Tabletop Games Thread

[Seika]

Haha, I never noticed that. The PHB in the Core Rules CD still tries to sell you on the Complete line despite them having bundled that series on the disc too.

[Saiga]

Man, that system looks so damn confusing.

Sometimes 5E frustrates me and I hear other editions which did things I'd like to see

But I take a look at their rules and just get completely lost. Even 4E looks needlessly convoluted.

[black1blade]

5e is far less complicated than AD&D but far more complex.

- - - Updated - - -

In a lot of ways that have the biggest impact on the game.

[Seika]

Man, that system looks so damn confusing.

Sometimes 5E frustrates me and I hear other editions which did things I'd like to see

But I take a look at their rules and just get completely lost. Even 4E looks needlessly convoluted.

Don't get me wrong here, I think you're quite right. But I'll offer up some context for an apologia anyway:

AD&D had a (ludicrous) tables fetish which IMO was severely to its detriment in terms of complexity, ease of play, and game flow. But, when I present you with a table, it means you have remember that we weren't meant to memorise them. If something wasn't on your character sheet, either because it was too minor to put on there or because it had changed (e.g. a Shadow strength-drained you), you just looked up the table. You didn't try to work it out from first principles, because they were pretty arcane and involved guessing what the writers thought was realistic.

On a related subject, it was relatively more rare to get things that changed your capabilities temporarily. Enhance Ability was prefigured by the dire priest spell Draw Upon Holy Might, which left you helpless for 40d6 rounds after it ran out, CON check for half. (Half of 40d6 rounds. Oh good).

Another thing was that quite a bit more responsibility fell on the DM for managing things, which didn't help them out, but did make it easier on players.

[mAc Chaos]

Nowadays people look back on those table fondly as they weren't meant to all be 100% used, but just an endless amount of GM aids that could be taken on hand if you needed some reference for something.

I like the concept, anyway.

The random table helps you create an organic world with a sense of life about it.

[black1blade]

Yeah I prefer the DM managing more things. As long as players know what their attack bonus is I can work out the rest.

[Seika]

http://media.wizards.com/2017/dnd/do...UAv2_i48nf.pdf

I have started screaming on all my social media accounts about getting to make a pact with Blackrazor. Between this and Tales from the Yawning Portal ... pander to me more, Wizards, pander to me more.

(The Hexblade patron does have the minor downside that, powerlevels wise, it basically obsoletes any other Pact of the Blade Warlock because it's so clearly tailored for that. A Pact of the Tome one would be interesting as a kind of Gish-y character though too).

[Five_X]

Sweet, as a Warlock I could be Mei from Overwatch.

I adore Warlocks, so this is a really fun UA and I hope to see some of the material published eventually.

[Saiga]

God damn that warlock UA is fuckibg amazing

But god damn that Hexblade doesn't work with two-hand weapons

[Seika]

It's really dumb when their new invocation creates a greatsword. Definitely mentioning that in the feedback.

[Bird of Hermes]

That hex blade warlock looks like it would be a ton of fun to play as!

Raven Queen also seems pretty cool but I have a feeling that if I were to play it, I'd end up playing my character as a rip off of Vax from CR.

[Saiga]

It's really dumb when their new invocation creates a greatsword. Definitely mentioning that in the feedback.

Yeah, that bugs the shit out of me! The flavour of the Patron looked great but after reading the Invocations I have a number of criticisms of it...

Firstly, the fact that two features of the Hexblade Patron do not work together. Jeremy Crawford has already implied that was deliberately done to provide different options, but the one choice you make (Curse Bringer) is practically mandatory for the build.

Secondly, it doesn't quite address the issues of the original Bladelock. With only light armour access, Dex felt like the only real choice for Bladelocks, but TWF, ranged weapons and shields weren't options so that was suboptimal anyway. The optimal choice involved dipping in either Warrior or Paladin for heavy armour, a fighting style and maybe even smites. Even then, the class was heavily MAD. The Hexblade Patron gives medium Armour, shields and Cha to one-handed weapons, making SAD Warlocks possible - but at the same time, the Curse Bringer Invocation is simply much better, pushing Strength as the best option while doing nothing to address the issues Strength builds already had. Medium armour means you're only one feat away from heavy armor if you wanted, but otherwise dipping into Fighter is still the best way to make Strength builds work.

At least the smite-lite from Curse Bringer means that Fighter 1 becomes a lot better than Paladin 2, so that's nice. From those Invocations it looks like they realized Bladelocks needed a form of smite, but it could have been implemented a lot better (it's too much to slap onto part of an invocation).

Without multiclassing, Hexblades require Str, Dex, Con and Cha to be fully effective. That's pretty bad. The SAD Warlock loses out on the smite feature and the ability to transfer their curse, both of which are really big. So I feel SAD Warlock won't really be a thing, meaning that boon exists mostly for other classes to dip into and to make Stone Sorcerers even more broken - it's funny, I saw their 13 + CON AC and thought "eh, that still makes them MAD since they need a melee stat as well", but now needing only CHA and CON for melee attacks, spellcasting, AC and health is crazy. I definitely think that feature should have been reworked and made much harder to dip into - maybe scrap the thematically and mechanically inappropriate Shadow Hound and add that as part of a different level 6 feature.

Then the invocations. It's nice to see more options for Bladelocks, but having two Invocations spent on improving one's pact weapon was already quite demanding. This just adds more. I'm also not a fan of how it forces you into certain weapon types depending on your patron - I wouldn't mind the idea of different weapon types giving different bonuses, or different patrons giving different weapon invocations, but not combining them together. That's incredibly pidgeon-holey, given that you need those invocations to access your smite-lite ability. The +1/+2/+3 Invocations feel like they could have been a base part of the Pact Weapon Boon. Some invocations may no longer be required (GFB and BB may replace the need for Thirsting Blade with their scaling, Lifedrinker becomes less useful when only hitting once with your pact weapon) but overall it feels like the class is very demanding from both attribute investment, feats (if not multi-classing), invocations, Pact AND Patron relating to the same build, and possibly cantrip choice as well.

I think they aimed to give Bladelocks a lot of choices for different builds, and there definitely is some there, but the class did not need abilities that won't work together. The Hexblade patron gives the build a solid foundation that it needed, but making it a Patron choice severely limits Bladelocks (along with the Invocation taxes doing the same thing). I think a rework of the Blade Pact feature was needed so that Hexblade didn't appear mandatory. But with both Patron choice, Pact choice, and half your invocations going toward making Bladelock work it feels like you're investing a lot into the damn thing.

edit: It is still a welcome addition and looks like the patron will be fun to play, however it didn't really address the core issues that made Bladelocks awkward... just made them stronger. Fighter 1/Hexblade X will be a blast, but I could already make a viable Fighter 1/Bladelock X. I was hoping they'd come up with a good single class Bladelock, and the one-handed Hexblade doesn't seem competitive with the other builds.

[mAc Chaos]

You should send that feedback in.

I've slowly been amassing my own library of self created and gathered homebrew.

[mAc Chaos]

Also the popular reaction to this latest UA seems disproportionately large compared to the other ones, for some reason.

[Seika]

I just see everyone bitching at them for making the Hexblade features not work together. And, you know, it was apparently deliberate to avoid complete Charisma SAD, which is a fair goal. But with melee warlocks being so MAD right now (I've tried to build them before and Saiga rightly points out that they really do need either a heavy armour dip or good stats across four attributes), it would have been much nicer that way. It also just feels so bad, like such a logical disconnect, that I think that puts people off too.

[Saiga]

Doesn't feedback open when the next class is released? I'll also probably take some time to organise it better before submitting it.

As for reactions, I have seen a crazy amount of hype but also a lot of complaints. Calling either Hexblade or Lore Wizard crazy OP (and I think they're right for the Wizard), pointing out the way Curse Bringer issue, complaining that Bladelock still has problems being single-classed or looks better for a dip.

It's funny, I was sure I read that either Mearls or Crawford dislike Fighter and Warlock dips being so ubituous but they haven't fixed the issue. As long as Strength builds require heavy armour, many classes will dip Fighter for it.

[Five_X]

It's just me, but I prefer going DEX for melee caster builds, at least for Warlock. As Seika said, though, Hexblade makes playing an otherwise-built Warlock subpar unless you're going mainly for flavour. I can understand how it's a weird, difficult thing to balance, though.

[Saiga]

Dex mains are part of the problem! Down with Dex!

Anywho, I think the Cha replacement could be scrapped entirely. It seems better for multiclassing than it does for the actual Warlock, and the idea of creating "martial" characters that can get by using only casting stats rubs me the wrong way after thinking about it more.

I also find it funny our Wizard (who only plays Wizard) thinks that Lore Wizard has no balance issues. He's my best friend but he's clearly not very fair, and has complained about basically ever other caster he's played alongside for overshadowing him. Early in the campaign he was convinced the Arcane Trickster had to be using an overpowered homebrew without telling us, because he felt the AT was a better caster than him... somehow. He even got me thinking it until I decided to actually check the PHB.

[Seika]

This 254-page supplement features the following:• Traits for 12 new races, plus 60 Alternate Racial Traits and 49 new Character Traits
• 125 new Character Class Options, including new archetypes, bloodlines, domains (and subdomains), and much more
• 93 New Feats
• 84 New Magic Items, Mundane Items, and Technological Items
• 61 New Spells and Psionic Powers
• 23 New Deities and Philosophies

Do you ever consider that your system might be a bit ... mental?

[aldeayeah]

the joys of splatful RPG design