this post was submitted on 30 Aug 2023
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D&D Next - 5e Discussion
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Honestly I think I'm done with DND. The whole session was nominally a fight, but almost all of it was the bad guys running away and us dashing to keep up. And then setting off like 5 lightning bolt traps in a row with no way to detect them really in a narrow hallway. (Apparently I should have tried dispel magic on the glyph, but how was I supposed to know it was a non-standard glyph of warding that keeps firing??)
And our wizard.. mixed bag. He'd split off from the party and, to his credit, figured out an alternate route that put him ahead of the baddies. But he wasn't able to stop them. Couple rounds of action and they got past him and escaped.
Though to the wizard's credit the main baddie happened to have legendary resistance so the wizard's portent + polymorph did nothing. Which sucks. Legendary resistance sucks.
So it wasn't great. Two hours of "I dash" and the baddies got away.
But even aside from that I've reached a point where like every piece of DND has something that annoys me. Time to find a new system. One that's not a close relative. If I never see another d20 or traditional six stats in a game, I might be okay with that.
Sometimes it seems like DMs think tabletop roleplaying is a competition with the players.
Like, this sounds really frustrating and boring, wouldn’t most people hate it?
The other three players didn't seem too upset, but hard to say if they were being more polite. I tend to be the most critical player, but I think the fighter and bard both made some concerned noises.
Like I said in my other comment, this guy is usually pretty good. Maybe it was just an off week.
@jjjalljs @Phantaminum that mostly to me sounds like you're done with that GM? Which is very reasonable...
Have you considered running?
Yeah I'm currently running a game of Mage and have run plenty of DND. I think this guy doesn't usually do this bad a job. We all have off days, you know? He said something about how he didn't expect us to chase the baddies. He thought they'd make a clean escape and we'd explore the trapped area more slowly. Which. Ok fine. It still sucked. Being able to improvise fun is an important skill and he kind of dropped the ball here.
Assuming you're being hyperbolic at the end there - the samey, no-actual-options feeling of DND is what drove me to Pathfinder 2e. And all the rules are officially free here.
But if you weren't being hyperbolic and want something in the same fantasy-action genre: Genesys is pretty awesome.
If you want something really real off-the-wall and different, try the one-shot friendly slapstick-comedy The Sorcerer Supreme (also free).
I've thought about Pathfinder 2e. I really intensely disliked pathfinder 1e so I didn't even consider it for a long time. It sounds like they changed a lot though.
If I go back to a fantasy dnd-like it might have to be Pathfinder, but I worry about how so many players can barely learn a simple game trying a complicated one. And unleashing my inner power gamer I tried to banish after college.
I really want to try Fate, but finding non DND players is hard.
Wow, your DM should learn some design best practices. I have started to look for a new system a while ago, my main problem has been that my party is not as deep as me in RPGs. Im a fate guy and them are dnd because its their first game
Are you me? Fate is my big game crush and it's hard to get people to play it. And then hard to break them out of the DND mindset.
At least I finally got some people to play Mage. Been wanting to do that for years.
Perhaps, well, i didn't think you will find it this easy...
Is hard to invite people to fate beside some oneshot.
Mage could fry some of my friends mind, is too much hahaha but some of them are willing to try Lvl up advanced 5e. I have some really good hopes on that game.
@Phantaminum @jjjalljs I enjoyed Fate more in concept and rules book than as played. My GM was a firm believer in giving me as many opportunities to earn fate points as possible, and "constantly failing" didn't feel good
Why were you constantly failing? The few times I've been able to play Fate I felt like I succeeded on all the stuff I wanted to, and picked my poisons on troubles.
It was really satisfying for my Space Nazi Hunter to invoke like four aspects at once to really make sure the space Nazi leader got his head blown clean off. Also satisfying to get fate points by starting nonsense with my "faked own death to escape corporate espionage charges" trouble.
Might've just been lucky with a good gm
@jjjalljs kinda exactly? "Hero" a-la Snow Crash obviously had a "best swordsman in the meta verse" aspect. But did he have to spend a fate point to win the swordfight when he was challenged in a bar early on?
In my game, my character was supposed to be talky-McTalk face, and I failed to talk my way into a bar because I wasn't willing to spend a fate point to do so. I shouldnt have had to.
I made a mistake when I tried to run it for one group of setting the difficulties too high, which can give results like you experienced.
I also found that when it went well, the players pushed for more "this aspect gives me permission without even having to roll". So if someone was playing "smooth talker" and the gm said to roll to get past a bouncer, the player might push back.
The time it went worst I think the players didn't really offer any creative input. Failures just turned into "I give up" instead of like "what if I convince him to let us in by lying that I'm someone famous, and then the real person shows up?" or whatever. I think it's hard for some players to zoom out from just their character and get more into the writer room space.
@jjjalljs I was focused more on the direct role-playing and less on the writers-room aspect... So by the time I was going "wait what?, I shouldnt need to roll?", the RP had already gone off the rails because the GM declared the bouncer pulled out a magical face id thingy and declared some trivial lie of mine was false
I.e.: failure always unless I spent fate points
That sounds like your GM wasn't one I'd enjoy, and wasn't following the "the table should buy in to whatever's happening" premise. Sorry your game wasn't good!