/5eg/ D&D Fifth Edition General: I Didn't Ask For This Edition

>Ki can't transcend over physics for more than six seconds
Is ki the lamest magic in the multiverse?

After a turn, gravity takes effect and you fall unless you make a check to 'climb' the wall in that spot and start again next time.

That's a good point if you don't use your action on a Dash.

I generally fluff Ki as not actually magic at all, what with it originally never particularly being portrayed as such.

Hey, since it's about a setting for use with 5e, anybody mind giving me some advice here:

> using shitty 3.5 planar lore

Yeah, sorry. 3.5 and 4e were utter trash, 5e is objectively superior. Time to grow up and move on, user. Throw that shit out and start anew. For example, create a setting with kender, tieflings, etc., some of the less-loved races in 5e. That would be far better than reusing some stupid shit from 3.5 that is no longer a part of D&D.

Anyone have/know of a decent goblin playable race homebrew?

No, ki is not magic, it's martial bullshit which will always be underpowered in D&D because that is the way of world. You want a balanced martial/caster RPG, play Dungeon World. Otherwise, accept D&D for what it is.

>our party sorcerer rolled wild magic three times
>"becomes blue" three times
>not even remove curse could take away the fact that he was glowing in the dark

fuck, I miss that group.

>I did a thing a while back
>THE ENTIRE MULTIVERSE in which it took place was annihilated
>I want to have a kind of "a new world from the ashes" thing
Yeah, clearly I'm sticking with the exact same shit.

Also, I was using the Planescape book from AD&D 2e, mostly.

Subtract 10 from the scores for gobs in the Monster Manual. Boom, there you go.

Oh wait, racial penalties are against the 5e rules because how DARE we insinutate one race is worse at things than another race! That would be RACIST.

Your better off just sticking to the core races, user. Their much better than anything the overly-restrictive SJW 5e rules will allow.

>Yeah, clearly I'm sticking with the exact same shit.

Yeah, it seems cliche as hell. Drop it, unless you want your players to laugh at you. While you're not bothering to be at all original, why not have a quest about bringing a magic ring of evil to a volcano to destroy it? With no eagles, of course. That would be overpowered!

Can any of the other Rogue archetypes even come close to comparing to Arcane Trickster?

Getting whatever ability makes enemies that can't see you have disadvantage on saves has made our rogue go from a joke to our MVP.

He told you to use Kender, for fuck's sake. Learn to recognize a troll.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with playing a kender...

>tfw you will never run a Heroic Bronze Age campaign in 5e
>When your players will never form the seed of the world's myth cycles and bring about the various demihuman races from tappin' that fine, fine deific booty.
>When you will never run a sci-fi campaign where a player recounts said myth cycle to a dying alien that speaks only in a memetic language.

Why must life be suffering, 5eg?

...get out.

Stop. You're embarrassing yourself.

Then explain exactly what is wrong about playing a kender.

You can't.

You can only spout memes.

Why not suggest those ideas to your players/friends and see if they would like it?

Swashbuckler and Thief probably.

The problem was always about people drawn to play kender.

I want to dm a game that has the aesthetic of a fantasy wonderland, as in being very cutesy, but I don't have any good tokens to use for npcs. Though I want to have the world be a Christmas critters esq world where everything is all cute and innocent but has a strong dark underline.

Does anyone have any suggestions for what to look up for tokens?

Anyone here good at poetry? I've got the need for a poetry clue for my campaign. The poem needs to feature the "cutter of roots", the "seer of stones", and the "winder of golden wire," as these are three people who's shops were burgled. It leads to them investigating to find odd items were stolen--these items all lead up to the realization (if my players are smart enough to figure it out) the items in question are all ingredients in summoning.

I know I don't have to have an actual poem, and can just gloss it over and give them the three clues, but that's boring!

What was stolen?

Kender are explicitly described in the lore in as behaving in certain ways. Those ways are obnoxious as hell.

>constantly stealing things other people need
>curious to the point that they'll push a big red button with a sign that says DO NOT PUSH just to see what happens
>the book explicitly says that other races find kender endearing, meaning that for the other players to react in a way that fits the lore, they have to PRETEND TO LIKE YOU STEALING THEIR SHIT
None of this is memes. This is all right there in the fucking book.

Any race that only exists to infuriate other players is bad.

Would you suggest to someone that they try to seriously play a stereotypical nigger in a modern game? I'm talking an unintelligent thug that isn't particularly tough but acts it while hitting on the party member's significant others while stealing their shit and running away whenever there is any conflict?

Cause that's basically what a Kender is. A D&D nigger. Except short.

Just watch Southpark's "Woodland Critter Christmas" a few times.

I haven't played any prior edition and have no experience with kenders, but just from reading half of this it's obvious the race itself is absolute garbage.

The Seer of Stones had a chunk of iron ore from the abyss, a moonstone from a fortress on the astral plane, a vial of soil from the fields of Elysium, and a piece of obsidian from the Elemental Plane of Fire stolen. The Seer is a fortune-teller sort of NPC.

The Cutter of Roots had a mummified hand from a troll, an antennae from a rust monster, a claw of a rast, the horn of a minotaur, and the venomous stinger of a monstrous scorpion. The "Cutter of Roots" is a druid herbalist.

The Winder of Golden Wire had a large bag of powdered silver stolen from his floor vault. The Winder of Golden Wire is a jeweler and detailed metalworker.

"Awwwwww, look at the adorable little kender. He triggered my anti-theft traps and now his face and fingers are burning off, leaving him hideously scarred and unable to be productive. But he is so cute while doing so!"

The bonuses to skill shit that Thieves get seem a lot less useful than spells.

Hows this?
>the winder of the golden wire often left to visit the choir
>When the vagrant strolled to his shire he stole what he most desires
>He one day hopes to make one big fire with that which he desired

I did which waht got me inspired to make a story based on false innocence but there's only so much you can do with Bambi and friends.

Back in older editions, any bonus to a thief skill was more or less invaluable. Unless you were 10th-level, you had a pretty shit chance of succeeding at anything climbing walls and maybe one or two skills if you ignored all other skills.

Interestingly, there was still no bad races for thief, because each race got bonuses to different skills.

Except humans, of course, but they were pretty much the only ones who could make it past level 10, so it worked out in the long run.

I like the idea behind this. The sorcerer learning to control a surfr or some of the surges becoming permanent if rolled so many times. I have a sorcerer in my group that has rolled confusion on himself 3 of the last 4 wild magic surges.

Fast Hands, Use Magic Device, and Take Two turns in combat are all really, really excellent upgrades. Thief is totally solid. But honestly any rogue choice is solid. It's an excellent class.

For a sense of scale, a Thief that is Hasted by his allies can fire a cannon on his own every round. Even without actually being Hasted, being able to put up a withering volley of cannon (or other siege weapon) fire is hardly a small deal.

Dancer Bard user back for a daily dose. In this latest attempt
>When you can use an enhanced style is made more clean
>Marcado makes allies' weapon attacks count as magical
>Accelerando grants bonus damage to up to 2 attacks rather than any number
>Fermata limited to 10 feet
>Maestro of Dance limited to one turn per short rest

Already though, I'm wondering if instead of range, Maestro should boost the potency of the enhancements. Or another ability, but I've yet to come up with one that's satisfactory that isn't just a modification of Draconic Presence or Panache.

The Seer of Stones traveled far and wide
To put pieces of earth by her side
But take it away -
She'll have the last say
And to the hells you all shall ride

The Winder of Golden Wire spins tales
For he has little when all else fails
But bits of gold
Will not stop the cold
When silver winds fill his sails

The Cutter of Roots had forgotten his own
When he held a hand, a claw, and a bone
Now a collector of parts
For many sordid arts
As his chest beats with a heart of stone

About spell scrolls, if the spell written takes a bonus action or reaction to cast, does reading the scroll take the same? Or does it still takes your main action?

Awesome, that'll work. Thanks!

I love the core concepts and will be saving this WIP in case I miss the finished product. A couple of notes, though.

1. The range of Movements of Grace seems to restrict the bard to a melee role to an extent. Is this intentional? If not, consider extending it a bit.

2. The increased range at level 14 feels a bit underwhelming. I'd consider making the increase smaller but persistent.

3. The combination of scimitars (dervish-like weapons) with the Italian nomenclature is a bit jarring. If this bard chooses not to use scimitars, all the first feature gives is a single skill proficiency, which seems weaker than is necessary. Then again, it's probably balanced out by the AC increase from Movements of Grace.

Overall, though, it has excellent flavor and your notes show you're working hard at making it engaging and balanced. Good work!

I expect payment in the form of your favorite moment/story from the game you're DM'ing right now

this is awful, not sure if this is a serious attempt or a joke but either way its not a good one
1/10
this is usable. good job attempting a meter and a rhyme scheme, though there are some major scanning issues with at least half of the lines
but then you wrote it in 5 mins for some guy on the internet so good job
6/10

>earned a solid 60% on a five minute limerick
well shit I wasn't even expecting a grade but thanks anyway user

Oh, my. I've got a few.

In the campaign, the party is following in the footsteps of a 112-year-old explorer's last voyage. The explorer was the only one to come back from his last voyage; all 12 members of his team, the crew and captain of the ship he chartered, and the ship itself, vanished. The explorer refused to reveal any information on what happened, when he got back two years later. After living as a recluse for approaching five years, he took his own life.

Fast forward over a century. The explorer's great-grand-son--the explorer had children before his last voyage--hires the party, on his deathbed, to find what it was that marked his great-grandfather so, discover what he never wanted found.

They went off in a ship, did a bunch of stuff, a couple of them died, and they got to the island where the explorer said he washed up. Bad things continued to happen, horrible, many-eyed-and-tentacled monsters abounded, and they actually found some remains of the previous team of explorers, including one petrified half-elf fighter. The dice were with them on their adventures before arriving at the island, and they had a potion of greater restoration, so they used it on the petrified half-elf. He was grateful, of course, and answered their questions as they escorted him to the ship.

However, something fun was revealed. The party said, "Oh, we were hired by your old leader's great-grandson."

The half-elf responded, confused: "Great-grandson? The leader had no children, and was infertile."

----complete, dead silence----

The party: "What?"

The half-elf: "The leader was born that way, and the various clerics were unable to cure him of it, when the time came. That's why he became an explorer--his one failed marriage because of lack of children led him to attempt to immortalize himself with his discoveries."

The party: "WHAT?"

Up until this point, no one had even questioned the "great-grandson's" motivations. Didn't even think to ask.

OH MY GOD PC, A MIMIC!

It works well enough for my purposes! Poetry was one thing I never could wrap my head around, when it came to writing.

If I had my druthers and the talent, I'd make it a sort of madrigal, with nonsense words thrown in and such.

But, alas, like most white boys, I have no game.

How does that help him find tokens?

Aand what were his motivations?

The Thief is amazing, maybe even the best archetype, if you play it right.
You need to use fast hands to do any or all of the following as bonus actions:
Heal your buddies with the Healer feat
Drops caltrops and ball bearings
Set hunter traps
Apply poisons to your weapon
Steal a spellcaster's implement
Steal a fighter's weapon (in conjunction with your normal action to disarm them)
And using whatever other bizarre items you and/or your DM make up.

You know, as much as we like to be sharing and caring, property and possessions are quite an important feature of civilization. Now, when you go dig up an iron-age village you may not find locks. As villages grew into towns and city-states, you see the invention and proliferation of locks. Now, you can interpret this a couple ways; you could say, "see how generous and civil everyone was, they didn't have to have locks, How innocent we were". Or you can interpret this as there isn't much to steal from in a small village and if you did take uncle Dilbolu's flaked stone axe, everyone would know you took it since it's the only one in the village. A larger town and populace, however, means more opportunity for deception, which means that locks were an important factor that allowed peoples to live together without everyone just stealing everything all the time.

The point of all this is: Possessions and defining what is mine and not yours is an essential aspect of human civilization, and direct affronts to that are (rightly) anathema to any post-agricultural revolution character.

>character hired as secret agent for government, essentially CIA or MIB type stuff
>haven't told the party because I kind of just want it to be mine, and so they don't go blabbing
>players don't know either
>in character girlfriend is anti government/rules, fine
>her crazy new friend is feeding her conspiracy theories about unexplained disappearances and forcing the masses to be happy through mass suggestion
>it's all going to come out next session

This is either going to be a lot of fun, or a lot of drama

Not evil, although I didn't reveal that to them for a while. I let them simmer.

The "great-grandson" was actually the same explorer, kept alive by his wealth and a buddy who specialized in alchemy. The issue was, the aforementioned many-eyed-and-tentacled monsters had infected him with an egg that, when he died, would eat his body and hatch, therefore letting the Chthonic horror onto the mainland. Only way to prevent that was a certain psionic item that lived within the center of the island, put there to trap something. It suppressed psionic creatures, putting them into a dormant state; it would allow the man to have the egg removed without killing him.

Is it better to just make a fighter and become an eldritch knight than it is to be a wizard and multiclass into fighter sometimes and eventually become an eldritch knight?

If I wanted to play a strongman wizard, with more focus on the wizard part, I'm assuming I should just do the latter, ignoring which is more effective, correct?

Sounds cool user, and a pretty good set-up for a boss battle.

If you want to be a strongman wizard, be a regular wizard with a high strength score. Also, enlarge.

>sometimes
Not sure what the latter is, but a strenght wizard won't be viable on its own. Bladesinger is kind of the wizard side of EK (both gishes but they lean heavily towards their parent class), so it seems that would be best, but I can't imagine it will work well with strength. I guess you can just do abjuration, take a level of fighter for heavy armor and such early on, then later take more levels for EK stuff. The recommended spread is 10/10 I think, but I don't remember exactly. That would be a less tanky EK but with many more slots and more focus on the spellcasting.

Hey, anons, I need a picture of a eastern european half-elf gypsy bard with a pet monkey.

Got any?

Anyone ever have super nifty ideas for multiverse planes?

The campaign I'm running will send the party into pandemonium, and then through a short hopscotch chase through a few home brew planes.

I've got stuff like a salt desert with magical constructs buried under the dunes, and a portal that goes into the bowels of some colossal herbivore, but if I see good stuff here I will use that instead.

Maybe something with skeletons

What's a good way of making Assassin better? I use the "dual wielding doesn't cost a bonus action" houserule and they benefit from it more than other rogues (and other classes in general), but I still feel like it's very week.

I always liked alterations of the astral plane myself. Even the pretty standard astral sea is really cool, and it being a river of souls like the river to the underworld, or a Great Old One encapsulating the multiverse and granting entry to other planes if you do it favors, are just a few alterations I've heard of.

Strength and wizardry don't go well together. You *could* play a rather melee wizard with the Bladesinger tradition, but that's not only dex, but your still a squishy wizard, so it's best to (ab)use its buffs to maintain concentration spells at range.

If you want to use str at all and cast spells, go fighter->EK

Hang out with other stealthy people so you can get the drop on enemies and actually use your archetype's main feature.

I feel like that's the problem, either the campaign, the group, or both, have to cater and play around the Ass in order for them to utilize their features because they rely on something (normally) so rare as surprise. I guess it's great for actual infiltration and ensures that if you do have surprise you will fuck up the enemy, but being able to win even more convincingly when you're already winning doesn't matter as much as turning a loss into a win, and covering weaknesses.

Basically, if the group/campaign doesn't cater to them, how do you make them viable, or how do you make them at least a bit less reliant on that?

1. Yes. It's supposed to enforce them using their signature dances in close support range, either of the frontline or backline they intend to aid. This is why they have the AC increase.
2. I'm working on that, noted.
3. The current names for those is because most of my musical knowledge is related to a school band class and sheet music. I might try to come up with other names, but hitting the right balance is hard, especially when it's 6 terms.
Thank you.

I was originally thinking of facing them with some sort of gate or link to the underworld, but I'm sort of staying away from soul/destiny stuff.

Honestly, the assassin is just sort of poorly made. One thing that might work is running ahead of the party and hiding near any enemy group and waiting for your party to show up to surprise them. However, that's not always plausible, and often very dangerous. Unfortunately, the assassin's just not that great.
It's especially awful for them because the thief and arcane trickster both make MUCH better assassins. The thief can infiltrate all sorts of places with ease with his climbing skill, can coat his weapons with poison in the middle of combat, and can even capitalize more on the first round of combat. The arcane trickster is a better assassin too, using disguise self for infiltration, the invisibility spells for stealth, and he hits the hardest out of all the rogues thanks to green flame blade and booming blade. If you're married to your character concept but not the archetype itself, I'd suggest asking your DM to let you make your character a thief or arcane trickster instead.

Presumably someone's already commented on it, but is there a particular reason you chose the AC bonus to be 13+dex, as opposed to how unarmored defense works for barbarians/monks? So, for instance, something like 10+dex+cha? Might be a bit much (though, still a lower AC than Barbarian as he can still use a shield) considering the bard's spellcasting,

It's a nice WIP, though.

Not playing an Assassin, just wondering how they could work better with the talk of ATs being so good last thread. Thanks for the thoughts though, I'm more annoyed at the Rogue's naming conventions than ever now. Thief is mundane but extremely skilled assassin, thief, spy, etc., while the AT learns magic to boost them in their work. The criminal fluff making every rogue think they have to be thieves and at least of questionable morality is so annoying, "Assassin", "Thief" and "Inquisitive" are just jobs and like the inquisitor and bounty hunter they should just be backgrounds. A bit ranty but fuck.

First draft used 10 + Dex + Cha, but I've moved past that since there's no precedent for casters getting full Unarmored Defense, especially with their main stat, barring those that drop levels in monk. If they added Cha to their AC, each of their ASIs would boost their casting stat, class resources, a very useful skill, AND AC.
Also, typically Barbarians actually don't get insane mileage out of their UD, since they want to put their focus on Str.

I understand completely, I myself play a "thief" who's a renowned surgeon on the run from a crime syndicate. He uses the Healer feat as a bonus action with fast hands, has expertise in medicine, and his "sneak attacks" are just him applying his intimate knowledge of humanoid anatomy.

I'm sad guys. This is so far my favorite edition of D&D, but all my players are still in love with 3.5 and Pathfinder. If I want to play Best Edition, I have to be ForeverDM. I'll never really get to play the game I like.

Shit players edition when?

There are definitely many people who will make non-criminal characters and that's great - my current game has a rogue who is an explorer, maybe not the most selfless but not fitting of the roguish stereotypes. But that shouldn't be breaking the mold, and I seriously consider just doing a whole document refluffing rogue so players don't get the wrong idea about the dexterous martial skillmonkey class.

Every edition user.

>those dubs
That made me feel a little better user. Thanks. Here's some spaceghost.

oh hey, it's dancer bard again.

i like the changes, but here are a couple of thoughts and comments.

1. lack of styles, is there any particular reason why you've opted for just 3 styles, instead of having a bigger pool (but eventually having it impossible to get every style?) I think it'll work well for the background of a dancer, since there are potentially a lot of different performance styles that would be difficult for any one person to master.

2. enhancements are all reactions: while there isn't anything wrong with it now, I think it'd grant a greater degree of tactical freedom if you allow some styles to be enhanced at the start of your turn, for example. Ties in with point 1, with there being a greater selection of styles to choose from.

3. maestro of dance seems kind of weak, the 30ft. bonus is indeed no joke, but it's a capstone that's limited to once per short rest.

One of my players has been reading Stephen King's The Gunslinger series again, and he wants to make a gunslinger type character. Anyone have any good homebrew classes or know of anything firearms related we can use? I'm not all that worried about guns being OP, their party is pretty underpowered and could use some crazy firepower.

So what makes spells should an Arcane Trickster take? most look to be checks to negate then, but you'll most likely not have the int to make that useful

I am making a third level character for a campaign I'll be in this Sunday. I have my heart set on making an Aarakocra or Human variant, but I need to know what crazy class mixup I should use for it. Any neat and/or weird ideas for me?

Dont play Arakocra
As for Humans, they work with literally everything so be more specific

1. There's only so many I can think of, to be honest. I was even down a passive for one until it was suggested a few threads ago. I don't think many can be made that actually benefit allies in an area, unless I either move onto things that impair enemies in the area or just "Choose one person and give them a BM maneuver"
I'm still clinging to the focus of the dance ability being "Buff to nearby allies", but if it's too bare without a way to debuff enemies, I'm nearly at a loss. Besides, you have spells for that, too.

2. Well, reactions can be taken at any time. If you (or an ally) take damage on one of your turns, you can use Reprise. You can attack on your turn and drop an Accelerando on it. And Fermata can be used whenever, to boost a passing ally an extra 10 feet during the middle of their move, as an example.
3. I'm still quite dissatisfied with the ability, and unsure of where to take it. Even when you're learning another dance at that level, a range boost feels like a copout, whether it's constant or temporary. As someone said last thread, I'd like to consider something 'flashy', but it needs to be fairly low power since you're getting a style too.

Spell Scroll doesn't any component right?

Does this mean unearth arcana's artificer (who can create spell scroll for free) can also use spell like simulacrum or gate for free too?

Spellbound Inspiration is garbage.

3 levels of spells is a huge amount of power to sacrifice for a single measly inspiration die, especially because they'll already be getting their dice back on short rest by the time they get the feature.

the components are used in the creation of the scroll, it more or less caster normally and stored in the scroll. So no

Matt Mercer's Fighter archetype for it is reputably the best. However, if guns are common enough any fighter, rogue etc. can use one and having a weapon-specific subclass doesn't make much sense.

Not for Artificer. You use arcane recovery point to create scroll. No gold,components or spell slot need.

well if it's just ideas for more styles, then you can simply add some more mundane styles like AC +1, reaction to double that for a single ally for that turn. Or you can go the way of very specialized but powerful buffs like +saving throws, dance of blades (+slashing damage only), etc. Even more options open up if you'll allow "offensive" styles.

if you are intent on just having 3 styles, that's fine too, but I think it'd be good to give more variety to the class otherwise.

as for the capstone, I would probably recommend something that improves the efficacy of the dance, and maybe make a once per long rest to balance the feature.