Concentration really does two things: 1) Prevents layering of multiple spells on a target (stacking) to dramatically increase their power to god-like levels (3e had the scry, buff, teleport meme--or the scry and fry). 2) Allows a spell to be disrupted to end the effects early. Some spells may require both aspects, but many could get away with only one of those restrictions (mostly the first one). If the mechanic was broken into its two separate components, it would be more useful. Some spells just need to be disruptable. More just need to disallow stacking. Some few may require both. Or Super Concentration. But I'm not confident in the Devs ability to apply these mechanics well, given Witch Bolt, Crown of Madness, and Enervation. It would be interesting if there was some combination of Sustain, Disruptable (taking damage or some such can end early), and Unstackable. Unfortunately, that would add a level of complexity to spell design that would make things much more difficult; both for the designer and the players.
Came here to say this. Concentration is really two mechanics that got mashed together. I think a lot more spells could just be disruptible and not exclusionary. Disruptible makes sense in-game for most long-duration spells.... But not all of those need to cancel other long-duration spells.
I broke it down in another comment without seeing this one, but there's a third aspect here as well that I think has to get separated out: trying to keep combat complexity manageable by way of limiting the number of statuses that have to be tracked. IMO all three of these should have been separated into their own mechanics, and could have been with minimal complexity. That said, the point about design quality in general is on point. It's pretty clear that a significant number of developers don't grasp the reasoning behind their own system designs.
I agree that concentration is overly used. Though I really think there are just too many spells. But the most annoying for me is when defensive spells take concentration. It could be useless if a spell fails to protect you, you take damage, and then you lose concentration.
There are too many spells. I'm with you on this. 500+ spells is honestly just too many especially when so many of them would never realistically be picked. If they had 200 spells that were all reasonable contenders in their own right, I would appreciate it much more.
@@InsightCheck I'd go so far to say that DnD is too specific. Every spell and every power needs to be exactly defined. There should be some general principles behind the scenes that should be brought forward instead of needing to make a new thing for every permutation they want to allow in the game. But that's getting a little off topic...
@@InsightCheck Many spells are dominated in the game-theoretic sense: Options that are dominated are never chosen by a thinking player and thus just end up being traps at best. Flame Arrow doing something more like adding 3D6 to ammo would start to become worth it. At 1D6 with all the other stipulations, it's just a trap. Or if you could use it to make up to 10 pieces of +D6 ammo and the duration was 24 hours. Or something. Just not what it is. To be fair, Flame Arrow has pretty much always sucked all the way back to 1E.
As an alternative to the idea that there are too many spells, I think it could be said that there aren't enough reasons to use any spells but the best few. Having some spells that are better than others at the same level can be value additive if there are mechanics which force and/or encourage you to use them, but since you can cherry pick only the best all the time, they're truely wasted. I recently ran a game with a house rule that made it so casters had to discover every new spell in randomized loot - similar to 1st/2nd Edition wizards, with no automatic spell acquisition when you level up - and it felt pretty good in a variety of ways.
@@InsightCheck I had many combats that the win condition was not to kill the boss, but to drop his concentration. It's dramatic, requires coordination, and makes the martials shine. I get why concentration is not a popular mechanic. It's a burden on the casters and nobody likes that. But considering what it does to the game, it will be really sad if they change the mechanic. But I can agree with you that it is overused.
Yeah, I mean the entire point of the video wasn't to say that they should get rid of it but rather that it is a great idea that could be iterated on. I think it has a lot more untapped potential that is just wasted on them overtagging spells with it haha.
@@InsightCheck I actually agree with your points in the video, but the video's thumbnail put me on the defensive. It's not a good representation of your ideas.
@jspsj0 sure that’s a fair criticism. For me the suggestion was more that it has problems that create knock on effects but obviously is attention grabbing language.
Correction At 4:40 you say the DC of a concentration check when you take damage is "DC 10+ half the damage you took" when it's 10 OR half the damage you took, whichever is higher
That dc 10 clause is why I love magic missile on my bad guys Your level 3 cleric holding up bless only has +4.5 so they have a 27% chance to fail per missile
One thing not brought up is that concentration becomes super weighted towards monsters at higher levels. Typically, monster saves scale faster then the players as their prof bonuses tend to be higher, and they can always burn a legendary resistance if they fail. Also, monsters tend to have move beefy attacks at that level where it is sometimes impossible to succeed for the players (high level dragon breath attacks or other big save for high damage abilities come to mind). I know a lot of things break at higher levels, but still something to note. Edit: I think a simple wording solution that would fix this would be something like "The DC equals half the damage you take. The DC cannot be lower than 10 or higher than 25."
you're not fighting 4 monsters with legendary resistance at once, don't act like you do the concentration of a single boss monster is worth so much more than that of your casters
@feferson492 Not sure what ur saying here is exactly. The value of concentration is always contextual to the combat cause spells are contextual. I was just trying to say at higher level the scales aren't even. Say, you have an Ancient Gold Dragon with Maze. The dragon can easily impose an impossible concentration check on a failed breath weapon save, while also holding concentration on a spell where the only counterplay is likely breaking concentration, which will be difficult when it has legendary res.
@@tibot4228 I was trying to highlight for example a failed breath attack (crits also often get this high cause of high damage dice as well), where the concentration check is DC 30+. War Caster and Con save prof won't help you, the save is impossible.
Warlock also gets hit hard by concentration. You already have such a limited pool of spell slots, so when a spell you're concentrating on ends prematurely it REALLY hurts. (and warlock has so many good spells locked behind concentration ;w;)
Concentration is a great way to prevent spell stacking, but it obviously still exists in many ways in 5e. The only places I think it's overused is in smite spells and cantrips, otherwise I think it almost always comes down to spell balance. There are some exceptions, and I could see flame arrows being one of those. I liked 4e sustain as a way to prevent inappropriate spell stacking, but also spells were overall worse compared to other editions.
Yeah this is a fair take. Cantrips I can almost understand why it’s there more. They are inherently dangerous to design because they’re infinitely repeatable and cost “nothing”. It can be suuuuper easy for those to get out of hand real fast.
Sustaining spells is a mechanic that Pathfinder 2e currently uses. You need to use an action on each consecutive turns for the sustained spell to continue. The difference with Pathfinder is that it uses a three-action system. Everything uses 0 to 3 actions including moving, attacking, and casting. Here, sustaining a single spell isn't much of a burdeon since you still have most of your actions to do other things. However, you're still able to lock yourself down with double or triple sustaining if you want at the sacrifice of using your other, valuable actions. It also means that it isn't a problem if half your spells are sustained, and it gives you options to be creative with it which I really like.
Some spells also don't have Sustain as a duration, but have an additional effect that's applied if you do Sustain it. This adds a core mechanic that can be built on, such as feats that let you do a Sustain once for free (or once per turn or something).
I think one of the most important aspects of concentration is allowing a spell to be interrupted without needing a Counterspell or Dispel Magic. It allows anyone, particularly martials, to try and disrupt multi turn spells.
The sustain minor in 4e where you spend your minor action (bonus action in 5e terms) to keep the spell up every turn always seemed like better design than concentration to me. It had two really important features, one is that it's tactically more interesting because you're giving up something to keep the spell going instead of just filling an extra slot so using any concentration spell is a choice, not just which one you're going to use. having played both 4e and 5e, the 4e sustain mechanic is much easier and faster to play with because there's just less to forget. You don't have to remember a concentration check every time you take damage, and using an action to actively sustain the effect every turn is a good reminder to apply it so it doesn't get lost. being able to break concentration is cool, but I think it should be something that requires setup or at least something more notable than just taking any damage. that would make it easier to remember and then you could make it harder to succeed the check so that the mechanic is more predictable.
There were ways to break Sustain in 4E, inflicting the Dazed condition being a classic. I played a Psion(?) with a bunch of summons-type powers for a while and boy oh boy did I hate it when I got Dazed....
Concentration is such an underused design space. Just on this bathroom break: 1) effects when Concentration ends: hypnotic pattern does some psychic dmg, creatures affected by a spell gain resistance to the dmg, caster gets a boost or debuff, etc. 2) More ways to break Concentration with skills that aren't damage. 3) While Concentration lasts, option to use action to empower spell, spread effect, enable class features. 4) melee Concentration. Please, you dont think a rogue or monk isnt concentrating when doing some of their stuff? 5) Rewards for maintaining Concentration for x rounds. Or think something like delayed fireball here too. Seriously. They could do so much w this function, it already has great tactical implications, asking characters to swap targets bc of concentrating enemies, and of course building around protecting it as well. Ty for the video
This is the way we handled it when I was playing AD&D: spells had a casting time of a number of segments. A caster started the spell on their initiative, then after X number of segments it went off. If intead the spell caster was hit during those segments, then they lost concentration and the spell was lost. Since casting time was most commonly 1 segment/spell level, low level spells were favored during combat.
An understated benefit of Concentration reducing the number of ongoing effects at any time is making fights more manageable. There are fewer things the DM has to keep track of, even at higher levels.
Yeah they almost underutilize the space despite bloat. I like how it’s this invisible “slot”, but concentration spells that need to be carried into their next Turn would be sooooo nice (other than True Strike). Getting the teamwork to cover you while you unload destruction or something dramatic would absolutely slap (PF2Es got a couple spells like that, but I’d enjoy it under DnD’s concentration system more). Concentration conceptually I also like because it can give this idea of only one ongoing spell effect at a time. PF2Es / 4Es sustain might be one of the best alternatives, with concentration mainly being a tag needed only at the moment of casting. Also a damn shame Barbs have this anti-synergy with this tag, restricting that class even more than it already is compared to other classes.
15:52 It wouldn't change much power-wise, it would just make casters more boring. They already use a Concentration spell and then stay back casting cantrips unless the encounter calls for more resources to be used by the caster (which they rarely do) - the cantrips are weak, but at least they feel like you are doing _something_ on the following turns. If 'Super Concentration' was implemented casters would just nope out after casting and go hide/run away/climb into a Rope Trick - then the player would grab their phone and stop paying attention. I cannot imagine this would be a positive for the game. My opinion is not that the spell average is too powerful, it is that combat encounters and martials are too weak/straight-forward. While the DM is in control of the combat encounter, the advice the books give and the monsters provided do lead to this without heavy modification being applied. Furthermore, if present, the DM may also be limited by any martial characters with few options available - which may make the encounter unsuitable for these characters even while now being more suitable for the casters with the options. If combat encounters and martials are sorted out, spells (and thereby casters) will be more strongly in-line with expectations. A retort to this is that spells could be nerfed. However, I would like to note that many spells cannot be meaningly nerfed without destroying the essence of the spell, since numbers are rarely what makes such spells powerful - the effects are. Furthermore, changing the numbers that _do_ exist in these spells (Spell Level, Spell DC, etc.) to nerf the spells often results in casters having a lack of effective options at low levels, and/or lolrandom effectiveness - which would result in the game being decidely more dull for tactically-inclined players at lower character levels. This is why I will instead champion raising everything else rather than dragging casters down. Once all that is sorted out, Concentration could do with being scaled in some fashion. The reason for this is that low-level spells with Concentration have to contend with higher-level spell options, not just the Spell Slot. This leads to far fewer options being practical (which leads to 'cookie cutter builds') - and not just at the level at which they are acquired either, since switching out spells available is limited. These spells becoming duds as the caster levels up reduces content rather than increasing it, while the power would have been limited by Spell Slot in any case. Many options exist for scaling Concentration with level; for example, scale it with Proficiency and add a Concentration Level to spells, such that you can stack lower-level spells/weaker long duration effects as the character grows, while ruling out stacking level-appropriate effects. Another example would be to just have classes ignore Concentration requirements on lower level spells as they level, although this may allow too many at once.
Concentration should have been made so how it was in 0e. When casting any spell you have to spend your whole turn casting the spell, no moving either. The spell is cast only at the end of the combat round. If you are hit or fail a saving throw then the spell is lost. Spells that had concentration needed you to have that for the whole duration of the spell.
Great video! Here's hoping the September PH fixes this by basically removing concentration from a lot of weaker spells, or especially half-caster spells and self-protection spells (like protection from energy). Also, here's hoping more of those spells get bonus action casting times.
Instead of concentration, you could make it such that you could cast 1 spell that requires 2 (or more than 1) rounds to cast. Thereafter, it is self sustaining and you could cast another spell. But limit the # of ongoing/active spells to 2
If you look through the different editions you can see that 5e took a lot of the brakes that spells had in those editions. The biggest is simulacrum, check the 1st edition PHB.
Sustain also exists in PF2e in a similar way. The big difference is the three action economy in PF2e. It makes sustained an interesting strategic choice in combat, and I'm a big fan
As someone who is very new to dnd, it's been frustrating that concentration is on the smite skills because i have to recast it each turn to get the effect and i can't hold bless on my allies while doing it.
Some extra info about 3.5 to fill in the gaps: 1) In addition to when interrupted by damage or vigorous motion, a Concentration skill check was also required when casting a spell adjacent to an enemy (to cast defensively). A failure wasted the spell and the action to cast it. You could choose not to roll, and instead provoke an attack of opportunity (which if they hit would require you to make a Concentration check anyway for taking damage). 2) 3.5 also had 'sustained' spells, indicated by having "concentration" as the duration of the spell (3.5 and d&d in general uses the same word a lot for multiple meanings). By default these spells required you to use your standard action each round to keep the spell going (exactly like the variant rule from 5e). Failing to do so would end the spell or end your ability to modify the spell (for example, a spell could have a duration of concentration + 3 rounds, and while you spend your actions each turn you can move or modify the effect, but once you stop spending your action, the spell remains stationary for 3 more rounds, then ends). 3) there was some small counterbalance to spell stacking in 3.5, specifically with abilities that granted numeric bonuses. In 3.5 numeric bonuses had a type (enhancement, alchemical, circumstance, luck, divine, etc), and for the most part bonuses of the same type didn't stack. In this way, if you had a whole party with bull's strength (the precursor to enhance ability, which granted +4 enhancement bonus to strength), it didn't matter how many castings were on a single target, they'd only receive +4 total bonus. Almost everything else that wasn't numeric stacked, though, and it was busted af.
11:50 because of how spell stacking works, having multiple simultaneous instances of flame arrow wouldn’t work. Your attacks would only register one of them. Also, I’d argue that hunters mark actually isn’t that good. The primary reason people think rangers are bad is and has always been because people use hunters mark instead of the other good concentration spells. Making either those spells or hunters mark non-concentration would make things a lot better though.
How exactly is guidance worse. I may be missing something, but no concetration, range and being a reaction all seem like upgrads, in addition to not needing to use it before the check (even if most don't use it that way). It and resistance feel like shield, being free defensive spells at little cost outside of your reaction, which for clerics tend to bot be heavily used.
For clarity, I MUCH prefer the new versions of Guidance and Resistance. I think they are much better to use now. The reason some feel Guidance might be "worse" now is that the 10 feet restriction is very close. I don't agree with this take lol.
I am in the minority I think cos I don’t like the new version. I don’t like stuff that allows players to avoid failure. Failure is fun for narratives. Guidance ought to require pre planning. There are times when, because a task might take a few minutes, it makes sense for a character to cast guidance after a party member tries to start the skill. But using it as a reaction feels like a free avoid-negative consequences trick. To say nothing of the fact I think the DM should really have NPCs react with hostility to magic. If you are in a conversation and suddenly a character casts a spell, as if you would keep speaking to the party - you would know you are being duped (subtle spell aside).
I think you make some good points, but miss a precursor to the concentration issue. Saves. More specifically, save or suck effects. Anything that requires the expenditure or a limited resource, and has a high chance of yielding no effect whatsoever, is a bad design. At best, the effect isn't valuable and so nobody uses it. That's BEST case scenario. At WORST, the effect is so desirable that EVERYONE uses it. This fails in both directions at the same time: frustration when it DOES work, and frustration when it DOESN'T work. The first step is to acknowledge that when a player expends a resource, they should get SOME effect out of it. An effect that is significantly weaker than the goal, but also good enough to not feel like a total waste. The "save for half" damage spells are a good example. The second step is to acknowledge that a higher chance of success can be used to balance a lower value effect. The reverse is a bad design as described above. To this point, the DC calculations should yield a higher success rate so that lower value effects are justified. This leads directly to the next step. The third step is to acknowledge that a duration is only meaningful if there's a decent chance of seeing it. When a spell offers a save every round AND has a low chance of sticking, the duration becomes irrelevant. A higher chance of the spell sticking makes it likely to get SOME value, and the followup with a higher DC means that a duration is possible, but not guaranteed. So let's look at one of the worst offenders: Hypnotic Pattern. Save or suck, long range, large radius, devastating condition, single save. Supposed, this is balanced by concentration, friendly fire, and a relatively low chance for each target to fail the save. Step one, on a successful save each target has the blinded condition until the end of their next turn. Step two and three, raise the chance of success to about 75%, but allow followup saves every round. Now, with a much stickier spell and no chance at a complete fail... Reduce the range and area to 30ft and 15ft cube respectively. It's still incredibly powerful, but is far less likely to completely defeat an encounter in one shot. On the other hand, the caster will never feel like it had no value. Once the base value of the spell is adjusted away from the extreme gambles, concentration mechanics are a lot easier to approach without breaking anything.
Yeah, I loved just playing a buffer and putting 10 spells on everyone, can't do that anymore. But that's because they balanced the classes against each other like a video game, instead of against the world. Everyone has to be equally good in a fight, because you can't have classes that exist to do stuff before/after fights like buffers/talkers/making stuff.
@@acrab6527 'Tis a pity. Heck, I remember playing Neverwinter Nights back in the day (I think this was in Hordes of the Underdark); there was an explicit command to tell a spellcaster to blast every buff spell you had onto the party. Good times, good times.
Any concentration spell that can be upcast should have a spell level where concentration is removed as a requirement, as per bestow curse. Once 4th and 5th level slots are in use the potential for abuse goes way down.
Concentration is underused for martial classes imo. Thats a design space that they could expand into more. Could give them some interesting and powerful abilities that way
16:00 Maybe if you have regular concentration for things like enhance ability and then use a super concetraiton mechanic for things like hypnotic pattern.
Here is another thing about concentration on spells in 3rd edition. Your right spells would stack, but also, if the spell states it needs concentration, then you needed to spend your action to keep it going. So what you call super concentration in 5e is just how concentration spells worked in 3rd edition. this is why concentration spells are very rare in 3rd edition, or why some concentration spells last a little longer after you drop concentration like wall of fire.
I think its worth considering that if u remove concentration from spells like hypnotic pattern, u can then combo it with bane or other spells that will debuf their saving throws, or with something else that will take advantage of the incapacitated condition that was just inflicted, that's definitely a poor example. There's a reason it's basically a must pick even with concentration
I'm preferable to the idea of having Concentration as a Bonus Action. "Do you want to sustain this spell?" Burn a Bonus Action. Still requires a sacrifice but not as severe. If you want to acquire a different target, add a metamagic ability, have it sustain damage, then a full action seems reasonable.
But this would heavily favor casters that have no use for their bonus actions. The benefit that sorcerers can quicken for bonus action spells / cantrips is lost etc. The wizard would lose less when implemented as such.
I might like a slightly more detailed system where there are tiers of concentration, like light, heavy, and full concentration. It could further make balancing a spell by controlling how high the resource cost there would be to maintain concentration on a spell.
@@MrSeals1000 interesting, but doesn't that add a lot of complexity to the game? I, for one, am on the side of "simplifying the game" as players often forget the rules and I like to be able to remember all the rules without having to look it up. With each spell having a different concentration level (e.g. no cost, BA, Action), messing up which one it is could make it feel real bad.
I wouldn't be opposed to concentration being a wisdom save Just to make spellcasters that are supposed to be squishy like Wizards and sorcerers actually squishy by encouraging them to make the Constitution their tertiary instead of their secondary ability score.
just make it your casting stat. A high level wizard should be better at it than a lower level one. If it's wisdom or constitution, a novice and a master are equally as good.
Yeah it's funny to me when people say "if you change the rules, you're not playing D&D." Especially since it *literally* says in the rulebooks "Change the rules if you want to." (Just don't push the big red button.) As someone who's played since 80's (1e), I was glad for a lot of the changes 3e brought, and Concentration checks were imo a good idea. It's better than "if you take damage while casting, you lose the spell." But yeah, it's not perfected. Also, I guess an average of 5 per minute, and said 95.
Some things should be changed after you can realize an error was made in a design. Something that makes it hard to make changes later is print products. The problem with going print is that it becomes hard to make changes later. Sure, people can get errata, but after a while it can get annoying to compare a print book with its errata.
Pf2 does sustaining too. And since you have 3 actions there you can sustain up to 3 things technically if you somehow mange to also find the actions to cast all that. Think it works better than 5e, tho you can't really do something exactly like that, due to how different the actions work between the two systems. One thing I wanted to bring up, which you didn't mention, is that it also has a big impact on buildcrafting for those who like that. As a caster your are kinda expected to get con save proficiency at some point and at best even have advantage on the save. Which is also kinda weird thematically, that casters tend to do better on con saves, than martials on average. It takes away a bit of freedom of expression, from people who like to do powerful character builds.
17:30 I mean, in a way, Rage doesn't require you to make checks for it, but I'd say it kind of works like concentration. Another example is Tasha's Ranger's Favored Foe.
I agree with most of what you said here. I think the changes to Resistance are probably good, but it would be better if it was an Action with a duration of 6 seconds OR an instantaneous Reaction. That way if you notice the dragon has gotten its breath attack back, the Cleric might decide to use his/her Action AND Reaction to give two people resistance. It's great to give a non-physical class more options on how to use their Reactions, but for more Gish types, maintaining its usability as an Action might be preferable. You could even have a Fighter-Cleric Action Surge to use Resistance 3 times if things got desperate... hopefully the dragon is impatient or doesn't notice. :-P That variety of use cases makes the spell more versatile without actually changing the power of the spell individually. I did play 4e extensively, but I had forgotten the specifics of the Sustain mechanic. One of the reasons I prefer Concentration to a simple version of Sustain is that it gives the spell-caster less decisions to make in combat. In 5e, most Concentration spells continue to function for as long as you are concentrating, allowing you to make an additional decision of how to use your Action. Fights in 5e probably take half as many rounds as 4e fights. Therefore, if you had to use your Action to continue casting the spell, that means the spell-caster might go the entire battle having only decided on one Action. Yes, they can drop the Sustain, but that would be inefficient. This is a nerf to casters, which isn't a bad thing, but it is also decreasing player agency. That said, if spells with Sustain have many options on how to Sustain them, the player continues to make choices. I think that's pretty smart. In essence, the spell kind of begins to act like a creature summon, where the caster is possessing said creature. This wasn't something I had considered, at least in that exact form. So that is very cool. However, it might be confusing for new players to have BOTH Concentration and Sustained spells, and it could be difficult on the DM to remember to Sustain everything. 4e fights took a long time, and I can definitely see how this mechanic specifically led DMs to having longer turns. I do think that Concentration needs to be used for more non-magical applications. For instance, instead of Hunter's Mark as a spell, you could have "Blinders" as an at-will Ranger class feature Concentration bonus action. You can focus on a target to gain +30 feet to all ranged attacks, and +1 on all D20 Tests against that creature, but a -1 on all D20 Tests against every other creature. I also think Concentration has potential for use in some part of the process of counterspelling, such that you must concentrate on an enemy's words and actions to figure out what spell they are casting in a timely fashion. But maybe using Concentration to focus on an enemy makes your more vulnerable to enchantment and gaze effects. The key - as always - is to find the most elegant solution possible so that you can gain extra verisimilitude and depth without overloading the game with rules that are difficult to remember.
As a player I’ve never really loved concentration and I think you’ve perfectly put into words why. While I definitely think it’s good for the balance of the game, I think the fact that concentration spells all compete for one concentration slot means that new spells introduced need to compete with older spells leading to further power creep issues. I also think there’s an issue with buff spells being so heavily concentration based as I think it hurts collaboration with other players. For example, there have been many times where I’ve wanted to cast Fly on a martial so they can catch up to an enemy only to find out when I calculate it in my head, my concentration would be better spent on an objectively better DPR concentration spell instead. I also think buff spells usually buff martial character more than spellcasters anyway, so I think it could help both groups feel more powerful and interesting if single target buff spells either didn’t have concentration or had the sustain quality like you’ve detailed in this video. Another alternative to the concentration ability might just be giving spell casters more concentration slots at higher levels. Nothing crazy but like maybe 2 concentration spells at a time at level 11 or something could make concentration spells feel more dynamic instead of only picking what ends the fight fastest?
I do think the sheer number that require concentration is too high. One small way to make it less burdensome is to make more spells like resistance a reaction instead of an action.
Outside of setting books Druid only has 5 second level spells that don't require concentration. Lesser restoration, protection from poison, dark vision, find traps, and locate animals and plants. At least 2 of which, you might never have a single niece to ever cast over the course of an entire campaign, regardless of circumstances. And none of which have consistently applicable combat use. It's almost like having a good balance between concentration and non concentration. Spells was not a priority.
I like the idea given how problematic spell stacking can get but really hate the implementation of Concentration as well as how ad hoc they got with a lot of spells, quite a number of which really *should* have Concentration but don't and a number of others which might well be better if they didn't have Concentration. They oversimplified it and drastically overused it as a balancer when there were other mechanisms as balancers available. Concentration cantrips could have been done by making them Reactions (as it appears in 2024). If you want martials to be able to deal with spellcasters, one way might be to have spells cast in melee that don't have some kind of tag that makes them melee safe draw an Attack of Opportunity. Readying to interrupt is also a nice mechanism. I'm not overall a big fan of 4E, but Sustain was really well-done. To sustain, you had to give up actions, which meant if you wanted to keep the spell around you had to not do other things. In other words, the big cost was to your action economy, so if you wanted to stack spells, you weren't doing much else but what those spells enabled you to do, and if you got dazed, force moved, or whatever, you might end up having to choose what spell to drop. Translating to 5E terms, you might have to give up a Reaction or Bonus Action first, then Action. (Pity they got rid of Move as an action, though I understand why. I guess you could just charge some fraction of the character's Movement.) So the more you've got stacked up, the less you can do, which is totally appropriate, and if you get knocked out, your stack of spells comes down. Losing your Reaction, in particular, is a big cost for a lot of casters. Bonus Action is also rife for being lost. 4E also had a lot of "until the end of your next turn" or "until the start of your next turn", which was another great way to have spells punch but not hang around for too long. I think these would work really well with Buffs. Sting like a bee then die!
I believe that concentration is too powerful a mechanic, Super Concentration (using action) is a decent way to bring the power down but I believe a better solution would be not possible use an action to cast a spell while concentrating (cantrips, dash etc. still ok). The idea of concentrating on a spell, then also simultaneously being able to focus your mind onto the next instantaneous spell makes very little thematic sense, and also helps bring down the martial-caster divide.
IIRC, the changes to guidance and resistance were vetoed by popular vote, because the document that playtested them was released before BG3 was finished. It's a damn shame too, a lot of other good mechanics from BG3 were voted out for similar reasons. I expect a huge number of "Why the playtest was flawed" essays to start cropping up in October of 2024.
Concentration is (to me) randomly assigned to spells and really doesn't stop spell stacking... just need multiple casters and the GM has as many as they want :). Spells are already a limited resource and having them slapped off of you is really annoying. Plus some of the spell combos in the past rewarded creative thought and were fun. The stacked buffs were less fun/creative but dispel magic had a purpose... now fireball is probably as good at dispelling as dispel magic plus does damage. Full disclosure; I hate concentration.
I underatand the balancing idea but as stated, with so many spells requiring concentration it innevitably forces a character to follow a typecast role, choosing only the best concentration spells and making any other spell obsolete. I think blade barrier is a cool spell for example but why bother using it if spirit guardians is a better spell to concentrate on...theres a reason why most clerics outright just have the same builds and its cause theres little reason other than rp to take another concentration spell. Why would I bother casting enhance ability if i have guidance or bless, why cast beacon of hope when you can cast aura of vitality. The clerics concentration spell list is full of spells that encourage a use and sit there playstyle. Cast bless then just tickle the balls of the enemies while you wait for your party to do the work Imo just have concentration be a skill check roll per round...if one concentration spell is active every round you have to roll a 10 or above to keep it going, for 2 concentration spells, you have to roll a 16 or above If you fail your roll you lose both spells, that way you can potentially be a god for a round or 2 with some good rolls but also higher risk of losing spells.
Good video. I disagree that concentration is broken. It's application may be broken for certain spells or seem like there might be a better solution. The 2024 ooks seem to be working on this.
Your suggestion of "Super Concentration" being normalized calls me back to DC20's standardized 4-Action Point system (where Move, Action, Bonus Action, and Reaction have all been homogenized, and can be used for... Whatever. With that, Concentration can eat up a fourth of your Action Economy, but not lock you out from entire Realms of actions...
I think you are ignoring the tracking aspect for things like flame arrows. Spell stacking wasn't just a problem for how high it could get but for +2 from this, +1 from that, another +1 here, +4 from the THING, but there's also a -2.... And you are quickly looking at 5 modifiers that can't be per-caluclated to the average roll.
Divine Smite is overrated and actually worse than a concentration spell imo. Hilarious to me that they want to nerf it, but even so adding a once per turn limit on it would be good enough.
4e's sustain is a lot more limiting than concentration because it mostly forced you to use your action or bonus action (the equivalent of it, at least) in a specific way. Concentration is so much better. Having played Pathfinder 2e which tries to use both sustain and concentration, it's not really adding anything. I think it's fine as a mechanic, tbh.
I also like Concentration and I can see how things like Sustain can be more limiting but that was kind of the point of that entire section. To discuss different ways at implementing similar effects that might be more consistent with what they were trying to achieve, not just me saying "do this".
@@InsightCheck That makes sense. There is a lot of buzz online about PF 2e and while it is definitely fun, it’s just hard to have characters that can do more than the same handful of things again and again. The changes to concentration are one reason - all mechanics have trade offs and using the 5e concentration mechanic comes with very few big issues compared with other systems that aim to solve the same problems.
I think the deeper underlying design problem with concentration is that it's one mechanic trying to solve too many problems - only some of which are mentioned in the video - simultaneously, and this tends to create a huge number of unintended consequences for using it, because you take on all the down sides no matter which problem(s) you're trying to solve. It has a whole mess of well-intentioned purposes: - Limit stacking of effects into wombo-combos - Limit complexity of play from many status effects - Provide a way to turn off powerful bonuses on foes - Provide a way to save allies from control effects - Tie magical effects to the status of the caster - Let non-magic types interact with magical effects So many use cases - especially when it includes things like limiting complexity which can be argued as applicable to virtually anything with a duration as a matter of consistency - creates an attractive nuisance for designers who aren't inclined to robustly integrate their work with the greater whole. Which in turn produces numerous problem cases: - Needlessly blocking fair and interesting synergies - Needlessly weakening effects which didn't need to be - Creating multiple failure points on a single effect - Class levels without good non-concentration spells - Casting classes burning spells at very different rates - Spells competing for resources across spell levels If this were broken down into maybe three separate mechanics, and given a better supervised design, it could be highly successful. But when you have to take all of that together, all or nothing, IMO it's just not worth it despite the best intentions and various real benefits.
100% agree. Something i have been toying with is seperating concentration into 3 interacting parts. Sustain, Concentration and Channel. All three of these keywords interact with eachother like the original Concentration. Eg you cast a spell with any of those key words, it ends any currently active spell you previously cast that has any of those key words. Concentration cannot be broken, and is mostly put on things like defensive buffs like stoneskin as well as other minor spells that are slightly above the power curve. Sustain can be broken like the old Concentration, but also requires a free hand (or focus) to actively hold the spell together. It also ends if you become restrained. Thus would go on most spells that require concentration already. Channel, just like Sustain, but requires an action every round to maintain the spell. Failure to do so doesnt end the spell, merely suspends it. Thus would go on very powerful spells such as Wall of Fire and Animate Objects.
@@vadaritis While that approach creates a sensible gradient of costs, I don't think it solves the actual problems, since so many of the gameplay issues with concentration emerge from the absolute mutual exclusivity factor. Personally, I see three main things worth keeping about concentration: a simple rule for limiting the number of status effects that must be tracked, a simple rule for disrupting powerful effects cast by enemies, and a simple rule for preventing undesirable stacking. I think it's these three things that need to be separated from each other. To that end, if I were writing the system over from scratch (and thus didn't have to worry about making rules changes in hundreds of existing places and creating confusion), I think I'd do three rules something like the following: *Focus:* You have a Focus pool equal to twice your proficiency modifier, and spells with a duration longer than one round but less than permanent cost Focus equal to their spell level while they are active. Unless otherwise noted, you can end a Focus-based spell as a free action to free up its Focus cost. This is intended to limit the number of long-term statuses in play to a reasonable number in a more flexible, scalable fashion. *Concentration:* Whenever one of the following occurs, you choose one of your ongoing Concentration spells and it ends immediately unless you succeed on a Constitution saving throw: you take damage greater than your level (DC equal to damage taken), you become Frightened (DC 10), you become Paralyzed (DC 15), you become Stunned or Incapacitated (DC 20). If you become Petrified or Unconscious all your Concentration effects end. *Channeling:* In addition to the standard action types, characters may take one Sustain action each turn. A channeled spell requires a particular action (Action, Movement, Bonus, or Sustain) be spent by its caster each turn to maintain its effects, and ends at the end of its caster's turn if the required action was not spent to do so. Only particularly powerful and synergistic abilities require channeling. An arrangement like this allows you to apply exactly and only the limitations warranted by a spell's design to each spell, without trying to place every spell on some kind of single-axis power scale and levie costs or challenges to balance it out generically. Focus is always there to limit complexity, spells which need a "way out" for the enemy can require Concentration, and things that must not be allowed to combine require Channeling. It also opens up lots of opportunities for mechanical interactions, for example: - Items and features could give you a bit more focus, or reduce or remove the focus cost for specific spells. - Curses or other status effects could reduce a character's Focus pool, limiting their complexity in a dynamic way. - Casters could cast lower value concentration spells to "ablate" away before losing concentration on a key effect. - Effects that are particularly disruptive could cause multiple concentration rolls or penalize rolls they inflict. - Specific channeled spells could be allowed to stack based on the action that they require to be maintained. - An intelligent item or especially powerful familiar might confer the ability to Channel a specific action for you.
Some spells could be concentration optional. Maybe they last a round, a minute, 10 min, an hour if you concentrate. Hex is a decent example of one I'd say 1min and 1 hr. Hypnotic Pattern, I'd say 1 round end of enemy turn or concentration 1 min.
Not only do i think it is overused, I don't like the mechanic to begin with. It requires the GM and/or the player to remember to roll a concentration check every time the concentrating character gets hit with a spell, which can be challenging if there is already a lot going on for the GM to manage or the player to consider, and the GM calling for a concentration check over and over again can slow down combat quite a bit in battles with multiple caster pcs. There have been so many times in the games that I have been on as well as live plays that I've seen where concentration checks were either completely missed or the GM had to interrupt the correct player to ask a previous player to roll of concentration check both GM and Player forgot about in the heat of the moment. I feel that games that leave the maintaining of spells in the hands of the player using part of their action economy during their turn is a much better way of handling it, ensuring that it is less likely to be forgotten, as well as unlikely to disrupt or slow down the flow of combat. The way it should be done in 5e is through sustaining it with a bonus action. If the play group still wants to have the chance for a spell to be interrupted with an attack, then sustaining it should be done with a reaction. Either case, it uses up parts of the pc's action economy and shouldn't interrupt or slow down combat.
Concentration is awful. It means you cast haste and only haste. Because you can only have one spell, and the objectively best spell is always haste. I prefer 3.5/pathfinder, where you only have to concentrate until the spell goes off. If you must keep it, just make you able to concentrate on more than one spell, and just make each additional spell have +2 to the check per spell.
Concentration definitely isn't a cure-all. It should be used as a "Disruption" Feature, and not a "Sorry, pick and choose" Feature. And to further emphasize that, Spells that require Concentration should require you to be in danger for the more powerful effects, such as Hypnotic Pattern, while less powerful effects such as Witch Bolt don't require you to be in close quarters. In fact, if you put it on the Fly Spell, I'm sure many spellcasters would be upset, until the enemy tries to fly away. Buuut they'd also learn to prepare the Feather Fall Spell whenever they plan to Fly.
Sorry to say, but by the end of the video, I felt like nothing of any value had been said. The "critical flaws" you announced in the title were just empty cick bait. Concentration works beautifully and is basically did most of the heavy lifting when it comes to bringing casters in line with everyone else. The actual issues are with select spells (e.g. witchbold) not with the design itself (e.g. call lightning).
Ok. I’m not sure what to tell you 🤷♂️. If you watched a 19 minute video about something and felt like you derived 0 value, nothing I can say in a comment is going to change that. There’s no clickbait. There was ample discussion of all the hits and misses of the mechanic. You’re totally free to disagree with me but that doesn’t mean they weren’t addressed. I’m further confused by the fact that you mention the “actual issue” however, what you define it as was something I also specifically discussed during the video in regard to Flame Arrows. All the best :)
@@InsightCheck When someone tells you that your clickbait video had next to no substance (despite its considerable length) you got several options: Considering what went wrong and how to do better in the future is one of them. Ridiculing that person and giving them the ":)" is another.
@Yeldibus there was no ridicule, I genuinely don’t know what to tell you lol. We have a fundamentally different understanding of what “clickbait” is and you seem to be the only one to have labelled it as such and stated it had “zero substance”. Again, you’re free to disagree with me and believe what you will. I can’t change that. I am always very amenable to genuine feedback and have made considerable changes based on it in the past. I suppose I would say here that there isn’t a whole lot to “consider” as there wasn’t really any genuine or meaningful feedback. You just labelled it clickbait and said it had no value. Feedback is a two way street,
@@InsightCheck Sure, because that's how you respond when you take someone seriously. lol. :) See what I did there? The title promises "critical flaws" - and then the best thing you got is "They went overboard with concentration in 5e - the proof is that they recently removed it from these 2 cantrips!". What kind of "critical flaw" is that supposed to be? You're both cherry picking from the few bad apple spells (aka not an issue with concentration, but with individual spells) and also complain about an "issue" that's already fixed in the latest version of the game. To put it simply: There was no "critical flaw" with concentration. They just fixed up some outlier spells. You also mentioned "super concentration" (aka requiring concentraiton and your action on your turn) and say it renders spells "nearly unusable" (with a disbeliefing chuckle no less). Presenting this as a "critical flaw" of concentration is once again misleading - it's just individual spells that suck (like witch bolt). Requiring both concentration and your action can actually be really cool design space and work perfectly well (see call lightning). While bemoaning "super concentration", you suggest adding it to all concentration spells "as a question" at the same time. It's like you half-tought about it, realized the idea wasn't great, but still kept it in to pad out the length of your video. Hypnotic pattern is not a sign of concentration having a "critical flaw" either. It's just another outlier spell that could do with being toned down a bit. You critique that concentration has failed to bridge the caster/martial divide, but if you've played even a bit of 3e before, you'll know that concentration worked wonders to achieve exactly that. There is still a gap at very high levels, but concentration (and fewer spell slots) has turned it from the grand canyon into something you can jump over without rolling an athletics check. Truly, it's just about fine-tuning individual spells now, which is exactly what they are doing with One D&D. I was curious to learn about "critical flaws" but ended up watching a 19 minute video without hearing any - hence the feeling of being baited.
@Yeldibus I mean this essentially states what I originally said which is that your feeling of being “baited” is ultimately just disagreement. Which is fine, you’re more than welcome to disagree (as I’ve said multiple times). I’m not entirely sure what you expected though. There are 524 spells in the game, of course I’m going to pick ones that contribute to the discussion otherwise the video is gonna be like 4 days long lol (talk about padding the length of the video!) Of course the problem ultimately comes down to the spells, why wouldn’t it? Concentration is a mechanic nearly entirely focused on… spells! So this is where the pain points will be felt. Of course the issues are going to present themselves with the spells, where else would you see them? I also specifically say that in the video. If there were a few spells that were a bit off then sure, it’s a fairly isolated issue but it’s so so so much bigger than that. Dozens and dozens of spells are sacked with this requirement under the expectation that it will do more than it’s capable of doing and it leaves everything feeling off. There’s only so many times you can fix the leak in your pipes before you have to realize that something bigger is the issue. You can disagree, you can feel baited, you can feel however you want to feel. I have no control over that and that’s fine. But your disagreement has ultimately limited your scope of the discussion to what you believe. I mention in nearly all my videos that I’m not here to change anyone’s mind, I’m just interested in the discussion. I’m also not even saying that I’m necessarily “right” either, I truly don’t care about being “right”, I’m just providing perspective.
You have a screenshot of how concentration works in 5e, and proceed to say something completely different.. It's not 10 PLUS half the damage you took.. it's EITHER 10, OR half the damage you took, whichever is higher! How did you get something this important and basic wrong?
lol I apologize, have you never misspoken? I’m not reading the screenshot while I record VO, just an honest derp :) I typically catch these and correct it but clearly I missed this one.
@InsightCheck You responding to random comments is actually rather sweet. I'm used to being on 9gag, where people are constantly unfiltered and insulting each other. My bad for going hard on you..
I do think the sheer number that require concentration is too high. One small way to make it less burdensome is to make more spells like resistance a reaction instead of an action.
For fun, I rewrote pretty much teh entire game (rules, classes) so I could twist them more to my liking, and apart from using concentration as a mechanic for non-magical features as well (e.g. Rage, though it can't be broken by damage), I wrote one thing at the very top of the feats page: NO WAR CASTER.
@@InsightCheck I commented before watching the vide because I was heading out but wanted to give it engagement, but to me it's a case of a must-pick feat that removes one aspect of the game (the risk of dropping concentration from damage). But equally important is the fact that this should be an ability for specific classes, and while the War wizard already has something like that, War clerics don't and it is baffling to me. I also like the idea of sorcerers getting access to it through the Extended Spell metamagic (basically the magic clinging to you).
he has said concentration 3 times in the first minute, and I feel as though that will keep up to some extent so I’ll say a variation between 2-5 times per minute that he says concentration. I’m mostly just guessing tho On average that makes for around 3.5 per min. We can remove the first minute though since we know that one is 3 18x3.5+3=66 mentions of concentration. That’s what the math says but my gut says it’s too low. I guess I have 2 guesses Either 66 or…. 85? Danget
I do use the sustaining rules in combination with 4 AP from DC20 and love it so much, if you wanted you could concentrate on 4 spells at once and somewhat control/sustain them at your turn, but you couldn't do anything major (that would require AP...)
Like attune, concentration may be an intentional governor against magic in 5e generally? Perhaps your next "sister video" should be "Is attune broken?"
Good idea. Leave most defensive and utility spells as requiring concentration, but offensive spells require constant actions instead. Or just have it be an official mechanic for use in balancing, call it maintenance or something (maybe it's been long enough since 4e to use the same term, but it's a gamble)
Nah that was bad DM's. "but if they cast 12 buffs they're unstoppable!" "Why isn't a wandering guard patrol surprising them after the second spell? Why do none of your enemies use the 2 dozen forms of dispel available? Why aren't you making puzzles or traps that use up the spell slots that would otherwise go to buffs?"
@@pwykersotz you have no idea what the definitions of toxic or bad are, then? You're really saying it's bad game design to have the wizard cast water breathing on the party to get through a flooded cave, instead of casting haste? Talk about tourists.
