I hope you found this video useful. I know for some people, math can be a really dull topic and they don't want to think about it while playing the game, but I genuinely believe an understanding of the core of the system and how it works will make you a better dungeon master. If you've got stories of crazy high numbers or ridiculous situations caused by the treadmill effect in previous editions, let me know about them below! Much love Anto
The problem with bounded accuracy is that it inhibits something I loved about earlier editions, the smooth scale from normal people to demigods. Bounded accuracy is only useful for those who do not want to have growth from normal to godhood.
Another video like this that has less visible math, and more conclusions, would be really helpful. For example, why as a DM you shouldn't give out +2 Plate and a +2 shield, or a +3 hand crossbow.
excellent video. thank you. love the format, delivery, and style. very lean, no fat. you obviously understand this topic very well as you've presented in an easy to understand way. -from a mathematically challenged physician in the states.
Solid video, great to explain this to newer folks or those not quite aware of the arithmetic behind it all. Wolves are a great example of frequent mistake newby DM's make; "Oh this is low CR, let's throw a big pack of them against my level 1-3 party"... Rarely ends well! Glad you touched on psychology and how it effects the player experience - sometimes arbitrary higher number 'challenge' just ends up being a frustrating dice-roll simulator.
Anything that imposes advantage/disadvantage introduces a lot of swing into the difficulty of things. There's a solid range of bonus/target number combinations where getting advantage means you're almost guaranteed to hit, and that is a massive deal! I almost always bump the HP over AC on monsters because of that psychological aspect of players not having fun if they aren't hitting. A 10 round combat where you all hit every round and collectively chip away at a monster is much more fun than a 10 round combat where you're just waiting for the one player with he highest bonus to hit half the time.
A possible follow-up video on this one would be demonstrating how to use bounded accuracy, and underlying maths, in showing how to prep maybe three different encounters (e.g. CR 4/8/12. Extra points for adjusting on the fly as the RNGoddess gets fickle. ;-)
That's a great idea! I've got a video on running interesting combat planned, but a more mechanically focused video looking at the numbers and percentages of encounter planning would be cool. I'll add it to the list!
The thing is that one you know math in dnd you learn that a lot of things players think is strong is actually kinda weak. Cool video, love the math behind dnd as well!
@@IcarusGames yeah, mostly a dm here, but like the math from like the monsters and then the players as well, lets me set a threshold for what to expect. The math behind builds is also fun too hahahaha
@@IcarusGames Thanks for responding! I definitely am, I'm still going through your videos so you may have already done it, but maybe something about running horror elements in D&D? I'm trying to create a Lovecraftian homebrew adventure, and absolutely loved playing in Curse of Strahd before our group disintegrated.
@@andersschmich8600 I am looking at releasing some kind of horror themed video for Halloween, drawing on some of the sessions I've run with horror elements before.
I think it would be neat if you could do a video on the maths of why spells have their damage, heals, and save values. It would be so cool! I've never seen anyone make a video on that subject. It would be useful for DMs who have to remember every spell in D&D. It would also be handy for homebrew.
Going from a 60% to a 50% chance to hit reminded me of something I've seen mentioned several times: during 5e's playtest, people generally seemed to have the "most fun" if they hit 60%(maybe 85, forget which) of the time. Someone plotted out all the monsters ac by their CR and this holds true, on average, for the entire swatch of monsters.
How to fix CR's and bounded accuracy. In the 90's we had the same problems. Its easy, use the D4 thru the D12 as minus modifiers to the DC. Using the minus D12 mod on CR 25-30 creature makes it 5% to 60% harder per player. Respectively, a D4 minus mod makes the creature 5% to 20% harder per player.
Well, I guess I'm gonna stop using the Flanking Advantage rule! Another upside is it will make stuff like my Barbarian's Reckless Attacks, my Paladin's Vow of Emnity and my Cleric's Invoke Duplicity more useful. Advantage doesn't stack, of course, but it can benefit from a +2 on the total roll so flanking still rewards them whilst encouraging them to be more tactical beyond simply "surround an enemy and kill them one by one".
I get what you're saying with bounded accuracy, but when it's balanced by piles and piles of HP that monsters seem to always have, it feels like your greatsword is made of nerf foam for how many times you have to hit a monster.
That's a completely fair point! There's absolutely a time and place for bumping AC on favour of HP. I wouldn't tend to bump it past the point where the players are only hitting half of the time though.
Great video for a newbie DM like myself curious about the math! 😊 One criticism: I hated having to go back and pause-play-pause to see the jokes that flashed quickly on the screen. These were funny yet didn't interfere with the content nor pace of the video. So not sure why some content creators do this (I watch a rugby channel that does it too). Again, easily digestable information for newbies is the content I love!! 👍
Glad you enjoyed. As for the short flash jokes; it's a two fold reason: one is that they only might only apply to that one precise moment, and the other reason is they are moments that people will go back to and link (people tagging them in the comments is pretty common) which helps with the stats of the channel (extra watch time and replays keep the TH-cam machine happy). I'm trying to work more humorous elements into my videos and I'll try to make sure to get a balance of quick jokes that need to be paused and jokes that can sit in the open.
It's part of the TH-cam "game", like the "thumbnail face". A lot of those little things can seem silly, but they work. For the most part, I do enjoy putting images and text in for a frame or two that you need to pause to see. It's like a secret message to the people that pause sometimes :)
Thanks! I hope you enjoy the videos. I try to be as open and honest about the whole TH-cam thing as I can. Even with 11k subs I'm still a tiny fish in the sea and there's a whole load of plates one needs to spin to grow, the least we can do is be honest about why we're doing certain things.
Icarus Games it kinda was but tbh I really appreciate it, I wanted to write a paper about it but wasn’t sure where to start and I certainly didn’t know about the “bounded accuracy”. Now I know more or less how to approach it, so thanks!
If you give your players a Flat +2 for Flank, but then they find another way to get advantage, like a Barbarian Reckless Attack or one of the many other ways, well now your players are getting basically +7, so in a way you have actually made things worse for yourself as a DM. Really letting your players have advantage is more balanced because all of 5e is balanced around advantage.
That's a really good point! It's actually part of the reason I don't use flanking rules n my game (that and the players forgot about them 99% of the time in our last campaign). That being said, at least to get the +7 they would need to be keying off specific abilities rather than getting an almost constant bonus. I would much rather plan for the general rather than the specific if the specific is part of a class feature etc.
@@IcarusGames what about "Inspiration", "Find Familar", "Help Actions""Fearie Fire" theres so many ways to get advantage, it just makes sense to either NOT use flank at all or just accept that players will have advantage Often. Or are you also not giving out Inspiration, and killing off familars, ect....
There are plenty of ways to get advantage, you're right! We don't actually use flanking in my game, because it would go from a player or two maybe getting advantage once or twice a session to at least two players getting it on most of their attacks. If I were to use it I would run with a +2, so that even though a few times a session they would get the +2 and advantage, they would still mostly get just the +2.
Thanks Anto - you presented this subject in a way that makes it even more interesting, and helps me understand why 5E feels so different to PFRPG, and how much cleaner the system feels.
Can't believe you didn't shout out anydice.com! Such a useful website for figuring out attack bonuses, ACs, and DCs, or for just playing around to see how the probabilities look in a visual form. (hint: the "at least" chart is your friend.) Sidenote about the psychology, I read somewhere that players feel like things are fair - that is, they think they're hitting ~50% of the time - when they're actually hitting ~65% of the time. It's not a hard and fast rule, but it can be a good guideline when you're starting out.
@@IcarusGames Oh, absolutely. AnyDice can't replace an actual explanation. AnyDice doesn't tell you why the chance of getting a crit with advantage is only 99.75% or even why the chance of getting a 4 or lower with a +3 bonus is 100%. All it does is visually represent the probabilities as histograms. Still, I've found it to be a really great supplemental learning tool because the histograms are a lot easier to understand and remember than lists of numbers. For example, you can see that adding more dice creates a steeper curve, and then you can ask why that would be the case, and thus come to a more intuitive understanding of the math. I don't need to do any calculation to visualize the different distributions of, say, 1d1000 vs 10d100 vs 1d100 x10. And, like I said, it's also a great tool for figuring out actual numbers when you don't want to do a lot of calculation. Like, if I know my PCs are usually adding ~+7 to hit, and I want them to hit ~65% of the time, I can mentally calculate that the AC should be 15. But what if the PCs will generally have advantage? Disadvantage? What if the enemy has Parry, raising its AC by 3 once per turn, but some of the PCs have multiattack? Ok, in the latter case I think I'd need to do math either way, but AnyDice can make that math go faster. Which is really all you can ask of a calculator.
Badaar moves at 25ft/turn. The roc flies at 120ft/turn. If Badaar travels for 4 turns in the opposite direction to the roc, how far apart will they be.
Having good positions in battle should give a big advantage. You didn't make a case for why flanking giving advantage is overpowered. As for your math: 60% x 60% = 3600%% = 36% that missing step might be throwing people off. Technically it's supposed to be 0.6 * 0.6 = 0.36 = 36% since all statistics uses probability not percent. Your video was fine though and your charts are nice.
If you've been playing for a few editions 5e will probably feel like a breeze in terms of numbers, but there are still some core figures that are important to understand.
It is my personal belief that Wizards of the Coast was deceived into believing that people were afraid to play Dungeons and Dragons because there was too much math. What really happened was there were Gatekeepers who were claiming there was a lot more math than they're actually was. The Gatekeepers were trying to claim that it was calculus, when it was really just addition and subtraction with some multiplication thrown in when you're lucky. I have never believed the math involved in 3.5 was a barrier to entry. It's still the sort of game anyone can pick up and anyone can learn. And I'm sorry you are wrong about bound and accuracy being a strength. It limits player power level and makes the game way too damn simple. It's restrictive I feel literally constrained by chains.
What I don't understand about Maths and D&D is critical hits and critical misses. Am I the only one who hates that and thinks it shouldn't be in the game?
@@IcarusGames I just feel like if it takes a 17 to hit, then any number that hits is the same. 17, 18, 19, & 20 and rolling any one is the same as rolling another. I don't think 20 should be any more special than 17 in this case. From a mathematical standpoint, I feel like there shouldn't be "special" numbers.
@@IcarusGames I'm kinda old school that way I guess. I like rolling a straight 3d6 for ability scores. But I am not totally old school. I am glad they got rid of THAC0 of course.
You're right though, from a pure math standpoint 20 is no more significant than any other number. An alternative that I quite like is scoring a crit when you're attack roll matches the AC, representing hitting exactly the right spot on the armor. Mechanically identical, but there's a little extra flavor there.
Icarus Games safe and kind? Strangely enough I believe you are sincere in that sentiment ... tell me kind hearted one when has socialism EVER lead to anything but misery? And how is Antifa kind? Better alignment with your kindness....please be a student of history....
I hope you found this video useful. I know for some people, math can be a really dull topic and they don't want to think about it while playing the game, but I genuinely believe an understanding of the core of the system and how it works will make you a better dungeon master.
If you've got stories of crazy high numbers or ridiculous situations caused by the treadmill effect in previous editions, let me know about them below!
Much love
Anto
The problem with bounded accuracy is that it inhibits something I loved about earlier editions, the smooth scale from normal people to demigods. Bounded accuracy is only useful for those who do not want to have growth from normal to godhood.
Really useful video for designers and serious homebrewing GMs!
Thanks, Bob! :D
Another video like this that has less visible math, and more conclusions, would be really helpful. For example, why as a DM you shouldn't give out +2 Plate and a +2 shield, or a +3 hand crossbow.
DnD is my favorite probability lesson, it even has a vampire in an ominous and misty realm!
excellent video. thank you. love the format, delivery, and style. very lean, no fat. you obviously understand this topic very well as you've presented in an easy to understand way.
-from a mathematically challenged physician in the states.
Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed!
Solid video, great to explain this to newer folks or those not quite aware of the arithmetic behind it all. Wolves are a great example of frequent mistake newby DM's make; "Oh this is low CR, let's throw a big pack of them against my level 1-3 party"... Rarely ends well!
Glad you touched on psychology and how it effects the player experience - sometimes arbitrary higher number 'challenge' just ends up being a frustrating dice-roll simulator.
Anything that imposes advantage/disadvantage introduces a lot of swing into the difficulty of things.
There's a solid range of bonus/target number combinations where getting advantage means you're almost guaranteed to hit, and that is a massive deal!
I almost always bump the HP over AC on monsters because of that psychological aspect of players not having fun if they aren't hitting.
A 10 round combat where you all hit every round and collectively chip away at a monster is much more fun than a 10 round combat where you're just waiting for the one player with he highest bonus to hit half the time.
A possible follow-up video on this one would be demonstrating how to use bounded accuracy, and underlying maths, in showing how to prep maybe three different encounters (e.g. CR 4/8/12. Extra points for adjusting on the fly as the RNGoddess gets fickle. ;-)
That's a great idea! I've got a video on running interesting combat planned, but a more mechanically focused video looking at the numbers and percentages of encounter planning would be cool. I'll add it to the list!
The thing is that one you know math in dnd you learn that a lot of things players think is strong is actually kinda weak. Cool video, love the math behind dnd as well!
Thanks, glad you enjoyed!
@@IcarusGames yeah, mostly a dm here, but like the math from like the monsters and then the players as well, lets me set a threshold for what to expect. The math behind builds is also fun too hahahaha
Thank you. I kinda gave up on dnd maths, shying away from statistical homebrew. This helps
I'm really glad it helped! The bounded accuracy tables should make working things easier!
Very useful video! As a new DM who has recently started trying to create my own homebrew worlds and adventures, your channel is a godsend.
Thank you, Anders, I'm glad that you're finding the content helpful! What other topics would you find useful as a newer DM?
@@IcarusGames Thanks for responding! I definitely am, I'm still going through your videos so you may have already done it, but maybe something about running horror elements in D&D? I'm trying to create a Lovecraftian homebrew adventure, and absolutely loved playing in Curse of Strahd before our group disintegrated.
@@andersschmich8600 I am looking at releasing some kind of horror themed video for Halloween, drawing on some of the sessions I've run with horror elements before.
@@IcarusGames I look forward to that!
Thank you so much for this! It will greatly balance my homebrewed systems
You're very welcome! Glad you found it helpful!
I think it would be neat if you could do a video on the maths of why spells have their damage, heals, and save values. It would be so cool! I've never seen anyone make a video on that subject. It would be useful for DMs who have to remember every spell in D&D. It would also be handy for homebrew.
Going from a 60% to a 50% chance to hit reminded me of something I've seen mentioned several times: during 5e's playtest, people generally seemed to have the "most fun" if they hit 60%(maybe 85, forget which) of the time. Someone plotted out all the monsters ac by their CR and this holds true, on average, for the entire swatch of monsters.
There's definitely a psychological aspect that makes it much less fun f you're not hitting more than half the time.
How to fix CR's and bounded accuracy. In the 90's we had the same problems. Its easy, use the D4 thru the D12 as minus modifiers to the DC. Using the minus D12 mod on CR 25-30 creature makes it 5% to 60% harder per player. Respectively, a D4 minus mod makes the creature 5% to 20% harder per player.
Well, I guess I'm gonna stop using the Flanking Advantage rule! Another upside is it will make stuff like my Barbarian's Reckless Attacks, my Paladin's Vow of Emnity and my Cleric's Invoke Duplicity more useful. Advantage doesn't stack, of course, but it can benefit from a +2 on the total roll so flanking still rewards them whilst encouraging them to be more tactical beyond simply "surround an enemy and kill them one by one".
I get what you're saying with bounded accuracy, but when it's balanced by piles and piles of HP that monsters seem to always have, it feels like your greatsword is made of nerf foam for how many times you have to hit a monster.
That's a completely fair point! There's absolutely a time and place for bumping AC on favour of HP. I wouldn't tend to bump it past the point where the players are only hitting half of the time though.
Great video for a newbie DM like myself curious about the math! 😊
One criticism: I hated having to go back and pause-play-pause to see the jokes that flashed quickly on the screen.
These were funny yet didn't interfere with the content nor pace of the video. So not sure why some content creators do this (I watch a rugby channel that does it too).
Again, easily digestable information for newbies is the content I love!!
👍
Glad you enjoyed. As for the short flash jokes; it's a two fold reason: one is that they only might only apply to that one precise moment, and the other reason is they are moments that people will go back to and link (people tagging them in the comments is pretty common) which helps with the stats of the channel (extra watch time and replays keep the TH-cam machine happy).
I'm trying to work more humorous elements into my videos and I'll try to make sure to get a balance of quick jokes that need to be paused and jokes that can sit in the open.
@@IcarusGames Ah, I getcha!
If the comments/tags increase traffic, fair enough 🙂
It's part of the TH-cam "game", like the "thumbnail face". A lot of those little things can seem silly, but they work.
For the most part, I do enjoy putting images and text in for a frame or two that you need to pause to see. It's like a secret message to the people that pause sometimes :)
@@IcarusGames I appreciate your honesty.
I've added your DM Tips playlist to my library and will be making my way through it
*Liked and subscribed* 👍
Thanks! I hope you enjoy the videos. I try to be as open and honest about the whole TH-cam thing as I can. Even with 11k subs I'm still a tiny fish in the sea and there's a whole load of plates one needs to spin to grow, the least we can do is be honest about why we're doing certain things.
This guy: “we’ll be talking about the maths behind dnd?”
Me a maths major: FINALLY!
I'm sure as a math major this video was like watching a child play with number blocks 🤣
Icarus Games it kinda was but tbh I really appreciate it, I wanted to write a paper about it but wasn’t sure where to start and I certainly didn’t know about the “bounded accuracy”. Now I know more or less how to approach it, so thanks!
Glad to have helped!
If you give your players a Flat +2 for Flank, but then they find another way to get advantage, like a Barbarian Reckless Attack or one of the many other ways, well now your players are getting basically +7, so in a way you have actually made things worse for yourself as a DM. Really letting your players have advantage is more balanced because all of 5e is balanced around advantage.
That's a really good point! It's actually part of the reason I don't use flanking rules n my game (that and the players forgot about them 99% of the time in our last campaign).
That being said, at least to get the +7 they would need to be keying off specific abilities rather than getting an almost constant bonus. I would much rather plan for the general rather than the specific if the specific is part of a class feature etc.
@@IcarusGames what about "Inspiration", "Find Familar", "Help Actions""Fearie Fire" theres so many ways to get advantage, it just makes sense to either NOT use flank at all or just accept that players will have advantage Often. Or are you also not giving out Inspiration, and killing off familars, ect....
There are plenty of ways to get advantage, you're right! We don't actually use flanking in my game, because it would go from a player or two maybe getting advantage once or twice a session to at least two players getting it on most of their attacks. If I were to use it I would run with a +2, so that even though a few times a session they would get the +2 and advantage, they would still mostly get just the +2.
Thanks Anto - you presented this subject in a way that makes it even more interesting, and helps me understand why 5E feels so different to PFRPG, and how much cleaner the system feels.
Hi Iain, I'm glad you found the video helpful. Coming from PFRPG to 5e, bounded accuracy is so nice to run! No more AC 40!
Can't believe you didn't shout out anydice.com! Such a useful website for figuring out attack bonuses, ACs, and DCs, or for just playing around to see how the probabilities look in a visual form. (hint: the "at least" chart is your friend.)
Sidenote about the psychology, I read somewhere that players feel like things are fair - that is, they think they're hitting ~50% of the time - when they're actually hitting ~65% of the time. It's not a hard and fast rule, but it can be a good guideline when you're starting out.
I've used anydice a couple of times but I wanted folks to understand how to get to the numbers themselves.
@@IcarusGames Oh, absolutely. AnyDice can't replace an actual explanation. AnyDice doesn't tell you why the chance of getting a crit with advantage is only 99.75% or even why the chance of getting a 4 or lower with a +3 bonus is 100%. All it does is visually represent the probabilities as histograms.
Still, I've found it to be a really great supplemental learning tool because the histograms are a lot easier to understand and remember than lists of numbers. For example, you can see that adding more dice creates a steeper curve, and then you can ask why that would be the case, and thus come to a more intuitive understanding of the math. I don't need to do any calculation to visualize the different distributions of, say, 1d1000 vs 10d100 vs 1d100 x10.
And, like I said, it's also a great tool for figuring out actual numbers when you don't want to do a lot of calculation. Like, if I know my PCs are usually adding ~+7 to hit, and I want them to hit ~65% of the time, I can mentally calculate that the AC should be 15. But what if the PCs will generally have advantage? Disadvantage? What if the enemy has Parry, raising its AC by 3 once per turn, but some of the PCs have multiattack? Ok, in the latter case I think I'd need to do math either way, but AnyDice can make that math go faster. Which is really all you can ask of a calculator.
Hey can I get someone to create a math test based upon dungeons and dragons?
Badaar moves at 25ft/turn. The roc flies at 120ft/turn. If Badaar travels for 4 turns in the opposite direction to the roc, how far apart will they be.
@@IcarusGames I was thinking more like an entire sheet of math tests on a website somewhere I can print.
Having good positions in battle should give a big advantage. You didn't make a case for why flanking giving advantage is overpowered. As for your math: 60% x 60% = 3600%% = 36% that missing step might be throwing people off. Technically it's supposed to be 0.6 * 0.6 = 0.36 = 36% since all statistics uses probability not percent. Your video was fine though and your charts are nice.
Quick maths
Ui doesn't understand maffs! He just knows the math rocks go click clack :p
Haha your right he has no idea
Clickity clackity I roll to attackity
math? in 5e? What?
If you've been playing for a few editions 5e will probably feel like a breeze in terms of numbers, but there are still some core figures that are important to understand.
@@IcarusGames yeah, you posted some pathfinder videos so you got what I meant. It was just a joke anyways, don't take it too seriously
Oh I got you! I lived that level 20 Pathfinder life, I know all too well 😂
It is my personal belief that Wizards of the Coast was deceived into believing that people were afraid to play Dungeons and Dragons because there was too much math. What really happened was there were Gatekeepers who were claiming there was a lot more math than they're actually was. The Gatekeepers were trying to claim that it was calculus, when it was really just addition and subtraction with some multiplication thrown in when you're lucky. I have never believed the math involved in 3.5 was a barrier to entry. It's still the sort of game anyone can pick up and anyone can learn. And I'm sorry you are wrong about bound and accuracy being a strength. It limits player power level and makes the game way too damn simple. It's restrictive I feel literally constrained by chains.
What I don't understand about Maths and D&D is critical hits and critical misses. Am I the only one who hates that and thinks it shouldn't be in the game?
What is it that you hate about them?
@@IcarusGames I just feel like if it takes a 17 to hit, then any number that hits is the same. 17, 18, 19, & 20 and rolling any one is the same as rolling another. I don't think 20 should be any more special than 17 in this case. From a mathematical standpoint, I feel like there shouldn't be "special" numbers.
@@IcarusGames I'm kinda old school that way I guess. I like rolling a straight 3d6 for ability scores. But I am not totally old school. I am glad they got rid of THAC0 of course.
You're right though, from a pure math standpoint 20 is no more significant than any other number. An alternative that I quite like is scoring a crit when you're attack roll matches the AC, representing hitting exactly the right spot on the armor. Mechanically identical, but there's a little extra flavor there.
@@IcarusGames Yeah that adds a little character to it.
UnsubscribedI refuse to support anyone who voices support for Antifa an avowed violent promoter of communism.
That's your right! I'm a big ol' socialist so if that's an issue, go ahead and unsubscribe. Stay safe out there and be kind!
Icarus Games safe and kind? Strangely enough I believe you are sincere in that sentiment ... tell me kind hearted one when has socialism EVER lead to anything but misery? And how is Antifa kind? Better alignment with your kindness....please be a student of history....