1y ago

Spellslot well spent

Happened at our table a couple of months back.

74 comments

Fun fact. I wanted to trap my level 12 party in a dungeon, one of them had disintegrate. So I engraved a reflecting effect in the door. Any direct one target spell casted on the door would bounce back. It would take 3 spells used that way to empty the magic of the door.
Sadly, he never casted disintegrate on it. Sad DM noise.
But DAM its hard to trap a high level party anywhere.
- I was gonna give you advice on trapping them, but then I realized you were talking about their characters and not the actual players.
  Then again, playing the odd session in an actual escape room might be fun.
  
  Wait hold up TTRPG escape room?
  Tell me more!

Semi-related fact: Knock and Speak With Animals are the best utility spells in Baldurs Gate 3, and anyone who says otherwise is a liar.
- Utility ? No idea. But Speak with animals is so fucking hilarious that I will carry a class just for it because its that funny. I was sold the second I talked to the squirrels near the bard.
  
  As far as I understand, "utility spell" is a category consisting of all spells that aren't combat spells.
  I agree 💯 btw 😁
- I haven’t used knock at all but the first thing I do after every long rest is apply speak with animals to my PC. I then talk to almost every animal I meet.
  
  Raise your hand if you spoke to the guard bear again after saving the Grove, hoping that the xenophobe had changed its mind about you 🙋🏻
- Speak with the Dead is also pretty good too.
  
  Get the necromancy book in the blighted village and you get speaks with dead on any character for free.
  
  True.
- Knock wastes a level 2 spell slot while thieves tools are plentiful. You can easily unlock anything with thieves gloves, don't even need a dex character. Speak with animals is replaced by a potion that most merchants sell for a few gold.
  
  You don't really need that extra spell slot for a game that's not at all punishing in the combat department though, and having Speak With Animals memorized as a ritual is just much better QoL than having to buy and drink potions all the time IMO
  
  Agree, I only go with Knock if I’m not carrying Astarion around for some strange reason. He’s such a bastard, but too useful in so many situations. I’m a potion hoarder though and I will likely finish my run with enough potions to start my own business.
  
  Smack the door with your sword. The only ones that don’t fall to my sword are arcane locked and astarion can lock pick those.
- Speak with animals gets a lot better with infinite duration.
  
  Yeah, I use that mod and cast SwA right after every long rest 😁
- And Thunderwave is the best combat spell in the game
  
  Especially considering the absurd amount of cliffs is the game.
  
  Spike Growth wants a word. Although that one does pair nicely with Thunderwave, so there's that.
  
  Gust of wind is better. Clears out gas clouds and enemies.
- Lol never once needed knock. Astarion (and later respecced roguelock Wyll) almost never failed, especially with guidance. And even if you fail, I never once had single digit thieves tools.
  SwA is goddamn awesome though, totally agreed. Talking to the Rothes in the underdark blew my mind
  
  There are some doors that are impossible to lockpick throughout the game, unless you use Knock to unlock.
- Anyone who has played any of the Divinity games knows that Speak with Animals is a must-have. Pet Pal was also the best perk in DoS / DoS 2.
  
  Pet Pal was a sure ticket to depression in DoS2. The stories of the animals in BG3 are usually quite cute.
  
  I hadn't, so it came as an extraordinarily positive surprise to me 😁

The wizard in my D&D group tends to be somewhat frivolous with his spell slots. As someone who looks at D&D as a resource management game (BECAUSE IT IS), this often gives me pain.
If you want to play a game where you do cool wizard shit on the regular, probably don't play the game built entirely around "you should save your spells for the big fight." And if wotc don't want to induce "but what if I need it later?" anxiety they should fucking fix that, and make powers per-encounter or something.
- Just because it has resources to manage doesn't mean it is a resource managing game.
  D&D is a narrative game first, a strategic boardgame second. (That is why it is an Role-Playing first, Game second)
  The point is to create awesome stories and memories with friends at the table. If this involves spending resources on frivolous shit, then so be it.
  I'd bet you will remember stupid shit that Wizard got you in longer than when you tactically defeated a boss.
  
  Lol. This just is not true in the slightest for earlier D&D. Sure, 5E is mostly focused on narrative, and everyone ignores food, water, etc. This was not always the case though. It was a role playing game, but the role was that of a person who had real needs and desires. It was mostly about dungeon crawling, and often even competitive-ish. Players would frequently try to get one up on each other, like sneaking off to steal all the loot from a dungeon before anyone else got there. There was also almost nothing done in cities and stuff. You'd purchase your equipment and move on to the next encounter.
  I agree this isn't what the game has become, and it also isn't the way it "should" be. To pretend like resource management and survival aspect were never part of the game though is ignoring a lot of history.
  
  DND is not a narrative game first. It has very few rules for narrative stuff. The bulk of its attention is spent on resource management and combat. Because the bulk of the game is centered around managing resources (spell slots, HP, sometimes gold), I say it is a resource management game.
  It's not very good at facilitating good stories. It's just missing a bunch of tooling like you'd find in Fate or other games. You can still play make believe but you can do that with anything. The rules aren't really helping very much. They often don't care at all about the narrative.
  I'll remember stuff like him blowing hold person on a retreating mook when the expertise-in-grapple rogue could have just grabbed him, sure, but not happily.
- This is what BG3 fucks up in my opinion. Occasionally places will be created where you can't go to camp for a long rest, but usually you can leave and come back trivially. There's almost no need to save spell slots. You can easily long rest after every encounter and just blow all your slots as soon as possible. I enjoyed playing it how tabletop is played. You actually need to manage your slots. If you decide to just long rest somewhere dangerous you're probably going to have some kind of encounter in your sleep, and your armor won't be equipped and it takes time to put on.
  Sadly, BG3 doesn't have a dungeon master to see you cheesing something and counter it. I agree the best part of D&D comes from managing resources and making do when you're running low. The fear after you've blown all your spells after a big fight and need to get to safety with low HP is when there's the most tension. It makes for good storytelling.
  
  I too tried to play it 'right' and only rested sparingly. I made a point to never leave a dungeon or major quest sequence to rest, and generally burned through every last slot and ability I had before I chose to go back to camp. Highly recommend. Actually used my damn potions. Only issue is trying to figure out how to catch up on the rest cutscenes. I tried to squeeze them in all at once but I'm sure I missed some here and there.
  To be fair though, my first Tav was a warlock. Even after my party was drained of everything, Eldritch blast goes pew pew and tosses enemies off cliffs (if Karlach didn't get to them first)
- Add a homebrew spell slot potion
  
  What problem is that intended to solve and how does it solve it?

"I cast Disintegrate on the wall"
- "The small brick you hit is gone, but it seems there are more bricks behind it."
  
  Long rest. Repeat as needed.

I prefer Enlarge/Reduce over Knock, way less noise.
- If you shrink a door does it pop off the hinges loudly? Or are you shrinking yourself and hopping in the keyhole?
  
  DM Fiat imo for the first way, that will get the whole party through.

I just smack the door with my sword. I keep a maul or war hammer ready for metal doors.
- I just smack the door with my sword
  Axes: am I a fucking joke to you?!
  
  I like greatswords.
- You're gonna dull the blade!

"Doesn't the Building has windows?"
"Okay, I jump inside and pull from the other side."
- In my campaign recently I just unlocked a flying ability so I fly to the second floor and look for windows and the DM says "no there are none". I'm like bullshit. What building doesn't have windows?
  
  Sounds railroady and yeah BS, but I know some that don´t have buildings. Like a Dungeon, a Turret with just arrow slits same with the Burgfried. Or a Barn, maybe a church that abhorres the Light and or Sun? Just spitballing :)