5e's Rust Monster

There's been a bit of whining in the D&D community that the Rust Monster just isn't scary enough any more. Here's a rundown of the differences:

• 2nd Edition: Rust monster immediately corrodes things it touches, eats them. Magic things have a 10%-30% chance of not getting corroded.
• 3rd Edition: Rust monster makes a +3 touch attack, corrodes things it touches, and eats them. It's a DC17 dex save to protect a magic item.
• 4th Edition: Rust Monster has to hit first (or be hit) to trigger rusting, then can hit again with a bigger attack to destroy a rusting item. This is only a once-per-encounter attack for the lower-level specimens, and a recharging ability for the higher-level ones. Rusting is a cumulative, temporary penalty.
• 5th Edition: Each time a Rust Monster touches or is touched by an item, it takes a cumulative, permanent penalty until it rusts away. Magic items are immune. 

Clearly, the worst of them all is the 2e Rust Monster, due to the generally lower scaling and scarcity of magic items. The 3rd edition version seems bad, but when you take into account Magic Mart and how rapidly the party's AC gets nearly out of reach, it's not too awful.

The Rust Monster is another iconic D&D monster, but this is in part because it's too awful. It's essentially a monster that your front-line fighters out entirely, unless you gave them time to change into leather gear, or room to escape and change. Basically, parties will do whatever they can to avoid them, which makes them not a very good monster to actually use.

In 5e, the scarcity of magic items is why they aren't affected. If you are running a campaign where you allow players to have easy access to magic items, I would strongly recommend modifying this trait. If you are playing 5e RAW, remember, your players might go a long time without ever seeing more than a few pieces of uncommon gear.

The cumulative damage bonus means players are more likely to fight them, and you can use them in groups without it being an overwhelming ruination of player gear. Players *might* decide to run and change, or they may just tough it out, drawing a backup weapon and using it until it dissolves. It's also a good time to use the Magic Weapon spell.

So it's true. The 5e Rust Monster is not as big a threat as in older editions. But in my experience running the game, that makes them a more usable enemy. They're still something that plate-wearing fighters will want to keep a healthy distance from.

The Death of Magic Mart

Dungeons and Dragons always had magic items. But, possibly inspired by Diablo, 3rd edition went crazy with the concept. Tons of new magical items were introduced, and the rules explicitly stated that players could buy anything they wanted that they found in the rule books. This was possibly the most world-breaking idea introduced by the game. The fluff claims that magic is rare in the world, yet you can apparently walk into any town and find stores that keep arsenals of magical gear in stock...yet these pieces cost a king's ransom for just one simple +2 magic sword. Gear essentially became a way to further augment your character's ability as you leveled up. It also destroyed the concept of loot, making it pointless to explore random dungeons and side quests except to level up. Hence, many DMs house-ruled Magic Mart out of the game.

A major consequences of Magic Mart was that magic item bonuses were simply baked into the numbers. This had the unfortunate effect that magic items largely didn't feel that awesome. A Magic +2 Sword was a godlike weapon of smiting in AD&D, but by 4e, it was merely the base-level item you were expected to have at level six.

5e has returned to a low magic setting. Magic Mart is gone entirely---any special items you find are either randomly rolled or at the DM's discretion. Not only is a magic item bonus not baked into the numbers, but most magic gear has no modifier bonus at all.  The Flame Tongue Sword is 2d6 of fire damage. There is no +2 Flame Tongue Sword.

The up side of this is players no regard Magic +N gear as trash to sell immediately, and finding something special is a big deal. The down side of this is that Eberron campaigns don't convert well.

3.5's Legacy in 5e

In my last post, I said that 3.x and 5e are almost like two independent revisions of AD&D for as much as they have in common. However, there are some 3rd edition revisions that 5e has kept around---basically, anything that made 3.x easier to play than AD&D is retained, while things that made it more complicated (like touch AC, damage reduction, and the four-fold attack modifier) are jettisoned:

What's still around:

1. All modifiers are still based on ability scores. In AD&D, THAC0, saving throw bonuses, and kill bonuses all came from a huge array of tables at the end of the player's handbook. 3.5 simplified(!) things here by making all those +n bonuses to things based on your ability scores.

2. Skills replace table lookups. In AD&D, most things required a table lookup from some weirdly specific table, like "bending strong bars" or something odd like that. 3rd Edition introduced skills, which meant you could resolve most situations with a skill check. Even if there was some lengthy, detailed rule explaining how to do something specific, you could in practice just ignore it and have the player roll a skill check. This also means anyone can *try* to do just about anything.

3. Feats and class options are back. I think making character builds was what a lot of people loved about 3rd edition. The options are aggressively simplified (a 3.5 character would have at least 7 feats by level 20; a 5e character can have no more than four and may have zero.

4. Ability scores can improve as you level up. In AD&D, if you rolled a weak character, you had little recourse. 3rd edition introduced the idea of getting +1 to an ability every 4 levels. Of course, it had ability-enhancing magic items, too. 4th edition got rid of the items, but increased this to alternating +2 to two/+1 to all, which could result in ridiculous ability scores. 5th edition dials it back a little. You get either +2 ability points or a feat every 4 levels (except the fighter).

5. Multiclassing is simple again. Dual-classing in AD&D was cumbersome and weird. 3rd made it so that you just take levels in whatever class. This was easy to exploit, so 4e slapped the concept so hard that it turned into nothing more than a few feats and powers. 3rd-style multiclassing is back in 5e, but  it's much, much harder to exploit.

Evolution of the Mind Flayer

The Mind Flayer is one of those iconic D&D monster that players love to not ever have to deal with in their campaigns. Let's look at how it's changed over the years. For 2e AC and THAC0, I'm going to put the more modern d20 system values:

2nd Edition:

The 2nd Edition Monstrous Manual is about 70% fluff and 30% stats. The stats can be kind of confusing, and there's often stuff like "if you find this in a cave, there's a 25% chance it will have eggs." There's generally enough fluff to be clear on what kind of habitat you find the monsters in, what they'll be doing, what kind of social hierarchy they have, etc. Anyway, the 2e Mind Flayer is a creepy bastard who lives in an underground city centered around a huge brain and keeps a couple mind-controlled slaves around. The artwork is terrible.

Hit points: 40
AC:  15
To hit: +9
Special crap: Resists magic powers and 90% magic damage, can stun for 3d4 rounds, tries to carry off stunned creatures and EAT THEIR BRAINS!!! The Mind Flayer has a tentacle attack. If he attaches all four of his tentacles, he sucks out your brains and YOU DIE!!! Psionic Mind Flayers are in there as an option, but I won't get into that.
Magic spells: Suggestion, charm person, charm monster, ESP, levitate, astral projection, and plane shift.

3.5th Edition:

The 3.5 MM gives the Mind Flayer about two full pages, including some nice illustrations, several round-by-round paragraphs detailing its tactics, how to run the monster as a character race, and a more powerful variant.

The basic Mind Flayer is an 8th-level enemy:

Hit points: 44
AC:  15 regular, 12 touch, 13 flat-footed
To hit: +8
Special crap: Gets to do its regular attack four times as a "full attack," has flat resist 25 to magic, can do that same stun blast and 4-tentacles-and-you-die trick, 11 skills that I'm not going to list, has Improved Grab, has three feats that you have to look up if you don't know by heart (Improved Initiative, Combat Casting, Weapon Finesse).
Magic spells: Charm monster, detect thoughts, levitate, plane shift, suggestion.

There is a 17th-level version that is a bit more complicated, but one thing to note is it has 27 AC, in keeping with 3rd's +1/2 level scaling concept.

4th edition:
This is the basic 4e Mind Flayer. It starts at level 14, so its numbers are a lot higher (4e has 3.5-like shifting). It's stripped out all the spells, feats, and most of the skills and boiled the monster down to two special powers.  There's a 18th level version that has a bunch of powers, but I'll leave him out.

5th Edition:

The 5e MM has solid amounts of fluff and artwork. Each race typically gets a full page. The general feel is AD&D, but things are organized into tight, 4-e style stat blocks rather than 3.5's rambling text. The art is the best yet.

Hit points: 71
AC:  15
To hit: +7
Special crap: Advantage on saving throws against magic, and his save bonuses are pretty high. Not only is the mind blast back, but now it does 4d8+4 damage! He grapples you with a tentacle, and if you can't escape, he'll hit you next time with Extract Brain. Basically, the mind blast, grapple, and extract do so much damage that if you get hit with all three, you'll probably die.
Magic spells: Detect Thoughts, Levitate, Dominate Monster, Plane Shift.

WHAT IT ALL COMES DOWN TO:

While the numbers and powers look pretty similar, you have to remember that 8th-level 3rd edition Fighters will typically have an attack bonus of around +12/+7 (because having multiple attack bonuses is better), so 15 AC is basically a joke. In 2nd edition, the 8th-level Fighter attack bonus is between +7 and +9, and in 5th edition, it's the same. So again, we see that 5e is bringing the numbers more in line with AD&D.

One thing I noticed when reading the older stuff is just how much of a mess 3.5 is. The AD&D MM tends to have a serious problem with clarity and presentation, which the 3.5 MM solves with lengthy, detailed descriptions and just overall increasing the complexity of the system. Seriously, who wants to look up feats for monsters? Really, three different ACs? I try not to rag on 3.5 too much, but the 3.5 Monster Manual was a big step in the wrong direction.

The 3.5 die-hards are crying bitter tears over the loss of monsters as playable races and the reduced complexity that makes it too "casual-friendly." The fascinating thing is just how few of 3.5's monster-related innovations are retained in 5e. Essentially, 5e and 3.5 can be viewed as two entirely different revisions the AD&D source material. 3.5 is an across-the-board increase in precision, complexity and detail. The precision is welcome, but there are far too many additional rules, and the MM tends to be long-winded in explaining how to run a particular monster. 5e, by contrast, goes the opposite direction, making everything tighter, cleaner, and more to the point. It's heavier on the fluff than 4e without rambling the way 3.5 does. This is a running theme in 5e, and it's why I think it's the best D&D yet.

5e's Bounded Accuracy

One of the most controversial aspects of 5e (at least for die-hard fans of 3.x/PF/4e) is so-called "bounded accuracy." What this essentially means is there is very little built-in scaling of bonuses to d20 rolls, and player ability scores are all capped at 20. The +1/2 level bonus is now gone, and the magic item bonus is no longer built in. If you've played 3rd or 4th edition, you know that a high-level wizard can jump across chasms more easily than a low-level barbarian, and a high-level fighter can pick most mundane locks with ease.

What the whiners say:

It ruins everything! The whole concept of attaining godlike power as you level has always been a fundamental part of D&D, and now 5e has ruined it. Everything sucks now! This isn't D&D!

Actual D&D History:

A +1/2 level bonus is actually not fundamental to D&D.  This was actually new to 3rd edition. In AD&D 2nd, AC was based only on your armor, not your level. Each class' THAC0 increased at a different rate, so no, the Wizard never got any better than useless at trying to stab someone in full plate with a tower shield. Only the thief had any ability to disarm traps, sneak, or pick locks at all. The fighter eventually got better AC not by leveling up, but by first earning enough money to buy plate mail, then eventually finding some cool enchanted gear.

The concept:

The designers of 3rd edition brought in this entirely new idea that as players gain experience, they should just naturally become good at things. A wizard should, after surviving enough scrapes, eventually be so handy with a blade that he could easily best a city guard in melee combat, pick the lock on a house, scale a rocky wall, and bluff his way into an orc stronghold. 5e is a return to the old AD&D concept that fighters are good at fighting, thieves are good at thieving and wizards had best stay a healthy distance away from hobgoblins if all they're going to wear is pajamas.

How it worked in practice:

In actual practice, a 12th-level wizard's intrinsic +6 bonus to disarming traps didn't matter.  Any trap a DM threw at a 12th-level party was, surprise surprise, always a 6 difficulty points harder than anything he threw at them when they were first level. In practice, that big modifier on the sheet didn't mean anything. It was just a big number that felt cool to look at because it was so huge. But really, the novelty of rolling a d20+22 wears off pretty quickly when you realize everything you meet has minimum 32 AC. Players tended to complain that it felt like the world just leveled up with you. If you've never played AD&D, but you've played The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, that's what I'm talking about.

The math:

Without getting into details, a 5e fighter will usually have +5 to hit, 1 attack, and 18 AC at level 1. At level 20, he'll have +11 to hit, four attacks, and at least 20 AC. The wizard will probably never have better than 10 AC and 1 attack, and his bonus will go from +2 to only +6. The "feel" is much more like AD&D than 3.x/PF/4e.

How it works in practice:

I find I can throw greater variety into dungeons and still have it be fun. 4e's "minion" monsters are no longer necessary. Low-level monsters serve as minions just fine now. The main thing is that as players level up, the game feels less and less "flat." By level 20, the barbarian becomes a fire hose of damage, but he's *more* vulnerable to a mind-control spell cast by a monster of his same level than he was at level 1. The wizard unleashes insanely powerful blasts of magic, but an ancient dragon will make mincemeat of him if he gets too close. The challenge of the game actually increases as the party levels up, because the players have to become more skilled at exploiting their strengths and avoiding their weaknesses.

D&D 5e: As Simple As You like

One of the more remarkable things about Dungeons & Dragons 5th ed. is that there is little tradeoff between simplicity and power in character builds. In 1st & 2nd editions, "character build" was barely even a concept. You had your race, your class, your abilities...and not much else. The only real complexity on offer was in the caster classes. As a Cleric, you *could* just fill all your 1st-level slots with Cure Light Wounds and be fine, but at least you had options.

3.x/PF and 4e, by contrast, rewarded players who spent a lot of time learning the nuances of the class and fine-tuning their builds with massive payoffs in power. But players who didn't work too hard at their build were punished with weak, useless builds. If you were a 3.5 fighter who just picked cool-sounding feats instead of carefully planning out synergies...well, you might as well quit playing at Level 6.  4e narrowed the power band a bit, but it added the further wrinkle that players who didn't learn to use their Encounter, Daily, and Utility abilities effectively would still feel significantly underpowered.

5e starts with an AD&D-like foundation, and then allows more 3.x/4e-style flexibility as options. These options are laid out in such a way as to be mostly lateral moves in terms of power.  The most obvious change is in the feats. Feats are now an alternative to ability score increases. It's hard to say which is more powerful, two ability points or a feat. They're roughly even. But players who just take the ability bonuses won't be punished.

Let's look at how this philosophy affects the Fighter.

The simplest Fighter build is to be a Champion who takes ability score upgrades whenever he has the option. If you go this route, you end up with essentially an AD&D fighter: You roll a lot of attacks, you have a lot of HP, you can use any weapon, and you have some nice static bonuses to a variety of numbers on your character sheet. There isn't a lot to think about.

On the other end, you can be a Battle Master, and you can take a mix of feats and ability score upgrades. This results in a much more complicated character sheet with a mix of powers and feats, somewhere between 4e and 3.5. The crazy thing is that if you run the numbers (and a lot of people have), the damage output of these builds comes out pretty close.

Other classes follow a similar pattern. There's a lot of depth to be explored, but you can play the class in a simple, straightforward way and still be a force to be reckoned with. It's about how you want to play, not about finding the perfect combination of stats that results in you dumping a bucket of damage dice on the table every time you hit while that "stupid newbie" can't figure out why he only ever seems to roll a single, lonely d8.