There seemed to be a couple people in chat interested in in 5e, so I’m doing this as a bit of a log of my experiences with the system.
The idea to start up a 5e campaign was rather spontaneous. I wasn’t initially thrilled with a lot of the changes 5e brought about – the return of the complicated save system, where sometimes the player rolls and sometimes the DM rolls when you cast a spell, and the spell levels being reverted back to the needlessly complicated level naming system (why do you get a level 3 spell at level 5 again? Could you have at least given it a less goofy name, like ‘Rank 3’?
But I was eager to play in another campaign after our 4e campaign with the same group had gotten derailed, so we decided to get together a group of people (beginners and people who don’t min/max) to play.
Looking through the Player’s Handbook, I noticed that feats as a mechanic was drastically reduced. Feats is one of the things I found most daunting about 4e, so a de-emphasis on them is a good change. In this edition, you choose at certain levels to either take +2 in a stat (or +1 in two stats) or to take a feat. This makes taking feats vs. stats an interesting decision, and to compensate, feats are quite powerful.
Another thing I immediately noticed and liked was the Advantage and Disadvantage mechanic. In 4e, one of the most frustrating things in my opinion was keeping track of all of the buffs and debuffs. In this system, it is pretty simple. If you have Advantage, roll twice and take the better result, if you have Disadvantage, roll twice and take the worse result. If you have something that gives both (even if one is given more times than the other), you roll normally. Conditional buffs and debuffs were not the most elegant part of 4e.
The main other notable things is that the skill system is pretty similar to 4e, and the characters generally have less options, with the lack of dailies and encounter powers for classes like Rogue and other physical characters. This makes the game faster and more simple, the latter which can both be good and bad. Also, low level spells can be ranked up, so if you cast a level 1 spell from a level 2 slot, it is more powerful. I’m not sure if 3e really does that. There are also Cantrips for mages, which act as 4e At-Will powers. All of the mage classes get at least one damaging Cantrip, and the arcane casters (Warlock, Wizard, and Sorcerer) get more. These also level up over time.
Stats are generally lower and scale up more slowly than in 4e. The maximum stat is 20 normally, and proficiency bonuses replace the half-level mechanic from 4e. Proficiency bonus affects attack, saving throws in abilities which you are trained, and skills which you are trained. For the most part, skills in which you are not trained you will be bad at forever. AC does not rise with level, only with upgrading equipment and gaining Dex. Dex, btw, is kind of an overpowered stat in the system. You can use it to use some weapons, and it affects AC and Initiative. Con is back to being a dominant stat, because it affects your HP every level.
Another mechanic that the game has is Concentration, which I think 3e has as well but I’m not certain. If you are hit while casting a spell that has the Concentration tag (often buffs or debuffs will have this), you have to make a Con saving throw or else the spell ends. You can take feats to give you proficiency in Con saving throws or Advantage on Con saving throws to lower the chance of being screwed over by this. There’s also the Hit Dice mechanic, which allows you to heal yourself for your HP die + Con modifier for a number of times equal to your level, but hit die only come back per day equal to half your level (according to rules as written, you never get them back at Level 1, but that is kind of idiotic so pretty much everyone is houseruling that. The Hit Dice mechanic makes Cleric less vital, but you really want in-battle healing for revival so don’t worry Cleric fans, they are still good.
Going through all of the classes, the character balance is pretty good. Casters don’t feel overwhelmingly powerful, and all of their spell slots max out at 4 per level. I know more about the classes our characters are actually playing, so those entries are longer.
Barbarian – Pretty defensive and reasonably good at taking care of themselves. Rage gives them resistance to physical damage and a bit of extra damage, and Reckless Attack gives them Advantage against enemies in return for them getting Advantage back at you. Later, you get more movement, two attacks, and critting ability, as well as a primal path which lets you emphasize either nature or anger. Their capstone ability is +4 Str and Con, and the cap on those stats is raised by 4 as well.
Bard – A versatile buff/debuff/healbot with a decent physical attack option. One of their main niches is Bardic Inspiration, which allows allies to add a die to an attack roll, a saving throw, or an ability check. The die starts at d6 and goes up with level, and after a while it turns from CHA mod of times per long rest to CHA mod times per short rest*, which is a nifty improvement. The second niche they have is the ability to dip into other class’s spells at certain levels, giving them offensive or healing options that they otherwise don’t really have. They also have two choices for their subclass; one gets more skills and more spell dipping, and the other emphasizes a physical build, giving multiple attacks, medium armor, and shields. Each also has modifications to Bardic Inspiration.
*a short rest is an hour in this edition, so it is a little more stringent than 4e encounter powers
Cleric – Cleric is still their usual good self, with great healing options, large variety in paths, and Channel Divinities that are on average quite good. They get an attack buff (or cantrip buff in the case of the more casterish Cleric builds) a few levels later than the others get extra attack, which helps them somewhat keep up in damage with the physical fighters. They can also pick up heavy armor in some of their paths. One of the paths, Light Cleric, is reminiscent of 4e Invoker.
Druid – They are a diverse caster with healing, nature, and some attack options, and they can morph into animals which is quite interesting. They also have a cantrip that makes their physical run off their Wisdom which is kind of awesome. I’m not sure how practical or battle useful that the Wild Shape powers are, but turning into an elephant is fucking awesome and I won’t hear otherwise.
Fighter – Fighter is your basic weapons and defense person. They get all weapons and armor, and they get one of six abilities that allow them to be better at different fighting styles – ranged, one-handed, two-handed, two-sword – or better at defending – an AC booster and an ability to block incoming attacks from allies. They also get a once per short rest ability that lets them take an extra turn, which is quite rad. But probably their two biggest niches are their ability to acquire stats and feats at a faster clip than the other classes and their Extra Attacks, which they get four of (no one else gets more than two). The two paths for Fighters seem pretty complementary to the package rather than amazing.
Monk – Their big thing is the multi-attacking with the unarmed strike and the ridiculous mobility. They can also reduce the damage of projectiles, which is super cool, and later they can reduce the damage of spells.Ki points also offer them some movement versatility, with Disengage being a good action to take if you want to get somewhere without provoking an opportunity attack. Their level 5 ability to stun for a Ki point seems potentially quite potent as well.
Paladin – Paladin is naturally a personal favorite, and the 5e incarnation is interesting. They have some of the Fighter passives, but no duel wielding or ranged style. They emphasize protection and helping allies with auras and stuff, and one of their spells is kind of like a 4e mark. They can also be a secondary healer in a pinch, although they shouldn’t be the primary healer. They have spells buff their physical attacks as well and they get a single Extra Attack. The paths are pretty cool as always, and one of them resembles Avenger from 4e. And all of the paths have awesome transformations at level 20!
Ranger – I’ll be honest, Ranger seems like a worst of both worlds Fighter/Rogue. I don’t really even give enough of a fuck to go over it. They can attqck but not as well as Fighter, they can dodge and reduce damage but not as early as Rogue, blah blah whatever.
Rogue – Rogue is pretty freaking awesome, sneak attack dice go up ridiculously fast compared to the general low damage scale of the game, and you can even ranged attack with Sneak Attack as long as an ally is next to the enemy. Awesome. They can be a skill monkey, with Expertise making them better at skills than most, but Cunning Action is really their great ability. The ability to attack and hide, disengage, or take a second move action is so good. They also can halve damage with reaction (!) at level 5 and can dodge spells a bit later. Yeah, Rogue is really good.
Sorcerer – Sorcerer and Wizard are pretty similar classes in the style of the 3e spellcaster. They have the classic spell lists (although somewhat toned down in their overpoweredness). In the case of Sorcerer, their big feature is Metamagic, which gives you a few choices of different properties of the spells. A couple of personal favorites are the one that makes their burst spells ignore friends, the one that increased accuracy by imposing Disadvantage, and one that makes spells Bonus/minor actions rather than full actions. You use these abilities by spending Sorcery points, which you start with 2 at 2nd level and gain one per level after that. These points are limited at first, being only restorable after a long rest, but over time you can use them quite often. Dragon Sorcerer ends up seeming pretty nifty, but I’m not into Wild sorcerer so much.
Warlock – Warlock is like the Satan-worshipping cousin of Wizard, but they feel distinct from Wizard or Sorc because of the nature of their spells. They restore spells after a short rest rather than a long rest, which allows greater freedom with spells. They only get up to 4 spells per short rest though (2-3) at lower levels, unlike the crazy number of spells from some of the other classes. They get some great passive abilities called Eldritch Invocations, which give them the ability to cast daily spells at will (False Life, which gives you 8 temp HP forever, is pretty damn valuable and makes the Warlock feel tanky compared to the other two arcane casters). Another great EI is the one that boosts the damage of Eldritch Blast, which is one of the money cantrips of Warlock. At higher levels you get the ability to fire multiple shots of it at either one or several enemies, which makes it a great cantrip. Another interesting thing about Warlock is that their spell slots are always the highest level they can be, so all of Warlock’s spells act as level 2 spells when he or she is class level 3 or 4, and since most powers scale up at a higher level, Warlock is able to use scaled up versions
Wizard – Wizard is pretty boring and straightforward; they have arcane traditions for each style of magic, and each of them boost those particular types of magic. Evocation is definitely a heavy-hitting damage dealer and allows you to target spells ignoring friends, so that seemed pretty cool. I haven’t looked at all of the arcane traditions that throughly, though.
I ended up deciding on a Valor Bard, but it was a tough decision. I also decided to play as a Lightfoot Halfling. Halflings actually has a really cool power that makes up for their low movement and limited weapon choices, which I didn’t feel like they really had in 4e. The best thing they have is Lucky, which allows you to reroll 1s, using the second result, lowering the chance of massive failure dramatically.
We ended up with a Dragonborn Barbarian, a pacifist Dwarf Cleric who ended up leaving the party after his traumatic experience being a mercenary, a Halfling Rogue who sneak attacks people with her bow, a Warlock Drow, and my bard of course. We ended up replacing the Cleric with an Elf Monk, which is an interesting and very mobile class. You’ll note that there are no Humans in the party, as this game seems to be encouraging people not to play as Humans.
On, and as an aside, the 5e Player's Handbook is something I have very conflicted feelings about. On one hand, its art is magnificent and colorful and the characters depicted are diverse and generally are quite beautiful. On the other hand, the book loves drooling over Drizzt, and even talks extensively about his anime rival Artemis. In the book, his personal motivation is described as “I will not rest until I have proved myself better than Drizzt Do’Urden.” Seriously now, whose life motivation is solely to be better than some random person? Maybe a sibling or something, but just no otherwise. Lastly, whoever decided to organize the spells in alphabetical order instead of level, class, or even school of magic should probably be fired.
Next time I’ll talk a bit more about how the game actually plays rather than character creation. Any questions/comments/corrections would be appreciated.
