Ranged Builds 5th edition

[Talamare]

Please look at this picture.
LOOK AT IT!

I love how it looks like that Dragon stole his Blue Wings from something else

[Mortis_Elrod]

Equal or better features than other tabletop games. I know thats subjective.

Specific areas of focus for me are a games character customization and advanced combat options.

A generic game with generic characters is by definition uninteresting. If you can make it interesting in ways like players making unique characters or controlling the game from within rather than the GM then that is better than having stereotypical classes or following standard rpg scenario #7.

5th edition is just boring and comparing it to anything is like comparing white bread and chicken to a buffet.

For example is there ways to make superior builds to the default classes? A Rogue that does one-turn kills against anything? A Druid that has a bear Army? How about an Archer that shoots down dragons?

i can make a level 5 archer that shoots down a dragon. I doubt it will be dead though. (eldritch smite no save knock prone)

Potentially a druid might be able to summon pixies that polymorph everything into bears.

Monk 19/Rogue 1. open palm or long death. But idk if there's a rogue build in 3.5 that one shots kills EVERYTHING. I'm sure there's monsters that don't die by conventional means or sneak attacks or just have ridiculous amounts of Hp to rival WoW bosses.


There's alot of Variety in 5e. Not as much as in other rpgs though so it may look generic through those tinted lenses. You shouldn't walk in to forums though demanding the ability to do the things you did in another game. That's just asking too much. Go play those games then, for you will be disappointed here.

[Willie the Duck]

Equal or better features than other tabletop games. I know thats subjective.

Good. Because as has been stated repeatedly, a whole lot of people do say 5e has equal and better features. And what other tabletop games are we comparing it to? I think we've established that you know 3e D&D. PF. 4e D&D, and what else?

Specific areas of focus for me are a games character customization and advanced combat options.

And those foci are going to be the how and why to why others disagree. A lot of people consider the price 3e/PF pays for its' customization to be an amazingly unwieldy and unbalanced system. For a lot of people, that is a dealbreaker.

5th edition is just boring and comparing it to anything is like comparing white bread and chicken to a buffet.

Or, to switch up the analogy, a well balanced fried chicken shop compared to 'a frickin' buffet' (buffet in particular can have good or bad connotation).

For example is there ways to make superior builds to the default classes? A Rogue that does one-turn kills against anything? A Druid that has a bear Army? How about an Archer that shoots down dragons?

Well, the design ethos is that builds aren't supposed to be particularly universally superior. Focused maybe, but not superior. And I'm going to go out on a limb and say that most people consider one-shotting to be a bad thing in a game. The rocket-tag nature of 3e is one of the largest complaints about it.

Subjective, subjective, and subjective.

Of course it is subjective, and we're just going around in circles. The OP is complaining that this edition has things that it deliberately chose to put into the edition because they were things that lots of people wanted--the OP just happens not to be one of those people. We have no point of stasis where he's magically going to flip to liking the edition or the edition is magically going to change to match his preferences.

[2D8HP]

Equal or better features...
...an Archer that shoots down dragons?

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As a guess, @Chaosticket, you may like Champions, Fantasy HERO, and Exalted.

As for an archer shooting down a Dragon:

Spoiler: Here you go

Show

[Talamare]

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As a guess, @Chaosticket, you may like Champions, Fantasy HERO, and Exalted.

As for an archer shooting down a Dragon:

So we are just ignoring the ~10 arrows that shot it first
The fact that bird clearly gave that dude Bardic Inspiration
and the fact that the dude clearly did some Eldritch Smite and used a +3 Arrow of Slaying

[Chaosticket]

Funny.

Okay if you dont understand why using the rules and imagination to progress on even a fundamental level as character design then you never will.

Have you ever played Battletech? Lots of options for customizing mechs especially omnimechs. Ever play a Sandbox type game where you can do things like found your own Empire? A lot of options outside of combat.

5th edition is staggeringly low in its options. Everything you say is a bad thing is a possible goal for ANY tabletop roleplaying. Make better designed characters(very important with a low level cap), become Emperor, open a restaurant chain, become the God of Love. Make your dream come true.

Actually Ill just ask, what is the highest goal youve ever imagined?

[JNAProductions]

Funny.

Okay if you dont understand why using the rules and imagination to progress on even a fundamental level as character design then you never will.

Have you ever played Battletech? Ever play a Sandbox type game where you can do things like found your own Empire?

5th edition is staggeringly low in its options. Everything you say is a bad thing is a possible goal. Make better designed characters(very important with a low level cap), become Emperor, open a restaurant chain, become the God of Love.

Actually Ill just ask, what is the highest goal youve ever imagined?

You can become an Emperor in 5E. Sure, you can't single-handedly slay the entire old Emperor's army and take his place through brute force of arms, but you can raise your own armies, politicize, spread rumours and sow dissent, and become an emperor through other means than raw power.

You can open a restaurant chain. In fact, to my knowledge, there are barely any rules for that in 3.5 (just as in 5E) so in either system it's basically the DM winging it. (And, as a side note, I ran an adventure of this once. Elfbucks-they ran a coffee shop. Was good times.)

You can become a (or the) god of love. Again, you can't just gain enough power to beat up the existing god of love and steal their title, but that seems like a pretty unthematic way to become one.

[Unoriginal]

Okay if you dont understand why using the rules and imagination to progress on even a fundamental level as character design then you never will.

What is it supposed to mean?

Ever play a Sandbox type game where you can do things like found your own Empire? A lot of options outside of combat.

5e can do that pretty nicely.

Make better designed characters(very important with a low level cap)

I've yet to see you explain why "every characters is good, some are great at something in particular" is a bad thing.

become Emperor, open a restaurant chain, become the God of Love. Make your dream come true.

All things 5e can do.

Actually Ill just ask, what is the highest goal youve ever imagined?

In a Legend of the 5 Rings game, I played a Mantis Bushi who wanted to create a school of dueling able to rival or surpass the Crane's.

[SharkForce]

So we are just ignoring the ~10 arrows that shot it first
The fact that bird clearly gave that dude Bardic Inspiration
and the fact that the dude clearly did some Eldritch Smite and used a +3 Arrow of Slaying

bard always has bardic inspiration...

the bird was probably a diviner and used portent ;)

[Chaosticket]

I would ask "through official rules?" But you don't seem to know. So what actual benefits do those things grant? Being Emperor means you have armies of soldiers, blacksmiths, inventors, currency. Being God of Anything means your statistics are now what?

Rules for grappling, called shots, commanding armies of followers. Those are just some ahem "game breaking" things.

[JNAProductions]

I would ask "through official rules?" But you don't seem to know.

Rules for grappling, called shots, commanding armies of followers. Those are just some ahem "game breaking" things.

The grappling rules are far, FAR better in 5E than in 3E.

Called shots aren't a thing in ANY edition of D&D, to my knowledge, and don't mesh well with the concept of HP.

Commanding armies of followers is not codified in 5E's rules, no. It is in 3E... But Leadership is generally considered completely broken, is it not?

[2D8HP]

....Have you ever played Battletech? Lots of options for customizing mechs especially omnimechs....

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Nope, not really my thing, but

Spoiler: I'm reminded of:

Show

Besides D&D, my favorite games have been Pendragon, RuneQuest and Traveller to play, and Call of Cthullu to GM/Keeper.

...Actually Ill just ask, what is the highest goal you've ever imagined?

Comfortably retired in a Stronghold I guess, but the "endgame" has never interested me as much as the journey.

[Unoriginal]

I would ask "through official rules?" But you don't seem to know.

You can become Emperor and open a restaurant chain with the official rules. Becoming a god of love requires the DM homebrewing it. Unless you just want to have a religion with you as the god, without the divine spark, in which case it's also in the rules.

Rules for grappling, called shots, commanding armies of followers. Those are just some ahem "game breaking" things.

What are you even talking about?

Rules for grappling are not "game breaking". They're in the base game, and generally considered pretty good.

Commanding armies of followers is also possible, though if you want a really big army those are not the best rules in the game. They're working on an UA to correct that.

Called shots aren't really in the game to my knowledge, but they'd hardly be game-breaking. They just serve little purpose in the game as it is.

Being Emperor means you have armies of soldiers, blacksmiths, inventors, currency.

Yes? Seems like a pretty sweet deal to me.

Being God of Anything means your statistics are now what?

As a full-blown god, you have better things to do than adventuring. It's an end goal, not a speedbump on the road.

[Chaosticket]

Im expecting a lot from "the ultimate roleplaying game" where there are codified rules for basically everything from managing hunger to Apotheosis.

[Chaosticket]

You can become Emperor and open a restaurant chain with the official rules. Becoming a god of love requires the DM homebrewing it.

As a full-blown god, you have better things to do than adventuring. It's an end goal, not a speedbump on the road.

Become God of Multiple domains, then go to Chief God of the planet, then solar system, galaxy, univese, multiverse, then dimension.

Dont know if there is a 5th or higher dimensions off the top of my head.

[Willie the Duck]

Okay if you dont understand why using the rules and imagination to progress on even a fundamental level as character design then you never will.

There's no reason for us to engage with this. No one else here thinks you are showing a greater level of understanding and awareness than the rest of the conversation participants, and this continued behavior makes people think very poorly of you.

Have you ever played Battletech? Lots of options for customizing mechs especially omnimechs.

Battletech isn't even a tabletop RPG. It is a wargame. Of course it has customization options. It is designed around the concept of designing and playing a small (sometimes one unit) army and using it to best your friends in a pvp scenario. I fail to see what this example brings to the conversation except more evidence that you like customizing your combat capacities, which we've already established.

Ever play a Sandbox type game where you can do things like found your own Empire? A lot of options outside of combat.

Sure. TSR-edition D&D was very good for that. Have you played those? I would think they would show you how there are many games much, much farther in the direction you apparently don't like than 5e is. I don't see how these support your position at all. By all accounts this is a counterargument to your point.

5th edition is staggeringly low in its options. Everything you say is a bad thing is a possible goal for ANY tabletop roleplaying. Make better designed characters(very important with a low level cap), become Emperor, open a restaurant chain, become the God of Love. Make your dream come true.

Actually Ill just ask, what is the highest goal youve ever imagined?

No idea how 5e's slightly lower capacity for character combat specialization is remotely relevant to any of this. If you want to make the argument that 5e is bad for these, you are going to have to make that argument.

As to highest goals ever imagined--hmmm, true love... become the world's foremost author on the subject of the troglodite wars... build a keep on the western frontier that would stop the darkstar hobgoblin kingdom from encroaching on Duhrlendale... and return an intelligent battleaxe to the hands of a dwarven king. And that was one party. Not seeing how any game we've established we've both played would do better or worse with that.

[Chaosticket]

Okay go back to the first page of this thread and look at the suggestions and then think of ways to make them BETTER. Then make those better. Player Characters are the game medium to keep progressing in stats, skills, and so on. Its not my costume, its my battlemech.

Take actions that you may just brush of and put actual benefits. Born on Farm? You own property, that means you can produce and sell items like a business simulator.

But way back. What is the point of specializing as one character or class if youre not the best at what you do among a party? If youre a Fighter then fight to win. There is no try.

[JNAProductions]

Okay go back to the first page of this thread and look at the suggestions and then think of ways to make them BETTER. Then make those better.

Take actions that you may just brush of and put actual benefits. Born on Farm? You own property.

But way back. What is the point of specializing as one character or class if youre not the best at what you do among a party? If youre a Fighter then fight to win. There is no try.

I'll agree that Fighter is not a very good concept for a class when it comes to D&D because EVERYONE fights in a party. The Fighter is no more a master of combat than a Barbarian, they just fight differently. But that's an issue going back to at LEAST 3.5, and quite possibly earlier. (I don't know D&D pre 3E, so I'll ask some grognards to fill that info in.)

And, while specializing isn't perfect in 5E, it's a damn sight better than in 3.5, where a Druid's animal companion is quite possibly a better fighter than the Fighter. I'll take a game where everyone is competent at fighting (in a game focused around fighting, by and large) and can still contribute well even when not fighting, depending on your background, as opposed to a game where you have one person who can buttstomp everything, from fighting to social encounters, and three meatshields.

Also, before you say "there's more to D&D than fighting", I'll agree there is, but the MAJORITY of the rules are there for combat. That is true across all editions 3E and onward, and I believe that to be accurate for 1E and 2E too.

[Chaosticket]

I am genuinely surprised at that response. Those are reasonable observations based on the ingame rules.

If Its not possible to focus one-shot enemies, then what are the other options? are there rules like 3.5/pathfinder with using Called Shots to target specific locations? Or can you fire Dispelling Arrows?

Focus or Versatility. Either one should be game breaking to be a top tier character. I still wonder what happened to Rogue/Thieves that would kill enemies in one hit with Backstab.

[JNAProductions]

I am genuinely surprised at that response. Those are reasonable observations based on the ingame rules.

If Its not possible to focus one-shot enemies, then what are the other options? are there rules like 3.5 with using Disarming Shot?

The battlemaster has their maneuvers, and the DMG has options for things like disarming without a maneuver.

And why is one-shotting an enemy a desirable thing? Enemies of reasonable challenge should not be so frail as to die in one turn, generally.

[Chaosticket]

I expect enemies not to just have more Hit Points, but actually start using advanced tactics like ambushes and feints. You want to face a Hasted Enraged Minotaur group? Being unable to kill the WEAKER enemies on demand is a critical failure in capabilities.

Maybe theres away to get Explosive Arrows or trick arrows like Green Arrow sometimes uses.

[JNAProductions]

Have you actually played 5E, Chaos? Because things like ambushes are much easier to pull off in 5E with less restrictive movement rules.

[Contrast]

Being unable to kill the WEAKER enemies on demand is a critical failure in capabilities.

I assume you understand that parties in 5e do indeed fight enemies and kill them without being able to one shot a 20th level barbarian in a single turn right? Not being able to one shot stuff makes combat more tactical, not less (as you don't need tactics if 'I just kill them' works).

[Jack Bitters]

I don't think you're going to like 5e. It's designed so that even at very high levels, you aren't astoundingly more powerful than at level one. A fighter attacks four or five times per turn at level 20. That's it. A level 20 cleric can cast 22 spells per day without using his other abilities. There are no epic levels in the rules. Ability scores are capped at 20 with few exceptions.

Because of the design concept of bounded accuracy, even a lowly goblin or orc may be a nuisance at level 20, and a character is unlikely to be able to deal with more than a few dozen monsters by him or herself.

Because of the new mechanic of concentration it is extremely hard to layer multiple magical buffs on one character, as each person can only concentrate on one spell at a time.

Basically, within the constraints of the basic ruleset of 5e, characters may feel much less deity-like at high levels, although they are still ridiculously powerful within the 5e game, relative to everything in it. Your adventuring career will most likely not culminate with you developing super powers.

All that being said, because of the nature of dungeons and dragons being the game that it is, it is perfectly possible to do almost anything you can think of in game, but at some point the rules stop providing official support for it and the dungeon master has to step in. There is no official support for being a necromancer who raises an army of dragons from the dead, but your DM could come up with a way for you to do it. There is no official support for you to ascend to godhood and get the stats of a god, but your DM could make up the rules for it. Your DM can use the 5e ruleset and create rocket launchers that do 5x the damage of a fireball, but you won't find those guns flipping through the book. As others have mentioned, there is no official support for building your own empire and paying upkeep costs and fielding an army for your nation, but the DM could add it in. Anything is possible, technically.

[2D8HP]

I'll agree that Fighter is not a very good concept for a class when it comes to D&D because EVERYONE fights in a party. The Fighter is no more a master of combat than a Barbarian, they just fight differently. But that's an issue going back to at LEAST 3.5, and quite possibly earlier. (I don't know D&D pre 3E, so I'll ask some grognards to fill that info in.)...

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There were originally three classes:
Fighting-Men (Fighters), Clerics, and Magic-Users (Wizards).

Thieves were added along with the Paladin subclass of Fighter in the Greyhawk supplement, with other classes afterwards (Rangers were from a magazine article).

Paladin was originally a type of Fighter with stuff added to it (subclass).

If Fighter seems lackluster it's because it was the first class listed in the rules, without stuff added. Originally a First level Fighter was a normal human:
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Check out the 1974 Attack Matrix:



(Note: "Normal men equal 1st level Fighters", despite the level title being "Veteran".
Dirty Peasants of the world unite!)


And here's the AD&D one only a few years later:



(Note: the introduction of "0 level humans", so snooty PC's can have people that they fight better than, starting the whole rotten "PC's are exceptional" junk)


Anyway, what Chaosticket seems to want is to play at leading armies, and/or more tactical rules.

Carwars, Chainmail, Risk, Runewars, and Warhammer all come to mind.

[JNAProductions]

-Snip-

Gosh 2D8, you are so correct and handsome! :P

In all seriousness, thanks for weighing in with your grognardly wisdom.

[Unoriginal]

Focus or Versatility. Either one should be game breaking to be a top tier character.

A game *not* breaking is a good thing. A game's rules shouldn't break it.

[JAL_1138]

One-shotting weak enemies at high level is certainly possible. Depending on what you mean by weak, anyway.

The average Challenge 1/4 goblin's max HP is 12, average 7. A low-level Fighter can reasonably chop one in twain. If you use the Sharpshooter feat's -5/+10 and have a Dex bonus of +1 or better, your minimum damage on a successful attack with a ranged attack is higher than their max HP.

A 20th-level Fighter with Sharpshooter can plausibly Action Surge to potentially one-round (though not one-shot) the average Challenge 5 Hill Giant (105 HP), potentially one-round a Challenge 7 Stone Giant (126 hp), with a bit of luck a Challenge 8 Frost Giant (138 hp), etc.

There are a lot of creatures in the 90-110 HP range that a high-level Battlemaster can expect to get somewhere in the vicinity of a couple times per short rest with Action Surge and decent die rolls.

[Chaosticket]

Thats a very strong different in opinion. Having a vary narrow set of rules means that there is little room to expand without "house ruling it" which is basically just cheating but the GM allows. "Game-breaking" within the rules is fun as that means you are clever enough to get what you want and keep it. You beat "the system".

3.5 is the golden age as so many possible rules were published to cover every aspect. Other games like Pathfinder, Rifts, Gurps, Champions, SHadowrun, etc. encourage creativity by trying to expand with as many rules as possible. Of course many are optional.

Critically 5th edition is boring for the reasons why some people like it. Its small, safe, secure. You dont have to worry about enemies killing you/you killing them in one hit, or think about managing an empire, or becoming a deity. Are there even rules in 5th edition for becoming a Lich?

Highlights of other games are fighting/having tea with Demon Lords, Elder Gods, Celestial Entities. And that was just 3.5. I havent played Rifts but from what I read its fantastic. What the heck happened to make DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS lose its fantasy?

[JNAProductions]

You say it's a good thing. And that's fine-but it's your OPINION.

5E is a well-designed system. You are capable of sitting down with brand new players who pick what sounds cool and they'll all have fun. That's not true in 3.5.

You are capable of sitting down with some experienced players and some new players and their characters will, in all likelihood, not be overshadowing each other. That's not true in 3.5.

And the thing is, "beating" 3.5 is something people like Emperor Tippy did. Guess what? Unless you're one of the ORIGINAL optimizers, one of the few who figured out the tricks with minimal outside help, you did not beat the system. Someone else did, and you just copied them. More than that, 3.5 is so variable in power (with a LOT of the stuff above the curve of what WotC expected) that it's pretty trivial to "beat", say, the regular modules.