Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Zardnaar Nov 02, 2014 22:22:51	I thought I wold share a few things we have been using in our games. We have 2 games running, 1 I DM and the other I get to play in. Last week we had 4 sessions adding up to around 25 hours of D&D. 4 day weekends and public holidays.    The other DM has been flicking through the MM and he has been quite clever in pickling out various abilities and pulling some fast ones on us. He ad hocs his encounters rules be damned and we somehow seem to come out alive most of the time. The lore in 5E seems to be based a lot on the 1st editions monster manual.    My PC is a valor bard with a pair of gauntlets of ogre power. Anyway I do not make athletics checks to rip dorrs of hinges I make bennd bar and lift gates rolls just with a fixed DC (I may use the athletics skill however ). Bend bars/lift gates dammit.    By room 14 using the Tomb of Horrors my PCs had enough and I gave them another path to take leaving the Tomb behind. Something about 3 save or die pit traps one of which was undetectable did that for them. 3d6 falling damage+1 to 5 1d6 damage spikes, DC15 con saves vs poison or take another 16d6 points of damage tends to do that to you I suppose. While not technically dead the words save or die may have been used for 20d6+ damage at level 8.    The other DM has been refering to fighters as fighting men as well. He has not actually played OD&D or even 1st ed either but there you go. This week or the one after it they have a date with King Snurre, see how this weeks session runs. Pit trap into a floating lake of magma and a ye olde school wish gem (exploding) lifted from the Tomb of Horrors.....
#2 Rastapopoulos Nov 03, 2014 6:28:13	This weekend I finally ran a playtest of my 5e-3e hybrid that I was fleshing out for a while. Basic 5e systems with bounded accuracy and all, but scrapping 5e classes almost entirely save for 1 or 2 class abilities that I might have actually wanted to keep. As I dislike 5e classes overall.   Well, maybe 5e-2e hybrid would be more precise, I don't know. I picked more elements from 3e than 2e to use in this conversion, but the general feel, deadliness and power level I used in the game and rules are more 2e than 3e.   I must say it all worked quite well and the session was fun, with enough challenges but no deaths although PC power level in general should be slightly lower than raw 5e (something between 2e and "3e-no splats" character power, meaning heroic but not super heroic / overpowered.) The bard did fall on the last battle although he didn't die, but he also basically won the fight shooting with his bow while orcs ran uphill to smash them. Needless to say the orcs were quite mad with him, the ones who actually made the top, and sort of focus-fired on him.   I'm using the 5e Monster Manual as the basics of the system (proficiency bonus, bounded accuracy, saves, and this stuff) are 5e, so the monsters there are pick-and-use even if I've changed the game considerably.
#3 abs1nth Nov 03, 2014 7:57:52	Rastapopoulos wrote:
#4 Bluenose Nov 03, 2014 9:40:48	I don't think 5e is like early D&D versions, whether you're speaking of 1e or BECM. It's got a 3e structure with a 2e facade. So it's not really on the OSR side in the edition wars, instead being on the 90s/00s path.
#5 Zardnaar Nov 03, 2014 11:53:26	Bluenose wrote:
#6 Rastapopoulos Nov 06, 2014 20:13:12	Zardnaar wrote: