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How to Play
Topic Started: Feb 12 2016, 03:10 PM (30 Views)
Darthmoe
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God of All Things
First off this is all 5.0 rules so you need the Players handbook or alternatively you can use the SRD which is not quite as good as the Players Handbook but it works., and it's free

http://media.wizards.com/2016/downloads/SRD-OGL_V1.1.pdf

Now that you have the book the next issue is how do we share maps, and do dice rolls, and all those kinds of things. For that we will be using the free Roll 20 program desinged by the nice people at En World Forums

https://roll20.net/

Technically there are brand new and fancier tabletop programs available that are licensed by none other than WoTC and even include access to published D&D material. But these table tops programs cost a lot of money and would either require everyone in the group to shell out about $40 cash for a license, pay a monthly subscription fee, or would require me to fork out the full $240 access fee just so that I as the DM could share the features that I would be paying for with you the players, and yes it will literally block you from seeing materials that I might want to share with you, even if we are in engaged in an active game session. Even worse is the fact that it is all handled through pay pal who I literally hate. At the end of the day the people at Roll 20 are much nicer compared to Greedy bastards who own Fantasy Grounds (the fancy version) and if we decided to use only the demo version of Fantasy Grounds we'd be probably be better off using Roll 20 anyway because Roll 20 would have more features than the free demo version of Fantasy Grounds.


Characters in my games are always made on the 5.0 standard 21 point buy, which will shock a lot of 3.X and 4.0 veterans at how low the point the buy system is in this game, but that is because 5.0 uses a bonded bonus system so things don't get as far out of hand when players gain levels, (example plate mail becoming completely useless past certain levels because by that time all enemy's attack bonuses are so high they hit on anything above a natural 1 anyway, or the reverse that a defender's armor class is so high that you need a natural 20 to hit). This will be an adjustment but just keep in mind that a +1 bonus is a lot bigger deal in 5.0 than it was in previous games and in time most people grow to prefer this method over older systems. Another point I should mention about that is that no magical magical item gives anything higher than a +3 bonus in this game.

Audio Chat

There are many options available for this including Skype, and instant messenger services but I am partial to Team Speak, because the it protects the privacy of the user a bit better and it has very low bandwidth demands so it will usually work even when someone's internet connection is not the greatest. None the less we will figure that out once it gets closer to game time, but it will probably be TeamSpeak.

Difficulty Classes

DCs are lower in this 5.0 than in previous versions because of the bonded system of bonuses in 5.0. So other than opposed checks which are more common in 5.0 there are 4 difficulty classes you need to worry about, but in principle it's really only 3 DCs to worry about. A DC 5 is very easy and is the lowest but in reality unless the circumstances are unusual the DMG states that DC 5 checks should be automatic passes. An example of a DC 5 check would be driving your car down an empty city street, assuming you're proficient about the only time the DM would require you to roll a drive check is if the roads are icy. That leaves open the possibility that a roll of a natural 1 could cause a collision. A DC 10 is easy and is the standard DC for most checks, CD 15 is medium, a DC 20 is hard. Technically there is also a DC 25 and a DC 30 which are rare. A DC 25 means that only an exceptional character would be able to pull of the move. A DC 25 is on the level of complex brain surgery or something like, not very many characters below level 10 have any hope of pulling these off. A DC 30 is something that is technically feasible but for all practical purposes is basically impossible, even a level 20 character would need a 19 or 20 to pull this roll off. This is along the lines of Denzel Washington's maneuver he pulled off in the movie Flight technically it's possible but in RL nobody has ever pulled that move off successfully!

Also keep in mind that if your applicable attribute score -5 is equal to or higher than the DC that is automatic pass. So for example if you have a Strength of 20 you will automatically pass an Strength check of a DC 15 or less, unless unusual circumstances hinder. The flip side of that is that the challenge will also not grant XP if you have an automatic pass. The other flips side of this that since you have a couple instances in which you can gain automatic passes on you checks, natural 20s no longer mean an automatic pass on your skill check either.

Hit Points

To make things fair so that Fighter A doesn't always roll near max on his HP and ends up the biggest bad ass of the party, and Fighter B rolls three back to back 1s and somehow ends up with less HP than the Rogue we use standard HP progression. This means automatic Max HP at level 1, and every level after that you receive halve your hit die +1. In other words when a fighter gains a level automatically gains 6 HP + CON (half of a d10 is 5 +1 is 6).

Bloodied Condition

I use this condition even though it is a hold over from 4.0 rules and not used in 5.0 I really like the Bloodied Condition and I think a lot of people house rule it in their games too. Anyway bloodied just means is reduced to half his HP or less it gives the opposing combatants some visual clue as to how beat up the defender is. Now in 4.0 the Bloodied condition could trigger certain powers to kick in defender's might have defensive abilities or rage powers that would either kick in or become more powerful once the defender was bloodied and attackers could have attacks that became more powerful if used against bloodied defenders. In this game there might be some of that for example a magical suit of armor might cast cure light wounds on you, once you become bloodied, or a magical sword might allow you to impale bloodied defenders on an attack roll of a natural 20 and cause massive damage, but in the interest of balance I am not going to rewrite existing 5.0 class talents to involve stipulations for the bloodied condition. So just know that it is mostly just a measuring rod for the defender's general health.

No Meta-Gaming

Meta Gaming as described in in the DMG is like when a character in a movie realizes it's just a movie and acts accordingly. This is just your advance notice that if I feel you are metagaming I reserve the right to veto your metagaming actions.
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