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Please tell me how wrong I am.
You aren’t wrong. These all make a lot of sense.
Not at all. Consistency in how you do things at the table is important, not rules as written or enforced conventions.
Gladly. You're first "hot" take (seriously, dude, hating on initiative rolling has become more common than not. How do you not know that?) is taking one of the most fundamental aspects of the game and removing it because apparently you prefer boring, same-y bullshit.
If you want a better argument against that nonsense, watch XP to Level 3's video "D&D Isn't Slow," particularly the section on initiative. It demonstrates pretty thoroughly why trying to remove it is just nonsensical.
hey, your desk light arc isnt in your amazon list
@@PulsefiredGaming True, I made it myself. Not sure if you're based in the US, but.....6-foot aluminum strips from ACE Hardware. And the LED strip lights are from Amazon, they are adhesive on the back.
Originally, the zero was a zero, because the 10 sided dice we played with only had single numbers on them. Most of us only had one 10 sided die to begin with. So you would roll first for the tens place and the second die as your ones. So when you got 0 then 0 it was 100.
It is still a zero. Adding any opposite sides on the die always results in the same value, so you will always find 7 opposite 2, 1 opposite 8, and 9 opposite 0. (This is not true of the dice printed with "10" as I have seen these dice have the opposite sides add up to 11.)
Actually…Originally you were trying to ROLL LOW. You were testing a % chance of success, nobody did this because you wanted to roll a 00… 0. Then at some point D&D decided that it was hurting peoples brains to remember when they wanted to roll low or high 🤷🏼♂️ and I guess this is the upside down system that developed along with failure %s
00 + 0 = 100% true! Old gamers never started with a percentile d10. When it was introduced, everyone was so danged thrilled that you didn't have to declare which die was "high" (representing the 10' value) no one questioned if there was another way to contemplate the math of the roll itself. Younger gamers (those under 35-40) have no idea how many fights at the table this solved.
@@boblablablaw6677 old school gamer here. Started in 84/85. One of the two lol.
When rolling alone the d10 is 1-10. When rolling for percentile its 0-9. Otherwise 10+0 would be 20.
for number 12, THANK YOU people seem to forget so often that the alignment chart exists COSMICALY and is more than just a way to shorthand your character's ethics, its where they stand on a massive interplanar conflict. for your d100 one, it's less that i disagree and more i was taught differently, when i roll a percentile the d10 is the "ones place" and the d100 is the "tens place" so any time except 100 the 0 and 00 are just that, zeroes. but if your roll both of them that's how you get 100.
Initiative isnt for deciding who acts first, it’s for deciding who reacts first. Someone might say they want to shoot the enemy, but the enemy has the chance to draw and fire first after seeing them go for the gun. Initiative allows for anticipation to see who fires the first shot
Not only that, but it requires different strategies in combat. If everyone always went in the same order based on where they always sit, encounters would feel really repetitive. A bard having their turn sandwiched between 2 monsters would result in different decisions compared to if they went in the middle of their team
I prefer DungeonCraft’s system.
The players get two minutes to plan their moves, they all roll dice simultaneously, and DM describes it all as one scene depending on the die results.
So.
Much.
Quicker.
I kind of agree with wyloch on this, initiative itself is dumb. This should be based on perception, at least for the first round, or maybe even just a straight dex check where this one roll is converted to d100 and each + equated to plus 10 or so to more accurately impact the roll.
@@DKarkarov if you wanted to, you could take inspiration from Edge of the Empire where there are 2 different initiatives. Vigilance for when you don’t expect the fight and Cool for when you are expecting one. This could be interpreted in DnD as one initiative tied to Wis for things like ambushes or Dex for who is quicker on the draw. However, the purpose of 5e is simplicity and its perfectly reasonable to determine how quick you are at reacting to a surprise through Dex.
As for the d100…. What? Why? Your just doing a d20 roll and multiplying the result by 5. Is that to try and limit the number of ties in initiative? We already have a solution for that, it’s your Dex modifier and even if those are the same you can either reroll or let the players decide the order to encourage teamwork. A d100 roll where a +3 initiative is actually +30 does nothing
@@tyeklund7221 it is just meant to add more variamce and make dex difference more impacting. Case in point dex plus 1 guy rolls 62 initiative 72. Dex plus 3 person rolls 46.... Much lower roll but due to that plus 3 it counts as 76 and he goes first. In a d20 scenario that would translate to 12+1 and 9+3... +1 goes first.
Does that make more sense?
In 35 years of roleplaying I have never had the 00+0 on the percentile dice come up a single time. I had never thought about that at all.
I'd never seen percentile dice before. I just used two 10-sideds of different colors, and designated one as the 'tens' die. Simple... :)
I made a crit hit table that had instant death on a 100. Player rolled it first time he got hit with a critical when we implemented it lol.
Should add that's the only one in 30+ years for me
I've only been DM'ing for 8 years, and have seen it 4 times.
Lol play call of Cthulhu, when your main die roll is d100 you see it a lot which is why wylock is wrong. Using his method how do you roll a 90%? If 90+0=100 you can’t which is why 0/10 on the ones die always=zero and a 00+0=100
Alignment- I always rather liked the alignment quiz from the 3.0 heroes handbook.
Alignment is a reading of your characters decisions and morals, it doesn't decide what you do.
Mrs Professor Dungeon Master here. Every Con PDM tries to convince me to consider a recessed table. Thank you for finally settling the debate!
The one I found most horrifying was your d% system. The whole point is that each die corresponds to a digit -- it's not about summation. '0' is just zero ones, the same way '00' is zero tens. Your way breaks the symmetry and is quite ugly. 00|0 is an edge case that can be considered 100 following the same logic that a '0' on a d10 is a ten: map the single 'out of range' generated value to the single 'unreachable' desired value. Further, if a '0' on the ones die is ten, how do you justify '00' still being zero tens? By your logic it would be 100, and you'd have numbers in a range 11-110!
To be fair, it's not "my" d% system, it's "The" d% system. 😀
Anyway you are correct, if a 0 is to be treated as a ten, then why should the 00 be treated as a zero? I get it. Can't argue that.
0=10 makes the d1000 fall apart as well. I need my expanded rod of wonder table to work!
And besides rolling a Nat 20 is epic and when rolling percentages what is more epic "90+0" or all zeros "00+0" for the nat 100?
I think this may be him just trolling.
So for example in "Wylock Dice Method" (tm) to get a roll of 30 you would need to roll a 2o and a 0.
Just confusing the piss out of people. Especially younger players. I'm gonna say trolly troll under the bridge troll. But funny nonetheless.
I'm just confused at how you're supposed to roll a 90. If 9 and 0 is 100, then I'm guessing 8 + 0 = 90? So this means 7 = 80, 6 = 50, 5 = 60, 4 = 50, 3 = 40, 2 = 30, 1 = 20, and of course 0 + 0 = 10?
Agree. Especially with initiative. As for recessed tables, the problem with every one I've seen (except the one I built) has narrow borders that suck for the reasons you mentioned. I built mine with 12" borders perfect for paper, books, snacks, and arms. That being said I eventually ditched that table and moved to a big open flat table so....
You built a table on top of table so players have to use puppet versions of themselves to interact with the smaller table. Intuitive.
I pull chips marked with the characters names, or numbers for the mob(s) out of a bag for initiative. Keeps people at the table because they don't know when their turn is coming up. I acquired this method after watching some WW2 Bolt Action game play. Plus characters love when they go last and then get drawn to go first so they can complete a sequence of attacks they have worked out. Clunky, maybe, but we as a group like it. Thanks for the video.
This is a great way to run initiative if the system is balanced out to keep all the stats as equally relevant. Assuming dex isn't already OP.
There are lots of variables and I haven't had my caffeine.
In High Elvish, it’s pronounced Drō, with a sneer, in Dwarvish it’s Drau, but in native Drow it’s pronounced Drah, with an Aussie twang. 😜
(Because Drow are from “down under”.) 😂
And none sound like crow lol
Sure, because proper pronounciation in a fantasy game is whats important. If all players and DM agree that drow is pronounced drow its all good.
Based on your example, a 00+0=10, 10+0=20, 20+0=30, etc.
Why do extra math when I can just roll 10+0=10, 20+0=20, etc? And if the 0=10, why wouldn't the 00=100?
He is simply saying why is a d10 in one situation a 10 while others a zero? He isn't wrong about that. Of course it is explained differently in game manuals.
That d100 interpretation goes against one concept: Perceiving is easier than calculating.
If you see a 70 and a 0, you are seeing a 700. Which can be easily interpreted as a 70.
Your ruling, instead put your brain against your senses, seeing a 70 and a 0 suddenly represents an 80, but your eyes see no 8. 10% of your rolls require a calculation. Even worse: you are more likely to find yourself explaining this rule to newcomers because it happens more often and it goes against the senses.
In the words of the mighty hero Odysseus: GO FOR THE EYE!
Yep, it’s counterintuitive, like wanting to roll high on a test where you have % chance of success
Yeah, I'm vehemently against his interpretation of the percentile dice. Rolling a 10 and 0 is a total of 10, that is how you get 10. 20 and 0 is 20. 00 and 0 is 100.
Anything else just doesn't make sense to me, and while I understand where he's coming from, the system we're describing easily allows for a roll of 1-100 with the two dice without causing any further confusion/calculation. 00 and 0 is the ONE special roll, all the other 99 possible outcomes are easily understood at a glance, which I prefer over doing calculations literally 10% of the time.
Fun initiative homebrew I've heard is roll initiative AFTER combat (or at start of session), then use those values when next combat starts. Letting you get straight into rolling, and letting people enjoy rolling dice for stuff.
If you give players an opportunity to always strike first they will always do that. Casting a spell is not an instant thing - you have to do the jestures and speak the words - people could react to it. That what initiative represents.
"It is what my character would do!" is actually something I find hard to draw a hard and fast line on.
Often, it is used as an excuse or a rejection of personal responsibility for actions that the rest of the table find ruin their fun or make them very uncomfortable. And ultimately YOU the player are both the one who created the character and all the things that character would do, and are ultimately in control of their actions, and if someone is making a character that is constantly disruptive to the game everyone else wants to play, that's a problem beyond what in game consequences should be used to address. What is disruptive in this context? Highly group dependent, any example I give, no matter how extreme, you could probably find one group that is okay with that, and on the other hand, there are some groups where being too mean IC would be taken personal and seen as disruptive. I wouldn't want to live at either extreme, but I am sure those groups exist.
That said, when you are REALLY roleplaying a character, and have been insider their heads for a while, it does really feel like they take on a life of their own. Almost as if they have their own agency and their own ways of making decisions! And sometimes those decisions surprise you even though they came from your own head. And betraying that natural flow of what you think the character would do to override it with out of game meta concerns feels really wrong! And sometimes those decisions will push the boundaries of what is acceptable, but not doing so also makes the game feel inauthentic and worse as well! In these cases it is probably fine to push limits a bit for the emergent narrative, and if everyone is on the same wavelength people probably won't mind
But it is a huge fuzzy gray area that shifts depending on context both in and out of game, and no matter how authentic the RP it is still possible to cross lines that shouldn't be crossed with your given groups make up and traumas and comfort zones. Letting "It is what my character would do!" excuse terrible behavior that ruins the game (even charitably assuming that the offensive action WAS driven by real roleplaying) isn't going to fly with me. But at the same time, expecting everyone at the table to have to consider real world people first at every second of the game instead of getting inside their heads, that's not going to lead to the cool RP we love either.
In general, I say, feel free to live inside you PC's head, try to RP them authentically, that's really cool. But at the same time, if something happens and they cross an IRL line and we need to chat about it OOC, you have to be willing to recognize that YOU are the one in control, and do right by your IRL friends first, and the Wizard that lives inside your head second.
If your character is an a-hole, then "what my character would do" is insist that we kick them out of the party... Time to roll a new, less annoying character.
I had a friend try to pull the " it's what my character would do" line for being an ass to the rest of us so when my character found out he slaughtered his. I reminded the crew I was a murder hobo. A literal psycho that completely ignores local law with a body count to rival some early real world battles, with the power of magic... It's not hard for characters like that to develop god complexes... I was a very wrathful god. We haven't had that problem since then because we check each other. When aying a murder hobo be a murder hobo.
"But my character would do it", if unnecessarily derailing, is not allowed IMO. I'm fond of the rule that characters must be designed for cooperation and achieving the overall plot, because any character that wasn't designed that way wouldn't join the party in the first place.
My players entered a room in a tomb of a paladin whereas the inscription read, "Only those that carry the light may pass." There was a ceremonial candle next to the entrance. This was a riddle as only those of Lawful Good alignment could pass into the inner sanctum without activating the tomb's defenses. I love alignment!
The pvp hot take I disagree on strongly. It simply gives some people an excuse to steal from the rest of the party. then feelings get hurt. If I sat at a table where this occurred, I would stand up again and leave.
In my games, Mimics and Ropers are two species of, essentially, eldritch hermit crabs that subside on minerals, with ropers consuming rock and mimics consuming metals. If you check the chest, you will likely notice a hole bored through the back, and several more on the bottom used for locomotion, but they never attack until you open them.
Also, Mimic eggs look like pearls, and since they eat only metals you could easily ignore them among the other gems and non-metallic treasure left behind. Toss them in your bag of holding and before too long your own gold starts to mysteriously disappear ;-)
I'm not going to tell you which of your opinions are right and which are wrong because they're your opinions and you're entitled to them regardless of how wrong they might be.
HOWEVER, because I love your channel, I am adding a comment here to appease the Engagement Algorithm!
Keep up the great work!
I agree about alignment. I think the biggest problem people have with alignment is limiting themselves. There are things that you should choose not to do in a campaign because your character would not do them. I think people FOMO about playing "optimally" or missing opportunities, but a big part of the fun is choosing to embody a fleshed out character with realistic motivations.
To completely contradict my point about limiting yourself, the only one I really disagree with is multiclassing. I love extreme class customization. Part of that is my playgroup all have pretty min/maxed characters so our DM just gives us harder encounters.
Your error is in assuming that the ones die is to be "added." The dice are place holders, with the tens die representing how many 10s you have and the ones die representing how many 1s you have. So 00 literally represents 10 10s. So if you are using % dice to cover a range of 1 to 100, 0 represents 0 ones, otherwise your would get 101. You can, of course, create your own system (assuming the math gets you 1 to 100), but the dice were originally intended to represent values of x10 with 1 die and values of 1 with the other die. 00 represents 10 tens.
Narrative initiative works fine, and is better then many of the more arbitrary systems like: Heroes go first. There are several systems that already run Initiative in this manner.
Here's the basics of the system with a few variation notes:
- The side that has the drop on the other goes first. AKA: Ambushing them, or holding the other side at gun point, etc...
- If one side or the other doesn't have advantage, but declares they are attacking. The side that declares they are attacking goes first.
- If both sides can feasibly go first, both sides roll their attack rolls the side that rolls highest hits first. But both attack.
- If your system uses LUCK, HERO DICE, KARMA, INSPIRATION, etc... You may spend a point to interrupt the enemy and go first, but they may spend a point to interrupt you. Who ever spends more points, goes first.
As for Exponents... I don't even use the base score any more, I just have the players assign 7 pts of exponents from 0 to 5 for all six attributes. What about racial, lienage, feats?!? All those systems except for randomly rolling all averages out to 7pts anyways, so just spend 7pts and move with your life. Then every four levels let the players decide between a feat or adding an exponent point. No feat adds to the attributes.
As for the way you roll percentile dice... WHO TAUGHT YOU THAT! I seriously remember no game telling me to interpret the dice in that manner. If I had a player rolling percentiles and it came up 00's and they tried to call it a 10, I would lecture them about cheating, and tell them that's a 100, and not to do that again. I mean play the way you want to at your table, but holy %@$$#@ explain what your doing before try that at some one elses table. Kind of like eating spaghetti with a straw, your not wrong, but its also not the standard either.... so be aware of that.
Screw multiclassings, They already have customizable backgrounds, dozens of sub classes, countless of races, and tons of feats that let them sample other class features. Exactly why do they need to multi-class too? They never even remotely balanced multi-classing and the characters that get created are almost always narrative gibberish built around a mechanic, not a story. SCREW MULTI-CLASSING. I'm done with it. Sorlock is not a class!
Death Saves, do not bother me... not because I'm generous with my players. %@$@ I'm a smelly old Grognard. No... if you pass out in the middle of combat that is NOT a good thing. Having their gear stolen, getting kidnapped, taken hostage, stabbed to death, eaten or as one player learned beheaded while lying on the ground, happens with all the time in my campaigns. Death saves... are a luxury I reserve for newbies. Advanced heroes better stay awake, if they want to stay alive.
Want to watch your characters panic, describe the goblin that just downed them, grabbing their magic sword (free interaction), stabbing (with advantage) getting a free critical (two failed death saves), and then just walking away with their best gear. ... stop staring at me like that. I'm not a bad man, the goblin did it. Its what its character would do!
Great video Wyloch, but dude you roll percentiles WEIRD!
As for mimics, I made a mimic that’s a guitarist in a band and her head is a makeup case and she has a lisp. Think Peggy from The Oblongs.
Alignment: WotC is planning to do Planescape soon, apparently, and I confess I'm confused. The high concept of Planescape was 'philosophers with clubs,' the absolute moralities and alignments standing against each other on a series of philosophical planes of existence, as much or more mind, spirit and philosophy than matter. However, moderns, and Wizards specifically, have indicated that they don't like alignment, which I do, just like you said. I'm hard pressed to figure out what that setting is going to be like, other than a series of watered down stages for a series of boring 'adventures' to take place, all as an excuse to sell poorly manufactured and poorly written books. Well, I have nearly the full 2e collection now, so I guess I'll just have it my way at my table, like I do with alignment.
D&D being explorative, this is something I've always done but I've never thought of it this way and intrigues me.
Although I've done tabletop gaming for well over 20 years now, I've only gotten to try a very small amount of DnD (and the few times I was accepted into a group, someone usually threw a wrench in the works fairly quickly. Think scheduling woes, personality clashes, "That guyisms", etc) a few of these points are things that haven't crossed my radar yet, but in the case of medicine that might be telling of the issue brought up. Alignment was something I had trouble with. I realized I don't do well at pretending to be someone I'm not. But, instead of ditching it, I just quickly made a list of personal notes on my character of general rules of behavior based on their alignment to help me remember how to stay in character and it made the overall experience vastly more engrossing and enjoyable. Sadly, my last group dissolved as the Dm was overextending themselves, running too many groups
You are wrong about the percentile dice. Back in the 80's we'd use two d10s. Before you roll you'd say "the blue one is the tens, the red one is the ones." Therefore "double zero" was 100.
So how did you roll a 1? Or any single digit number? If a zero the blue one (tens) means 100? Or did you mean that the double-zero was an edge case exception to the normal rule?
@@WylochsArmory Good Question, double zero was the exception. If you look at the old AD&D table they looked like this:
01-34 xxx
35-67 xxx
68-89 xxx
90-00 xxx
This made it clear that double zero was the "100" result.
5E medicine is one of those skills that requires extra work by the DM to make more useful in a game. More strange poisons, diseases and skill checks made easier or even trivial by having a medicine skill are the factors that makes it worthwhile for a PC who chose it and also buy a medicine kit. Example- You see a KOed NPC and nobody knows if they are injured, poisoned or diseased. So what miraculous spell are you going to use to help them? In most people's game at high levels they can just go through the list and figure it out by process of elimination. In MY games the players have learned that wasting spell slots is not a great idea so a medicine check by someone trained is the way to go. Also IDing random magical herbs and stuff that can be used to heal a bit, cure poison or disease or even make healing potions. Also several of the obstacles always have a alternative roll they can do with medicine to gather more intel. But again...it's more work to make the dang thing useful. Alchemy kit / Herbalism kit automatically seems better in any game where this isn't taken into consideration.
Having a Medicine skill in a game with undefined wounds is naturally going to lead to the skill hardly ever being used. Pretty ironic that a game so full of combats and wounds also renders the skill called medicine almost useless, but that’s hit points for you.
Whether we agree or disagree, these opinions get us thinking and ideally talking both here and with our gaming groups. Keep opining.
BRAVO ON INITIATIVE. IT SIMPLY CANNOT BE SAID ANY BETTER. IN MY GROUP I JUST ASK WHO WANTS TO GO FIRST AND THEN SOMEONE SAYS ME AND THEN WE GO AROUND THE TABLE. STRANGELY THIS HAS NOT CAUSED THE GAME OR ITS WORLD TO UNRAVEL AT THE SEAMS.
Definitely agree with the "what my character would do" comment. If you don't want a certain type of character in your campaign then that should be dealt with in a session zero.
Also, if your DM is going to make session zero hyper mega important and requiring fully fleshed out backstories they should actually read them. There is no reason why your DM should be shocked to learn you are middle aged after a month of play when character age is the 2nd line in their forced backstory template.
1000% Agree ALIGNMENT is the single most important mechanic in D&D. So many rules are based around this key feature. Assassin, Druid, Monk, Paladin, and Ranger classes simply break without alignment restrictions. Oops, I guess this is coming from a hardcore 1st Edition (AD&D) DM. Regardless of which edition of D&D you play, alignment is key. Well said Wyloch.
"Roll for Initiative" helps wake up "that player." You know who they are. As for the rest, each table is unique so do what works for yours. You are correct on the D12. I have a set of custom D12, which I call Infinity die. 1 through 10 as normal and then there is a + and a - face. This allows for exploding results up and down.
Preach it! This is a highly articulate and well thought-out apologia for many aspects of the game. I don't agree with you about every thing (I've pronounced "Drow" like "ow" ever since I saw it in print), but this is very well done. The percentile dice explanation was grand. Can't wait to hear what you REALLY think about Multi-classes. Right on about Death Saves. And ALIGNMENT -- Amen!!!
Oddly The 1st edition DMs guide describes the d100 method that Wyloch mentions on p9, but then uses "00" as the last item on all of the percentile charts, thereby implying that you read the dice as they come up.
Thief’s skill % go up, racial bonuses add to it… nobody wants to roll high…
I agree with most points and that table is gorgeous.
My unpopular opinion is twofold: guns belong in DND specifically simple early guns such as wheel lock pistols and muskets as they predate plate armour.
However, gunslingers classes in my experience tend to mainly attract bad players and those with a strong case of main character syndrome.
Easy fix. Have the gun slinger face a wizard. You boom sticks have a chance to miss.... My magic missiles dont. Your pea shooters are great at putting holes in people. There is not a body when I'm done. You have ammo... I don't. People often don't understand the limits of firearms and when you consider what they do vs what a caster can do guns are not that impressive.
@@Ashtor1337 I tend to agree. Heck guns and canons are almost invalidated by heat metal. Cast that on the barrel and it cant be used till it's cool. Heck what about the metal hoops on a barrel used as a powder keg.
Gunpowder storage would need to use smaller all wood containers. Any metal and it's a bomb.
And regarding the magic user doing more. Warlocks are at minimum capable of similar power at greater range. And that's power that's relatively easy to get with no skill needed.
Clerics are walking blenders.
Like a gunslinger too me is just a fighter who uses guns. Guns are not any more special than other weapons.
#3 i agree and the alignment system i like; the rest, not so much. Regarding the percentile dice calculation- if the 0 on a d10 is 10, the 00 on a d100 is 100, as you said that you can't roll a 0 on a d10, you also can't roll a 0 on a d100. So in the case that you roll 00 on the d100 and 0 on the d10, you disregard the d10 result because you already rolled the highest number in the range.
Yeah gotta if anyone feels a D100 roll that we all do is so wrong, enough to make a video trying to correct it, then maybe it is they that are doing it wrong. The roll stems from the days of having only a single digit on each die face. adding in the 00 die has just confused the issue for you. The way you say is wrong, makes perfect sense except for the 1 in 100 times that 00 comes up and you need to think about it. This is the only example of this other method I have ever seen in my 30 years gaming.... it would be way confusing to teach new players too. Just roll without the 00 die, pick a different colour or roll one at a time.😀
You can't role a 0 on a D100 and you shouldn't be disregarding on of the dice because D100 is two dices added together - one dice is 0->90 skipping tens, the other is 1->10. If 90 is higher than 10 then it's also higher than 00 which means that 00 can't possibly be 100 because 90 is less than 100.
When did people start using 00+0 as 100?
@@MI982 when d10s had single digits like 50 years ago
@@MI982 It's been that way forever and only became an issue after d10s with a "10" printed on it and d00s with double digits printed on instead of rolling the same d10 twice. The d10 is not designed to be added together; it is designed to be used as digit places like the mileage counter on an odometer.
The d12 is definitely my favorite dice. The d100 method you described however definitely confused me.
Concerning percentile dice, page 6 of the Players Handbook for 5e "If you roll a 7 and a 1, for example, the number rolled is 71. Two 0s represent 100."
I really like the old school Law-Neutral-Chaos alignment spread, where 80% of the world’s population are Neutral and declaring your allegiance to either capital L LAW or capital C CHAOS is a pretty significant thing.
Right with you on the d12. The divisibility of this die and it's usefulness in mimicking other dice is invaluable.
12 is THE number for division for sure, not the number of completion, now where’s his video explaining the use of the Roman dodecahedron
Recessed tables... hehhehehe.. They made me giggles. But then I thought about almost every "modern" table I have sat at. Your points are valid, but also. The kids don't use line of sight much. So the looking down in and of itself is one of my pet peeves.
wyloch with the chain is making me happy :) i love alignment especially, glad to see someone has my back on it
The best use of alignment I felt they ever rolled out (showing my age when I played the most) was the Barbarian class from the original Unearthed Arcana (1985): apply chaotic good alignment and you have the Conan/Kull 'moral compass' on which the entire in game concept of a barbarian warrior seems to have been inspired by.
On the Drow topic, as a lore expert and knowing the actual elvish origin of the word. You are correct. and I hate it, but the Truth is the Truth, fact is fact, regardless of opinions.
In a sense I agree with your take on the death saving throw mechanic, it's a clunky and inelegant system. But I will say that it produces good gameplay a lot of the time.
1. Roll for initiative - It's a weird example, but yes, it is one of the many ways that the crunch of D&D interferes with the storytelling and shows how little stats matter.
2. Drow - I think of it like what countries are called (e.g. Japan, Nippon, Nihon, Wa, etc.). So, someplaces yes, others, no!
3. Modifier - 100% correct.
4. % die - Old school rolling was like coding (numbers start at 0 and go to 99) but 1 is added to eliminate zero as a possibility, but it should die out.
5. Multiclassing - Classes are identities and should be tied to narrative, abilities should be independent. Hard agree.
6. Death saves - Same as roll for initiative. It gamifies a moment and robs it off weight while also being super clunky.
7. d12 - Lots to unpack there, but I like it.
8. Paid DMing - If people want to pay for something, they should, but I wouldn't.
9. Recessed tables - Now I can leave a game set up, pop the top back on and feed all my players at a dining table. Not for everyone, but better than a gimmick.
10. Mimics - So dumb.
11. My character would do it - Provided you have a good rapport and understanding with the party. In a vacuum, its selfish, but agreed.
12. Alignment - A narrative device often used incorrectly, but cool. Should not gate abilities, classes, etc.
As usual, I appreciate your videos so much; thanks for kicking off so many of these discussions!
But is it "What my character would do"? Issue there is too often people play Evil as stupid. Just because you are Evil doesn't mean you kick every puppy you see and doesn't mean you screw over everyone else. Evil people don't generally want to die and if you kill everything that says boo to you then you are going to die when the wrong guy says boo. So do "what your character would do" but do it smartly. Also Evil can work with good it is just that evil uses good as a tool to get what they want without worrying about what good wants unless what good wants furthers what evil wants. So evil in the party isn't destined to screw over he party but too often that is how it is played.
The Characteristic number should be the one in the LARGER box. I am a proud Grognard. As the character advances the stats which affect the modifier are often rolled against. Also the Stat changes and when the Stat changes the modifier does. So the Stat is more critical than the modifier and here is a thought the players should be smart enough to know every even number after 10 is an additional plus one. If they cannot learn that why do they have a chair at your table.
Percentile dice rolling:
You are absolutely RIGHT. Never in 43 years have I heard this and never realized it. I would start using it tomorrow. You are completely correct.
How the heck do I get to play at your table? Love your DnD Ideas and charisma!
I'd personally like an octogonal table so no one is too far away. Works well for board games also.
on a percentile role, I've just always used two d10s. The number on each is the digit in the result. If you get 0 and 0, that's 100. Yes, it's inconsistent, because 8 + 0 is 80, not 90. But it's much more intuitive.
Finally someone reads percentiles like I do! I've been teased about this (and having to explain it to others I game with) since I started playing D&D all the way back in the '90s! VINDICATION!
How now brown Drow? OW!
As someone who has a recessed gaming table I agree with this sentiment. I love my table, but I Use the recessed function for board games and card games not for TTRPG's. For boardgames its fantastic and lets everyone see the board really well. For TTRPG's it really clunky to change the environment as the GM.
I have used medicine a few times, when I am low on spells and want to see what is wrong with someone in my party to see if what is wrong can be cured by lesser or greater restoration
It honestly confuses me that so many people can't understand the percentile dice, saying things like, 'you're making it too complicated', how is addition complicated though?
Medicine can be used to determine forensic information. Estimate time of death, rot and decay, types of wounds sustained based on blood loss, etc etc
I like mimics, but not just as a treasure chest, I think they can be used on many types of objects making it more versatile
I like to think of the mimic as a boogyman to scare children and probably thieves. In a world nearly devoid of magical creatures, particularly shape-changers, creating uncertainty about the existence of such creatures is key, because they are so rare. To exist in my world it would have to be a demon of some sort, or a wildly exaggerated cave monster like a vicious cave turtle that looks like a rock and even drops onto ppls heads as it’s first attack. Gotta keep it real so magic is unique and exciting not everywhere and undefined. Wizards animate bizarre flesh golems to fight in the ornamental boxing matches where a ritual to the Master of Clowns is invoked to give benefits to the most outlandish combatants. Here you could see flesh golems made with the jaws of a hippo and teeth of a shark crafted to resemble the mythical mimic demon. It’s an interpretation of the classic D&D monster meant to be more realistic, believeable in the context, kinda the Watchman approach to costumed superheroes - ie how could something like this actually exist?
Some interesting takes. Only one I strongly disagreed with was the multiclassing, but you yourself said you disagree with yourself somewhat, so I guess I'll wait for that video!
D12 is indeed the best die shape. Also this reminded me of a rant a physics professor went on saying why the imperial system persisted vs metric in the industrial revolution. You can have more meaningful and understandable subdivisions of 12 than 10. 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 12 vs 1, 2, 5, 10. And those can be done very easily in one's head vs base 10 getting really esoteric beyond quarters. Sure 1/8 is nice at 0.125 but that's not a common fraction.
I thought I'd have an issue with initiative, but that was a good argument and you've changed my mind on it. Some other minor quibbles aside, the only problem i really have is the d100 its tens place and ones place, not addition. The d12 is definitely the best die and we should be using base 12.
I read the dice as digits on a display, so for me, rolling 0 on the units die always means you read only the 10s die. Otherwise when rolling 60 and 0 you get 70, which is just confusing and a lot of extra unneeded addition.
Initiative is a huge factor for some subclasses. Take a look at MotM Bugbear, then pair that with Gloomstalker. If you aren't first in turn order its a huge negative. It makes feats like Alert a huge must have.
"But my character would do it" in a vacuum is fine, but in the context of community hate is just short hand for someone who is being deliberately obnoxious/frustrating for the rest of the table, and is (generally speaking) not actually meant to be taken at face value. In my experience at least.
About Death saves - me and my players agreed that death saves are rolled by dm and nobody except the dm knows the result. That immediately made them relevant. Players fear for their fallen comrad and trying to get him back up
I can see how this would be chilling for the players, and if this is the desired effect, this method is great; however, I always saw it as the character fighting to stay alive and putting the dice rolls in the hands of the player lets them keep agency in keeping their character alive.
It's just easier to read the 0-9 as actual 0-9 die so when you get 20+0 it's a 20 not a 30. The 00+0 is immediate to read as 100.
If you have an actual 1-10 die, then the same thing, just add them up so 20+10 = 30, 00+10=10.
Just add up the numbers, that's the easiest way to do it.
In 40 years of playing RPGs, I have only ever heard the phrase "It's what my character would do" from jerks who were trying to derail the game and ruin everyone's fun. Good players don't need to justify their actions. And yes, you can waste a lot of time trying to hit them with in-game consequences, but this will not deter them. In fact it will only make them double down, because you are giving them exactly what they want -- spotlight time at everyone else's expense. They will keep doing this until you throw them out, so you might as well throw them out immediately and save everyone a lot of time and headache.
Dude, love this video. You don't always have to post workshop stuff, we dig you, bro!
I love this! I don't necessarily agree with everything you said, but I respect the fact that you backed up every point with your reason for listing it, and that's something 99.9% of hot take videos don't do.
Agreed, Multiclassing IS not a thing, it does not exist.
If you want to play such a character talk to your dm and make such a class.
Alignment can be a really great thing. However, I do prefer to have players not playing evil characters. Chaotic, Lawful, Neutral, good, neutral all that is fine within a group but a chaotic evil character? I would talk to my player about how and what this character's character is.
🙂🤨🤔In my humble opinion about *Alignment* : "good" and "evil" are just points of view, I believe the best characters in all stories are the ones seen as good by some and evil by others, I feel that this is a level of depth that DnD has unintentionally curbed a lot of times since the beginning with this mechanic. *Chaotic vs Lawful* again, no one is one or the other all the time, ok if you use it as the standard behaviour of the character, players should still be encouraged to go against it sometimes and not punished by it, I believe this adds Conflict to the character.
Some may argue that alignment is just a guideline, but DnD has never treated it as such, hence the boring predictable Paladins that have their power stripped away if they dare to go against it!
But obviously, this is just my opinion when I DM, I can see the benefits in your arguments as well, and If I'm playing someone else's story I would of course defer to the DM's rules to have fun in their game! :)
_b.t.w. I'm a huge fan, Wyloch!!! Always excited to see another one of your videos, and always going back to your old playlists, I lost count of the times I've watched your Tomb of Horrors build!_ 😄
Great vid! And me too…I “built” my table by buying a 8” x 4” sheet of fine ply.
My table gets hyped when I drop "Roll for Initiative" - so my experience differs. That said, different groups requir different approaches.
Mimics are trendy more than anything else, I think. "But my character would say..." usually gets "Are you SURE about that?" from me when I'm running, and then I let the chips fall as they may. Unlike a lot of new school D&D kids, I am all about the alignment system since it helps you RP your character better, IMO-- though I generally frown on allowing CN characters since Chaotic Neutral always seems to end up being self centered, insufferable Chaotic Butthole. As in that one character everybody else wants to choke to death in short order. I like your ideas for initiative and percentile dice and I do believe I will incorporate them next time I run. Good video!
CN has the unfortunate history of being used by people to justify being an insufferable troll. Thing is, CN shouldn't be a selfish bastard, at least not all the time. That would be CE. Neutrality is an interesting case in general. We usually put animals as true neutral, because we believe they have no concept of morals whatsoever, but neither are they always selfish. They do what they do, and we can't say what they were thinking about.
Both ways of rolling a percentage die are correct. Your way of rolling just seems like extra steps.
I love alignment and find it helpful to keep in mind how my character would view the world and how they would respond to certain situations. Death saves are stupid and yeah Initiative is pretty arbitrary (in dnd at least).
I may disagree with the d100 dice version. But I think it's a good practice to have the DM decide how the rolls will be interpreted. After that it's all good :)
You are a legend sir!!! This is all so on point!!! The initiative part I agree in 5th edition, which is why I prefer how 2nd Ed handled it, yes a bit more clunky but way more randomized. And YES, you nailed the pronunciation of Drow!!! Keep up the good work 😊
I had a Grave Cleric whose whole schtick was that he was basically a funeral home director. Knew funeral rites for all sorts of cultures and religions. I had him use medicine checks for forensic sciences purposes. Determining the cause of death and what damage had been done to the body sort of stuff. Came in handy more than a few times while I was using him.
Some interesting points. I’m fine on alignment and playing in character is key. But humans IRL regularly act.’ Out of character’ so it shouldn’t be handcuffs
i do agree that allignment is a good thing , its just that most players i have played with (probably myself included) have a hard time portraying anything other then then straight up good or evil and maybe neutral so it often gets viewed as a bad thing because ppl dont play their alligment "correctly"
My lawful good artificer vedalken wants to open an abortion clinic in a very poor town and the back of the store will be a placenta taco shop, and build futurama suicide booths that supply an aboleth i met with more friends
The issue is most people don't understand what good and evil are. Most people should just be neutral. Much like most people don't understand the natural world. How many times have we seen the animal loving druid that didn't want animals to be harmed.... Seriously half the animals out there feed on other animals. Life and death are the natural way.
There is one correct response to "It's what my character would do", and that is, "Who creates your character to be like this?"
Like you, I have no problem with inter-character conflict, characters of dubious morality or 'tactically sub-optimal play'. This adds drama and interest to a game, especially one where people are telling a story. And I think it's great when someone does something unexpected which causes everything to veer off in exciting or dramatic new directions.
However, if someone's actions "in character" are disrupting the game or causing problems to the point where players aren't having fun (e.g. if the GM and other players are sick of one character going off on their own continually, or if each game ends up disintegrating into tiresome debates about morality and nobody can get things done), then "in character" or not, the player's choices are causing a problem.
We don't use initiative. Myself as a GM will go in order, which makes sense as the battle is taking place. I tell people when it's their turn.
#5. No multi-classing was the only one I agreed with. I wish you hadn’t wussed out on that.
Back in the day, it was a cheap way to differentiate elves, dwarves, etc from humans. The rationale made some sense, in that they lived very long lives and could pick up multiple skill sets over long time periods, and it was counterbalanced by fairly low level caps, rationalized by stating that the flip side of having very long lives was they didn’t have the same raw ambition as humans. There were only a few broad classes, and it could make sense narratively: a fighter-thief could be like Conan, and a fighter-mage could be like a LOTR (book) -style elven knight. Also, you declared your classes at the outset, and split your experience between them. You were a fighter-thief, and would be forever. You advanced roughly 1 level for every two of your peers, but got more benefits when you eventually leveled up.
Now, in 5e, this has become a hot mess. With the proliferation of classes and races, with no real limitations, players are free to treat the class abilities not as professions that require discipline, long study and experience, and dedication, but merely as a smorgasbord from which to pick abilities to creat the most game-breaking combos that never came up in play-testing. Most of these combos are specifically designed to circumvent limitations the designers put in place
But my real problem with it is it make no sense narratively , and so it is immersion-breaking. There’s a guy on UA-cam who does shorts rapid-firing off “epic” multiclass combos. “Take a Aarokocra, take one level of warlock to gain x, then take 2 levels of some subclass Monk for y, then 2 levels of Oath of Vengeance Paladin for z, and then 1 level of Circle of Moon Druid for ab. Then in combat, shape shift to this, do that, then use the other, and wipe out armies of bosses.” Now that I read it that is actually less bizarre than his actual combos. Anyway, in real life if you jump from career to career like that you’d never get hired, because you’d be a hot mess with no expertise. How do you square the idea of being all these classes, many of which have contradictory ethoses, with a believable identity for that character? The player ends up having to employ some serious pretzel logic to come up with some kind of narrative, and in the end their character ends up boring and lacking individuality, being merely a frankensteins’s monster of min-maxxing. For both these reasons, the system is broken. Either just throw out the whole class-based system in favor of a completely open ability tree, bring back the limitations to restore balance and narrative plausibility, or eliminate the multiclass concept altogether. I am strongly leaning toward the latter, with maybe some fixed combos. I think with the proliferation of classes and subclasses, and races with their own special abilities, for game designers it has become a fool’s errand to try to imagine every combination for possible loopholes and endruns around game balance. And if you ditch the class system entirely, are you even playing D&D at that point? Maybe switch to a new system if that’s the way you wanna go. I’m sure there are systems out there with open skill trees and no classes.
Btw, there used to be “dual-classing” for humans, which represented a major life and career change, a midlife crisis. And when you switched, falling back on your old class’s abilities meant you stopped earning experience in the new class. So it was kind of a there in case of emergency thing (with caveats, exceptions, and time limits, see the 1e Bard for example). But this narratively made sense, was a one-time change, and had some serious limitations to balance it out, especially at lower levels.
I feel like what'd work best for you was the prestige class system in 3.X
Is there a need for multiclassing when you have some many subclasses which are essentially (and a bit of another class).
Is there any need for subclassing when multiclassing would do the job just fine?
My ideal system would be classless, but I understand how badly that matches the typical high fantasy game.
I feel that subclasses are mostly devised to fill obvious gaps created by the class system.
e.g. My fighter can't access magic, let's create a fighter who has a bit of magic..
The new subclass then creates two gaps - one either side.
This leaves the game in a fractal "never quite done" state of exponential bloat.
@@steveholmes11 I think you’re on to something there. I suspect this might be the effect of video games. Back in the day, we made characters that fulfilled a role in the party. It was like the “A Team", everybody had their role, and we tried not to step on each others toes with character creation. This allowed everyone at the table to shine in turn. Come across a locked door or suspicious chest, or need to pickpocket the aristocrat suspected of espionage? Thief to the front! Need find out what happened at a massacre at a lonely crossroads? Wizard, do your thing and commune with the dead. Etc etc. It also created opportunities for dramatic tension: e.g. when the wizard was incapacitated or kidnapped, the party had to do without magic while they figured out how to rescue the wizard or heal him.
Now, everyone is used to playing solo heroes in video games. You don’t have a team in Skyrim, your character does it all, and accumulates all the needed skills themselves. I think the expectation bleeds over into D&D, and newer players want to be jacks of all trades, and master of _all_ . They don’t wan’t to be part of a team where they have to depend on others, they just want to be super badass Mary Sues who will always be up for any possible obstacle. I think this is having a negative effect on the game. It also fuels the subclass and race inflation…if everybody can do everything, how do you make your character stand out? By ever flashier and outré subclasses or races.
Who in such an environment would play a human fighter? Yet some of my favorite characters I’ve played have been human fighters. And some of the most iconic characters from fiction: Aragorn (arguably, despite inspiring the ranger class), Boromir, Faramir, Theoden, Éowyn, were all human fighters, all memorable and very different from each other as characters. And just a few minor tweaks, like introducing elves, dwarves, and hobbits, and even though they are all fighters too, we can have very different characters with Legolas, Gimli, Frodo, & Sam. No need to resort to aarakocras, dragonkin, or playable fairy dragons.
Just plain wizards, thieves, etc etc are also common in fiction. These focused characters aren’t less interesting, they are arguably more interesting, with dedication, an ethos, and a worldview that organically arises from their profession. Playing a character with special expertise, who can step up and fulfill their role when needed, and let others shine in their turn, is a cornerstone of what makes D&D a great collaborative experience. We stray from that at our peril.
Alignment is great. I think the way it reads in the book is backwards. You choose an alignment and that governs how a character acts rather than looking at how the character acts and realizing that corresponds to a specific alignment. Even saying someone has a code of honor, that code can have someone commit very evil acts that are allowed within the code.
I get what you are saying with the d100. But I grew up with 18/00 strength scores. So that one isn't breaking anytime soon.
You forgot one. [FIRE IN THE HOLE!] "5E sucks!"* {ducks for cover} Also, there is still smoke coming out of my ears from the percentile die thing. Gears just ground to a halt! Will have to revisit after I change the oil. Lastly, Forbidden Lands or GTFO. 😉 Good stuff, Wyloch!
*Opinions are like....
I edited my comment and lost my heart. Sad. 🥲😁
My friends get mad when i talk about the d10 thing now but i think your way makes infinite more sense
On alignment, it depends on how it gets defined. Personally, I've not seen a description for the law/chaos axis that actually makes much sense when applied to any halfway realistic situation. Good/evil can work for me if it describes altruism versus selfishness. Problem is a lot of time I see descriptions for both axis talking about how the character is seen by/interacts with the greater society, and as someone who's part of a marginalized group such descriptions make me super wary.
On initiative, I agree that the narrative should take precedence over any dice roll. I want to test other systems of doing it so I can figure out my preferred method. I have never liked the idea of rolling initiative every round, though, like I've seen some system suggest.
I don't agree with you on d100s. The Proper™ way is to roll an actual d100 (which look a bit like golf balls covered in tiny numbers). The next best way is to roll two d10s, with one as the ones place and one as the tens place - 0 | 0 (or 00 | 0) indicate 100, as the hundreds place is not shown and the expected range is 1-100 instead of 0-99. However, if I were a player at your table then I would use the method you describe as you'd be the GM.
On how to pronounce drow, there's... um, grow, throw, blow... Ah! Plow, brow sow... There we go! I actually hadn't really thought about it before, but I see why it could be pronounced either way. I'm just more familiar with one than the other.
My favorite dice is 2d10. There's a mathematical beauty in its probabilities: 10% to get 11 in the middle, then you loose a 1% for every step to the extremes, until you reach 2 and 20 who are both 1%. Plus, I love the sound and feeling of shaking to dice in my hand.
Thank you for being the other person in the universe who pronounces "Drow" properly.
Death saves will not go away in D&D (5e or one D&D) it's a selling point for the game which is ease of play (easy is the key word)
The flaw in the % opinion (as mentioned elsewhere in comments) is the original dice did not have the tens, they were different colours 00 is 100. However d12 are cool and should replace d4 and d6 in use with different numbers printed as they roll better.
The bit about d100 really made my head work - I can logically see how your presentation makes sense, I'm just not sure if I'm ready to accept it :D
After 40 years of playing D&D I know the following:
Initiative rolls count. There is always a possibility that the Wizard with a -1 thinks fast enough to cast hold person before a rogue with a +5 can stab someone.
Percentile dice 00 + 0 = 100 Done that way since 2nd edition.
Medicine check - yes I have used medicine check for stabilizing players when the cleric was down or couldn't get to the down fighter.
D12, how Sumerian of you. Yes, Sumerians used the inside of their finger to count to 12.
You’re right about the percentile dice. I feel good about following such a sane person 👍🏻
The d100 is a matter of when you learned it but my only disagreement is in Alinement, or rather how it is done. I prefer other systems metrics such as from Barebones Fantasy albeit with a few tweaks. Under the current system there are nine alignments but people come in way more flavors.
Interesting choice for rolling 100s. Everyone I know has always made the 0 a 0. Really it comes down to consistency at the table. As long as everyone is playing with the same rules, you are fine.