Quote from: S'mon;1113009I think Crawford has raised it to new levels of shitness compared to previous editions.

Crawford is nothing compared to the spite of Jean Wells in the early Dragon SA. She apparently admitted to deliberately giving bad advice because she thought kids should not be playing D&D and should go outside and to real things. I have alot of the early editions and yeah that was apparent even then. The transition to I believe Skip Williams is notable in the change of tone. Though Skip could be mercurial too. Just not spiteful.

Crawford I have no clue on. His answers sometimes feel as if he doesnt even know his own game.

Quote from: Omega;1113014Crawford is nothing compared to the spite of Jean Wells in the early Dragon SA. She apparently admitted to deliberately giving bad advice because she thought kids should not be playing D&D and should go outside and to real things. I have alot of the early editions and yeah that was apparent even then. The transition to I believe Skip Williams is notable in the change of tone. Though Skip could be mercurial too. Just not spiteful.

Crawford I have no clue on. His answers sometimes feel as if he doesnt even know his own game.

I admit I have not read Wells' Sage Advice, it may be worse. However a bunch of TSR staffers seem to have really hated her so I dunno. Skip got it wrong sometimes but was not terrible. Crawford I agree - he seems to have no real grasp on the game in the 5e PHB and the design principles by which it was put together. I'd say his 'advice' is worse than you'd get off a random on the Internet. He seems to have an uncanny ability to pick the worst possible interpretation - if there are 2 reasonable interpretations he typically finds a third, nonsensical one to promulgate. Just doing the opposite of whatever he says would probably give a better game!

Quote from: S'mon;1113009I think Crawford has raised it to new levels of shitness compared to previous editions.

Well, since he gets his shit on everything he touches, I don't know why we would expect Sage Advice to be any different.

Quote from: S'mon;1113016I admit I have not read Wells' Sage Advice, it may be worse. However a bunch of TSR staffers seem to have really hated her so I dunno. Skip got it wrong sometimes but was not terrible. Crawford I agree - he seems to have no real grasp on the game in the 5e PHB and the design principles by which it was put together. I'd say his 'advice' is worse than you'd get off a random on the Internet. He seems to have an uncanny ability to pick the worst possible interpretation - if there are 2 reasonable interpretations he typically finds a third, nonsensical one to promulgate. Just doing the opposite of whatever he says would probably give a better game!

This makes me wonder if I was right with my original interpretation of the intention behind duelist style (that it could not be used with a shield).

Quote from: TJS;1113296This makes me wonder if I was right with my original interpretation of the intention behind duelist style (that it could not be used with a shield).

It's the plain meaning of the original text that it can't be.  The whole point of the style is to make certain character concepts more viable than they would be otherwise (and they would be in reality, for that matter).

Quote from: TJS;1113296This makes me wonder if I was right with my original interpretation of the intention behind duelist style (that it could not be used with a shield).

Well I think the wording allows a shield, but it would be much better balanced vs the other styles if no shield. I don't know about intent.

Quote from: HappyDaze;1112979That may have been the original assumption, but Sage Advice has shifted to "everything not explicitly spelled out in a spell description doesn't happen."

The consequence of being bombarded with hundreds if not thousands of questions all asking for THE answer. I run into this all the time when answering 5e questions over on rpg.stackexchange.com.

I generally give both a plain English interpretation and a RAW intrepetation. Most of my answers have a handful of downvotes because of that. Something I know from the comments I get from my answers.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1113313It's the plain meaning of the original text that it can't be.  The whole point of the style is to make certain character concepts more viable than they would be otherwise (and they would be in reality, for that matter).

Quote from: S'mon;1113323Well I think the wording allows a shield, but it would be much better balanced vs the other styles if no shield. I don't know about intent.

This is from one of my playtest packs I still have. The intent is very obviously here a single weapon style with no shield.

QuoteDuelist
Your fighting style is like that of a swashbuckling fencer, focusing on mobility and misdirection.
Suggested Background: Noble
Suggested Specialty: Skill specialist
Suggested Equipment:
Studded leather armor, rapier, light crossbow, 10 crossbow bolts, adventurer's kit, and 65 gp
Level Maneuver
1 Spring Attack
2 Tumbling Dodge
4 Glancing Blow
8 Lightning Reflexes
10 Opportunist

Though I think if they had kept the Buckler it would have fit with duelist. A larger shield? No.

Had a large battle last night. The PCs were knocked down to 0 hp and then back up a few times. It makes you wonder why the bad guys don't coup de grace anymore. No, I don't want to deliberately seek out a TPK, but in-world it is probably pretty obvious that there is a difference between all dead and mostly dead...and leaving a foe in the latter condition is just asking for them to be returned to the fight.

Quote from: HappyDaze;1113332Had a large battle last night. The PCs were knocked down to 0 hp and then back up a few times. It makes you wonder why the bad guys don't coup de grace anymore. No, I don't want to deliberately seek out a TPK, but in-world it is probably pretty obvious that there is a difference between all dead and mostly dead...and leaving a foe in the latter condition is just asking for them to be returned to the fight.

Well, you don't have much choice but to have enemies coup-de-grace at every opportunity. It's a bit of a paradigm shift, but in a world where recovering from grievous wounds is super easy, barely an inconvenience, "always stab a downed enemy before moving on to the next" becomes basic strategy.

Of course, once players hit 5th level, that might not be enough either...

See, it's just like I said. Hitting 0 in 5e is more like being downed onto one knee in Gears of War.

Quote from: HappyDaze;1113332Had a large battle last night. The PCs were knocked down to 0 hp and then back up a few times. It makes you wonder why the bad guys don't coup de grace anymore. No, I don't want to deliberately seek out a TPK, but in-world it is probably pretty obvious that there is a difference between all dead and mostly dead...and leaving a foe in the latter condition is just asking for them to be returned to the fight.

Have some enemies kill immediately when they get a downed foe.  Have others sometimes do it (if they think they can get away with it, maybe, but not if this might enrage a still fighting target).  Have others never do it.  Play them according to their personality, and let that shine through in other ways (reputation, conversation, etc.)  

Players will pick up on this method and start to treat being downed as potentially dangerous, and thus will try to avoid being in that state any longer than they must.  Psychological research suggests that for many situations, one sharp instance out of 20 is sufficient to establish a problem.  Or rather, 20 times of getting away with it is necessary to wean people off the fear of one time where they didn't.  Of course, the exact ratio will vary for particularly cautious or reckless groups, but the principle is the same.  If you make 1/10th of the monster obviously blood-thirsty, rampaging killers, the players will then treat being at zero as a very bad state.

Quote from: Omega;1113329This is from one of my playtest packs I still have. The intent is very obviously here a single weapon style with no shield.


Though I think if they had kept the Buckler it would have fit with duelist. A larger shield? No.

Thanks for that, it confirms what I had thought.  It's there to make the single rapier fighter comparable with other fighters who forgo shields (If they're not, the problem is Great Weapon Master is too good - but you don't fix problem abilitiies by messing with everything else).

Of course it remains uncertain if it was consciously changed before final release or the predominant interpretation is just an artifact of sage advice.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1113348Have some enemies kill immediately when they get a downed foe.  

If my monsters see 0 hp PCs being brought up, they ALWAYS go for the CDG. Before then it depends, but I generally have multi-attack monsters and high level monsters finish off fallen PCs, while orcs vs low level PCs likely won't to start with.

On the subject of HP.

Something that has been bugging me since release of 5e is not the HP itself. It seems to be balanced to the monsters and higher damage output nearly everything feels like it has now.

Instead its that quite a few classes or class paths get some form of temp, extra or phantom HP somehow.
Phantom HP could be from resistance. For example the Barbarian while raging has resistance to normal combat damage. Which means they essentially have twice as many HP as it takes 2x the normal damage needed. And the Bear totem path gets resistance to ALL damage types except psychic.
The Draconic Sorcerer path gets +1 HP per level. Its not alot, but it is still eventually 20 more HP.
The Warlock can gain the Armor of Agathys spell which grants 5 temp HP per level of slot spent. That is 45 extra HP.
The Druid heals when they revert back from a beast form. And they get 2 uses of this and depending on the form they took and how much damage it soaked. That could be with say the Brown Bear 34 HP a pop. 68 potential total right there. More if they can grab a short rest.
The Champion path for Fighter at the high levels gains essentially regeneration of 5+CON mod HP every round HP are below 50%.

There are others. But this to me seems a more pressing issue. Resistance in particular. But that said. Quite a few monsters have this or that resistance as well.