Orcs in the Hood Edition
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>Previous thread:
When was the last time a group/faction/army/nation of orcs posed a serious threat to your party?
Why are orc girls the best?
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>Orcs
>Best at anything
In our last game. Our Wild Magic Sorcerer tried to cast sleep on a group of orcs who had their backs turned on us. He had a surge and ended up casting fireball on himself, detonating the room full of stolen gunpowder we were standing in. Everyone died.
Wild magic is always fun
Here's the problem with the way most people handle Liches (and enemy spellcasters in general):
They imagine that this Super Wizard is spending all day anticipating a threat, loaded for bear against it. So paranoid was this particular guy about getting shanked in the night, he pursued undeath so that he could "live" eternally without fear of adventurous murder and... and... what?
It's horseshit. Liches became liches because they had magical secrets of the universe to complete, and it's going to take longer than their 80-something living years to uncover all that shit. They wanted to be a not-zombie so they could have the time to uncover all those cosmic truths. They spend each and every day of FUCKING ETERNITY engrossed in their studies and magical experiments, and all of that takes casting. Their spell list doesn't read like an encyclopedia of damage and save-or-suck CC spells, it's all utility bullshit. They've got seven different instances of "if you cast this spell every day in the same spot for a year, it becomes permanent" on their schedule, and they've been doing that for centuries.
So the lich knows you're there, to be certain, somewhere in his lair. He doesn't know you're in his fucking bedchamber already, because centuries of every other adventuring party getting assblasted by his bajillions of traps and monsters and magical countermeasures has made him complacent. You're sitting in a room right now with a doorway out of your peripheral vision, unlocked, because you don't anticipate a Bolivian death squad rushing in and murdering you. The lich feels EVEN MORE SECURE. You are not a threat to him. He doesn't care that you're in his house. You'll die eventually, and he's got experiments to run. Waltzing out to Finger of Death you--which he doesn't even have memorized, because he didn't wake up this morning expecting adventurers would be here, because no one's bothered him in 17 years--would be a waste of his time, as much of it as he has.
Funny, in the second encounter of my first only 5E game my 2nd level Wild Magic sorcerer surged, got fireball, and wiped the entire party.
Reminder that Eberron is the best setting.
>They've got seven different instances of "if you cast this spell every day in the same spot for a year, it becomes permanent" on their schedule, and they've been doing that for centuries.
Every corridor of their lair is filled with heavily-obscuring fog. Also, that fog is Stinking Cloud, which means you are Con saving literally every round to not barf. This Stinking Cloud is E V E R Y W H E R E and comes back within minutes if dissipated. But you can't dissipate it, because every corridor also has a fucking Gust of Wind blowing straight at you, at all times, and it's blowing in Stinking Cloud from everywhere else. Every bit of air in this place is fucking Stinking Cloud.
Any time you make a turn in these Stinking Cloud-filled halls, there's a 50% chance you go in a direction you didn't want to, into another hallway filled with Stinking Cloud and Gust of Wind pushing you back.
Every door is Arcane Locked, and is illusioned to look like the wall. Also, covered up by Stinking Cloud.
Staircases are filled with regenerating Web. Also, Stinking Cloud.
There are Magic Mouths every five feet, screaming "GET THE FUCK OUT". You can only hear the nearest Magic Mouth, because every tile is partitioned off by a sound-proof barrier. This partition is also vision-proof, meaning that even if everything wasn't a swirling mass of Stinking Cloud, you'd still be blind every five feet.
Any time you turn a corner or enter a room by the door you couldn't see to begin with, you must Wisdom save against Suggestion telling you, "It'd be a good idea to leave and go home." EVERY TIME.
Divination magic doesn't work. Divination sensors cast outside can't come in, either.
Teleportation and planar travel magic doesn't work.
It's nothing but 5x5 cubes of sound-proof, vision-proof, difficult terrain vomit gas screaming GET THE FUCK OUT.
And that's before we even talk about the traps rigged to pressure plates and tripwires that you can't possibly see.
With their patience, they've also had time to layer their lair with dead ends and abjuration spells. Good luck penetrating a shitton of Glyph of Wardings, etc.
>You're sitting in a room right now with a doorway out of your peripheral vision, unlocked, because you don't anticipate a Bolivian death squad rushing in and murdering you
My bedroom door is in my sight when looking at the computer and always locked. Enjoy your death squads, user.
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Rate my sorcerer changes
Harsh criticism is welcome
>he doesn't know they have radar guns that can see you through your wall and anti-materiel rifles that'll punch straight through
>he doesn't know they can hear everything going on in the room by lasering the vibrations of the window
>he doesn't know they're aware of everything on your monitor and TV screen because they're working back from the EM fields flying out of the room, on top of already having remote access on the PC
>be on Veeky Forums, using my Gentoo rig powered by QUADFIRE 7970s and an i7 2600k, when knock at cave door
>OPEN UP WE'S THE POH LEASE
>push a couple old Pentium 4s against the door (those things are just so damn handy)
>begin waddling towards escape hatch
>BANG BANG BANG
>cops shooting the door, screaming MURIKA FUCK YEAH
>be Canadian, quite confused
>continue waddling as fast as I can
>cops break door down
>they begin sprinting towards me
>one gets caught in my intranet
>fuck that was an expensive cable it's hard to get them that long
>whatever
>cop begins shooting me
>dive behind Fermi pile
>Fermis burst into flames, buying me time
>grab my Thinkpad
>escape hatch blocked by cans
>prepare for final stand
>cop comes around corner
>nail her on the head with my Thinkpad
>Thinkpad 1 SWAT helmet 0
>another cop rounds corner
>shoots me
>absorbed in my fat, bounces off
>this angers me
>release the bear
>Guardian Neckbear leaps from neck and begins biting cop
>throw GNU/Hurd kernel DVDs at him
>he dies from disgust
>cop jumps through can pile
>falls onto my pile of dragon dildos
>runs back out screaming
>jump in my get-away pedovan
>mom runs out of house
>SERGIO COMPUTER NO JUST WERKO
>NOT NOW MOM I'M BUSY
>rev up car
>cop cars begin coming around corner
>speed off
>they chase me
>they have no drivers and crash into poles
>an entire polish parade
>1.7% of the parade survive
>more cops behind me
>NO TIME FOR LOVE, COPPERS
>helicopter appears above me
>it's rotational velociodencity begins to degrade as it comes closer to my giant dog-shapped pedovan
>it bluescreen
it's like you're narrating my life, user!
Primarily use a shield, yes. I like slapping people around, but we have more than enough people using two-handed weapons for the big deeps, so it's whatever.
I've been assuming I'd use Protection style since it's the most "generic" and would go along with anything I did.
Protection sucks. Defense or Dueling are the money styles if you're sword and boarding. Acquire Shield Master, become God.
>Cleric
>Take War Caster, spellcasting focus embedded in shield
>Use two shields, wear chainmail
>20 AC
Tell me why this shouldn't work
Shields don't stack
Which is bullshit because there is literally an enemy for whom it does stack.
Bullshit as in that it shouldn't be true, not that it isn't true.
what are you gonna do when you run out of spells?
It still looks like it's only benefiting from one shield's AC bonus... plate sets it to 19 and a shield is +2, and the monster has 21 AC
If it comes to that, I'll simply drop or stow one of my shield and start smacking heathens with my mace.
>plate sets it to 19
Plate Armor gives 18 AC, and the blurb explicitly states that "each of [the shields] is accounted for in the giant's AC." Though then we have the problem that each shield apparently counts for 1.5 AC.
Ah, shit, my bad, I keep mixing Defense with Protection, I meant Defense, sorry
Should I take Shield Master for my feat at level 1 then? I didn't actually have anything else really in mind now that the Weapon Mastery feat is off the table, though Fell-Handed sounds fun.
I'm half-considering non-variant human just because of nice and rounded stats but that's probably stupid as hell
>Level 1 fighter's character art wears platemail
[Triggered]
As long as his armor is medium or heavy armor you can just reflavor it as damaged armor.
Perhaps the giant has the Dual Wielder feat?
Close but not quite
18 AC for plate
+2 AC for one shield
+1 AC for offhand shield
But I actually kinda dislike this monster's AC and think it should be slightly higher. At least 22. I'll tell you why
...look at the *type* of shield it's using. That's a motherfucking GREATshield. The thing is massive and the monster is already focused on turtling and protecting itself. Greatshields should definitely offer +3AC imo, at a slight tradeoff for PCs of course...
And what's so wrong about having access to the best mundane armor at a low level?
Not all low levels are poor and/or value their lives so poorly.
Am I retarded for trying to play a grappme-focused monk in 5e? I was trying to be a snowflake and go for a drunken master type build by making strength, dexterity, and constitution my highest stats without paying too much attention to wisdom. I suppose I could always multiclass into fighter at the expense of some monk-exclusive ki stuff, but I feel like I might have dug myself into a hole here.
Honestly I think it should be exactly 22, because it clearly covers 3/4ths of him and 3/4th cover is +4 AC, just like how half cover corresponds to a single shield with +2 AC.
Maybe, but again the statblock clearly indicates that "each" shield is accounted for.
his inventory says chainmail
this isn't acceptable
18 from plate
+4 from two shields
-1 from dex
>Inb4 implying the guy who wrote this shit knew anything about the rules
>REEEEEEE
He didn't. It should be 22. In my games it's fucking 22, end of discussion
Dude just tell him to reflavor it to "Worn plate (Chainmail)." It's not like there'll be any difference gameplaywise outside of the difference in AC. You can just say that pieces were lost to make up for the 10 pound disparity in weight.
Full Plate is heavy armor, why would dex matter?
Finding character art that is 100% accurate is basically impossible, you have to work with what you got.
NPCs can do a lot of shit that PCs can't, and PCs often do stuff that NPCs can't. That's how 5e works.
>why would dex matter?
It doesn't, that's the whole point of the post
See
Because WotC doesn't understand their own rules sometimes
>cleric
>war caster
>cast shield of faith on self
>wield 2 shields and plate armor
>24 ac
tell me why this shouldn't work
Plate, shield and armor fighting style should cover it all.
>changeling
>shapeshift into a shield
>4 ac
tell me why this shouldnt work
>Every 5ft is a square of screaming fart gas
My fucking sides are in the Astral Plane
The best grapplers, oddly enough, are rogues and bards, because grappling is based on the Athletics skill and rogues and bards get skill expertise.
And in general it's a bad idea to be "grapple-focused" in the sense of having grappling be your plan A all the time. It is a tool that is only useful under certain circumstances, like when someone is trting to escape or when there's an environmental hazard to pull someone into. Grabbing someone and then shoving them prone, or using the Grappler feat to restrain them, is usually a waste of time compared to just attacking instead (or, in the case of a monk, stunning them.)
Barbarians have advantage on strength throws in rage, so that's about the same as the bonus from skill expertise at higher levels of proficiency, and better at lower levels.
see >the blurb explicitly states that "each of [the shields] is accounted for in the giant's AC."
I need a fantasy-sounding name for the magical equivalent of a circuit breaker or fuse box.
Transmogrifier
Flux capacitor
>Am I retarded for trying to play a grappme-focused monk in 5e?
Yes. If your DM is nice you might be able to convince them to let you add your Wis mod to a grapple check as a part of the Martial Arts Feature or something. At least then you wouldn't need strength.
What's your dex?
Arcane connector?
In hindsight, normal human is always dogshit though isn't it?
Guys help, there's this guy that likes to play dnd with me and the guys. He's a cool dude but he just makes really shitty characters that no one likes. The last one mouthed off to the wrong god and got sucked into his realm and we started to do a solo-campaign to see if he makes it out but his character was so bad it got boring and I had to stop the campaign. I'm offering him a second chance with the party and to make a new character.
However the first Idea he threw out was awful.
HELP
NPCs and PCs are not following the same rules. More news at 11.
Welp serves me right for trying to be special. Thanks for elucidating, anons.
see
But it doesn't mesh very well with their preferred equipment, either having a big honking two-handed weapon or using a shield to maximize unkillability. Rogues and bards are not hampered as much by having a hand free.
10, why?
How awful are we talking?
If shield gives +2 on its own and we assume a baseline of 1, then you should have 3 AC in shield form
>Barbarian with Tavern Brawler
>1d4+2+Str unarmed attacks, with shield
Besides, you don't need unarmed damage when grappling if your DM isn't a faggot and you are beating your grappled target up with the environment.
Power Shunt
That is still much worse than just having a battleaxe in one hand and keeping the other hand free for grabbing.
If it's any comfort, because so few monsters have skill proficiency, you will still be able to succeed at grabbing a good amount of the time. Just remember to only use it when there's a reason and not just as a substitute for attacking.
You lose an attack for your grapple attempt in that scenario. It also ignores any environmental shenanigans you might do that would inflict more damage or conditions with a non-fag DM, in which case the damage of your weapon doesn't matter to begin with.
His first character monologued for miles and sucked out player time for the rest.
then this next one was gonna be a braindead wizard who is too powerful magically.
Playing 'Mother May I' and hoping your improvisation does more damage than a battleaxe feels like a risk to take. Even GMs who like improvisation tend to get tired of the 5th time in a fight you need to find an object to smash a guy into.
Unless there's a river of lava or a sphere of annihilation or something like that, any environmental damage will be an improvised melee weapon attack delivered exactly as though you had a chair in your other hand.
Last session, actually.
The GM could also impose disadvantage to your grapple if you are trying to smash them into an environmental object due to increased difficulty.
As an aside: Which environmental objects would do more damage than 'Hit them with a battleaxe/warhammer'?
>i am / my DM is a fag DM
At least tried making a point
That's not how improvised weapons work
>implying he has a game
Would the spell Web be a decent lore bard pick?
With cutting words you could basically ensure they never succeed if they fail their first save by hitting them constantly with the -d8 to their strength check.
post more muscle waifus
If the DM doesn't want me to hit enemies with things, he shouldn't put things in a room, or have fights near things.
You've got good taste, but for real what should I do? I got a week to plan
Don't forget, the room shouldn't be made out of things.
Let him play his shit character. It's usually comedic relief anyways.
But they're not awful in the fun way. They're so bad that his character was killed off by the rest of the party complaining for a month about it.
Tell us what he made
Refer to
But in more detail he made an ugly monk with no charisma and he just picked fights and was so quick to kill. Not to mention he used an item that actively made enemies stronger and nearly got multiple people in the party killed. He constantly talked to a character no one else could see, hear, or interact with and got mad at me when it didn't give him meta knowledge
Sure it is. When slamming somebody against something, it's functionally equivalent to slamming that thing against somebody, at least closely enough given the level of abstraction present in the rules of D&D. As they say, it doesn't matter whether the stone hits the pitcher or the pitcher hits the stone; it's going to be bad for the pitcher.
Wrong. Liches obsess about anything interrupting their studies or plans. That means that every doorway in their lair has an alarm on it. That means that they can use divination on any room in their layer at will through specially created magic. Yes, they might be somewhat complacent, but once you reach closer to where they are they already know you are there and have prepared every conceivable way to defeat you. They aren't complacent enough to let you skip through a room and smack them on the head, they have 20 INT.
My friend wants to, and I quote: "play as a grappler whose main thing is I grapple people, but I also want to be able to throw objects, and to teleport to those thrown objects".
What class most closely represents my friends retarded idea?
Lore bard with Misty Step?
Horizon Walker Ranger with Brawny and Tavern Brawler?
Seems like it would work. In fact the fact that works as well as it does is kinda odd.
Which things are going to do more damage than the battleaxe?
Any more orc pics like these? I hate the cartoonish "bulky green people with tusks" look, and these here look legit terrifying and alien.
>Find perfect looking character art
>It's exactly what I imagined my character to look like
>Except he's got a little red strip of cloth tied around his arm and I didn't include that
>DM REEEEEEs at me and demands I find me art
No, he wants it at 1st level.
Is there literally any way for me to make this balanced without telling him his idea sucks fat cock?
Or, you know, you could add the phrase "with a little red strip of cloth tied around one arm" to his description, perhaps to remind him of some cause or friend.
Teleporting at level 1 isn't really a thing. Let him play an eladrin or shadar-kai?
Tell him to stop being a snowflake and build his character as it levels up like everyone else
Tell him that he can work towards getting it but he won't start off as some god teleporting around the battlefield at level 1, because level 1 characters are brand new to the whole "adventuring" thing and probably only had one or two strange things happen to them
Tell him if he insists on doing his retarded meme horseshit he'll have to get it when he levels up like everyone else's cool abilities.
A grappler Horizon Walker Ranger could be perfectly viable at low levels. He can go Goliath with Brawny to drag people around at full movespeed as a stopgap before actually getting the ability to pop around like an 8 foot tall ripped Tracer every turn.
If you feel like throwing him a bone give him Tavern Brawler for free (Maybe without the +1 STR).
In fact the more I look at it, a grappler Goliath Horizon Walker seems like it'd work rather well since they can remove an enemy's resistance to nonmagical bludgeoning and deal extra damage with punches once a turn.