D&D (2024) New Unearthed Arcana Playtest Includes Barbarian, Druid, and Monk

Chaosmancer said:

Additionally, high dex gives quite a few boosts, and strength... doesn't.

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Which is total bollocks.
It is just that some people ignore everything Str gives. And seem to only be playing in sneak around and alphastrike games.

I found it inexplicable that you couldn't swim, climb or jump if you were a Rogue or Dex fighter with the 2014 rules.

Either you're a physical person and you should be able to move around, or... you're not and you have to use magic or be left behind. But there aren't two totally separate kinds of physical persons. Throw Arnold Schwarzenegger and Simone Biles in the water and see who swims better.

Basically, I don't think you should have to take both skills.

Asking a Dex build to get Athletics just for basic movement... and then being just mediocre at it; to me that's a bug in the 2014 edition. I've always houseruled Athletics and Acrobatics is basically the same skill, or specifically, that you can use either for most physical feats.

The reward for high strength has always been maximum martial damage. There's no good justification for penalizing dex builds with an inability to do stuff... everyone expects you to be good at!

A Dex build isn't expected to bend bars or lift boulders or win tug-of-wars and grapples. Nobody expects Simone Biles to wrestle Conan to the ground and choke him out. That the rules require strength and/or athletics here is totally fine.

But performing physical feats like jumping up to catch ropes and lamps, climb over walls and such? That's totally what a slender dexterous hero archetype should excel at! Just as well as a bulky muscle mountain, I mean.

To be honest, I would have preferred it if Strength was renamed Prowess or something. What we need in D&D is a stat that describes the ability to tear an enemy limb from limb or crash a blow through both a shield and armor.

Every acrobat and dancer needs plenty of physical strength and endurance. What they have less of than Conan and Ahnold is muscle mass or "awesome force".

Having a stat called Strength and then assuming every Strength 8 character must be physically weak (the rogue always drawing, never winning, when arm wrestling the wizard, for instance) is just... wrong.

The "deal awesome damage" stat should be renamed into something that doesn't make people assume the lack of it implies physical weakness.

UngeheuerLich said:

And seem to only be playing in sneak around and alphastrike games.

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UngeheuerLich said:

So accept that sr is devalued then. I think many groups ignore lore checks. So int can be dumped too. And influencing people is straight player ability. So dump cha.

Yes. Take rules out of the game and use only 3/6 stats.

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I HAVE accepted that strength has less value. That's my point.

If you go around stating that small ancestries are never going to be good for strength builds, when strength builds already have so little going for them, then you are just pushing more things into the already optimized builds.

And while some groups don't use Int skills, far far more do than use encumbrance.

Clint_L said:

If you’re doing sword and board I would presume you are tanking and will eventually want plate.

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Medium armor mastery does the same thing, if you truly need 20 instead of 19. And gives you stealth as an option.

Chaosmancer said:

I HAVE accepted that strength has less value. That's my point.

If you go around stating that small ancestries are never going to be good for strength builds, when strength builds already have so little going for them, then you are just pushing more things into the already optimized builds.

And while some groups don't use Int skills, far far more do than use encumbrance.

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I HAVE accepted that some people just play the game differently and think dex has inherently more value for all characters, even if that is not the case. And that they dismiss or ignore all advantages of a str build.

And I don't remember pushing more characters towards optimized builds and don't think I mentioned small characters at all...

UngeheuerLich said:

Which is total bollocks.
It is just that some people ignore everything Str gives. And seem to only be playing in sneak around and alphastrike games.

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Such as what?

We've already discussed AC and Damage, and found the gap to be small.

Per the rules, you do not need to roll strength for climbing bor swimming except in extreme circumstances, which are mitigateable with comm items.

Encumbrance rules offer no benefit to strength characters, merely penalties to non-strength characters.

What is it exactly that I'm ignoring here? Breaking down doors instead of using lockpicks?

UngeheuerLich said:

And I don't remember pushing more characters towards optimized builds and don't think I mentioned small characters at all...

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This entire conversation started with small characters wielding heavy, two-handed weapons. Whether you were here when it started is largely immaterial to that fact.

Chaosmancer said:

This entire conversation started with small characters wielding heavy, two-handed weapons. Whether you were here when it started is largely immaterial to that fact.

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So it was not a personal "you" , but a general "you" .

Yeah. Small characters are worse at grappling, so there is one advantage over dex gone anyway.

Chaosmancer said:

Such as what?

We've already discussed AC and Damage, and found the gap to be small.

Per the rules, you do not need to roll strength for climbing bor swimming except in extreme circumstances, which are mitigateable with comm items.

Encumbrance rules offer no benefit to strength characters, merely penalties to non-strength characters.

What is it exactly that I'm ignoring here? Breaking down doors instead of using lockpicks?

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Grappling. Tripping. Throwing weapons (a.k.a ranged one handed weapons, which are buffed in 2024 D&D for extra attacks). Other feats of strength besides breaking things. Resisting grapples/trips (often str saving throws), getting out of grapples by shoving the enemy away for an attack instead of an action.
Climbing and swimming, even though you dismiss it because magic.

Then for dex, we usually have longer range weapons (usually two handed, so say bye to your shield, as swapping costs an action). Sneaking (not needed as low level spells or magic items covers that against most enemies (path wothout trace, boots and cloaks of elvenkind, invisibility, enhance attributes). Initiative (easily to increase with a feat). Dex saving throws, often just to reduce damage, buy a potion of reistance instead or take tough as a feat.

Now I know you will dismiss all strength advantages as irrelevant and say that my logic is faulty regarding dex... same as everytime dex promoters dis str.