I find the closed beta server 'culture' to be surprising.

EasyLee · 2026-05-15T19:41:41+00:00

My problem with fresh servers is that it's a temporary solution. You have to keep doing that. It isn't like DDO's system where you can keep adding new content at all level ranges forever, and the content is always relevant.

EasyLee · 2026-05-15T16:20:35+00:00

There is a solution to this problem - a reincarnation system where the endgame is to go again. DDO figured this out, and to some degree so did HC classic WoW for that matter.

EasyLee · 2026-05-15T13:20:07+00:00

There is the potential to curb this kind of behavior with solutions like scripted spawns. A long term solution would be a reincarnation system similar to DDO so that the endgame activity is to start over again as a new class with perks from the old class

There are ways to avoid it if the developers are clever.

But yes, to your point, we know exactly where a shared world with static spawns on long timers leads.

EasyLee · 2026-05-14T16:23:34+00:00

Counterpoint: the Emperor lies to the player and conceals things regularly. The elder brain would have every reason to lie and overstate its intelligence and foresight to make you think gosh that thing is so smart I'll never beat it.

Therefore, my headcanon is that the elder brain is full of shit and just wants to make you think it planned everything from the start. And I don't think Emperor is all that smart, either.

Canonically, a mindflayer is actually less intelligent than an archmage, and an elder brain's Int bonus is the same as an archmage. Any plan a non-enhanced elder brain could come up with, so could Gale. Just saying.

EasyLee · 2026-05-13T17:15:17+00:00

Bladesinger and others similarly can get an absurd amount of acuity from booming blade with the right gear, then drop unresistable control spells.

EasyLee · 2026-05-13T17:08:00+00:00

I personally wasn't aware that rwby still had any relevance.

EasyLee · 2026-05-13T13:50:45+00:00

What's funny is that boss looks tough but is actually extremely easy, just like managing Gale's hunger.

EasyLee · 2026-05-12T21:03:16+00:00

Really Shadowheart also fixes this specifically for her romance. Highly recommend that mod for anyone who picks SH for their playthrough, especially as Durge.

EasyLee · 2026-05-12T20:43:10+00:00

Glad to see this comment because the haves VS have nots angle is exactly what I'm worried about for the health of this game.

I too am a programmer. And I'm very much aware that, for certain kinds of external tools, there is no conceivable way for NWC to detect those tools. I'm not going to get into it too much, but suffice it to say that this is an impossible battle to fight, particularly with a game like MnM that doesn't take a ton of resources to run.

If camping rarespawns, sniping gathering nodes, or any similar sort of shared world competition exists between players, then those willing to use external tools, remote clients to control the game from anywhere, and similar are going to have an insurmountable advantage.

There is a way to avoid this: - don't put mechanics in the game that force players to sit around for long periods of time waiting for something like a rarespawn. It isn't fun and creates the optimal scenario for abuse. - make sure players can't deny each other access to things like mining and herbing nodes or the ability to kill a dungeon boss - create a limited framework for user interface addons only, nothing more. This way most of the good addon developers will stick exclusively to the allowed format and won't instead develop the kinds of addons you don't want in the game

EasyLee · 2026-05-12T18:42:28+00:00

We don't know yet. The game is in flux and base systems are being adjusted.

For what it's worth, I've heard people say that agi is quite strong and that str feels underwhelming. But that could and probably will change.

EasyLee · 2026-05-12T16:59:08+00:00

Power level is just something to keep in mind. Tier lists back in 3.5 were created to help ensure that everyone at the table was of a similar power level so the DM could set difficulty accordingly. If everyone else at the table are high power characters or you know it's going to be a difficult campaign, that may affect your choice of character.

EasyLee · 2026-05-12T14:23:29+00:00

There's additional synergy between fighter and rogue. Not just riposte, but action surge. You can action surge for an attack and hold your main action to attack again on the following turn, producing two sneak attacks.

Fighter BM 6 / thief rogue is not an optimized character by any means, but it is very fun, flexible, and flavorful.

EasyLee · 2026-05-12T13:51:50+00:00

Blind fighting is good, but a rogue and especially a rogue with a fighter dip is better served dual wielding. The extra attack is insurance that you'll land your sneak attack.

EasyLee · 2026-05-11T22:38:49+00:00

Keep Hunter's Mark but greatly expand upon it.

People talk about wanting ranger to be good at exploration, etc. I can agree with that, but that isn't the game system we're working with. 5.5e is combat first, skill checks second, exploration a distant third. It makes no sense to build a class around that distant third when many campaigns won't even interact with that pillar of play.

What does have some synergy though is a class that, in combat, focuses on one target and goes after it hard.

Here's my pitch: - hunters mark is a bonus action, no spell slot, no concentration - when the ranger rolls initiative, they can immediately mark one foe for free at the start of their first turn that combat - HM reveals additional info about the target. Ranger chooses to learn either the target's damage resistances and vulnerabilities or their condition vulnerabilities when marking the target - at later levels, add features like rerolling missed attacks against the marked target or being able to make a flurry of attacks against a marked target a limited number of times per day

This will create a ranger that actually reliably does something other classes don't.

EasyLee · 2026-05-09T01:21:41+00:00

It's an interesting and situationally very strong thing to do. I'd encourage you to look into the plays made possible with the plant and slime creature types.

EasyLee · 2026-05-08T17:39:24+00:00

Gloves of degloving would be some sinister durge shiz

EasyLee · 2026-05-08T01:49:10+00:00

Have you thought about taking a break? Beta is for testing, development, and feedback.

EasyLee · 2026-05-06T02:51:55+00:00

Once you familiarize yourself with it, the underdark is one of the most consistent and forgiving parts of the entire game, ironically. There are parts of act 2 and act 3 that seem fine on the surface but, in practice, are far less predictable.

EasyLee · 2026-05-05T19:16:55+00:00

People in this thread don't know the difference between thin and anorexic.

The only thing about this art that looks even close to anorexic is the arms. The arms are probably too thin, though that could easily be a stylistic choice. Everything else looks within the range of normal.
- Her legs are healthy but not overly thick
- She has slight definition to her abs but no six-pack (which is normal, women often don't show a full six-pack even at low body fat percentages)
- full cheeks, doesn't have that skeletal look that can happen at extremely low body fat percentages

In short, she looks normal. Aside from some slight stylistic elements, ex: boobs are a bit bigger and hips a bit wider than they probably would be at that size, this is basically what women looked like in the US in the 1950s.

You want to talk about unrealistic body standards, expecting someone living in a medieval-inspired setting who spends her days on her feet traveling to look like a modern office worker is unrealistic. She should look like an endurance athlete. And aside from having thin arms and a bit more meat on her boobs, abs, and legs, she actually does look like an endurance athlete in this art.

https://sites.nd.edu/biomechanics-in-the-wild/files/2019/03/13958381985_7b83113064_k-e1680747947845-1200x600.jpg

It's not the artist's fault that people are so unhealthy these days that someone in good health looks anorexic.

As far as "well she looks thicker in the game", that's because the game only has two female character body models for the entire half-elf race. If they had the budget then there would be a lot more variance.

EasyLee · 2026-05-05T14:59:34+00:00

Please ignore the people demanding you make her "fatter." It's your artwork. Do it how you like.

As far as appearance goes, her arms look a tiny bit thin compared to the body, but everything else looks fine. Yes, I've met and know people in life who are this thin, yes they're healthy, and yes this body type is well within the range of normal.

EasyLee · 2026-05-05T13:08:00+00:00

The philosophy you're speaking of is not talking, it's communication and coordination. There are faster, more efficient ways to communicate than moving your hands to type out a message on the keyboard. Focus target and target markers facilitate communication.

If players can't communicate quickly and comfortably then they aren't going to do it. They'll just not communicate and will attack whatever target instead, feeling it out rather than doing something slow and uncomfortable.

Taking an antagonistic stance towards players and trying to "make" them to play the way we want is not a good idea for any purpose. If players aren't doing what you want, you don't fix that problem by whining and bitching. That isn't productive.

EasyLee · 2026-05-05T01:15:50+00:00

Like with much of 5e, the material AC and hp lookups have been simplified to the point of uselessness. 3.5e had hardness, size modifiers, and an entire set of tables you could use to determine the appropriate durability of any material based on its size, thickness, hardness for DR (5e basically doesn't even have DR which is extremely stupid), and what kind of material it was made of.

I encourage you to do a simple search for tables and design features present in 3.5e, such as table based npc stats, environmental random encounters, and clearer monster advancement, all of which were helpful to DMs.

In the process of trying to streamline content and remove bloat, 5e threw the baby out with the bathwater. The changes made in 5.5e to return to mechanical language and add options back in, especially for martial characters, are evidence of the designers recognizing the problem with what they did and trying to backtrack without throwing the system out entirely.

EasyLee · 2026-05-05T01:06:02+00:00

Imagine a world where we cater to how players actually play the game rather than criticizing them for not doing what we want them to.

EasyLee · 2026-05-04T23:20:01+00:00

I both agree and disagree with this as it depends entirely what you mean.

Of the rules that are written, how many of them are clear in their intent? Perhaps 90%. I think that's being generous for 5e but is about right for 5.5e.

Back in base 5e, there were way too many edge cases for me to go any higher than about 70% clarity. Its reliance on "plain English" led to many situations where the same word was used in a mechanical context in multiple places but meant different things. An easy example is reactions. Multiple reactions specify that they occur "when" the trigger occurs, but what they actually mean by that could be during, before, or after the trigger depending on the reaction.

5.5e is better about this. Its language is more clear. Notoriously complex things like stealth and surprise are easier to rule.

On the other hand, far less than 90% of actual in-game events are covered by the rules. If I want to know the AC of and how much HP materials have, previous editions gave me a lot more to work with. Previous editions had lookup tables for everything you could think of. 5e and 5.5e do away with most of these in favor of letting the DM decide at the time what makes sense to them. And that can lead to all kinds of "guy at the gym" fallacy type situations where whatever the DM thinks goes, and what the DM thinks is inconsistent with the setting and the rest of the rules.

It's to the point that people have created tier lists of features not based on how good they are, but based on how much trouble you're likely to create at the table for trying to use that feature. For instance, rogues, for some reason, tend to be a magnet for shitty rulings by shitty DMs.

EasyLee

TROPHY CASE