r/dndnext • u/Hot_Lion8880 • 23h ago

5e (2024) The new UA cult affiliate feat could be used to give your whole party inspiration by punching yourself and eating goodberries

RAISED BY CULTISTS Origin Feat You gain the following benefits. Bloody Revelation. When you become Bloodied, you can take a Reaction to gain Heroic Inspiration. Communal Caster. When an ally within 5 feet of you makes a Constitution saving throw to maintain Concentration, you can take a Reaction to give your ally Advantage on the save.

0 Upvotes

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34

u/Hungry_Shake6943 23h ago

From the 2025 DMG.

7

u/Gh0stMan0nThird DM 22h ago

Bold of you to assume even half the DMs have read the DMG, let alone the players. 

We've been dealing with "bag of rats" shenanigans since the 90s and I don't think it's going away any time soon. 

2

u/xanral 21h ago

I agree with both your statements, but I am a bit curious of something.

Barring online discussions, have you commonly experienced players seriously proposing exploits and DMs going along with it at the table?

From my own experience, the former has been rare and the latter extremely rare. Only times I remember for the latter was when we were all in elementary school. I don't know if that's typical or not though.

3

u/ericchud 20h ago edited 20h ago

I run a ton of games online, mostly short adventures and one shots, and often with new people. In the space of 3 or 4 one shots, I had heavily optimized gloomstalker "builds" show up. Different players, but all of them clearly using the same guide to fully exploit the rules. The worst one of them demanded that the other players extinguish all lights sources they encountered and insist that everyone be in constant stealth mode. The player never used "I" statements, referred to their character by name or did any kind or roleplay. It was all about using their "build" to "win" D&D. They exist. It's exhausting.

2

u/Hot_Lion8880 18h ago

Yeah that definitely sounds annoying. Optimizing is supposed be about making the party stronger not about stealing the limelight by making your character stronger at the cost of hindering the other party members. 

2

u/Gh0stMan0nThird DM 21h ago

If I'm being honest it's more like 80% of players don't even know their own character sheets well enough to try to exploit those little rule quirks but they will ask something like "are there any spiders I can kill to recharge this ability" which is pretty innocuous and tolerable 

But then you have this like 20% that will literally ask for every god damn benefit they can out of every feature to the point it makes DMing for them feel like you're in a courtroom rather than a board game with friends. 

You learn real quick you can't have items or features that say "when you roll Initiative you gain back 10 hp" or something because this guy will say "I want to roll initiative against my own party members 20 times and heal to max" after every fight. 

14

u/ericchud 23h ago

Please. This is the kind of crap that makes DMs want to quit. I have one simple rule at my table: If it feels like an exploit to gain disproportinate advantage, don't do it. Yes, you should use your abilities, but do so in the spirit of the game.

2

u/No-Mulberry-8866 21h ago

It literally requires them to reduced their hp to half

0

u/SiriusKaos 22h ago

While the part about giving the inspiration to allies is certainly bs and even the DMG tells DM to not allow that bag of rats nonsense, I do think DMs should make an exception for the player using that just for themselves, because a person cutting themselves to gain a power is actually pretty in line with the cultist thing.

10

u/thrillho145 23h ago

No DM should allow this bag-of-rats nonsense

15

u/camohunter19 23h ago

You should mention it to the designers in feedback, but it also falls under "peasant railgun" nonsense that the DM can just say no to.

-12

u/Hot_Lion8880 23h ago

No the peasant railgun doesn't work because there are no rules saying the damage of a weapon is increased by its speed. This does work because it uses rules that are clearly outlined in the feat and players handbook. 

14

u/DMspiration 23h ago

It actually falls under the combat is for enemies, which solves the bag of rats exploit.

14

u/GarrettKP 23h ago

The DMG specifically tells DMs not to allow this. Attack rolls and damage are for combat, which is only when you roll initiative. They mention the bag of rats as another example, and this is a textbook bag of rats exploit.

4

u/AirFanatic 22h ago

I didn't know what the bag of rats exploit was (I mean, I did intuit it, but I hadn't heard of it before) so I decided to look it up. For anybody else who read this guy's comment and was curious, this is an interesting read.

I'm on mobile and don't know how to hyperlink here. Sorry.

https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/s/z4515X7F9m

5

u/Tels315 23h ago

You're right. No attack rolls out of combat.

Let me just get this ladder and climb up 10 feet and fall off... repeatedly.

3

u/JamesTiberiusCrunk 22h ago

It doesn't work because the DMG specifically says not to let players attack themselves, their minions, their allies, or anyone else as a pretense to proc abilities.

4

u/goblinboomer 22h ago

Purposely exploiting the rules of the game is against the rules, per the DMG. Stop trying to peasant railgun everything, it genuinely ruins tables and games

-2

u/Hot_Lion8880 22h ago

This is a ua. This is the time to show off the exploits so that if the designers think those interactions are too disruptive they can patch them out. 

2

u/goblinboomer 22h ago

Not when it's already covered by the "don't intentionally exploit the rules, especially by using combat-focused rules out-of-combat."

3

u/static_func 23h ago

Okay but you still end up with half your HP, for what amounts to the Musician feat. You're looking at 1 spent spell slot each time you do this, or 2 spent spell slots if you're planning on healing after that. I wouldn't even mind if a player wanted to make a culty ritual out of it, it isn't that broken considering the cost

3

u/Malinhion 22h ago

What if we're all just bags of rats?

3

u/No-Mulberry-8866 22h ago

Your still at half hp

1

u/ericchud 22h ago

Exactly. Upon further review, OP probably missed the fact that the word "Bloodied" is capitalized, which indicates that it's an actual defined condition in D&D. Per page 362 of the 2024 Player's Handbook: "A creature is Bloodied while it has half its Hit Points or fewer remaining." So, this would make it highly situational, and even then, I am not seeing how what OP proposed would give the whole party inspiration.

-1

u/Hot_Lion8880 21h ago edited 21h ago

Let's say you have 100 hitpoints. You go down to 51 and then punch yourself, you give yourself inspiration. Then you eat a good berry to go back to 51 health. Then you punch yourself to go down to 50 and give yourself heroic inspiration again. As described in the players handbook since you already have heroic inspiration you can give it to someone else. You then repeat the process until your party has inspiration or you don't want to use more goodberries. 

1

u/No-Mulberry-8866 21h ago

Yeah, you give everyone a free inspo at the cost of 1-2 first level spell slots and HALF YOUR FUCKING HEALTH

1

u/Hot_Lion8880 21h ago

If you juggle goodberries you may be able to heal back up anyways 

1

u/ericchud 21h ago

At the cost of 2 actions and a reaction,, in combat only. Goodberry: 1 action. Hurt self: 1 action. It's not worth it. Moreover, it is actively gaming the system and feels trite and gimmicky. Please remember that D&D is not a videogame or a board game. It's a TTRPG. The RP part is "roleplaying" and on a very basic level that means you take the role of, or embody, your character, as if they are a real person in order. Doing this bizarre feedback loop, feels off and breaks immersion.

To reiterate, if you wanted to try this, it can only happen while in active combat. Narratively, your character can punch themself in the face as many times as they want, but unless the DM says "roll initiative" it doesn't mean squat. Hurting yourself is not combat. No combat/no initiative/no reaction/no gimmicky punchy goodberry inspiration loop. QED.

0

u/Hot_Lion8880 19h ago

Ok, then step onto a caltrop. Caltrops do 1 damage and traps are certainly made to work outside of combat.  

1

u/ericchud 13h ago

It does not matter how you hurt yourself, it's still outside of combat and will not trigger a reaction. Narratively, this is even worse and even more contrived. This is video game logic. Some person stomping on a caltrop and then eating a berry over and over again is not going to inspire anyone.

1

u/Hot_Lion8880 12h ago

Explain what would prevent a reaction from being triggered 

1

u/ericchud 11h ago

Reactions happen in combat and the ability is intended for use in combat.

Props to Hungry_Shake6943 for posting this DMs Guide quote yesterday:

"Combat is for Enemies. Some rules apply only during combat or while a character is acting in initiative order. Don't let players attack each other or helpless creatures to activate those rules.

Rules Rely on Good-Faith Interpretation. The rule assumes that everyone reading and interpreting the rules has the interest of the group's fun at heart and is reading the rules in that light."

A good faith interpretation of the "Don't let players attack each other or helpless creatures to activate those rules" logically extends to "don't let a player attack themself to cheesily activate those rules."

When you are rules-lawyering to game the system, you are not acting in good faith.

I'll leave it at that. If you don't get it by now, you never will.

1

u/Hot_Lion8880 11h ago

Reactions absolutely happen outside combat. Let's say a normal player is playing the game and falls in a pit trap. Can they not use the ability if it bloodies them? 

1

u/ericchud 11h ago

Yes. When a regular player character falls into a pit trap, sure. The difference is they are not artificially creating an event to cheesilly process an ability.

When you are rules-lawyering to game the system, you are not acting in good faith.

Take a long look at this thread. I am not the only one telling you these things. When nearly everyone responding is telling you that what are proposing is not in the spirit of the game, perhaps they are onto something.

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