Quote from: B.T.;543083To get back to the gaytest, I've noticed a trend: people who play 5e like an old-school game have fun with it while those who play it like a new-school game do not.  

My playtest experience so far supports the first assertion here.  I'm finding I'm still not in love with the stuff I was worried about, though (healing, at-wills).  Advantage is fun.

Quote from: jibbajibba;543108It is at this level that the automatic never misses Magic missile becomes an issue, for example. If I can hit something 100' away unearingly I can put out a candle, extinguish a torch, Hey why can't I target the wizard's staff to cause him to make a save or drop it, etc etc.

Not to take sides on this, but the spell description says you have to target a creature.

Believe me, if I could've used the at-will magic missile to shoot any old thing, I would've been using it a lot more.

The playtest wizard does get at-will mage hand, though.

Quote from: B.T.;543083gaytest

trollock, are you reading this? This is how you do it.

Quote from: VectorSigma;543134Not to take sides on this, but the spell description says you have to target a creature.

Believe me, if I could've used the at-will magic missile to shoot any old thing, I would've been using it a lot more.

The playtest wizard does get at-will mage hand, though.

But that is exactly what I mean, its classic Game versus Physics split.

Either a wizard can generate a magical bolt of energy which he can target unearingly and never miss or .... a wizard can hit a target creature for x damage once per round.

One is more associative than the other.

Does the magic only work when targeting living things? Perhaps the magic is drawn towards life force? What about golems? Animated hat-stands?

(As an aside - I would have liked to see a roll to hit perhaps with a bonus to hit from Int rather than Dex and would probably run it that way.)

Quote from: RandallS;541931... If 5e stays close to this and WOTC actually puts out some good adventures, they would probably be easy to use with 0e, Microlite74, 1e, or BECMI/RC.  This will be a major improvement over 3.x and 4e adventures.

That's the one thing I'm hoping will come out of this.  Whatever they do with the rules is going to have zero influence on my gaming, but it would be great to be able to buy and use D&D brand adventures without having to extensively rewrite and restat them.

Quote from: jibbajibba;543108It is at this level that the automatic never misses Magic missile becomes an issue, for example. If I can hit something 100' away unearingly I can put out a candle, extinguish a torch, Hey why can't I target the wizard's staff to cause him to make a save or drop it, etc etc.

:rolleyes:

Quote from: 1e AD&D PHB, p. 67, "Magic Missile"Area of Effect: One or more creatures in a 10 square foot area

Geebus on a stick, jj, how deep do you plan on digging that hole?

Quote from: jibbajibba;543146But that is exactly what I mean, its classic Game versus Physics split.

Either a wizard can generate a magical bolt of energy which he can target unearingly and never miss or .... a wizard can hit a target creature for x damage once per round.

One is more associative than the other.

Does the magic only work when targeting living things? Perhaps the magic is drawn towards life force? What about golems? Animated hat-stands?

(As an aside - I would have liked to see a roll to hit perhaps with a bonus to hit from Int rather than Dex and would probably run it that way.)

Oh, I don't really disagree with you on this; if the descriptive text said something about an eldritch bolt that disrupts the animative force (be it a soul or necromancy or whatever), yeah, that would make more in-game sense.

Quote from: VectorSigma;543162Oh, I don't really disagree with you on this; if the descriptive text said something about an eldritch bolt that disrupts the animative force (be it a soul or necromancy or whatever), yeah, that would make more in-game sense.

See my goal would be the other way. You always need to roll to hit.

That seems to me to be the Simplest solution.

It's easier, and therefore more preferable, to say " you can summon a bolt of magical engergy and fire it at a target - Roll to hit" than "you can summon up a bolt of magical energy that always hits a target creature but can't even be used to try and hit a non-creature target, because the magic doesn't work that way".

The same basic approach can be tied to  everything. You can't climb a wall made of glass without special tools (ie suction cups), you can't trip a Gelatinous Cube, you can't backstab an ooze, a fireball will burn things, a flying creature that gets hit by a freezing ray of frost will fall to the ground if it needs to flap its wings to fly but not if it flys due to magic.

This is what we used to call common sense.

Quote from: 1e AD&D PHB, p. 67, "Magic Missile"Area of Effect: One or more creatures in a 10 square foot area

Quote from: G3, Hall of the Fire Giant King, p.18These locks cannot be picked by thieves and must be opened by "bending bars" or knock or magic missile spell.

I love 5th edition, its like we can have every 4 decade long debate all on one thread. ;o)

Quote from: jadrax;543171I love 5th edition, its like we can have every 4 decade long debate all on one thread. ;o)

Indeed and too many people take the rules as gospel even back then

Quote from: jibbajibba;543169See my goal would be the other way. You always need to roll to hit.

That seems to me to be the Simplest solution.

I don't mind the flavor of an autohit for some spells at all, though.

Could always go with magic missile is (traditional) auto-hit when shot at creatures, but you can fire it off at inanimates with a to-hit roll or something.

Quote from: VectorSigma;543177Could always go with magic missile is (traditional) auto-hit when shot at creatures, but you can fire it off at inanimates with a to-hit roll or something.

I do not really want a Magic Missile spell that can somehow intrinsically tell if something is a 'creature' or not tbh. To me, that is an example of disassociated mechanics at its worse.

Quote from: jadrax;543178I do not really want a Magic Missile spell that can somehow intrinsically tell if something is a 'creature' or not tbh. To me, that is an example of disassociated mechanics at its worse.

Yeah I agree. That doesn't make any sense to me either. Besides, the point of low-level spells and effects like magic missile or ray of frost is that they're kind of ubiquitous, straightforward spells. You don't want to split their effects too much to make them more complicated than they really need to be.

To remain in the spirit of the game and the spell it should only target animate objects/creatures. If you want something with more variety/triggers use a higher level spell.

Quote from: jadrax;543178I do not really want a Magic Missile spell that can somehow intrinsically tell if something is a 'creature' or not tbh. To me, that is an example of disassociated mechanics at its worse.

Exactly.

Either you can summon a bolt of energy that always hits it's intended target or you can't.

Is it a Game Engine or a Physics Engine.