Ive played every incarnation of dungeons and dragons (i like them all),seems lately that the balance as far as party vs monsters is going greatly in the partys favor.
In 3.5 by 8th lvl the warriors and barbarians were buzz saws and it was hard to keep the BBEG up for more than a couple of rounds.
I just got the starter set for 5e and notice fighters get a second attack at 3rd(i think) lvl and with a great axe reroll 1s and 2s,i really hope they playtested this so that its not a walk through for the party.
Isn't this a DM concern? Anyways... We are three months from the Monster Manual release. How can you tell anything about the monster math yet?
And, as the easy fights? I have heard stories of TPKs and monsters being too much. So, sounds like we need a bit more time to figure out a good battle configuration.
I dunno. My experience at the con game is biased because we had level 1 characters, but from that, I think the balance is similar to 3e: Casters do the heavy lifting, and non-casters do the clean-up. Furthermore, levels 1 and probably 2 are just headaches given how lethal they are.
If you're judging by the monsters in the playtest, they specifically said that the playtest was not a test of how easy or difficult combat vs. monsters was.
In the final rules, the monsters in the Starter Set are much beefier and more difficult than they were during the playtest. The full 5E MM should be similar when it is released, with monster difficulty ramped up based on the final rules vs. just there for learning mechanics in the playtest.
Well then we're back to having heroes you shouldn't even bother to name until like 3rd level.
bardulf7 wrote:
Ogiwan wrote:
Ogiwan wrote:
With bounded accuracy, even with a powerful party of minmaxers, you should be able to challenge the party simply by adding more monsters, especially an extra caster with AoE effects. I havent played it yet, but the "take a death roll failure" when you take damage at zero hp will make being zero a lot more scary I think, esp once the AoE starts flying around, or against mindless style creatures like zombies which might keep attacking a downed foe (brains!)
bardulf7 wrote:
Psikerlord wrote:
Rhenny wrote:
Ashrym wrote:
Psikerlord wrote:
Ashrym wrote:
Ashrym wrote:
mellored wrote:
kanageddaamen wrote:
Ashrym wrote:
mellored wrote:
Ashrym wrote:
Welp, if you want to ghost the party or give them a challenge, whip out the Beholder and have it spam Disintegrate on some fools. Presto changeo, TPK in a matter of rounds. woot! 
It has 2-5 chances to nape fools. ..... OH NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!1! I just re-read the Beholder and the eye rays are guilty of squirrely wording.
Disintegration Ray: On a failed say, anyone with 60 or less HP is capped. On a successful save: take 10d6 damage.... sooooooooooo.................. if they have more than 60 hp, you'd want them to make the save?!? hahaha.... either way, the point is there's still some monsters in the bestiary from last playtest that will nuke some fools. Of course, most players get enraged with the save or die stuff. so there's that. woot.
anywho's, can't wait for the real mm to drop so we can see for realzies how the pc's stack up. I do like how in the Starter Set they beefed up the monsters.
Ashrym wrote:
awogaman wrote:
awogaman wrote:
My kitty avatar's tail, is gonna take a Decipher Script check.