the monster's manual where necessary). In general, page number references have some crazy Stealth checks in the PHB.

[Segev]

What I read Tanarii write about spells is to me part of a bigger reference issue.

In the class spell list, each spell should have a page number (and then yes, please organise by level and list spell levels in the monster's manual where necessary). In general, page number references have some crazy Stealth checks in the PHB.

I think it'd be far less additional word-count to just put the classes that get the spells in the existing spell headers. Adding page numbers to each spell and re-organizing by level makes it harder to browse, because you still have to hope they put that reference in. As-is, all you need is for them to have gotten the spell's name right.

[x3n0n]

I think it'd be far less additional word-count to just put the classes that get the spells in the existing spell headers. Adding page numbers to each spell and re-organizing by level makes it harder to browse, because you still have to hope they put that reference in. As-is, all you need is for them to have gotten the spell's name right.

I would have also preferred alphabetical within level as the primary grouping (as suggested above) along with a merged alphabetical index with level and optionally page number. My daughter was quite frustrated as a Lore Bard trying to determine her Additional Magical Secrets options, needing to page through the entire spell corpus and ignore things that were level 4 or higher.

From within NPC/monster stat blocks, I'd already prefer that the spells be grouped by level anyway.

I would not want to be a spellcaster without digital tools.

Edit: regarding classes in the spell headers, it just seems so fragile: new subclasses get access, and even new classes (Artificer). That said, digital tools come to the rescue again.

[Segev]

I would have also preferred alphabetical within level as the primary grouping (as suggested above) along with a merged alphabetical index with level and optionally page number. My daughter was quite frustrated as a Lore Bard trying to determine her Additional Magical Secrets options, needing to page through the entire spell corpus and ignore things that were level 4 or higher.

From within NPC/monster stat blocks, I'd already prefer that the spells be grouped by level anyway.

I would not want to be a spellcaster without digital tools.

Edit: regarding classes in the spell headers, it just seems so fragile: new subclasses get access, and even new classes (Artificer). That said, digital tools come to the rescue again.

Ultimately, there are ups and downs to any static organizational method. Online tools are the only way you're going to be able to find one that satisfies you for your every need.

3.5 and PF had the best organization, I think, with the class list indeces having short descriptions of the spells for quick lookup of "spells of X level for Y class," and the alphabetical listing of spells having classes that cast it and at what level of spell in the spell descriptions.

[saucerhead]

SCAG is not great, but players do use the Bladesinger and cantrips. If those bits are what you don't like about the book, then yes it is probably the worst. For a player though, the MToF is not worth buying. As a player, I am starting to think Hoard of the Dragon Queen/Rise of Tiamat is pretty bad too. The two books were eventually changed into one, but playing it is still frustrating.

[Boci]

3.5 and PF had the best organization, I think, with the class list indeces having short descriptions of the spells for quick lookup of "spells of X level for Y class," and the alphabetical listing of spells having classes that cast it and at what level of spell in the spell descriptions.

In the spirit of "no system is without its downsides" those brief sumerries are responsible for a lot of confusion by new players who think they accurately describe how the spell works when trying to decide which one to cast mid combat.

[PhoenixPhyre]

3.5 and PF had the best organization, ... and the alphabetical listing of spells having classes that cast it and at what level of spell in the spell descriptions.

I disagree with this particular part--it's super fragile against change. New classes mean having to errata the PHB and risk conflict.

Honestly, the only way that new players can really pick spells in any edition I've ever played (PF/4e/5e) is to have spell cards or an online tool. There are just too many of them.

Sorting by spell level -> alphabetically in the body of the text would be ok with me.

[KorvinStarmast]

There are just too many of them. Yep. A 10% liposuction would be in order, as I see it.

[Doug Lampert]

I've seen a group implode over that. My friend was an old school player, and refused to accept that killing an orc sight because they were orcs and therefor it was the dity of a good character to kill them wasn't acceptable. This led to a number of arguments that eventually resulted in the DM ending the campaign.

Eh? How old school was he? Because the ORIGINAL GAME back in 1973 listed orcs as possibly neutral IIRC, and that was back when there were only three alignments.

[Boci]

Eh? How old school was he? Because the ORIGINAL GAME back in 1973 listed orcs as possibly neutral IIRC, and that was back when there were only three alignments.

Lord of the Rings old school. He often referenced it when the topic came up.

[Doug Lampert]

Lord of the Rings old school. He often referenced it when the topic came up.

IIRC there are some Tolkien quotes out there that orcs are not irredeemable since Morgoth lacked the power to create but could only corrupt what already existed.

[Boci]

IIRC there are some Tolkien quotes out there that orcs are not irredeemable since Morgoth lacked the power to create but could only corrupt what already existed.

Possibly, but that likely would have come later. Whilst Morkoth is named dropped once or twice in LotR, the The Silmarillion wasn't published until 23 years after LotR (though it may have been written before that). In any case, that piece of lore was not something my friend subscribed to.

[Segev]

I disagree with this particular part--it's super fragile against change. New classes mean having to errata the PHB and risk conflict.

Honestly, the only way that new players can really pick spells in any edition I've ever played (PF/4e/5e) is to have spell cards or an online tool. There are just too many of them.

Sorting by spell level -> alphabetically in the body of the text would be ok with me.

True, it does become outdated when new classes are printed...but that's like complaining that it's better to have a random glass handed to you and be asked to get a cup of water than to be handed a measuring beaker and asked the same thing, just because later on you might be introduced to metric and the beaker doesn't have metric measurements printed on it.

And having used both sort by spell level and sort by alphabetical first, I can say the latter is definitely my preference. I was even introduced to the former first; like I said, I got started with 1e AD&D, and the first RPG book I ever read was the PHB for that edition.

[micahaphone]

In the spirit of "no system is without its downsides" those brief sumerries are responsible for a lot of confusion by new players who think they accurately describe how the spell works when trying to decide which one to cast mid combat.

My god, you are right. I absolutely hate that about pathfinder. I'll read the synopsis of a spell then the DM has a question and I need to read through the synopsis and the full text it's like they expect me to memorize every spell available to me

[Segev]

My god, you are right. I absolutely hate that about pathfinder. I'll read the synopsis of a spell then the DM has a question and I need to read through the synopsis and the full text it's like they expect me to memorize every spell available to me

I still think the summary is better than nothing. Experience will quickly teach players that the summary is just a summary. Unless you memorize every spell, you'll never know what you're reading in a spell's name. You might have a reasonable guess, but a summary would tell you so much more.

[Miele]

If and only if the topic is the quality of a book, in "money per page" worth, then I'd say that the rules manuals are pretty much okay, they do their job even if they are lacking in some or several aspects.
If instead the criticism is towards the balance of 5e book by book, then I could have something to say.

I enjoyed SCAG, got it as a background book that answered a ton of questions I had on the FR setting. It's not a fast read, nor an easy one, the reader must *really* be interested in it. The cantrips... who cares honestly, they are good, but not game breaking, in fact they add choices that, more often than not, are interesting.

XGtE is mandatory: I mean it's so good that if you create a character with just the PHB, then start a campaign and *then* buy XGtE, well... you feel the desire to die or suicide, so you can reroll with the new book contribution.

So far the worst book for me has been Hoard of the dragon queen, it was a painful slog, not particularly interesting, prone to break the illusion of disbelief every other step... I understand it was done very early in the 5e history, but it was really NOT worth the money.

(Descent into Avernus on the other hand...)

[MaxWilson]

I still think the summary is better than nothing. Experience will quickly teach players that the summary is just a summary. Unless you memorize every spell, you'll never know what you're reading in a spell's name. You might have a reasonable guess, but a summary would tell you so much more.

It might help to have examples of what you have in mind. What summaries would you write for Fireball, Hold Person, Sequester, and Contingency? Do you imagine something like:

Fireball (8d6 fire, 20' radius, Dex save for half)
Hold Person (paralyze humanoids temporarily, Wis save each round)
Sequester (turn objects invisible and undetectable indefinitely)
Contingency (delay a spell up to 5th level until a trigger occurs)

Is that really better than a page reference?

[PhoenixPhyre]

It might help to have examples of what you have in mind. What summaries would you write for Fireball, Hold Person, Sequester, and Contingency? Do you imagine something like:

Fireball (8d6 fire, 20' radius, Dex save for half)
Hold Person (paralyze humanoids temporarily, Wis save each round)
Sequester (turn objects invisible and undetectable indefinitely)
Contingency (delay a spell up to 5th level until a trigger occurs)

Is that really better than a page reference?

My problem with summaries is that they quickly replace the actual text. People read them and then don't read the real thing. Which drops tons of nuance. I saw the same thing with summaries of notes when teaching school. There is no shortcut for actually reading the text.

The only thing that works for spells IMO is spell cards (virtual or not). Experienced players can work either way, but new players need something "physical".

[Segev]

It might help to have examples of what you have in mind. What summaries would you write for Fireball, Hold Person, Sequester, and Contingency? Do you imagine something like:

Fireball (8d6 fire, 20' radius, Dex save for half)
Hold Person (paralyze humanoids temporarily, Wis save each round)
Sequester (turn objects invisible and undetectable indefinitely)
Contingency (delay a spell up to 5th level until a trigger occurs)

Is that really better than a page reference?

Those would be awesome, honestly. And heavens, yes, they're better than a page reference. With it arranged alphabetically, finding the spell isn't much harder than finding the page number. I mean, if you really have to have a page number, "p. 275" is not going to add too much to those summaries.

You don't even need the page number if you do the spell level->alphabetical organization, because you're looking at the spell list. It tells you what level spell you're looking at, so you can search levels and alphabet as easily as alphabet alone. The reason I'm in favor of alphabetical listing with no spell level sorting on the full spell descriptions is for reference from other books. Adding "p. 254" to every spell that, say, a Gray Slaad can cast is going to inflate the stat block and hinder readability. And since it doesn't say what level the spell-like abilities are, organizing by spell level -> alphabetical would mean having to search multiple spell level sections if you don't happen to remember it. So the page number reference would be needed, then. Which, again, bulks out that stat block.

[heavyfuel]

It might help to have examples of what you have in mind. What summaries would you write for Fireball, Hold Person, Sequester, and Contingency? Do you imagine something like:

Fireball (8d6 fire, 20' radius, Dex save for half)
Hold Person (paralyze humanoids temporarily, Wis save each round)
Sequester (turn objects invisible and undetectable indefinitely)
Contingency (delay a spell up to 5th level until a trigger occurs)

Is that really better than a page reference?

Those are actually pretty great. Definitely better than a page reference.

Especially for divine casters who have access to every spell in their list, having a summary can really help preparing the right spell. Say a Cleric wants some area negation spell, what can they get? Well a quick summary of Blade Barrier will quickly answer that.

You don't have to read dozens and dozens of paragraphs of description to get what you want. Just read dozens and dozens of short descriptions and one or two paragraphs.

[xroads]

Sword Cost Adventurer's Guide.

It's not terrible. It just has too much fluff and too little crunch for my taste.

[Tanarii]

I disagree with this particular part--it's super fragile against change. New classes mean having to errata the PHB and risk conflict.Not to mention theres the question of if subclass specific spells should be included. Ie should Thunderwave list Wiz, Sorc, Druid, Tempest, (insert subclasses I cant remember).


Honestly, the only way that new players can really pick spells in any edition I've ever played (PF/4e/5e) is to have spell cards or an online tool. There are just too many of them.Fair. I agree. Spell cards are a necessity.


Sorting by spell level -> alphabetically in the body of the text would be ok with me.I get where people that just want it alphabetical overall come from. Maybe I'm just wistfully grognarding for when I'd turn to the page for 3rd level cleric spells and then peruse them all.

Except even then it said c.f. Wizard 2 Darkness. 😂

[Segev]

Wizard 2 Darkness. 😂

"This is Wizard to Darkness. Come in, Darkness."



Yeah, my first edition had them listed by level and class first.

Illusionist was basically the first attempt at a spontaneous caster: all the Shadow Conjuration and Shadow Evocation lines were about preparing one spell that could be several different ones.

[Souhiro]

If anything, I'd say that DM's Guide is pretty lackluster for me.

Of course, I'm comparing it with his main rival: Pathfinder's DM's Guide. With PF out there, not wanting to adress it would be just delusional:

PF's Guide tell you how to build a story, and a good collection of tricks to keep your players and yourself commited to the game. It has even ways of recovering the pace from a TPK!

The bulk of DM's guide is the magic item compendium. Maybe it's the message of "Magic Items aren't a necessity now" but I find it just a way to fill space. The art isn't also that good: Most of the items looks pretty fragile to me. The kind of object that you'd better keep under lock and wrapped in the softest cloth, not stuff them in a backpack while fighting ogres!

Also, it has too much filler text, too many obvious things like 'Hight level characters are powerful. Lvl 20 characters are masters of their world because they have access to Wish". But martial classes cannot cast wish (Even if they can cast at all!) and spontaneous casters may not bother themselves with that spell.

The other addition is the Downtime actions. But I still find them odd: If the campaign is a race against time -and most campaigns I've been are- PC's aren't going to spend time running a business. If anything, after a big fight -the one at the end of a chapter- they would want to rest. Spent part of the loot just sleeping in the tavern, drinking their pains away before packing and keep fighting evil.


By the wae: Seriously, this Wand of Thunderbolts looks like it would break if I swing it!

https://www.aidedd.org/dnd/images-om/wand-of-lightning-bolts.jpg

[ProsecutorGodot]

By the wae: Seriously, this Wand of Thunderbolts looks like it would break if I swing it!

https://www.aidedd.org/dnd/images-om/wand-of-lightning-bolts.jpg

In fairness, you don't really swing a wand. My complaint would be that it looks eerily similar to a melted spatula.

[furby076]

If they can spend tons of pages on naming suggestions, they can spend said pages on skill DC suggestions. For example, I missed suggestions:
Climbing Wall:DC 15
Has handholds: -5 DC
Is vertical:+5 dc
Is made of ice: +10 DC

Here is the argument about "let the DM decide"...the DM can still decide to override the above "yes it has handholds, but you can only stick one finger inside, so it's only +1". Done. And as the "rules lawyer" for my table, my "rules lawyer job" is to help clarify rules, not argue with the DM. For example, we have been doing Surprise wrong. In our table Surprise gives the surprisers a totally free round. Those surprised dont even roll initiative. The DM asked me at the table and i explained the correct way and said "but you play how you want"...and guess wht...that's how i explain the rules, and the DM appreciates what I know and sometimes says "lets do it" and sometimes says "my way is better'. But at least give us the information.

At this point, skill DC suggestions should be a free web supplement

[Tanarii]

If they can spend tons of pages on naming suggestions, they can spend said pages on skill DC suggestions. For example, I missed suggestions:
Climbing Wall:DC 15
Has handholds: -5 DC
Is vertical:+5 dc
Is made of ice: +10 DC

First of all, a wall with handholds is DC Automatic unless something is trying to knock you off or there's a hazard. Even a Str 3 character without Athletics can do it. DCs aren't even necessary unless it's slippery or sheer, or there's a hazard or something is trying to knock you off. And if you have time, you can take ten times as long and succeed as long as it's possible. Climbing checks aren't needed unless it's time dependent and an exceptional situation.

Every time I see climbing brought up, it seems like that's overlooked. And all checks are like that. It needs to be time dependent, and it needs to be an exceptional situation.

Second of all ... I dunno, maybe at this point they need to make that clearer for every check. Tables aren't needed if there's a clearer statement for each one of the things that are automatic without a check. But what I don't want is 3e style checks-simulate-the-world. Very few modern RPGs go that route, instead going the 5e style of broad bands of difficulty and GM judgement on when a check is necessary and what the difficulty is. What you're asking for is winding back the clock on game design 20 years.

Of course, I often lament and want to wind back the clock forty years to BECMI concepts. :smallamused:

[Waazraath]

First of all, a wall with handholds is DC Automatic unless something is trying to knock you off or there's a hazard. Even a Str 3 character without Athletics can do it. DCs aren't even necessary unless it's slippery or sheer, or there's a hazard or something is trying to knock you off. And if you have time, you can take ten times as long and succeed as long as it's possible. Climbing checks aren't needed unless it's time dependent and an exceptional situation.

Every time I see climbing brought up, it seems like that's overlooked. And all checks are like that. It needs to be time dependent, and it needs to be an exceptional situation.

Second of all ... I dunno, maybe at this point they need to make that clearer for every check. Tables aren't needed if there's a clearer statement for each one of the things that are automatic without a check. But what I don't want is 3e style checks-simulate-the-world. Very few modern RPGs go that route, instead going the 5e style of broad bands of difficulty and GM judgement on when a check is necessary and what the difficulty is. What you're asking for is winding back the clock on game design 20 years.

Of course, I often lament and want to wind back the clock forty years to BECMI concepts. :smallamused:

I don't know... I have the feeling there is a difference between what you mention here (3.x route with tables for everything), and what furby076 is talking about (skill DC suggestions). I don't play other RPG's at the moment so I don't know what the state of the art in game design is atm, but not every change needs to be an improvement. Personally, I feel the pendulum might have swung(?) too far the other way compared to 3.x. Instead of having a skill difficulties (DC's) given for everything there are DC's for almost nothing. Yeah, a few examples for climbing and persuasion, but otherwise it's either 'opposed contest' or the 'very simple to almost impossible' chart in the PHB.

The reason why I think that there is too little atm, is because skills are part of the balancing of classes - but how can you balance something if you don't define at all what it does? Take rogues (the best example cause skill is their main shtick). When you can do very little with 'skill', it is a sub par class. When you can do great supernatural things with DC's for 'hard' or 'very hard', the class, with expertise and reliable talent, is fantastic. This cannot solely depend on the DM, at least when classes were designed, designers should have had an idea on what 'expertise' could do and how it would be weighted against other abilities in the game.

I don't want lists for everything, but an idea, per skill, what could be done with skill at some of the different difficulty levels in a default game isn't that much to ask imo. They could even expand on it: if you want a game where your characters can do more supernatural stuff without casting spells, 'very hard' could mean X (e.g.: DC25 acrobatics to fly / jump a la crouching tiger hidden dragon, or DC 25 persuasion to convince a dragon to fee you instead of eat you), with a warning that this makes certain classes and races relative stronger; or some suggestions for a very 'mundane' world where DC's are much higher (but also with a warning that rogue for example is relative weak, and maybe some suggestions on how to compensate for that).

You can go pretty far with this without ending up in the 3.5 territory where a skill sometimes had more than a page description with several tables in a really smal font.

[MoiMagnus]

Yes, but finding a spell you don't know the level of by name only would be a pain. Imagine a DM running a lamia needing to check mid-encounter what these spells do:

Innate Spellcasting. The lamia's innate spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 13). It can innately cast the following spells, requiring no material components. At will: disguise self (any humanoid form), major image 3/day each: charm person, mirror image, scrying, suggestion 1/day: geas


I have, however, grown used to it and actually find it much more useful organized in pure alphabetical order when I want to look up the spell when it's referenced in a monster's statblock or similarly named with no additional information.

If you organize spells by level, you obviously have to include the level in every occurrence of the spell in other books.
So the innate spellcasting text would be instead "At will: disguise self [1st level] (any humanoid form)" or something similar.

And that would probably be way better for a new DM. Having the spell level systematically in the text would inform him of the relative power of this spell without having to read the description of the spell.

[Segev]

If you organize spells by level, you obviously have to include the level in every occurrence of the spell in other books.
So the innate spellcasting text would be instead "At will: disguise self [1st level] (any humanoid form)" or something similar.

And that would probably be way better for a new DM. Having the spell level systematically in the text would inform him of the relative power of this spell without having to read the description of the spell.

I’m not sure how that helps a new DM. He’s going to have to look up the spell anyway if he doesn’t already know what it does. What does telling him it’s level do that saves him any time? The monster has the spell and has a CR.

[Boci]

If you organize spells by level, you obviously have to include the level in every occurrence of the spell in other books.
So the innate spellcasting text would be instead "At will: disguise self [1st level] (any humanoid form)" or something similar.

And that would probably be way better for a new DM. Having the spell level systematically in the text would inform him of the relative power of this spell without having to read the description of the spell.

There would still be over issues. "At what level can we cast teleport?" is a good question. Teleport is a useful spell that opens up the game world for the party and changes how they expirience the story. If a new DM doesn't know that level teleport is, checking will be a pain. Checking what level daylight is, because you seem to be encountering a lot of sunslight sensitive creatures in the game is a liekwise valid question, as is remove disease.

By contrast the only benefit I can think of for the alphabetical and by level listing is leveling up a caster, which typically doesn't happen during gameplay.

[Tanarii]

I’m not sure how that helps a new DM. He’s going to have to look up the spell anyway if he doesn’t already know what it does. What does telling him it’s level do that saves him any time? The monster has the spell and has a CR.You missed the point. If it's by level, then alphabetical within a level, you need to include the level listing to find it. Or have an index of spells page.

Of course, I reiterate: if you have to stop the game to look up a spell you've already messed up.

The players handbook is supposed to be a reference book for making characters. That's when by level, then alphabetical within each level, really shines. Make it useful for what it's primarily used for.

[Boci]

The players handbook is supposed to be a reference book for making characters. That's when by level, then alphabetical within each level, really shines. Make it useful for what it's primarily used for.

So DMs are expected to remember every spell and not look them up because the players handbook is for making characters, not for them? That's ridiculous and I don't believe you actually think that.

Sure, its good practice to look up spells you know will be relevant before the session, but new DMs and even expirienced DMs will sometimes miss something and need to look something up. You can fluff that as "well the DM messed up" if you like, but being human that is a thing that will happen.

[Segev]

You missed the point. If it's by level, then alphabetical within a level, you need to include the level listing to find it. Or have an index of spells page.

Of course, I reiterate: if you have to stop the game to look up a spell you've already messed up.

The players handbook is supposed to be a reference book for making characters. That's when by level, then alphabetical within each level, really shines. Make it useful for what it's primarily used for.
You said that it would help the DM to see that a spell is a particular level in the monster entry. I am asking how that is so. What information does that convey and how is it useful to the DM to know it, assuming he is not going to go look the spell up in the PHB?

Or did I misunderstand your statement that it would be useful to the DM to know the power level of a spell when he sees it in the monster’s entry? If so, please explain what you meant by that.

[Tanarii]

You said that it would help the DM to see that a spell is a particular level in the monster entry. I am asking how that is so. What information does that convey and how is it useful to the DM to know it, assuming he is not going to go look the spell up in the PHB?

Or did I misunderstand your statement that it would be useful to the DM to know the power level of a spell when he sees it in the monster’s entry? If so, please explain what you meant by that.
It wasnt my statement. But I assumed the usefulness was being able to find the spell in the PHB if it was arranged level first, then alphabetical withing each level.

[Pex]

It would be fine all the spells are in alphabetical order as one thing if when the preceding pages gave the spell lists by class and level they provided page numbers, but then 5E has never been good at having a proper index.

[Segev]

It wasnt my statement. But I assumed the usefulness was being able to find the spell in the PHB if it was arranged level first, then alphabetical withing each level.My bad, it was MoiMagnus. And here's what he said that I was confused by:


And that would probably be way better for a new DM. Having the spell level systematically in the text would inform him of the relative power of this spell without having to read the description of the spell.

The last sentence in particular confuses me.

[PhoenixPhyre]

It would be fine all the spells are in alphabetical order as one thing if when the preceding pages gave the spell lists by class and level they provided page numbers, but then 5E has never been good at having a proper index.

I'll note that the House Style Guide for D&D writers strongly discourages using page numbers, at least in part for business reasons.

Basically, internal (ie not in the index) page numbers can't be done automatically--they have to be inserted by hand after every other piece of text, layout, and art is done. That makes them horrifically expensive (anything manual costs way more) and fragile/easy to screw up. Plus, if anything ever changes (any errata in new printings, etc), they have to be manually rechecked for any page number after the inserted or removed text. Automated systems can't really handle that very well, and you can't go by section headers because they aren't always on the same page as the desired text. You can generate a slew of possible references for any given string, but someone has to do context checking to see which ones actually make sense.

Compounding all of this is the fact that the D&D team is really quite small, and most of them are not editors. So those that can do this (that don't have other things to be working on) are a bottleneck. And any issues found here can have compounding consequences--if a change to a page number pushes something around, you have to then revalidate every page after that. And since you're doing that at the very last step (working on the final ready-to-print manuscript), that can cause deadlines to slip. And that's BAD NEWS from a business perspective.

Indexes work a little better because they're at the back and concentrated, but still have extensive cost issues. And there's a tradeoff between having too much (would you put every mention of every spell in the index?) and having too little. Plus, pages spent on indexes aren't spent on content. Which means that the content gets smaller, because it costs more to print additional pages, much more than the marginal cost (the printing business is, well, screwy).

Does this excuse not using page numbers internally? Up to you. But to me it makes a lot of sense and fits with my experience writing a dissertation. Automating section references--trivial. Page numbers and indexes? Super fragile.

[MaxWilson]

I'll note that the House Style Guide for D&D writers strongly discourages using page numbers, at least in part for business reasons.

Basically, internal (ie not in the index) page numbers can't be done automatically--they have to be inserted by hand after every other piece of text, layout, and art is done. That makes them horrifically expensive (anything manual costs way more) and fragile/easy to screw up.

How... cute, I guess. Somebody at WotC needs to discover LaTeX. This is a solved problem in the 21st century.

[furby076]

First of all, a wall with handholds is DC Automatic unless something is trying to knock you off or there's a hazard. Even a Str 3 character without Athletics can do it. DCs aren't even necessary unless it's slippery or sheer, or there's a hazard or something is trying to knock you off. And if you have time, you can take ten times as long and succeed as long as it's possible. Climbing checks aren't needed unless it's time dependent and an exceptional situation.

Every time I see climbing brought up, it seems like that's overlooked. And all checks are like that. It needs to be time dependent, and it needs to be an exceptional situation.

Sweet jesus, that is your argument? That my example doesn't conform to your thought of what a wall should do? Climbing a wall, heck a ladder, requires a check. Not everyone can do it. Even DC 8 can fail...that str 3 may get lucky and roll well, or fall...which they should. But that's not the point. It's an opinion that you have

QUOTE=Tanarii;24728873]Second of all ... I dunno, maybe at this point they need to make that clearer for every check. Tables aren't needed if there's a clearer statement for each one of the things that are automatic without a check. But what I don't want is 3e style checks-simulate-the-world. Very few modern RPGs go that route, instead going the 5e style of broad bands of difficulty and GM judgement on when a check is necessary and what the difficulty is. What you're asking for is winding back the clock on game design 20 years.

Of course, I often lament and want to wind back the clock forty years to BECMI concepts. :smallamused:[/QUOTE]

3e style checks is EXACTLY what we need. It allows everyone to have a baseline, and obviously people can just say "nah, i dont care". BTW, what is the DC to pick a lock on a wrought iron door? Or a jail cell? Or to break down said door or jail cell? Right now, it's up to the DM and varies from table to table. I"ve only played AL one time (covid started, so the place shut down), but if there is no standard, then players probably will get annoyed going from table to table.

Again, nothing wrong with having official tables, and DMs can use or ignore. Some people actually want it....but you know, lets have pages dedicated to dwarf names

[furby076]

I don't want lists for everything, but an idea, per skill, what could be done with skill at some of the different difficulty levels in a default game isn't that much to ask imo. They could even expand on it: if you want a game where your characters can do more supernatural stuff without casting spells, 'very hard' could mean X (e.g.: DC25 acrobatics to fly / jump a la crouching tiger hidden dragon, or DC 25 persuasion to convince a dragon to fee you instead of eat you), with a warning that this makes certain classes and races relative stronger; or some suggestions for a very 'mundane' world where DC's are much higher (but also with a warning that rogue for example is relative weak, and maybe some suggestions on how to compensate for that).

You can go pretty far with this without ending up in the 3.5 territory where a skill sometimes had more than a page description with several tables in a really smal font.

I wouldn't mind a list for "everything" (not everything, but lots of stuff). It wouldn't hurt the game. Again, I could ignore it. I'd settle for something more than what they had. Heck, what do stats mean? 9-11 is average, but what does 14 mean? Back in the 90s, DC Superheroes had a side bar for every stat explaining what 1 to 30 meant. 10-11 was average (IIRC). It may say "14-15 is Grog, who can throw a car across a football field". That was 1) funny and 2) informative. Now I knew, when building a character str 14-15, I could throw a car across a football field. Even more cool, if I liked Grog, I now knew how to emulate some of his abilities.

They could have done more....way more, and it would be appropriate. Make it a web page on DND beyond.

[Telok]

I'll note that the House Style Guide for D&D writers strongly discourages using page numbers, at least in part for business reasons.

Page numbers bad! Hulk smash! No numbers in book!

How... cute, I guess. Somebody at WotC needs to discover LaTeX. This is a solved problem in the 21st century.

Professional publishing software bad! Hulk smash! Only Notepad for publish game books!

[TrueAlphaGamer]

Sweet jesus, that is your argument? That my example doesn't conform to your thought of what a wall should do? Climbing a wall, heck a ladder, requires a check. Not everyone can do it. Even DC 8 can fail...that str 3 may get lucky and roll well, or fall...which they should. But that's not the point. It's an opinion that you have

Ay, hol up tho.

Not sure if I'm hearing this right but . . . you want climbing a ladder to be a check? Why???

I think 5e's level of streamlining is more than welcome when it comes to things like creating mechanical 'floors' for movement options. It removes a lot of frustration from the inevitable scenario of having an 18 Strength Paladin fall to his death because XD I rolled a 2 while climbing the ladder and now I fall to my death, teehee!
(Also it helps somewhat curb the mechanical consequences of 'Guy at the Gym'-type thought)

I agree that there should be references for what skills can do (I think it would do well to prevent ideas like crit-fail/success on skill checks from permeating), but I don't think using skills for something as mundane as "Climb Rope" or "Use Object" are conducive to a fun play experience in 5e for most modern tabletop circles.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Page numbers bad! Hulk smash! No numbers in book!

Professional publishing software bad! Hulk smash! Only Notepad for publish game books!

Honestly, I've used LaTeX (for my dissertation). It doesn't do internal page number updating (as opposed to the ones at the bottom of the page) very well either. You'd have to tag every piece of text you'd ever want to refer to later. And even then, it tends to break in new and interesting ways.

[micahaphone]

Honestly, I've used LaTeX (for my dissertation). It doesn't do internal page number updating (as opposed to the ones at the bottom of the page) very well either. You'd have to tag every piece of text you'd ever want to refer to later. And even then, it tends to break in new and interesting ways.

"Break in new and interesting ways" is a great way to describe the software I used for my research too :roy:

[PhoenixPhyre]

"Break in new and interesting ways" is a great way to describe the software I used for my research too :roy:

Isn't it? Yeah. I was a computational physics PhD, so things breaking was known as "It's a day whose name ends in 'y'".

[ff7hero]

Climbing a wall, heck a ladder, requires a check. Not everyone can do it. Even DC 8 can fail...that str 3 may get lucky and roll well, or fall...which they should. But that's not the point. It's an opinion that you have


Might want to check out PHB 175 and 182 (Athletics checks and Climbing sections, respectively) if you think PCs have a chance to fall off a ladder under non-stressful circumstances.

[Pex]

Ay, hol up tho.

Not sure if I'm hearing this right but . . . you want climbing a ladder to be a check? Why???

I think 5e's level of streamlining is more than welcome when it comes to things like creating mechanical 'floors' for movement options. It removes a lot of frustration from the inevitable scenario of having an 18 Strength Paladin fall to his death because XD I rolled a 2 while climbing the ladder and now I fall to my death, teehee!
(Also it helps somewhat curb the mechanical consequences of 'Guy at the Gym'-type thought)

I agree that there should be references for what skills can do (I think it would do well to prevent ideas like crit-fail/success on skill checks from permeating), but I don't think using skills for something as mundane as "Climb Rope" or "Use Object" are conducive to a fun play experience in 5e for most modern tabletop circles.

That's the point. Different DMs have different opinions on what can be done. You may think it silly it takes a check to climb a ladder, but another DM doesn't and he isn't more wrong than you saying there is no check. That lack of consistency between tables is the problem some of us have with the game. If there was a table for Climb that said DC 0 - ladder, DC 5 - rope, DC 10 - tree, etc. then there wouldn't be an issue. Don't need a whole list of things. One example for each DC would be enough.

[Boci]

That's the point. Different DMs have different opinions on what can be done. You may think it silly it takes a check to climb a ladder, but another DM doesn't and he isn't more wrong than you saying there is no check.

They kinda are. D&D is a heroic game, a check to climb a ladder doesn't gel with that ideal, and there's only so far different interpretations of the genre can go. Yes people can sometimes fail to climb a ladder in non-stressful situations, and when I still did martial art, someone once stepped wrong and dislocated their ankle. Both are realistic, but neither should be modelled in the rules for a heroic game.

[TrueAlphaGamer]

That's the point. Different DMs have different opinions on what can be done. You may think it silly it takes a check to climb a ladder, but another DM doesn't and he isn't more wrong than you saying there is no check.

RAW, in 5e, they are incorrect, and it can be incredibly frustrating to have these kinds of hurdles added based on the DM's whim. It is intrusive to most people's expectations of fun play specifically because it adds this kind of dumb "haha gotcha, git gud XD" complications to actions that are not only trivial to adventurers, but also specifically defined by the rules.

Imagine if you had to make an Acrobatics check whenever your character took the Dodge action, or an Intelligence check when your character tried to read a sign. What purpose does it serve?

I'm not saying that kind of stuff can't be fun, I'm just saying it probably won't be fun if the player's goal is to play Dungeons and Dragons, 5th edition.

And if it's not fun, why bother?

[Tanarii]

Sweet jesus, that is your argument? That my example doesn't conform to your thought of what a wall should do? Climbing a wall, heck a ladder, requires a check. Not everyone can do it. Even DC 8 can fail...that str 3 may get lucky and roll well, or fall...which they should. But that's not the point. It's an opinion that you haveI mean if your counterpoint is "I use house rules" that's fine, but be clear about it.


3e style checks is EXACTLY what we need.No."We" really don't. They're not good for the D&D gaming community, just a few stuck in the middle of the past semi-grognards.

Clearly what "we" need is to ditch ability checks vs variable DCs entirely, like true stuck in the ancient past full-on grognard. Maybe later on we can add some nwps against your fixed ability score if we're feeling really racey.

[Pex]

RAW, in 5e, they are incorrect, and it can be incredibly frustrating to have these kinds of hurdles added based on the DM's whim. It is intrusive to most people's expectations of fun play specifically because it adds this kind of dumb "haha gotcha, git gud XD" complications to actions that are not only trivial to adventurers, but also specifically defined by the rules.

Imagine if you had to make an Acrobatics check whenever your character took the Dodge action, or an Intelligence check when your character tried to read a sign. What purpose does it serve?

I'm not saying that kind of stuff can't be fun, I'm just saying it probably won't be fun if the player's goal is to play Dungeons and Dragons, 5th edition.

And if it's not fun, why bother?


It's not gotcha DMing. They honestly believe a particular skill requires a particular check at a particular DC no malice intended. They just disagree on if a check is needed and if it's needed what the DC is. That inconsistency is the problem some of us have about the game. Acrobatics aren't called for Dodge actions because the rules define how a Dodge action works. There are complete rules for "everything" except skill use. They do say what numbers to use for difficulties but not what difficulty to assign to what thing. Obviously you can't for everything in existence, so what would have been helpful are benchmark examples of the most common things that tend to come up in games so informed judgment calls could be made for everything else. Define climbing a ladder is this difficulty, a rope is that difficulty, and climbing a tree is this other difficulty to help the DM come up with the difficulty of climbing up a jungle vine that's not listed on the table. There I wouldn't quibble if one DM made it equal to the rope while another made it rope DC + 2 because I know one DM wouldn't say go ahead while another says no way. The lack of tables is what causes two characters having the same statistics be like Tarzan in one game and George of the Jungle in the other. That's a bother.

[KorvinStarmast]

It's not gotcha DMing.
Actually, it is. My brother does it with some frequency.
He has people roll ability checks that are irrelevant; the point is to see if something unusual happens ... but if we check chapter 7 we note that a roll is only called for if success versus failure has a consequence.

But I am sure we have been down this road before more than once. Climbing a ladder requires no ability check unless that is an outside agency that creates a risk of failure for the character involved.

I guess I'll get some popcorn and watch that same old thread about ability checks resurrect itself like a bad onion sandwich during a business meeting.

[ProsecutorGodot]

I guess I'll get some popcorn and watch that same old thread about ability checks resurrect itself like a bad onion sandwich during a business meeting.

I was just joking with my DM about this, I often share ideas with him that I find on the forums here and the timing of the reoccuring "climb check dc" debate brought it up.

For what it's worth, he did not decide to set a DC for climbing a ladder, can't recall him ever asking us to make a check for climbing anything other than the time our Sorcerer was teleported over a pit of lava, opting first to try grabbing a ledge rather than misty stepping to a safer area. I suppose the real debate is whether he had time to do either of those things, what kind of check it would take and what DC it should be.

[KorvinStarmast]

I suppose the real debate is whether he had time to do either of those things, what kind of check it would take and what DC it should be. This isn't hard.
pick one, pick a number, and have him roll it, don't agonize over it. Athletics or acrobatics fit fine, either will do.
It really is that easy in practice. (Or so I have found).

And I always like to remind D&D players, the aw (censored) instances are a part of the fun - success is never guaranteed. If it is guaranteed, then a die roll wasn't needed in the first place. Kind of like a very old advert for ABC's wide world of sports: The thrill of victory and the agony of defeat!

And the reminder to the rest of the party is "and if this goes horribly wrong, what do you intend to do?"

[Tanarii]

And the reminder to the rest of the party is "and if this goes horribly wrong, what do you intend to do?"
Point and laugh?

Cheese it?


Sometimes both are required. :smallamused:

[TrueAlphaGamer]

It's not gotcha DMing. They honestly believe a particular skill requires a particular check at a particular DC no malice intended. They just disagree on if a check is needed and if it's needed what the DC is. That inconsistency is the problem some of us have about the game. Acrobatics aren't called for Dodge actions because the rules define how a Dodge action works. There are complete rules for "everything" except skill use. They do say what numbers to use for difficulties but not what difficulty to assign to what thing. Obviously you can't for everything in existence, so what would have been helpful are benchmark examples of the most common things that tend to come up in games so informed judgment calls could be made for everything else. Define climbing a ladder is this difficulty, a rope is that difficulty, and climbing a tree is this other difficulty to help the DM come up with the difficulty of climbing up a jungle vine that's not listed on the table. There I wouldn't quibble if one DM made it equal to the rope while another made it rope DC + 2 because I know one DM wouldn't say go ahead while another says no way. The lack of tables is what causes two characters having the same statistics be like Tarzan in one game and George of the Jungle in the other. That's a bother.

Yes, the rules define how the Dodge action works.

Just like they define how climbing a ladder works. Under normal conditions, without innate climb speed: half your movement speed.

Yes lack of tables are an issue, but I'm just saying that Climbing isn't something that needs those tables. The same way walking doesn't. Or opening an unlocked, not-stuck wooden door. The real bother is having something arbitrarily turn your huge, bad-ass Half-Orc Barbarian into a wimpy, clammy-hand mess that fell on his butt because of one die roll. I don't want to roll for every time my character tries to climb a ladder, or get up from prone, or swim - because I don't think that's where the challenge should come from in 5e, and the PHB agrees.


And I always like to remind D&D players, the aw (censored) instances are a part of the fun - success is never guaranteed. If it is guaranteed, then a die roll wasn't needed in the first place. Kind of like a very old advert for ABC's wide world of sports: The thrill of victory and the agony of defeat!

And the reminder to the rest of the party is "and if this goes horribly wrong, what do you intend to do?"

IDK, I don't think a lot of players play the game to have the dice decide everything that happens1, more that they want to play, engage in, and create a dramatic and fulfilling story/adventure/etc.

I think Matt Colville articulated this well when he mentioned something to the effect of how dice aren't dramatic, they're just random. They allow for arbitration within the system, but they're hardly the best or most fulfilling way of processing action.

1: and the ones that do prefer to argue about it over internet forums

[Edea]

I would only call for a check on mundane crap like that if it's to mess with the players' heads due to metagaming, and it must be used sparingly.

"There's a door in front of you, it looks flimsy and is slightly ajar."
"I use my 10-foot pole to open the door!"
"Acrobatics check."
"?!?! Oh GOD, I rolled a 2!"
"The door opens."
"...wait, what?"
"The door opens. The corridor beyond looks unoccupied."

Cue the players wondering for like a freaking hour what in the Nine Hells that check was for.

[Pex]

Actually, it is. My brother does it with some frequency.
He has people roll ability checks that are irrelevant; the point is to see if something unusual happens ... but if we check chapter 7 we note that a roll is only called for if success versus failure has a consequence.

But I am sure we have been down this road before more than once. Climbing a ladder requires no ability check unless that is an outside agency that creates a risk of failure for the character involved.

I guess I'll get some popcorn and watch that same old thread about ability checks resurrect itself like a bad onion sandwich during a business meeting.

As is often said no rules can stop a jerk DM from being a jerk. I have said in the past 5E facilitates such DMing. Not cause it, just facilitate it because it's up to DM whim, and it takes an experienced player to notice it doesn't have to be that way. If a newbie gets annoyed enough he may think that's D&D and quit the game itself rather than just that campaign. However, we can at least agree that whatever we're discussing the DM is playing in good faith. The only disagreement among DMs is the difficulty of the task.


Yes, the rules define how the Dodge action works.

Just like they define how climbing a ladder works. Under normal conditions, without innate climb speed: half your movement speed.

Yes lack of tables are an issue, but I'm just saying that Climbing isn't something that needs those tables. The same way walking doesn't. Or opening an unlocked, not-stuck wooden door. The real bother is having something arbitrarily turn your huge, bad-ass Half-Orc Barbarian into a wimpy, clammy-hand mess that fell on his butt because of one die roll. I don't want to roll for every time my character tries to climb a ladder, or get up from prone, or swim - because I don't think that's where the challenge should come from in 5e, and the PHB agrees.




The PHB does not agree. It leaves it up to DM whim whether he thinks something is trivial enough it doesn't require a roll. It does not define what makes something trivial. You may think it fine someone can swim across the river just because he wants to. Another DM will disagree and require a roll. Another DM also disagrees and insist on a roll but then he'll set a different DC. What happens when a PC fails the check? Also up to the DM. One DM might say the character gets caught in the current and is floating down river. Another might say the current is too strong so the PC is forced to go back to shore. Another might ask for a Con save to avoid starting to drown.

But yes, avoiding a bad-ass half-orc barbarian from turning into a wimp is precisely the point. There will always be the DM who insists on a Natural 1 being a total fu hahaha. That's a different topic that has nothing to do with 5E specifically. I'm with everyone there. What I'm talking about is what I've brought up before. In one campaign I had a 10 ST not proficient in Athletics character be able to swim a moat, climb a rock hill, then climb a wall to crawl through a window without one single die roll. I could do it all just because I wanted to. In a different campaign I had a 10 ST not proficient in Athletics character wanting to climb a tree to see over yonder, and the DM required a DC 20 check. Neither DM was wrong. Neither DM was playing gotcha. They just disagreed on the difficulty of physicals tasks, and it made all the difference in the world of what I could do with my character despite having the same game statistics. That's the problem that drives me up the wall.

[Tanarii]

The PHB does not agree. It leaves it up to DM whim whether he thinks something is trivial enough it doesn't require a roll. It does not define what makes something trivial. You may think it fine someone can swim across the river just because he wants to. Another DM will disagree and require a roll. Another DM also disagrees and insist on a roll but then he'll set a different DC. What happens when a PC fails the check? Also up to the DM. One DM might say the character gets caught in the current and is floating down river. Another might say the current is too strong so the PC is forced to go back to shore. Another might ask for a Con save to avoid starting to drown.


CLIMBING, SWIMMING, AND CRAWLING
Each foot of movement costs 1 extra foot (2 extra feet in difficult terrain) when you're climbing, swimming, or crawling. You ignore this extra cost if you have a climbing speed and use it to climb or a swimming speed and use it to swim. At the DM's option, climbing a slippery vertical surface or one with few handholds requires a successful Strength (Athletics) check. Similarly, gaining any distance in rough water might require a successful Strength (Athletics) check.
PHB 182

• You struggle to swim or stay afloat in treacherous currents, storm-tossed waves, or areas of thick seaweed. Or another creature tries to push or pull you underwater or otherwise interfere with your swimming.
PHB 175

One DMs river might be more dangerous than another river. One river in a single DMs world might be more dangerous than other rivers in the same DMs world. But if a DM requires you to make a check to swim in water that isn't rough, treacherous, storm tossed, thick with obstructions, or being interfered with by another creature, you've already got a rule you can point to and ask why. You don't need a table to keep Tyrannical DMs (TM Pex) in check, if that's what you feel you need.

Ditto climbing.

Meanwhile DMs have the flexibility to create more than one kind of dangerous climb, more than one kind of dangerous swim, more than one kind of difficult lock to pick ... all without having to constrain themselves to adamantine locks.

Edit: Oh, and more than one set of consequences for a failed check in a dangerous swim for that matter. Of course different things can happen as the result of a failed check in different swims. I suppose we could have a table of failed results with different chances of each ... but we could also have a critical fumbles table. :smallyuk:

[ProsecutorGodot]

This isn't hard.
pick one, pick a number, and have him roll it, don't agonize over it. Athletics or acrobatics fit fine, either will do.
It really is that easy in practice. (Or so I have found).


Oh it was easy in practice, probably should have put it in blue as it was intended to be pretty tongue in cheek.

My DM is generally good at improvising, and we can rarely if ever tell that he's making it up on the spot.

[Boci]

As is often said no rules can stop a jerk DM from being a jerk.

Some people would call a DM a jerk for requiring a check to climb a ladder unhindered.

[Imbalance]

But I am sure we have been down this road before more than once.

Like a broken record for the entire time I've been on these boards, the same posters keep derailing threads with the same argumentative complaints that are clearly not a problem for the vast hordes of people just getting into this game.:smalleek:

The worst 5e book is the rulebook from Lost Mines of Phandelver. What is this...pamphlet? It's inadequate even for the short adventure module WoTC determined to be introductory, let alone something that should be slipped into a Starter product. Some D&D boardgame manuals are less anemic. The free SRD would be a far more useful document if it wasn't formatted like a 400-page beta tester's treatise, but it's still a better starter book than the one for Lost Mines and I'd wager it's where a majority of savvy players and DMs turn once they realize how much the starter is missing. It was cute how they tried to rectify these shortcomings with the Essentials Kit, but what has been sorely lacking is something that speaks to curious gamers who have never tried D&D before.

In defense of SCAG, as one of those gamers completely new to everything about D&D (not the least of which was its default setting), I found the semi-encyclopedic information very valuable for catching up on this edition's lore. In hand with Storm King's sandbox descriptions, I have a far better grasp of the geography and cultures of the world than I did when I started. I have since found numerous wiki sites with even more details (of sometimes dubious nature, given that most are fan sites trying to reconcile decades and multiple editions of sometimes conflicting lore), but those two books were of particular detriment to my resistance against future purchases.

[Pex]

CLIMBING, SWIMMING, AND CRAWLING
Each foot of movement costs 1 extra foot (2 extra feet in difficult terrain) when you're climbing, swimming, or crawling. You ignore this extra cost if you have a climbing speed and use it to climb or a swimming speed and use it to swim. At the DM's option, climbing a slippery vertical surface or one with few handholds requires a successful Strength (Athletics) check. Similarly, gaining any distance in rough water might require a successful Strength (Athletics) check.
PHB 182


Without defining what the DC is. That's the problem. The DC is DM whim.


• You struggle to swim or stay afloat in treacherous currents, storm-tossed waves, or areas of thick seaweed. Or another creature tries to push or pull you underwater or otherwise interfere with your swimming.
PHB 175

One DMs river might be more dangerous than another river. One river in a single DMs world might be more dangerous than other rivers in the same DMs world. But if a DM requires you to make a check to swim in water that isn't rough, treacherous, storm tossed, thick with obstructions, or being interfered with by another creature, you've already got a rule you can point to and ask why. You don't need a table to keep Tyrannical DMs (TM Pex) in check, if that's what you feel you need.

Ditto climbing.

Meanwhile DMs have the flexibility to create more than one kind of dangerous climb, more than one kind of dangerous swim, more than one kind of difficult lock to pick ... all without having to constrain themselves to adamantine locks.

Edit: Oh, and more than one set of consequences for a failed check in a dangerous swim for that matter. Of course different things can happen as the result of a failed check in different swims. I suppose we could have a table of failed results with different chances of each ... but we could also have a critical fumbles table. :smallyuk:

But yet it's perfectly fine for all plate mails in every DM's game for all campaigns to be AC 18. It's perfectly fine for all Fireballs cast at 3rd level spell slot for every campaign every where to do 8d6 damage to everyone in a 20 ft radius with a Dex save DC of 8 + caster's spell ability modifier + caster's proficiency. You can't tell me consistency is wrong for skill use when there is consistency for everything else.


Some people would call a DM a jerk for requiring a check to climb a ladder unhindered.

Perhaps. I might even agree depending on context. If there existed a table that said DC 0 to climb a ladder then the incident wouldn't happen at all most of the time because DMs tend to follow the rules, especially on minutiae, unless they feel the need to house rule something. The jerk DM who insists on a DC 20 check or some such anyway stands out. You'll know for sure instead of having to guess, and for newbies they'll know it's the DM and not the game.

[Boci]

But yet it's perfectly fine for all plate mails in every DM's game for all campaigns to be AC 18. It's perfectly fine for all Fireballs cast at 3rd level spell slot for every campaign every where to do 8d6 damage to everyone in a 20 ft radius with a Dex save DC of 8 + caster's spell ability modifier + caster's proficiency. You can't tell me consistency is wrong for skill use when there is consistency for everything else.

I can see an argument for why they're different. Combat is combat, and skills are skills. 5e seems to be written under the assumption that the tules of combat will largely be the same from group to group, but skills won't, or even game to game. Is finding food going to be an issue for the group on their week long trek to the fortress of solitude? How will the group find the ex-thieves guild member hiding in the port city? By not giving a straight answer one way or another 5e allows a DM some control over the story they tell, without making combat also entirely at their whim.


Perhaps. I might even agree depending on context. If there existed a table that said DC 0 to climb a ladder then the incident wouldn't happen at all most of the time because DMs tend to follow the rules, especially on minutiae, unless they feel the need to house rule something. The jerk DM who insists on a DC 20 check or some such anyway stands out. You'll know for sure instead of having to guess, and for newbies they'll know it's the DM and not the game.

But then why does that need to be printed? In 3.5 DC: 0 was meaningful because you could stack enough penalties that a player could have a fair chance of failing, but in 5th ed, failing a DC 0 would generally require having no profiency, 7 or less in the relevant stack, and rolling a 1, so why is the rulebook wasting ink telling us the DC is 0 when not assigning a DC would work just as well 99.9% of the time.

[ironkid]

I thought Ravinica was bad.

Mythic Odysseys of Theros is far and away the worst book out there. it is a campaign setting that ties and manipulates the players into either playing a cleric or sucking up to a deity patron.

the race selection is limited and poor. The map is an uninspired brown blob with no wondrous sites or features. there are just three cities, all human, and then the writing team went home.

the entire book is a knockoff Greek mythology setting. But all the names are changed to a make believe culture that seems afraid it might get sued by ancient Greeks. (There is no copyright on Greek mythology). The only real work was done on the deity system and the rest was just lazy.

I find the book 100% useless.

I *LOVE* the book. I agree it's useless tho :elan:

To be clear: I love the greek mythology flavor, I love the gods involvement thing, I love the overpowered bonuses you get, and I *really* like the piety thing. The problem is, the only people that would be interested would be ones with the same passion for mytholgy that I have - and they wouldnt be interested in fake zeus or fake charon, they'd want the Zeus and Charon (I myself don't care about the presented gods, except for inspiration for the actual things). And while you and I can incorporate Zeus or Hades in our games, I do understand a company's reluctance to do so, as classic gods did serious sexual crimes that have been horribly unjustifiable since always.

Yeah, on a local level we can pretend it never happened and make it so in our games, but I do understand WotC reluctance to use the actual Deities.

The PC options aren't bad just too limited (two subclasses and only a new race option, the satyr, none of which are bad at all); I expected at least racial feats for the centaur and the minotaur, which are hardly the most played, or powerful, races available.

If I had been in charge of the proyect, I'd tried to talk with my editor to include an appendix with the piety system applied to the gods included in the PHB. As it is, the book is a good read, the piety system is a good inspiration for other deities, has few but interesting PC options, and sans those, will likely see no play at all.

[Pex]

I can see an argument for why they're different. Combat is combat, and skills are skills. 5e seems to be written under the assumption that the tules of combat will largely be the same from group to group, but skills won't, or even game to game. Is finding food going to be an issue for the group on their week long trek to the fortress of solitude? How will the group find the ex-thieves guild member hiding in the port city? By not giving a straight answer one way or another 5e allows a DM some control over the story they tell, without making combat also entirely at their whim.



But then why does that need to be printed? In 3.5 DC: 0 was meaningful because you could stack enough penalties that a player could have a fair chance of failing, but in 5th ed, failing a DC 0 would generally require having no profiency, 7 or less in the relevant stack, and rolling a 1, so why is the rulebook wasting ink telling us the DC is 0 when not assigning a DC would work just as well 99.9% of the time.

Because not every DM agrees on what is trivial enough not to need a roll. A baseline is needed for a frame of reference. I've seen it in play of DMs having difficulty on what DC to give something. They don't know because they lack a frame of reference. It's not enough to say what number to give when something is easy or hard. What's also needed is what makes something easy or hard. Tell the DM a few examples of DCs for a skill. He can take it from there for everything else. If climbing a ladder should be trivial tell DMs that. Tell them it's DC 0, and you won't have one DM say DC 10 another DC 15 and another DC 20.

[Spriteless]

From a player's perspective, I always find complaining that one DM gives a DC 10 and another DC15 to be annoying. Like, I know you just want to play the same game at many tables, but it's not a war game. You might as well complain that some DMs run games with political intrigue, some run whodunnits, and some dungeon crawls. It's a feature, not a bug, that different DMs run games that are not equal.

But as a DM it would be nice if I didn't have to pull quite so many numbers out of my butt. It was intimidating at first. If I just decide it's DC 15 am I somehow illegitimate? (No, but I have social anxiety so yes.) I could look up a table in Pathfinder, then half it, and then add 5; it makes me feel it's a legitimate number, but is extra work. I'd like some sort of number to start with and change so it is less work for me.

[PhoenixPhyre]

From a player's perspective, I always find complaining that one DM gives a DC 10 and another DC15 to be annoying. Like, I know you just want to play the same game at many tables, but it's not a war game. You might as well complain that some DMs run games with political intrigue, some run whodunnits, and some dungeon crawls. It's a feature, not a bug, that different DMs run games that are not equal.

But as a DM it would be nice if I didn't have to pull quite so many numbers out of my butt. It was intimidating at first. If I just decide it's DC 15 am I somehow illegitimate? (No, but I have social anxiety so yes.) I could look up a table in Pathfinder, then half it, and then add 5; it makes me feel it's a legitimate number, but is extra work. I'd like some sort of number to start with and change so it is less work for me.

Here's legitimate numbers for you for any occasion where they're not written down:

Do I want there to only be a small chance of failure? DC 10
Do I want there to be a medium chance of failure? DC 15 <---this is a fine default for things that have interesting failure states
Do I want there to be a large chance of failure? DC 20

Done. You don't need any other DCs to play the game. If you're tempted to say that DC 10 is too hard, don't call for a check at all, just let them succeed. At high levels you can assign DC 25 or 30 checks if you don't want anyone but a specialist to have a chance.

------------
More seriously (although the above is totally true), social anxiety is a pain. I totally understand the desire to have a "shield" to justify your decisions. But here's the thing (IMO). Those "shields" are crutches. They slow down the game and prevent you from becoming the great DM you can be. And reinforce your anxiety.

You could instead dig through all the DCs found in the DMG, PHB, and Xanathar's Guide (those are likely to be generic, rather than adventure-specific) and start forming your own mental model There are a lot more of them defined than you might think. I compiled a list of 82, but that was condensing lots of similar checks together (for instance all the "social checks" ended up in 4 rows). The benefit of doing so is that you gain a deeper understanding of the intent and meaning of each DC and check, while also being able to say "I don't like that--in my world X is [easier|harder] than that."

[Tanarii]

Here's legitimate numbers for you for any occasion where they're not written down:

Do I want there to only be a small chance of failure? DC 10
Do I want there to be a medium chance of failure? DC 15 <---this is a fine default for things that have interesting failure states
Do I want there to be a large chance of failure? DC 20

Done. You don't need any other DCs to play the game. If you're tempted to say that DC 10 is too hard, don't call for a check at all, just let them succeed. At high levels you can assign DC 25 or 30 checks if you don't want anyone but a specialist to have a chance.

------------These numbers are wrong. :smalltongue:

Do I want there to only be a small chance of failure? DC 5
Do I want there to be a medium chance of failure? DC 10 <---this is a fine default for things that have interesting failure states
Do I want there to be a large chance of failure, unless you've got both a high score and proficiency? DC 15
Do I want almost no chance of success, unless you've got both a high score and proficiency and Magic, and expertise is a good idea too? DC 20

Edit: I don't want numbers for specific tasks. I think that's creates more problems than it solves for DMs. But the DMG labels/names for setting DCs in the one table that needs to exist sets unrealistic expectations.

[PhoenixPhyre]

These numbers are wrong. :smalltongue:

Do I want there to only be a small chance of failure? DC 5
Do I want there to be a medium chance of failure? DC 10 <---this is a fine default for things that have interesting failure states
Do I want there to be a large chance of failure, unless you've got both a high score and proficiency? DC 15
Do I want almost no chance of success, unless you've got both a high score and proficiency and Magic, and expertise is a good idea too? DC 20

Edit: I don't want numbers for specific tasks. I think that's creates more problems than it solves for DMs. But the DMG labels/names for setting DCs in the one table that needs to exist sets unrealistic expectations.

Depends on your baseline. The names match really well if they're referencing a level 1 character with either a good ability score or a weaker one and proficiency.

I'd never assign a dc 5 check unless it was critical (bad consequence for failure) and a straight check in a tertiary score for everyone. Because otherwise it's not worth rolling.

A 50% chance of failure (dc 10, mod 0) is about as low as I care to go. Because anyone who hasv either proficiency or a decent stat can hardly fail.

[Pex]

These numbers are wrong. :smalltongue:

Do I want there to only be a small chance of failure? DC 5
Do I want there to be a medium chance of failure? DC 10 <---this is a fine default for things that have interesting failure states
Do I want there to be a large chance of failure, unless you've got both a high score and proficiency? DC 15
Do I want almost no chance of success, unless you've got both a high score and proficiency and Magic, and expertise is a good idea too? DC 20

Edit: I don't want numbers for specific tasks. I think that's creates more problems than it solves for DMs. But the DMG labels/names for setting DCs in the one table that needs to exist sets unrealistic expectations.


Depends on your baseline. The names match really well if they're referencing a level 1 character with either a good ability score or a weaker one and proficiency.

I'd never assign a dc 5 check unless it was critical (bad consequence for failure) and a straight check in a tertiary score for everyone. Because otherwise it's not worth rolling.

A 50% chance of failure (dc 10, mod 0) is about as low as I care to go. Because anyone who hasv either proficiency or a decent stat can hardly fail.

My point proven.

[Tanarii]

I'd never assign a dc 5 check unless it was critical (bad consequence for failure) and a straight check in a tertiary score for everyone. Because otherwise it's not worth rolling.
That's a fairly common situation IMX. Unless you're running a game with a lot of One Roll to Rule Them All checks for the entire party, and the players get to let the PC with the best odds step up. Otherwise, having to roll without a high ability score and proficiency should be more common than not.


My point proven.
No. We're arguing about if the numbers on the one table a DM needs are right. Your argument that overly generalized tasks need specific numbers still doesn't hold water.

[Telwar]

I *LOVE* the book. I agree it's useless tho :elan:

To be clear: I love the greek mythology flavor, I love the gods involvement thing, I love the overpowered bonuses you get, and I *really* like the piety thing. The problem is, the only people that would be interested would be ones with the same passion for mytholgy that I have - and they wouldnt be interested in fake zeus or fake charon, they'd want the Zeus and Charon (I myself don't care about the presented gods, except for inspiration for the actual things). And while you and I can incorporate Zeus or Hades in our games, I do understand a company's reluctance to do so, as classic gods did serious sexual crimes that have been horribly unjustifiable since always.

Yeah, on a local level we can pretend it never happened and make it so in our games, but I do understand WotC reluctance to use the actual Deities.

The PC options aren't bad just too limited (two subclasses and only a new race option, the satyr, none of which are bad at all); I expected at least racial feats for the centaur and the minotaur, which are hardly the most played, or powerful, races available.

If I had been in charge of the proyect, I'd tried to talk with my editor to include an appendix with the piety system applied to the gods included in the PHB. As it is, the book is a good read, the piety system is a good inspiration for other deities, has few but interesting PC options, and sans those, will likely see no play at all.

Yeah, if you DON'T want to play in that setting...and I'll be honest, I'm not sure why anyone would, there is very little that's portable. But it's a fairly detailed setting presentation.

Which brings me to my worst book, SCAG. And to be fair, I think they've changed their minds since that was published, because Wildemont, Theros, Ravnica, and Eberron are all beautifully detailed setting books, but SCAG...I think assumes you already know about the Realms, and maybe they thought if you didn't, you'd be happy to go buy PDFs of the old books that did detail the setting.

[PhoenixPhyre]

That's a fairly common situation IMX. Unless you're running a game with a lot of One Roll to Rule Them All checks for the entire party, and the players get to let the PC with the best odds step up. Otherwise, having to roll without a high ability score and proficiency should be more common than not.


Even someone at +0 only has a 20% chance of failure. Unless it's something do or die, I'm still not going to roll. And I rarely have any single check with that big of consequences. Remember, the opposite of ORtRTA is One Failure Condemns Them All. And (except in stealth), neither one is all that great a practice IMO.

But sure. Either set of DCs (5|10|15|20) or (10|15|20) is plenty good. And I'm fine with a default of ether 10 or 15. I'd probably do 10 for straight checks and 15 if proficiency's allowed.

But to be honest, I have to confess that I rarely actually set explicit DCs beyond "roll high/roll low". Because 50% of the time at least, the die roll isn't where I have to think about it. But I'm also pretty strict about DC: No and DC: Yes (success not possible and failure not reasonable, respectively). And I'll flat out tell people when the characters would know the plan wouldn't work. So by the time they're actually rolling, it's all about resolving that middle 50% uncertainty range. That's a style thing IMO.

And I'm also a rule-follower by nature--if they had fixed DCs for things it would be more difficult for me to set my own. Which would severely cramp my style and my worldbuilding. And suck most of the fun out of things for me by increasing my mental overhead and anxiety about "doing it right" by leaps and bounds.

[Pex]

That's a fairly common situation IMX. Unless you're running a game with a lot of One Roll to Rule Them All checks for the entire party, and the players get to let the PC with the best odds step up. Otherwise, having to roll without a high ability score and proficiency should be more common than not.


No. We're arguing about if the numbers on the one table a DM needs are right. Your argument that overly generalized tasks need specific numbers still doesn't hold water.


My point is different DMs having different opinions on the difficulties of a task, and my two most vocal opponents on the matter can't even agree on what DCs to give even just for advice. Point is proven. Someone has to come up with the example DCs. It would be the game designers' job to have provided the example DC tables for DMs to use for those of us who wanted them. Let them hash it out in development all the different opinions on difficulties until they come up with a final output. They chose not to do that, causing these problems I and others have.

[Spriteless]

My point is different DMs having different opinions on the difficulties of a task, and my two most vocal opponents on the matter can't even agree on what DCs to give even just for advice. Point is proven. Someone has to come up with the example DCs. It would be the game designers' job to have provided the example DC tables for DMs to use for those of us who wanted them. Let them hash it out in development all the different opinions on difficulties until they come up with a final output. They chose not to do that, causing these problems I and others have.

It is true, different DMs set the DCs to different numbers. Whether this is a glitch or a feature is more a matter of taste. I would find it disconcerting if I were playing Adventure League with a different DM every week. Instead, it's more like I have 2 buddies with 2 different styles, I just think of it as one runs Dark Souls while the other runs Hyrule Warriors. They are very different games that have different moments and challenges. If it is a campaign rather than pick up, it's worth bringing up in session zero if you want to use skills!

I get more upset that people think D&D is the only system, then that people run D&D differently.

[Imbalance]

Even if the rules were hard coded, things would probably still play differently at different tables, just like how Cruisin' USA was technically the same game on SNES as it had been in arcades, though it felt dissimilar in many ways.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Even if the rules were hard coded, things would probably still play differently at different tables, just like how Cruisin' USA was technically the same game on SNES as it had been in arcades, though it felt dissimilar in many ways.

The rules of Monopoly are hard coded. Yet I'd bet fewer people play it "stock" than play with any of the (widely-varying) house rules.

Variation is inevitable. The 5e designers realized that and realized that by delegating to the DMs and their tables they could please more people with less brittleness and a more robust system. And it seems to have been born out in practice.

[Pex]

The rules of Monopoly are hard coded. Yet I'd bet fewer people play it "stock" than play with any of the (widely-varying) house rules.

Variation is inevitable. The 5e designers realized that and realized that by delegating to the DMs and their tables they could please more people with less brittleness and a more robust system. And it seems to have been born out in practice.

The rules of Chess are hard coded and played without variation*, yet you can't say every game plays exactly the same.

*There are interesting variants, such as adding two new pieces - The Cardinal that moves like Bishop & Knight and Phoenix that moves like Rook & Knight to play on a 10 x 10 board plus the famous Star Trek 3D Chess, but they are novelties not serious contention of playing Chess.

[KorvinStarmast]

From a player's perspective, I always find complaining that one DM gives a DC 10 and another DC15 to be annoying. I find that to be true both as a player and as a DM. Pick a number, roll, see what happens. And then, See What Happens Next.
My point is different DMs having different opinions on the difficulties of a task, . That is correct. Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it. This isn't a video game where you control the mouse/joystick.
The dice will be cruel to you but you will soldier on. Go and read the PHB and find the text that I just quoted. Hint for you: it's early in the book

RTFM

[Pex]

I find that to be true both as a player and as a DM. Pick a number, roll, see what happens. And then, See What Happens Next. That is correct. Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it. This isn't a video game where you control the mouse/joystick. Go and read the PHB and find the text that I just quoted. Hint for you: it's early in the book

RTFM

Tell the people who don't like Great Weapon Master and Sharpshooter to "Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it."

Tell the people who don't like players dipping into Hexblade to "Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it."

Tell the people who don't like the SCAG Cantrips to "Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it."

Meanwhile I can always hope they'll have a page or two in Tasha providing example DCs. I'm not expecting it, but it's nice to think about. I was pleasantly surprised they gave example DCs for tool use in Xanathar, so it's possible.

[KorvinStarmast]

Tell the people who don't like Great Weapon Master and Sharpshooter to "Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it." I have objected to ther objections in the past. The hate on martials I dislike.

Tell the people who don't like players dipping into Hexblade to "Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it." I dislike Hexblade. I dislike mostly because what was actually needed was a small tweak to pact of the blade. But if someone picks one at our table I suspect I'll put up with it.

Meanwhile I can always hope they'll have a page or two in Tasha providing example DCs. I'm not expecting it, but it's nice to think about. I was pleasantly surprised they gave example DCs for tool use in Xanathar, so it's possible. There's a little something for everyone.

[Imbalance]

Tell the people who don't like Great Weapon Master and Sharpshooter to "Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it."

Tell the people who don't like players dipping into Hexblade to "Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it."

Tell the people who don't like the SCAG Cantrips to "Deal with it. Or, leave the table if you can't handle it."

Meanwhile I can always hope they'll have a page or two in Tasha providing example DCs. I'm not expecting it, but it's nice to think about. I was pleasantly surprised they gave example DCs for tool use in Xanathar, so it's possible.

I mean, yeah. That's what you do. Or, "don't buy this book if you don't like the content," "play a different system if you think the port is bad," basically, "this is how it is - make up your own mind if it suits your or not and move on." Because, "wah! You screwed up! Fix it for me!" has historically not been effective.

[Tanarii]

GwM/PAM/SS/CBE, SCAG Cantrips, and Hexblade are perfect examples of why DC example tables with very specific DCs for what are broadly variable tasks should never see print.

They are optional rules. And now that they have been printed, many people assume they're the default, and accuse people that don't like them or use them of badwrongfun.

[Pex]

GwM/PAM/SS/CBE, SCAG Cantrips, and Hexblade are perfect examples of why DC example tables with very specific DCs for what are broadly variable tasks should never see print.

They are optional rules. And now that they have been printed, many people assume they're the default, and accuse people that don't like them or use them of badwrongfun.

By that logic there shouldn't be rules for anything because someone somewhere won't like it.

There will be rules. There will be people who don't like a particular rule you like. What's badwrongfun is metaphrocally yelling at the people who don't like a rule you like how dare they. Good for you if you like 5E skill rules as is. Don't tell me I'm having badwrongfun for not liking them, or is it badwrongnotfun.

you = general you, not Tanarii specifically


I mean, yeah. That's what you do. Or, "don't buy this book if you don't like the content," "play a different system if you think the port is bad," basically, "this is how it is - make up your own mind if it suits your or not and move on." Because, "wah! You screwed up! Fix it for me!" has historically not been effective.

I'm not demanding 5E do anything. I'm only criticizing the choice they made, just like other people do for their pet peeves like Great Weapon Master or Hexblade dipping. When they ask for opinions in their surveys that's where I can tell them I'd like DC examples. I can only hope for the best they'll do so in the future.

But please, do tell the people who don't like Great Weapon Master and Hexblade dipping they're "wahing" all over the place. I'll wait.

I'll put it another way.

People complain about Great Weapon Master. I have no problem with it. I speak about how in games I play it's not taken by everyone. When it is taken it does not break the game. I disagree with the notion it's a universal fact the feat is broken. I do not tell people who don't like the feat they're wrong to not like it. I do not tell them to stop talking about how they don't like the feat. I deserve the same courtesy.

[Tanarii]

I wanna if you want to see it in action, look at this post where they assume that the new xanathars rule on identifying spells was always the rule, retroactively:
https://forums.giantitp.com/showsinglepost.php?p=24735104&postcount=31

[Imbalance]

Look, I don't mean to be discourteous, so I apologize. But if we're talking courtesy, does it not seem more polite to keep this repeating discussion to its own thread rather than injecting it so frequently into unrelated topics? I haven't been on these boards very long, and this isn't the kind of place where I get very savvy on people's usernames. However, it didn't take long to start recognizing and scrolling right past when I see the avatar of the dude pointing the pistol because it gets to be the same complaint over and over again. And then it always turns into the same arguments and badwrongfun accusations. Again, I apologize. I don't even care about the argument itself, I just wish people's memories could include that they just said the same thing in a completely different thread the other day while I'm trying to read about the worst books in 5e.

[Pex]

Look, I don't mean to be discourteous, so I apologize. But if we're talking courtesy, does it not seem more polite to keep this repeating discussion to its own thread rather than injecting it so frequently into unrelated topics? I haven't been on these boards very long, and this isn't the kind of place where I get very savvy on people's usernames. However, it didn't take long to start recognizing and scrolling right past when I see the avatar of the dude pointing the pistol because it gets to be the same complaint over and over again. And then it always turns into the same arguments and badwrongfun accusations. Again, I apologize. I don't even care about the argument itself, I just wish people's memories could include that they just said the same thing in a completely different thread the other day while I'm trying to read about the worst books in 5e.

I wasn't the one who brought it up. Someone else commented on the lack of skill DCs as being a reason why he felt the Player's Handbook was the worst book and others commented he was wrong to do so. I agreed with his assessment that lack of skill DCs was a bother, but it wasn't enough a reason for me to declare the PHB the worst book. I agreed with his premise but not his conclusion. Others would not let it go and still insist we are wrong not to like the lack of skill DCs so here we are.

[Tanarii]

I wasn't the one who brought it up.
But it's a fair point (meaning for me too). Let's give it a week or so, and then start our own thread where we can go for round 20 or whatever of the endless argument. :smallwink:

[Amnestic]

Theros takes the cake for me - a setting that is just ancient greece with the serial numbers filed off, only two subclasses (neither of which are particularly exciting to me personally), only two new races (one of which, the satyr, have a questionable power level). No new spells. The piety system is interesting enough but it's hardly worth the price of admission. Given that some of Eberron's guild stuff is getting reprinted in the setting-neutral Tasha's if I'm remembering right, I wonder if Piety will get something similar down the line.

[MaxWilson]

GwM/PAM/SS/CBE, SCAG Cantrips, and Hexblade are perfect examples of why DC example tables with very specific DCs for what are broadly variable tasks should never see print.

They are optional rules. And now that they have been printed, many people assume they're the default, and accuse people that don't like them or use them of badwrongfun.

And yet, DMG spellpoints and Disarm are not widely used. Clearly it's possible to give DMs advice while keeping it off the players' radar.

I think all of the adventures are pretty bad (dreary and overlong cliches--I get more useful adventure content out of other game systems like Paranoia, Microscope and DramaSystem), but of the settings books that I bought not counting SCAG, Explorer's Guide to Wildemont is the worst and hardest to care about, while Exploring Eberron is the best. (Says the guy who was not an Eberron fan until he bought Rising From the Last War and was impressed by its quality.)

[Chauncymancer]

The problem is, the only people that would be interested would be ones with the same passion for mytholgy that I have - and they wouldnt be interested in fake zeus or fake charon, they'd want the Zeus and Charon (I myself don't care about the presented gods, except for inspiration for the actual things). And while you and I can incorporate Zeus or Hades in our games, I do understand a company's reluctance to do so, as classic gods did serious sexual crimes that have been horribly unjustifiable since always.

Yeah, on a local level we can pretend it never happened and make it so in our games, but I do understand WotC reluctance to use the actual Deities.




But all the names are changed to a make believe culture that seems afraid it might get sued by ancient Greeks. (There is no copyright on Greek mythology). The only real work was done on the deity system and the rest was just lazy.


WotC actual goal in using their own thinly veiled deities is that this book is a tie-in to a pre-existing game and novel setting and you want to draw specifically and explicitly on that IP.

[NorthernPhoenix]

They actually, close to objectively worst made book is probably the original version of Tyranny of Dragons.

But to me personally, any of the books with clear powercreep are far worse.

[Tanarii]

And yet, DMG spellpoints and Disarm are not widely used. Clearly it's possible to give DMs advice while keeping it off the players' radar.
All they'd have to do is put it in the DMG's using Running the Game chapter. Not even DMs read that.

[PhoenixPhyre]

All they'd have to do is put it in the DMG's using Running the Game chapter. Not even DMs read that.

This didn't really need to be blue, sadly.

[Wizard_Lizard]

This didn't really need to be blue, sadly.

I will admit, I, who has read all of my books inside out, did take a long time to actually read that chapter.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I will admit, I, who has read all of my books inside out, did take a long time to actually read that chapter.

I'd conservatively estimate that the majority (or at least a strong plurality) of the rules questions posted to forums could be answered by reference to that chapter and Chapters 8-10 of the PHB. So you're not the only one.

[Bannan_mantis]

Honestly it's the monster manual purely from the way monsters are designed. I'm sorry but I've found monsters in 5e to be hard to use, boring and just kinda cakewalks. I feel this is most obvious within the tarrasque, a fearsome beast who (from what it's CR suggests) is meant to be too much even for level 20 parties is easily beatable by someone with a flying speed and a +1 longbow and is essentially just a big wall of HP and resistances. It has very little genuinely interesting abilities which change combat or the way you fight it, there's swallow but I don't feel that's enough to genuinely make it an interesting fight at all. It just feels like a sack of HP you needa swing at enough to kill and be done with it.

Now there is the whole case of where you can change environments people fight in and give more varied monsters to help but I feel that those are bandaids for the poor base monster design.

[GreenDM]

The worst adventure I have tried to run so far was Out of the Abyss, so that I guess. Very difficult to give the party good direction and meaningful options, or the exact opposite and FAR to many NPCs and locations to go all at once.

[Waazraath]

The worst adventure I have tried to run so far was Out of the Abyss, so that I guess. Very difficult to give the party good direction and meaningful options, or the exact opposite and FAR to many NPCs and locations to go all at once.

Serious? Wow, I just made a 'best 5e book thread' and nominated it as best adventure =D But that was as a player, so I don't now how much trouble the book was to run for my DM.

[Azuresun]

I'd conservatively estimate that the majority (or at least a strong plurality) of the rules questions posted to forums could be answered by reference to that chapter and Chapters 8-10 of the PHB. So you're not the only one.

See how many people on forums believe that they need to have 6-8 encounters per day no matter what, when 10sec of reading the DMG (rather than hearsay from people on the internet) would correct them on that.

[PetterTomBos]

They're the most boring kind of name generators, though, because they don't incorporate any of the deeper structure that goes into real naming. Like, in the real world names vary greatly in structure based off of your culture of origin (https://www.fbiic.gov/public/2008/nov/Naming_practice_guide_UK_2006.pdf). In 5e, you basically just have a paragraph of information in each racial description that tends to boil down to "there are distinctinctly masculine and feminine names".

That was a fascinating link! Any fantasy version of it around?

[Tanarii]

See how many people on forums believe that they need to have 6-8 encounters per day no matter what, when 10sec of reading the DMG (rather than hearsay from people on the internet) would correct them on that.It takes a bit more than ten seconds to drill down into the combat encounter section to find the eight to ten statement, since it isn't in the front of a section. Unlike some core 5e concepts that replace previous edition methods, such as ability check concepts. Of course, those are hidden in Chapter 8 instead of placed in Chapter 1. :smallyuk:

Once found, it takes about ten seconds to realize that the statement was written as a cap.
It takes considerable analysis of the tables to realize the statement itself is utterly wrong, based on their own math.
It take a year or more of DMing experience to realize the table numbers are a pretty good minimum for challenging no feat no Multiclassing beginning players that haven't ever looked at D&D. Less than that and their going to have a cake walk. That's not to say they won't enjoy it.

It takes some pretty careful paying attention to three different sections of the book to realize that non-combat encounters are supposed to be included in that, but those that aren't expected to use resources (player skill or skill checks only) are Easy XP in the basic rule, but are Medium XP as a goal under the milestone XP rule.

It's important to read the DMG, but it's not without its issues. :smallamused:

[noob]

It takes a bit more than ten seconds to drill down into the combat encounter section to find the eight to ten statement, since it isn't in the front of a section. Unlike some core 5e concepts that replace previous edition methods, such as ability check concepts. Of course, those are hidden in Chapter 8 instead of placed in Chapter 1. :smallyuk:

Once found, it takes about ten seconds to realize that the statement was written as a cap.
It takes considerable analysis of the tables to realize the statement itself is utterly wrong, based on their own math.
It take a year or more of DMing experience to realize the table numbers are a pretty good minimum for challenging no feat no Multiclassing beginning players that haven't ever looked at D&D. Less than that and their going to have a cake walk. That's not to say they won't enjoy it.

It takes some pretty careful paying attention to three different sections of the book to realize that non-combat encounters are supposed to be included in that, but those that aren't expected to use resources (player skill or skill checks only) are Easy XP in the basic rule, but are Medium XP as a goal under the milestone XP rule.

It's important to read the DMG, but it's not without its issues. :smallamused:

dnd 5e is supposed to be an easy introduction to D20 systems.
Hence why they did try to "simplify rules"(it is as much a mess as it ever have been but now the complexity is from rules that are interpretable in 50 different ways (unlike 3.5 where there is like only 4 ways to interpret each rule and all of them dysfunction) and word shenanigans like weapon attack attack weapon weapon which is not the same thing as attack with an attack weapon weapon weapon(3.5 had similar problems and the fact they did not fix it in 5e is very shocking) in exchange for taking less pages)
So not being able to make rules that are quite understandable they make the varied challenges easy enough that people can ignore half of the rules and still win the day.
For example I am quite convinced that for encounter balance they did not account for subclass features.
I think that for a fair playtest you are supposed to have no feat, no multiclassing and no subclasses(nor sub-race of course) and not have too many problems dispatching the monsters when taking decisions like "my druid will never wildshape and will only use damage spells" or "my wizard will fight with a bow and cast spells like magic weapon on their own bow during the fight" (those are actually things the dnd 3.5 playtesters did and I think the dnd 5e creators excepted the same kind of behaviour) or "my fighter does not know what is a weapon attack so they will instead stand in front of the monsters and punch at them also they never use second wind nor action surges because it is too complicated".

[KorvinStarmast]

I think that for a fair playtest you are supposed to have no feat, no multiclassing and no subclasses(nor sub-race of course) That makes no sense to me. The basic rules walk your brand new player, level by level, into your sub class (unless you grabbed Cleric, who is front loaded) to bring the new player along to where they arrive at some new toys/features with their sub class. Sub classes are an embedded piece of this edition, and I think they were built that way to avoid/prevent the dumpster fire that prestige classes are/were. They also offer the dwarf the benefits of one of the sub races.

Do we need sub races? I don't think so, but we have them and that tradition - different kinds of elves - has been with the game since AD&D 1e.

[noob]

That makes no sense to me. The basic rules walk your brand new player, level by level, into your sub class (unless you grabbed Cleric, who is front loaded) to bring the new player along to where they arrive at some new toys/features with their sub class. Sub classes are an embedded piece of this edition, and I think they were built that way to avoid/prevent the dumpster fire that prestige classes are/were. They also offer the dwarf the benefits of one of the sub races.

Do we need sub races? I don't think so, but we have them and that tradition - different kinds of elves - has been with the game since AD&D 1e.

I think they did think "let us get a replacement for prcs" and that they did not realise that sub classes were not optional.
Thus the encounters that are too easy because you basically always get prcs.
And sub races are more or less "the previous editions made tons of subraces that were often like the base race but with added stuff let us add this to the game too by tradition" without thinking much about it.
And traditionally dnd was balanced with people that were using the iconic races and not subraces of them.
You could try and see if the suggested encounter maximum finally gets not easy.

[KorvinStarmast]

And sub races are more or less "the previous editions made tons of subraces that were often like the base race but with added stuff let us add this to the game too by tradition" without thinking much about it. I suspect that they got a lot of noise fan feedback and kept them, just as the noise fan feedback reverted the 5e Warlock to Cha when it began as Int ..

And traditionally dnd was balanced with people that were using the iconic races and not subraces of them. Traditionally, D&D was balanced by applying level limits to all races that weren't human, right? :smalltongue:

[noob]

I suspect that they got a lot of noise fan feedback and kept them, just as the noise fan feedback reverted the 5e Warlock to Cha when it began as Int ..
Traditionally, D&D was balanced by applying level limits to all races that weren't human, right? :smalltongue:
And that worked fine back in my time also thief was not a class: it was what an adventurer was.

What I say is that they keep the same mentality in balancing encounters than the previous editions but with the decision "it should be easier because we want this rpg to be widespread so fights should be doable by novices"
And in all the previous editions monsters were balanced around characters not doing things like picking the cool stuff such as subraces, special stuff like dual classing and prestige classes, rare spells that were op, artifacts or magical items that were often even more op but that you got randomly and so on.
(and monsters were intended to be lethal in normal cases)

[KorvinStarmast]

And in all the previous editions monsters were balanced around characters not doing things like picking the cool stuff such as subraces, special stuff like dual classing and prestige classes, rare spells that were op, artifacts or magical items that were often even more op but that you got randomly and so on. (and monsters were intended to be lethal in normal cases) I am not sure that monsters were ever balanced, per se, but we did see the original encounter tables progress from I - VI (or 1-6 per Wilderness and Underworld Adventures p. 10-11) if that's what you are referring to.

(In this level of a dungeon, you are most likely to see monsters like this ...)

And I think that you are correct: with the wild variability in 'number appearing' encounters do seem to have been intended as lethal, or potentially lethal.

[TheUser]

No contest for me:
Horde of the Dragon Queen.

1. Has literal encounters designed to one shot the party (dragon's breath on level 1's) and only resolved by a crit against the enemy...

2. Almost completely on the rails with exceedingly small amounts of player agency involved.

3. Not even a complete story; requires Rise of Tiamat purchase to properly conclude the adventure.

This was WotC's first adventure book and it's painfully obvious. Only buy it if you already know how to design and run a solid campaign because a vast majority of the adventure will require you to do that anyway to make it work.

Dragon Heist is a close second though...

[Xervous]

I suspect that they got a lot of noise fan feedback and kept them, just as the noise fan feedback reverted the 5e Warlock to Cha when it began as Int ..
Traditionally, D&D was balanced by applying level limits to all races that weren't human, right? :smalltongue:

Level limits were in place verbatim as a mechanical justification for why elves, dwarves, or other races with more favorable stat lines didn’t take over the setting and dethrone the assumed human majority.

[Aquillion]

And sub races are more or less "the previous editions made tons of subraces that were often like the base race but with added stuff let us add this to the game too by tradition" without thinking much about it.Another reason why they kept sub races was likely so if you have five people who want to play elves they still have a chance to make themselves distinct.

Also, there are some races that legitimately have different, conflicting fantasy tropes associated with them that players might want to explore. Elves are a case in point - you have your sylvan nature hunter elves, your tall like-a-perfect-human elves, your arcane mystic magic elves, and so on. Without elven subraces you wouldn't be able to give everyone who wanted to play an elf what they were picturing.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Another reason why they kept sub races was likely so if you have five people who want to play elves they still have a chance to make themselves distinct.

Also, there are some races that legitimately have different, conflicting fantasy tropes associated with them that players might want to explore. Elves are a case in point - you have your sylvan nature hunter elves, your tall like-a-perfect-human elves, your arcane mystic magic elves, and so on. Without elven subraces you wouldn't be able to give everyone who wanted to play an elf what they were picturing.

Yeah. 4e tried to make the two (elrond elf/legolas elf) separate races entirely (eladrin and elves), but 5e decided to do that as a subrace (high elf vs wood elf). It lets you have commonalities and then further specializations. What you can't do with subraces is have a subrace that takes away something from the base race.

Honestly, I'd prefer it if they had made base races pretty anemic (just the core stuff) and made subraces for all the different cultures. Or made an easy way for DMs/setting-designers to do so.

So all elves would share a core set of features, but then my setting might have [gwerin|ihmisi|goroesi] as subraces while yours has [moon|sun|stars] and someone else's has [spring|summer|fall|winter] or whatever. And my humans might share some similarities with your humans, but the subraces would be what really sets them apart.

[noob]

Another reason why they kept sub races was likely so if you have five people who want to play elves they still have a chance to make themselves distinct.

Also, there are some races that legitimately have different, conflicting fantasy tropes associated with them that players might want to explore. Elves are a case in point - you have your sylvan nature hunter elves, your tall like-a-perfect-human elves, your arcane mystic magic elves, and so on. Without elven subraces you wouldn't be able to give everyone who wanted to play an elf what they were picturing.

With the same stats you could have all those elves just do not pick the exact same class and background.
If you have all those three subraces of elves all pick wizard with the same subclass, the same background and the same spells and the same personality you will not see any difference.
Most of the distinction between those subraces you gave in your examples is in fact different backgrounds and it is a thing separate from race.
I mean "I am totally a sylvan nature elf but I worked as a carpenter in the slums of an industrial city stabbing people with carpentry implements to steal their purses" does not work because sylvan nature X is a part of the background and not of the subrace.

[Aquillion]

So all elves would share a core set of features, but then my setting might have [gwerin|ihmisi|goroesi] as subraces while yours has [moon|sun|stars] and someone else's has [spring|summer|fall|winter] or whatever. And my humans might share some similarities with your humans, but the subraces would be what really sets them apart.Aren't they doing that? I heard they were going to make racial features mostly cosmetic and make most of the abilities be cultural, for a variety of reasons (opens up more aesthetic / roleplaying options, avoids the unfortunate implications of some races being Genetically Smarter than others, etc.) So you'll be able to play Corporal Carrot and be culturally dwarf while being 6 feet tall.

I'm not sure how that's going to work with sizes and other overt physical features with mechanical implications, though.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Aren't they doing that? I heard they were going to make racial features mostly cosmetic and make most of the abilities be cultural, for a variety of reasons (opens up more aesthetic / roleplaying options, avoids the unfortunate implications of some races being Genetically Smarter than others, etc.) So you'll be able to play Corporal Carrot and be culturally dwarf while being 6 feet tall.

I'm not sure how that's going to work with sizes and other overt physical features with mechanical implications, though.

That's not quite the same, and I strongly don't like "race is just cosmetic" implementations. It ruins setting-immersion for me, and that's one of my big fun-sources.

I see it as having the following structure:

Race: has all the genetic stuff. For me, this includes both some (minor) ability score increases (usually a +1 to something) as well as things like dragonborn's breath weapon, sizes, and other directly physical stuff that you couldn't just learn.
Subrace: This is per race per culture. So even a <wall-builder> halfling and a <wall-builder> human (using names from my setting) would have separate subraces. Because the culture gets evoked differently in the different races, despite being unified as a culture. This has the rest of the ability scores (none of these 'pick your own' ones generally) and the culturally and some genetically-determined features (genetics for isolated sub-populations or special cases only).


Human (base race)
Ability Score Increase. One score of your choice increases by 1.
Age. Humans become adults around age 16 and, if allowed to die of old age, tend to live around 80 years.
Size. This varies considerably between sub-races, but your size is Medium.
Speed. Your base walking speed is 30 feet.
Versatility. You gain a feat.
Languages. You can speak, read, and write Common.

Night's Child (subrace)
Ability Score Increase. Your Strength increases by 1.
Darkvision. As a gift from the dead goddess, night’s children have superior vision in dark and dim conditions. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of grey.
Region of Origin. Your region of origin is Byssia.

Fang-kin (subrace)
Ability Score Increase. Your Dexterity increases by 1.
Size. Fang-kin are shorter than most, ranging between 5’0” and 5’5”. Their weights range toward the lower end of the scale, averaging about 110 pounds.
Ophidious Ancestry. You have advantage on saving throws against being poisoned.
Regional Origin. Choose a region of origin from Asai'ka, the Sha'slar Autonomous Zone, or the Serpent Dominion.

Wall-builder (subrace)
Ability Score Increase. Your Wisdom score increases by 1.
Devout. You gain proficiency in Religion.
Region of Origin. Choose your region of origin from Dreamshore, Moon’s Vengeance Foothills, Sea of Grass, or Southshore.
Skilled. Wall-builders all practice a craft. You gain proficiency in one artisan’s tool of your choice.

[Chauncymancer]

That makes no sense to me. The basic rules walk your brand new player, level by level, into your sub class (unless you grabbed Cleric, who is front loaded) to bring the new player along to where they arrive at some new toys/features with their sub class. Sub classes are an embedded piece of this edition,

The most important finding of the 5e playtest was that most people running the playtests didn't actually read the rules manuals and neither did the players. Your encounter math needs to account for a certain amount of players going the entire campaign without figuring out how their class features work.

[noob]

The most important finding of the 5e playtest was that most people running the playtests didn't actually read the rules manuals and neither did the players. Your encounter math needs to account for a certain amount of players going the entire campaign without figuring out how their class features work.

That was the case of the 3.5 playtest too.
I even mentioned that I did think that during the playtest of 5e in all odds most of the druids never used shapeshifting because it involves monster manual delving.

[Tanarii]

That was the case of the 3.5 playtest too.
I even mentioned that during the playtest of 5e in all odds most of the druids never used shapeshifting because it involves monster manual delving.Common animals are in the PHB. Not that players are prone to read the PHB rules either. :smallyuk:

[noob]

Common animals are in the PHB. Not that players are prone to read the PHB rules either. :smallyuk:

The phb is a monster manual as far as I know since it contains monsters.
The thing is that few players wants to read animal lists to see which animal will help them the most.

[HappyDaze]

The thing is that few players wants to read animal lists to see which animal will help them the most.

Weird, I've never found a Druid player that didn't comb through them for the most optimized beasts for wild shape and summoning. Combine that with access to the whole Druid spell list (much as with Clerics and their own list), and Druids seem to be one of the most homework/prep intensive classes in the game.

[PhoenixPhyre]

The phb is a monster manual as far as I know since it contains monsters.
The thing is that few players wants to read animal lists to see which animal will help them the most.

Or class lists. Or spell lists. Or rules in general. Not blue because not joking.

But honestly, I've considered making "generic" animal stat blocks. Something like
* Ursine/Lupine/Feline/Reptilian/Avian/Aquatic/Insectile--these would be the primary combat ones and would just level up with your main class.
* minor (includes all the cat, bat, rat, dog, horse ones) Basically one stat block that you could add things like "flying" or "swimming" or "large" or whatever when you shift into it.

Moon druids would have faster/higher progression of stats, while non-moon druids would only have the minor ones and very limited combat forms progression. Flavor it however you like within those general categories. Maybe even simpler than that.

Or just get people the animal cards and hand them a couple that they like. I do that with spell cards. Makes a big difference for new players.

[Tanarii]

Weird, I've never found a Druid player that didn't comb through them for the most optimized beasts for wild shape and summoning. Combine that with access to the whole Druid spell list (much as with Clerics and their own list), and Druids seem to be one of the most homework/prep intensive classes in the game.
Oh, I've known many unprepared Druid players. On both the spells and creatures front.

Long rest classes in general not knowing basics of how their spells work even with spell cards in hand is pretty common IMX.

Class features other than spells, on the other hand, tend to get more review/understanding IMX. The Druid Wild Shape is comparable to spell comprehension, for similar reasons.



Or just get people the animal cards and hand them a couple that they like. I do that with spell cards. Makes a big difference for new players.
Yeah done that too. The animal cards thing.

If you want to play a caster, spell cards or some other printed reference are a requirement a DM should enforce, IMO. Was the same in 3e. And the same for powers in 4e.

[Luccan]

Yeah, I specifically restricted a new player Moon Druid to a few initial forms because they were already having trouble picking spells

[Segev]

It could be interesting to have subrace be cultural, with every culture having a list of subraces for races common to the culture, and one "generic" subrace that any race not in the list can have.

[Wizard_Lizard]

It could be interesting to have subrace be cultural, with every culture having a list of subraces for races common to the culture, and one "generic" subrace that any race not in the list can have.

Yeah I think Keith Baker made a comment that in eberron (And yes I will cite either eberron or discworld in any context shaddup) that Race means Race, but subrace is more often than not (with obvious exceptions like drow) just a way of optimising your concept. Both wood and high elves could be Aereni or Tairnadal, for instance.

[HappyDaze]

Yeah I think Keith Baker made a comment that in eberron (And yes I will cite either eberron or discworld in any context shaddup) that Race means Race, but subrace is more often than not (with obvious exceptions like drow) just a way of optimising your concept. Both wood and high elves could be Aereni or Tairnadal, for instance.

Yet that's not what the book says. Aereni are High Elves and Tairnadal are Wood Elves per the book. Elves of the Five Nations can be (descendants of) either type.