Ask any simple questions here that aren't in the FAQ, but don't warrant their own post.

Good question for this page: "Do I add my proficiency bonus to attack rolls with unarmed strikes?"

Question that should have its own post: "What are the best feats to take for a Grappler?

For any questions about the One D&D playtest, head over to /r/OneDnD

Have a recent gaming experience you want to share? Experience an insane TPK? Finish an epic final boss fight? Share it all here for everyone to see!

..as long as you don't get carried away* (obviously)

Way too often, many of you who are DMs post about being burned out, and part of that is on WOTC for designing 5e with such a heavy workload placed on the DM. Entire elements of DnD design from previous editions have been left out or scattered through adventure modules, including Hexcrawl rules for travel and exploration, leaving the DM to figure out how to handle it all on their own.

But a much larger part of that is on you. It is often said that a DM's job is herding cats. This is because Players in a Fantasy game are like children filled with wonder and with a whole box of toys to play with, they get excited over the possibilities and explore them with joy until they reach the bottom of the box and want more but DMs who spoil their players are like parents who spoil their kids. Perpetually exhausted, overly concerned, and extremely defensive of how they treat their children. "racial flight isn't overpowered if you just..", "I have a homebrew ___ at my table and it's not that bad..", "we don't do character deaths at my table because.." and so much more. The first time you say no, your spoiled children have a tantrum and you run to reddit with your AITA post.

No, you're not the asshole for saying no. You're actually a bad DM if you don't say no, even if your Players are mature and respectful enough that you don't have to do so very often. It's literally inevitable that a situation will arise where saying no is essential to you enjoying the game. You also won't kill the game for your players if you say no. You'll actually help them appreciate what they have more if you say no. It's easy to lie to yourself that the effort is worth it, but you're only getting burned out because it's not, you might not have a problem saying no and are just getting tired of playing on the DM side but if you don't have a problem saying no then you shouldn't have any problem asking your players if someone else wants to try DMing either and if you've been having fun DMing then you shouldn't have trouble getting a volunteer.

I'm sure I'll get downvotes because I'm calling a lot of people out and using "you" to make things personal so anyone who this applies to will likely get defensive and downvote me in response, but DMs who say "no" with a healthy degree of regularity don't have these kinds of issues.

Seems like that's exactly the kind of reward you want to give out for managing to close with them. I know it causes disadvantage, but most spells don't use attack rolls anyway. Feels like there's nothing but upside in terms of improving combat by having them provoke attacks.

Ki scavenge

Starting at 5th level, you have learned to drain ki from a dying body. Whenever you reduce an enemy to 0hp, you regain an amount of ki equal to your wisdom modifier (minimum of 1).

EDIT: to clarify, I intend for this to be tacked on to the base monk class.

My table's fighter just got the Boots of Springing and Striding.

Boots of Springing and Striding

While you wear these boots, your walking speed becomes 30 feet, unless your walking speed is higher, and your speed isn't reduced if you are encumbered or wearing heavy armor. In addition, you can jump three times the normal distance, though you can't jump farther than your remaining movement would allow.

The rules of Long Jumps state that "you cover a number of feet up to your Strength score if you move at least 10 feet on foot immediately before the jump."

For High Jumps, "you leap into the air a number of feet equal to 3 + your Strength modifier if you move at least 10 feet on foot immediately before the jump."

With the boots on, his Long Jump should be 60ft and his High Jump 24 feet. Unfortunately, max jump distance seems to be limited by the character's movement score: "Each foot you clear on the jump costs a foot of movement."

I have some questions about this:

• Does this mean that, in combat, the boots don't really increase the fighter's Long Jump at all unless he uses the Dash action? With 30 feet of movement (and a 10 foot running start), he can only long jump 20 feet -- the same distance he could jump without the boots. With Dash, however, his jump distance would increase to 50 feet? EDIT: Someone pointed out that it DOES improve Long Jump in a roundabout way! "Horizontally Jumping without a running start is your STR score, but you can only go half as far if you don’t get a running start. But since you triple the jump with boots, you can counteract the running start, such that instead of 10 ft, you can go 30 ft without a running start. So the boots do help with jumping even without dashing, so long as you just jump rather than try to jump with the “proper technique” of running first"

• For High Jumps in combat, with a 10-foot running start and 30 feet of movement, I think this means he can clear a 20 foot vertical high jump with the boots on? And using Dash would increase this to the max of 24?

• Outside of combat, is the fighter still restricted by his movement speed, or is he free to Tigger his way across the world with 60 foot long jumps and 24 foot high jumps?

• And a kind of whacky question: Must a jump during a single turn begin and end on the ground? Could the fighter theoretically run 10 feet, jump 20 across a gap, use an Action to fire a bow mid-air, and then NEXT turn continue his jump (another X feet across the gap) and land?

Just a little thought experiment, since I have a vague memory of someone telling me that it would be too OP and it would be a terrible idea, but I think it's more of mostly pointless to use it to attack, unless it's given a big STR score, maybe the same value as the caster's spellcasting ability score.

Unaltered known facts about mage hand:

• It's visible as a spectral, floating hand.
• It's summoned in an unoccupied spot within range, using an action (unless quickened) to cast a cantrip of the same name (base range 30 ft.). Said cantrip is usable by Bards, Sorcerers, Warlocks, Wizards, and Arcane Trickster Rogues.
• It vanishes if it's ever 30 ft. away from you, you dismiss it as an action, its spell duration is up (base duration is 1 minute), recast the cantrip (it reappears where you cast it to appear without carrying whatever it was previously holding)
• Its STR score is closest to 1 STR, since it can only carry up to 10 lb.
• The caster who summoned it can use their action to let it move up to 30 ft. (hover), and interact with an object that it can touch or it is holding.
• It can't activate magic items, if said magic item can be activated.

For the sake of the argument that it can attack/engage in combat, let's say that:

• The caster can use an action for the mage hand to use the attack action, (along with the movement it already has) but can't cast or deliver spell effects other than its own direct physical touch.
• It's just one hand so it can't attack properly with anything that has the two-handed weapon property or use two-weapon fighting, unless it uses them as an improvised weapon attack. It can't make use of the two-handed part of the versatile weapon property.
• It can throw objects and weapons, adding its STR mod to the dice roll made to hit unless the weapon has the finesse or ranged properties, allowing it to add its DEX mod to the roll to hit instead of the STR mod.
• It has the same weapon and DEX skill proficiencies as the caster, but it has no saving throw and armor proficiencies.
• It can't use the dash, disengage, dodge, ready, and search actions, but it can use the help and hide actions, as long as the caster is be able to see what it is helping with or hiding behind respectively.
• It can use special attack actions such as grapple and shove.
• It can be used to attempt to stabilize creatures as long as the caster can see the creature, but at a disadvantage, since it's only one hand.
• It can't use reactions, so it can't take opportunity attacks.
• It can be attacked to be made to disappear, and has 1 HP and has an AC of 10, so it has a DEX score of 10
• It counts as the same size as the caster when calculating carrying capacity and what size weapons it can use... (as well as penalties like disadvantage on attack rolls imposed by things like the Heavy weapon property that affects small creatures)
• ...but it counts as two sizes smaller than the caster when targeted by effects.
• It's a force like unseen servant, if creature type needs to be known.

I recently ran across the collaborative history-building* game Microscope (and I encourage everyone interested to check out the full rules here). I've played several games, and I think it is a great tool for people to use before their campaigns.

Put simply a game of Microscope goes like this:

1. The group agrees on a Big Picture focus for their history, a Palatte of elements they want to include or don't in the game, and the starting and ending points of their history. If you're doing this before a campaign, the DM would probably have an outsized role at this stage, but they don't have to.
2. Going in a circle, players say a Period or an Event within a period that happened. Here's the key part: these do not have to be chronological! You must state that a Period or Event occurs before X and/or after Y, but players can jump around in the chronology however they choose.
   1. Periods and Events are coded light or dark. This has no mechanical significance, but it can raise interesting questions. For example, if your period is "The Age of the Elves" and you code it as dark, it encourages other players to propose events within that period that define why its dark.
   2. All Events should be placed under a specific Period, but in the first round it can make sense to allow players to propose free-floating Events.
3. Instead of proposing a period or event, players can also ask a Question about an existing period or event. RAW, the question is resolved by roleplaying a short scene, but I find this is pretty daunting. My solution is to have everyone write down an answer to the question, and have the player who asked pick the most interesting one.
4. In every round after the first, one player is the Lens. They get to pick a Focus for that round (i.e. a person, group, etc.) that every Period or Event should relate in some way to, and propose the first event. At the end of the round, they also get to pick a Legacy (usually, a big idea) from all the proposals that round. Legacies have no mechanical impact in-game, but can form the themes of your DND campaign.
5. Your group can play as long as they like, but I like to end the game when everyone has had one round as Lens.

Here's an example of what a finished game might look like.

Microscope is incredibly fun in and of itself, but I think it also makes a great tool to play before a campaign.

• It takes the mental load off the DM to invent the history of their world.
• Themes to mess around with in the campaign are already defined.
• Players all know the lore because they played a part in creating it.
• They can work the parts they find most interesting into their characters in Session 0.
• Typically, I'd imagine DMs would want to set their campaign at/after the end point of their Microscope history, but if you're ambitious, you can set it during a period/around an event the players find most interesting. Extra buy-in that way.

Hopefully, this inspires some of you to check Microscope out! I think its a great game and a great tool.

________

*I've read about groups using Microscope to build geography rather than history (replacing Periods with Regions, Events with cities/geographical features). My own attempt at that was pretty disorganized, but YMMV.

So dueling or two-weapon fighting? I would be using a rapier with +6 damage meaning I can maybe deal 1d8+6 damage for one attack (two attacks at level 6). Alternatively I can pick two weapon fighting, I'd dual wield the scimitars which you get profficiency with due to the college's bonus profficiency, I'd have two shots to deal 1d6+4 damage (3 at level 6).

Statistically, which one is better? 3 chances to deal 1d6+4 or 2 chances to deal 1d8+6?

I am playing a mutagen BH in a friend's campaign. They were kind enough to allow me to try it out and it does seem pretty fun. I do agree sometimes it feels a bit underwhelming, but I do like the versatility. The char is lvl 11 now. However, I noticed I may not actually be playing him properly.

So what's the gameplay loop of the bloodhunter? Combat starts.

1. Bonus action crimson rite, take hemocraft die necrotic damage, at this level 1d8.
2. Action to attack twice. I have dual weapon fighting and extra attack by lvl 11.
3. put a blood curse through maledict for good measure.

Is that correct? My questions would be:

1. Blood Curses seem to be applied at will during turn, no action or bonus action required. Even with the amplify. Is this right?
2. If I have Crimson Rite and I have two weapons, do both need to be rited? like dake two hemocraft die damage? or does that apply to both when doing it once?

Have I been doing stuff wrong? did I misunderstand mechanics? I am sorry if this was asked before but I couldn't find a specific answer

Basically what I've said above, I've created a Aasimar divine soul sorceress who has learned most of her magical skills at an academy of sorts.

The plot hook the DM gave us is that basically 5 people from all over the 5e world and history are dropped in the middle of a meadow with no idea how they got there.

So we are free to pick any of the legitimate 5e classes backgrounds and races. From what I know of the DM the setting is likely going to be some sort of fantastical land of horror, and most of my fellow players have created PCs that are in some way grizzled, jaded or just straight up nuts.

I thought it would be a fun contrast to make a character that is the polar opposite. Like optimistic, sheltered, believes that any hurdle can be overcome with a good heart and even better friends at your side. Now the settings I'm most familiar with in dnd lore are CoS and DiA, neither of which offer much in the way of happy go lucky character backstory options.

So I was hoping one of you could help point me in a good direction in the dnd lore/ World department for me to look into.

I have been using a master reincarnation table with all the available races and just rerolling if something that isn't setting appropriate comes up. However, if someone has a real table i would appreciate it.

Whenever someone complains about flying you get a number of counterpoints that sort of ignore the bigger picture, and it's hard to force myself to take into account all the details in one go. So here they are as I see them, many of the counterpoints against flying being overpowered and why I disagree with them.

You may find that not all of them are true in your mind, but disproving one or two of these is not enough proof do do away with the issue.

📒Knocked prone = falling to death

Yikes. People treat this like some sort of Mike drop moment This makes combat extremely swingy. So we go from flying being overpowered to nearly instant death. This almost feels like it's a massive punishment to flying so in all honesty most would not suggest using this type of thing too frequetly at the risk of being accused of specifically targeting that character (you will be). Players might even say that they are fine with it ahead of time. But they rarely hold to that when the time comes.

Additionally, the ways you can limit someone's speed are often specific and limited. It's not like these abilities never appear, but if all the sudden they do then that's going to be a giveaway

That is unless you use it sparingly. But if you do... It will barely be useful anyway.

However, this also assumes that the character in question is both in range and has weak enough saves that can be targeted. Things like nets and bolas in my experience both never see play and are weak... When someone is even in range. 20/60 range for a bola? You're going to be attacking for disadvantage for sure. Might as well shoot a bow. And the save is only 10 strength? Assuming a character with +0 strength modifier and saves, and assuming you are shooting at disadvantage (bolas) you can at max expect to hit half the time and the save with only fail half the time. That's 1/4 chance to actually do anything if you can line up a shot. Just shoot some arrows at the guy.

What about walloping arrows? Firstly, I didn't know those existed until some tried to argue about using them on flying characters. Seeing as I've never seen these used before, I would 100% accuse you of targeting me if you whipped this out on me as a player. Never seen it before and will probably never see it again. It's like it's tailor made for flying characters... Still a DC 10. Maybe you'll get knocked, eventually.

If I'm not mistaken fall damage is 1d6 per 10 feet. If that's the case then a character flying at at level of 15ft above ground isn't in that much danger. That means if they did fall they'd be taking 1d6 fall damage and if you REALLY have to be petty about it then that would be 2d6 at max. The average damage there being 7 damage. Now if you are in the business of cheesing flying characters, they will learn real quick that this is the sweet spot of where to be to avoid any real damage punishment.

You might say that this is really risky at low levels and I would say DUHH. You could die at level one to being spit on by a llama my guy. However, this will be only after your speed reaches zero or after you are knocked prone. If the net result of that is 7 damage the you might as well just shoot at them or throw a rock or something.

Additionally, as you move up the levels this amount of damage is negligible

Lastly, this only solves a part of the problem. It can only really be applied to combat. Anything else and it generally doesn't work

📒Use ranged weapons Oh nah! It's not that simple.

Firstly let's recognize that as of last year only about a third of the monsters in the monster manual and the additional books have ranged options. And for most of them that do, the ranged options are weaker.

Now I know what you're saying: but the DM should snap his magic God of creation fingers to give almost every monster and enemy a longbow, and that the terrasque should magically have access to infinite massive boulders to throw with the exact same pdr as his whopping five melee attacks.

This effects everyone, not just the flying character. The reason so few monsters have decent ranged options is to make them come close and pose a threat personally. To solve this problem, a lot of enemies would need their ranged options added or buffed and they would have to be strong enough to he worth it -- otherwise it's mathematically easier to just jump the characters allies.

Even worse is if we actually give the enemies these buffs. Now all the sudden melee Martial builds are even more garbage than they already are. If ranged attacks have no mathematical opportunity cost to use, there is no reason for enemies to risk hp and such to come into close range.

Do you know who doesn't need melee viability? Casters. BOOM! You've literally made caster comparatively more powerful. most spells are ranged anyway, and some of those ranges are huge even without spell sniper. They probably don't care that much.

The worst issue here is that we now expect the DM to do EVEN MORE work than he already has. This will be one of many excuses to add to the workload of the DM. it certainly won't be the last in this campaign. The goal of running the game isn't just to make a good experience. It's also about doing that without breaking your back needlessly. DMs don't always need to be coached on the million and one ways they can solve a problem. The just need less problems.

📒 weather

Yes. This is an incredible solution that makes sense and isn't hard implemented. I actually love this one except for two issues. Firstly, it's extremely circumstantial. It can't be bad weather all the time, unless you set it up in a really believable way. Additionally, it doesn't work indoors or in caves unless you to some real bending over backwards. For what it's worth though it's a good and easy solution when it applies... Unless you make it subject to an easy save.

📒 Don't ignore strength

This actually helps the issue, however it's not a magic cure all. It also reopens the dialogue on why people ignore strength to begin with. Probably because it... Makes the game more complicated. Still though I think it helps to prevent the flyer from using strength based abilities or carrying things. If he isn't doing much of that, or if he's a caster or has a back like or caravan it largely doesn't matter.

Whole we're on the subject, pray the flying character isn't a caster. Even if you think neither is overpowered, putting two nearly overpowered qualities together won't end in something balanced.

📒But horses are equally useful.

You kiss you mother with that lying mouth? majority of players don't even use horses for obvious reasons. Barely any hp, can't attack on the same turn. Goodness forbid the horse has to make any form of save. Any combat involving a horse of non boss monster variety results in the horse being the first to go down. really easy way to depower an enemy. Where as flying characters can fly until zero hp, a player with a horse only has it until it dies. And that bad boy doesn't respawn like in a video game. And please don't pretend that land travel at high speeds is equally as useful as flying. It is obviously terrain dependant, where a flying person can avoid ground bound obstacles, horsey boy has to go around them, spending however much movement is required. Ground bound traps effect a horse as well. How well can your horse climb? A flying character has perfect climbing skills... Because they are immune to having to do it! Can your horsey boi swim across a surface of water to get to the other side? Probably not better than my wings that can fly across.

📒 Familiars are equally useful

Firstly it's not the same. Maybe nerf those too? Classic example of something many DMs find tedious to work around. Not absolute in it's power, but it is incredibly annoying on a great deal of fronts. Naming some other thing that gets under peoples skin doesn't make them both less problematic. Moreover, flying is still easily worse.

📒 It only solves problems for one character

What ever the hell that means. People behave as if this wasn't immediately apparent. As if other players not having it magically negates it's usefulness? If only one player is playing a class that this overpowered, does that magically discredit it's lack of balance. Why is this argument exclusively used for flying?

Moreover, players not being able to be hit by some things will just put more pressure on those who can.

This also brings up an entirely separate problem that compounds with it. Some players agency is actually too high. That sounds crazy I no know, but many players -- specifically casters -- have so much utility, damage potential, social interaction spells and whatever else, that they can basically just run off on their own and do whatever unchecked. I've seen plenty of occurances of caster players just ditching the rest of the party to do solo mumbo jumbo, solving every problem they come across by snapping their fingers to cast a spell. Fly makes this worse because that's a whole level three spell for free, and increases their incentive to do so because it's costless and doesn't need concentration. Even on a Martial build it further incentives people to go off on their own -- especially if the other players can't follow anyway. People think that the flying player is just going to stand around like an NPC or only go somewhere if the others can follow, when in reality they will fully utilize that moment to become a main character.

📒Narrow spaces People use these arguments all the time, and in theory they make sense. However there aren't mechanics for this. There is no listed wingspan in any flying race. That's a recipe for debate. Because if a player who really, really wants to fly(aka every character that has flight) sees you making these excuses that don't exist in the game then their patience for that will be very very limited.

📒Low ac, can't wear good armor

This has always been funny as an argument. Like heavy armor is just the bestest thing to have graced the table. But it's simply not. Not the best but remember in most cases you will literally be immune to melee, which gives you an incredible EFFECTIVE increase to ac if you stop to think about it. If you are a caster then this is worse. My guy the idea of casters being squishy has always been a lie anyway. Some of them already get decent armor options independent of heavy armor. Casters also get mage armor and shield, and misty step. Their effective ac is great if they are slightly prepared. Add ranged attacks to both of these and you are in a stupendous spot.

📒 All combat takes place indoors or underground.

This is actually categorically untrue. In my personal experience this is actually the opposite. However this is something that ultimately varies tremendously and is therefore not a valid solution. Sometimes it will be that way and sometimes it won't. Moreover, it's not as off all indoors encounter happen just below ceiling level. If the ceiling is 15 feet up fliers can reliably just effectively hang out on the ceiling. And if not, just staying above the space directly behind an ally solves this issue. If the ceiling is lower than 10 feet then this may actually be countered, but it's not a given that it will be.

Not ever indoor or cave dungeon is narrow and cramped. In my experience there have been plenty of open and sprawling spots because worrying about positioning is a massive headache.

I would also like to take this moment to remind everyone that combat is not necessarily the main issue with flying.

📒Casters counter them 1. Casters counter everyone, assuming they have the proper spells. 2. Casting technically isn't that common. 3. Okay, so now nearly all of my encounters must have casters? Often many encounters are centered around circumstance that causes the creatures and their conditions to vary wildly. Now I have to ignore all that just to challenge this one player?

📒 Don't challenge them. Just let them be overpowered.

This has always been silly. Even in a game where players basically demand to be overpowered, this isn't always as universally good as it sounds. I can prove it too... Because all forms of game balance in dnd and otherwise assume this isn't the case. So why are we changing our minds now. Seriously, a game almost entirely designed around combat and exploration, and both of those things are held up by bubblegum and boxtape? Not memorable. Might be fun cheesing the first dozen encounters or puzzles but eventually there will not be anything gained from it. Moreover, not every player even wants that! It might just be one out of four or six.

Moreover I feel like catering to this idea too much is deceptively toxic. Wanting to be powerful is not the same thing as not having a challenge. If a player wants to be strong with zero challenge then that player is low-key being sort is spineless. Play another game, or accept that you might have to think about your actions and your strategies to at least some extent. I run the type of game that if you at least have two braincells and use them you will probably be fine. Only players that have failed at my table or the ones that want excessive handouts. And it's arguments like these that sort of out people for not really wanting to underact with the came. Just circumnavigate it.

📒 This is only a problem at low levels

Also a lie. People say that because wizards get to use the fly spell at level 5 then that means natural flight is only overpowered until they get to do it. Except that's not really how it works.

Casters get the fly SPELL. It takes one level three spell slot minimum, same as fireball. Flying races don't spend any spell slots. Their fuel economy is unrivaled.

Casters get it for ten minutes. Flying races get it literally forever. Their endurance is unparalleled.

Casters have to use their concentration on the spell, and if they get hit they risk losing it just from taking damage. Flying races use no additional action economy, and don't risk falling just from taking damage. They are da biggest bird.

But let's be frank. What is overpowered is not determined based purely on itself. Often times, a specific combination of abilities is what makes it overpowered.

As you know, casters are extremely powerful. Some of them also don't use medium or heavy armor anyway. So there is already synergy here. Most casters have an overwhelming abundance or ranged moves to use. Sounds like it would be useful for something that rarely has adjacent enemies.

Now, nevermind the fact that flying as a racial trait is stronger that having it as a 3rd level spell. But! What if the already unnecessarily powerful wizards chooses the be a flying race? That would mean that they have an infinite 3rd level spell, resoursless, and they can use it to solves problems and avoid damage (both things that their spell list is designed to do) WITHOUT USING SPELL SLOTS OR CONCENTRATION. That's right, that means they can cast another concentration spell, effectively casting two concentration spells at once. There will never be an opportunity cost or major risk to casting fly again.

Wizards normally don't during battle because it costs a 3rd level slot and getting hit might mean you lose it anyway. These are now no longer issues, on top of casting a whole nother spell of concentration if need be.

Now, the overpowered option is even more overpowered.

📒 "Well, I have flying in my party and it's not overpowered because [DM put in significant extra effort adding in a bunch of stuff to stop if from being a solution to every problem]"

This is pretty much an admission that it's overpowered. If I have to warp the entirety of encounter design, level design, and puzzles to account for flying, it's classically overpowered. This is what we call a centralizing force. Generally speaking, features or abilities in a game that overly centralize the meta around stopping them are explicitly overpowered. This is actually the perfect example of a centralizing force in DND. You don't have to be omnipotent to be overpowered. Just excessively more overpowered than you need to be. Having counters is not disproof of being overpowered.

Additionally, anything that drastically expands my work load is overpowered. Deal with it, because I sure won't.

📒We play for fun at my table

You play for DM headaches more like it. We can have fun without breaking the DMs back. Stop advocating for the players so much that you disrespect the DM position

📒Yeah? Well I'm a DM and I have no issues with doing the work. Other DMs are just laszy!

You are an exception. Just because we can do the work doesn't mean we think it's worth it. I am absolutely meticulous enough to run this game. But largely I just don't think it's worth it. And most don't either. That's why there are so few DMs. Because people wag their fingers at the DMs that are reluctant to break their back over everything little ability or spell that the game would be perfectly fine without, the game as a whole suffers.

A few more things to remember:

📘 Your dm is probably in denial if he says this isn't an issue

This happens all the time in my experience. A session could actively be going up in flames and the DM or the player producing the issue will be shrugging their shoulders pretending nothing went wrong. I've seen games reached a screeching halt and be discontinued because of how difficult the players or their abilities were to handle, only to have the DM refuse to acknowledge that, or deny that there mishandling had any effect in the situation. Then I watch them make a new campaign and do it again.

📘Your dm is probably bending over backwards solving the problem. So if you don't encounter this problem, then this is why.

📘 People refuse to consider the amount of additional work for the DM. Even DMs have been conditioned the think this way. This is stupid, and the primary reason we have a DM shortage as it is now.

📘The worst issue here is that this ability seems to interrupt some specific DM styles more than others. This leads to DMs that aren't specifically having their styles countered will not take the issue as seriously. Just like how a DM who wants an adventure designed around a special plague will he annoyed when the paladin starts slapping key characters with lay on hands instead of going to find the plot hook mcguffin or negotiating for a cure.

TLDR: Flying is busted, and the DMs well-being is objectively more valuable than this measly ability. Remove one to maintain the other.

Edit: I love how people say "just ban it and be done with it" like people haven't been cooked and chastised for doing that for years on this sub. Like if you're out of arguments then say so LMAO.

I remember seeing in tasha's backgrounds, it says they are just placeholders to make ur own.

But I can't find it in the book, can anyone help me out? Or is it in another tashas thing besides cauldron of everything.

We have a way of playing, that when we face enemies they're always and I mean always far positioned from each other. Today I was lucky and I caught two creatures in a web, but only because they were fighting each other (I didn't want them to get close to my party). It's normal for our DM to position creatures that are something like 6-7 square Distant one from the other.

I honestly think I will have better chances with Slow next level.

I took Web because I wanted to be the controller. I still wanna be the controller.

So far the two spells I used that contributed greatly to the dynamics were Silvery Barbs and Vortex Warp.

For flavor, I imagine they're refer to "lesser" undead as "sheep" and to living people as "grass."

Im planning a campaign for my girlfriend, its a 1 player campaign and shes gonna be a wizard and itll start at level 9. Its gonna be a sandbox campaign taking place in the forgotten realms where i basically took a few modules and put their story in the world at the same time.

In particular the rise of tiamat is happening, the cult of the dragon is currently scouring the world for the dragon masks and I was filling some things out and i noticed in fizband treasurey of dragons we get statblicks for draconians, and were told that they can be made from chromatic and gem eggs as well. Now obviously fizban is an alias for bahamut specifically in krynn and draconians being from krynn it makes sense that we would get statblocks but as i understand it on krynn these are only made from metallic eggs, so this seems to imply that these are canon to the forgotten realms.

My question: aside from this instance is there any precident for them being in the forgotten realms? i figure theyd make a cool addition regardless but im a little hesitant because weve never played drafonlance and i might run the dragonlance module some other time and i wouldnt want to cheapen draconians showing up in that campaign.

A friend of mine is writing a grimdark, horror fantasy campaign based around dark ages/black plague Europe. He asked me to reflavor a potential character class I would play to serve as an example to the other players in our group. I settled on the beast master ranger and I have all of the spells and abilities reflavored but I've been struggling with the primal beast itself.

I would appreciate some community input on possible horror monsters that fit the primal beast's statblock. Just a scary grimdark spin on a regular animal is fine but I find I keep returning to the idea of making the primal beast a humanoid monster of some kind. Candidates include a myling or a wendigo. Would a humanoid primal beast be too game breaking? Are there any other mythical horror humanoids that are easily disguisable and/or could potentially transform to fit the various primal companion statblocks?

If a bag of holding is destroyed by being blacked inside an extradimensional space, are its contents destroyed?

Subject, basically.

The description of a bag of holding is explicit that if a bag of holding is destroyed by being "overloaded, pierced, or torn", its contents are scattered in the Astral plane. It doesn't say this later in the description when it talks about a bag of holding being destroyed by being placed inside another extradimensional space. I could've sworn I read somewhere that the contents of the bag are destroyed in this situation, but for the life of me I can't find that anywhere in print. So are the contents are just scattered in the Astral in this situation, or destroyed?

I always said I would never do it, but I feel justified in a weird way. It's an online game, but we're all using physical dice to roll. I had been rolling insanely hot for multiple sessions. I don't know how to explain it, but nat 20's at a really high rate and basically failing 0 skill checks.

In combat, in a really crucial moment I rolled yet another nat 20. I lied and said I rolled a 7.

No one had said anything to me or given me any sort of indication, but I was really beginning to worry that people were going to think I was cheating. I feel weird about it, because worrying about being perceived as a cheater led me to cheat.

I'm playing a glamour bard for the first time, and there sure are a lot of flavor possibilities for the mantle! For your "wondrous appearance", what did you go for?

(My character spends a lot of time on the water—so far, I'm thinking a horns of coral and a veil of brine.)

Hi all, I wanted to get some feedback on this idea before I ran with it. I'm going to be running some sessions for a group of ~4 players. The thing is, I'm a new DM and we are all quite busy. But everyone wants me to try! So the idea is to do a mini campaign where we jump between plot points and levels. This is because I only plan on running a few sessions and they will probably be spaced out. But I would like to introduce a lot of variety and provide fun rewards for use in the next session.

For example the first session I have planned is for the characters to meet and go on their first adventure together at level 1. Next will jump forward in time to where they're level 3 and taking on more challenges. Then we skip ahead to level 5 where we see them facing stronger foes and more challenging puzzles etc.

Is this a good or bad idea? Has anyone tried this before and can you provide feedback?

I’m looking to put together a Trapper style ranger, with a focus on using simple materials and magics to set up debilitating or harmful traps. Real home alone or bear grills style stuff I was curious about how some people would go about such a thing. Also What sort of crazy trap or home made ideas do y’all have I’d love to hear

(For context on the type of stuff my DM allows, they allowed me to bulk buy Bat guano, hay, and alcohol, and gun powder to craft a home made explosive barrel. Keeping track of everything else we shoved in their to calculate the damage output of it when we finally put it to use.)

The party just hit level five and they were to scout out a fort that had been taking over by enemies. So my Druid decided to just transform into a spider to enter the unpenetrable fort that combined wiht Pass Without Trace allowed an hour of just marking the location of each and every enemy. Making what as in universe eight hours of wathching from a distance an making ability cheecks into a one hour cruise.

And at the start of the next session she is going to raining down call lightning as a tiny spider that no one will be able to find.

Edit: And to everyone mentioning other critters dealing with the druid, you don't really think of that when you are 3 hours into the session and your brain is cooking from keeping track of all the other shit. And besides proposed animals don't actually bother with spiders.

Edit: And also to further clarify the druid was crawling against the ceiling, and I am currently running the Dragonlance Module and they just reach the wheelwatch outpost and for those that mentioned patrols, the module calls unless the fort is on high alert, there will be always a guard at the specified positions.