too many concentration spells

[Powercrank]

is 5e actually like this? if you only have 1 caster they practically cant do anything fun. i mean, even web is a concentration spell in this game. How does that even make sense? especially considering that grease is not a concentration spell. why do the webs magically disappear after being summoned but grease doesn't?

[Jotun]

Origineel geplaatst door RhodosGuard:

Origineel geplaatst door Jotun:

That is what I mean. Such a setup for a pitiful +1 AC is laughable. Sorry, I'll just take whatever buff I can get like armor of faith + a ring that increase my damages + a better clothing. Thank you very much.

You cant concentrate on SoF as a raging barbarian. Meaning you wont get the 1d4 psychic from your ring.
Whoops.

Well, at least that cleric/paladin will concentrate on something semi-useful then! /s

[Makkura]

Origineel geplaatst door RhodosGuard:

Origineel geplaatst door Makkura:

Not quite. Depending on how high it needs to be it is much worse or not quite as harsh.
Rolling a 20 normally is 25 times more likely, than rolling a 20 with disadvantage.
Rolling a 11 or better normally is twice as likely than rolling it with disadvantage.

I think when I said that I was considerung a DC 10 (most likely until higher level enemies) at 10 Con (most likely on a Wizard, less likely on a sorc/warlock)

basically you have chance y and chance 1-y
With Advantage your chance to succeed is
2*(y(1-y))+y² (succeed once on either dice or succeed on both dice)
that boils down to:
2*(y-y²)+y²=2y-2y²+y²=2y-y²

At 80% that comes to 88%
Your chance to crit also increases but I am too mentally tired to do that calculation right now.

Well, when discussing chances you shouldn't consider the DC but the target to roll, since the offsets are dependent on level and abilities.
If we take your 80% chance to succeed, then your target to roll were 5. To roll a 5 on disadvantage has a 64% chance. With advantage you have a 96% chance to succeed.
If the target roll was 10 then the chance is 55%. 30% disadvantage and 80% advantage.

The calculation for disadvantage is actually just squaring the chance for the target roll.
The calculation for advantage is correct, though it seems a bit more complicated than just saying "1-(1-p)^2" where p is the chance to roll a specific number or higher.

The important part from my side however was that neither disadvantage nor advantage influence the chance linearly. Saying it betters/worsens your chance double/by half is just not correct. For disadvantage especially not in the high rolls, for advantage especially not in the low rolls.

[Yagger]

3e were the golden days for sure

[pEEtrs]

Origineel geplaatst door Tozobi:

Origineel geplaatst door pEEtrs:

My feelings exactly after I spend some time to actually check all the spells and finished the game as sorc.

I get it why it's there (to balance out stacking of multiple effects), but what it actually leads to is that you're forced to pick one or two good CC spells (basically Hypnotic Pattern as you general CC and Hold Person / Monster to lock bosses), pick no buffs at all and just go raw damage.

You should have to choose, If you did not, there would be very few reasons not to start any combat with hunger of hadar + any terrain blocker under it, and then just spend the rest of the battle using AOE in the death zone. Or any other death zone you can create with similar spells.
And you can still actually do just that, but concentration means you need more than one character to do this. Would you like to start ambush combats caught by surprise by a single character/enemy that can start with those and wipe your party in 3 turns?

Well yes, the only choice I was making from certain point of game is (around middle of act 2): Is there any priority target? If there is, Hold it -> Win. If there is not, Hypnotic Pattern everything -> Win. Technically this was second choice every time, primary was: Is it larger battle so I use CC initially and win in 2nd round of combat or should I just nuke everything to dust in 1st round?

Then you have spells that are very strong and for some reason don't require concentration, like Plant Growth (not hard CC, but still very useful CC to use at times).

[Jotun]

Origineel geplaatst door RhodosGuard:

If you bring the infernal alloy to Dammon, he wil give you the Flawed Helldusk Set.

The gloves of this set are the only reason I started a STR Ranger + Monk Multiclass:
Attack with Monk Weapon + 1d4 Fire + 1d6 Hunters Mark + 1d8 Colossus Slayer, Flurry Of Blows with Open Hand + Tavern Brawler + the gloves for 2d6 + 2d4 + 2xSTR

Edit:
Another one would be using a Rogue with the Hand Crossbow from Yurgir and the Hand Crossbow from Grymforge.
Yurgirs sets enemy on fire on a hit from stealth or invisibility, the one from Grymforge deals 1d4 additional Piercing against a burning Target.

Yeah I know. These are the actually GOOD items and that's great. I'd just expect some other hard to get loot to be not as anecdotal. So far I really haven't found much that compares to Casormyr or the Flail of Ages. I mean, even the Giant Slayer is a bit "meh". It really feels like there are some great items like the one you mentioned and tons of bad ones, with very little in between.

[pEEtrs]

Origineel geplaatst door Jotun:

Origineel geplaatst door RhodosGuard:

You cant concentrate on SoF as a raging barbarian. Meaning you wont get the 1d4 psychic from your ring.
Whoops.

Well, at least that cleric/paladin will concentrate on something semi-useful then! /s

Yea, like dealing damage instead of poor buff that won't help much (i.e. it won't kill enemies, it won't CC enemies, why bother?), so you'll essentially sacrifice all spell slots to Smite and not to actually cast spells.

On the other hand clerics do have some nice spells: like a lovely spell such as Glyph of Warding (either hard CC or nice damage).

Clerics do have 1 good buff, Heroes Feast and otherwise you're much better dealing damage or CCing enemies with them. Healing with Cleric? What for, it's much better to not take any damage (because of CC) then taking it and trying to out heal it (which will cost more spell slots in the end, than just one hard CC). I think I used that mass healing spell two or three times during the entire game (and only because I had that amulet that grants it, it never made it into my clerics spell book on its own).

[RhodosGuard]

Origineel geplaatst door Jotun:

Origineel geplaatst door RhodosGuard:

If you bring the infernal alloy to Dammon, he wil give you the Flawed Helldusk Set.

The gloves of this set are the only reason I started a STR Ranger + Monk Multiclass:
Attack with Monk Weapon + 1d4 Fire + 1d6 Hunters Mark + 1d8 Colossus Slayer, Flurry Of Blows with Open Hand + Tavern Brawler + the gloves for 2d6 + 2d4 + 2xSTR

Edit:
Another one would be using a Rogue with the Hand Crossbow from Yurgir and the Hand Crossbow from Grymforge.
Yurgirs sets enemy on fire on a hit from stealth or invisibility, the one from Grymforge deals 1d4 additional Piercing against a burning Target.

Yeah I know. These are the actually GOOD items and that's great. I'd just expect some other hard to get loot to be not as anecdotal. So far I really haven't found much that compares to Casormyr or the Flail of Ages. I mean, even the Giant Slayer is a bit "meh". It really feels like there are some great items like the one you mentioned and tons of bad ones, with very little in between.

It all depends on the companions you chose, the classes you chose for them and the multiclass you might do.

If you think most items suck then that's a very subjective thing because I think a lot of them work rather well as long as you have someone who can use them to stick them to.

The Lightning Charges and Heat items are more like sets you use if you go for the very specific use cases they provide (Tempest Cleric with the Shield, Chest, Boots and ring)

The existence of Finesse Longswords in and off itself is pretty neat. Blood of Lathander literally gives you a per long rest Sunbeam and Blind against any undead.
The Trident from Act 3 is a GOAT for the always popular Throwing Builds, the Dark Justiciar related items are pretty great for a Rogue Multiclassed Shadowheart if you dont want her to be a pure healbot, then again there are so many heal focused items you get early that also work off things like the flail from flind or any other self heal, that you could probably walk around with constant blade ward on Shadowheart that way.

All I'm saying is that I really like the itemization.

Even if in the lategame for casters it just melds into "use as many high spellcasting items as you can"

[Jotun]

Origineel geplaatst door RhodosGuard:

Origineel geplaatst door Jotun:

Yeah I know. These are the actually GOOD items and that's great. I'd just expect some other hard to get loot to be not as anecdotal. So far I really haven't found much that compares to Casormyr or the Flail of Ages. I mean, even the Giant Slayer is a bit "meh". It really feels like there are some great items like the one you mentioned and tons of bad ones, with very little in between.

It all depends on the companions you chose, the classes you chose for them and the multiclass you might do.

If you think most items suck then that's a very subjective thing because I think a lot of them work rather well as long as you have someone who can use them to stick them to.

The Lightning Charges and Heat items are more like sets you use if you go for the very specific use cases they provide (Tempest Cleric with the Shield, Chest, Boots and ring)

The existence of Finesse Longswords in and off itself is pretty neat. Blood of Lathander literally gives you a per long rest Sunbeam and Blind against any undead.
The Trident from Act 3 is a GOAT for the always popular Throwing Builds, the Dark Justiciar related items are pretty great for a Rogue Multiclassed Shadowheart if you dont want her to be a pure healbot, then again there are so many heal focused items you get early that also work off things like the flail from flind or any other self heal, that you could probably walk around with constant blade ward on Shadowheart that way.

All I'm saying is that I really like the itemization.

Even if in the lategame for casters it just melds into "use as many high spellcasting items as you can"

I can give Larian that: they have items for pretty much everyone (class and subclass wise), which is very nice.

[Iso Koala]

Meh, I feel there is too many of concencration spells as well. I get that they dont want overbuffing be part of the modern rules (even though I enjoy buffing strats myself), but being able to do just 1 of any of those, I just put the 2 best ones in the quickslots and never use other spells because of this.

[Powercrank]

i mean overbuffing and cc stacking can easily be resolved without severely limiting player options like this by simply limiting the amount of buffs a single entity can have or else they "overload" or something (hell you could even do something like more wisdom = more buffs active without overloading, maybe make clerics not suck at everything but healing) and cc stacking is solved by diminishing returns (or in the case of this game, something like +1 to saving throw every time you fail) like in every other game ever made?

also the whole limited number of spells to day already IS a huge limiting factor on how much casters can do. now you have to be conservative and you're not allowed to do fun spell combos even when you are blowing your load.

[Elrodeus]

Origineel geplaatst door Powercrank:

is 5e actually like this?

Yes, it most certainly is. In fact since I didn't build my character for concentration on my table top game I specifically don't even bother to prepare most concentration spells for this reason as my Constitution is pretty dogshiiii.

I will say though that concentration spells are very strong. I just had a fight last night where I managed to hold Call Lightning through an entire fight and consistently doing 3d10 Lightning damage (with pushback because I'm a Cleric) on multiple enemies every round for 10 rounds without spending additional spell slots is pretty strong. Of course that required me to take almost no damage because I still didn't build my character for concentration spells even in Baldur's Gate 3.

[RhodosGuard]

Origineel geplaatst door Powercrank:

i mean overbuffing and cc stacking can easily be resolved without severely limiting player options like this by simply limiting the amount of buffs a single entity can have or else they "overload" or something and cc stacking is solved by diminishing returns like in every other game ever made?

also the whole limited number of spells to day already IS a huge limiting factor on how much casters can do. now you have to be conservative and you're not allowed to do fun spell combos even when you are blowing your load.

I really dont get that complaint.
I feel like you and the people who want less concentration are the people who expected a "Pew pew I want everything to explode at my very touch" game, which 5e and in consequence BG3 just is not.

There is a certain balance to go around, and while, in the end, yes, the rules are to be amended for the fun of the players, this is a CRPG, that is all about appealing to a wider range of DnD fans, and with the sheer amount of homebrew and houserules it is impossible to please every player, so they settled on a system that to me, and a lot of others, is balanced rather pleasingly.

The point is, there is no need for diminishing returns in dnd CC.
Once you go "Hypnotic pattern, you cant do anything anymore" there is no need to say "Oh yeah, but the next stun you land is active for 1 turn less" because if you utilize your CC there is no need to pack more CC on. Just pummel whatever failed their check to death, then turn to those who succeeded.

Everyone who has a problem with this should really try playing a test round of 5e dnd or at least read the PHB/DMG.

I feel like you want something that is less DnD and more generic fantasy and that is not what this game aims to be.

[Powercrank]

Origineel geplaatst door RhodosGuard:

Origineel geplaatst door Powercrank:

i mean overbuffing and cc stacking can easily be resolved without severely limiting player options like this by simply limiting the amount of buffs a single entity can have or else they "overload" or something and cc stacking is solved by diminishing returns like in every other game ever made?

also the whole limited number of spells to day already IS a huge limiting factor on how much casters can do. now you have to be conservative and you're not allowed to do fun spell combos even when you are blowing your load.

I really dont get that complaint.
I feel like you and the people who want less concentration are the people who expected a "Pew pew I want everything to explode at my very touch" game, which 5e and in consequence BG3 just is not.

There is a certain balance to go around, and while, in the end, yes, the rules are to be amended for the fun of the players, this is a CRPG, that is all about appealing to a wider range of DnD fans, and with the sheer amount of homebrew and houserules it is impossible to please every player, so they settled on a system that to me, and a lot of others, is balanced rather pleasingly.

The point is, there is no need for diminishing returns in dnd CC.
Once you go "Hypnotic pattern, you cant do anything anymore" there is no need to say "Oh yeah, but the next stun you land is active for 1 turn less" because if you utilize your CC there is no need to pack more CC on. Just pummel whatever failed their check to death, then turn to those who succeeded.

Everyone who has a problem with this should really try playing a test round of 5e dnd or at least read the PHB/DMG.

I feel like you want something that is less DnD and more generic fantasy and that is not what this game aims to be.

You cannot possibly insinuating that rules that were only added in 5e, the most recent version of D&D, is "more like D&D" than all of the other versions of D&D...

[Jotun]

Origineel geplaatst door RhodosGuard:

Origineel geplaatst door Powercrank:

i mean overbuffing and cc stacking can easily be resolved without severely limiting player options like this by simply limiting the amount of buffs a single entity can have or else they "overload" or something and cc stacking is solved by diminishing returns like in every other game ever made?

also the whole limited number of spells to day already IS a huge limiting factor on how much casters can do. now you have to be conservative and you're not allowed to do fun spell combos even when you are blowing your load.

I really dont get that complaint.
I feel like you and the people who want less concentration are the people who expected a "Pew pew I want everything to explode at my very touch" game, which 5e and in consequence BG3 just is not.

I would argue it is the otherway around: if you are to build a caster, might as well make it a blaster caster going "pew pew" because otherwise you just can't stack spells. so don't stack spells and just do damages instead which doesn't require concentration. Personally, I don't like it. Blaster casters are the least interesting type of casters in my book.

What 5e pushes you to do is: find a few best spells (hell, cantrip even), often low level ones (just up cast them), stick to these for the next 5+ levels. Which is great for sorcerers I guess, but sucks for wizards (once again) and is very boring. If they wanted to avoid people using always the same spells like haste, well... I guess they have failed because now Wizards will just auto pick Hold person/monster and spam it instead (that and AoE spells like fireball). I don't think it made magic more interesting than 3.5. It made more accessible maybe? But at the cost of it being quite shallow.

[Noin Trongaz]

Origineel geplaatst door Tozobi:

Origineel geplaatst door A Peasant Mobster:

The system is such that you can actually make any class work. You can make absolutely weird builds and with enough experimentation and thought invested into it you can win fights by using tier 1 spells.
If you don't want to do it, the game doesn't force you in any way! You can simply play on lower difficulty. What I did can't be called meta-gaming BTW because I didn't need any external information to make this build, only enough ingame expertise. Neither is any cheeze truly necessary.

I personally find Pathfinder system a lot more enjoyable than the DnD5e because the DnD system is so much simplified that build creating is basically non-existant. Like you literally don't have to think how to build your character at all, and neither do you have the system which offers freedom to experiment, discover new things etc. I actually like it that you need to put a lot of thought into making a strong party if you want to play higher difficulties, because otherwise what is even the point of the higher difficulties?

The Pathfinder system was simply a lot more fun for me as far as the actual RPG gameplay goes. Baldur's Gate 3 I played more for the story, the world, the characters. But the character progression, the itemisation, the choices you can make in how you make your party / do tactical combat - they are quite weak and not very interesting.

You have to realize that what you call bad design is actually *the most fun* I ever had with a party-based cRPG literally ever. For me, no other BG-like game comes even close, not even the original BG1 and BG2. As far as the tabletop system is concerned, Pathfinder 1 and especially Pathfinder WotR is the most fun I ever had, and I probably played all the games of this genre (PoE, Tyranny, BG, Icewind Dale, Neverwinter Nights).

I guess that it is simply a taste preference. I realize that for a lot of people WotR is not fun, just like for a lot of people Dwarf Fortress is not fun. However, both games are absolutely amazing at what they do even if they are not for a mainstream player. People who love complicated games which take a lot of learning to understand should also have games they have fun with. In the end, I don't have any fun playing Doom Immortal, or many other games. Most popular games are actually not fun for me at all. To each their own.

It is fine liking Pathfinder more than DnD. Tastes differ. The reason I call this bad design - and I am referring to WOTR, not tabletop pathfinder, is that while what you say is true, and yes you can create your own builds to make it work without going online, the available builds that can actually do that are not that many. Not every character and class can do this. If you do have the time to spend trying to find them, cool.

Again: for anyone who actually looks for this in a game, if it works for you, that is good enough. I used to play tabletop Shadowrun, so I know the appeal of this type of class building and combat. But implementing it while allowing some freedom with viable options in a video game is a difficullt proposition. 20 years ago, even DnD 3e and 3.5e were the same thing in tabletop, and back then people complained that "2nd edition is better because reasons". It is all a matter of perspective in the end.

Weirdly enough, I didn't find a single class who could not be redeemed with a proper gear, feats and maybe a dip or two. I don't know how the max difficulty is, as I was not interested in min maxxing (in a sense of deliberately chosing the most efficient class combinations, gear etc) or cheezing.
If you play on normal, you can finish the game with every single class in the game.