/5eg/ - D&D Fifth Edition General

Didn't realize the old thread was dying so I'll post this here.
I'm having trouble giving my Wild Magic Sorceress Tiefling a goal, and I'm having trouble fleshing out her background. What I have so far is:
She was found in the wild as an infant by a kind and selfless priest. I need help choosing what deity he worshipped. But anyway, the townsfolk that the priest lived in feared the infant because it was obvious she was a Tiefling, and despite the priest's best efforts, he couldn't stop their prejudice. He raised her in his temple, keeping her safe and away from the fearful townsfolk. She discovered her powers around the age of 18, while the priest was asleep. Unfortunately, a wild magic surge destroyed the temple, killing her adopted father almost instantly. To make matters worse, the townsfolk were awoken and began making their way to the temple to see what had happened. She knew if they found her there, they would no doubt execute her. Though she wanted to mourn her father's death, she couldn't. She took off out the back of the temple, never to return to the village she grew up in.

And that's where I'm stuck. What did she do after, and before meeting the party in Neverwinter for the story of LMoP? What is her goal? What would a chaotic good Tiefling want to work towards? Any suggestions will be appreciated.

Does any other GMs find their groups level up much faster after level 5? I find it hard to throw a challenging encounter at my players with giving them 4000+ xp and they are leveling up once a session.

Pre level 5 they leveled up every two sessions. Am I just being retarded?

Yes, because you're not using milestones.

Milestones my dude, xp bean counting is for chumps, levels should occur at plot points where the DM chooses.

My suggestion is: Don't get bogged down in the specifics of your race. Race is important in DnD but not the driving factor behind what your goals and motivations are.

Judging from what you wrote she'd probably have taken some of the values of her adoptive father. Maybe she's religious and performs pilgrimages to shrines and temples of her father's deity, hoping that she might get accepted there. After all, just because you have demon blood doesn't mean you can't be a devout Catholic or whatever.

She might be generally hesitant to trust humans since they never trusted her. Maybe she hangs out with elves or dwarves or something.

>DM is using XP with everyone having different amounts depending on if they miss a session or started the game later than someone else

Shucks tbya famiglia

I used milestones in my last campaign and thought I'd give the xp system a try to see how it works. It's fine at lower levels, but after that not so much. I'll probably switch back to milestones then

>level 4 party
>level 1 newbie joins
>A melee Fighter with less health than the Wizard

fucking why

I literally stopped tracking my XP because of this. When I feel like it's time to level up I will put down just enough.

I do like the religious idea, I think Ilmater fits very well too. And my group does have a lot of non-humans, I think we have only one human actually so that works well too. Thank you for the advice.

Because retards think con is a dump stat

>What did she do after, and before meeting the party in Neverwinter for the story of LMoP?
Sounds like she'd be a pretty devout follower of his deity. Maybe she makes an effort to do good deeds in the deity's name to prove she's more than her heritage, attempting to proselytize through righteous action and use her actions to persuade communities to be more tolerant of good-natured folk who happen to have an unfortunate ancestry.

This is fine. Why should people who don't contribute get the rewards? Welfare systems breed entitlement.

He doesn't do it to that extreme. If everyone is level 10, you start at 9; but it still seems dumb

Sounds like you forget to split the xp? Or are you perhaps following DMG p.84 rules?

This is probably a really stupid beginner-level question.

Other than the obvious stuff like the Players Handbook, dice, pens, paper, etc, what are some must-have purchases or downloads for a new player?

I've been using group xp to make things a little easier. As long as everyone is participating then they get the full xp reward for the encounter. Is it better to have the person landing the killing blow getting full xp for a monster and anyone else who assists getting half?

Senpai are you retarded

astranauta.github.io/5etools.html

Keep this shit bookmarked for easy reference, it's super useful.

no wtf just divide the total xp evenly among the PCs that took part of the encounter.

Well there's your problem.

Even with 14 CON you'll only start with 12 HP though. A level 4 Wizard with 10 CON will have 15 HP at the least if you're gaining at least half your HD in HP per level.

Point is that a level 1 character has no business fighting CR 4 encounters that deal his max HP in damage twice per round, especially in melee.

Thank you for helping me resolve this issue

>ask players to not have a set in stone character concept before Session Zero
>ask the players what sort of adventures they want out of this campaign, set up a loose framework story based on this (combat-heavy dungeons instead of puzzles and monster evasion, scum-and-villainy style adventuring where most adventurers are basically marginally tolerated outlaws, city scenarios where the PCs are basically doing heists and fighting gangs as mercenaries and/or vigilantes being their highlights on what they want)
>hand out setting notes on homebrew setting, includes restrictions on character options, expansions on others, point out the only page that is required reading (a short bulleted list) and that the rest is just fluff in case they want it
>ask if everyone's okay with the setting, make one or two minor alterations for players with specific objections, confirm updates with other players
>day of the session
>one player has already rolled up his entire character, is dead set on a race we've pruned with a concept that doesn't mesh with the setting, and didn't realize one of his spells is on the blacklist

I've talked to him about this and he's rebuilt with the others. We managed to alter his backstory enough to keep the theme but make it more congruent, but we had to go over the setting a bit and get him to figure out something more fitting on his rebuild. He's a bit salty but whatever.

What I can't ask him is what in God's name motivated him to deliberately pre-build when everyone was asked not to, agree to a theme he didn't pay attention to, claim to read up on the setting he didn't read up on, and then get defensive when it was made clear he didn't follow any of the group's agreed upon procedures?

Dont forget to check out the kobold fight club website! It's a great encounter building tool.

>I don't like unnecessary homebrew because the rules are perfectly functional and many homebrews just complicate things because I already know the system very well
>player wants to play a fairy homebrew that I have no idea where it came from
>he says the rules are too stingey and homebrew is more diverse
Who is the retard here

Does anyone else find trinkets to be a big disappointment?

I thought they were a neat idea at first, but over time, they've really just been a vague loose end that is just ignored.

I think it might be because even the most boring legit magical item is far more interesting than the most interesting trinket.

Him

Isn't that just because trinkets are purely for flavour unless you homebrew something for them?

What kind of fairy? A tiny one or a human sized one?

Tiny

Is the college of swords bard at all worth it in favor of the ek?

I wouldn't argue either of you is the retard, just that you have conflicting views.

Depends on how you play it out I guess. I think it helps if you try to find a reason as to why you're carrying it around and what it means to you.

Right now I'm playing a Barbarian with a tiny mechanical spider that moves around when it's not being observed. I'm making it skitter around frantically whenever the Barbarian's Danger Sense kicks in so that I can call it my spider sense.

The player. Having one PC 6 inches tall while everyone else is 6 feet fucks with everything, from combat to eating at the inn. The whole game and party dynamic have to warp around one player and his tiny character.

They're just for flavour.

No, it takes way too long to come online. Unless your DM loves throwing anti-magic measures at you all the time, just go with Lore Bard. Lore Bard is to Bards what Battlemaster is to non-gishFighters, there's no reason to pick anything else.

That's circumstantial. If its just a homebrew race then take a look at it yourself. If the race doesn't require any other additional material and isn't obviously broken, I'd say let them try it. If it introduces new rules or require knowledge from other homebrew sources then they're asking for more than is fair.

I really want my DM to give me the dead Sprite in a bottle so I can go on a quest to revive her.

It can cast fly on people, at level 1, and can fly itself

I think you've just got to give life to your concept and the direction it will take will come to you in perfect sense.

How did she interact with the townsfolk? Did she interact at all? This might define her world-view and give some perspective on where she sees herself in the world. A good place to start when figuring out a goal.

What was her goal back then? Before the magic surge and end of her sheltered existence. And what even provoked the magic to spark? Did that change her (previous) goal in any way?

That's what makes anything that's more than just flavor eclipse it.

Actually trinkets worked out really well for my Warlock.

He suffers from terrible nightmares after he became a Warlock, and his magically infused nightcap provided him with only good dreams. Boy is he fucked without it.

Don't ever say I don't give you anything, DM.

I have a hard time grasping what your point is.

It being able to fly isn't so bad, based on it's fly speed. But yeah, casting fly on people is not a good racial ability.

Why do warlocks get such a bad rep? I'm playing an Undying Chainlock in my current campaign, and I'm killing most of the enemies and still have spells for utility and overcoming a good deal of obstacles. Not to mention how helpful that familiar is. What's with all the hate?

they aren't wizards

Depends on how you use them. I turned one of my players getting the deed into the focal point of our campaign between more traditional adventures: the castle is a large, haunted ruin that they're working to clear out and rebuild, using their outside adventures to get strong enough to clear new sections and gain resources for reconstruction.

Damn, well that's disappointing. Hopefully Xanathar's can make them less shit.

All of D&D's RP "mechanics" are like that. It's up to you to make it interesting.

They're not as versatile as wizard.

Because only having 2 spell slots till level 10 sucks ass, especially if you're playing a game with high-risk combat encounters where you'd be stupid not to spend those spell slots on Armor of Agathys and Hex all the time.

Yeah, those slots are short rest... but it's still a pain in the dick having to rest for an hour after every fight or be constantly out of resources. It's not fun for the warlock player, and it's definitely not fun for their party.

The priest kept her sheltered for the most part, he knew they'd treat her badly. But sometimes she'd sneak out. Her interactions were mostly with the children of the village. They thought her horns were cool and they enjoyed playing little games with her. She avoided the adults, sometimes watching from afar but never getting close enough to be noticed. She didn't have much of a goal, she spent most of her time helping the priest with whatever he needed, and reading books he brought to her. That actually just gave me a fantastic idea. She was reading a spellbook, and while playing around and imitating the book, she accidentally casted the spell she was mimicing.
I guess for now her goal is to simply find a place she belongs, which seems to be with the party at the moment. Maybe she's trying to make a name for herself, to show that Tieflings aren't all evil monsters and that they can be good people. I bet she'd like a good old fashioned sacrificial death too, to live up to her worship of Ilmater by killing herself to save others.

But you have eldritch blast and a bunch of other stuff from your invcations, right? Correct me if I'm wrong, I've never played a walrock.

Invocations give you spells that still use slots or utility stuff, so you still only get two big spells per fight. Eldritch blast every turn is fucking boring as hell.

>Eldritch blast every turn is fucking boring as hell
But that's pretty much how a fighter works, they don't get ragged on nearly as much

>2 spell slots
But I get them back after almost every combat when the party rests up and it's never feels like a chore, it feels like a natural tempo. And I took magic initiate, so I get a Hex casting for free every long rest. I've never felt like I didn't have enough slots. It seems like people who complain about warlocks have only speculated about them, and never actually played one.

That's why everyone plays Battlemaster fighters. They actually get to do things

I think part of it is that Warlocks CAN do a lot of stuff, but they can only do a tiny sliver of it at a time and that feeling sucks. You have all these options for spells but they are all trap options since you are always going to be better off casting Hex instead.

>Invocations
>Shit wizards can do with a level 1 or 2 spell slot
>Shit twizards have enough spell slots to do way more times than they'd ever need to anyway, so the warlock being able to do it infinite times kinda doesn't mean much
>Shit they can never upscale beyond these level 1 and 2 effects when wizards get multiple high level level spells as the game progresses.

I mean, at least you have Eldritch Blast, which IS the most damaging cantrip in the game... but that's only slightly better than playing a Champion Fighter (the one without Combat Manuevers or anything cool) to be honest. You're just a turret doing the same fucking thing every turn.

Maybe you should play wizard then.

You mean to tell me every time you have a fight your party stops for a full hour so everyone can get their short-rest resources back.

Holy fuck that sounds boring. It sounds like a zubat infested cave in Pokemon, but every time you encounter a Zubat you don't get to move again until you've stared at the screen for 10 minutes first.

Warlocks are the only class that wants to take a short rest, and 90% of the time if you can take a short rest you could take a long rest instead and everyone else in the party is going to want the long one.

So you end up being a shittier wizard with a good cantrip. I've played Warlocks, I like Warlocks, I love their flavor and their weird invocation options. Warlock is not very well balanced with the rest of the classes and has some systemic problems, that doesn't mean you can't enjoy them, but wotc should probably do a revised warlock at some point.

This is literally what I (and almost everyone else) does after playing a warlock for the first time.

Situation that came up at the table that people are still arguing about in our group discord;

>Raging barbarian runs towards enemy that is, just barely, out of his range
>Hasn't attacked or taken damage this turn
>Bard shoots the barbarian in the back with an arrow so he can continue raging into the next round

Is this "taking advantage of the tactics offered by the system," or just "metagaming?"

So warlocks get eldritch blast as a back up, a few high level damage spells to flash here and there, and invocations and a bunch of mid-level spells providing utility. They seem really well rounded, and it seems like the only real issue is when people want to play them like a wizard variation. Also, all the complaint about short rests seem weird. I've never played in a party that found short-rests tedious because you can just say "We're going to tend to our wounds for an hour and start moving again".

Warlocks are fun, and honestly I prefer them to wizards. I use High CHA waaaaaaaay more than High INT.

I've considered giving Warlocks a second pool once they hit 3rd level, but the second pool can only be used to cast 1st level spells. Once they hit level 7 they can cast those spells like they were in 2nd-level slots, and at level 14 they can cast them like they were in 3rd-level slots.

I'm also thinking they can expend one of their Mystic Arcanum slots to replenish one of their spell pools instantly instead of resting to do so.

>We're going to tend to our wounds for an hour and start moving again
>roll on the roaming monster table

>Invocations
>Mid level

You're really pushing it. And in terms of utility, what the warlock offers is inferior to druids, clerics, bards, wizard... just about everyone except sorcerers to be honest.

Warlocks the worst casters in the game because they're built around short rests, but their short rest resource pool burns the fuck out the first time you need to do ANYTHING, while the other casters can go all day and have resources to spare usually.

/5eg/
>If you're not playing a wizard, you're not having fun right

Welcome to dungeons and dragons.

It's bad behaviour, I'd call it metagaming since the characters don't view the world in game terms.

>We tend our wonds for an hour and move on.

This is great until you're still in the third or fourth room of a dungeon and realize you've wasted half the day already because each room had a combat encounter.

>tfw having fun playing a monk

As DM, I'd only allow that if it was roleplayed well.

Doesn't even have to be a combat encounter. Just an encounter that uses a spell slot.

I don't even hate the idea of a short-rest caster, but to parrot what other anons have said, 2 spell slots for half their existence is just way too few. You use even a single spell in a non-combat encounter and half of your resource pool is already gone.

I did this one because I always end up with atleast 8 weapons and cant keep track of them.

Isn't Champion the one that gets Regen somewhere waaaayyyy down the line?

I really like Regen so if I ever played 5e I was sorta tempted by it.

What your barbarian should have done was throw something at the enemy because he was so pissed. Even if he's wielding a 2H weapon he can hold it with one hand for a few moments since he's not attacking with it.

It sounds like our groups just have different play styles. We plan on spending at least a week in most dungeons, and most of the rooms have riddles or obstacles that don't deal with combat. Repetitive combat is way more tedious that short rests.

>Change that to Psionic. Wizards aren't the overpowered bullshit class anymore. At least until mid-high level. Before that, bullshit psychic anime characters are the go-to class for weeaboos and That Guys.

Sorry, guess they're called "Mystics", not "Psionics"... even though they're literally just Dark Sun psionics that don't belong in any fucking setting except Dark Sun.

Every barbarian should have a couple javelins strapped to his back for this very situation

The Barbarian could've just punched themself in their blind rage. 1 damage and still pissed.

Answer the following with a yes or no. Don't answer ME, I don't give a damn, answer yourself.

>Is the Barbarian's rage an effect in-setting which can be clearly distinguished from him just being really angry? Does he give off some supernatural aura, change his appearance, actively show partial regeneration from injuries inflicted during rage, or something else that can be clearly defined as more than 'big guy is pissed'?
>Has the Bard (or someone the bard is in communication with) studied and experimented with the means that trigger this effect and turn it off, determining that the rage effect terminates when a given time frame passes where he neither attacks nor is attacked?
>Does the Bard actively track the Barbarian's rages and actions in-rage specifically to help sustain it, having done the prior two stages to identify and quantify the nature of the Barbarian's rage?

If you can answer yes to all three, you are being a clever player. If you cannot, you are metagaming.

What is the maximum number of javelins one can have on their back?

What do you think about Curse of Strahd module? It looks cool to me, but there is ton of reading required, and those stupid lengthy room descriptions.

Yeah, although there a Mystic class that gets it way sooner if your DM allows UA content.

And yeah, even though you get regeneration, Champion is literally the "tutorial class" in a sense. All it can really do is basic attack every turn. No combat manuevers, no magic, no real resource pool except for action surges. It's feels like it's there for the player who doesn't know the rules yet and just wants to hit stuff without worrying about tracking abilities.

I'd say four is the reasonable amount, but if you are a Bearbarian you can carry a lot more than that.

Depends on your strength score.

With 20 Str, it's 60.

just put them inside a bag of holding.

That's unfortunate, I love light regeneration.