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Hot take: Strongest creatures in the setting shouldn't just be clowned by PCs with no resistance.
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It is actually bad game design in the sense that there really isn't a decent mechanic to escape monsters. 5.0 orcs, for example, had double the speed of the average PC with their dumbass free move action. The solution is rolling disengage as a series of skill checks (like World of Darkness would...) but then you have to explain how, exactly, a dude in full plate escapes a dragon.D&D, especially 5e, is just missing broad sections of game stuff so it can "leave it up to the DM". Other stuff is really underbaked. Degree of success, succeed at a cost, non-violent conflict, ending combat other than totally wiping the other factions... That can be fine if everyone's on the same page, but since D&D is the mega popular game you're likely to be playing with new players, or just randos, and that can lead to tension.
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We used to talk about how to cure Vampires in Mage (awakening, 2e). The easiest is probably time magic. With Time4, rules as written you can rewrite their history so they never became a vampire. It persists until the spell elapses, but you could make that last a year without too much trouble (assuming time4, gnosis3, a rote skill of 4). With Time5, the "fuck you" level of Mage, you can use the Unmaking practice and prevent them from being embraced, though that's big hubris and risks butterfly effects at the GM's discretion. Other approaches I'm less sure about. You could probably do something with Life5 (make a new body), 5 or so points of Death or Spirit to get a new soul (fun fact: in awakening, souls are fungible), and Mind5 to put their mind in the new body. Kind of a ship of Theseus situation.In oWoD meanwhile there is an entire book with ideas how Mages could fix a vampire and what would be the consequences.
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Even in Heroic Fantasy the enemies should be challenging, while in D&D (not even 5e, 3.5 had this issue too), it's basically inevitable that high enough PCs will rollstomp everything, laughing all the way.
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Inspired by frustrating conversation I had. For those curious, that was the statblock of Caine, father of the vampires.
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WW also made a guy who was a vampire, mage, werewolf and eventually ashtray, so i wouldn't put them on a pedestalAnd then he either got murdered by PCs or Metuzalah or exploded from Paradox, before turnign into ashtray.
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To be fair, starting at around level 13 it becomes more challenging to, well, challenge a party without having dragons and shit everywhere. You can almost not build encounters with "normal" enemies anymore.Before my group got bored with D&D and we decided to give it a break and switch to Mage, it got to a level I was prepping to have the this level 13 party fight Vecna and Zariel at once, just to make it at least a little hard.
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This is Pathfinder, kiddo, we don't play around with silly D&D handwaves: Which wizard, and why?Your character doesn't know that information.
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It is actually bad game design in the sense that there really isn't a decent mechanic to escape monsters. 5.0 orcs, for example, had double the speed of the average PC with their dumbass free move action. The solution is rolling disengage as a series of skill checks (like World of Darkness would...) but then you have to explain how, exactly, a dude in full plate escapes a dragon.Pre-firearm plate armor was pretty lightweight, lots of videos of people running and rolling and climbing in it. Is D&D supposed to only be like jousting armor where you can't move? I've never been clear on this and I'm more willing to look like a twerp about it on here than with a DM in person
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Your character doesn't know that information."And it was in this moment, when the player opened the book on RECALL KNOWLEDGE rules, that the DM realized, he done fucked up."