Character Backgrounds - A work in progress

It's still early days and no doubt the PHB will provide extra information on backgrounds beyond the Basic pdf but here are a few ideas.

Squire.
Squires are aspiring knights, robust youths who train in skill at arms but also busy themselves with tending and caring for their master's gear, keeping it sharp, clean, and ready to use. Squires also learn the courtly arts and etiquette. After proving their loyalty and skill in battle, squires usually become knights. In lands where knighthood is only granted by a king or other monarch, some squires remain so for their entire lives.

Proficiency
Animal Handling
Land (Mounted)
One extra language

Squires may have specialized such as:
1:Herald. 2:Standardbearer. 3: Scout. 4: Messenger. 5:Guard. 6: Cavalry
A squire can find favor at a nobles manor, gaining food and lodgings for himself and his companions.

Barmaid/ Barkeep
Barmaids/Barkeep are servers, entertainers, and even harried cooks in inns and taverns throughout the cities and towns of the world.

Proficiency
Persuasion
Performance
One extra language.

Can find free food and lodging at inns and taverns in exchange for some part time work. Also has a chance to overhear stories, rumours, and secrets that others would rather keep hidden.

Sailor

Shipmates are ordinary sailors, the rank-and-file deckhands who keep any vessel, great or small, afloat and moving. They are alert for danger and quick on their feet, weathered by wind and wave and sun, but always with an eye for what waits beyond the horizon.

Shipmates can be employed as low-level marines, rivermen, bargefolk, or even just be swamp rats living in stilt-houses.

A First Mate is the loyal assistant to a ship's captain. He oversees duties and discipline aboard ship, feared but always respected; he is able to entertain with a sea shanty one moment and ply his trusty lash or flashing cutlasses the next. A first mate could also be the warden of an exotic island prison.

A Captain is mistress of a ship at sea. She may be the legal authority and representative of her nation, company, faith, or faction, or she may be an independent captain owing allegiance to none and claiming no home but the sea itself. Captains may be used as pirates, admirals, or master merchants.

Proficiency choose 2 from:

Sailing (Ships)

Persuasion

Survival (Sea)

Intimidate

Also take Navigation Tools

Cannibal

Cannibals are ferocious, savage humanoids, feral people with a taste for sentient flesh. In battle, they charge with savage war cries, often tossing their weapons aside to hurl themselves onto their foes with hunger and abandon, eager to taste the blood and flesh in the ecstatic heat of battle.

Proficiency

Survival

Intimidate

A Cannibal in his tribe could be

1:Tracker. 2:Shaman. 3:Animal Handler. 4. Warrior. 5. Chieftain 6. Trapper

Cannibal tribes are often feared and respected in the wilder lands and a Cannibal may be granted save passage through humanoid lands for fear of retribution, or may bey hunted or shunned in more civilized societies.

Dealer

Dealers are purveyors of drugs, toxins, poisons, and all manner of proscribed and questionable alchemical substances. Operating from hidden laboratories and kitchens, they import and concoct their wares to rule the streets through the power of their sweet seduction.

Dealers sometime provide their skills as poisoners and assassins, traveling charlatans or snake-oil salesmen, or even semi-honest alchemists, apothecaries, and street physicians.

Proficiency

Deception

Medicine

Herbalism Kit

Corrupt Dealers often have ties with the criminal underworld and can gain favours (for a price) from thieves guilds.
Honest Dealers often rub shoulders with respected alchemists or hedge wizards, and can often acquire more powerful cures or potions and more easily than most, and may even have access to a magical item appraiser or sage.

Prostitute

Prostitutes are workers for hire in the field of love. From cheap trollops to brazen strumpets, saucy tarts to haughty courtesans, they work the streets and backroom brothels of cities and towns, tending to the wants, needs, and dark desires of their clients, often in elaborate costume and makeup for erotic roleplay. Most prostitutes have at least a little larceny in their hearts, however, and those who procure their services would be well advised to keep a close eye on their purses.

Proficiency
Performance
Deception
Disguise Kit

Prostitutes could be used as members of a harem or an actors' troupe. A prostitute might also be a noble's or wealthy businessman's mistress, or even a barmaid looking to make a little money on the side. Prostitutes also make good low-level spies or undercover agents.


Trapper
Trappers are roving hunters who wander the woods. They take any animal they can safely hunt or trap, but they are best known as the heart of the fur trade, making a variety of handcrafted but deadly effective traps to catch the unwary beasts of the forest. Trappers can work as as royal game wardens, as scouts, or as hunters for a nomadic tribe.

Proficiency
Survival
Tracking

Tools Traps & Snares

Seer
A seer could be a simple fortune teller, earning a trade to entertain the locals or as part of a wandering caravan.

Doomsayers are ranting demagogues who continuously predict doom, cataclysm, and ruin, crying in the town square and distributing pamphlets in literate communities. A doomsayer may build up a cult of personality, but they are happiest when they can ensure that others are miserable.

Doomsayers may be primitive witch doctors or shamans, dark cultists, witches, or rough frontier “priests” in remote villages or other areas without organized clergy.

A medium is a speaker who bridges the worlds of the living and the dead. She proclaims rest and blesses gravesites, ushering in birth and consigning the dead to the ground, yet it is also her seance that recalls the shades of the lost and ensures the continuity of a community's past, present, and future.

A medium could be a village priestess or wise woman, or can simply be used as a generic wandering cleric, or one of many low-to-mid-level priests staffing a temple.

Proficiency 2 of the following

Performance

Insight

Religion

Deception

Plus one language.

Travelling Merchant

Traveling merchants wander the world, peddling their wares, seeking out new markets for their goods, and journeying into distant lands in search of new trade routes to open and exotic commodities to take back home to turn a tidy profit. Many traveling merchants join large trade consortiums or are masters of their own caravans, but they sometimes venture alone (or more usually, with guards) into the wilds carrying small items of high value.

Traveling merchants make excellent diplomats, spies, and information brokers, or even knowledgeable and socially skilled nobles or gentlemen.

A travelling merchant can get items for 10% less than they would normally cost. And sometime may be able to gain access to wares not commonly for sale.

Proficiency
Persuasion
Insight

Notes on THE BASIC RULES

We've been playing using the Alpha for some months now and a couple of weeks ago the free Basic Rules PDF was released. So there were a few adjustments to be made, some on old rules, some on new rules, and some on the understanding of old rules. This is just a quick bullet point list of thoughts for discussion, and items that may need clarification. Its not in any particular order.
Please feel free to add.

1. The basic rules don't mention how to gain Experience points (XP) so unless you know something about how the older editions worked you're a bit stumped on how to achieve extra levels.
2. Inspiration is very cool but there is little to say how it is awarded. If it is based on your background, most notable the 5 parts of your personality then surely the DM needs to know this or you are going to have to remind him/her every time - 'Please sir can I have Inspiration because ....'
3. At 5th level Fighters gain an Extra Attack whenever they choose the Attack Action. But if you are a dual wielder you don't get 4 attacks,as the off hand is a Bonus Action - and you only get one of them per Turn.
4. Domain Spells for the Cleric are memorized all the time, but still use up casting slots.
5. The rules mention all alignments but the Backgrounds only have a few Evil personality traits.
6. The Criminal background seems to ignore Assassin type rogues.
7. If your race gives you a Proficiency and your Class or Backgrounds give you the same, you can choose an alternative.
8. Charge is a Feat (Mike Merls published a list). 
9. Without the Charge Feat would it be sensible to allow Charge as an action say an Athletics check to give Advantage to an Attack.
10. How can you use Athletics, Acrobatics, Sneak, Slight of Hand etc to change combat?
11. Each caster prepares a number of spells at the beginning of the day. The number of spells prepared is equal to their Level plus their Spellcasting Ability Modifier. A caster also has a number of spell slots, determined by their class and level. 
12. When a character casts a spell, they expend one slot to power one spell of its level or lower. The list of prepared spells does not change – if you had prepared magic missile, it is still prepared. However, the number of slots you have to cast spells in has been reduced for today.
13. If the slot you used was of a higher level than the spell you cast, your spell may have additional effects. For instance, magic missile creates 3 missiles. However, if you were to use a 3rd level slot, it would produce 5 missiles.
14. If you use a spell with a ranged attack roll when next to an opponent, you have Disadvantage on that attack roll, the same as if you were using a bow.
15. Saving throws, in theory, could draw on any of the six attributes, but most likely link to Constitution, Wisdom or Dexterity.
16. At first level, a character will likely have saving throw modifiers of -1 to +6, whilst at twentieth level, the modifiers will be -1 to +11.
17. In general a spell a player is going to be casting will have a DC from between 13 and 19.
18. Spell concentration can be broken by you taking damage, although you get a Constitution saving throw based on half the damage to avoid losing Concentration. It is also broken by you being incapacitated or if you die.
19. You can only concentrate on one thing at a time. Spending more time than 1 action casting spells requires concentration. When you ready a spell, it takes longer than an action, so concentration applies.
20. Clerics get to prepare any spells on the cleric spell list.
21. Wizards can only prepare spells that are in their spellbook, At first level, they select 6 first level wizard spells to put in their spellbook, and they gain two extra spells (of any level they can cast) for each level they gain. It is also possible for them to find spells in the game and copy them into their spellbook.
22. Wizards may cast any spell they have in their spellbook as a ritual; they do not need them prepared. Clerics may only cast spells they have prepared as rituals.
23. Tools are not tied to a particular ability modifier, whereas Skills normally are.
24. DM will need to be careful when setting DCs. A DC of 10-15 would be adequate for most uses, with 20 and above being reserved for exceptional use. The Basic D&D pdf does not give sample DCs for tasks and just relies on a generic table.
25. A passive check assumes the character or monster rolled a 10. This is most commonly used with Wisdom (Perception). No roll required but the DM needs a list of the characters Passive check score.
26. Marching order. Although characters in back ranks can cast spells or fire missile weapons, they will normally be penalised for the opponents having cover (from the other members of the character’s party.
27. You can happily move through allied characters without penalty.
28. Reach weapons can be used from the second rank, but again may have a penalty.

Herding Cats - .....

..Or the importance of good team tactics, not splitting the party and what fun can be had when it all goes pear shaped.

Its been a while since we last played and so when we began there was lots of fun had just quickly catching up on what people had been doing. I think the last time the group met up we had gone out to the cinema together so while it didn't feel to long a time since we had all met memories had somewhat faded on where we we in the game.
We had our regular guest player back and a new guest member of the party who was to join us for this game only - (but we are all hoping he can join in again in the future). So a quick how to get him into the party was a rather comical 'I jump out from behind a rock and wave'. Our first human party member yay!

And so we were off into the old mine where the orcs had enslaved the villagers. This was a bit of a side quest from the main adventure and I for one was looking forward to rescuing helpless villagers and their families as my characters Priest background is focused around the projection children and the innocent. Unfortunately my character is sometimes as mad as a bag of cats, which presents itself sometimes in angry outbursts, verbal ramblings, and talking about olives - and so the chaos commenced

Our first plan was to try and catch an orc alive after the party came across a group asleep. All fared pretty well first few rounds until my tiefling was hit by the last living orc and so I asked other players how she should react. Quite loudly came the reply 'badly' and so my tiefling sorcerer used a reaction to immolate the orc and so killed it.
So much for catching one alive for questioning. All good roleplay fun and this then lead to another character reacting to the fiascio and storming off. This sort of started a recurring theme of the players getting their characters to go off and do their own thing without any real party continuity.

The second battle was against a beholder - for some reason only my character had any past knowledge of it ( nice DM gave me a Nature roll) so my sorcerer tried to get the rest of the party to lure it so I could get behind to cast spells. Instead they all went the other way leaving me stranded with two kids. Did I mention we rescued two children? Well yes we did.

Now the human had ran away from the conflict thereby leaving the children to a fate worse than death, or so it was in the eyes of my character. The reason for this became known later on in the game as he only had a constitution of 4 and so only 4 hit points at 3rd level. Of course his character hadn't communicated with the party that he was easily hurt or fainted under the slightest cut. So after the beholder is killed the kindly teifling sorcerer escorts the children out of the mine on her own. Then she sees the human sitting on a rock and goes bat-shit crazy and chases him around the hillside - while magically transformed in to a demi-human half dragon - all so she can angrily tell him off. This was handled very well through a bit of proficiency dice rolling and roleplay and didn't, as can sometimes be the case, end up with players trying to kill other players.

So argument over, and grumpy dwarf joins human (tells him off also)and tielfling and they rest. But where we the rest of the party? After the beholder battle the dwarf went on his own and eventually got to the surface to rest, and the rest ignored the tiefling and the dwarf and decided to explore further into the mines and then rest.
The result of this was they were nearly ambushed by more orcs and a beholder, and the elf ranger accidentally shot a human slave (we think) in the dark. Thus forced a hasty retreat and so the other party members didn't get to rest.
The party had taken a lot of damage from the first beholder and used up half of their spells and special abilities and now were faced by another battle.

It didn't go as well as hoped though we did defeat the enemy,but with two characters very low on hit points and two more dead, the party are in dire straights and the game ended with us being immediately attacked by a mind flayer.
TPK may be just round the corner.

And why were we in such mess? Well the truth is because we didn't plan and coordinate our attacks or actions as well as we had previously done. So rather than whole being greater than the sum of its parts,  we were divided and almost conquered.
This shows not only in roleplay terms but also in team tactics how a coordinated response can be vital to party survival. It also shows with DnDNext how well different classes complement each other so that as a team they can cover many conflicts and scenarios with confidence.

As the characters get to higher levels and get more useful they also get more complicated to play. It was clear, and by their own accord, that some of the players struggled a bit to keep on top on how best to use their characters abilities, no doubt compounded by the length of time since our previous game session. We have now reached 4th level which gives us the option of choosing a Feat so another layer to add to our characters skills.
My sorcerer wants to become a Paladin (or a pirate) and so has begun trying (very unsuccessfully and very comically) wielding a glaive as a weapon. So maybe her chosen feat will be Polearm Master rather than something for sorcerer focused.

I cannot say that everyone had as much fun that day as previously, sometimes a character death can seem unfair especially if the odds (compared to previous game sessions) feel suddenly stacked against you. However it is all part and parcel of the game, and a good learning curve. And of course the added bonus is you get a chance to try a whole new character, or even just play your previous characters twin if you so wish.

I enjoyed it and in truth was ready to have my character killed - whether its from past experience, being able to read the story well or plain luck I somehow knew this mine would hold a much greater challenge than before. And as the DM said , now that were were higher level we needed to face harder monsters, where running away was a suitable option. As a result I had roughed out a new character just in case it was required.

We may see some Multi-classing coming in, there has also been talk of one player maybe switching to a new character entirely which will be interesting to see how that is played through, and especially how this will affect inter party relationships if well established and useful characters are replaced with someone new.

As a last note, it was felt by players and DM alike that we hadn't progressed as far in the adventure as in previous games. Maybe this was down to the fact we were all having lots of fun and so plenty of laughing and joking. Maybe the uncoordinated efforts of our characters made the conflicts and exploration eat up more time.

There were some great little snippets of roleplay, some tiny but evidence of how the players are evolving their characters, the reaction of teifling and dwarf to the human fleeing combat, and the subsequent interaction between dwarf and teifling. The Druid has become the party agent of stealth and is mad about loot - clearly wants to be a thief. The warforged leaping in to save others.

Can't wait to find out what happens next time we play, Total Party Kill probably.

3rd level characters and some ramblings

Hi there,
So we had a few weeks away from the game and this weekend played one session, with a returning player to join our ranks. We have a sort of guest player who doesn't live near the rest of us so when he visits he joins the game. Last time his character was killed off to facilitate him not being around to play but this time the DM has found a way to keep him behind the scenes by being the captain of our very own flying ship!
A fantasy setting isn't complete without a magical flying ship, so this was very cool in my opinion. My character got to dress up as a pirate.

The flying ship gives us the ability to travel at a relatively good pace which helps to keep the game flowing. Because we never really know when we can play next I think its a good policy for the game to focus on the main quest without being too drawn out. Sometimes drawing out a journey to a goal can be fun, as it increases the tension and the feeling of questing for a hard earned prize. Sometimes a quest is stretched out over great distances (in the campaign) and if this is not portrayed it can make the world feel too small, and not the untamed wilderness it is meant to be.

Our game session consisted of only two combat encounters, which was less than in previous game sessions, but what happened was a higher level of roleplay and encounter exploration. There was some interesting discussions over whether or not we should free a giant spider, including investigative spell casting, use of non-rollable and well as checkable skills and a small amount of in party tension, where the more good aligned characters wanted to show greater compassion than the more direct pragmatic characters would have wanted.

The players are getting into their characters well, and you can see how as players they are making their characters interact and work well together. One of our first encounters (back against the zombies) we had to retreat and prepare ourselves and organize a plan of attack. The fight against the spider was supposed to be avoided - well that's what we were trying to do - so when the fighting broke out there was no time to organize a plan. Yet players had already prepared their characters and paced them in position just in case. That encounter saw some good team tactics and support, made all the more easier to see and describe by miniatures.

DnD Next is has been designed so you can play without miniatures but there is nothing to stop you using them, and it does make it a lot more fun. The game mechanics make battle quicker than 4e and this flow can be maintained even when using miniatures, because you don't have to be as tactical in your execution of skills. A few props were used to represent spell effects and important objects.

The character classes being played are getting quite fun now they are 3rd level and we have had some hours to play them at this power level. Its good to see the Fighter using sweeping strike to take out two opponents with one hit, and the Ranger picking injured targets to maximize the use of his Colossus Slayer perk. I'm playing a sorcerer and I am loving the metamagic, being able to change how spells work makes this character so much fun. It also adds a new level of tactics which for me is important as I do like to play complex characters.
You can see how each class has its specialty and we as players are now getting the first real chance to let our characters special skills show. The fighter is the the primary melee attacker being able to easily wade in and take on multiple enemies, but also ( and this is very good in DnDNext) aid in he defense of nearby allies. The fighter is the natural leader in combat.
Our ranger is mightily skilled in ranged combat and is the guy to dish out massive damage on a single target to help bring down the enemy boss, a very good support roll in a fight and a very good scout of course. Just coming into spellcasting we have yet to see the rangers full potential but his tracking skills are very useful.
The sorcerer is the fire brand. Busting out massive damage in the first couple of rounds to devastate the enemy before running of of steam and having to flit around the battle field helping where she can. The sorcerer has been able to take down enemies with one spell hit. Maybe the dice rolls have been unlucky but even though she is dexterous and is using finesse weapons in melee she can't hit a cows arse with a banjo!
The Druid is the controller and support, able to deal damage from a distance, heal, and do well in melee combat. The Druids massive choice of spells makes her a very versatile character able to offer aid and has good roleplay / noncombat powers which are very useful.

Out of all the characters the druid seems to be the hardest to play which is down to the fact that it is very much a multitasking character and so does not really specialize in anything. The large number of spells available compared to the number that can actually be memorized for the day, while very useful does mean that quite often the player is having to wait until the next day to perform a spell task. As we continue to play we will no doubt see a natural selection process of 'day to day' spells but for the moment its an overwhelming choice and of course a lot of spells to try and learn.

The power levels seem right. The sorcerer can deal the most damage in one hit but can only really do this twice before having to fall back on spells that equal the fighters damage output for a few rounds and then is relaged to low damage output, and then the enemy can save for half damage. The fighter can dish out extra damage on a few attacks but has the advantage of being a constant slogger. The ranger is like a weapon wielding version of the sorcerer but can maintain the damage output against a single creature. The druid can deal out a lot of damage as well with some spells but also has a lot of other non damage spells.

The fighter has the best armor class and can aid the defense of others. The sorcerer isn't too bad defense wise due to a class perk which gives them improved armor but is limited in combat. The druid has similar limitations on combat but our player has actually made melee a bit of a common fallback.
In terms of non combat character skills the fighter and sorcerer in our group have the fewest. The sorcerer beats the fighter due to a higher intelligence so giving her more proficiencies and languages to choose from. The rangers tracking/hunting and wilderness skills alongside a good dexterity makes him a formidable assassin. Our ranger player has almost exclusively used his bow in combat except for this last game session where he tried his hands at swordsmanship. The druid is the support role with healing and spells, and also her animal form makes her a great scout and burglar.

Third level has given the characters a strong base of skills, and a decent enough number of hit points to allow them to experiment a bit more with their characters without risking an untimely death. We should therefore see the players pushing the boundaries of their characters more to see what they can achieve, and by doing so better understanding their strengths and weaknesses.

Throw the GM a curveball and see if he can catch.

Sometimes,as I know myself from my past 2nd Edition gaming, the players can take the best made plans of the GM and turn them upside down without even knowing. A good player, and especially a seasoned player will try to listen for the telltale clues that the Gm drops to follow the game. Now obviously we are aware that a good rpg isn't run on rails but its a pointless task and frustrating for the GM if the players purposefully head their characters away from the adventure. A good GM therefore guides the players with story and clues etc and the players try to follow, and so the adventure unfurls.

But now and again the players do something that means everything changes, and this sort of happened this weekend. A momentous weekend where we were able to play 3 days in a row, and all the characters leveled up again, we are now 3rd level groovy!

The characters loose their gear to another group of adventurers - in fact they were level 0 wanting to become adventurers and were entirely clueless. We met them via a random encounter roll and decided to give them a lift in our boat down to the next town. On the way we got into an 'altercation' with two wyverns and while we were on land the other group escaped in our boat with most of our characters gear.

Well they didn't get too far and we caught up with them and found out that they had sold all our belongings - we got most of the cost back by re-trading what they had bought ( all of it was useless tat no good to us). Now remember this all started form a random encounter and us roleplaying out the situation and then reacting to the outcome. So it was not a main story plot. What was going to be part of the main story plot was a local murder of a priest by a herbalist - who just happened to have been sold a very important item of ours by the level 0 adventurers. So nicely woven in by the GM, simple and effective.
Unfortunately one of our players characters decided it would be best if his fighter had to prove a point that we couldn't be trifled with and killed one of the other party. Which then lead to the inevitable silencing of the rest of them. This then lead to their bodies being unceremoniously stuffed into barrels and us sailing down stream to dispose of them.

Now our GM did a very good job of weaving this into the main plot and we did get away with it, but there was still the risk of us still being discovered, and so we decided to leave town. Now it was the  intention that we would investigate the priests murder and therefore be in town much longer and no doubt unearth some other interesting things relevant to the main quest. All this had to be changed as we were clearly not going to hang around.

There was nothing that the GM could have done to stop this without making it too obvious we were being railroaded. The death of the other adventurer group was a bit of a mistake, the player sort of realized what he had done just a little to late and the resultant 'disaster' actually was played out very well. We managed to recover from it without too much of an issue but it sort of made it impossible for the party to hang around the town. Oh and did I mention that we killed the herbalist too? That happened sort of by accident.

So much for the in town adventure section. Our GM has been trying to give us (and its a good way to try out the #next rules) a good range of areas to play in. Abandoned dungeon, snowy mountain wilderness, fog bound river, busy merchant town and mysterious forest have been covered up till now.

The town adventure being cut short we did have the option of heading down stream to the next mote of civilization but we instead headed straight into the trees, so again preventing the GM the opportunity for urban encounters.

The game still worked out well in my opinion, though the GM wasn't as keen on how the story had unfurled. Possibly because we had cut out a chunk in a way not expected. But that's the fun of an open world and
we got another step closer to our final adventure goal.

The real leveling up review - a comparison from the old skool player.

Ok, so the last post was more about the fun adventure but I shall now give a brief opinion on how the characters have leveled up. My DnD background is the Basic set and 2nd Edition, and as there is a lot of consideration that DnDNext is trying to hearken back to older versions to try and reclaim that classic feel of the game . I shall use my experience from long ago as reference, and leave comparisons to 4th edition to those more experienced than me.

We have fought 4 battles and each of those has been stacked against us on paper in terms of hit points. Now I say this, and what follows, based on the fact that I have not seen the GM monster stats that he used, so this is purely from-the-coalface how it felt when playing. Knowing how DnD monsters work classically I can ascertain that a lot of the creatures were of a higher level than us, some significantly so. When we faced the Ettin during the battle I was totting it up in my head and estimated a minimum of 100 hp (we were told afterwords it had 130 hp), and a party of 5 first level characters took it down in 5 rounds (or was it 4? ed).

So are the characters too powerful at level one? Compared to 2nd edition, no because back then fighters we ok and mages were fodder. Its a good balance because you don't feel helpless or restricted but there is still that danger of defeat, while also knowing that your skills are still just beginning.

So a quick maths on the combat above - average 26 hp of damage per party member over 5 rounds 5.2hp per hit. And that assumes everyone hit every round, which we didn't. The hit roll required was 20, we all averaged about +5 to our favored attacks due to proficiency and ability scores so that gives 15 or more to hit so an aggregate of one successful strike every 4 rounds. So we could have been doing 20 -21 hp damage each hit  - if you follow the numbers here.
Obviously that isn't the real case, what happened is we were lucky with some natural 20's so gained critical damage bonus and we were trying out some house rules which basically meant we were doing  four times normal damage.

In reality we were probably averaging 8 hp of damage per hit which equates to 3.25 rounds to take it down if we hit every round. But with a 1 in 4 chance it could have taken 13 rounds.

Now all these numbers are slightly up in the air because over such a short encounter the law of averages doesn't really get a chance to settle in, plus I can't be bothered to be more accurate with my calculations.

Conclusion - We were very lucky in that fight, but if you had asked me before that battle if we could have won, it would have been a resounding 'no chance'.
So why did we fight it, well I for one was expecting the GM to favor us some rolls, tip the balance for the sake of the party, in fact I do believe they were all open rolls and we were just very very lucky.

So are our characters more powerful at first level than if we were playing 2nd edition? Yes they are but not by much, maybe 5 or 10 % more powerful in terms of damage output. Starting with max hp on your hit dice at first level makes a big difference than the old random roll so in terms of hit points we are actually close to double, but still 50%-70% lower than 4th edition (I think).

So what really tipped the balance? And I do believe there is something in this game because while we did very well to kick the butt of our opponents, when we were getting hit it was only 1 or 2 strikes before we were worrying if our character would end their days still at first level.

In my opinion, and this is where I think this game has got it right, the ways the character classes are balanced to each other and the ways they can complement each other makes a huge increase in success. In 8 hours of play my sorcerer has drawn a weapon in combat only once, and that was by choice not necessity. The ranger who favors his bow was able to use it without issue, through maneuver and team tactics, the druid could switch between spell, scimitar and sling without feeling disadvantaged, the fighters could vary weapons as they wished without penalty, and all together the party was able to draw upon the strengths and talents, and this is just at level one!

I am not saying that this new version of the game has exclusivity on the way it handles character balance and ability. 4th edition does it great too from what I saw, though some folks say it got too heavy or overpowered above 10th - but I never got over level 1 so I can't say anymore about it.

We have now reached level 2 but are yet to play actively at this level. Hit points go up, healing improves, more spell slots, and some more special class abilities, so you do feel almost twice as powerful as before. Not everything improves, the mechanical parts of the characters that are shared across classes stays the same until higher level, and this is a constant theme. Class abilities increase or improve in some way every level, as you would expect but other more universal abilities improve at a much slower pace.

The variety on what classes do and how you play them is much more like the old feel of 2nd edition, in fact even more so. With a sorcerer and a druid in the party we had a chance to see how two different spell casters worked. In 2nd ed the wizard was the damage spell-caster but at low level was cast once rest 8 hours, while the druid or cleric was heal or buff and be so-so in combat. Not now, the druid was very versatile as should be expected. The sorcerer was more a one trick pony at 1st level but was able to fall back on cantrips and her spells felt powerful (for low level) when needed and versatile when required.

Are we leveling up too quickly? Hmm difficult one as that can depend on a number of things, including most importantly the play group. We don't get a massive opportunity to meet and play regularly so faster leveling will help to keep it fun and keep progress smooth. There's nothing worse than being stuck at one level for 6 months or longer because your just too busy to play regularly, and you then loose the enthusiasm.

I think it looks like classes progress in power at a more regular pace and, from when I have been rolling high level characters to test out the creation, it is obvious that they do not become too overpowered at the higher echelons of the play test. This means that quicker character leveling shouldn't feel as if you are getting too powerful too soon. I think that will be attractive to a lot of players.

We leveled up! And other stuff.

So we have been playing a new DnD Next playtest and last night was the second game in the adventure, and we leveled up. Thank you, thank you and congratulations to all, I couldn't have done it without you!

So why such excitement? Well because our playing group has in the past rarely had a chance to play regularly, and this has meant that games have either ground to a halt due to lack of time, or other new games/ideas have come up which have been played instead. This has in fact meant that leveling up in any game has become a true rarity . For a long while we have been stuck in the level one loop, and while each game has been fun that achievement of taking your character past the first steps has always been elusive. But no longer.

A quick welcome to our newest player Iain who contacted our resident Games Master a little while back having been looking for ages for a group to play with, and he had never played before. I'm not sure who was more excited in the first game, Iain for getting a chance to sit round a table and do some DnD role play or the rest of the group to have another new face. It was me the  last time who was the new guy though I had the advantage of being a veteran player. With a potential new guy on board we quickly arranged a new game to be run by GM Simon and we were able to arrange another night less than a week later. Now this is a rarity indeed for us!

A new game with new-ish characters. I say newish because a few weeks before Iain joined us we had a session where we had rolled up first level characters and I had mashed together a quick test scenario to try out non-combat skill checks and some combat encounters. It was only a couple of hours and no experience was awarded so it allowed the characters to be ported directly over to the new adventure.

Over the two sessions we have played about 8 hours and our party have battles elves, undead, and an Ettin! We also got so see an aerial battle between two Wyverns - beautifully described and scene set my the GM - a worthy opening to the game.

The party of 5 is made up of two fighters, a ranger, a druid and a sorcerer, and we have christened ourselves team #ankles, after the parties first kill where an elf was downed from a critical hit with an arrow to the ankle.
A well rounded group though a bit light on healing. What we have found out, players and GM alike is that we are pretty powerful and are quite capable of taking out stronger monsters in 3 or 4 rounds with little risk to ourselves. Obviously being first level anything other than the weakest hit against our characters risks an untimely death and there has been some good roleplaying and team tactics to heal on the fly or rescue downed comrades. The GM has admitted that he needed to up the Hit Points of the creatures we were facing to make the battles worthy, which seems to point initially to a problem with monster balance in the playtest.

From my perspective the hardest and most dangerous battle was where we were ambushed by elves and had 2 assailants each. Being outnumbered in this way where you cannot effectively use team tactics shows the weaknesses of the individual characters.

One of our best battles was the finale of last nights game. The previous game sessions fight vs the Ettin was impressive but this for me topped it. The scene was a room full of undead, and the GM had used normal creature stats as the base; so it was us vs a skeleton human, zombie human, zombie bugbear, zombie bullywug, zombie manticore. Now that manicore with its bite and two claw attacks could easily kill one of the fighters in a single round never mind the  weaker less armored spellcasters, and we didn't want to be facing all these beasts at once. So with the GM allowing us the chance of a careful retreat we rested up to regain spells and hit points and then formulated a plan.

The druid would cast entangle close to the entrance inside the room so when the undead approached they would have to battle through the spell to get to us. The sorcerer was going to then burning hands the hell out of them, but a quick check on the spells it was decided this would burn out the entangle spell, so she changed to a weaker ranged fire attack on the creatures still not entangled, leaving the burning hands in reserve if the druids spell failed. A wide enough gap was left to allow the fighter to enter the room to harass zombies that broke out of the druids spell, and the ranger held back and shot with his bow.

A well thought out plan, that easily adapted as the fight unfurled. One fighter was hit hard by the bugbear but the druid was able to heal him. What was supposed to be a hard and dangerous fights was managed and controlled by good player tactics and character cooperation. But I waffle on, leveling up...

Actually there is not much to say, the rules were easy to follow for leveling, the only question was how the Hit Dice worked and how this then worked for healing dice, everything was easy to understand. The player of the druid needed to spend some time reading up on what circle to choose and what beast forms she could have but everything else seemed to make sense. And so we are now all waiting in anticipation for the next time to level up.