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[D&D 5E] Nothing is true, everything is permitted.

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  • discriderdiscrider Registered User regular
    The Reckless statue doesn't have a weapon, but requires you to take its armour off

  • BursarBursar Hee Noooo! PDX areaRegistered User regular
    A glass hammer?

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  • IvelliusIvellius Registered User regular
    Reckless is all the weapons? Maybe requires you to adorn it with more weapons than it can "carry."

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  • see317see317 Registered User regular
    edited April 2018
    Aldo wrote: »
    I think claw weapons or other weapons that require you to get all up in someone's business are quite reckless.

    That, or a blunderbuss

    Clearly the best answer here is a combination of a blunderbuss and a punching weapon.

    see317 on
  • DenadaDenada Registered User regular
    So DMs... Looting bodies. My kids (err, players) try and loot everything down to the gold fillings when they slay someone. How do you keep the loot down? They're taking bows and swords. Kinda had to say no to a goblins armor... But jeeze. Do your players just do a general "I loot the corpse" and they get some things? Are weapns/armor in too bad of shape to toss in their sacks and sell back in town?

    And God lord no children. You cannot skin the goblin and sell his hide. This isn't minecraft. It's a process.

    With my daughters, who are also surprisingly violent in their dispatching of goblins, I just kind of hand-wave away post-combat looting. If they want to loot the bodies, I just tell them something like "most of their stuff is in pretty bad shape and isn't worth your time, but you find a few things worth a total of [some small amount of GP] that you'll get when you sell it back at town." and then who cares about how they're carrying all that stuff, encumbrance is the worst and no one asks Steve how he's carrying thousands of cubic feet of earth and stone in Minecraft.

    I save the interesting items for when they're exploring and investigating. Like recently they were trying to track down a necromancer, they found his old hideout and were searching his basement, so I put some vials of magic liquid in there when they wanted to find some vials of magic liquid.

  • ShawnaseeShawnasee Registered User regular
    My players battle cry is "loot the bodies!".

    I gave out a couple Bags of Holding so I didn't have to worry about encumbrance.

  • DarkPrimusDarkPrimus Registered User regular
    Well, the first thing you do to discourage them is enforce the encumbrance rules.
    And then make sure they pack enough rations and water and everything to actually travel.
    And then by the end of the dungeon, the treasure they loot weighs a lot anyway, so they have to seriously choose between what's valuable and what isn't.
    And if they slowly trudge back, fully encumbered, they will find out that the eighty pounds of bandit weapons and armor they were carrying are basically worthless, for the trouble they went through to carry it. Oh, you've got... six shortswords and four suits of leather armor, all worn-out and low-quality? I'll give you 5 gold for the lot.

  • see317see317 Registered User regular
    When you reek of pounds of rotting goblin skin I'd imagine that is almost certain to impose a penalty or disadvantage to any charisma checks (outside of a few select establishments).

    And what kind of person would be walking into a town with that many weapons? The kind that's looking to start trouble by arming up a rebellion or starting some riots. No town guard is going to let you in when you're carrying enough low quality weapons to start a war.

    Yeah, sure, wear that necklace of looted goblin ears, just don't be surprised when the next town you stop in has had a long established truce with the local goblin tribes and you wearing that walking around is not likely to be looked upon kindly.

  • AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    I'm trying to encourage the logic that if you find an armoury in an Evil Dungeon you don't have to carry everything with you, you just tell the location to whatever local allies you have and they'll thank you for it and become better allies.

  • Hexmage-PAHexmage-PA Registered User regular
    I've got Battle Master Fighter 3/Hexblade Warlock 1. Next time I level, should I:

    1) Take a level in Fighter and increase my Charisma score.
    2) Take a level in Fighter and choose a feat.
    3) Take a level in Warlock to get invocations.

    I'm leaning towards option 3 right now.

  • ShawnaseeShawnasee Registered User regular
    Ok, thanks for the suggestions! I think I have the statues/words/items figured out.
    1. The statue with the word Strength written on it, is a hulking warrior. He has no weapon in his hands but his stance indicates that he should be holding one. (Put the huge 2h battle axe into its hands)
    2. The statue with the word Recklessness written on it is wearing armor but has no weapons and with its arms at its sides, doesn't look like it should. (After closer inspection, they find that the armor is detachable. Thx @discrider !)
    3. The statue with the word Trust written on it is aiming a crossbow with a some sort of aiming device, like a spyglass, mounted to it. (They need to knock the bolt into place)
    4. The statue with the word Friendship written on it has her hands on her hip, smiling face turned slightly upward and to her right. (They must perch the familiar (Raven, Owl, etc) onto the shoulder she is looking towards)
    5. The statue with the word Protection on it is in a stance with one arm crossed in front of him and the other arm pointed behind him. (Put the shield in his hands)
    6. The statue with the word Power on it is of a woman with a mace in one hand while the other hand, balled into a fist, is held out in front of her. (Place an arcane focus of some sort into the fist)

    Now I just need the actual mechanics.

    The character who received the message will be held in suspended animation over one of the pits because I want his friends to not let him fall. The players then put the missing statue pieces into the right spots. But what if they get it wrong? He drops a few feet? The statue attacks? Might be an interesting fight traversing the pit grinders.

    What say you lot?


  • SleepSleep Registered User regular
    edited April 2018
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    I've got Battle Master Fighter 3/Hexblade Warlock 1. Next time I level, should I:

    1) Take a level in Fighter and increase my Charisma score.
    2) Take a level in Fighter and choose a feat.
    3) Take a level in Warlock to get invocations.

    I'm leaning towards option 3 right now.

    Invocations seem dope, in fact riding Warlock to 3 and getting the blade pact going isn't bad either. Assuming your cha isn't sitting at like 12 or something like notably lower than your normal attack stat was.

    Sleep on
  • SleepSleep Registered User regular
    generally in the battle master/ hexblade combo I favor the following leveling scheme:

    F1
    F2
    F3
    W1
    W2
    W3
    F4
    F5
    W4
    W5
    W6
    Then do whatever

  • ShawnaseeShawnasee Registered User regular
    Agreed...invocations like Eldritch Sight and the detect magic ones are so good. I dipped to three so I could get the familiar.

  • Ken OKen O Registered User regular
    edited April 2018
    Had an amazing game last night in our Curse of Strahd campaign. Keeping story details out from the information below to keep it spoiler free.

    We got into a fight with a vampire spawn, which was a lot for our 3rd party characters.
    The vampire we were attacking decided to strike out at the NPC priest who was with us. The combined claw and bite a attack dropped him in one round. I was next up in initiative so I got just out of range and cast Dissonant Whispers to send him running and then Healing Worded the priest to revive him.

    Two rounds later the vampire decides he's tired of me and hits me with the claw/bite combo. 20 points in one round so I'm down to 5. On my turn I disengage, backing up about 10 feet. Holding my bloody wounds I trigger Mantle of Inspiration and yell "get him!" This lets three of the characters in the group to move their full movement without attacks of opportunity and get 5 temp hit points. They surround the spawn and finally take it down.

    As we're leaving the DM had mentioned the fallen priest's soiled clothes numerous times I quietly give him a prestidigitation clean up and he takes it as his god showing him favor again. That one felt pretty good.

    Finally that night we're bunkered in house when there is a knocking at the door and the howl of wolves. We're pretty sure it's Strahd but no one wants to look or go to the door. The sound is unnerving everyone, especially the NPC we're protecting. My bard launches into song, using cantrips to be even louder when needed. After a few songs he stops and everything is quiet. Then there is a soft clapping from outside the door. It's followed by the sound of nightmarish horses and a carriage driving away.

    I already can't wait for next week. We're planning on visiting a Visanti camp any my character already thinks they're wonderful from our first encounters.

    Ken O on
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  • SmrtnikSmrtnik job boli zub Registered User regular
    Which hook did your DM use to get you to Barovia? The Vistani camp one?

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  • Ken OKen O Registered User regular
    Smrtnik wrote: »
    Which hook did your DM use to get you to Barovia? The Vistani camp one?

    Yup! We had to ask the Vistani camp to leave. My character instantly saw them as kindred spirits and was happy to help them in whatever way. He kind of dragged the rest of the party along.

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  • Hexmage-PAHexmage-PA Registered User regular
    I asked my DM about the Suggestion spell (which says you can give a creature a "reasonable suggestion" that they have to follow), and he said he figured what is "reasonable" would vary depending on who you used it on. The example he gave was that you could use it to convince a Lawful Good person to give a beggar their horse, but it would fail on a Chaotic Evil person because they would consider such a suggestion unreasonable.

    My problem with this is that it makes a 2nd level spell that requires concentration to maintain basically just an alternative to the Persuasion skill, wherein you force the target to make a Wisdom save instead of rolling Persuasion.

  • DevoutlyApatheticDevoutlyApathetic Registered User regular
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    I asked my DM about the Suggestion spell (which says you can give a creature a "reasonable suggestion" that they have to follow), and he said he figured what is "reasonable" would vary depending on who you used it on. The example he gave was that you could use it to convince a Lawful Good person to give a beggar their horse, but it would fail on a Chaotic Evil person because they would consider such a suggestion unreasonable.

    My problem with this is that it makes a 2nd level spell that requires concentration to maintain basically just an alternative to the Persuasion skill, wherein you force the target to make a Wisdom save instead of rolling Persuasion.

    In previous editions you were allowed to essentially set assumptions. Like the example was literally "That pool over there is cold clear water, wouldn't a quick dip be really refreshing?" when the pool is actually acid. The sorta works with the framework your DM laid out. Tell the CE person the horse is demon possessed and will kill it's next rider or something.

    Nod. Get treat. PSN: Quippish
  • EnigmedicEnigmedic Registered User regular
    I think reasonable here means more like something that could be accomplished. Go throw the one ring into the fires of mount doom vs hand over the cursed ring kind of thing.

  • RendRend Registered User regular
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    I asked my DM about the Suggestion spell (which says you can give a creature a "reasonable suggestion" that they have to follow), and he said he figured what is "reasonable" would vary depending on who you used it on. The example he gave was that you could use it to convince a Lawful Good person to give a beggar their horse, but it would fail on a Chaotic Evil person because they would consider such a suggestion unreasonable.

    My problem with this is that it makes a 2nd level spell that requires concentration to maintain basically just an alternative to the Persuasion skill, wherein you force the target to make a Wisdom save instead of rolling Persuasion.

    I would consider it a huge stretch to use your persuasion skill to make a knight give their horse to a "random" beggar! But like, take into account this scale.

    Charm person is a 1st level spell that causes someone to treat you like a friendly acquaintance, and lasts 1 hour.

    Suggestion is a 2nd level spell you get to direct someone toward a single course of action which "sounds reasonable" and the spell specifically calls out obviously harmful acts, and lasts 8 hours.

    Dominate Person is a 5th level spell that lets you do whatever you want with a person, and lasts 1 minute.

    When viewed big picture, suggestion's power level shouldn't be absolute, but it should be LESS limited than charm person. After all, getting someone to do something they would be very opposed to doing otherwise requires a level 10 spellcaster, suggestion only requires level 3.

  • captainkcaptaink TexasRegistered User regular
    Monks really come together at level 5. Stunning strike comes online, so you've got that going. Second attack. Enough Ki to really start throwing it around a little more. My party fought some drow and clay golems last night. The clay golems were tough, although they are not immune to Open Hand technique so they at least spent some time prone. The drow though, my fellow monk and I could really fuck them up. None of them got off more than one round's worth of spells and attacks.

  • webguy20webguy20 I spend too much time on the Internet Registered User regular
    Got my copy of Mordekainen's Tome Of Foes on order. I'm hoping to steal liberally from it for my genesys game.

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  • DevoutlyApatheticDevoutlyApathetic Registered User regular
    webguy20 wrote: »
    Got my copy of Mordekainen's Tome Of Foes on order. I'm hoping to steal liberally from it for my genesys game.

    If you're doing system conversions anyways you might want to look at the 13th Age Beastieries. They are super interesting monster books with fun ideas and variations in them. Some of it will be wasted space about Icon relationships but even those are usually give you fun ideas for how to fit them into a world.

    Nod. Get treat. PSN: Quippish
  • Hexmage-PAHexmage-PA Registered User regular
    So is there any reason to pick Two-Weapon Fighting, at least for a Hexblade? The only positve I see is that it effectively gives you one extra multiattack.

  • SleepSleep Registered User regular
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    So is there any reason to pick Two-Weapon Fighting, at least for a Hexblade? The only positve I see is that it effectively gives you one extra multiattack.

    An extra attack is pretty boss

  • KadokenKadoken Giving Ends to my Friends and it Feels Stupendous Registered User regular
    um, to be epic

  • RendRend Registered User regular
    Because then you're a Hexblades

  • Hexmage-PAHexmage-PA Registered User regular
    edited April 2018
    Sleep wrote: »
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    So is there any reason to pick Two-Weapon Fighting, at least for a Hexblade? The only positve I see is that it effectively gives you one extra multiattack.

    An extra attack is pretty boss

    To start out with, yeah, but that loses its appeal when you get more attacks.

    Plus I've just realized I need a hand free to cast Shield...unless I take the Warcaster feat, that is. I'll probably do that.

    Hexmage-PA on
  • CarnarvonCarnarvon Registered User regular
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    Sleep wrote: »
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    So is there any reason to pick Two-Weapon Fighting, at least for a Hexblade? The only positve I see is that it effectively gives you one extra multiattack.

    An extra attack is pretty boss

    To start out with, yeah, but that loses its appeal when you get more attacks.

    Plus I've just realized I need a hand free to cast Shield...unless I take the Warcaster feat, that is. I'll probably do that.

    Xanathar has a 500gp item that lets you turn a weapon into a spellcasting focus, which would help with that.

  • Hexmage-PAHexmage-PA Registered User regular
    I'm reading an overview of the third party Midgard setting over on RPG.net.

    Link

    My favorite part so far is the kingdom of evil gnomes who turned to devil worship to save them from the wrath of Baba Yaga. Their borders are guarded by giant gnome statues called "glower stones" that launch spells at those not welcome, and the gnome king's castle can only be found if one is invited (after which wandering around the capital's streets will eventually cause you to appear at the front gate).

  • HydroSqueegeeHydroSqueegee ULTRACAT!!!™®© Registered User regular
    this game...

    Session 3. The High Elf Sorcerer met up with his Hill Dwarf Fighter friend and went on an adventure.

    I didnt really know where to start, so i asked them what they wanted to do. The Elf wanted to go loot the ruins of the tower at his last location and drug the Fighter along. Luckily enough the town militia cleared out any stragglers of Goblins left so they were free to delve down into what turned out to be a small crypt. They gouged out the ruby eyes of a statue, then took down a couple goblins guarding a stone tomb with a stone phoenix towering above it. They killed one Goblin outright and knocked out, tied up and interrogated the other. After some intimidation, they found out there were more goblin encampments in the area and the location of the head honcho of the operation. (They came up with that on their own. Specifically asked if there were more camps. Sure, why not?). The Dwarf happens to have proficiancy in masonry and history and determined the tomb belonged to a goblin king. They then made the Goblin open up the tomb, which turned out to be a good thing because the Phoenix shot forth bolts of lightning at the goblin, frying him to a crisp. After looking the goblin crown and some gold, the Fighter tried to pick up the corpse, which turned to dust (and ill probably have him come back later in the campaign this is turning into, phoenix and all that...)

    Then they doubled back up a spiral staircase and stumbled upon a couple goblins in a store room munching on lunch. They were quickly dispatched, scrolls and potions looted then back to town with their new information on goblin camps.

    Sooooo this is shaping up in ways i never even thought of, which is really cool. They have the location of camps on their map. So they can sell or give the info to the town or clear the camps their selves. And in the meantime, while they run about their daily lives, an undead goblin king rises in the background.

    Pretty cool stuff.

    Went the the FLGS, got a couple more books including the guide to the Sword Coast. Guess this will all be taking place in the Forgotten Realms around Daggerford. Im printing out maps for the kids... Off to adventure we go!

    kx3klFE.png
  • Phoenix-DPhoenix-D Registered User regular
    Kobold with a battleaxe session 1 went well. Nothing like critting the session boss for twice as much damage as you have health..
    Carnarvon wrote: »
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    Sleep wrote: »
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    So is there any reason to pick Two-Weapon Fighting, at least for a Hexblade? The only positve I see is that it effectively gives you one extra multiattack.

    An extra attack is pretty boss

    To start out with, yeah, but that loses its appeal when you get more attacks.

    Plus I've just realized I need a hand free to cast Shield...unless I take the Warcaster feat, that is. I'll probably do that.

    Xanathar has a 500gp item that lets you turn a weapon into a spellcasting focus, which would help with that.

    It also has a warlock invocation that does the same and makes your pact weapon +1

  • Ken OKen O Registered User regular
    Phoenix-D wrote: »
    Carnarvon wrote: »
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    Sleep wrote: »
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    So is there any reason to pick Two-Weapon Fighting, at least for a Hexblade? The only positve I see is that it effectively gives you one extra multiattack.

    An extra attack is pretty boss

    To start out with, yeah, but that loses its appeal when you get more attacks.

    Plus I've just realized I need a hand free to cast Shield...unless I take the Warcaster feat, that is. I'll probably do that.

    Xanathar has a 500gp item that lets you turn a weapon into a spellcasting focus, which would help with that.

    It also has a warlock invocation that does the same and makes your pact weapon +1

    It also has a cloak that billows as if in the wind as a bonus action. Which means Xanathar's is like the best book.

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  • AbbalahAbbalah Registered User regular
    Hexmage-PA wrote: »
    So is there any reason to pick Two-Weapon Fighting, at least for a Hexblade? The only positve I see is that it effectively gives you one extra multiattack.

    There's very little reason for anyone to take Two-Weapon Fighting ever. It doesn't actually even give you an extra attack - anyone wielding two light weapons can take a bonus action to make that extra attack, without Two-Weapon Fighting or the Dual-Wielder feat. The only thing Two-Weapon Fighting does is let you add your ability mod to the damage of that offhand attack, which is a marginal damage increase that is matched or beaten by every other damage-increasing fighting style even before accounting for the fact that those other styles also have access to various ways of generating that bonus action attack for themselves anyway.

    It's particularly suboptimal for a Hexblade because if you're playing a Hexblade you're likely relying on Hex Warrior to let you make attacks with your CHA instead of your STR/DEX, and Hex Warrior can only be applied to one weapon at a time.

    Dual-wielding in general is basically a victim of the very tight control 5e imposes on the action economy alongside the standardization of attacks across characters/classes. It's almost always substantially worse than both sword and shield and two-handers. It's usually worse than just bringing a single one-handed weapon and using your free hand to make shadow puppets.

  • GoumindongGoumindong Registered User regular
    TWF is hella good and definitely not sub par compared to Two Handed or sword/Shield. The feat is a bit weak (it gives you AC though right?) but the margin in damage is not bad at all

    wbBv3fj.png
  • SmrtnikSmrtnik job boli zub Registered User regular
    It's good if you are a rogue finishing for sneak attack crits, but you don't need the feat for that.

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  • AbbalahAbbalah Registered User regular
    It is, though, especially once you take feat support into account.

    It requires light weapons in both hands, so dual-wielding at all is close to a wash in damage compared to sword/board - at most levels you're getting 2 attacks per turn, so you're giving up an average of 2 damage off each attack action (and 2 AC) to unlock a bonus action attack that only deals an average of 3.5 damage. It's significantly less damage than a 2hander, where you're giving up an entire d6 off of each of your attacks in order to get 1 of them back as a third attack - you're just outright losing 3.5 damage per turn baseline. (All this math gets way worse for TWF if you're a fighter and high enough level to get 3 attacks per action, incidentally)

    And then when you add the fighting styles, TWF adds 4-5 damage per turn, while GWF adds about the same amount if you're using a greatsword (average of 2 damage per attack times 2 attacks), leaving TWF still a full d6 of damage per turn behind assuming it can spend its bonus action to attack every single turn, whereas GWF has its bonus actions intact (and can potentially also use them to attack provided it finds a method).

    And then you get into feat support and the dual-wield feat is terrible (+1 AC and turns your d6 attacks into d8s) while Great Weapon Master needs no introduction (and conveniently comes with periodic access to bonus action attacks!). Alternately (or in addition), you could take Polearm Master, which basically neutralizes the value of GWF but gives you the same bonus-action attack dual-wielding does, without requiring you to downgrade your normal attacks to d6s, and gives you regular access to an additional reaction-speed attack to boot. (I skipped over Archery earlier, but once you're looking at feats you can also get more damage from Archery+Crossbow Expert and/or Sharpshooter than from TWF, but at range and with a free hand.)

    TWF serves no purpose except to increase your damage, but leaves you dealing much less damage than GWF (and barely any more than sword+board, but with less AC and fewer options). It's bad, and it's difficult to even argue that you can recover its value with multi-attack synergy like having Hex/Hunter's Mark up, because A)putting those up costs the same bonus action you're trying to attack with and B)GWF can frequently get the same number of attacks (or more) if it wants to anyway, in addition to dealing more damage with each one.

  • evilthecatevilthecat Registered User regular
    edited April 2018
    TWF's ranking largely depends on whether feats/magical items are allowed in your game.
    With neither, all fighting styles are largely the same.
    As soon as they appear, however, TWF becomes .. supremely average as it doesn't have any "wow" elements built into it like the +10 attacks or the shield slamming.

    edit:
    All the number crunching overlooks a rather crucial aspect of D&D, though.
    It's your roleplaying fantasy. If you want to go and gut a lich while wielding 2 swords then go and do that.
    Most tables do not require you to have min/maxed murderhobos and a good DM will make even an average PC shine (Or just kill the twinked barbarian once he gets to cocky, either works!).

    evilthecat on
    tip.. tip.. TALLY.. HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
  • AbbalahAbbalah Registered User regular
    They're not the same even without feats/items. At level ~5, TWF with shortswords/scimitars gives 3 attacks with an average damage of 7.5 each (1d6+4), for a total of 22.5. GWF with a greatsword gives 2 attacks averaging 13 damage each (2d6b2+4) for a total of 26. And the GWF still has his bonus actions left over for spells or whatever whereas the TWF loses 7.5 damage every time he has to spend his bonus action on something else.

    Yes, obviously, play what you want and if you want to play something even though it's underpowered it'll probably be fine. But that doesn't change what the power levels are, isn't relevant to a discussion of what is or isn't powerful, and presumably someone who specifically wants to play a dual-wielding character come hell or high water wouldn't be in here asking if there's any point in taking TWF.

    TWF is bad. It's mechanically worse than the other options. If you want to play it anyway because you think it's cool, go nuts. It will still be bad. If you don't care that it's bad, that's okay! You're allowed to not care! But not caring if it's bad doesn't make it good.

    Hopefully this sufficiently addresses the ritual 'why does anyone care about power level' portion of this power level conversation.

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