So I just came across this thread today (actually, I came across this months ago, but I only just saw it again now today. I really feel like we should petition Toady to create some sort of Tabletop Games subboard one of these days).
Anyhoo, I picked up the Player's Handbook last week. I don't have it with me right now, since I lent it to another member of my 4e group in anticipation of our upcoming character creation session next week. But I looked it over pretty thoroughly (read everything but most of the spells in detail), and here are my impressions in no particular order:
Everybody doing reporting on D&D Next has made a big deal about the advantage system (and it certainly has been used to great effect and is much better implemented than when they first announced it), but what really struck me about this edition was proficiency. It's used for skills, saves, tools, and replaces BaB and normal weapon proficiency into a single easy-to-remember-or-at-least-look-up number, and seems readily applicable for use in unusual situations. Next week, I'm going to ask our future DM if I can use the rules for training between adventures to build up a proficiency bonus to saves against iocane powder.
Also, something that actually struck when I originally read the Basic rules, but was reinforced in the PHB, was the fact that, since feats are an
optional rule, you don't need to take a feat to do some basic mundane thing you should be able to do anyway. The two examples I can think of right now are how you can just use your Dexterity modifier for Finesse weapons or how you can just move between attacks so long as you have movement left, which before
required a second tier feat.
And speaking of feats, I really like them in this edition. For the most part, any prerequisites are things that would actually be useful for someone taking the feat, rather than an arbitrary tax (the exceptions being having the previous tier for the armor feats, which is somewhat understandable, and the Ritual Caster feat for anyone who wants to use Charisma for casting). But, yeah, I like where they're at; they have a good balance for the most part between being not so bad you wouldn't ever want to trade a stat bonus for one of them but not so good that you automatically would.
And that may have just lead into ability scores or not, but it was the next thing on my list, so I'm going to talk about that now. So, yeah, I don't know about you guys, but I actually really like the fact that ability score progression is capped. With the amount of ability score improvements characters get in this game, it means that even a half-orc has the chance to be a top tier wizard some day, which is fantastic. Sure, he may not have the head start that a gnome or high elf has, and his strength bonus will probably go completely to waste, but it eliminates the idea that one's ultimate achievements in life must be limited by the nature of their birth. Also, it means that level 20 Barbarians are super badasses for exceeding what's technically possible for a humanoid creature.
Also, I like the fact that having a high casting stat doesn't you can cast more spells than normal; it just means you have a wider daily repertoire for wizards and clerics and paladins (and I think maybe druids? Can't remember), and you still have more potent spell DC's of course, but it's a more variable advantage than before. I also like how spells go up by slot level you use them in, rather than some lower level spells simply going up because you have a higher casting level. And I think I'll end this paragraph by saying, does anyone else think it's weird that Bards became full casters?
And now I'll dedicate a whole paragraph or so to Warlocks, because it's an interesting class. First of all, you can get your magic from Cthulhu, and that's not even a joke or an exaggeration. And they only get up to level 5 spell slots, but they can cast more of them in a fight than an equivalent level wizard can cast in a day, plus a single casting of each spell level after that once per day. Then you've got your Pact Boons.
Pact of the Blade seemed probably the weakest, since, while it has great flavor, it's weaker than the Eldritch Knight's similar ability, but it does give you proficiency with any melee weapon and allows you to gain a multi-attack like martial classes get (I can't remember off hand if it requires a bonus action to use or if it's just a straight up second attack), so you can probably use it to turn your Warlock into a somewhat decent gish. Pact of the Chain gives you nice familiar and allows you to do stuff with summons, afaic, but what rather intrigues me is Pact of the Tome. You get access to 2 cantrips from any class (or was it 3), and then you can also spend a thing (I think they were called Invocations, but I'm away from book, so it could be something else) to be able to learn all the rituals. I guess this isn't a huge thing, since rituals aren't super great from what I recall, but it is definitely interesting.
But that's enough rambling about Warlocks, I want to talk about Monks now. I believe I had heard from somebody somewhere that Monks don't suck anymore. I'll have to do some testing to confirm this, but it seems somewhat plausible as, for one thing, Monks have no need of Strength (unless you want to grapple or something), since they use their Dexterity for unarmed and monk weapon attacks. And there's no penalty to their unarmed damage die increase for being a Small creature (which inspired the Halfling Monk character I'll most likely be playing when we get started) and this damage increase can be used for monk weapons, which means that, while most warriors will be inclined to use bigger and bigger weapons as they advance, the Monk will be looking for more compact or versatile weapons, which I think is kind of funny. Also, they can catch projectiles and throw them with proficiency and run along walls and over water, in addition to pretty much all the other stuff they could do before (and there's probably some stuff I'm forgetting).
Anyway, let's talk about the class build choice things. I don't think there's a general term for them, but for the Monk, they all start with "Way", as far as I recall. The first one, Way of the something-I-can't-remember, is a pretty generic monk path. When you first get it, you gain the ability to do cool stuff with your Furry of Blows (or does that have a different name in this edition?), which is pretty nice. Then you get
Wholeness of Body, which works just like it did in 3rd edition except you get 5 times your monk level in hit points to heal instead of twice (I kinda thought you'd be able to use ki for this, but I guess they wanted to give the healing ability without needing to expand the ki pool, so whatever). Then for some reason you get a first level spell that might prevent things from attacking you, so long as you don't attack them, so that's a thing. And, finally, you get that
weird attack where you hit someone and then later you can have them die if you want, which I guess you can use to pretend to be Kenshiro and tell people that they're already dead.
Next is the Way of the Shadow. It starts off with you being able to use your ki to cast 2nd level spells at the same level a Wizard would get them, which is nice, though you don't get to pick them, and for some reason Mirror Image wasn't one of the ones included, even though it's probably the most ninja spell out there, but whatever, at least you get the Minor Illusion cantrip. A little later you gain the ability to teleport up to 60 feet between any two points that are dim-lit or darker, which you can use at-will as a bonus action, and doing so grants you advantage on any attack you make that turn. So super-good, so long as you can create areas of darkness (Darkness is one of the spells you learned earlier) and you can manage to see well enough (Darkness spell blinds even those with darkvision). So very good, but may be a bit difficult to use. Then you gain the ability to become invisible while in dim light or darkness, which is nice, and finally you can use a reaction to hit someone that an ally has hit, which is a weird way to end the path progression, but okay.
Finally, there's the Way of Elements. Maybe there's a "the" in there, I don't know. So in this one you get various element-themed powers to choose from, most of them being spells which you get at way past the level of an equivalent Wizard, but it's not total suck since you power them with ki, which gets completely replenished in a short rest, and you can use up more ki to increase the spell level, so you could potentially cast 3 9th level spells per fight (the Wizard gets one of these per
day), and it's possibly by a strict RAW reading that you could even cast a spell up to 11th level equivalent, though that's probably just an oversight. And so you can either pick all your powers from same element and pretend your a *bender (probably a good idea, since then you can take the one feat that lets you bypass a creature's immunity to spell damage of a single type) or you can mix and match, but either way you only get 4 powers to chose from besides the one you get for free that's basically Prestidigitation or Thaumaturgy for elementalists. For the most part it's just Evocation spells you can get, I believe, but there's also Fly in there (at about twice the level a Wizard learns it, but you can cast it more often than said Wizard), and if you're playing a firebender and your DM doesn't let you say there are jets of flames coming from your feet while you do this they are a bad person.
Alright, so let's finish this up with some rules I found a bit weird. First of all, charging isn't a thing just anyone can do. They made it a feat, and as I recall it seemed a rather feat-worthy feat, but there is no way to use your action to move more than normal and attack in the same turn, though I'm not sure that's actually a big deal. Second, there's no inherent bonus to flanking. Sure, you can use your action to provide a distraction and grant an ally advantage against an enemy, and Rogues still to Sneak Attack enemies if an ally is within 5 feet of said enemy, but otherwise flanking is no more (well, there's also that one ability for Wolf Totem Barbarians).
And I think that's it. I've rambled enough for tonight, and it's getting quite late, so I'll just hit post now.
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Topic: "DnD Next": Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition. Starter set is out! (Read 58378 times)