D&D 5E What needs to be fixed in 5E?

[KarinsDad]

I decided to throw my hat into the 5E rules discussion.

One of the things that is starting to bother me about Monte's articles is that he doesn't seem to be that familiar with 4E and he is discussing a lot of things that do not appear to need fixing.

So, I decided to ask the community what they think needs fixing.

To start off with, I'll throw the excessive bookkeeping of conditions into the mix.

IMO, conditions last for too short of a duration. Our group is constantly putting little tokens on the miniatures for dazed, bloodied, marked, grants combat advantage, is at +2 to all attacks, etc. Now, not all groups put out tokens for everything, but the game does encourage it.

So, I'd like 5E to have:

1) Have "save ends" only durations for short term adverse conditions.

2) Have "until the end of the user's next turn" only durations for short term advantageous conditions.

3) Get rid of "until the start of the user's next turn", "until the end of the target's next turn", and the rest of the special corner case short term durations.

It would make it easier to remember if all of these were consistent.

4) Increase the number of different PC condition auras (e.g. like the Cavalier Defender Aura). At least in my experience, players can remember an effect like an aura a lot more than which foe that they hit with a condition.

5) With regard to long term conditions, it makes sense to have more of these in the game. Making a foe -1 to defenses for the entire encounter is preferable to constantly placing tokens on and off the miniature (or on a white board, whatever).


Can people think of other aspects of 4E that could or needs to be improved?

 

[Viking Bastard]

Condition tracking is one, that there are way too many situational bonuses/penalties/etc. is another.

Basically everything that's cumbersome to keep track of.

 

[the Jester]

Yeah, tracking stuff.

Also, I think the game needs more swinginess, but on a "dial" so that each campaign can set the level themselves.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

I decided to throw my hat into the 5E rules discussion.

One of the things that is starting to bother me about Monte's articles is that he doesn't seem to be that familiar with 4E and he is discussing a lot of things that do not appear to need fixing.

So, I decided to ask the community what they think needs fixing.

To start off with, I'll throw the excessive bookkeeping of conditions into the mix.

IMO, conditions last for too short of a duration. Our group is constantly putting little tokens on the miniatures for dazed, bloodied, marked, grants combat advantage, is at +2 to all attacks, etc. Now, not all groups put out tokens for everything, but the game does encourage it.

So, I'd like 5E to have:

1) Have "save ends" only durations for short term adverse conditions.

2) Have "until the end of the user's next turn" only durations for short term advantageous conditions.

3) Get rid of "until the start of the user's next turn", "until the end of the target's next turn", and the rest of the special corner case short term durations.

It would make it easier to remember if all of these were consistent.

4) Increase the number of different PC condition auras (e.g. like the Cavalier Defender Aura). At least in my experience, players can remember an effect like an aura a lot more than which foe that they hit with a condition.

5) With regard to long term conditions, it makes sense to have more of these in the game. Making a foe -1 to defenses for the entire encounter is preferable to constantly placing tokens on and off the miniature (or on a white board, whatever).


Can people think of other aspects of 4E that could or needs to be improved?

Two things here that I spoke about in another thread.

A: Monte Cook does know about 4th edition and how it works. Why would they even bother to hire the guy if he didn't?

B: Monte Cook really doesn't know much about 4th edition because he doesn't need too, he was hired to work on 5th edition.

• I whole heartedly agree with the changing of magic items in 5th edition because they need to be rewards, not part of the math.
• Make Aid Another more interesting by giving more options.
• Actually make heavy armor interesting and actually worth something.
• Make Epic level more interesting.
• Make Non combat more interesting.
• Revamp the whole skill system.

If I can think of more I will post them.

 

[KarinsDad]

• I whole heartedly agree with the changing of magic items in 5th edition because they need to be rewards, not part of the math.
• Make Aid Another more interesting by giving more options.
• Actually make heavy armor interesting and actually worth something.
• Make Epic level more interesting.
• Make Non combat more interesting.
• Revamp the whole skill system.

If I can think of more I will post them.

Could you be a bit more specific? Making things more interesting is a laudable goal, but without some concrete thoughts, it's pretty nebulous.

 

[RangerWickett]

I'd personally like magic gear to no longer have a mechanical effect on attack bonuses or defenses. It makes it easier to balance encounters when the party is ill-equipped, or to still run a fair game if you decide to go Monty Haul.

I'd like to borrow some of the rules from Gamma World, so you can use Str or Con to make heavy weapon attacks, and Dex or Int to make light weapon attacks. Or else put something in so that PC attack bonuses are less dichotomous.

Right now a typical fighter is completely loathe to pull out a bow against distant opponents, because his attack bonus is so much weaker, and he has no ranged powers. He'd rather sprint across open terrain to close to melee. I'm fine with PCs deciding to do that, but it should be viewed as a dangerous tactical risk, rather than the only option open to the character.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

Could you be a bit more specific? Making things more interesting is a laudable goal, but without some concrete thoughts, it's pretty nebulous.

Well I would give "Aid Another" more options because it will make people feel better about giving up their action in order to help someone else.

Let's face it, you are better off using light armor with a high ability score towards your AC. I would present something different with regards to heavy armor. Maybe give heavy armor a type of damage resistance to make up for the lesser AC. Sure you get hit more but you can handle more damage.

Epic level is just one big epic bore fest. Try and make Epic just as much of a sweet spot as heroic.

I want to have just as much fun in non combat than I do combat. Maybe by building a non combat system that is on par with the combat system. 4th edition puts a lot of emphasis on combat so i think they could do the same for non combat as well.

Rinse and repeat is what I feel the current skill system is like. Actually make training in a skill worth more than just a +5.

 

[Gort]

Ridiculous inflation of numbers at epic level. A typical attack bonus of one of my players (level 25, by the way) is +30. Some monsters I was running have 40 AC. It suddenly struck me - "Why am I bothering to have these enormous numbers? Why don't I just knock 30 off all defenses and have the player just read what's on the dice?"

Another thing that annoys me is striker classes that add extra dice of damage every time they attack. I currently have a Dragon Magazine Assassin in my party, and the character has the Athasian minstrel theme from Dark Sun, and every attack seems to involve rolling about eight dice and adding damage in from a ton of different sources. The player is playing it honestly, but I find the arithmetic impenetrable, so they could easily cheat if they wanted to. I vastly prefer strikers that just add on an amount of damage to each attack, like sorcerers and slayers.

 

[dangerous jack]

I don't mind the bonuses to hit from magic gear to some extent, but it shouldn't be part of the required math and could even be something that not every magic weapon has. e.g. +0 flametongue vs a +2 sword. one does fire damage, and the other actually guides your hands to hit enemies more easily.

But I agree wholeheartedly with the problem of fighter's not wanting to use a bow. But more than that, my balanced fighter with ability scores of 14's and 12's is pretty useless. It doesn't matter that he's a fighter and trained with a sword, an unclassed brute with 20 strength is going to be much more effective.

Why not remove the ability score bonus from the binary element of an attack altogether (do I hit or miss), but leave it in the variable element (how much damage do I do)? e.g. something like fighters gets +4 to hit with their choice of melee/ranged attacks and +3 with the one they didn't choose, but a strong fighter might do more damage or push, a dextrous fighter might increase his critical range or knock the opponent prone, a fighter with high wisdom might gain bonuses to follow-up attacks as he sees weaknesses, etc.

 

[KarinsDad]

Well I would give "Aid Another" more options because it will make people feel better about giving up their action in order to help someone else.

Or alternatively, make vanilla Aid Another a Move action.

Course, that could run into some issues if the DM has every other monster do Aid Another.