Oh no. A spell got buffed and made useful. Sorry.. if your complaining about blade ward for having to remove 1d4 from a roll... Lets add Bane and Bless to that. The player should ABSALUTLY be handling this, you tell em the attack roll, they roll the D4. Its not hard. I'd also like to add if your solution to high AC is 'just throw bigger monsters at them' thats REALLY dumb. And to get around high AC, do saving throws. This honestly sounds a bit like DM vs player mentality developing. If one of your players has a high +hit, do you suddenly buff the AC of every monster. If a player is built to be really good at perception checks (passive and rolled) do you suddenly start givening bad guys massive + stealth modifiyers If a player is really good at lock picking, do you start using really high DC's for all locks. no, ofcourse you don't because if shafts the other players. you complaining about an 18AC, at a guess Imma assume scale mail (14+dex (max 2) = 16 plus a shield = 18. So thier sacrificing their damage to take hits for the team. Even if they went scale mail (16) + defencive fighting style +1ac, +duelist +1 ac to reach 18ac, their still sacrificing a LOT of damage for the ability to tank hits for the team. DO NOT punish that kind of team play. Their also having to consentrate on the spell, so a saving throw spell that still does damage on a save can break that consentration. Will never understand a DM that has an issue with high AC, every low level high AC build has weaknesses. It's like having a DM that doesn't shoot their monk with a ranged weapon once a turn just becasue they have deflect missiles.. like, its what the charecter/class is MENT to do.
I am mindful about the arms race. As you say: * If one of your players has a high +hit, do you suddenly buff the AC of every monster. * If a player is built to be really good at perception checks (passive and rolled) do you suddenly start giveing bad guys massive + stealth modifiyers * If a player is really good at lock picking, do you start using really high DC's for all locks. If you're not purposeful, the answer can become, yes! Especially when you have power gamers at your table who revel in this sort of min-maxing. This was a far bigger problem in prior editions, particularly D&D 3.x and its variants, where people could stack on seemingly endless bonuses (so maybe I have some battle scars...) That said, I don't think the answer is nerfing the player's abilities or the spell (which is the conclusion I get to in the video). The player built a character to be the tank ... so let them be the tank. :) As a GM, I think challenging that player comes in different forms rather than simple escalation, like needing to protect/tank for the party when while some other character needs to complete a task. Like Boromir holding off the orcs while the hobbits ran to the river in Fellowship of the Ring ... though that didn't end well for Boromir... Thanks for commenting!
Just played with is last night, the PC with blade ward just rolled the d4 and said what the new AC was to the DM. If the player forgot about the buff that's their fault, the DM already has enough going on.
Yeah, I think the "no going backwards" thing is important to keeping things moving. We're pretty good about that normally, though this is a test drive so it's likely to happen more often. Usually when someone forgets their character could do a thing (usually with mastery, which is a new mechanic, and one folks aren't used to yet).
The fact of the matter is, most characters who take this won't use it often. The only characters you really need to be concerned about with it are Valor Bards and Bladesingers at 6th level, and Eldritch Knights at 7th, since they can incorporate it into their Attack action, making them much more likely to use it. Then you'll have the occasional Sorcerer who might Quickened Spell it from time to time. It's not that big a problem.
And the 3rd level battle master with arcane initiate background. :) We'll see how it plays out over time. In our second test drive session, it didn't stop said battlemaster from getting pummeled by rogues (partly because of those nifty mastery abilities, and partly because of a crit).
Understood, and I get that. I played off my own initial reaction during the game (which was along the lines of ... damn, this is powerful AND one more thing to remember AND it's frustrating) and then talked through how I realized that "hate" was too strong a strong word, and I needed to take a breath. :) As a group, we had a good (and short) talk about it and got to a reasonable place (the PC will manage the die roles for blade ward, which moves the bookkeeping from me to him). That bit's covered in the episode; a future episode will talk about how that played out at the virtual table (spoiler: Blade Ward can't save you from everything).
@@nukehavoc This should be dont with EVERY ability the players have, you as a DM shouldnt have to keep track of your players abilites, if players cant be bothered to keep track of those abilites, they shouldnt be playing (there are acceptions, like those with disabilites etc)
@@Whitewolf1984p Typically, I'll take a more collaborative/cooperative approach to tracking things (as does my group). Yeah, the player who cast the spell (or the used the ability, or whatever) is responsible for the book-keeping associated with it (tracking rounds since cast, remembering if it's a concentration spell, etc.) BUT for a lot of these spells (like bless; we rarely use bane for some reason), there's a collective utility associated with them, so everyone at the table needs to remember that an effect is up so they can take advantage of it (or, ahem, suffer its consequences). In the real world, I'd help this by hanging a folded index card over the DM screen with things like "Bless 1d4" to remind people, hey, there's a spell out there that can help you. Online, that's harder. I try to use the colored pips in Roll20 to indicate effects. If it's an aura spell, we turn that on so everyone recalls when something is up. The challenge with Blade Ward (and Mastery, but I'll get into that in a future episode) is that it impacts the action economy, and adds 1) one more thing to remember and 2) one more thing to track. That's not a bad thing, but it's a new thing. Keeping track of these things collectively helps with accessibility (I imagine I'm not the only one who runs for neurodiverse tables), but it also just helps. :) Anyway, in our first session with Blade Ward, the onus felt like it fell on the DM (or any other attacker) because of how the spell is worded. A quick talk at session's end was enough to recalibrate our thinking.
Oh no.
A spell got buffed and made useful.
Sorry.. if your complaining about blade ward for having to remove 1d4 from a roll...
Lets add Bane and Bless to that. The player should ABSALUTLY be handling this, you tell em the attack roll, they roll the D4. Its not hard. I'd also like to add if your solution to high AC is 'just throw bigger monsters at them' thats REALLY dumb.
And to get around high AC, do saving throws. This honestly sounds a bit like DM vs player mentality developing.
If one of your players has a high +hit, do you suddenly buff the AC of every monster.
If a player is built to be really good at perception checks (passive and rolled) do you suddenly start givening bad guys massive + stealth modifiyers
If a player is really good at lock picking, do you start using really high DC's for all locks.
no, ofcourse you don't because if shafts the other players. you complaining about an 18AC, at a guess Imma assume scale mail (14+dex (max 2) = 16 plus a shield = 18. So thier sacrificing their damage to take hits for the team.
Even if they went scale mail (16) + defencive fighting style +1ac, +duelist +1 ac to reach 18ac, their still sacrificing a LOT of damage for the ability to tank hits for the team. DO NOT punish that kind of team play.
Their also having to consentrate on the spell, so a saving throw spell that still does damage on a save can break that consentration.
Will never understand a DM that has an issue with high AC, every low level high AC build has weaknesses.
It's like having a DM that doesn't shoot their monk with a ranged weapon once a turn just becasue they have deflect missiles.. like, its what the charecter/class is MENT to do.
I am mindful about the arms race. As you say:
* If one of your players has a high +hit, do you suddenly buff the AC of every monster.
* If a player is built to be really good at perception checks (passive and rolled) do you suddenly start giveing bad guys massive + stealth modifiyers
* If a player is really good at lock picking, do you start using really high DC's for all locks.
If you're not purposeful, the answer can become, yes!
Especially when you have power gamers at your table who revel in this sort of min-maxing. This was a far bigger problem in prior editions, particularly D&D 3.x and its variants, where people could stack on seemingly endless bonuses (so maybe I have some battle scars...)
That said, I don't think the answer is nerfing the player's abilities or the spell (which is the conclusion I get to in the video). The player built a character to be the tank ... so let them be the tank. :) As a GM, I think challenging that player comes in different forms rather than simple escalation, like needing to protect/tank for the party when while some other character needs to complete a task.
Like Boromir holding off the orcs while the hobbits ran to the river in Fellowship of the Ring ... though that didn't end well for Boromir...
Thanks for commenting!
Just played with is last night, the PC with blade ward just rolled the d4 and said what the new AC was to the DM. If the player forgot about the buff that's their fault, the DM already has enough going on.
Yeah, I think the "no going backwards" thing is important to keeping things moving. We're pretty good about that normally, though this is a test drive so it's likely to happen more often. Usually when someone forgets their character could do a thing (usually with mastery, which is a new mechanic, and one folks aren't used to yet).
The fact of the matter is, most characters who take this won't use it often. The only characters you really need to be concerned about with it are Valor Bards and Bladesingers at 6th level, and Eldritch Knights at 7th, since they can incorporate it into their Attack action, making them much more likely to use it. Then you'll have the occasional Sorcerer who might Quickened Spell it from time to time. It's not that big a problem.
And the 3rd level battle master with arcane initiate background. :)
We'll see how it plays out over time. In our second test drive session, it didn't stop said battlemaster from getting pummeled by rogues (partly because of those nifty mastery abilities, and partly because of a crit).
Oh, this is about D&D 2024. When I saw Greyhawk '76, I thought this was about REAL D&D. Hard pass.
This hobby needs more positivity now more than ever. And frankly I am just tired of old men complaining.
Unsubscribed.
Hate to see you go. We're usually positive. This rule change makes things challenging as a gm to make things fun for everyone at the table.
Understood, and I get that.
I played off my own initial reaction during the game (which was along the lines of ... damn, this is powerful AND one more thing to remember AND it's frustrating) and then talked through how I realized that "hate" was too strong a strong word, and I needed to take a breath. :)
As a group, we had a good (and short) talk about it and got to a reasonable place (the PC will manage the die roles for blade ward, which moves the bookkeeping from me to him). That bit's covered in the episode; a future episode will talk about how that played out at the virtual table (spoiler: Blade Ward can't save you from everything).
Every hobby needs more old men complaining.
Subscribed.
@@nukehavoc This should be dont with EVERY ability the players have, you as a DM shouldnt have to keep track of your players abilites, if players cant be bothered to keep track of those abilites, they shouldnt be playing (there are acceptions, like those with disabilites etc)
@@Whitewolf1984p Typically, I'll take a more collaborative/cooperative approach to tracking things (as does my group). Yeah, the player who cast the spell (or the used the ability, or whatever) is responsible for the book-keeping associated with it (tracking rounds since cast, remembering if it's a concentration spell, etc.)
BUT for a lot of these spells (like bless; we rarely use bane for some reason), there's a collective utility associated with them, so everyone at the table needs to remember that an effect is up so they can take advantage of it (or, ahem, suffer its consequences).
In the real world, I'd help this by hanging a folded index card over the DM screen with things like "Bless 1d4" to remind people, hey, there's a spell out there that can help you. Online, that's harder. I try to use the colored pips in Roll20 to indicate effects. If it's an aura spell, we turn that on so everyone recalls when something is up.
The challenge with Blade Ward (and Mastery, but I'll get into that in a future episode) is that it impacts the action economy, and adds 1) one more thing to remember and 2) one more thing to track. That's not a bad thing, but it's a new thing.
Keeping track of these things collectively helps with accessibility (I imagine I'm not the only one who runs for neurodiverse tables), but it also just helps. :)
Anyway, in our first session with Blade Ward, the onus felt like it fell on the DM (or any other attacker) because of how the spell is worded. A quick talk at session's end was enough to recalibrate our thinking.