138
votes
I gave my players far too much wealth and they have far too much power. What do I do to get things back on track?
Consider that "sudden, undeserved wealth" is a fantastic story hook.
The party is now famous. Against all odds they defeated the dragon and spent its treasure with abandon at all the best shops in ...
- 1,326
132
votes
Accepted
A player always wants to recruit NPCs into the party. How do I handle this?
Your first instinct-- gently talking to the player-- is a very good one. You can easily follow that up with a less gentle discussion laying out the basic idea that tabletop RPGs (unlike computer RPGs)...
- 42.4k
108
votes
Accepted
Sentinel Raven uses too much awesome magic
Yes, you are missing something; an incapacitated creature cannot maintain concentration:
Being incapacitated or killed. You lose concentration on a spell if you are incapacitated or if you die. (...
- 28.5k
101
votes
Can Alter Self be used to enter an enemy's body and destroy it from the inside?
I think your players need some help understanding the game's fundamental abstractions. To that end, let's address their plan:
Sounds like a pretty reasonable way… to deal 1d6 damage
In reality, human ...
- 29.1k
98
votes
Accepted
My DM has removed heavy armour from the game. How can I make a Paladin work or convince him not to do this?
Since he's suggesting you play a Paladin and removed Heavy Armor and claim combat will be deadly, just start a conversation with him and how he imagines your character surviving without the Heavy ...
- 80.2k
98
votes
Is Hunger of Hadar seriously overpowered or am I reading it wrong?
The spell says (emphasis mine):
No light, magical or otherwise, can illuminate the area, and creatures fully within the area are blinded.
Once a creature is not fully inside the area this ...
- 6,968
92
votes
How can I reasonably prevent Manual of Bodily Health abuse?
The Feywild is a living place too and 100 years is a long time.
Your party is burying the manual of bodily health in the Feywild with only the hope that in 100 years within the Feywild that nothing ...
- 2,075
89
votes
Accepted
Realistically, does Leomund’s Tiny Hut allow for indefinite long rests in a dungeon?
The spell enables relatively secure resting in dangerous places
You are correct that, on the whole this spell enables the party to rest securely knowing that they will not be murdered by the most ...
- 93.9k
86
votes
Accepted
Assassin using Arcane Trickster's Mage Hand: Is it Unbalanced?
Although many tables allow some degree of tweaking in order to make a build match a concept, they usually involve some degree of horse trading, i.e. giving up something to get something else. ...
- 32k
86
votes
Accepted
How powerful would an always-on Truesight ability be for a PC?
That's a 20th level epic boon (so very powerful)
The power of a permanent truesight effect would be situational. If you measure 'power' by raw combat ability, then unless you're fighting invisible ...
- 13.8k
85
votes
Accepted
Do 10 second turns/60 second rounds make spellcasters horrible?
Yes and No. But mostly Yes.
It makes spellcasters worse, by making some spells worse. In particular, the spells you mentioned, i.e., spells that rely on a Duration. Notably, however, other spells are ...
- 36.9k
80
votes
Can Alter Self be used to enter an enemy's body and destroy it from the inside?
That's not how attacks work.
The Alter Self spell could plausibly give the caster a tentacle that they can use as a weapon.
Natural Weapons. You grow claws, fangs, spines, horns, or a different ...
- 31.4k
79
votes
How are Fighters Linear but Wizards Quadratic?
Breadth of Option
Unexpected monster rears out of the darkness, clearly well beyond the battered party's ability to handle?
Wizard teleports home. Fighter manages to kill the thing half to death ...
- 29.7k
75
votes
Accepted
I gave my players far too much wealth and they have far too much power. What do I do to get things back on track?
So, your first mistake was allowing the players to go to Fantasy Costco and freely spend their wealth on magic items. Magical items aren't purchasable by default; the only things players can buy are ...
- 72.8k
74
votes
Is it just me, or is Guiding Bolt horrifically overpowered?
It's not OP compared to other 1st level spells.
Consider Burning Hands, which deals 3d6 in an area, or Inflict Wounds, which deals 3d10 damage, or Dissonant Whispers, which deals 3d6 while wasting ...
- 63.4k
73
votes
Accepted
Why is allowing players to stack their skill proficiency bonus overpowered?
It leads to "All or Nothing" skill development
This is going to cause exactly the problem that the 'bounded accuracy' philosophy of 5th edition was designed to address: All skill checks ...
- 72.8k
73
votes
Accepted
Is the Mordenkainen's Sword spell underpowered?
Mordenkainen's sword isn't underpowered - it's terrible
It's bad for a concentration spell
At any given level, the spell you chose for concentration should be one designed to "win" that ...
- 18.1k
72
votes
Accepted
How do I tweak this crouching rule to balance it?
Crouching is a no-brainer
And no-brainers are bad design --- you've created a new action that has a very negligible downside. No wonder your players are spamming it!
Think about it --- the only ...
- 53.9k
72
votes
Accepted
Is my Ranger doing more damage than they should?
You are doing wildly too much damage.
A ranger's damage shouldn't be out of line with the other characters. While some classes and weapon choices hit harder than others, it shouldn't be more than 20% ...
- 72.8k
71
votes
A player always wants to recruit NPCs into the party. How do I handle this?
He doesn't want me to run the NPCs either.
There's no basis in the rules to allow this. NPC's cannot be run by the player; that's actually the definition of an NPC. As DM you need to assert control ...
- 831
71
votes
Is this house-rule removing the increased effect of cantrips at higher character levels balanced?
No, this makes the current system less balanced.
The current system for cantrips gaining damage at regular intervals is the magic users' equivalent of the "Extra Attack" feature that other ...
- 1,651
71
votes
Accepted
What do I do with a party that is much stronger than their level?
CR and Encounter Building are not an exact science
If you find that your group is too effective (or too ineffective) in dealing with enemies, you will have to improvise and adjust the difficulty.
...
- 4,939
66
votes
Is a Bastard sword better than a Greatsword?
No need to ban the bastard sword, because it's not part of D&D 5e yet. D&D Wiki is mostly full of things made up by random people on the Internet — the Bastard Sword you link to is some random ...
- 243k
66
votes
Accepted
Are purchasable animals overpowered?
The part you're missing is
(ignoring story consequences).
I've played with a party who were really amused about the idea that they could buy an Elephant, and then did (and named it Bongo) and ...
- 80.2k
66
votes
How do I handle the wizard's familiar invalidating exploration, outshining the rogue, at low to no cost?
Find familiar is not overpowered by itself, you are giving it too much leeway.
Maps
There are 2 ways for a familiar to map an area:
The familiar maps the area, and telepathically relays what it ...
- 9,406
65
votes
Accepted
Is this homebrew hûthvír-like weapon balanced?
This is not balanced.
Okay, I don't usually do "is this balanced" questions, because I don't really know what 'balanced' is. But, to paraphrase Potter Stewart, "I know it when I see it, and this ain'...
- 101k
65
votes
One PC doing too much damage
I'm not sure this is a problem if you're actually reading and applying the rules for poisons in 5e.
Poison is bought in single doses. How much were they allowed to buy? And how much did they buy them ...
- 845
64
votes
Realistically, does Leomund’s Tiny Hut allow for indefinite long rests in a dungeon?
Yes, right up to the point where the goblins go fetch their shaman to cast Dispel Magic and fill the adventurers full of arrows.
The downside of your scenario is it hands all the strategic initiative ...
- 207k
60
votes
Accepted
Were "class tiers" in D&D and Pathfinder made on purpose?
Almost-certainly not.
One of the authors of the third edition, Monte Cook, has claimed that it was an intended feature to reward “system mastery,” for example here. He credits/blames Wizards of the ...
- 346k
58
votes
How can I convince a fellow player to stop playing super-powerful PCs?
Get them to help you build yours
You said that you don't want to play somebody else's character, but what if they helped you build yours? That way it's still your character but they've helped you ...
- 1,723
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