Rather than 1 hit point minions, I like the 13th age minions that are instead a single pool of hunt points equal to 1 minion, and if that number drops to 0 then whichever minion was hit last in that group was the one killed, and if the player got a crit and did enough damage to kill multiple minions, you'd describe them somehow doing so. For example, you have 8 minion skeletons with 13 hit points. As soon as the minions combined take 13 damage, whichever skeleton was hit last dies. If the group had taken 12 damage already and the next hit did 14 damage, the player shatters one so much that the bone shards fly into another and cause it to collapse. If it had done 20 damage, the same would happen and the minions would still have 6 damage left over for the next attack.
@@geoffreyperrin4347 I might feel differently about it in practice, but that feels like too much micro management and math for what I want from a minion. If I'm running a ton of mobs I don't really want to be doing anything that slows me down with them.
@IcarusGames it's not that slow. You have 20 skeletons with 13 hp. Player does 20 damage. 1 skeleton dies and you mark down 7 left over damage. Next player does 6, now no left over damage and whichever skeleton was just hit dies
I do like it, but there are definitely places where improvements could have been made, and instead have been missed. One of the prime examples is the price of magic items, the guide price is not that useful. up to 400gp for uncommon? this has dropped from the 2014 DMG.... most levels are cheaper, according to that table, all except for the legendary where they have quadrupled... I would have definitely preferred a more complete list, of costs against each magic item. Part i did like though was the creating magic items, more detailed in the 2024 version. with costs (these costs to align to some degree with the table, but again I believe these should be higher), and time needed. Overall it is better than the 2014 DMG, but there is much they could have improved on.
Totally agree with teh pricing, I really think something like Kibbles crafting would have been better (you can work out the price for anything with his system). Also disappointed with the new monster advice, along with the lack of recommended encounters per day. Even if it was just "give a short rest after 'x' encounter" or "after 2 deadly encounters, your party will likely need a long rest" etc. These types of things you pick up (Forge of Foes does a great job with this) when you are experienced but not for a noobie. Overall it is a good book, but I really think they were so close to being S tier the mistakes they made were glaring. :)
I haven't had the chance to read it yet, but I did talk about it with my brother, who has. Like you, he commented that it seemed far more aimed at the beginning DM than an advanced one. Admittedly, he's more a player than a DM at heart, but he has been involved with the hobby for about 45 years and professionally for more than 30 years. In his opinion, it once again fails to overthrow the gold standard for DMGs: Gygax's original. My own interest is solely for the Greyhawk content, so it's not high on the priority list.
The 4e book is still my favourite. It's got all the general DM advice that was brought forward to this one, but also has much better magic item pricing and more specific rules for a lot of stuff too.
@@IcarusGames I have to admit that I'm not as familiar with 4e, so I can't make direct comparisons, though I will say that the original 1e DMG has complete magic item pricing. I do think the player types thing is a very good move--but I don't think of that as a 4e thing so much as a Champions thing as the first time I saw it was in the Strike Force supplement for that game in 1988.
I've never once played in a campaign where we did anything close to more than one or two combats per in game days. I feel like the combat balancing as laid out in both 5e and 2024 is built on theoretical math, not on how the game is actually played out in the wild.
The 2014 math could be adapted to do fewer, more difficult combats fairly easily. I would pretty regularly run 2-3 "deadly" encounters in a session and manage to hit the daily XP threshold for the players' level. That daily XP threshold is gone in the 2024 version, you only have per encounter based XP. There's no actual guidance in the 2024 book for how many encounters between long rests the game is designed around.
It looks nice but other than that meh. I am sure it would be helpful for newer DMs and of course for system specific needs (magic item tables, bastions, etc.). I actually think Kobold Press's TOV Gamemaster's Guide is much better...for beginners and non beginners. I am speaking more from a helpful tips and how-tos viewpoint rather than the balance of say magic items or balance. One good thing about being a forever DM for 40+ years is all the previous DMGs are also great tools the 2024 DMG will join them but again meh.
Question: Are those 160 or 280 magic items including the one use items & the 100 items only talking about the magic items that are ongoing & semi-permanently owned by the party? Just trying to be generous even though we know they were in too big a rush to meet the 50 year deadline.
I do believe both numbers include consumable items etc. I can't see anything in the rules to suggest the 100 item guidance isn't just ALL magic items, including potions and scrolls.
@@BLynn Sorry, I might not have explained it well enough in my irritation in the video; One section of the book says a party of four PCs should get 100 items over a level 1-20 campaign. But if you follow the advice elsewhere in the book to award a treasure horde every session and are using XP levelling, you will end up on average awarding hundreds more items than you should because you'll be awarding multiple items every session for 100+ sessions.
@IcarusGames you did fine. I'm just the generous sort so I'm trying to figure out if they just messed up some minor wording that leaves an unintended impression.
The Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master and Forge of Foes by Sly Flourish is going to give you must bang for buck advice than the DND 2024 DMG. So far, I think DND 2024 is not worth the money but sadly it’s going to be the most popular TTRPG. I agree there’s some good base level advice but you really just have to ignore most of the tables and the math. And if you want to be a little bit better you’ll have to look elsewhere. In my honest opinion, Sly Flourish’s, Level Up Advanced 5e, and Justin Alexander’s books are the best advice, bang for buck. And I will die on this hill.
Those books are great resources for people who already have some of the assumed knowledge gained from a period of play and experience, but I don't think they are ideal for BRAND NEW players (Return of the Lazy DM even explicitly calls this out at the start). While I have some issues with the revised 5e DMG, it is a really good book for brand new DMs, certainly the best we've had since the 4e DMG.
WotC oversimplied the rules in 5.5E when the 5E's rules were already simplified (compared to older editions). 5E lacked a lot of nuance and 5.5E stripped what little nuance there was to bare bones. This bothers me when WotC's design philosophy is "rulings over rules" but they barely give any foundations for (new) DMs to work with!
The game is not an economy ❤
The game is not a physics engine ❤
Rather than 1 hit point minions, I like the 13th age minions that are instead a single pool of hunt points equal to 1 minion, and if that number drops to 0 then whichever minion was hit last in that group was the one killed, and if the player got a crit and did enough damage to kill multiple minions, you'd describe them somehow doing so.
For example, you have 8 minion skeletons with 13 hit points. As soon as the minions combined take 13 damage, whichever skeleton was hit last dies. If the group had taken 12 damage already and the next hit did 14 damage, the player shatters one so much that the bone shards fly into another and cause it to collapse. If it had done 20 damage, the same would happen and the minions would still have 6 damage left over for the next attack.
@@geoffreyperrin4347 I might feel differently about it in practice, but that feels like too much micro management and math for what I want from a minion.
If I'm running a ton of mobs I don't really want to be doing anything that slows me down with them.
@IcarusGames it's not that slow. You have 20 skeletons with 13 hp. Player does 20 damage. 1 skeleton dies and you mark down 7 left over damage. Next player does 6, now no left over damage and whichever skeleton was just hit dies
When the world needed him most, he returned!
Not that he left, mind you, it just seemed like a fun thing to say.
I do like it, but there are definitely places where improvements could have been made, and instead have been missed.
One of the prime examples is the price of magic items, the guide price is not that useful. up to 400gp for uncommon? this has dropped from the 2014 DMG.... most levels are cheaper, according to that table, all except for the legendary where they have quadrupled...
I would have definitely preferred a more complete list, of costs against each magic item.
Part i did like though was the creating magic items, more detailed in the 2024 version. with costs (these costs to align to some degree with the table, but again I believe these should be higher), and time needed.
Overall it is better than the 2014 DMG, but there is much they could have improved on.
Yeah the magic item pricing is laughable. It's simpler than 2014, but that's it!
Totally agree with teh pricing, I really think something like Kibbles crafting would have been better (you can work out the price for anything with his system). Also disappointed with the new monster advice, along with the lack of recommended encounters per day. Even if it was just "give a short rest after 'x' encounter" or "after 2 deadly encounters, your party will likely need a long rest" etc. These types of things you pick up (Forge of Foes does a great job with this) when you are experienced but not for a noobie.
Overall it is a good book, but I really think they were so close to being S tier the mistakes they made were glaring. :)
Once again 4th edition proves to be king 😎😎
👑
More powerful players... just what D&D needed
I haven't had the chance to read it yet, but I did talk about it with my brother, who has. Like you, he commented that it seemed far more aimed at the beginning DM than an advanced one. Admittedly, he's more a player than a DM at heart, but he has been involved with the hobby for about 45 years and professionally for more than 30 years. In his opinion, it once again fails to overthrow the gold standard for DMGs: Gygax's original. My own interest is solely for the Greyhawk content, so it's not high on the priority list.
The 4e book is still my favourite. It's got all the general DM advice that was brought forward to this one, but also has much better magic item pricing and more specific rules for a lot of stuff too.
@@IcarusGames I have to admit that I'm not as familiar with 4e, so I can't make direct comparisons, though I will say that the original 1e DMG has complete magic item pricing. I do think the player types thing is a very good move--but I don't think of that as a 4e thing so much as a Champions thing as the first time I saw it was in the Strike Force supplement for that game in 1988.
I've never once played in a campaign where we did anything close to more than one or two combats per in game days. I feel like the combat balancing as laid out in both 5e and 2024 is built on theoretical math, not on how the game is actually played out in the wild.
The 2014 math could be adapted to do fewer, more difficult combats fairly easily. I would pretty regularly run 2-3 "deadly" encounters in a session and manage to hit the daily XP threshold for the players' level.
That daily XP threshold is gone in the 2024 version, you only have per encounter based XP. There's no actual guidance in the 2024 book for how many encounters between long rests the game is designed around.
It looks nice but other than that meh. I am sure it would be helpful for newer DMs and of course for system specific needs (magic item tables, bastions, etc.).
I actually think Kobold Press's TOV Gamemaster's Guide is much better...for beginners and non beginners.
I am speaking more from a helpful tips and how-tos viewpoint rather than the balance of say magic items or balance.
One good thing about being a forever DM for 40+ years is all the previous DMGs are also great tools the 2024 DMG will join them but again meh.
Question: Are those 160 or 280 magic items including the one use items & the 100 items only talking about the magic items that are ongoing & semi-permanently owned by the party? Just trying to be generous even though we know they were in too big a rush to meet the 50 year deadline.
I do believe both numbers include consumable items etc. I can't see anything in the rules to suggest the 100 item guidance isn't just ALL magic items, including potions and scrolls.
@IcarusGames if the lower number was referring to semi-permanent item can that account for the confusion they created?
@@BLynn Sorry, I might not have explained it well enough in my irritation in the video;
One section of the book says a party of four PCs should get 100 items over a level 1-20 campaign.
But if you follow the advice elsewhere in the book to award a treasure horde every session and are using XP levelling, you will end up on average awarding hundreds more items than you should because you'll be awarding multiple items every session for 100+ sessions.
@IcarusGames you did fine. I'm just the generous sort so I'm trying to figure out if they just messed up some minor wording that leaves an unintended impression.
"I have a lot of thoughts". Ya don't say? 😀
Good video
@@DungeonsAndDrams 🤣 many thoughts over here
80gp to level up is insane
@@TheBiomedZed Iknowright?! Like, at that level why even bother putting a gold amount on there?
A pink Beholder? 😛
What's wrong with a pink beholder?
The Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master and Forge of Foes by Sly Flourish is going to give you must bang for buck advice than the DND 2024 DMG.
So far, I think DND 2024 is not worth the money but sadly it’s going to be the most popular TTRPG. I agree there’s some good base level advice but you really just have to ignore most of the tables and the math. And if you want to be a little bit better you’ll have to look elsewhere.
In my honest opinion, Sly Flourish’s, Level Up Advanced 5e, and Justin Alexander’s books are the best advice, bang for buck. And I will die on this hill.
Those books are great resources for people who already have some of the assumed knowledge gained from a period of play and experience, but I don't think they are ideal for BRAND NEW players (Return of the Lazy DM even explicitly calls this out at the start).
While I have some issues with the revised 5e DMG, it is a really good book for brand new DMs, certainly the best we've had since the 4e DMG.
WotC oversimplied the rules in 5.5E when the 5E's rules were already simplified (compared to older editions). 5E lacked a lot of nuance and 5.5E stripped what little nuance there was to bare bones. This bothers me when WotC's design philosophy is "rulings over rules" but they barely give any foundations for (new) DMs to work with!
Someone should make a better dnd.
We got a head start if someone wants to take a look.