Category Archives: Tabletop

Tabletop

On Character Options

The Iron Kingdoms game I’m currently playing in is winding down, and with the launch of the new edition, it’s looking likely that I’ll end up in a D&D game soon. As always, the question becomes what to play. Since getting the book last week, I’ve been tossing a few things around. Since I happen to know that I’m going to be rolling stats for this character, what I play may depend on what stats I end up with.

The Default Choice

Now that there are a lot more animals to pick from, my default choice (a Druid focusing on shapeshifting) seems like a good option. The playtest druid encouraged focusing on martial stats, and wild shape provided a bonus to them (like in Pathfinder). The final druid lets wild shape replace your physical stats (like 3.5) but also adds the shape’s HP on top of your own. (To make up for this, most forms have fairly low AC.) I don’t know what race I’d use for this; Elf would be the obvious choice but I avoid playing elves whenever possible. Given the druid ability to mostly ignore physical stats, I’ll probably end up here if my rolls are particularly low.

The Bad Idea

I went over this one with a friend yesterday, but it would be entertaining to play a dragonborn (black dragon heritage) warlock for maximum bad ideas (also works with Half-Orc). I tend to avoid playing squishy arcane casters, but warlocks have a few options to help them stay alive and with blade pact at level 3, the ability to mix it up in melee themselves. This probably works better with a DEX-based character, but STR seems like it would be more fun. I haven’t played the big guy in the party in a while. It would take a lot of stats to make this work, however.

The New Toy

Paladins have 3 class options available to them. Oath of Devotion is similar to the traditional paladin, (with Flame Strike thrown in as a bonus spell for good measure). Oath of Vengeance is similar to the 4e avenger, and it’s a bit less supporty than the other options. The option I would play is Oath of the Ancients, which has a bit of the 4e Warden, making the paladin a bit less “holy warrior” and a bit more “defender of nature”. This gives it some spells from the druid spell list (including my new favorite, Moonbeam) and changed abilities (Channel Divinity allows you to turn fey instead of undead, for example). I like having a paladin that has “removed the stick”, so this might be an interesting thing to try.

All of these have a bit of magic and a lot of beatdown, so I guess that’s the sort of character I’ll be playing in whatever comes next. I expect some of my time is going to go into developing backgrounds for these characters, whether they see play or not.

For more posts about… everything, check out the Blaugust Initiative. Two posts today to make up for the lack of one yesterday: Maevrim starts to write about her 15 games, and Thalen talks about what he wants out of the new Sierra.

Tabletop

On Min-Maxing

There’s a certain mentality when it comes to pen and paper RPGs, the drive to “win the game” as it were. Kodra speaks about this in his preface to his post from two days ago, and I want to expand on it a bit. (For the record, I think the big winner in Wizard schools is Conjuration.)

Optimization is not Bad

There’s nothing inherently wrong with wanting your character to be better. Kodra and I occasionally talk about this sort of thing, we spent a lot of playtest time trying to figure out what was “broken”. When it came time to actually play the game proper, we mostly shied away from these things. Also, our usual DM probably would have murdered one or both of us if we brought in a triple-class character with an AC of 22 and 4 attacks per round at level 6.

But even in play, there’s no reason not to make informed decisions. While it might be fun to have a Monk with high strength, one with more dexterity will usually be better. While Rogues are proficient in clubs and longswords, class features are more effective if you use a rapier or dagger. If you’re a Wizard, you should probably try to have an intelligence of more than 8.

charisma

Roleplaying is Good

How much is too much depends on the playstyle of the group. An adventure that is a straight dungeon crawl may call for characters that are more combat-focused. If your adventures mostly require dealing with people in town and rarely getting into combat, then that wizard with 8 int might not slow you down too much, and will provide amusing RP possibilities. (You may also want to explore roleplaying systems that aren’t D&D; many others are better at this sort of thing.) Most groups will be somewhere in the middle, it depends on what your group finds fun.

When I feel it goes too far is when winning the game becomes a primary character goal. It can cause problems when not playing the same game as everyone else and rolls Pun-Pun when the rest of the party is more-or-less standard. There are more reasons for this than just roleplaying, an unbalanced party makes encounter design somewhat challenging. Things that challenge the super-character would crush the rest, and things that would challenge the rest are brushed aside handily. I think it’s better to come up with characters that fit the direction of your campaign, and see where it goes from there.

For more posts about… everything, check out the Blaugust Initiative.

Tabletop

On Terrible Ideas

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D&D had always been fairly good at allowing this, but the new edition does seem to have a lot of potential for amusing bad ideas. The new edition is no different, and maybe even better. A lot of these were in playtests or teasers, so I hope there’s no problem with me posting them here.

My personal favorite by far I mentioned yesterday, the Wild Magic Sorcerer. I’m not the biggest fan of tables for loot, but this table for wild magic effects is awesome My personal favorites are “07-08 You cast fireball as a 3rd level spell centered on yourself” and “53-54 You are immune to being intoxicated by alcohol for the next 5d6 days”.

Also worth of mention is the overchannel feature for Wizards specializing in Evocation that reads as follows:

…When you cast a wizard spell of 5th level or lower that deals damage, you can deal maximum damage with that spell. The first time you do so, you suffer no adverse effect. If you use this feature again before you finish a long rest, you take 2d12 necrotic damage for each level of the spell, immediately after you cast it. Each time you use this feature again before finishing a long rest, the necrotic damage per spell level increases by 1d12. This damage ignores resistance and immunity.

This is the only printed way of accessing the maximize spell effect. I know at least one player who would abuse this, mostly to their detriment.

An Honorable mention goes to the Warlock class, for being entirely based on a questionable idea. I feel like this class is just asking for your DM to inflict you (and your party) with a variety of unfortunate encounters courtesy of (or tangentially related to) your choice of patron.

For more posts about… everything, check out the Blaugust Initiative. I’m a slacker and don’t have another post to highlight for today.

Tabletop

On D&D Next

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For those who have not heard, the Player’s Manual for the new edition of Dungeons & Dragons released yesterday. I don’t know what the official term for this edition is, but since they’re no longer calling it D&D Next I’m just going to call it 5e. I played a bit with the playtest packets that were out near the end of last year, but there were some balance issues there. I look forward to giving the full rule set a bit of a workout.

Something Old

5e is a return to the ways before 4e in most cases. There’s a mostly familiar set of classes (Warlock is the only class that wasn’t in the 3.5 Player’s Handbook), although there are some changes I’ll mention later. Gone are the encounter/daily/at-will powers from 4e, returned are the concepts of spell slots and spell levels (although these don’t work exactly like they used to either). Also gone are fort/ref/will defenses, but the saves that they were replacing are a bit different now. It’s a return of familiar things, without just being 3.5++, like Pathfinder.

Something New

A completely new concept (for D&D anyway) is the advantage/disadvantage system, where you can roll 2 d20s and take the higher or lower of the two depending on which one you have. Things like Sneak Attacks and various bonuses and penalties were reworked to use this system. The action system is also changed up a bit, in that (generally speaking) players get to take an action and a bonus action per turn, with movement being separated from that system. (This means that you can do things like move in between attacks if you have more than one, or move, attack, and move again, etc.) Advancement is also a bit different, since feats are semi-removed from the normal level progression.

Something Borrowed

A concept from 4e that did stick around is the concept of class variants. Most classes get to make a decision at level 3 that affects the rest of their progression; A few classes (like Clerics) make this decision before then. There’s a lot of variation locked in these, including an option for the Fighter that adds spellcasting progression, a Druid option that makes wildshape far more powerful, and this Sorcerer option which looks like a terrible (but awesome) idea.

Something Blue

I’m a bit sad about the staggered release of the books, since the player’s handbook doesn’t contain much about magical items (probably in the Dungeon Master’s Guide) and had only a tiny list of creatures (which is unfortunate for both Druids and DMs). I like what’s there, and I especially like the variety of class options available, but I just with there was a bit more.

For more posts about… everything, check out the Blaugust Initiative. For an interesting look at what solving an ARG is like, check out Kodra’s post about The Secret World launch ARG.