/5eg/ Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition General

>Unearthed Arcana: Elf Subraces (No new UA this month)
media.wizards.com/2017/dnd/downloads/UA-ElfSubraces.pdf

>Trove
rpg.rem.uz/Dungeons & Dragons/D&D 5th Edition/

>5etools
lithdoran.github.io/fiveetools/5etools.html
5etools.com

>5etools latest update-
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>Resources
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Previous thread:
boards.Veeky Forums.org/tg/thread/57167057

Thread Question:
Have you ever given your players an IRL time limit to complete something (Navigate a burning building, run from an erupting volcano, solve a puzzle)?

POST YOUR MAPS NERDS WHO USE ROL L20
DO IT
SHOW ME YOUR HARD WORK OR YOUR HARD STOLEN COLLECTION

I did, pointed them to a collapsing tomb and set an hourglass. No one died, but it was fun to see them work against a real-time clock.

Casters>martials again

Why did we switch to 5e from 4e?

Would you rather have a Coffeelock or a Nuclear Druid in your party?

>Have you ever given your players an IRL time limit to complete something (Navigate a burning building, run from an erupting volcano, solve a puzzle)?
I have given them a number of turns to complete things but I have never given them something like a stopwatch to complete a task. The closest that I have come to something like that is when they want to wrap something up.

>IRL time limit
I imposed an IRL time limit on myself when I cast Contact Other Plane in my last game. Made the questions seem that much more important, you know?
Also we tend to impose the 6 second rule for specifically when someone wants to communicate a plan of action to another player while we're in combat. Only if it's strategy or vital information though, if it's just banter or roleplaying then we say fuck it and go full Jotaro vs. DIO levels of cramming shit into a few seconds.

Reposting from last thread

>What character concept are you most looking forward to playing in your next game, 5eg?

Personally, I really want to play a Half-Orc Storm Herald Barbarian with a Pirate background.

I have a wildman cavalier that rides a bear I've been wanting to play

What class would be in a partnership with a gloomstalker ranger that works in the Underdark?

I have a question about random encounters.

I don't do a lot of random encounters in my game normally, but my Tomb of Annihilation campaign is in the hexcrawl portion, so I'll have to start integrating them into my game. Our sessions are 2 hours long and we meet consistently every week. I'm concerned that random encounters will slow the pace of the game down too much.

What are some ways to speed up random encounters? Also, is it even worth speeding up random encounters?

A good thing to do is not make all random encounters combat-based, or have some of them not necessarily need combat to solve a dangerous situation.

As a DM, I would rather have a character that made since in regards to the setting I was running. Your characters design should happen as you play and focus on how you want your character to perform from an RP perspective.

If you design the character strictly from a meta powergame perspective you can find another table.

>would you rather eat an apple or a banana?
>as a connoisseur, I would rather have a plate of delicious vegetables, steamed and spiced to my liking
That's a nice non-sequitor, but how about answering the question?

Goolock with Devil Sight.
He can see the Gloomstalker since he isn't using Darkvision, and he can communicate silently with Awakened Mind. Even better if the ranger is a Ghostwise Halfling.

Says you. Clearly you've never made 10 smites in a round before.

How about no


But the nuclear druid is just a burst monster and then otherwise not so interesting, the coffeelock just keeps going on and on but is shut down by avoiding downtimes.

>shitty baiting troll gets ignored in favor of actual discussion
>gets butthurt and posts a food analogy
Put an image macro in there next time and you'll be set.

do elaborate

That's a good point. Having looked through the TOA random encounters list, I think it's something like 70% of the encounters are combat. I suppose that I should make sure that my PCs have an easier time than normal of de-escalating situations.

You must drink a lot of water to survive being so salty.

Ok, niggas, we just had a TPK.
Help me out building my College of Glamour Goliath Bard.
What instrument does he play?
Our DM allowed to start with a uncommon magic item, what do I choose?

Plays a huge drum...and a flute.

You that guy who asked about 3 Frost Giants?

Ask your DM for the Instrument of the Bards (Mac-Fuirmidh Cittern) and refluff it as a huge fucking alphorn

You didn’t start a discussion though. You made a statement about your preference with very little to add or talk about. If you think his post was so shit as to never go along with the original premise then just make your own post separate from his.

Are you the guy that had to fight 3 frost giants?
Also piccolo and Eyes of Charming

Yep, that was me.
Our 2 wizards had 0 crowd control spells for some reason, our cleric was clutch but after we killed the first giant we didn't focus on a single giant for some reason

Anyone here tried greyhawk initiative with any success?

Well, they fucking deserved it then. Have fun playing your Bard.

Without a doubt the most powerful uncommon magic item is the Winged Boots. If you have any kind of ranged combat, it's extremely potent. It also solves a lot of puzzles and environmental hazards.

That being said, please don't pick the boots, because it can make a DM's life miserable.

Fucking called that shit, I can smell a TPK from a mile away

I see that Xanathar's Guide is super popular (I've heard that it's on a couple of metrics' best sellers lists). What does it have other than extra class features and feats? Is it worth picking up as a DM?

Hey can you not reply to me unless you're making a constructive post?
Kthxbai!

Just download the pdf from the trove and see if it's worth your money

Some clarifications on rules, a section on trap building, new tables for random names

Oh duh, good point. I'll check it out.

maybe if you're a bad DM. I gave my players winged boots and loved seeing what they would come up with.

I really like Dragonborn. Are any of their racial feats in Xanathar's worth using, though?

I tend to have trouble prepping for sessions. I either do too much or too little but never just right. Thankfully I've been able to solve most of it by improvisation but I can only take that so far. Any tips?

What are you doing that's too much? Are you talking with your players to see what they like?

one of each please

>Planned to kill an NPC from day 1
>Party come to love him
>They get angry at me for killing him
Hm.

suppose I play theblade singer as just a Caster who is tankier, how ill the extra attack ever become relevant?

too little and improvisation is "just right"

you basically spend your time preparing to improvise and it won't be wasted, even if it sits in the random folder until some later time

>Planned to kill an NPC
choo choo

Mainly stuff that we don't get to or don't end up implement be it because of taking too long on some things or some "derailing". Not sure if I'm explaining myself.

the very definition of railroading

also

>they hate you, but for the wrong reasons

why don't you try explaining yourself then

try actually explaining

what did you actually prepare
what actually happened

I guess I can see that. The thing is that I don't feel too confident when improvising, and the more I stretch it the worse it gets. Maybe it's a practice thing.

>A single NPC that was going to die because of him crossing the thieves guild to help the party
>Railroading

I've had the itch to make a noble background cavalier and play it as a honest-to-god knight-errant

ignorance is no excuse

Pretty much this.

I want to play a Human Shadow Sorcerer (or maybe GOOLock?) with the Charlatan background. He's going to be a Dr. Facilier type of character.

I plan to use Drunken Master monk and I was wondering if the capstone ability requires you to have different targets for flurry of blows or just for the 3 extra flurries?

For example one time I had a small dungeon prepared but they gad the option to go to a nearby town before following on the hook to ask around and restock their supplies. But somehow it (d)evolved into a whole crazy adventure in town with npcs. Mainly stuff I had to keep making up on the go and with no clear way to put them back on the right path so to speak.

My experience with the Winged Boots comes from giving them to a UA Ranger who had Sharpshooter. The bonus 30' of movement and the boots made it so they could ignore virtually all location features and could always find a shot while never being in danger themselves. They became the ultimate kiting machine, totally unbeatable in open-field situations. It was also frustrating that I was basically starting to design all my encounters around ways to nerf this one specific player.

I ended up making the boots have 3 charges per day, which still made them insanely good, but at least felt a little more fair.

>cross a gang
>automatically destined to die
try being a good DM sometime

>Steal from gang because the PCs convinced you to
>Despite you begging the PCs to not make you do this
>You tell them that if you get caught, they'll kill you to make sure you can't tell the PCs anything

I want to make a campaign that is SNES JRPG plot as fuck, something like.

THE HOLY DRAGON OF MT. KELITRIX, WHOM GUARDED THE 8 ANCIENT RUNES OF TANFARIA SINCE THE TIME OF THE WAR OF MAGIC, HAS SUDDENLY GONE SILENT. YOUR GROUP HAS BEEN SENT OUT TO FIND OUT WHATS WRONG. A FEW MILES OUT, YOU SEE SMOKE IN THE DISTANCE BACK AT YOUR HOME VILLAGE AND RUSH BACK TO INVESTIGATE.

I have a folder full of interesting creatures near the CR

I half bake everything until it's actually uncovered/investigated/exposed whatever

I have a list of names because naming an NPC is one of my stumbling blocks so I mitigate it, and pick at random then make a note

>no clear way to put them back on the right path so to speak
BAD DM
BAD

there is no right path. dicking around in the town was the right path. the dungeon will keep and the next time they need to go underground you can pull it out, tweak it and you're good.

it could also be a tower if it's small enough

Well, you could have integrated the dungeon you prepared into the crazy town adventure by having one of the npcs lead your players to it...

>changing the scenario to cover for your dumb ass retroactively
sad!

dance all you want you planned to kill the NPC and you couldn't not once you planned it.

just because you don't actually understand how what you are doing is railroading doesn't mean it's not. the more you try to act like you're somehow not completely wrong the worse you look.

now go think about what you could have done and consider if you can have faked his death.

Perhaps a better way to do it, or just explain it, would be to say that the thieves guild would attempt to kill the guy - perhaps a couple of times. Then allow the players actions to impact the attempts. Maybe they stop it, maybe they don't.

>friend tells me to make a level 5 character for a oneshot
>settle on a dreams druid who just wants to sleep a lot and wants everybody else to have a good nights rest
>DM tells me that character motivation coincidentally lines up perfectly with the story of the oneshot
>get towards the end of character building, time to pick spells
>look at the druid list
>no sleep
>no silence
>no darkness
>no hypnotic pattern
>no catnap
>have to settle for feign death
should have just made a bard desu

if you lead a bull by the nose ring it's not railroading?

>THEY HAVE TO GO TO THE DUNGEON BECAUSE I MADED THE DUNGEON FOR THEMS TO GO TO

what did the DM say when you asked if you could use those spells as druid spells for role play purposes

These things come with practice. In general it's better to over-prepare, since you can always incorporate stuff you planned for later.

You should put your planning in very general terms unless you know for 80% certainty that a scene is going to come up. So think about where your players are and where they want to go. Think about what NPCs are with them/going to interact with them.

I also like to plan ahead 3 or 4 encounters (combat or social or skill challenges, etc) that can be dropped in and make sense in their location. I plan for more encounters than actually happen because some encounters might be location-specific or avoided depending on what the players do.

Preparing a stock of pluggable stuff actually sounds pretty good. Will try it next time.

Well I didn't really end up sending them to the dungeon but since I ran out of stuff to put in front of them and was a little tired from dealing with the unexpected turn of events I just kind of waited for a good moment to end the session. Maybe in retrospective there was a better way but in the heat of the moment it isn't so easy. Thanks for the help, everyone!

we were pretty much already roleplaying by that point
Lesson learned, pick spells first, then class after

all you have to do to challenge it is include a single caster with dispel magic. There aren't any rules necessarily about what happens when you dispel magic, but i was comfortable ruling that the flying speed is disabled for one round.

A creature falls 580 feet in a round according to sage advice, (though calculating it out, 175~ seems more accurate). That's enough cushion to really punish someone for being high and grapple them.

Alternatively, increase the number of airborne enemies.

These are relatively tame and easy to make adjustments.

How much of a Magitech world can this spell bring about?

Okay, not lead, maybe "woven in" would have been a better term. Maybe the dungeon is accessed from the basement of one of the townhouses. Maybe the players got a tip that the mcguffin they need to progress is found inside the dungeon.

And by prepared, do you mean you have maps and tokens printed and everything? Because if not, I'd just roll the entire dungeon. Encounters, traps, treasure, everything. If you have easygoing players that don't need a paper tactical videogame, take it easy on yourself.

The total derailment of plot happens all the time. Players are fickle and unpredictable, which is one of the things that can make DMing fun and interesting. But in situations where you really have no idea how to link the current events to what you have planned, there's no shame in telling your players that they're venturing into territory that you hadn't planned for.

I find that a simple "Ok guys, just a heads up, I hadn't prepared for y'all to go over here" works wonders. If you feel comfortable with what they're doing and just need time to maybe prepare an encounter or something, then just ask for like 10 minutes to get some stuff ready and let them know it'll be largely improv.

I find that most of the time, players will head in whatever direction you prepared if you are honest with them. After all, they came to play an adventure and without you and your planning, there is no adventure.

>but in the heat of the moment it isn't so easy
that's where practice comes in and thinking ahead to like
>can I flip the dungeon into paths in the woods
>could this bit be used in town
>can I lift encounter with X,Y,Z from the dungeon and put it on mainstreet

but if I have an expectation and prepare for something the more sure I am it's going to happen the worse I am for improvising when it doesn't. I'm only really good at improvising when I go in expecting to improvise. Whenever I've really gotten knocked off a track I thought we were firmly and safely on it's always been the hardest to shift into improv after.

I personally wouldn't drop the entrance to the dungeon into town. I'd pull a room and make it someone's basement maybe but the dungeon will keep and if you made it with a point (as opposed to just lol randum) it will keep for the next time they choose to or need to go underground.

How do you guys feel about setting an encounter that is most likely unwinnable? I have one planned that isn't set for combat in particular but is more worldbuilding. One NPC is 6 levels higher and his crew is between 2 under to 2 over. It will be antagonistic but not directly combat unless the PCs make it

>player's actions having consequences = railroading
Wanna know how I know you're all bad players?

because we read your FIRST post before you were dancing around trying to deny it?

>Planned to kill an NPC from day 1

just gonna link you to a second time and say eat shit buddy

I'm not even that guy, I just know shitty players when I see them. If you even have a DM I'm surprised they haven't kicked you from the table yet.

see

Just making suggestions. He never said there was a point to the dungeon either, just that he prepped it. And like another user said, it's never bad to over prep and keep it for later.

Is there any way to really use flame arrows effectively if you're the one casting it?
Seems to me like an extra d6 of fire is kinda shit for a 3rd level spell, and for only 12 attacks.

Who thought up this shitty spell? Why doesn't it set things on fire?

Do you have brain damage pal?

tell me how i'm a shitty player then

I really want to hear this

I'm not even a player you silly-billy.

This. Unless you're playing with a bunch of snob grogs, this works most of the time.

I find that if you plan on giving your players options to choose their path, have all those options prepared. I did Curse of Strahd like this and it worked out great.

jokes on you I spend so much time looking at stuff I did prepare that it's literally indistinguishable from complete and total improv! haha, take that table!

There's a difference between 'Player's actions have unavoidable consequences' and 'Player's actions have consequences'.

You steal from a shop? Well done, you're jailed for life. No, you're not allowed out, roll a new character.

That DM's players forced an NPC to steal from a Thieve's Guild against his will. Even knowing the consequences, that he would be killed for it, they still got mad at him for following through. Meanwhile, here you come along calling it railroading. If a party of adventurers killed a king and got arrested for it, would you say the DM railroaded them into a jail cell? You're a shit player because you're supporting the basic idea behind murderhoboing, the idea that you can do whatever you want without reprisal. Actions have consequences, and just because you like a character doesn't mean they're immune to anything bad happening to them. Especially as a result of doing something that you as a player forced them to do.

Shouldn't someone with your level of autism be in the Pathfinder general?

>Planned to kill an NPC from day 1
Yeah I'm sure it had anything to do with the players' actions.

read the first post
first line
protip: that's railroading

And now it's just insults from the standard book of insults. I can't possibly how your players could be mad at you when you give them no chances at un-fucking themselves and then tell them to fuck off if they have a problem with that. Maybe they were just having a bad day?

It works decent if you're playing a ranger, I guess. More damage per attack that you can spread out over multiple enemies vs the one shot burst damage of lightning arrow.

I hope you don't DM. For the players' sake, I really hope you don't.

Rate my holy archer.

War cleric/hunter ranger focusing on AoE ranged attacks

Step 1: cast divine favor
Step 2: attack

Even at level 4 you can potentially attack 3 times for 1d8 + 1d4 + dex.
Take sharpshooter to boost the damage further if necessary. Miss your shot? War cleric accuracy boost of +10 after the roll.

Divine favor > hunters mark

this is a really good way to not look like a fucking idiot in this post