On the 4E hate train: I'm pretty sure the only reason it's a thing was because it was the first edition to come out in the age of prominent internet. (While there was internet at the era of 3.0, it was less widespread, and TSr was a dead company, so they were saving D&D from oblivion)
4E was great at what it was: Tactical, accessible, streamlined, balanced, functional.
Yeah, giving props to 4e definitely puts us into the minority. Like, people complain about cookie cutter classes, but playing a wizard like a fighter was a good way to commit suicide, same as anytime else.
I'm currently playing a campaign in 5e with my boyfriend and our two best friends. I'm playing a beast mastery ranger and the DM gave me a sideways glance but allowed me to use a horse as my animal companion based on the revised rules for Ranger that they put out a while ago XD it's awesome. Storm of Teeth and Claws is OP af
Hah, I've also been having some great fun with a horse...I'm playing as a wizard, but it's an RNG campaign and the DM essentially whipped up something unique for each character to have fun with, so since my character randomly rolled being a member of the cavalry, she got a warhorse. But the real fun comes from the fact that another member of the party always casts polymorph on it and turns it into a goddamned mammoth! So to make sure we can harm the monsters that come our way, I cast enchant magic weapon on that mammoth's tusks, and let me tell you, a mammoth's charge is no joke in terms of damage, especially if you knock them prone and get a free trample attack to go with it. So almost every single combat has basically been that...I think it actually frustrated the DM a bit, since I steamrolled an encounter that was supposed to be somewhat challenging for our party, but I trampled the shit out of that demon with my enchanted mammoth.
I don't know about reading, but I have it on good authority that Record of Loddoss War is basically the writer's DnD campaigns made manifest.
As for me, I was a 3.5 boy through and through and I miss being in a gaming group so much. Hell I wasn't even very good at it - I made a strong hero for a D20 Modern setting and took guns as my weapon >.< - but it was always such a good time.
There are a lot of podcasts or web series (like for example Critical Role, which features a lot of fairly prolific video game voice actors) that chronicle D&D sessions, but I've not come across any place where you can just read transcripts.
Fat Hippo said:
Hah, I've also been having some great fun with a horse...I'm playing as a wizard, but it's an RNG campaign and the DM essentially whipped up something unique for each character to have fun with, so since my character randomly rolled being a member of the cavalry, she got a warhorse. But the real fun comes from the fact that another member of the party always casts polymorph on it and turns it into a goddamned mammoth! So to make sure we can harm the monsters that come our way, I cast enchant magic weapon on that mammoth's tusks, and let me tell you, a mammoth's charge is no joke in terms of damage, especially if you knock them prone and get a free trample attack to go with it. So almost every single combat has basically been that...I think it actually frustrated the DM a bit, since I steamrolled an encounter that was supposed to be somewhat challenging for our party, but I trampled the shit out of that demon with my enchanted mammoth.
man, isn't Polymorph fun? we did a trick one session where our sorcerer polymorphed a random critter into a T-Rex. then I pulled a Jurassic world and used a torch as a flare to set it on the archmage we were fighting. the DM made me roll about 10 Nature and Animal Handling checks to keep its attention but I did it and it was awesome XD it pretty much murdered the sorcerer afterwards but that's what healing potions are for!
My RP group go through a lot of RPGs, but when it comes to D&D we tend to stick to 3.5. A few of our members have expressed an interest in 5th Ed, and I must admit I'm interested to give the new system a go, but the sheer volume of expansion books we have for 3.5 (39 different expansion books in addition to the core 3) make the move to a newer version prohibitively expensive.
Besides, whenever we start a new campaign the DM will select only three additional expansion books that will be in play for the campaign alongside the core books, which allows us to make targeted campaigns with a particular focus and limits the potential for min/maxed character builds. It also means that each campaign has its own flavour, rather than every campaign feeling somehow the same which they would if we were to use every book every time. The campaign we are currently running, for example, uses (in addition to the trinity) Cityscape, Complete Adventurer and Heroes of Horror.
Of course (and going off topic slightly), we have many other RPGs to fall back on if a long run of traditional D&D gets a bit stale. Iron Kingdoms, CyberPunk, Firefly, All Flesh Must Be Eaten, Paranoia, Call of Cthulhu, Mutants and Masterminds and Star Wars all have places on the group bookshelves.
Our group plays 3.5. Mostly because over the years we've built an extensive homebrew setting, which we've gotten quite invested in. We've discussed switching to 5e, but decided against it because the amount of work to convert everything would be herculean. The other GM and I are struggling to prep sessions to maintain the schedule as it is. We alternate the duty, giving the other a breather to just play, and maybe do some advance prep work, but even then irl responsibilities often mess things up.
Our current campaign is sort of made up of three sections, with each GM running one of two serious main quest lines, and the third reserved for more lighthearted and comedic one-offs (mostly done by me).
This is our group atm:
Quinn - LN Elan Psion 15 (other GM)
Tal Marro - LE Human Barbarian 7/Bear Warrior 5/Warshaper 3 (he likes bears. a lot)
Nythra - N Catfolk 'Swift Hunter' Scout 3/Ranger 11
Mericia - LN Succubus 7/Favored Soul 8[footnote]Before anyone points out a succubus can't be LN, deities in our setting love proving their way is best and can be huge dicks about it, Olympian style, even the 'Good' ones. She is the newest addition to the group, and yes, based on Overwatch's Mercy.[/footnote]
Desmond - CN Human Wizard 5/Master Specialist (Transmutation) 10 (that's me)
He's batshit crazy. He wants to be the good guy and a hero, but is more or less incapable of really understanding what being good is (not for lack of trying), and even then his frequent delusions and hallucinations make him perceive his actions as much more benign than they really are (think the Meet The Pyro video, but much less inherently violent). That said, he if frequently the most congenial and selfless of the group, ready to take up a good cause at a moments notice, because he thinks it's fun. He also wears a painted fox mask (inspired by Okami) he refuses to take off for any reasons, so the rest of the party doesn't know what he actually looks like under it. For some reason, Desmond is also a good cook.
If you'd ask him about himself, he'd say he comes from a super secret underwater volcano lab IN SPACE, the result of a failed experiment to create the perfect insane mage from parts of lesser insane mages. That's just what he tells everyone and the story keeps changing. His actual origins (and name, for that matter) are unknown and Desmond himself doesn't care enough to pursue the truth. I purposely made his background vague and nonsensical and his attitude to it indifferent to leave the other GM the choice of doing something with it or not. So far, I'm really enjoying where he's taking it.
Recent revelations in his subplot indicate some of his story may possibly be somewhat true. In one quest, we've come across an old dilapidated tower that once belonged to a very powerful, but long dead Wizard. An intricate stained glass window on one floor showed a portrait whose appearance is identical to Desmonds (Which only he noticed because of the mask). We've also come into conflict with agents of an organization who refer to Desmond as 'the project'. He accidentally briefly lost his mask in an unrelated encounter with a hostile Wizard, giving the other a glimpse at his face, prompting dumbfounded 'impossible' (before Tal ripped him in half. He needs his daily bloodbath).
Also, I'm well aware of 3.Ps reputation for munchkinry.
I take a somewhat dim view of minmaxing myself. I find it locks the game into a needlessly restrictive meta of 'viable' builds and an overly large focus on the mechanical, rather than the roleplaying. While I create characters that can effectively fill a role, I don't go out of my way to optimize. However, as a GM, I make it my business to know about all of the minmax techniques and abuse prone stuff, just so I can recognize it and act accordingly to prevent our games from devolving into a one-man-show, or worse, an optimization arms race. It happened once. Wasn't much fun.
Marik2 said:
Anyone know a place where I can read DnD sessions?
It might not be exactly what you're looking for, but check out the Giant in the Playground [http://www.giantitp.com/forums/forum.php] and Min Max Boards [http://minmaxforum.com/] forums. It might take some searching through the subforums, but some people there like to do campaign journals.
crimson5pheonix said:
Another question, if I may hijack this thread a bit, what is everyone's favorite D&D setting (or another RPG setting if you're feeling saucy)?
Out of the official settings: Planescape, Ravenloft and Dark Sun. But as mentioned above, we run a homebrew setting.
I'd like to try Spelljammer, but 3.5 resources for that are limited. They recently released Starfinder aka Pathfinder Spelljammer, so I might just nick and backport stuff from that as needed.
I've tried to convince my group to try a short little Call of Cthulhu campaign, on the basis that it's similar enough to D&D 3.5 for a quick in a out, but the stubborn gits don't wanna.
So, I did a CoC style 3.5 one-off. Got away with it clean and they really liked it. Yes, next time I ask, they'll have no more excuses...
I have the book for the Call of Cthulu game. I wanna try it out, mostly cause I am intrigued by its skill system since its kinda TES-like, and I kinda wanna make my own RPG rule-set that if its good, uses that skill system to essentially make a TES type tabletop RPG.
I have the book for the Call of Cthulu game. I wanna try it out, mostly cause I am intrigued by its skill system since its kinda TES-like, and I kinda wanna make my own RPG rule-set that if its good, uses that skill system to essentially make a TES type tabletop RPG.
Some people are already working on an unofficial Elder Scrolls rpg. Here's dev site. [http://uesrpg.blogspot.be/]. Seems to use a D100 system based on Dark Heresy.
Might not be your thing, but it could help you along in some way. [small]You know, pillage and plunder[/small]
I've tried to convince my group to try a short little Call of Cthulhu campaign, on the basis that it's similar enough to D&D 3.5 for a quick in a out, but the stubborn gits don't wanna.
So, I did a CoC style 3.5 one-off. Got away with it clean and they really liked it. Yes, next time I ask, they'll have no more excuses...
We almost have the opposite problem, most of our group really wants to play another couple of Cthulhu campaigns but the member of our group who owns the books vastly prefers playing as a PC rather than DMing and keeps changing the subject whenever we bring it up! I think I might steal your idea and run a D&D campaign using the Planar Handbook and Lords of Madness. Cheers fella.
I have the book for the Call of Cthulu game. I wanna try it out, mostly cause I am intrigued by its skill system since its kinda TES-like, and I kinda wanna make my own RPG rule-set that if its good, uses that skill system to essentially make a TES type tabletop RPG.
Some people are already working on an unofficial Elder Scrolls rpg. Here's dev site. [http://uesrpg.blogspot.be/]. Seems to use a D100 system based on Dark Heresy.
Might not be your thing, but it could help you along in some way. [small]You know, pillage and plunder[/small]
I'm currently playing a campaign in 5e with my boyfriend and our two best friends. I'm playing a beast mastery ranger and the DM gave me a sideways glance but allowed me to use a horse as my animal companion based on the revised rules for Ranger that they put out a while ago XD it's awesome. Storm of Teeth and Claws is OP af
You'll have to forgive me for being a scrub- I've only played in one session so far and listened to some podcasts and such. I have heard that Rangers in 5e are really underpowered, which is a shame because I would really like to make one. I grew up reading R.A. Salvatore books and watching Lord of the Rings so the idea of a woodland all weapons Ranger really appeals to me. I think I heard recently about an unearthed arcana for a non-magical Ranger or something like that which is what I'm looking for. Any insight into building a viable Ranger that doesn't necessarily spend his time with animals?
You'll have to forgive me for being a scrub- I've only played in one session so far and listened to some podcasts and such. I have heard that Rangers in 5e are really underpowered, which is a shame because I would really like to make one. I grew up reading R.A. Salvatore books and watching Lord of the Rings so the idea of a woodland all weapons Ranger really appeals to me. I think I heard recently about an unearthed arcana for a non-magical Ranger or something like that which is what I'm looking for. Any insight into building a viable Ranger that doesn't necessarily spend his time with animals?
Yeah, the base edition of Ranger is pretty generally considered woefully underpowered. They recently put out a variation on the base-game version of Ranger that beefed them up quite a bit specifically to combat how dissatisfied a lot of players were with what had happened to Ranger in 5e: [link]https://media.wizards.com/2016/dnd/downloads/UA_RevisedRanger.pdf[/link]
I LOVE Revised Ranger. It's got some really nifty damage bonuses that always make my fellow players give me envious looks when I hit something :3
Luckily for your purposes, there is already a non-animal-based spec for Ranger, called Hunter, if you don't want to have to mess around too much with the class. It's got a blend of features that work in melee combat OR ranged, so you can dual-wield swords, or use a 1h weapon and a shield (which is what I'm doing currently) if you'd rather that than having all your bonuses be tied to archery. At level 11 the Hunter conclave of Ranger gets a feature that basically allows you to attack any creature within reach, using only one action! It can be a lot of fun to RP, definitely puts me in mind of Aragorn fighting off the Nazgul at Amon Sul.
Otherwise, there IS an Unearthed Arcana for a Spell-less Ranger conclave, but I... can't seem to google-fu it anymore. It might be that they removed the pdf file, but there are dozens of threads offering advice about how to implement it (they come up when I search for the name of the pdf, "Class Design Variants"), and I personally have the pdf downloaded. It's an interesting little number because it's not entirely "spell-less" so to speak, so much as replacing the spellslots with features that are generally useable per short or long rest, and the Combat Superiority "Maneuvers" feature of Battle-master Fighter. If your interest in it is to do with dispensing with the administrative crap of having to remember how many spellslots you've used/not wanting to spend time picking out spells everytime you level, you will have to replace that with counting your superiority dice and picking out maneuvers. If your interest is purely for the fun of it, I'm sure it would work pretty well! There are some real nice melee combat maneuvers, which you can find in the Battle-Master Fighter details of the Player's Handbook (if you have it!).
Alternatively, they've juuuuuust recently put out an Unearthed Arcana document of specs for Ranger and Rogue, with a Rogue Scout spec that is pretty much Ranger-flavoured! [link]https://media.wizards.com/2016/dnd/downloads/2017_01_UA_RangerRogue_0117JCMM.pdf[/link] It might be that you feel like that would fit your purposes better - I could certainly read a Scout Rogue with shortswords and a bow as a Tolkien-esque Ranger, and it dispenses with the spells and animals both, to focus on pure combat.
With the revision to Ranger though I've definitely found myself holding my own alongside the warlocks and sorcerers that my boyfriend/best friend play. Favoured Enemy is great for bonus damage, and Rangers get a d10 hit die, so I get to laugh whenever we get hit by fireballs and I'm still mostly okay with my many many hit points while the spellcasters cry XD
I hope this helps! I'm sorry if I've not explained things properly or anything, just let me know and I can try to clarify
You'll have to forgive me for being a scrub- I've only played in one session so far and listened to some podcasts and such. I have heard that Rangers in 5e are really underpowered, which is a shame because I would really like to make one. I grew up reading R.A. Salvatore books and watching Lord of the Rings so the idea of a woodland all weapons Ranger really appeals to me. I think I heard recently about an unearthed arcana for a non-magical Ranger or something like that which is what I'm looking for. Any insight into building a viable Ranger that doesn't necessarily spend his time with animals?
WOW thank you so much for all of this. I'm at work right now but I can't wait to dig into some of this and learn more. I really appreciate you typing all this up. I am not opposed to messing with spell slots or any of that administrative work. I'd like to get a firm grasp of all the various mechanics. I made a Paladin as my first character basically because I had a backstory and a playstyle in mind that really suited one but I'm itching to branch out and learn the other classes that play differently. The hunter style ranger and the rogue scout both sounds really interesting. To me a focus on animals is more in the domain of a druid than a ranger, even though I know mechanically they are very different. I am definitely looking to play a combat focused, dual weapon and short bow type of character that in my mind really flows through combat encounters. In some ways a fighter might be a better pick but I'm drawn to the flavor of the Ranger.
New question- Anyone have any particularly interesting or creative character backstories? I am very into the roleplay aspect of the game and trying to understand these characters' motivations.
It's not particularly creative, but for my first character (a Paladin) he served some time in the local town guard but was always dissatisfied. He had witnessed a Paladin rescue a young woman during a mugging and had always aspired to one day help people like that Paladin had. Eventually he starts a family and joins the Paladins and then the day off/before/soon after his final initiation he is meditating on his duties and what it means to be a Paladin and his family is murdered during a break-in. He slaughters the two thieves and forsakes the order after realizing all his faith and commitment did nothing to stop his personal tragedy. So he spends his life on the road as a hero for hire of sorts, righting wrong where he finds them and protecting those he has the power to help.
So all in all he resembles a man who has lost his faith and his way, but still holds true to the virtues that brought him towards the Order. He is definitely a bit of a cynic, but finds laughs where he can and could be brought back to the light under the right conditions. He puts little faith in bureaucracy and keeps those who have proven their loyalty and friendship close.
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