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Avista
2019-04-11, 06:44 PM
For a 5e campaign set in a world with airships, floating cities, and tall mountains, what's a fair way to go about this? So far, I've got:

1. Certain races (mountain dwarves, aasimar, wind genasi, etc) have immunity. If their home country resides in areas of high altitude, they aren't affected.

2. For those without the immunity, every day at high altitudes they must make a DC 10 con save. They are disadvantaged if they have any stacks of exhaustion. A success means they will not suffer adverse effects for the day. A fail means they take 1d8 damage.

3. Having 5 consecutive successful con saves in a row grants them temporary immunity to altitude sickness. Any failed con save (make 4 successful saves in a row, but fail the 5th) resets the count back to 0.

4. A temporary immunity lasts until they return to sea level, where it then resets.

Does this sound fair and balanced?

JNAProductions
2019-04-11, 08:45 PM
It sounds basically pointless. As-in, the effects are so minor as to, past 1st level (and even not too much then) be something you can easily ignore.

Now, before you rush to make it much more debilitating, ask yourself this: Will adding this make your game more fun? If the answer is yes, work on it. If not... Don't.

Knaight
2019-04-12, 05:04 AM
It also seems pretty far off. Someone with Con 8 at high altitude is extremely unlikely to succeed at five checks in a row for well over a month. Meanwhile even sickly people generally get used to altitude in a couple of days, tops. Damage also just seems like a weird effect; altitude sickness generally works by making it harder for you to do physical exertion and would fit far better with Disadvantage than anything.

I wouldn't bother with it at all, but if I were going to that's definitely not how I'd do it.

Ashtagon
2019-04-12, 07:19 AM
As someone who has actually experienced altitude sickness, this isn't really how it works.

Knaight
2019-04-12, 05:32 PM
Yeah, while we're listing credentials: I live in the lowlands (5,000') and go hiking in the highlands (10,000-14,000') pretty routinely, and have experienced altitude sickness a couple of times. I've also seen it in other hikers, especially those unfortunates who live at sea level, visit us lowlanders, and have us take them hiking* in the highlands.

*I don't personally do that, because it's a terrible idea. It definitely happens though.

lucky9
2019-04-15, 01:41 AM
Some inspiration for you from the 3.5 srd, specifically the Mountain section. I’m rusty on 5th but should be easy enough to port over
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/wilderness.htm#mountainTravel

Also, for the curious, this is what hypoxia looks like. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XcvkjfG4A_M
Two of the early symptoms are confusion and euphoria, so you don’t even realize or care if the situation is dangerous.

Avista
2019-04-23, 04:34 AM
Some inspiration for you from the 3.5 srd, specifically the Mountain section. I’m rusty on 5th but should be easy enough to port over
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/wilderness.htm#mountainTravel

Also, for the curious, this is what hypoxia looks like. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XcvkjfG4A_M
Two of the early symptoms are confusion and euphoria, so you don’t even realize or care if the situation is dangerous.

That's awesome, thanks. I should be able to port that into 5e.

The Kool
2019-04-23, 08:25 AM
I would actually recommend using Exhaustion. Perhaps the following:

DC 10 Con save, once per day. This DC is reduced by 1 for every day past the first, regardless of success or failure. Ascending directly from a low altitude to a high one causes the first save to be made at Disadvantage. Each failure grants a level of Exhaustion, each success removes one of these levels of Exhaustion.

noob
2019-04-23, 09:47 AM
It is quite silly to know most commoners can die from altitude sickness.
Also the instantaneous reset is silly.(example:someone goes to sea level and comes back in 12 seconds with two teleports and is instantaneously affected by altitude sickness again)

Crisis21
2019-04-23, 10:15 AM
I would actually recommend using Exhaustion. Perhaps the following:

DC 10 Con save, once per day. This DC is reduced by 1 for every day past the first, regardless of success or failure. Ascending directly from a low altitude to a high one causes the first save to be made at Disadvantage. Each failure grants a level of Exhaustion, each success removes one of these levels of Exhaustion.

I wouldn't have success remove a level of exhaustion. Exhaustion can be removed one level per long rest provided you get food and water as well.

So, if the player is smart, the worst they suffer is a single level of exhaustion a day until they acclimate.


It is quite silly to know most commoners can die from altitude sickness.
Also the instantaneous reset is silly.(example:someone goes to sea level and comes back in 12 seconds with two teleports and is instantaneously affected by altitude sickness again)

Actually, the teleport thing sounds plausible. Many cases of altitude sickness are due to rapid transitions between elevations, and you don't get much more rapid than teleportation.

noob
2019-04-23, 06:51 PM
I wouldn't have success remove a level of exhaustion. Exhaustion can be removed one level per long rest provided you get food and water as well.

So, if the player is smart, the worst they suffer is a single level of exhaustion a day until they acclimate.



Actually, the teleport thing sounds plausible. Many cases of altitude sickness are due to rapid transitions between elevations, and you don't get much more rapid than teleportation.

what is weird is that you need again weeks to adapt to the mountain while you are back on the mountain near instantly

Crisis21
2019-04-23, 07:28 PM
what is weird is that you need again weeks to adapt to the mountain while you are back on the mountain near instantly

The weeks thing I'm not a fan of, but teleporting between elevations does sound like it might realistically induce some form of altitude sickness.