/5eg/ D&D 5th Edition General

>>50258870
>Players: What's the best sign that tells you "Fun/good session up ahead!"?
"I lost my notes, guys, so we're just going to wing it this session."

>>50258870
>>50258848
> "I want to play D&D and not having any Fighters and Rogues that aren't spellcasters is not D&D."
"Not to worry anon, as I said, I'll let you build your 1-trick beat-cop, you just have to sign this document that stats that you deliberately refused taking all the cool shit that was offered to you that everyone else took, and you promise not to whine about this decision later, and that if you decide to whine about it later we're going to tell you to GTFO."

>>50258932
Does Monster Hunter count as beat cop?

>>50258950
hey how is monster hunter? the fighter archetype from that UA i mean

I want to play a Firbolg monster hunter, it looks cool but i dunno, pretty much a battlemaster with some utility

>>50258969
It's pretty much a battlemaster with less and more specific maneuvers but more out of combat utility.

>>50258950
>"Does Monster Hunter count as beat cop?"
"Are you deliberately refusing/avoiding anything with supernatural sounding utility or social abilities, such as spells, or supernatural skill results, or the like? Are you choosing to be a character bound by real world limits in all ways except for how hard you can hit stuff, when everyone else can do a dozen different things for different situations?, If yes, then: yeah."

>>50258992
well fighter has always lacked utility imo

Monster hunter's abilities coupled with the firbolg racials should be a pretty varied character

>>50257648
>>50258027
>>50258260
>>50258578
>>50258599
>>50258696
>>50258785
>>50258713
>>50258848
>>50258932
>>50258907
>>50258950
>>50258998
"The Road So Far"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9lNS8sA_uk

>>50258998
Monster Hunter gets a couple of spells, more skills, a bonus language AND tons of damage.

When are are going to get high CR enemies?
More Tiamat and of her ilk.

>>50258932

"I refuse to sign because D&D should be what I want it to be or else it's not muh D&D and I'll go online and complain to everyone and threaten to go play Pathfinder."

>>50258870
>DM
no but that sounds neat if a bit hacky

>>50259033
>https://dnd.wizards.com/sites/default/files/media/upload/articles/UA%20Gothic%20Characters.pdf
>Monster Hunter
>Extra To-Hit & Damage
>Better Defenses
>Better Perception/Insight
>Detect Magic & Protection From Evil

It's interesting, but I'm not sure it gives you enough breadth.

>More of the same attack and damage stuff.
>Can now do interrogations/investigation missions better.
>Can see if something's magic but not do anything about it.
>Defensive buff & protection from possession

It helps a bit where social encounters are concerned, but does little for exploration, or combat encounter avoidance, or shaping combat encounters through more than hp damage, or infiltration, or party support.

Where's the Lords Alliance faction pack?

Those intros are pretty cool.

>>50259221
I want to be a big ol badass combat lad while still having some utility and out of combat stuff

That + firbolg would be enough I think. Kind of want to dip a level or so for some Rogue to get expertise on survival and perception

>>50259221
So pretty much any class that doesn't offer a full spellcasting progression

>>50259151
>"I refuse to sign because D&D should be what I want it to be or else it's not muh D&D and I'll go online and complain to everyone and threaten to go play Pathfinder."
"You refuse to acknowledge that you're actively avoiding all of the cool toys, and promise that you won't be a bitch to everyone else who took them? You can go right ahead and play pathfinder. We play that next week. It's the same way. What are you expecting from D&D: low magic fantasy? D&D hasn't supported that since the 70s, and none of us really dig that OSR stuff. If you wanted to play d20 Conan or HARNMaster/HARP, You should have voted for it when we were deciding what to play. They were options available to you, and the books are right there on my shelf. I even summed up what each system did before the vote."

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>>50258932

Am I the only one who feels like it should be the wizards, clerics and druids that get knocked down to fighter/rogue level rather than having them dragged up to magic level? I think D&D is, for the most part, a pretty scrappy game, and these godlike spellcasters in the later parts of the game are the thing that stick out, not the humble sword-swingers who are just doing what D&D characters should do and can do from level 1.

Why couldn't Iron Heroes take off?

Question to DM's how often do you allow your players to use Homebrew classes? What makes you allow it?

>>50259259
No, you don't need to necessarily have everything on that list, but you certainly want more than 1 or 2 things you're capable of.

Ranger does pretty well, and so do Paladin and Bard.

I mean, if you want to build a character who really only does one thing, that's fine, just don't bitch about it later.

>>50259273
>Why couldn't Iron Heroes take off?
People want to play fantasy superheroes. In fairness, 5e really makes you wait a pretty long time for the game to become that.

>>50259291
Bard has a full spellcasting progression. The Paladin's spell list is almost entirely about doing what the Paladin already does with its class features. Ranger's spell list is also pretty much just a booster to the Ranger's innate abilities. Eldritch Knight's spell list is extremely small and focused for that matter.

Really, you're just talking about 9th level spellcasters here. Half-caster spell lists are very tailored.

So how viable is Grapplebarian? I really want to do a grapple build. Probably bearbarian because im gonna be secondary party tank. We have a moon druid

Stats are: 14 14 11 10 10 5


Possibly going Orc or Bugbear

>>50259341
Stop playing grapplers. They're stupid.

>>50259290

I review the homebrew class they want and gauge if it fits the setting they're playing in (with that, I'd shoot down Mercer's gunslinger if they're playing in, say, FR) and read up on word-of-mouth regarding its balance. I factor all of that and decide if it's good enough. I'm usually okay with that ultimately.

However, if they link me to dandwiki, that's a big fat "NO"

>>50259341
>5
>nothing above 14

That's some poor rolling nigga.

>>50259290
Rarely. The only situation where I'd allow it is if there's absolutely no other way to build the character concept they have, and even then I'd probably prefer to just homebrew to alter an existing class myself with input from the player.

>>50259350
But whyyyyy

>>50259273
>I think D&D is, for the most part, a pretty scrappy game, and these godlike spellcasters in the later parts of the game are the thing that stick out, not the humble sword-swingers who are just doing what D&D characters should do and can do from level 1.
I strongly disagree. Most of the classes are Tier 4 or better, Fighter and Rogue (maybe Barbarian) are the outliers.
I don't have a problem with low magic games. I just don't think that's D&D. The mundanes don't have enough interesting shit they can do to make it interesting, and they're arbitrarily capped in many areas at "real world limits" well after the point where you can best an ogremage 1 on 1.

>>50259273
I'm not sure why I never really got into Iron Heroes. I suspect it's because I already had d20 Conan and thought it did pulpy low-power fantasy much better.

>>50259372
Skills are pretty important throughout the game. I think you're underselling Rogues

>>50259351
>a thing not fitting into FR
don't rock gnomes make firearms?

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have any of you successfully quietly magical realmed in a game?
included a low level fetish or waifu?

>>50259273

Because a not so insignificant amount of the D&D fanbase is of the Wizards rule, Fighters drool persuasion. They want to play an all powerful spellcasters with access to all the classic spells. They don't want that shit nerfed and "dumbed down".

But they also want a world populated by simple Fighters and other non-spellcasters. You can't buff them too much because it'd be unrealistic and you'd have weeaboo fightan magic where Fighters are just wizards with their inspirational healing, MMO maneuvers with cooldowns, defiance of the laws of physics, narrative powers, etc.

But magic is the exception because it's magic. Ain't gotta explain shit.

Yes it's a shitty line of argument, but it's the one they make, and a large part of why things are the way they are.

>>50259290
I usually allow it, but modify it so it can't be ridiculously overpowered. I tell the player that, yes, the concept is fine, but you can't summon a CR 2 creature under your command when you're level 1, that's retarded. Yes that's an actual feature from a class one of my players wanted to play.
The problem is, they'll see a class and not look at the balance, but once they build the character they'll brag about how they for some reason get 24 strength, and not expect me to pull them aside later and tell them they can't have that anymore.

>>50259393
Yes.

>>50259388
>don't rock gnomes make firearms?

Yes they do. In fact, Forgotten Realms is one of the few D&D settings where firearms are canon.

I'm more annoyed when they show up in Eberron, as part of its whole shtick is magic in place of technology (like Flinstones but magic instead of dinosaurs/rocks). You wouldn't have an actual gun in the setting. You'd invent a reusable blasting wand that you carried around in a wand holster- which Eberron already does.

Eberron is not steampunk/gaslight fantasy even if it shares some of the pulpy and noire aspects.

Forgotten Realms question, because I've never DMed a game in this setting or read about it at all. I modified an encounter and, well, the party's formed an alliance with a small orc tribe a bit southeast of Neverwinter. I'm talking like 7 orcs small. My question is, what could these orcs possibly ask of the party? They're so small that I can't come up with problems for them to have, but the half-orc in the party has pledged to do "anything they ask of him"

>>50259351
>>50259359
>>50259405
Yeah I'm planing on making my own homebrew. I'm going to make it underpowered to balance out that I am playing a class I made. Good to know thanks anons.

>>50259335
>Bard has full progression
So it does. I've yet to use them in 5e.

>Paladin
>1. Murderness
Check.
>2. Exploration
>Tree Stride, Dimension Door, Misty Step, Avenging Angel, Dispel Magic
Check.
>3. Investigation
>Detect Good & Evil, Detect poison & Disease, Purify Food and Drink, Zone of Truth, Locate Object, Protection From Poison, Commune with Nature, Scrying
Check.
>4. Infiltration
Nope
>5. Interrogation
>Zone of Truth, Intimidation, Persuasion
Check.
>6. Social Skills
>CHA, Persuasion
Check.
>7. Combat Avoidance
Nope.
>8. In-Combat Utility
>Compelled Duel, Dispel Magic, Banishment, Turn the __, Nature's Wrath, Hold Monster, Abjure Enemy, Relentless Avenger, Avenging Angel
Check.
>9. Party Support
Magic Weapon, Elemental Weapon, Raise Dead, Lay on Hands, Auras, Cleansing Touch, Protection From Energy, Hunter's Mark*
Check.

So there's 7/9 on the Paladin.

I call bullshit on the "only full casters can do most of the things on that list with any degree of success".

>>50259407
was hoping for more than that

>>50259398
Read >>50259032.

Fighterfags are the ones keeping the fighting man down. They don't want nice things, and throw a fit if you don't offer character options without them.

>>50259387
Rogues are definitely more capable than fighter. Those skills help them quite a bit. The question is whether they're in the same league as Paladins.

>>50259608
Check the Paladin's rate of gaining spells and how many of those spells are tied to specific oaths. Paladins are not really utility characters.

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>out of panic, accidentally sent my players back in time
>takes place in the city they've been adventuring in in the past few real-life months
>timeline overlaps the time their past selves were taking on a big criminal organization conspiracy
>a day later their past selves would have them leave the city and pursue an adventure in a neighboring kingdom before returning after 2 days
>panic.jpg
>players decide they should respect the rules of time travel
>they're excited as fuck
>I'm panicking
>they respect the timeline and dont' do any random shit
>they do, however, some random shit that explain some random shit that happened in their previous adventures
>"Hey, so that's why there was a random bar brawl in the nearby inn! WE STARTED IT!"
>they use this time to save an NPC who was reported dead but he wasn't dead all this time cause their future selves saved NPC
>all shit leads them back to the point their past selves travel back in time
>they take over and complete the loop
>"DAMN ANON THAT WAS GOOD! HOW DID YOU DO THAT?! SO GREAT! YOU MUST'VE PLANNED THAT SHIT OUT!"
>mfw the whole entire thing

I'm not doing that again. I had no notes, I was winging everything and I just scrapped any piece of opportunity my PCs did to give them the sense that they were truly in a time traveling adventure with time loops and shit.

But damn, my PCs were so good to me keeping that shit in check.

>>50259398
D&D is the game that supports high-powered magic fantasy gaming. When I want to play low-powered gritty fantasy, I've got like 8 other games do it much better.

>>50259670
You silly billy. When time travellers start to fuck up the last, you're supposed to arrange events and outcomes so that their messing with shit is what causes the original events to happen in the first place. The only reason things happened "first go around" and put them in a position to go back in time is because they had already gone back in time and did all that shit.

>>50259695

Yeah I didn't word it right but there were many moments that the PCs did just that that had them go "OH SHIT"

>>50259679
The worst is when people talk about gritty, low-magic fantasy "like Conan" and completely forget that Conan was an armor-and-shield Barbarian/Rogue with almost no magic-users running around and he routinely threw people straight through walls and performed feats of martial strength and badassery that the average DM would say "that's physically impossible and not supported in the rules" to.

>>50259659
Paladins gain spells slowly, and if they don't burn slots on smite, their damage is lower than a Fighter or a Rogue. Like, you're presenting this idea that Paladins are going to use most of their spells for utility purposes. That's cool if they do, they have that possibility, but it comes at a cost. Spell slots are at a fucking premium for partial casters.

>>50259663
Some of those are tied to specific oaths. True.
And yes, they gain them much slower than full casters. But most of hte lists in each category start at low level effects and work their way up, which is to say, the things he can do, he can do pretty early.

Sure, he's got limited spell access at any given time, and not a ton of slots. I'm not debating that. He can't do the utility things all day.

But he DOES have them.

>>50259720
Sure. Conan's not gritty. It's Pulpy low magic fantasy. I have a list of better games for that too. It's not the same list.

>>50259398
>>50259117
>> I'm arguing as one those people who have ridiculous ideas about muh D&D is/isn't.
>
> And one of those ideas is making sure non-spellcasters PC classes are in the game, but making sure they have to suck in terms of options/flexibility (and sometimes outright power) compared to caster classes.
>
> "Because muh gritty realism and vermisilitude!"
>
> You can't placate such people by leaving out non-caster classes or by making non-casters capable of awesome shit. It's a catch 22.

>>50259728
He has them, but they're so limited that most of their value is trumped by having any other full spellcaster in the party. Full spellcasters have slots to burn fulfilling utility duties. That's what more than half of your slots are going to be towards as a full spellcaster, because the best use of your spells is enabling your other party members.

>>50259721
His damage doesn't have to be optimal, if the utility is worthwhile. His damage can merely be "quite adequate".

>>50259721
That's why I've always wanted to multi-class paladin with sorcerer or bard or warlock

more slots for smites and their awesome spells.

What would work best? I kinda lean warlock.

3 warlock would give you cantrips, invocations, the first ability from your patron (like temp health on kill or telepathy) and two second level spell slots per short rest, and also some warlock spells, and for your pact boon you could get a fucking awesome familiar that adds so much to your disposal or get three cantrips and some rituals from any class

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>>50259720
>These rules are strictly fantasy. Those wargamers who lack imagination, those who don't care for Burroughs' Martial adventures where John Carter is groping through black pits, who feel no thrill upon reading Howard's Conan saga, who do not enjoy the de Camp * Pratt fantasies or Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser pitting their swords against evil sorcereries will not be likely to find DUNGEONS and DRAGONS to their taste. But those whose imaginations know no bounds will find that these rules are the answer to their prayers. With this last bit of advice we invite you to read on and enjoy a "world" where the fantastic is fact and magic really works!
Can you imagine Barsoom stories if everything worked the way the average D&D table operates?

>John Carter leapt at Thurid, but the ledge was more than six feet high, so the DM required an Athletics check, DC 15. Unfortunately, John was only second level, and so had a roughly 50% chance of face-planting into the hard stone, falling prone, and wasting his turn.
>A random Wizard flew out of nowhere under his own power and incinerated six tharks.

>>50259801
His damage will be higher than a monk's, I suppose, but Smite is a cornerstone of the Paladin's combat presence. It's what keeps them in the game with other damage dealing classes. All fighters are going to be bigger threats by default. Monster Hunters and Eldritch Knights can also have good utility without sacrificing their combat superiority. Smite is absolutely necessary to stand on equal terms. If you're not going to use Smite, then you're basically just a crappy heavy armor cleric.

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How do I make BestPaladinBro?

>>50259851
what, image, ants etc

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>>50258870
As a player the best sign I'll have a good time is getting a bit of a buzz, the bestest sign is when the DM has a solid idea and fellow players give a damn.

As a DM when I did D20 Modern games I had The Chainsaw Vigilante show up once. The party was in a highrise office stealing important files and rescuing a friend turned unwilling lab rat by evil megacorp. The party first heard screaming coming from an elevator then as the doors opened they saw him doing his thing on a bunch of villanous mooks. I left a beat to let the players to soak in the moment. Then one PC blew out his leg with a shotgun crit followed by a grenade tossed in as the elevator doors shut before any other player had a chance to react. The rest of the party was a bit annoyed they had to take the stairs since the elevator was exploded. As for 5e I've really just done AL stuff since I've got the itch to run games but not really time to plan.

>>50259843
All those auras.

I do agree though, Smite eating your spell slots kindof sucks.

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>>50259861

>>50259807

Warlock so your slots refresh on a short rest rather than a long one.

>>50259876
Paladin Auras are superfucking nice, and the only reason you might get away with not spending slots on Smite.

>>50258870
Yeah since I do spot DMing when the normal DM is in prep phrase, I usually incorporate shit that amuses me. Out of my last 3 one shots, One had the players dealing with the Scooby Gang, and another had them plot the assassination of JFK. The JFK assassination plot was just a set up so I could make a shitty grassy Gnoll joke with the second gunman conspiracy theory.

>>50259879
Thanks brah.

>>50259221
Is this nigga kidding? Monster Hunter actually gives Fighters a lot of the non-combat options they desperately need while keeping them at the top of the combat game. And I say combat, not just damage. The improved defenses help immensely, and the bonuses to key skills can make them your go-to guy for those skills.

Pretty much the only thing the package could ask for is Dispel Magic. Still need to find a good way to tack that on somehow, but otherwise you're looking at a solid class that can contribute in many more situations than usual.

What are all the class standardized this edition?
Same proficiencies and shit across the board.

>>50259999
Why* are all the classes* standardized this edition?

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>>50259999
>What are all the class standardized this edition?

>>50259807
Warlock is intriguing because you can pick up shillelagh and have both your ranged and melee attacks use charisma.

My experience has been that short rests are often not incorporated well into the game, which encourages going nova in every combat. In that scenario, a full caster like Bard gives you more spell slots to burn in a single go.

>>50259994
Yes, they remain at the top of the >Murder Stuff game because of their damage and defenses.

Yes, they're good for spotting hidden creatures, and yes they're good at detecting lies. (you'll note the skill bonuses don't apply in other situations).

But of the 9 categories of shit I listed that a class like paladin can do 7, monster hunter's still only doing like 3.

>>50259807
Are we just pretending that Paladins can cast smite with other classes spell slots, or am I missing something here?

From the phb: "you can expend one paladin spell slot to deal radiant damage to the target, in addition to the weapon's damage."

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>>50260037

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>>50259999
>Same proficiencies and shit across the board.
What did he mean by this?

>>50259889
Let's do some math here eh? full disclosure I barely made it past high school algebra

Say you're level 5.

Pure paladin. Most paladins probably use sword and board, as you don't have action surge or the ASIs/feats or the single attribute stuff like fighters have to make greatswords worth it.

two attacks, 1d8+4 1d8+4, min damage 10 max damage 24 from both attacks. If you took dueling, which you may have, up that to 14 - 28.

four 1st two 2nd level slots. if all those are used for smites, against non fiend/undead, that's 14d8 damage over all the slots being used purely for smiting.

Now we need to do a paladin warlock. I'm going to say we went 2 pally 3 lock.

You only have one attack, and no ASI, so assuming sword and board 1d8+3. Let's say you took tome and grabbed GFB. That's 1d8+3 + 1d8 reliably, also getting a 1d8+cha on an enemy within 5ft of your target but I'm not going to count that in your damage. Min Damage 5, max damage 19. Dueling would bump that up to 7 and 21.

You have two 1st level paladin spell slots, and two Warlock 2nd level slots. Blowing all of those is 10d8 worth of damage, BUT your 2nd level lock spells come back fully on a short rest. For every short rest you get 6d8 damage of smite. One short rest and that's more smite damage than the level 5 paladin.

also you could arguably use an invocation'ed eldritch blast to supplement your damage when not smiting. 1d10+3 and 1d10+3 isn't anything to laugh at.

this post maybe have been pointless but it was fun. someone pls respond

>>50260053
You are like a year + behind my friend, errata 1.0

>>50260053

http://www.sageadvice.eu/2014/12/11/paladin-use-warlock-spell/

>>50260052
Of the 9 categories you listed a Paladin can maybe do those once if (insert Bard, Cleric, Druid, Sorcerer, Wizard) decides he's too good for that this encounter.

>>50260073
>>50260076
Shit, that's a glaringly big error to miss before publishing the phb, but thanks for the correction.

SO I 'm guessing most have already given the Kobold, orc and goblin adventurers a swing from volos guide, but how well to Yuan-Ti or the rest play?

>>50259608
Like half the shit on this list is just for Ancients Paladin

>>50260073
>Paladin Warlock Multiclass

I am quite interested in this. Care to spell out a full build?

I'm also very interested in seeing what kind of utility you can pack into the build for different types of adventuring situations a la >>50259608.

>>50260107
A bunch of them are for Ancients Paladin, yes. If you're not going ancients, IIRC you still fill out the 7 categories, just less well. Some categories you may only have a single trick for.

>>50260078
Wasn't saying a full caster didn't have better utility. Obviously they do. I was saying that Paladin is a more reasonable bit for the low end of utility than your typical fighter.

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>>50259834 #
Just gonna ask, how would one run a game based on the pic? There was the Lankhmar book for 2e, but would that kind of game be too Low Fantasy for 5e?

Why are PCs built following one rule while NPCs and monsters are designed to different rules?

>>50260148
Look dude, I'm all for pumping up the Paladin, it's my favorite class. They're not a problem solver class, though. They just don't have the resources. Hell, look at your list, most of those are spells or special features from one oath or another. Very limited stuff. I won't say any fighter class has more utility, but I will say from experience that certain types of fighters are within the same ballpark. Especially because most skill DCs are rather low this edition, so just having a non-negative bonus and proficiency is enough to pass reliably.

>>50260166
You can use the 2e setting book just fine. The stats aren't directly usable, but the setting is.

Lankhmar is kindof low-powered in comparison to 5e, at the upper levels, but you could always just say you're running the whole campaign in a lower level range. Then you should be good to go.

Maybe draw out level advancement to slow the pacing of levelups.

>>50260176
Because most monsters/npcs are designed to be taken on by an entire group.

>>50260148
well personally I think full builds are pointless.

99% of games end before level 10. Sad truth, but a truth.

So, you want something that will be fun and effective at the "main" range of play, which is imo 1-8ish.

You def want to start paladin, you are doing nothing but losing proficiencies starting warlock. I would say you want your first (2nd) level in paladin for a fighting style, smites, and spells.

Another level in paladin is big too, channel divinity plus free spells known is a pretty big deal.

from here on I'm not sure what to do. The big point of Paladin-Warlock is getting more SMITES, more utility, more things to do.

Multiclassing in 5e kinda fucking sucks due to stuff like extra attack being essential. However IMO palalock has a saving grace in Agonizing Blast Eldritch Blast. Cantrips scale with character level, not class level. So instead of getting somewhat neutered with one attack at level 5 you get two 1d10+CHA attacks that deal a very rarely resisted damage type.

Unfortunately, you can't smite with Eblast. So IMO, optimally you'd use a shield and Eblast most of the time, then pull out your weapon for smites when you want to melee.

Don't really know how to do the rest of this "build". I think I would pick Tomelock for GFB and some other cantrips plus rituals. Alternatively a familiar would be a huge boon for scouting and utility stuff.

Some munchkin pls help

>>50260205
They're meant to be damage soakers?

>>50260166
When the Barbarian asks "can I do X", you say "Yes". That's pretty much it.

>>50260231
You can do some fun stuff if you focus CHA and neglect your strength, leaving enough to use heavy armours. Pick up Shelliegh through the tome, use it with a club and shield. Doesn't fix the multi attack problem but it does make you less MAD, though the levels leading up to that are probably going to be rough.

>>50260243
Partly. It's also why the monster/npc variant of certain abilities are usually more effective/powerful

>>50260176
Because it's much easier on the DM (and the system as a whole) that way. The DM has total freedom with NPC design, while the PCs are given a system with boundaries to maintain balance between each other and those NPCs based on CR.

>>50260231
>99% of games end before level 10. Sad truth, but a truth.
Not my experience, but okay.
>"main" range of play, which is imo 1-8ish.
Aand there's why. Do you really always start at 1? We almost never start below 6, sometimes starting at 7 or 8. I haven't had a campaign that started below 6 (as a player or DM) in like, 3 years. (That one did start at 1).

>5e Multiclassing woes. Extra Attacks
Yeah, I'm not super happy with that. They should stack, for sure. I expect next campaign I GM will be more multiclass-friendly. We shall see what I come up with when the time comes.

>Eldritch Blast scales by character level, not class level.
Oh, good point.
So, what if you don't give a fuck about extra attacks and smite, and use Eldritch Blast as your primary attack?

>>50260176
Do you mean levels vs assigned numbers?

Or do you mean high HP for monsters and low for PCs, and high damage for PCs and low for monsters?

>>50260290
>So, what if you don't give a fuck about extra attacks and smite, and use Eldritch Blast as your primary attack?

Then you may as well just be a warlock?

point of multi-classing warlock is to be a paladin with more utility/versatility and Smites. Can't smite with EBLast.

But even if you take Tome and grab GFB Eblast is better for avg damage. Like I said, you'd be eblasting most the time then pulling out a weapon when it comes time for melee and dumping your smites.

I wouldn't go over a 3 level dip in warlock personally. Not much reason to. Maybe 1 level to snap an ASI but warlock kinda sucks desu

how does anyone feel about letting martial classes extra attack(s) use total martial level instead of class level?
say, paladin 3/ fighter 2 get's extra attack right there and going paladin 6/fighter 5 gets you extra attack (2), or something like that?

it kinds of feel silly that cantrips scale with total level yet extra attack doesn't.


and on that subject how to make multiple spellcasting classes multiclass less shitty, i know you get full spell slot progression but outright losing maximum spell levels is awful. i don't expect a cleric 10/wizard 10 to be as good a either a cleric 20 or a wizard 20 but having only lv6 spells for a total level 20 character is silly, given he is technically a full spellcaster (with 9th level spell slots).

>>50260343
It is a bit silly but extra attacks are better than damage scaling cantrips by a large margin, with agonizing blast eblast being the exception.

Scaled firebolt is one attack, 2d10. Extra attack gives you two attacks, if using a greatsword that'd 2d6+STR + 2d6+STR. Big difference. More chance to hit/crit, much much higher avg damage, higher max.

Even extra attack with sword and board is more damage than a scaled cantrip save for EBlast

>>50260343
I would be good with that. Absolutely. Wouldn't stack martial levels though, because, for instance, Rogue doesn't get it.

But for any class that gets them? Absolutely.

Not sure what to do about the casters.

>>50259393
My fetish is getting into life-risking danger only to narrowly escape by luck or the help of someone else, every session is a magical realm for me, and i think the other players are starting to notice. The DM sure did.

>>50260343
All non-fighter martials have something to expand their damage outside of Extra Attack (rage damage with free advantage, sneak attack, smites, hunter's mark, flurry of blows, etc.). Fighters depend solely on extra attacks for damage later on, so making them stack would make the fighter class even less attractive than it already is.

Honestly Extra Attack not stacking is only a problem for going into Fighter. Every other Extra Attack class has an extra feature that level to compensate (rangers and paladins get 2nd-level spells, barbarians get Fast Movement, monks get Stunning Strike).

If you want to solve it so that going past 5th in an Extra Attack class is worthwhile, make multiple extra attacks give some extra damage once per turn, like an extra d8 once per turn. That way you could go fighter 5/paladin 5 without having an empty level but without fighter 5/ranger 5/barbarian 5/monk 5 outclassing fighter 20 in every way.

>>50260372
>>50260343

Paladin only gets the one extra attack at 5.

I definitely think a fighter2 paladin3 should get the extra attack. I'm less convinced about fighter 6 paladin 5.

>>50260405
>I definitely think a fighter2 paladin3 should get the extra attack.
Cus fuck anyone who dares not multiclass, right?

>>50260176
Because a monster that does "2d6+8 damage, gets a free attack on a critical" is far easier to use than "Wields a big sword (2d6+8 damage and has the feat Better Crit, Improved Better Crit, Toughness, Skill Focus (Basket Weaving), Weapon Focus (big sword), Weapon Specialization (big sword)" and so on.

It means you can give monsters what bonuses you want and autistic retards don't get to say " BUT BUT BUT BUT IT SHOULD ONLY DO 2d6+6 DAMAGE REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE"

>>50260278
>>50260283
>>50260300
Thanks, guys. I take it it would be impossible for NPCs/monsters to have class levels and only have access to features of classes?

>>50260300
All of that essentially.

>>50260433
>I take it it would be impossible for NPCs/monsters to have class levels and only have access to features of classes?
I mean, you can, but their CR would be absurdly low and you'd spend more time on it than you should. Just take the class features that you want them to have and calculate CR as normal.

>>50260433
Pretty much but you can just give them the abilities straight up.

>>50260405
It would make multiclassing strictly better really

like would you rather be a level 5 fighter, with extra attack second wind fighting style action surge and a martial archetype

or a 3 fighter 2 paladin with extra attack second wind two fighting styles action surge a martial archetype spells and spellcasting and divine smites and divine sense

>>50260383
sure, only martial classes that actually get extra attack would stack for it.
>>50260372
remember that only fighters get more than 2 attacks, while every cantrip gets 4 dice/bolts at lv20.

>>50258870
>What's the best sign that tells you "Fun/good session up ahead!"?

Whenever I see my roommate DM in his room writing and typing nonstop with three different books open around him.

>>50260420
This. Essentially. Despite it worded autistically.

>>50260400
my issue is not with solo classes extra damage but multiclassing martials most likely missing both of their damage increases.

if you go paladin 6/fighter 5, you are not getting any of extra attack (2) or improved divine smite. but sure i'm not really thinking too hard of the math of every other option taken into account.

>>50260066
He want Wizard to have 1/2 BAB and all that tedious mental tax shit.

>>50260231
>Unfortunately, you can't smite with Eblast. So IMO, optimally you'd use a shield and Eblast most of the time, then pull out your weapon for smites when you want to melee.

Bladelock is the worst but still shield+eldritch blasting away until its smite time then summon your weapon to smite is pretty nifty if nothing else

>>50260556
neat flavor but that is just laughable compared to 3 cantrips from any class + potentially rituals or a familiar that can go invisible and shit

>>50260433
The way you approach this in 5e is you give them the numbers you want, then give them abilities that mimic what classes get, and calculate CR as normal.

Check out Volo's guide and the back of the MM for a bunch of example NPCs.

In the Players Handbook pdf I downloaded from this general there seems to be a bit cut off from the sorcerers section. The 14th and 18th level class features for the Wild Magic sorcerous origin arnt there.

>>50260343
Fighter has underwhelming class features past Action Surge and pretty much the only reason to take them past 2 or 5 or 6 from an optimization standpoint is the fact that they are the only class that gets multiple extra attacks.
>you can reroll a save
>another ASI
>your superiority die is a d10 now... woah...
>you get 1 superiority die at the start of combat if you had zero
>you can reroll another save
Every features besides the additional extra attacks garners a response of disinterested yawns and murmured whatevers. They don't even get Feats of Strength as they level.

>>50260441
>>50260453
>>50260603
Thanks brahs. I'm actually warming up to this way of designing things. It's actually giving DMs freedom of choice and the ability to design however they want the living, breathing creatures of their world to exist in that world.

>>50260622
Its trying to help you

Sorc blows and wms is bad

>>50260643
They also get more ASI than other class. So you could put it in feat for fun stuff.

/sarcasm

>>50260661
You can do the same thing in 4e and Pathfinder, FYI. Both have rules for building enemies this way.

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>>50260679
Already got GWM from being Variant Human my man, though I suppose taking Lucky can never hurt.

>>50260679

I mean, it does help them build the super ultron GWM/polearm master/sentinel build... but other than that it's more just for getting some feats that are nice.

>>50258870
>Players: What's the best sign that tells you "Fun/good session up ahead!"?

Everyone in the party has a similar or sameish theme to their characters.

Examples

>Sun monk, Undying light Warlock, Light Cleric, Devotion Paladin

>Long death monk, Death cleric, Shadow sorcerrer, UA Whispers bard, Oathbreaker paladin, Necromancer wizard.

It gives them nice cohesion and allows for silly stuff that will not break the campaign.

>>50260701
You could get skilled or ritual casting.

>>50260747
>skilled or ritual casting
yeah those will go great with my Linguist and Keen Mind

>>50258870 (OP)
>Players: What's the best sign that tells you "Fun/good session up ahead!"?
When you didn't coordinate characters with the party and everyone shows up and you find out:
"This is a 6 rogue party"

>>50260782
still better than 2+ warlocks and no other spellcasters.

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>>50260782
>DM closes all of his campaign notes and googles the plot to assassins creed
>"w-wow guys it's like you read my mind!"

Am I in the minority for not optimizing? Like obviously I'm not gonna play a rogue in plate mail with a great sword or a barbarian wizard multiclass but like taking suboptimal spells or going with different class features because it feels better for the character. It just feels like a ton of posts on these threads are optimized or git out

>>50258870
I DM'd a game where a night hag disguised her actions as a plague upon a village, and I had two doctors as NPCs/informants for the players; one was a medical doctor from a major capital city trying to use modern medicine, and another was a more mystic medicine-maker that also practiced haruspicy.

If you haven't guessed it yet, these are 2/3 of the main characters and the overall plot of Pathologic. In my game though, Danill Dankovsky became "Dr Evan Daniels" the human doctor, and Artemy Burakh became "Tagranus" the blue dragonborn shaman.

Even used the music from that game to set up the atmosphere. That was a fun campaign.

>>50260974
>It just feels like a ton of posts on these threads are optimized or git out
Welcome to /tg/.

>>50260974

Not really, plenty of people play that way. /tg/, by its nature, tends to draw in very hardcore and dedicated players who are interested in those kinds of questions. I like optimization because pushing the system to its limits is fun for me.

>>50260974
it's actually very hard to optimize every character, for every campaign. one thing is maximizing your character's damage, given you race/background choices, other is just taking subpar options just for the sake of them being subpar, so no, most people do what makes sense for their character and afterwards, if they care about optimizing their damage, they do so but with whatever they still have available.

>>50260997
>I like optimization because pushing the system to its limits is fun for me.
i agree wholeheartedly.

>>50261010
That's uh, one way to build a character.

I (almost always) start with mechanics.

>"What would be a fun thing to be able to do?"
I then try to build a character around doing that fun thing well.

Once I'm done that, I determine fluff to match it.

>>50258870
To the Bards & nobles guy

Went to grab them to put on my phone and listen while driving. Unfortunately, Download is disabled on most episodes...

>>50260974
There is nothing wrong with making an optimized character and being a flawed character mechanically does not make your character good or better in any way RP wise.

stormwind fallacy my dude

at any rate, I like optimizing my character for usefulness. Optimizing for damage with stupid shit like hand crossbow sharpshooter bladelock bullshit is lame as fuck, but figuring out how to do a Paladin-Warlock well so that you can keep up in your role as a melee damage dealer/support tank while also gaining versatility and utility from Warlock stuff makes for more interesting and varied characters

one thing I don't like about 5e is how people consider multi-classing and shit to be bad. I really don't get it. Making more unique characters that play differently is bad? multiclassing was pretty huge in older editions and I kinda miss it, I always thought it was cool to see a character that started off as a fighter but became a paladin then a prestige class or some shit

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/5eg/ can you help me with the map for my new campaign? Names or critics welcome.

>>50259474

Volo's Guide to Monster has a really good chapter on Orcs draw inspiration from that.

Haven't read it in detail yet but - Why are they really small? Have all the warriors of the tribe died on a raid leaving the woman, sick, and infirm? Female Orcs worship the wife of Gruumsh, the goddess of the hearth and whatnot. Perhaps, to re-establish they have to perform special rites and rituals to appease her or something. Special herbs maybe a sacrifice or two I don't know.

>>50261194
>>50259474
There is a Manticore living in a nearby cave and every few days, it visits the tribe and demands an Orc sacrifice for a meal. A month ago, the tribe was nearly three dozen strong. Now they are seven.

When the manticore first arrived, many of the bravest and strongest orcs in the village attempted to fight it off, but it proved too strong and slaughtered them.

The tribe can't just relocate, these are their ancestral lands! The party must help them, and perhaps in the process find the Manticore's hoard...

>>50261183
You are That Guy and you can't even see it.

>>50261184

seems pretty well rounded, the hydrography is right, except for the topmost lake which seems odd,

Maybe too much forests? it is densely abitated after all

>>50260845
how would yall change warlocks to actually be a valuable class to a party?

they just feel like such a tertiary class, in power, role, and frankly justification for existing

>>50261251
Based on? You personally don't like multiclassing so anyone who does is bad?

I'm in three groups, GM of one of those, and we all have a great time. Been playing with two of those for most of the year and the other one for a couple months now.

>>50261184
The Cliffs of Dover

I been tinkering with a Fighter Barbarian multiclass and was curious if I should go with a tank build rather than a DPSer classic Champion/Path of Berserker greataxe build.

For the tank I was actually thinking of still using a Half-Orc and use the dueling fighting style to give him a shield and battleaxe.

My question is would the battleaxe be any decent in using Savage Attack?

Heavy armor or light armor?

Would Champion still be a good archetype for the build or is Battlemaster the way to go? My only reasoning is the shield with shield master feat can be used as a weapon and hopefully the Champion high crit can be worth it.

Other then shield master, I was thinking of also getting lucky, savage attacker and charger. With so many feats, would a human variant be a better option? Which feats should I get early on?

>>50261253
The one in the mountains? It's meant to be a dam, but I did have trouble with it.

It's also meant to be a tropical/jungle environment, but inkarnate doesn't have jungle trees.

>>50261333
For that sweet culture and gold right?

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>>50260782
I had that happen.
>what you got, people
>rogue
>rogue
>rogue
>barbarian

At which point I hid my notes and said
>you're all a genin ninjas, sent for their hardest, most important mission yet
>Barb: And what about me?
>And you are the worst ninja of them all

And then I made a whole game that was basically Mr.Bean as a ninja in that one Snickers commercial.

>>50261417
Barbarians are the best rogues. They can trapfind, go fast and doesn't afraid of anything,

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>>50261417

>>50261265

Warlock does three things well

1} Eldritch Blast Turret with Knockback
2} Use his autoscaling spells well to slant an encounter in your favor then regain them with short rests to keep up with regular casters
3] Get a rod of the Pact Keeper to get ahead of the Save DC curve and turn into a frightening good debuffer

If you get a good amount of short rests you can do well.If you can take advantage of no save forced movement you can do well. If you can win an encounter between short rests by turning everyone invisible giving them all Fly or Banishing two heavy hitters at once you can do well. If you can get a 20 Cha and a Rod of the Pact Keeper by mid levels you can do well.At higher levels add a robe of the archmage and do fucking fantastic with save DCs nobody else can match

If your campaign style or party composition doesnt allow all this then your Warlock wont do well

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>>50261417
>>50260851
This would probably be pretty fun actually. Just make the whole campaign a series of low-tech shadowruns.

>the local bad guys have all of their plans slowly dismantled by a ragtag team of theives, assassins, and arcane tricksters
>the bad guys are always on the defensive because every fight starts with a surprise round and multiple assassinations
>they can't seem to stop the good guys from getting into literally wherever they want
>the good guys don't have any class resources that can be worn down between rest periods
>they don't even know who or where the good guys are
>they could even be in this very room
>they could even be us

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My DM is running Storm Kings Thunder this coming Thursday and i need help with 3 character sheets, i am wondering what kinds of characters could /TG/ make.

i'm looking for lv1, dm said we could uses stuff from the Plane Shift books and Volo's Guide but no drow ( MINOTAUR'S are okay though )

so looking for any race, job and background that /tg/ can make and i will keep you up to date with how the game turns out.

How do I deal with DM anxiousness?

I really want to start DMing, but I can't get over the feeling that the fun of all my players rests upon me and if I fuck up I'm being an extremely shitty person.

>>50260974
From my experience this is very normal and common, even among people who know how to optimize well.

>>50261555
Social anxiety. Lots of ways to deal with that, medically, if your doctor's a helpful sort.
I just drink alcohol whenever I DM, which is stupid and reckless in terms of my health, possibility of developing alcoholism, etc.

Gotta make a character till Thursday, for a guest appearance at a campaign. Level 3.

What class would be best for a wrestler/luchador? Monk seems obvious, but would bard have merits? With promos (talking shit) and using charisma and whatnot.

Other than that, any ideas about what to play? No need for huge seriousness, but I'd like to keep it at "inspired by" rather than fucking the dude's game entirely.

>>50261597
Social anxiety does ruin everything, eh?

I kind of want to try and post on the Gamefinder thread, but the thought of having to use roll20 irks me.

>>50261465
A hell of alot of IFs there, and all those things need to happen for a warlock to be useful

I've had a warlock in almost every game I've played, no joke. They're always irrelevant really if there is a real caster in the party

sure they can be a eblast turret, just doing nothing but "i cast eldritch blast, again, i guess" but they're outdamaged by every martial besides like phb ranger but phb ranger is in the special Olympics league and doesn't really count

warlock is just a tietary class. Doesn't even do "debuffer" best

>>50261679
well what do you want to do?

people always go on and on about grapplers so you'll have plenty of ideas on that

When is the Volo's hardback meant to be coming out?

>>50261681
frankly ideally i would play IRL but everyone would have laptops with roll20 up

roll20 is great, if your problem is playing with randos then find stop being a bitch and find a group irl or deal with it

if you have social autism to the point of not being able to play with randoms on the internet then this just isn't the hobby for you lad

>>50261696
The problem I have with roll20 is that mapping is a pain, that's all.

>if you have social autism to the point of not being able to play with randoms on the internet
I have done so multiple times and it went just fine. My problem is with DMing, mate. I just worry too much that the others are not having fun.

>find a group irl
I'd love too, but no one plays 5e anywhere near me. Trust me, I

>>50261708
>Trust me, I tried finding a group already.

>>50261683
Not really up for grappling, I'm mostly looking for hooks for a fun one-shot character. And I've been kinda into wrestling so a bombastic promo-cutting, rolex-wearing, diamond ring-wearing, kiss-stealin, wheelin-dealin, limousine-ridin, jet-flyin son (or daughter) of a gun seems like an easy way to be over-the-top.

>>50261708
>>50261716
By mapping do you mean like getting maps for you combats and locations?

because there's tons of ways to get around that. You don't need maps for every location, only if there's combat.

/pfg/ has a shit ton of map pdfs that you can convert into images and use for roll20. There's a bunch out there lad. Our mega in the OP has a bunch of stuff too

this'll help

dubya dubya dubya filedropper /stormkingsthundermap

all the maps for SKT

dubya dubya dubya filedropper /ddrandommaps

random all purpose maps

>>50261679
Monk is the only real choice there as they are tho only unarmed class.

Otherwise a Variant Human barb 1/ rogue 2 with the Tavern brawler feat would be okay while also making you a great grapler.

Basically point buy your self to 13 in all physical stats and use your ASI to raise STR to 15.
Wear light armour for now.
Next ASI boost your Con and so on.

Take your other levels as a Totem Barbarian as you get more ASIs and decent features.

>>50258932
They really should've focused on more things like battlemaster.

Like spellcasting, except for martials, and the moves are relatively mundane.

Especially for monk. WOT4E monk was a brilliant concept done incredibly poorly.

If I wasn't so lazy, I might even make a monk that focuses on various moves. Like a 'spell list', except instead it's a 'Techniques list' and you get access to different techniques depending on which monk archetype you pick.
WOT4E - Elemental avatar type shit.
Shadow - The 'ninja' class that somebody always wants to play.
Open Hand - Focused on discipline and physical prowess over magic bullshit.

The fan-revised WOT4E shows an example of this sort of thing, where you can choose things such as 'you can cast X' or 'When you dodge, you can't be forcibly moved' and suchlike.

Naturally they won't be doing wondrous things that full spellcasters do, but it'd be everything from smashing rocks in two to high jumps + gliding or the much loved 'teleport to darkness' ability or simply just the stunning ability. Poison blowdarts, chain-weapon style focusing on grappling, dressing up as a fucking tree.

So many possibilities.

>>50261781
Well shit, thanks mate.

I really appreciate it.

>>50258870
Hey, /tg/. The monster guidelines.

When I see the "low" and "high" numbers, is that a weak average and a strong average, or is that maximum and minimum?

Both for HP, and for damage.

Thanks.

What are the most exciting undead to use for a city infestation?

>>50261526
You've got two problems.

>I want character ideas for ANYTHING
If you don't even specify what you want beyond 'it must be level 1', you're unlikely to get anything.
>level 1
Level 1 is boring. At least level 3 lets you bring out some concepts mechanically and to an extent fluff-wise, as for example an Eldritch Knight doesn't become an Eldritch Knight at level 3.

>>50261555
That depends on what's causing it. If you just have some kind of crippling social anxiety then I can't give you any advice because I'm a turbo normie and can't give good advice on something I don't understand.

If it's just caused by the game, there are a few things you can try. Do you plan on playing in person, or online? If it's in person, try getting the group to go out to eat right before the game each week. Make it a thing. That way everyone's relaxed and has time to shoot the shit before each game, and you're all more likely to have fun. You'll also tend to subconsciously associate the game with that "bros meet up and have a good time" feeling rather than the "oh god I'm putting on a show for everyone what if they don't like it kill me now desu" feeling.

You can also kinda talk to everyone ahead of time and get a sense for what they want out of the game and what they'd enjoy doing. You can also let them use you as a sounding board for character concepts and other stupid gimmicks when they're building characters, which serves to get them involved while simultaneously giving you insight into what you can do to make the game fun for them along with getting ideas for how to hook their characters into shit. More info takes some of the "fear of the unknown" anxiety off the table and helps to narrow your focus. Alternatively, you might learn that everyone just wants to crawl dungeons or murder goblins and dragons, which makes your job super easy.

>>50261810
Withering Gnolls.

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>>50261811
i don't know what to pick, this if my first time playing d&d, i'm guessing something like a fighter or rouge would be the easiest to play....

i like the idea of a goblin, Minotaur, human, dwarf or any other race in the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide. he ( my DM ) said we would be starting at level 1 but would breeze to level 5.

i just wanted to know what imaginative things /TG/ might have to offer.

>>50261783
Not really aiming for grappling to be honest, more for striking and the like, and I can fluff the shove action as a clothesline or something.
Barb was another option, the party already has one so it could be nice.
We'll be using the stat array from the PHB, but I still have the two +1s from Human.

So, I've got a question about rules-interpretation.

In the PH, it mentions that a readied action can be movement.
Which makes sense; "My wizard will keep his eyes open, and if anyone tries to engage him in melee, he will leg it."

So far, so good.

Would you take that to mean that 1: "a player can take their action, and then ready their move action." or 2: "a player can take only a bonus or move action on their turn, and then ready an action, which can be dash. " ?

I'm gonna be DM'ing a game pretty soon, and I don't quite know which interpretation makes most sense. Also, it might just give squishy casters too much of an advantage, if they can cast a spell, and run away from melee-based monsters and NPCs.

>>50261950
Readying an action always takes your standard, even if you only ready a move or a bonus.

>>50261943
Standard array?

Point buy rather than spending your ASIs to mend stat penalties.

Start with a 15 in Str and Con and a 13 in Dex (with your ASI) and your other stats are all 10s.

After getting your first ASI as a barb, raise either Dex or Con as you need them for unarmoured.

Monk is the only propper choice tho and no CHA based class can help you for unarmed really.

>>50261973
The wording in the PH doesn't really indicate that it is necessarily so - have they clarified this in some errata?

>>50261984
It's gonna be one session, and it's level 3, no ASI or anything, that's why I'm more interested in concept stuff than being super effective.

Standard array is the stats from the PHB. 15, 14, 12, 12, 10, 8 or something.

>>50261679
Barbarian/rogue multiclass is the best at grapples.

They're usually strength-based, they have advantage on grapples while raging, they get expertise in athletics and later on they get reliable talent.

>>50262091
>>50261679
Oh, someone already pointed it out.

Shove is also the same as grapples.

You can grapple and then shove someone to keep them held to the floor.

You could also try, say, swashbuckler, or open hand monk.
Open hand monks get to push people around with their flurry of blows, swashbuckler has use for charisma and can still get pretty good athletics checks. Just be warned, if you want strength+charisma and to be a swashbuckler you'll end up MAD as fuck because you'll also want dexterity and con.

Monk has low strength usually, too.

>>50262037
Ready is an action, in the phb it is listed under "Actions in combat".

The Ready action can be used to ready something that is not a "full action", moving for example, but it still taies a full action to do so.

>>50262139
Ah, alright. You are correct and have superior reading comprehension. Thanks, man/woman/bear/pig.

>>50261679
Aha, I've got it.

Monk1/Rogue1/Barbarian1 piece of shit.

Monk
>1d4 punches
>gives you extra punch as bonus action
>actually -2 damage worse than just using fucking shortswords but whatever. You WILL have to ask your DM to allow punches to count for sneak attack, however. This is not imbalanced, as your punches are weaker than shortswords, which would allow you to sneak attack even if youused strength.
Rogue
>sneak attack, 1d6
>expertise for athletics and performance
Barbarian
>+2 damage while raging if you use strength
>resistance to physical damage while raging
>advantage on strength related things (including grapples) while raging
>you don't have to wear armour, and your armour would depend on dex + con instead of dex+wis since that'll probably be better for you

Stats:
1. Max strength.
2. Put con as high as you can.
3. Dex should be next highest, AT LEAST 13.
4. Wisdom. Wisdom MUST BE 13, at least. No need to raise it above this point, however.
5. Charisma, obviously.
6. Intellect.


It's suboptimal, but it works just fine and should be interesting if not a fucking mess.

>>50262037
>>50261950

players will try to twist the rules on the Ready action every which-way. Let me lay it on the line.

The Ready action is always an action. Note how it is listed in the section called "Actions in Combat" and is always referred to as an action. Moving up to your speed is listed as one of the things you can choose to do if/when your trigger goes off, but that doesn't change the fact that Ready is an action. If the trigger happens, it also costs your reaction to do the thing you were readying to do.

Regarding other common abuses of Ready: You need to choose a SPECIFIC trigger and a SPECIFIC response to the trigger. You can't just delay your turn like in 3.5. I can't tell you how many times a player of mine has just said "I ready" without going into any further detail, even after I've told him this multiple times.

Readied actions happen right after the trigger finishes, not right before.

You can't ready movement AND an action with the same Ready action. You can only get one or the other.

>>50262172
>>50261679
And by that I mean
>you get +2 damage per punch while raging
>you get -1 damage per punch compared to shortswords

You'll do
2d4+STRMOD+2 damage twice, +1d6 sneak attack.
You'll have great grapple/shove checks.
You'll have pretty nice performance cheks.
You'll have pretty decent health (12 if you start barbarian, +5 for rogue, +5 for monk, +3x conmod.)
You'll get.. An extra skill from rogue, or two if you sacrifice 2 max HP (probably not worth it). You'll also have access to athletis, perception and performance regardless of background.

And you get to look cool while doing all of this.

Good for a one-time character, I suppose.

>>50261889
but you must have some preference like like using magic, tanking, healing etc etc plus reading STK background is slightly important too

What is your favorite damage type and why ?

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>>50262247
i have not read anything about it, all i kinda know is that the guys from penny arcade hire you to do a job and that there are storm giants in it. that's all i know.

i have been told magic can be a little complex in 5th ed and melee is the way to go.

>>50262197
>And you get to look cool while doing all of this.
That's pretty much what the plan is, thanks for the actual help.
I think I might go more conservative than that (new player at the table and I don't want to appear as some weird whose class line is half the charsheet), but Barb and Monk seem like my best bets, even if I don't go Rogue.

>>50262181
>Readied actions happen right after the trigger finishes, not right before

Would you make players specify a game-mechanical action? Like "If the dragon melee-attacks our rogue" or "If the dragon uses its breath-weapon." or "if the lich casts a spell"
Or would you go with more fluffy descriptions?

Also:
It would make far more sense to me, to let the player go first.
If the ranger nocks an arrow, to fire into the maw of the dragon, and waits for it to begin drawing in the breath for a mighty gout of fire, I would let that arrow strike before the dragon breaths fire.

Similarly, if the rogue wants to throw himself off the rock ledge, to fall on the lich, if he tries to cast a spell, I would let him attack before the lich resolves its spell.

>>50262260
Force is the best

>>50262264
Be a paladin, spend all of your slots on smites to boost damage instead of spellcasting, then learn how to cast spells little by little as the need arises instead of being locked into all or nothing.
And quit avataring.

>>50262181
Also, if the trigger never happens, would you consider the readied action lost, or does the player get to use it some other way, say; at the end of the round?

>>50262287
Have you considered FFG'S SWRPG?

How strong would be frost giant with frostbrand weapon and the abilities of lvl 20 Champion Fighter?

>>50262267
Yeah, it'd be pretty silly showing up as a new player with class1/class1/class1 that requires the DM to allow something that technically isn't allowed but should be allowed and only isn't allowed because wizards were scared of the possibility of synergies like PAM+rogue. ...Which is honestly balanced, I'd say.

I'd suggest barbarian, then. You can still punch people for 1+STRMOD+2 damage if you don't feel like axing them at any one particular time, say in a bar brawl.
Get athletics proficiency, find something such as the 'entertainer' background.

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>>50262288
thanks for the character idea, i need more ideas like this and no....it's to much fun to make stupid pics like this.

>>50262292
Yes. It's pretty good.

>>50262260
Thunder

It's the best smiting sound. Also infrequently resisted.

>>50262318
Avataring is like namefagging. Just don't do it for anything but one particular topic (say, a game dev talking about their game progress).

>>50262264
honestly just go >>50262288
and smite your way through the game as a human Variant and pick great weapon mastery feat

or pick UA ranger and pick humanoids (at level one) and then giants(at level six) or even dragon and then pick up bow fighting style and basicly you get +4 to hit anything with two legs at level one (excluding dex bonus

>>50262279
Not that anon but PHB 194 states "When the trigger occurs, you can either take your action right after the trigger finishes or ignore the trigger." If readied actions took place before the trigger, the example of you readying a lever to drop a trap door if the cultists step on it wouldn't make sense because you'd pull the lever before the cultists move onto the trap.

If your players are used to something like Shadowrun where interrupting actions is a large part of close combat, you might want to houserule something different but letting them do it without a huge tradeoff or penalty would cause a lot of problems if the players are thinking at all before declaring actions.

>>50262358
and if you at some point feel like your skill isnt high enough go a level in rogue to gain expertise in 2 skill plus 1d6 sneak damage

I'm making a qlippoth-spawn tiefling bard, and so far all my sheet is from PHB. What single supplementary text is best for bard spells? Or, more directly, what are good bard spells from supplementary books?

>>50262316
Yeah, I can probably roll a high-CHA Barb and work with fluff instead of something too specific.
Also, a whole lot of backgrounds could be wrestling gimmicks. Charlatan straight up has a hidden identity, you mentioned Entertainer (and that has a Gladiator variant), Folk Hero sounds like a traditional babyface, the McMahons are nobles...

>>50262360

Sort of obvious for that example. However, this ties into the "fluffy triggers" which I spoke about.
If you require the players to use a straight game-mechanic trigger, like "someone on to this space" or "the dragon uses a breath weapon" then obviously they cannot attempt to interrupt or utilize a specific moment, which takes a lot of the coolness out of the readied action.

However, if you allow triggers like: "If he BEGINS casting a spell" or "if the dragon starts rearing back and drawing in breath" then you can reasonably let characters release their action before game-mechanic events that they might wish to interrupt.

>>50261526
plane shift books?

>>50259351
>dandwiki, that's a big fat "NO
Any reason why? I'm relatively new so I don't know how useful it is.

>>50261679
Barbarian or Battlemaster Fighter with Tavern Brawler. Don't worry about why a luchador is wearing full plate, the mask is the important part.

>>50262535
The wiki is full of the unbalanced fever dreams of hundreds of 15yo twits who exclusively play CN/CE Elves or things with demon blood.
>hrm I'd like to use a daikatana in my game but there's no stats for it
>well katanas are better than longswords so a daikatana should be better than a greatsword
>how about a 4d8, reach, versatile weapon
>yeah this looks good, send it to print

>>50262535

It's got no quality control, basically. Take anything with a massive, massive grain of salt and very careful evaluation.

Hey folks
How to make the best saiyan?
Just Aasimar straight sun soul monk? Is there anything else to make it more similar?

>>50262531
I too am intrigued, because planeshift is the only setting worth a damn in dnd.

>>50262635
Lmao muh references!!!!!

>>50262646
No fun allowed hurr!!!

>>50262508
I know this is wishful thinking with the amount of autism rampant in TTRPGs, but this is why the DM is a human being and not a computer program loaded with a list of rules and encounter designs. You have to be able to look at something on a case-by-case basis and say "this is reasonable" or "this is not allowed, try something else."

If you need something more specific, try this:

When a character is involved, their reaction specifies a mechanical action taken by the character. When the environment is the trigger they can't specify a game mechanic because the environment doesn't take actions so you can let them ready reactions to more "fluffy" things like "rocks start to fall on me."

In the case of "if x steps on y space" I would generally allow them to resolve their action as a response to the character stepping on y space, then continue moving the character to their destination unless incapacitated by the action. When movement is concerned and for the purpose of readied actions ONLY I would treat each step as an action.

If the dragon uses a breath weapon, that's one action. I don't care how I fluff the dragon's attack, his only action was "use fire breath on x spaces" and so you react after his attack resolves and have to say something like "if he uses a breath weapon."

In the above case of "if rocks start to fall" I would let them take their action before the rocks fall because there's no action to resolve first, just a "fluffy trigger"

>>50258870
I've heard the play test version of 5e had real good/interesting fighters that got nerfed. I've got fighter favoritism. What file should I look for?

>>50262573
Well yeah, i'm not going to play as a dragon ogre with any sense of balance with the core races but is it really as bad as >>50262565 ?

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Bread anon reporting in
23 str
18 Dex
18 con
18 cha
17 Wis
10 int
Just got my father's masterwork great sword blessed by dol dorn
It does 1d12, +10 base dmg on a crit, and when I crit I gain temp HP equal to the dmg of the crit
I'm rolling champion/warlord right now
This is the 1st 5e campaign I've played
Is this normal?
I tried to warm up to a qt assimar but she critters and I fumbled speech rolls and she swore a blood oath to kill me.
Any way out of this that doesn't end with me murdering her? She seems like wife material and that's one of my characters goals, is to get married.
Chaotic good

>>50262508
If you ready an action and designate the trigger "if he begins casting a spell," and that spell has a casting time of 1 action, your action and the spell take the same amount of time to complete. You can only begin your readied action a split-second after he does, so you will complete your action a split-second after he does. If the spell has a casting time longer than 1 action, then yeah, you can definitely interrupt it.

We need Wizards to write in Dragonlance.

"In modern days, many believe that Istar was, in fact, an evil land, corrupt and given to darkness. They think that the Kingpriest was wicked, a secret follower of evil, that the citizens who professed their love of light were in truth covert devotees of the dark gods.
This was not so, however. The Kingpriest was a good man, but corrupted by power and fear to hate all that he saw as evil. In the end, his striving against darkness drove him mad, and led him to dare to command the gods themselves. This led to the Cataclysm, the destruction of Istar, and the gods’ disappearance from the world for over three centuries."
This is remarkably petty.

>>50262914
>you are right beside the fucker, but still take 6 seconds to stab him while he casts his intricate spell

>>50262290
The rules are clear on this. If the trigger never happens, or if the trigger happens and you choose not to use your reaction, or if you have no reaction left to spend when the trigger happens, tough. The Ready action has already been taken, and you can't take it back. Also, if you took the Ready action to cast a spell of 1st level or higher and you never actually cast it before your next turn, that spell slot is wasted.

>>50262936
Neither the attack nor the spell takes quite a full six seconds, but they're the same kind of action, which means the time to complete them is roughly equivalent.

>>50259354
>Tfw when I would LOVE for my players to end up with those rolls.
They usually come with 18s across the board. I make them reroll and they get 16s across the board.

I just started making them point buy so that the one guy without magic fucking rolling fingers doesn't feel excluded for not being a walking god at level 1.

Roll 4d6 take 3 highest seems silly to me and is weighted heavily in favor of inflated stats imo.

>>50262932
I don't think I even understand the distinction they're trying to draw. They seem to admit that he was guilty of presuming to command the gods, does it really matter whether he thought of himself as a good guy?

>>50262882
> implying any of this actually happen

You should already know it answer to your question. If you don't... go read PHB.

Guys if I want to get a better understanding of Forgotten Realm's lore what books should I read ( I dont mean DM books, I mean story books)

>>50262279
If it's something clearly worded as a way to try to twist the rules around for the players advantage, like "he BEGINS to attack," then nice try. The action you're trying to interrupt is your trigger, and therefore your readied action will happen immediately after it, not before. If it's something that just happens to not be an action as defined in the game rules, like "I see an orc" or "he draws a weapon," then yeah, of course they can be used as triggers.

>>50259369
Grappling hardly do anything in 5e. Enemy can just shove you away to break your grapple.

>>50262986
Learn to statistics.
http://anydice.com/program/13e
4d6 drop low averages to 12.24
If you point buy, you can split 12/12/12/13/13/13, average 12.5

>>50263026
Its what the dm told me though so I can't really argue against it can i?
As for str
I have a magical item that buffs it +2 and makes my leveled str threshold 24
Slap some ability mods in and the fact im a human with decently high rolls it's pretty reasonable
As for the situation with the assimar, where in the phb would I find the answer to my question?

>>50263031
Elminster's Forgotten Realms is a pure story guide with no game rules because it was written between 4e and 5e. I like it a lot. Because it was written by Ed Greenwood, it focuses more on everyday life and fine details, which might not be what you want.

The FR novels that other people are most likely to have read are the Drizzt novels. The Farideh novels are more focused on the stuff that's been added since 4e (considering that it's about a tiefling warlock raised by dragonborn.) Other than that, just kind of pick a novel at random if you want. Just don't pick Elminster in Hell.

We should put some faqs up in the OP post.

- Bladelock is bad
- PHB Ranger is bad, use Revised version instead

>>50263064
How about the fact that there is no speech roll in 5e and thete is no fumble for ability check?

Best actual advice? Stay away from that DM.

>>50263074
Bladelock is one of the highest damage archetypes in the game.

>>50263121
because it uses eldritch blast and not its blade?

>>50263115
I meant more along the lines while I was talking to her I fumbled 2 persuasion checks to ask her out to the fighters tourney match and, as a result (her name is Bai Bai) said Bai Bai as I waved goodbye

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>>50263131
>and, as a result (her name is Bai Bai) said Bai Bai as I waved goodbye
oh cmon who would get upset at that
complete gold

>>50263121
They are even worse than tomelocks in melee combat, which is the one thing bladelocks are supposed to be good at.

If you're talking about some trick involving Hex and a big weapon, a ranger can do it better, or a paladin or fighter with Magic Initiate.

>>50263131
Again. You can't fumble a skill check. For example, if the DC is 30. There is no different in your degree of failing between rolling a 1 alor rolling a 20.

So yeah. Read the freaking PHB.

>>50263131
0/10.

You're just making this up. None of this actually happen. Not interesting.

>>50263131

>>50263159
This. To give a more appropriate example, if you're trying to do an ability check with a DC 10, and you have a +9 bonus to your roll, you will always succeed even if you roll a natural 1. A natural 1 is always a failure on attack rolls and saving throws, but not on ability checks.

>>50263139
I thought so too
>>50263159
I asked the dm he still says it stands
I'm Sol there
>>50263178
Good to know, I've been calling him out on stuff that's blatantly wrong, such as him not allowing us to take higher of 2 on lucky rolls, or him just making attacks hit us regardless of our ac, he even made up his own exhaustion rules that at exhaustion 1 (1st level) you lose all your feats
And he gives us enemies that throw 20d10 meteor storms at 10th level campaigns.
I play dnd with him because he's a childhood friend and all my other friends play dnd with him.
I'll bring this up next session.
Thanks for your help

>>50263231
Just leave. If he can't get over his power fantasy / God complex, it's not worth playing with him.

Your time is better spend elsewhere. Maybe a part time job.

>>50263124
No, the blade itself. Bladelocks get to add both the attack stat and cha to damage, which gives them a distinct edge over other classes.

>>50263052
Oh shit. I had no idea statistics was a thing. Thanks for googling something for me.

In my experience. As in anecdotal evidence, my players almost always end up with walking gods whose dumpstat is 14. That doesn't mean always, it means it happens often enough IN MY GAMES, that when someone rolls shit they are outclassed by everyone else.

I didnt say it should be done away with or that your experience won't vary but for me I did away with it for the sake of inclusivity because IN MY GAMES it almost always ends with someone's lowest stat being a 13.

>>50263274
Correction: They rely on two separate stats in order to be utilize their features, and are gated further by not having access to heavy armor and thus being forced to rely on weaker options for an attack stat or reduced AC.
Warlock pacts are like 1/6 of a class option. If an EK is a third caster, bladelocks are somewhere between 1/3 and 1/6 martial depending on your patron, but then the patrons benefit traditional EB spam as well or better than going into melee, and you don't have any additional allotted synergy with going melee.
So, they can pull a melee weapon as a backup defense method and be better off for it. That's about what you'd expect from a 1/6 class. The problem is that Tomelock can be a better bladelock by taking a melee cantrip and shillelagh, thus giving them defense and offense on par with a Dex bladelock and a single stat which scales damage/hit/saves for all their attacks and spells.

>>50262948
>Also, if you took the Ready action to cast a spell of 1st level or higher and you never actually cast it before your next turn, that spell slot is wasted.

i agree with the rest, but this seems a bit much. id let them keep the spellslot

>>50263278
I don't roll for stats and don't let my players either, I hate the swinginess as well. But you're a prat to ignore statistics that are that accessible; it's no more prone to "bloated" averages than point buy, except it has a higher cap (and bottom)

>>50260204
So, gotta ask as someone who's never DM'd a game of 5e, what's the scale like?
>So many levels are low, then high fantasy, then wuxia

>>50263274
To support it, a bladelock with 20 STR, 18 cha, polearm mastery, great weapon master can deal on average 81 damage a round. You only need 12 levels in warlock to do this, so you can multiclass out to other classes such as paladin to add smite and gwf. Or fighter to add an extra ability score improvement and other fighter goodies. If the new ranger is allowed, you can add at least six levels of it to add 12 extra damage to favored enemies, and animal companions.

I want to do a simple conversion of DnD5ed to an ancient Greek setting like Glory of Heracles

Not many things need change, but of them is the alignments of the deities for paladins and clerics
I was thinking things like Zeus being teue neutral, Athena being lawful good, Hades being lawful neutral or Ares being neutral evil, bacchus being chaotic neutral, Aphrodite being chaotic good and so on.
It doesn't need to be faithful to the real myths, its a game after all, so I would appreciate help

>>50263323
>minimum 2 ASI and 2 Feats with maximized starting stats, no investment in defense via armor or dex and d8 hit die with no con
Good luck.

>>50263358
Don't unnecessarily add alignment to things that aren't built for it (everything).

Alignments are the stupidest concept in dnd.

>>50263323
To add some clarification to this a level 12 Warlock with 12 Con and taking the average health has 75 health, no heavy armor and probably meh Dex will not have more than 18 AC.

A CR 13 storm giant can hit you for 60 health average with their +14. So they are definitely pretty good later on in levels but you are the epitome of glass cannon.

5th ed general can you help me out, my first character ever is an Alchoholic Sorceror who used to be a deckhand in a merchant navy and developed his magic by stealing drinks from mysterious cargo in the ship's hold.

Is that an ok backstory or have I done things wrong?

>>50263231
> not allowing us to take higher of 2 on lucky rolls
What? I know that Lucky is a very powerful feat, but what the hell does he think it's supposed to do?
>just making attacks hit us regardless of our ac
Lame. If he really needed to cheat for plot purposes, he could just roll behind the DM screen and say they got a crit.
>he even made up his own exhaustion rules that at exhaustion 1 (1st level) you lose all your feats
That is truly baffling. It's not even worse than the normal effects of exhaustion; it's just completely needless. He does know that feats are optional this edition, right?
>And he gives us enemies that throw 20d10 meteor storms at 10th level campaigns.
Not completely unreasonable in the right context. A CR 10 red dragon can breath 16d6 worth of fire.

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>>50263358
Wizards thought of you already and did it for you.

>>50263274
>bladelocks add cha modifier to damage
[citation needed]

>>50263375
You can start fighter or paladin for one level if you want armor. The stats and feats are achievable with variant human and a standard array and a 12/8 split in class. If you go fighter for your 8, you can actually get 20 STR and cha. Don't be retarded.

>>50263404
No heavy? I doubt they even have medium armor, especially not if pure level 12 warlock with all their ABSIs taken.
Their dex is probably +1 or +2 and that guy is using a 2H weapon, so they're at like, ~12+2 =14 AC

>>50263438
Of 111 phb, lifedrinker.

So, I've seen some pretty optimized 5e characters.

What's the worst character you can think of that a player could plausibly build by accident? Let's assume original ranger is off the table.

>>50263406
If you can select spells that help you do that yes. Grab Mage hand disguise self all that fun sneak stuff.

>>50263301
That isn't a house rule, you know. That is how readying an action to cast a spell works.

>>50263448
You're actually going to take 12 levels of warlock? And mostly be in melee for that time? Heaven help you.

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>>50263439
>Bladelock is good because you need components from other classes to function anywhere near par, and cheese variant human combat feat to start
>Planning for level 20 multiclass
How about you stop instead?

>>50263444
At that point I was just giving them the 18 AC, so they probably do have a really low AC. That warlock won't make it to level 12.

>>50263471
I know reading isn't your strong suit, because you've needed clarification on this when I already explicitly said 12 levels of warlock, but read polearm master.

>>50263478
You can do it with warlock 20 too, but I was making the point that after 12 you can multiclass to increase damage further. But by far most of the damage comes from bladelock features and feats.

>>50263450
Dragonborn strength 4e monk
saw it happen at my table

>>50263439
>>50263478
That's uh, a lot of effort to try to be viable, for 5e. Not saying it doesn't work, it very well may, but nobody really does that in 5e.

Been playing Pathfinder recently?

>>50263432
Was Ares really worthy of CE

>>50263450
Assuming not 100% retarded and doing stuff like "what if I make my wizard try to use 2H swords"

An actually melee-focused bladelock, despite what this other guy is saying (because there is more to a class than high-level white-room DPR) Of course this bladelock can still EB spam and be "competent" + "safe" (and it's probably what they'll end up doing most of the time regardless), but bladelock requires more thought than most other classes to not be questionable in its design.

Maybe WoT4E monk where they spend literally all their Ki on their garbage-ass elements? Then they make it so they can't really do any cool monk stuff which leaves them fairly meh.

Most classes aren't going to break too hard, I think.

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stat this guy and give him a 5th ed job, i want to see what you can make of him.

i want lv1, 3,5, and 7

>>50263517
4e

Sorry, I meant for 5e. Thought that was obvious from the thread.

That str monk wouldn't be very good in 4e though.

>>50263503
And you know why that's a problem, I hope. Maybe optimizers like you don't really think about playing a character rather than just having one already at level 20, so let me try to explain. You're spending more than half of a 20-level campaign with a boring, unplayable character. Quite possibly over a year of real time. The vast majority of campaigns never even reach level 12. This is not a good plan.

>>50263450
Probably berserker barbarian, any race.

>>50263541
Is this a new form of shitpost?

>>50259290
Whenever a player comes to me requesting to play some sort of hombrew class, I normally have them go through all the canon classes and get them to reflavor most of the skills. Like when somone wanted to play an alchemist, I just made them a bard that used intelligence and darts instead of charisma and instruments.

>>50263548
What's so terrible about berserker barbarian?

>>50263559
Darts? Are darts classically associated with alchemists?
And especially as a tool to do their... "magic"?

>>50263536

Size/Type: Large Magical Beast
Hit Dice: 5d10+25 (52 hp)
Initiative: +1
Speed: 30 ft. (6 squares)
Armor Class: 15 (-1 size, +1 Dex, +5 natural), touch 10, flat-footed 14
Base Attack/Grapple: +5/+14
Attack: Claw +9 melee (1d6+5)
Full Attack: 2 claws +9 melee (1d6+5) and bite +4 melee (1d8+2)
Space/Reach: 10 ft./5 ft.
Special Attacks: Improved grab
Special Qualities: Scent
Saves: Fort +9, Ref +5, Will +2
Abilities: Str 21, Dex 12, Con 21, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 10
Skills: Listen +8, Spot +8
Feats: Alertness, Track
Environment: Temperate forests
Organization: Solitary, pair, or pack (3-8)
Challenge Rating: 4
Treasure: None
Alignment: Always neutral
Advancement: 6-8 HD (Large); 9-15 HD (Huge)
Level Adjustment: —

>>50263556
No, am legitimately curious as to what the least effective 5e character builds would be. I kind of want to identify them and build a couple, just to compare them to an effective character and see how much worse they are

>>50263545
The character isn't boring though. It gets 5th level casting before other martials, and stays competitive damage wise early, before pulling ahead once it can pump charisma.

I don't know why you'd think it deals suboptimal damage before level 20. That's retarded.

>>50263561
It's not even that bad, Ira just no other archetype hurts yourself as much. That point of exhaustion sucks, but if you only really hit things and nothing more it's all good.

>>50263529
Thanks. Helpful.

>>50263450
I've seen two bladelocks who regularly swing their pact weapons using their dump stat. I've seen a druid who never casts spells, but that's probably more a matter of how the character is played rather than built. I've seen one "optimized" halfling barbarian based entirely on a misreading of the rules.

>>50263582
Fifth edition's Way of the Four Elements Monk, commonly referred to as 4e monk.
That's what I'm talking about.
Had a Dragonborn 4e monk who decided it was a good idea pumping strength and was crying all the time about being useless in relation to the party's bearbarb

>>50263529
Typical cults sacrificed puppies to Ares before battle, sacrificing puppies really can't be seen in mug of a good way. They say he's a liar and a brute, so sure lets say a light chaotic evil.

>>50263601
Ouch. That's uh, comically bad. This actually happened in play?

>>50263521
It's more than viable. A full eldritch blast salvo at level 20 deals 42 damage on average. This build deals almost twice as much.

>>50263604

No one abbreviates it like that

>>50258870
>Players: What's the best sign that tells you "Fun/good session up ahead!"?

When two/three people from our 5 player table can't make it so our DM gets his secret binder and says "alright guys it's time for a secret two-player co-op session."

Last time we blew up a monastery.

The time before we blew up a temple.

>>50263604
Oh. I've seen it, was not familiar with the short term.

That doesn't sound particularly effective, no.

>>50263587
> It gets 5th level casting before other martials
I hope you understand how funny that statement is.

>I don't know why you'd think it deals suboptimal damage before level 20. That's retarded.
You're the one who tried to explain an entire 20-level build, which is the first sign that an optimizer has gone completely off the deep end. I'm telling you that playing a bladelock who uses a melee weapon as a first resort is an exercise in frustration, and on the off chance that you play characters and don't just build them, don't try it.

>>50263561
Basically nothing to do besides hitting things, and using class features is punished. It's the worst designed sub class in the game.

>>50263618
yo ass nigga
I see it all the time

>>50263616
>"Build" that requires a single invocation and 2 ASI coming from starting at optimal Cha, which also boosts your other spell saves
>Usable by any warlock pact/patron effectively
>With 2 other optional invocations to add even more utility/versatility to it

>As opposed to 6 ASIs upgrading 2 stats and feats and being limited to melee range

>>50263612
I swear that all of those actually happened. The halfling barbarian was actually based on three separate misreadings of the rules. The druid and warlocks were new players who, when their turns came around, tended to select a weapon from their character sheet more or less at random, believing that they were all equally good ideas.

>>50263641

No you don't

>>50263432
Why the fuck is Hades still LE?
Did they even into Greek myths?

>>50263616
Really? That's impressive dpr. Wait, is that actual dpr, or the damage *assuming you hit*? Iirc a gwm fighter typically dishes out about 75, factoring in miss chance, and like 190 if you assume a hit

How does the builds hold up in the earlier levels?

File: baka!.jpg (99KB, 1280x720px) Image search: [Google]

99KB, 1280x720px

>>50263657
Y-yes I do baka!!

>>50263686
I don't think I've seen anybody ever factor in miss/hit chances for these calculations. It's always assuming you hit.

For example, that 42 damage is calculated through 4d10+20. That'd be four shots of 1d10+5, which comes out to ~42 damage.

>>50263681
Same reason we still have "falchions" as weapons bigger than scimitars, short "rapiers", "longswords" that are actually arming swords, ridiculously shitty gambesons, and "studded leather armor".

Are the trolls gone since last night?

>>50263635
Why is the statement funny? You realize of course that paladins and rangers get fifth level spells at level 17, and fighters and rogues never get them, right? Getting fifth level spells at level 9 is a big plus, especially since you aren't sacrificing damage to do so.

The rest of your post isn't worth responding to.

>>50263724
>mentioning them
now you're going to make em come back.

read the thread. we seem to be more or less fine, with reasonable enough discussion.

>>50263642
>Dealing twice as much damage isn't free.

Go on, captain obvious.

>>50263727
>Why is the statement funny?

Not the guy you're responding to, but, anon, Warlocks are casters, not martials.

>>50263727
You're playing a primary caster in denial. Of course your spells will be better than those of non-casters. Spells are what you should be doing almost all the time. Your ability to fight with melee weapons, and more importantly your ability to survive in melee, will not be as good as non-casters because you're trying to make half a subclass do the work of a complete class.

>>50263686
It's assuming a hit. GWM fighter averages out to about 88 before rerolls are factored in. The rerolls might bring it to just under a hundred.

I've also ignored magic item bonuses.

It'd be like saying
>A cleric gets 5th level spellcasting before any other martials. It's a martial because you can wear heavy armor, a shield, and smack stuff in the face with a warhammer.

Which actually, a pure lock can't do.

>>50263736
You also failed to consider that the EB lock is free to use/move hex each turn as necessary, so add 14 average damage to that. Then there's the fact that for that "OP melee damage" you're biting -5 to hit for each attack, which is going to cause many to miss, especially fighting higher AC enemies. Then there's the fact you're restricted to 10 foot range, where the blaster warlock gets 120 (even more with Spear invocation) to position with, and you both have the same armor (or rather the blaster can afford to have even more since they can use their extra ASIs for medium armor, and keep a respectable Dex)
Then the Tomelock can even hold their own in melee with Shillelagh and GFB or BB.

You're investing an entire character progression to be worse than a paladin.

>>50263747
Sure, but this is dealing more damage than many martials can, which is why the comparison is made to them.

>>50263774

So, 42 isn't really impressive

>>50263717
Oh. The dpr spreadsheet factors them in.

Assuming his math is right, that gwm fighter is doing 75 on average, after factoring in a 42% miss chance.

And looking at monster hp progressions (calculated from the mm, not following the dmg guidelines) average hp on a cr20 monster is 296.

So that 42 doesn't seem as impressive as I initially thought.

>>50263795
>42%
Sorry, I have not slept yet and it's 830am. I meant 62% miss chance.

>>50263790

You said "other martials", which implies that you're talking about a martial character.

Also, I find it hard to believe that most martials are unable to do that kind of damage

>>50263795
Eldritch Blast's 42 damage is also cast every round at range (120 or 300 feet) dealing a damage type (force) that is like never resisted or .."immunitied." It's also one the highest (or maybe THE highest) at-will ranged attacks in the game.

In a single round, no, it doesn't do as much as a GWM fighter, which is good. But it can put out several attacks way away from the guys trying to knife you.

File: Beowulf_and_the_dragon.jpg (171KB, 461x599px) Image search: [Google]

171KB, 461x599px

>tfw people says a guy fighting a dragon in melee isn't high fantasy.

>>50263833

But wouldn't keeping enemies at a distance make you unable to use your Pact Weapon?

In your opinion, what are the things to avoid in an investigation-style session? I want to surprise my players with a very different, who-done-it scenario.

Probably the disparition of multiple students in a remote Wizard Academy. Maybe used as fuel for an epic discovery made by professors.

Mystery. Politics. Ethics.

>>50263789
You don't have to use the -5 to attack if the enemy is a high ac monster. That part is optional, and foregoing it you still do comparable damage.

Additionally, if your DM you can add magic item bonuses to weapon attacks and not eldritch blast, which removes most of the accuracy disadvantage and further bumps up damage past eldritch blast even further.

>>50263835
It ain't hurling fireballs and other magic with ease, so it aint high fantasy. Best I can offer is the rating of "low fantasy."

>>50263845
Yeah, it would. For clarity, I am not part of the discussion on Bladelock, just some other guy answering questions about Eldritch Blast.

>>50263823
Battlemaster with the same feats can do 6.33*4+20+40 (Extra Attack (2) with GWF and GWM power attack)
Then with bonus action 3+5+10 (GWF, GWM, PAM) or 6.33+5+10 on a crit/kill.
So at will, 103 damage, more with a crit/kill, then additional damage and effects from maneuvers.
Paladins also nearly match this cheesy MC warlock thanks to Improved Divine Smite, and smack it out of the park when you burn slots for Divine Smite.

>>50263833
True, it is at range, and it is not going to be resisted/immunitied. It's still going to take you an average of 7.05 successful hits (you didn't mention what your to hit bonus is so I can't factor it in to say how many rounds it would take on average to down a cr appropriate enemy).

>>50263721
It's retarded.

>>50263850
Oops, meant if your DM is reasonable about magic items.