Well, in actuall D&D 5e, the mechanical distinction is that checks require an action, as a mechanical action of which you only have one per turn, but saving throw require no action and you can do any amount of them per round. I think it's useful to have that distinction. Also, it makes sense that when there's lots of characters affected by one spell, that spell is not rolled on attacker side, as it'd often mean that they either roll low and the spell affects noone, or they roll high and the whole party is affected instantly at once. Saving throws for each individual character means that more often than not, some will be affected and some wont.
4th Edition handled that with a general rule that when rolling an attack that hits multiple targets, like a Fireball, you roll against each creature separately.
@Manek Iridius How so? It's not actually any slower than the way saving throw spells work in other editions: it's each creature rolling once rather than the attacker rolling once for each creature. The main thing that slowed 4E combat down was the plethora of actions characters could take on turns other than their own with Opportunity and Immediate Actions.
Andy English Depends on how your group plays. My group rolls all our own dice, so this forced one player to roll several times and check each of those against each defense number. In 5th, all the players roll their saves at the same time. The GM says the DC number and the players who fail say so and take the effect. At my table, one of those takes 15 seconds or so, the other takes 5. It’s not much, but it was a slow down. Analysis paralysis with all the actions was also a big culprit in keeping things from moving.
@Andy English Also, it's a little weird in 4th when you roll an attack against three or four creatures, and one of them crits, and the others don't. You have to roll damage to apply to those that don't, but the one crit takes maximum damage, and if you have any abilities or magic items that affect your crits, you then have to add those in, but only to the one crit, and not the others. And it is slower for one person to roll a die three or four times, than it is for three or four people to all roll a die. This can be mitigated if you have multiple d20s of different colors. I will admit that the 4th edition system did make sense, since the attacker was always the one rolling the dice, it was very weird that no matter how hard or easy it was to hit somebody with an effect, they always had a 55% chance of shaking it off each turn, since a save in 4th edition was just roll a 10 or higher on a (usually) unmodified d20. So, you could have a character with fortitude 25, another with fortitude 15, both could conceivably be affected by the same poisonous attack, and each would have the same 55% chance to recovering from it.
This. Never played anything other than 5e but I have friends that played older editions. I noticed the artwork in the older books tend to have the party frantically defending themselves or flee for their lives, death was more permanent and something to be feared. In 5e it seems there is more artwork of the party being heroic, brave and slaying endless monsters, almost as if there is no real danger and death is a minor speed bump to your inevitable/scripted victory.
@@danielgoldberg5357 maybe. Lol It seems that the old style and rules were more crude & unforgiving than hard. One mistake and you're instantly killed.
AD&D1e player here. When I started MMORPG playing in 2000s I was bemused that "death" didn't seem to exist. Just a chore of running back from the graveyard while your mates guarded your stuff. Seems this has permeated back into 5e? How does a character's story come to a heroic/tragic/bizarre - but memorable - conclusion when death is so easily avoided? FGU's "Bushido" even had rules for ritual suicide where you could curse another character (PC or NPC). Other games had the concept of carrying over some bonus from your dead character into the next - applicable to character generation. So a worthy life and death would result in a better/advantage in the next.
@@jamesorth8231 I've DM'd 1e AD&D and 5e. In my experience, I think AD&D and Old School RPGs are more fun because of the fear of death, so the players will be more cautious and actually be thinking about what could happen. In 5th, the players take a more passive role, as if they're watching a movie. They know they're not going to die. I'm sure it's more comforting for the players, but there's no tension. People who are overly concerned about their character dying are pretty cringe and need to lighten up. It's just a game, bro.
If you're taking requests, I'd love to hear your take on the history through editions of the Grapple action (and/or unarmed combat more broadly). Great channel and video content, thanks!
That’s not a bad idea. In AD&D being grappled meant you wouldn’t use large 2 handed weapons or somatic components for spells. It made grappling and pinning maneuvers a very viable option in combat.
Save-or-die mechanics and overall lethality of older editions can be really fun, but it requires or at least benefits greatly from a different narrative focus, DM design and player mindset and attitude towards their characters contra newer editions. Most of D&D's narrative exemplars are a character driven heroic fantasy epics (LotR, Conan the Barbarian, Nehwon stories, etc.), but rules are mostly influenced by wargames. Trying to recreate these character/protagonist centered narratives (like LotR) with old school D&D rules is an uphill battle. It can be done sure, but it typically requires either surgically crafted encounters fitted ad hoc to PCs, or a DM who actively pulls punches, fudges rolls and circumvents the rules (forcing out a desired narrative and/or tone through a DM fiat). When characters are so fragile and death can be so random, there's little point in expecting to get a story, which is centered around particular PCs with long character arcs and plots centered around them, with dramatically satisfying story beats and structure. Most fantasy stories are something like that (including video-games, novels, movies, tv-shows, etc), but trying to emulate them is not going to work very well with old school D&D rules*. Anticipating to play Conan or Grey Mouser, then dying at the first session due a failed saving throw against a random encounter basilisk is unsatisfying and "unfair" only so far, as the game tries to be like Conan story. When playing old school D&D, characters should be expected to quite incidental, temporal, fungible, and campaign's metaplot shouldn't be focused on them. Clowns come and go, but the circus goes on. A narrative focus should be fixed onto some objective, conflict, larger entity / corporation, environment, dynasty or basically anything except individual characters. Something which offers sensible continuum to bring in new characters and advance a campaign, when PCs are inevitable going to die. Some permanent structure in which new characters carry on whatever they are supposed to do in the campaign, instead of starting from the scratch each time. Some over-arching purpose or end-point which all different changing PCs are supposed to struggle for (ofc, this typically requires a metagame agreement on what that is. Though it's also possible to do run a full-blown sandbox simulation game, but they can become quite unwieldy with always trying to integrate yet-another-new-PC's agenda to an existing party). Designing adventures and campaigns in this style yields some unique advantages compared to character-centric narratives. Challenges are deadly, and there's no script immunity nor need for railroading or handhelding, thus a sense of achievement is totally something else. Also, as game isn't necessarily tailored towards PCs, there can be genuine sense of suspense and even dread about monsters and encounters. There can be quite strong immersion, as PCs are not the axis the world events revolve around, but a minor cog in much larger machine. There's also certain freedom in a character creation due the fleeting nature of their existence. It doesn't incentivize min/maxing or optimizing, but rather trying out many different, novel and unusual concepts. I suppose this can be a good or awful depending on many factors. I wouldn't exactly say this type of old school D&D is better than newer editions, in which PC have much larger control over the narrative and events, and there's so much more tools for them to survive prolonged campaigns. I've played my fair share of both and I enjoy both of them, but they require adapting a different mindset and design from the get got, to fully utilize advantages and possibilities different rules brings. Ofc, your video is about saving throws, and instant-death saving throws are just a part of all-out deadliness of old school D&D (less durable everything, so much more randomness overall, etc). A good video all and all, though I'd probably quarrel like many have in the comments about applying words illogical or inconsistent on several parts, but that's minor complaints about word choices, when I roughly agree with the general point. Addendum: also older editions fit well for challenge / gamist oriented playing (dungeon crawling and such), which are light on a narrative altogether. Although, its rare to see D&D played like that anymore, but in that context deadliness isn't all that troublesome. *disclaimer: I haven't played all the older editions and variations. I've played a lot of AD&D 1st edition, some 2nd ed. and a little bit of basic D&D (the Red Box one). Yet I suspect this probably true for all pre-3rd edition D&Ds.
Lemme appreciate dat wall of good points. Cant agree less myself, as I make own dare I say "fanrasy universe" using DnD5e with A LOT of homebrewed mechanics and changes for said system. I always warn players that they can die easily, and often with no chances to return, and that at levels 1-8 they can be "just some wandering brute/mysterious scholar" at best as world doesnt know about them and doesnt revolve around them. Its probably a shameless bragging but they just spamtexting me in a few days after session like its their addiction, in a good way.
I'll add on to this to say that part of the old-style of game is the ability for the characters to walk (or run) away. Even as far back as 0e, if I am remembering correctly, had some rules for getting monsters to stop chasing via things like dropping treasure as you ran. Usually "save-or-die" is the last ditch effort after making some very poor decisions or mistakes. It's "save to not fall into that pit because you weren't being careful" or "save to not get petrified by the medusa because you decided that fighting it head-on was a good idea". Not "here is a meatgrinder of a challenge you MUST go thru in order to continue the story, no way around it." In many cases the best solutions consist of ambush, setting traps, stealing treasure while its owner(s) are distracted, occupied, or asleep, or other forms of tilting the odds heavily in the PCs' favor. Because the best way to succeed at a saving throw is to make it so you don't have to roll one in the first place. Side thing: In many cases the desire for a character-focused story gets in the way of this for people used to newer editions & games, or who come into it from other media. For tone, I think of old school D&D as being more like a 19th/early 20th century expedition into dark unknown lands, with all the preparation and caution that requires. - This contrasts with a movie, show or story where you have 4 people, who are described or shown as carrying just their weapons and the clothes on their backs, travelling for a week and the only hardships are due to interference by a narratively-appropriate cause. That kind of thing is more suited to being run in FATE or similar systems.
One of my favorite rpg's was Stormbringer, published by Chaosium in 80's & '90s. In that game it actually recommended players have several characters on hand for any given session because life was so cheap and death was to be expected. But for that game -this was appropriate, as any one who ever read Michael Moorcock's Elric Saga (that Stormbringer was a rpg adaptation of) would understand. I guess my point is that back in those days, we just tended to accept that character death was a real possibility in every single encounter, and were usually stoic about it. I must admit though, i did have to work very hard to hold back the tears once or twice when a particularly beloved character died :) Oh yes, and something that was actually just as brutal as the save or die in AD&D was the way Surprise worked. One unlucky surprise roll could easily be a total party kill!
@@budahbaba7856 Oh man, that takes me back. I too played Strombringer back in the day, and I have fond memories of it. Definitely a prime example of 80s old school fantasy roleplaying design by all accounts (more specifically that period after the early wargaming and dungeoneering era of the seventies, after that more gaming orientated approach of very first RPGs. Heyday of what many refer as simulationist style of RPGs). Although, in my group it was for some reason always overshadowed in fantasy department by AD&D, MERP and especially Runequest, so we never really played it that much. I suppose, it was too similar to Runequest, and back then there was so much more material and buzz around Runequest (in the country I am from, I believe, Runequest was at that point the most popular fantasy RPG). The little I remember was fun, but I only remember some tidbits and trivia about it. Like the character creation was lol, there was 1% chance or something, that you could get to play a super saiyan Aryan master race melnibonéan, and if you did, you were pretty much more powerful than the rest of the party combined. As someone from our group described it once: "it's almost like running Sword&Sorcery novel in RPG form, but unless you roll that one, you are not going get to play Conan or Elric, but a nameless henchman who dies along with ten other nameless mooks, when Conan kills you passing by with one blow."
I've never played older editions but I definitely enjoy the simplicity of 5th edition even more after you explained previous versions. One thing that I didn't hear mentioned but would have been a good point, generally speaking the less common saves are a lot worse to fail. Failing an Int or Cha ST is the closest 5th gets to a save or die effect
i learned how to play Basic/Expert and AD&D at age 13. It couldn't have been that complicated. 5e is overcomplicated by a ridiculous amount of player options that a DM cannot possibly keep up with. The while premise of 5e appears to me to allow players to have characters that are so powerful -- even at first level -- than there is little chance of them dying (esp. if you use the balanced encounter approach in the DM Guide). 5e is simpler in that the players don't really have to play very smartly in order to survive. They can just roll in and dominate with little chance of dying without some really bad luck. OSR requires a lot more caution, cleverness and teamwork if you want your character to survive.
BTsMusicChannel All you need to defeat player characters are opponents with levels. If you fight an Adult Gold Dragon that’s an Oath of Ancients Paladin at 20th level, your players, even at 16th level, can’t just button-smash their way through. Come to think of it, every metallic dragon ought to be an Oath of Ancients Paladin of Bahamut, as the features of that class precisely fit the ideals of metallic dragons (such as basically unlimited longevity to protect a place from evil forever). By the same thread, basically every evil creature ought to be a Warlock other than those with power from other sources, such as liches (or undead in general). It would be fitting to have the party be shot at with Eldritch Blast from 1,200 feet away by a hag with the 300 foot Eldritch blast warlock invocation, the spell sniper feat, and the distant spell Sorcerer meta magic (with the fey ancestry, of course).
@@evannibbe9375 I would rather just avoid playing 5e, thank you. I tried it, found it unsatisfying after 2 1/2 years of trying it. I really don't even want to talk about Paladins and their relations to dragons or Warlocks. You don't need that stuff unless you don't read fantasy literature. If you read, you will have all the ideas you need. I am not into what has become -- over many years, but especially in the hands of Wizards of the Coast -- a little self-contained, tired, and predictable D&D mythology.
IMHO, 3E saves were the best of all. 5E is simple only on surface. For example, I totally forgot about proficient bonuses to a saving throws, and that classes apply these bonuses only to two categories of saving throws. It's not "simple". Swords and Wizardry has only one saving throw at all - now that is simple.
I believe wands/staves/rods were separated from spells, because most wands/staves/rods were essentially direct fire magic weapons, ie lightening bolt, fireball, magic missiles, etc.
If I remember my AD&D2 correctly, save values for rod/wand/staff matched those for spells exactly -- except r/w/s was one step easier. One of my house rules was just to fold them together. I had so many house rules for that old edition.
There is no lack of consistency. There are differing conditions, which are dealt with differently. When an attacker swings at a target, the AC already represents the defender's ability to avoid damage. The attacker rolls to see how effective his attack is. A save doesn't address this situation. When a wizard casts a fireball, it happens. But it doesn't have the same level of effect on everyone. Maybe you duck behind your shield. Maybe you throw yourself to the side. Whatever, the question isn't whether there IS a fireball, but whether you take the brunt of it or are able to avoid some of it. Likewise, on a poison save, the question isn't whether you were exposed to poison (you wouldn't be rolling if you weren't). The question is whether you are affected by it, and how badly. Hence, you roll against your CON. These are consistent. An attack roll checks to see if something HAPPENS. A saving throw addresses that something HAS happened, and checks to see how it affects you. You're really overthinking this man. It's not complicated and it's not broken.
Yeah I think somewhere people started getting confused about AC. Good explanation. Though I've never been a fan of the poison saving throw and found it rather silly.
decline you ever enjoy a beer? Alcohol is a poison. Since you're typing msgs, I'm going to say you passed your CON save. Hangover? That's the poisoned condition.
It's not complicated or broken, but it is not consistent. If a fighter tries to hit someone with their weapon, something has happened: the movement of the weapon. There is a quality to the action that affects its chances of success (attack bonus) and a quality that affects the chances of defense (armor class). Armor class even is a good example for the abstract nature of this since it doesn't differentiate why the attack fails to hurt the target. If a wizard tries to cast sleep on someone, something has happened: the casting of the spell. There is a quality to the action that affects its chances of success (spell dc) and a quality that affects the chances of defense (will save). Between saving throws and attack rolls, there is a change of perspective. Attack rolls ask: "is my offense strong enough to break through your defense" while saving throws ask "is my defense strong enough to withstand your offense?"
@@AlexBermann ummm, that IS consistent. The AC that opposes an attack roll, accounts for DEX (the ability to dodge) as well as physical protection. There are then spells and features, which can be activated as a reaction, to modify this even further. Thus, it DOES (abstractly) represent taking many things into account. The saving throw isn't about avoiding an attack. It is about avoiding the effects (at least partially) of something you HAVE encountered (as opposed to avoided). When you roll a CON save against poison, it's because you've already been exposed to it. You're not avoiding the poison. You're avoiding the effect. Likewise, a DEX save against a Fireball doesn't prevent the spell from being cast. It simply avoids some of the damage, as the fire completely engulfs the area. Now, I do have objections to some of the things that allow multiple saving throws, like how Hold Person gets to save on every round, even if it takes no damage. But, it IS consistent with the fact that you're trying to resist the effects of a spell that has already been cast.
Very interesting. Based on your description, I really like the way 4th edition did saving throws. The advantage of the attacker rolling for success comes to play if a player may become infected with a disease. If the GM rolls, the player has no idea how well they did and only learn of it when the first symptoms are showing. Furthermore, it sounds like a really good idea that some effects like petrification only happen as the last step of a chain of bad events. About 5th edition - I actually like that there are saving throws based on all ability scores. As with the skill system, it does seem like the developers wanted to make dumb stats more impactful to a character. One thing that annoyed me at 3rd edition was how it was possible that dumb stats had no effect. There was the underlying assumption of "appropriate difficulty" which made DC 15 diplomacy checks near nonexistent if your GM went along with the system expectations. Consequently, the barbarian wouldn't make the DC 25 diplomacy check anyway due to not having put any points in diplomacy (and even if they put points in it, it's still no class skill). So, a Charisma of 12 and a Charisma of 5 were effectively the same to them starting at medium levels.
I personally like the save-or-die approach. While it does suck to die because of an unlucky die roll, it made players more careful about how they approached a conflict. What I've noticed about 5th edition players is that they usually just try to face-roll encounters. Something that usually succeeds because the mechanics allow you to mess up a lot before you face any real consequences.
As a GM I'm much more likely to err on the side of the player if they are playing carefully like their fragile lives depend on it. I don't know...people get too attached to characters. Maybe every so often people need to play some old CoC or something and find the joy in lasting only 2-4 adventures. lol.
Do a video on the origins of the different class. Where did druids first enter the game? What about sorcerers? I’d love a full rundown of each one, like a more condensed version of the monk video
Not that unbalanced considering the strengths and weaknesses of each character class. For example, fighters are strongest in terms of combat due to armor availability, hit points, weapon use, etc. And so had horrible saves categorically until high level. Thieves (rogues) had terrible combat ability, but they levelled quicker and better saves overall. Magic-users had great magic-related saves but worse on things like poison, etc. In a way, fighters were the exact opposite of wizards - high melee, low saves at low levels, wizards we're terrible in melee and squishy, but had better saves at low level. I'm still glad for the current save system, though it still needs more expansion, because just like in the fort/reflex/will days, Con/Wis/Dex saves are far too common compared to the other three. Needs more intelligence charisma and strength sources.
I did a write up on this and how it was a terrible idea to split the saves. The numbers are insane and most people don't realize it just like you didn't. I guess I should be thankful though, that is what pushed me to start writing my own system.
I'm so down for more of videos like this. Keep it up. As for my favorite system, I'm a big fan of some modern systems that keep dice out of the GM's hands entirely. Having players be the only dice rollers keep them engaged even when it's not their turn, and some modern games so far as to remove the idea of "turns" entirely, making the game a constant back and forth between all the players and the DM at once, keeping everyone engaged at one time.
You don't have to precisely aim a breath attack in the same manner as a sword strike or an arrow from a bow, it feels natural to me to assume whether it is effective or not is more up to if the one being targeted manages to avoid/negate it instead; hence the roll should fall on them.
I always viewed saving throws as an expression of luck. If you go into a situation unprepared, then the chances of survival can be impacted greatly. If there was a situation in my games that required a saving throw, it's because you were doing something wrong. The saving throw is there to save you from your own poor decisions.
Great video as always. I still love this channel a lot. Bummer that the video wasn't in my subscription box. Still looking forward to the psionic video ;)
Saving throws do not represent "a lack of consistency" when juxtaposed to attack rolls. They are simply a mirror of something that actually exists: resistance. They make perfect sense in a world where poison can kill and where an area is the focus of an attack, rather than an individual target. There's no inconsistency involved, merely a change of focus on where the action takes place. You can't expect somebody standing across the room with an empty poison jar to roll for attacking the bloodstream or organs of the person who just accidentally drank that poison, any more than you can expect the jar to roll for an attack. What you can do, and what 3rd Edition streamlined so well, is to use the skill of the person who created the poison to determine its potency, and then allow the physical wellness and experience of the person drinking the poison to determine how well he resists it. Yes, the original OD&D/1st Ed/2nd Ed saving throws were rather arbitrary, but the idea is the same. In fact, I would say, that rather than "inconsistent," the saving throw mechanic is amongst the very least dissociated mechanics ever created for the game. I think maybe there is too much of a drive in modern gaming to force a single mechanic to fit every imaginable need, but aside from Dread (where every major action or decision is determined through use of a Jenga tower), I don't see any game system accomplishing that without completely dissociating half of what it is trying to accomplish.
@@garynicolson5192 In the real world for one lol. Most poisons don't actually kill. Those are the rarest ones. Even most of those have to enter the bloodstream directly and be fresh, and be in large enough doses to kill.
@@MrBottlecapBill Most poisons do not kill humans, yes. Though poisons that do kill humans do exist, and many more that can kill other creatures. As for why the saving throw makes sense, making it an attack roll vs a saving throw really doesn't matter, because they are all abstractions. You can explain the narrative of either roll and they work just as well as the other. The person is being "attacked" by poison. The word attack is not so narrow as to not work in this scenario. Otherwise countries could say "We didn't attack their soldiers, we just sent poisonous gas out!" The argument that was being made is about the way the mechanics feel and how they require an extra layer of thinking as opposed to just putting the two together. It's also weird for almost everything to be in the player's hands, except when a spellcaster casts a spell they need to wait for the opponent to roll a check, instead of rolling one themselves.
I don't get the whole point: Why should different effects be handled always the same way to begin with? What does it matter if you throw die for saving character, attack etc... It's same why I don't get people getting "confused" about Negative AC. What does it matter? Lower AC means better armor simple as that. What's difficult to understand?
@@_Zuc_ So by the same logic Golf is unintuitive and difficult, because you have to understand lesser points means you've made less hits and thus better game? AC 10 simply means you have no armor at all, you're uncovered. Once at 0 you're fully covered, and better armor from there only reduces the damage. I think it's very simple and intuitive.
Another great video. You really do produce some solid content. I've been sharing your channel on my Facebook pages, hope it gets you some traffic. Just wish they came out quicker, but they are worth the wait for the production value.
What's also notable is that the more class/character focused ways to avoid effects have been added as reactions. A wizard might not dodge a fireball, but he could use his reaction to counterspell, or increase his resistance to the damage done.
I like the concept of tiered success/failure with saving throws and checks. Everything flipping based on a difference of just 1 number on the die can feel very swingy and lead to inconsistent outcomes with certain events. Tiered success allows for more nuanced play and I think rewards more risky behaviour because even the worst result isn't super likely. Conversely the save or die results in very conservative play, where the dm's have to pull their punches and be really careful with how they construct their dungeons and campaigns to not completely wipe the players with a misplaced fireball or "rocks fall and everyone dies" effect. Also the players become super paranoid about finding a trap that could insta kill them or badly weaken them, or if their spell fails to work or their attack roll misses suddenly their whole turn is wasted. I think tiered success is also much easier to understand narratively and intuitively. 1 worst result 2-4 quite bad but manageable 5-9 bad but not life ending bad 10-13 potential success depending on the difficulty/minor failure with no large consequences 14-16 potential failure depending on the difficulty but minor successes aren't going to be too troublesome to handle. 17-19 Decent success 20 Best result Also allows the dm to customise the die rolls even further for each number depending on the save or check needed. It might increase the admin a little? But for people who are heavily invested in their characters it's a bit easier to really see the link between what the dice say and what happens on the table. As opposed to roll 15+ to succeed or die Feels more like an ultimatum doesn't it?
I am a fan of the save-or-die base rules for everyone. Rock-solid. Before every session, I give my players some custom rule options for the session. I inform them the alterations will be applied both ways, everyone will have the pros and cons of the custom rule options. At low levels, they take the options against save-or-die for the most part. At higher levels, they leave the save-or-die system as it is and usually use it to their advantage.
Someone made the reasoning (can't remember where) regarding the save categories in OD&D that they were not arbitrary: when you look at the table from left to right, it's from the most delibitating (instant death) to less debilitating. I personally suscribe to this theory. Also in Chainmail, it's not 4 hit in a skirmish, it's literally 4 simultaneous hits. That's important because it's a huge change in powerlevel. Also, I'm unsure about the use of the term "D&D evolved", as if it was a linear progress. Not only some people might disagree with regards to 3rd vs 4th, but people keep playing OD&D or Basic and haven't stopped doing so since the 70s. They have just as much fun (if not more in some cases !) than new players. BTW all your videos are awesome, I just wanted to point this out. Keep up the good works. Would be awesome to see you do more stuff with OD&D historians. Thanks for your hard work !
Just wanted to say how much I appreciate your videos. *really* well done - well thought out, the visuals are excellent and varied and the subject matter is well chosen and thoroughly explored. In short - good stuff man. :-) thanks **while I actually like long videos, (and I may be in the minority when it comes to YT viewers, but its probably because I'm a bit older) these are great as well and it never hurts to have variation.
One thing that feels inconsistent about 5e is that it can't decide which ability represents willpower: CHA or WIS. So a bunch of spells and abilities related to mind control, fear etc seem to randomly pick which kind of save to use. For example, you use WIS to have the willpower and bravery to resist Dominate Person and Fear, but CHA to have the willpower and bravery to resist Bane or the gaze of an umber hulk. It's pretty confusing.
Another interesting thing ot hit 2nd edition was magical armor bonus's were applied to many saving throws, as would cover or shields. It was a fairly intense amount of book work to figure out exactly what your save was at any given time vs an attack tbh. Worse because most the time you weren't even the one doing it. Due to the secrecy of a lot of reasons to make a save, most DM's I Played with rolled your saving throws in secret. Thus if you failed a save vs illusion you wouldn't know it's there. Same with a slow acting poison or disease. This meant the DM had to be aware of all those many modifiers and tally them up for every player.
Save or die is okay for rare monsters where it is a defining feature, like a Medusa with save or petrify. The whole point is to add unique flavor to some monsters, so watering save or die down to another damage effect just makes monsters less different. On the other hand, giving save or die to common creatures or even rare creatures that you meet in numbers is a mistake too. A Medusa is usually a singular creature for example. It’s the same with level drain effects - it’s no fun if there are vampires and spectres all over.
I like saving throws. I like occasionally putting the onus on the defender to avoid damage or effects. For example, in 5e my party was under an effect that imposed disadvantage on attack rolls, so the spellcasters used spells that required saves, bypassing the disadvantage. Good strategy option. My favourite saves are either the three saves from 3.x/Pathfinder or the single save from Swords & Wizardry, because saves don't need to be complicated.
The attack roll vs defend roll is, at least to me, actually very intuitive. Think of it like this: who is most influential to a specific action's success? If I strike you with a hammer or shoot you with a bow, it is primarily me and my abilities that determine whether I succeed or fail. If I throw a grenade or cast an area of effect spell, then it is the defenders who determine the severity of the effect. With the Medusa gaze example, it's not like the Medusa needs to "aim" to hit the heroes, it's literally just looking at them. What determines whether the heroes resist the gaze is their own personal abilities. The same can be said for poisons, automatic traps, curses, and so on.
I liked the Rolemaster system because you had the concept of a poison being a certain level, for example, meaning that a great hero might shrug off the effects or just take a little damage from something that would kill any ordinary man. I also like the idea of saving versus death in the case of falls. People have survived falls from aircraft through a series of lucky events. There's no way to do that for the early DND games, unless you are high level, and even then, 20d6 is enough to kill a lot of characters! There were a few cases in WW1 because they didn't use belts or anything. Should the craft tilt enough, you fell out. If you were very lucky, you hit a snowdrift after falling relatively flat, and the combination of terminal velocity and the best possible impact surface meant some ordinary guy might survive reasonably unharmed. It happened. But for every one that made it, most ... were not so fortunate, and their deaths were, shall we say, unpleasant! There was another case of a young woman who was in an airplane which tore apart. Her seat hit tree branches. She was the sole survivor. She then fought her way out of the jungle to civilisation, only to find the government absolutely refused to believe she could be who she said she was, since clearly no-one could have survived like that!!
From the 1930s through the late 1950s, "Pepsi-Cola Hits The Spot" was the most commonly used slogan in the days of old radio, classic motion pictures, and later television.
Hehehe you talking about book keeping nightmares for saves... I played with a group that used speed factors and weapon vs. armor modifiers. (example, a weapon might be better vs chain mail than chain mail's normal AC would indicate, and worse vs plate.)
One game that made great innovations with saving throws was Mutants & Masterminds, with its most pivotal mechanic being a damage save. As the editions progressed, there was more unification with how powers affected their targets using a 3-tier system of progressively worse conditions.
Take another look at the numbers on the wands column and compare it to the Spells column. Barring higher level magic-users, wands were easier to resist because they were weaker magic. Magic-users were better against spells at higher levels because it represented the magic-user being so adept with spells they could undo the magic before the spells could harm them. My fantasy heartbreaker, DungeonPunk, uses what I think of as a mashup of all three NuD&D save systems. 3.x's categories, 4E's better of two ability scores, and 5E's math (sorta, since I have different proficiency bonus math, and DCs are still 10 + ability + proficiency).
As a DM I allowed bonuses or additional rolls if the player could articulate a complex action that they would complete within seconds of the action causing the saving throw.
This was a pretty interesting look at the history of saving throws. I liked it. If you don't mind, could you to take a look at the 1st edition module Ruins of Adventure and the video game it is a tie-in for, AD&D the Pool of Radiance? I think it might be an interesting look at how TSR handled the burgeoning video game market.
Thanks for the suggestion! We hope to get to Ruins of Adventure/Pool of Radiance some time in the next couple of months. It would be an interesting exploration of the early D&D video game market and it would be fun to compare the game with the module.
I liked 4th for the simple and easy *to hit* number so even fresh meat err players could pick it up fast. The older systems could and did get mathy but also added to the flavor of that time where as now its more likely bob just tosses his dice via his cellphone then resumes his video once his turn is over.
Very interesting! One more note...I love RU-vid and I love D&D vids. I think RU-vid's algorithm has to be slipping on certain topics. I should have seen this video back when it came out and not just lately.
I would love to see content on Ravenloft since it was my favorite setting, the Van Richten books were phenomenal, as were many of the novels and modules!
One thing that’s common for D&D channels is to review old modules. I think one thing you could do is present original material that you’ve written. It wouldn’t necessarily have to be a home brew module but could be a monster or magic item of some sort. Presenting new original material is something the RPG channels just don’t do. A rare exception would be AJ Pickett who has presented a few examples
me, I prefer the specifics of 1-2nd gameplay..it makes it more challenging but enlightening for how things should really work with regard to a case by case scenario.
<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="180">3:00</a> is that a mirror on the right side of the table? Is that so someone standing around the table can sell tell what is a table level view? Clever.
I prefer either 4e or 5e's save systems. 4's flat defenses make a lot of sense to me and saves time rolling a bunch of dice, but makes things like magic resistance tricky. I like that 5 uses all the stats for saves and simplifies things like trips and disarms, granting extra utility to stats like Str (which most classes in 5 could basically dump otherwise).
While usually only a problem at high levels in 5e, I can say from personal experience that characters who have a poor to medium stat in a non-proficient save can create some really unfun scenarios. We once had a 15th level character get locked down for three or four turns from a simple Entangle effect, because they had a 10 Strength and weren't proficient with Strength saves. It's one of my relatively few criticisms of 5e as a whole.
I'm digging the shorter video format a lot. While I adore your in-depth videos spanning larger topics, smaller videos like these are also welcome. They can be made much quicker (I assume) and give you guys time to make work on the longer ones as well. Maybe we can get a format of like, one short video a week and a longer one at the end of the month or something going in the future~
As a general rule, in a tactical combat scenerio, the longer the scenerio, the more meaningful choices and advantages are. And thats why I like 4e's save system best. It leaves the most room for choice and action. Example, If you are facing a Beholder spamming death rays and it has wrackspawn allies with an aura thats causing a penalty to your save checks basically garunteeing you are dead in 3 rounds. Thats still a better sutation imo than a beholder with a chance to actually instakill me since thats three rounds I have to execute a counterstrategy.
Been playing D&D since early 1977. Yes, that's 45 years. I've played every edition, and have to say that I am split on my preference for edition. Adv 2e was my go-to for a very long time. I gave each new edition its chance, but always fell back to 2 because 3x and 4 were very poor substitutes. 5e, though standing on much of the 3x and 4x changes, harkens back to A2e in a much better way. It "simplified" and "streamlined" the game mechanics without losing nearly as much of the concept or "feel" of A2e. I play 5e now, exclusively, but. I hear that WotC is on the path to revamping again, with a "5.5" coming within the next year or so. If they botch the job the way they did going from 3 to 3.5, I will fall back to A2e yet again.
I think I prefer a chance to avoid an effect instead of letting my 'spell defense' block it. It leaves my avoidance of it in my own hands instead of just saying, "it hit me? oh."
Description of 4E condition and save mechanics is slightly off. Not all conditions imposed by an attack "escalated" the way the medusa petrification in the example did. Most (like ongoing damage) simply had a set effect that lasted till a save was made, which acted as "soft clock" on the duration of save-ends effects. Many things could give small bonuses to saving throws, either in general or specific types (eg poison saves) so that "unmodified d20" actually did get modified quite often. Personally I thought it was an elegant system, since it saved you from tracking exactly how long your (for ex) Immobilze debuff effect had been running and made durations harder to safely predict in general. The 13 Age RPG from Pelgrane Press is effectively D&D 4.5 mechanically, and uses a very similar system, with "escalating" effects (most of which kill you dead in 3-4 failed saves) causing "last-gasp saves" in the same way being reduced to zero HP does.
I think this video does a good job of showing how saving throws are basically a mechanic that came from wargames and has continued to be awkward in D&D ever since. D&D is really the only RPG that uses them, and is almost the only one to EVER use them. I actually prefer the approach of Fighting Fantasy, where you check a Luck score that goes down each time you succeed. The same concept is carried over into Crypts and Things and Low Fantasy Gaming, which are both D&D OGL clones.
Since I started play in 1976, once AD&D 2nd Edition came out, I stuck with those saving throw tables. A roll of a 1 was always a failure, and a 20 was always a save, no matter how dire or how good the conditions. That said, if a player was catastrophically hit, I gave them the option to make a "dying prayer." I'd roll two percentiles - the higher the better, to see if the deity had their focus in the neighborhood and whether they heard the prayer. Then the player rolled a percentile, and generally if they got a 90% or better, they weren't killed outright but critically wounded and bleeding out -- or some such. 95% or higher resulted in actual manifestations, and might or might result in them having to do something for the god's protection or restoration of health. While a few times the deity might make an appearance, more often it resulted in the sudden arrival of another adventurer party that suddenly changed the flow of battle. In general, too, my attitude wasn't to kill my players, but to have them enjoy the story, and the success or failure was primarily up to them. This was especially true the longer the player played their character, with some of them playing a decade or longer, so they naturally got quite attached to their alter ego. One or two even opted to take over one of their kids as their character aged, while others took their chance with anti-aging magic. So while saving throws might seem arbitrary, chances both good and bad do happen during melee; and there are always interlopers who might skew a fight one way or another. These might be other adventurers, or beings from other planes that are attracted by the expenditure of a lot of magic, the use of psionic powers, or things that open some sort of gate, portal, or teleportation. Players might mourn the results, but I never had anyone contest it because the saving throw had been rolled by them using their dice, not me. That's not to say that every expedition survived. No, they didn't. and some of the players starting new characters liked it when a higher level NPC went along to nurse them until they got a little higher to strike out on their own. Though I have been accused on occasion of psychically influencing the combat dice used by the monsters. But that's another matter entirely.
The place I think saving throws make the *most* sense as they are, is probably with regard to anything that affects multiple targets. Like, it would seem a little weird if the dragon's breath weapon targets this whole area, but no one gets hit because he just missed the entire thing. Like, did he have a neck spasm or something? I also think it makes sense for things like poisons where like, it's the recipient's body versus the poison. After the poison's been made, assuming enough has been exposed to the target in the correct fashion (often, through a wound), there's not much the poisoner's skill has to do with whether or not the victim succumbs to it. Overall I don't have a problem with the system in its 3rd edition/Pathfinder variation. It's fiddly, but not *too* fiddly. And surely not much *more* fiddly than a lot of D&D's rules.
I've never been a fan of the poison saving throw. Drugs effect people. It is what they do. If they don't, they aren't effective. The whole concept can really start to get twisted around. Why not make saving throws against healing medicines? Did you ever buy lsd and have everyone tripping but you must have made your save so you are sadly sober...even though you bought it specifically to trip...god forbid you save vs the anesthesiologist.
The extra saving throws in 5e confuse me a bit. As a DM how do I know if a random mental effect targets Intelligence, Wisdom or Charisma? Fortitude, Reflex and Will saves were at least clear and easy to comprehend.
The effect will usually tell you what ability is targeted by any given effect in it's description, for example, Confusion targets Wisdom, Feeblemind targets Intelligence, Fireball targets Dexterity, Cloudkill targets Constitution, Banishment targets Charisma, and Gust of Wind targets Strength.
I make everything that happens to a player be handled by the player, if they are attacked, they dodge, I don't attack them. Saves are the same. When a player does something to the monsters, the players roll to affect the monsters. I don't roll to have them resist those affects or attacks.
When I played, there was a common house rule that you rolled a d20 and succeeded if the roll was less than or equal to the relevant attribute. But, so far as I know, this was never an official rule (edit: I was wrong--it's briefly mentioned in Moldvay Basic).
Old school save or die made things scary. It is so hard to kill PCs these days, they have piles of HP and like five saves before the death spell kills them.
At what level, a group of level 1 to 5 adventurers are still pretty squishy, it's not "the wizard only has a d4 of HP and roled a 1 so a house cat can kill him" but it's "a group of goblins can kill the players if they understinate the cunning little bastards" Encounters can be pretty deadly, you just have to think about them
I like the 3rd edition saves the best. Cleaned up that borderline nonsensical mess of previous editions into something more comprehensible. Then 5e came and doubled the amount of saving throws for... some reason. I like that 5e harkens back to 3(.5) but simplifying things, but sometimes it bafflingly goes the the opposite direction. Saving throws are actually quite the oddity that doesn't really exist in other systems (that aren't modeled after D&D), but it's things like that make D&D what it is. Despite (or because) it's the first RPG. As a German, my first RPG was The Dark Eye, so D&D feels pretty unique, despite it's constant presence.
Death needs to be a factor or the game is boring. Saves for less damage are fine, but at some point you may have to chose to run away and come back another day. I'm also not against save or die deaths be they by trap, combat or careless player actions. Escaping death by wit or luck makes overcoming an encounter that much richer an experience. More memorable. I do like giving players a healthy chance to survive via a roll of the dice but the element of finality definitely carries excitement.
I am more in line with the Mutants and Masterminds 3rd edition side of things for saves. Or even better, narrative dice like in Star Wars FFG or Genesys RPG.
I'd rather do without them, but save or die could stay within the "fail by 5 or more" realm and I wouldn't mind TOO much. Now my favorite saves were the Defenses of 4e, but the 5e saves are set in a comfortable second place in my book.
3.5 is the best, anything past that is watered-down fanfiction meant to appeal to the masses. Just as in videogames, movies, and books diluting what has made something special for mass consumption is A Bad Thing.
I like attacker/proactive always rolls....So I prefer 4e's take on it. I also think it's easier for newbies to grasp because it's one consistent system. I've never played a system where defender/reactive always rolls, but that might work well too. Again, my problem with D&D is legacy inconsistencies that are viewed as features and not bugs. There's no way WotC will try to meaningfully fix the game again, not after the backlash over 4e...
I saw the history of D&D video from this channel, and most of the stuff in the "ye olde original" version was d6 stuff, IIRC. My first D&D set (Xmas of 1989) was the boxed Basic D&D and it came with a sheet of laminated chits you had to cut out and get your own cups for to 'draw' your rolls.
I feel like there are certain instances where death should be apparent. Player stupidity is one. Great example I had one party member that want to have sex with a demon during a battle. Even though the party warned against it after the battle was over they did the deed. Turned out she was a succubus. He died. We are still in campaign and the Centaur is carrying his naked body across his back. But I gave him 2 extra AC bonus for carrying him. Having a player died instantly is also a good sign of we better grab them and get the hell out of here. But there is also the old adage that story trumps rules. If it works for the story then I say kill them.
As a wargamer, saving throws just seem natural to me. I don't know why you guys find it so weird that the defender has to roll something. Attacker rolls attack, defender rolls defense. What's not to understand?
Enjoyed this and your other videos. While I appreciate your videos about early D&D, the one factor that you seem to omit regarding issues with the First and Second Edition rules is that Gary Gygax was an egotistical jerk. I began playing D&D with the First Edition back in 1975 as well as using the Chainmail rules. My buddies and I attended the first series of war gaming conventions where we also played D&D. I never ever heard players, who any sort of contact with Gygax, have anything positive to say about him. The numerous stories about his pettiness and vindictiveness towards players were legend. You mentioned in another of your videos the conflict that developed between the DM and players. I believe that this was a result of Gygax's own attitude regarding players (especially ones that didn't do what he wanted them to).
How D&D handles defensive actions have always bugged me to know end and is one of the reasons while I will always respect D&D, it will never be my favorite. Instead I prefer how GURPS handles things. To avoid getting hit, the defending character has to either dodge the attack, parry it with a weapon or if nothing else their arms or block it with a shield. So long as a character can move they can dodge and you can dodge any number of attacks (dodging more represents a character trying to move in a hard to hit way then dodging like say a boxer evading a punch) but is based on their Basic Speed stat and is hard to improve. Parrying and blocking are skill based, with parrying being based on your skill with the weapon you're parrying with and blocking being based on the sheild skill (there is more to all this but this is the basics). Also in GURPS armor is passive and reduces damage rather then make you hard to hit. Something like making a save vs turn to stone effect is just take whatever stat the effect targets, apply any relevant modifiers (a more powerful effect might give a -1 or more) and try to roll under that total on 3d6. In all these cases the way GURPS handles things just seems more intuitive and feels more in line with reality (and is actually much simpler in play then how D&D handles these things).
That is exactly what doesn't sit me in D&D too. Imho combat should be more of the back-and-fort of attacker vs defender. You roll for attack I roll for defensive action. It feels more dynamic and fair. Good systems let you chose the defensive action as well so you have something to do even when it's not "your turn". And no, in my experience it doesn't slow down combat excessively (at least in a system I used to game... original ... ok "original" as it is D&D inspired Czech RP system in case anyone was interested) as you tend to have your respective values prepared so it's just roll & see (if you succeeded) basically.
