one of the things for me about a persons ability to overcome a fright/fear aura the longer there exposed to it the more they get used to it. after repeated exposure to a particular source they would get a bonus to there save.
I've always viewed Frightful Presence as something a party needs to prepare for before facing a dragon same way as they would prepare for the dragons breath attack or ability to fly. If they don't want to prepare then surprise the'll have a much tougher fight ahead of them.
It definitely is something to take into account if you and the party manage to get prep time. And in a campaign you can always try to get items or charms to help you out. In my one campaign the Barbarian has Orc Splitter which creates and aura of fear immunity. Even if a party doesn't have time to prepare, I hope any casters might have some support spells for emergencies. Looking at clerics who hopefully have bless.
I recognize that frightful presence is usually for monsters who has neither range attack nor teamwork. This is a lazy way to avoid "a dragon who can't do any actual threaten for keep falling at traps".
You do understand that if you are unable to ever make the save that advantage is useless, and saves requiring a 19 or 20 will barely be helped. I also think that it seems a little much to make important character building decisions based on perhaps meeting a specific foe somewhere far in the future. So hope that your party has a member that is a spell-caster that prepares spells that has one of the key features. If they do not prepare spells then you are suggesting that they should take one of their very limited known spells just in case they meet this one monster.
" This one monster" is literally the most iconic one In the game, and there's a very high chance you'll be fighting one at some point in the campaign, so preparing for it, especially since your DM should be dropping hints that a dragon is coming, is common sense. And mathematically assuming you have no modifier and need a nat 20 to save, advantage literally doubles your chances. Going from 1 in 20 to 1 in 10 is not " barely helping."
But sure let's assume a hypothetical party of all melee martial characters with no spellcasters who wanna burn slots on buffs or ranged attack options. I hate to tell you but if your party is that unbalanced, Frightful presence is just one of a few dozen things that will give you a hard time
@@agentchaos9332 You go from a 5% chance to 9.75% chance (doesn't double, check you stats book). So you still stand an extremely good chance of not participating in the battle at all. And you kinda ignored the problem of any character that is just unable to make a 26 save is sitting the battle out. Wee! Fun! Also, there are lots of campaigns that do not feature dragons at all. If that's all you play then it would make sense to build around it. But that is a very limited view.
Oh of course, like I mentioned breifly at the beginning of the video I can see why people have issues with Frightful Presence. I was merely offering some pottential assistance or solutions to the problem. Advantage may not be very helpful for the 19 or 20 roll, but that's still assuming a character has a low Wisdom, many people keep an average wisdom just for perception alone and a number of classes have proficiency with the save. Not to mention just having a paladin within range can help drastically with a bonus to saves. Spellcasters that prepare spells normally have a good number they can prepare, often being Ability + Level, so one or two spells chosen for support won't be too bad, especially considering most of the spells I listed don't only remove fear but affect the characters in other ways too, or can be used in other scenarios. Also I wouldn't say the options are limiting the character building potential. You are right to say that characters shouldn't be built for every potential encounter but abilities like brave are like dwarven resilience, you may not use it often but when you can it may help a bit. I agree that the 24 and 26 DC saves are excessive but those aren't monsters that you are likely to roll a random encounter for. It's likely that you'll recieve warning or be able to plan in advance. Worse comes to worse, if you aren't prepared you can always run to return later. I'm happy you shared your opinions, thank you.
@@nicthedm7650 also the 26 is for fighting a literal deity, I think at that point if you're fighting a God and the whole campaign builds up to that titanic boss, you're allowed to make it a little unbalanced. I definitely don't want defeating the dragon queen to be easy
I wonder how many people who think frightful presence is unfair, or makes the encounter uninteresting, also drop a forcecage on dragons at the beginning of combat
Very true XD! Though I have had a Barbarian end up spending a solid 30 seconds of combat time just run around to try and save, no force cages that time luckily.
one of the things for me about a persons ability to overcome a fright/fear aura the longer there exposed to it the more they get used to it. after repeated exposure to a particular source they would get a bonus to there save.
That's a pretty cool idea. Gives hope to the people with low Wisdom.
I've always viewed Frightful Presence as something a party needs to prepare for before facing a dragon same way as they would prepare for the dragons breath attack or ability to fly. If they don't want to prepare then surprise the'll have a much tougher fight ahead of them.
It definitely is something to take into account if you and the party manage to get prep time. And in a campaign you can always try to get items or charms to help you out. In my one campaign the Barbarian has Orc Splitter which creates and aura of fear immunity. Even if a party doesn't have time to prepare, I hope any casters might have some support spells for emergencies. Looking at clerics who hopefully have bless.
I recognize that frightful presence is usually for monsters who has neither range attack nor teamwork. This is a lazy way to avoid "a dragon who can't do any actual threaten for keep falling at traps".
You do understand that if you are unable to ever make the save that advantage is useless, and saves requiring a 19 or 20 will barely be helped. I also think that it seems a little much to make important character building decisions based on perhaps meeting a specific foe somewhere far in the future. So hope that your party has a member that is a spell-caster that prepares spells that has one of the key features. If they do not prepare spells then you are suggesting that they should take one of their very limited known spells just in case they meet this one monster.
" This one monster" is literally the most iconic one In the game, and there's a very high chance you'll be fighting one at some point in the campaign, so preparing for it, especially since your DM should be dropping hints that a dragon is coming, is common sense. And mathematically assuming you have no modifier and need a nat 20 to save, advantage literally doubles your chances. Going from 1 in 20 to 1 in 10 is not " barely helping."
But sure let's assume a hypothetical party of all melee martial characters with no spellcasters who wanna burn slots on buffs or ranged attack options. I hate to tell you but if your party is that unbalanced, Frightful presence is just one of a few dozen things that will give you a hard time
@@agentchaos9332 You go from a 5% chance to 9.75% chance (doesn't double, check you stats book). So you still stand an extremely good chance of not participating in the battle at all. And you kinda ignored the problem of any character that is just unable to make a 26 save is sitting the battle out. Wee! Fun! Also, there are lots of campaigns that do not feature dragons at all. If that's all you play then it would make sense to build around it. But that is a very limited view.
Oh of course, like I mentioned breifly at the beginning of the video I can see why people have issues with Frightful Presence. I was merely offering some pottential assistance or solutions to the problem. Advantage may not be very helpful for the 19 or 20 roll, but that's still assuming a character has a low Wisdom, many people keep an average wisdom just for perception alone and a number of classes have proficiency with the save. Not to mention just having a paladin within range can help drastically with a bonus to saves. Spellcasters that prepare spells normally have a good number they can prepare, often being Ability + Level, so one or two spells chosen for support won't be too bad, especially considering most of the spells I listed don't only remove fear but affect the characters in other ways too, or can be used in other scenarios.
Also I wouldn't say the options are limiting the character building potential. You are right to say that characters shouldn't be built for every potential encounter but abilities like brave are like dwarven resilience, you may not use it often but when you can it may help a bit.
I agree that the 24 and 26 DC saves are excessive but those aren't monsters that you are likely to roll a random encounter for. It's likely that you'll recieve warning or be able to plan in advance. Worse comes to worse, if you aren't prepared you can always run to return later. I'm happy you shared your opinions, thank you.
@@nicthedm7650 also the 26 is for fighting a literal deity, I think at that point if you're fighting a God and the whole campaign builds up to that titanic boss, you're allowed to make it a little unbalanced. I definitely don't want defeating the dragon queen to be easy
I wonder how many people who think frightful presence is unfair, or makes the encounter uninteresting, also drop a forcecage on dragons at the beginning of combat
Very true XD! Though I have had a Barbarian end up spending a solid 30 seconds of combat time just run around to try and save, no force cages that time luckily.