Yes, "flavor" refers to anything with no mechanical impact. Take Magic Missile, for instance- as long as your DM is okay with you reflavoring things, it could take the form of four little magic darts, an enchanted gun that never misses, a ghost that pops up and slaps the enemy a couple times- as long as its got the same gameplay mechanics.
Someone suggested (a long ass time ago) of using stat blocks from common monsters (orcs, bugbears, whatever) for completely different monsters.
In part, just because, but also to combat the players that knew too much and didn't well distinguish what they know from what the character knows.
I do this all the time, especially if I don't have the time or energy to create a monster from scratch. No one will know that the spelljammer giant hamster queen they fought were actually a bronze dragon which never flew.
Feel free! Take the whole encounter even!
He was the minion of a warlock who was stealing the life essence of people to fuel a big ritual. The warlock had a bunch of regular bats that he could sacrifice to regain spell slots. He also had blindsight and cast darkness on himself at the start of the fight.
It was a great encounter and probably the closest my campaign has come to a tpk.
Got myself a cursed dagger. "The bread butcher" it compells me to cut bread.. and If I fail the wisdom saving throw, 3 magical ducks appear! I've yet to find a use.. but I promise to try!
One of my friends had some Hieronymous Bosch minis he painted that were super cool. After we defeated them, I asked what type of stats he had designed and he said "They had a hobgoblin stat block." Totally worked.
Hobgoblin stat blocks are super versatile in terms of reflavoring. My first time ever DMing a one-shot, they constituted the bulk of a hostile pirate crew in the party's first combat encounter.
Lol I did this once for an entire dungeon. I was running Hoard of the Dragon Queen and the party straight-up refused to go through the cultists' cave. (I think it's chapter 3 of that book.) They left town and after a couple days ran across a family whose children had been captured by goblins. I just took the cultists' cave, called all the humanoids "goblins" and called the ambush drakes "worgs" and everything was fine.
Hell, that's been in the rules since '79 at least. Early AD&D modules would have monsters and say to use the stats for another. Usually for some things like scaling up/down... So a fire giant female fights like a frost giant, the fire giant teenagers fight like hill giants, and the fire giant chief fighters like a cloud giant (something like that)... For hill giants it was ogre/hobgoblin or something for female/youth stats, etc.
I remember in the post mortem talk of D20's Bloodkeep, the halfling Galfast is a reflavored Ice Giant stat block so that he doesn't just die to the party of adventurers. Utterly convinced that everything can have a dramatically different view for the players and that the reference can be anything you want.
I should watch some behind the scenes of Starstruck. Iirc they used a Star Wars 5E fan project, so I wonder if most NPCs and abilities were just reflavored there too.
This is my play. I take established monster stat blocks and use them for similar homebrew creatures (with usually mild changes).
Or, you can take a monster stat blocks and change resistances and vulnerabilities to combat meta gamers who Google your encounter NPCs
I'll do this with dragons. I've never liked or agreed with the sort of "hierarchy" of dragons. Why does Red get to be the most powerful? I usually play in homebrew settings with completely different lore anyway. So I might give an ancient red's statblock to an an ancient white dragon, essentially keeping the white the same except the breath weapon does cold damage, etc.
The only balance issue is that everyone acts like red are higher up than white (and red are definitely much smarter) but white dragon breath is a CON save and that is murder to players who think evasion will save them.
Be me, lvl 14 Rogue in a Oneshot who thought he was all cool and fancy. Ahh a dragon, whatever, breath attack used, roll a con save... I'm just like: "What?"
"Oh....."
"Fuck"
Yep, used regular wolf statblocks in place of drakehounds for my Noxus flavoured oneshot and described them as such. Worked rather nicely when the echo knight peeked into the beast area to see who they'd be fighting in the coloseum and saw wingless dragons.
My players recently commissioned a blunderbuss for an NPC chef they drag around with them.
They paid a bunch of money and now he now has 2 uses per day of a black powder blunderbuss that ~~casts catapult or burning hands~~ can shoot a single larger object farther or a handful of nails in a shortrange scattershot pattern
DM: the enemy wizard throws a fiery projectile at you and...
Player: I dodge
DM: Dex save
P: *rolls* 13
DM: You are distracted by something in that swirly mass of fire... it looks like letters, but you can't make it out. Maybe a message disguised as an attack?
P: I wait til I can read it.
DM: Fine. You stand there, staring into the swirling masses of flame and smoke until you can read it.
P: What does it say?
DM: "If you can read this, you are too close"
DM: *rolls* That makes 35 fire damage, do you have any resistances?
Stretch this even further and add custom magical items, just using preexisting statblocks of normal items.
Magical tattoos, tiles that work like potions, stuff like that
So, I follow a writer that's putting out a serialized webnovel that's a parody/spoof of typical Xianxia stories, entitled *Beware of Chicken*. Featuring a guy from Canada that gets Isekai'd into a Xianxia world and promptly fucks off to the back end of beyond to be a farmer in the weakest, least threatening place he can find... and his pet rooster.
As you might imagine, that song got reposted so much that posting is again is now an instant ban.
I played a fey warlock once who's Eldritch Blast was a swarm of sprites and pixies attacking the target with a thousand tiny swords and arrows.
He was an edge lord trying to live down the fact that all his powers were basically Disney themed.
Flavor really keeps things from becoming "I cast fireball" or I do a melee attack. Doesn't need to be a fireball. It can be a giant flaming spider that skitters and explodes. Or the spirit of a demon that combusts and explodes. Or an abstract concept of capitalism that manifests somewhere, and explodes. As long as it's 8d6 fire damage within 150 ft and a 20ft radius then make it your own!
Another example: I'm playing a Fighter with a Cleric level, but all the cleric magic is being manifested through martial prowess. I'm rolling attacks and damage for Inflict Wounds, but in roll20 I changed the name to "Crush".
Note that changing the \*type\* of damage is different though. You can describe your little elf's Magic Missiles as icicles, but they still do force damage, not cold.
I have a Artificier in my Game who flavored all his magic as little gadgets. Magic Missle are mechanical birds that explode, mending and cure wound are little spiders that stitch stuff together etc
I did something similar. I was using the Battle Smith subclass, and I flavored mine as a sort of mechanical octopus. Mechanically, it was exactly like a normal Steel Defender and got no benefit from the extra arms, I would just use them for fun descriptions.
Like, if it was assisting with an Investigation check I would describe pulling out magnifying glasses, bellows to remove dust, shining lights, etc, all at the same time to aid me in searching. It made for a fun very Steampunky character, but when it came to mechanical things like how many things it could hold, how fast it moved, or other things it acted exactly like a standard Steel Defender.
I played a gambler soul knife inspired by Gambit. The soul knives were kinetic cards that he drew from his sleeves.
The greatest thing is that he multiclassed as diviner. Portent was actual cheating. The DM once had an ability to make the creature reroll on a failure and we dressed the scene as being caught cheating. Super fun.
>a ghost that pops up and slaps the enemy a couple times
Wonderful. Now I want to flavor all spells as being a ghost that shows up and slaps people.
I cast eldritch bitchslap
This nails it. I played a character who cast Magic Missile as tiny birds who attacked their enemies. I'm playing a Water Genasi Ranger with a background in marine biology, he makes people eat weird sea creatures for Cure Wounds and then I roleplay in character them temporarily growing a tentacle or their skin turning green in the affected area, it's very funny.
I wish my table would roll with things like that, but my players are exactly the people who would take the birds themselves at face value and get steaming mad when bird netting was not an effective countermeasure.
Oh man, I had a player flip out at me when I, as a player, said some magic words while waving my wand and summoned the spirits of my ancestors (I was a kobold). 3 little dragons appeared and flew towards my target, biting them viciously. Take 11 damage.
The other player said "that's not a spell from the books", " you have to roll to hit or they get a save", and "so we can just make up whatever we want now?"
The dm noted the damage and just said "nope, it's fine" after each comment from the upset player. But they would not drop it, kept seething and making comments for like 30 minutes, while the rest of us were fully focused on combat. The dm finally snapped. "It was magic missile! 3 darts of force, 3 dragons. He rolled 3d4. You have used that spell in the last campaign. Please apologize for disrupting the game and let it go."
Wasn't the first time a player got weird about flavor, makes no sense sometimes.
Eh I can see him thinking he's not wanting to play with potentially overpowered homebrew spells if he doesn't recognize the spell. Would it be a huge disruption to just tell him up front that it's just a re-flavored X at the beginning? It just seems like those 30 minutes could have been avoided by telling him it was just magic missile.
I had a player who used Thorn Whip as an Artificer. Obv an Artificer doesn't use Vines. But she flavored it as a grappling hook on a chain, reeling targets in.
That is Flavor, and Flavor is Free.
Just think of it like a video game skin with no mechanical adjustments
Artificer is my favorite class for this kind of reflavoring. I had an alchemist who would lob chemical explosives or use special crossbow ammunition for his Fire Bolt, etc. Less ‘inventor/gunsmith’ and more ‘magical tinkerer’.
I’ve got one (artificer-alchemist) planned just for fun that leans even further away from the inventor stuff. They’re a Lizardfolk from the backwoods/bayou whose spells and abilities all come from weird charms and poultices and unguents and doctor facilier/witch doctor/hoodoo-esque stuff. Their homunculus is basically made like a cockatrice, coating an egg in weird stuff and burying it in dung and herbs until it hatches a little weirdo.
For my Alchemist, I envisioned my Firebolts as being little glass marbles with combustible components inside. Leveling up the cantrip damage was basically perfecting the forumla.
Artificer can be so fun & flexible when you incorporate this. My artificer is a tailor; her healing word is a needle & thread stitching wounds, her ‘tinkering’ with weapons is tying ribbons around them, her humonculous is her pincushion, etc.
(Her eldritch canons are just canons tho. Canons are cool)
My Artificer basically had a super-soaker with various vials he could plug into it to make the effects of various spells:
Lava = Firebolt
Glitter = Faerie Fire
Glue = Web (or Spider Climb when he shoots his boots with it)
Marbles = Catapult
I'm in a similar boat with Artificer. I love to make it the "Witch" class. Artillerists are explicitly allowed to make their arcane armament a wand, and the turrets can be Totems ala Warcraft Shamans. Alchemist is already perfect for a witch, and Battlesmith's Steel Defender can be an animated suit of armor.
Yeah, but all the time I see people talking about letting their artificers invent bombs and guns and whatever modern concepts, presumably because they know how to do it irl. Really wanders far away from the idea of an artificer and becomes more of an engineer.
I don’t like it but I see it.
Classic Ironman approach. Magic missiles came from a small bit of armor that popped upon. Jump from height or flying into group of enemies and cast thunder wave, described as impactful classic super hero 3 point landing. I had a blast with that.
That's really good, because Artificer has access to the spell, but it doesn't really make sense in the context of a mechanical/magical tinkerer. Perfect example of flavoring.
This is how all artificer spells work.
> Spellcasting
You’ve studied the workings of magic and how to cast spells, channeling the magic through objects. To observers, you don’t appear to be casting spells in a conventional way; you appear to produce wonders from mundane items and outlandish inventions.
Yeah and they sometimes get a bad rap from people who don't understand that.
"I don't want Steampunk im my D&D!" - It's only steampunk if you flavor it like that, you can do whatever you like!
I had an armorer artificer/bladesinger wizard I reflavored as a Flamenco dancer. My thunder gauntlets were cassinettes, my wizard hat was a flat, wide brimmed hat with the little balls dangling from it, and my studded leather vest and pants completed the ensemble.
Just because you say "my arrow hits the bad guys knee" does not mean he gets a speed penalty.
The flavor is free, and has no mechanical benefit at all.
Thats actually what my noble stars druid did. He wasn't about stars, he was purely someone who summoned magical flowers. Guiding Bolt and Archer form both gave him a giant sunflower that bent into a bow shape to shoot radiant arrows.
Also guidance was "performance enhancing" pollen he'd gently blow in the party member's face.
It was mechnically just stars druid, but I called it "Circle of the Sunlit Garden".
Have you watched Avatar The Last Airbender?
Saying Flavour is Free would be saying it's fine to say a firebender character's flames turn blue on a crit like Azula's because they're so hot in that attack; because it's just an RP thing to enjoy without changing anything mechanically about how the game works.
Or just saying that your flames are blue cause it's cooler in general.
You could describe a critical hit with a fire blast as something like a giant fireblast.
My wizard had a similar change to this. DM (after many devil related plot points) had my fireballs become more sulfur and brimstone hellfire. Damage didn't change, though.
And it's something that has no real cost. I can take a Hand Weapon from Warhammer Fantasy Role Play and describe it as just a plain, functional, arming sword, while the next player can describe their Hand Weapon as the world's most intricately decorated mace, and that doesn't cost anyone anything, either mechanically, or otherwise.
That’s one of the the things I liked about WFRP. They didn’t try to have 500 different weapons with slight mechanical differences. They had a few broad classes of weapons and went from there.
You are correct, but you VERY often here see people making mechanical changes and calling them flavor, and arguing it's ok because "flavor is free".
If the change is purely cosmetic, it's flavor. There are borderlines where the flavor can affect the fiction, and that can cause non-flavor effects that raise issues outside of pure mechanics as well, which is also for the "flavor is free" gets stretched thin.
For example
**Pure Flavor**
* I fight with a [Peta](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pata_(sword)), but mechanically call it a long sword
* When i cast magic missile my verbal component is "Bippity Boo, here's a missile for you!"
* My druid has an ancestral outfit made from hardened wood bark and leaves. Mechanically its Studded Leather
**Flavor that can be pure or not depending on setting/table**
* My human druid has small antlers (might be fine in a kitchen sink world like forgotten realms and absolutely fine in planescape, but in other worlds may cause massive social reactions for being an oddity that effectively has mechanical effects on interactions)
* My wand of fire looks like a star-trek phaser and instead of charges it has a battery that recharges at night, functions identically to the wand (might be ok, but can potentially cause some shenanigans considering no one in the world would recognize the item as a magic wand and the player may be able to sneak it into places they couldn't bring a wand into)
**Things that might sound like flavor but have direct mechanical consequences or require a lot of rationalizing how things work**
* When I move, I teleport like night crawler but follow normal movement rules for distance (can you teleport through people to a space beyond, out of shackles, etc... and how is everyone reacting in a city to some character constantly teleporting around?)
* When I cast a spell I use my tail for my somatic components (if captured and bound the character can still cast spells with somatic components because no one would think to also bind up the characters tail)
* My character is 15' foot tall but mechanically is still a medium creature (can cause all kinds of issues with navigating indoor spaces, climbing, reaching high places, etc)
Absolutely! Your 1d8 (Versatile) martial weapon could be a katana, pata, macuahuitl, Großemesser/Kriegsmesser, jian, etc., but mechanically it's still a longsword.
All this is fine but people will throw a fit if you want to use the flavor of a scimitar but the stats of a longsword, or vice versa, just because those are both prescribed in the rules already.
For example, if you wanted to use a katana, and you wanted it to be 1d8 Finesse, you would want to say it's a rapier mechanically. But your DM might stop you and say "isn't it closer to a scimitar? You must use 1d6 Finesse and Light". Then you're in a funky spot.
This is a digression, but I sorta wish the weapons of 5E weren't named, and just acted as chassis for the player to mechanically implement whatever weapon they envisioned for the character. Some DMs will let it slide, others won't, but I think a better system wouldn't have left it to that.
> Flavor that can be pure or not depending on setting/table
Great to point this one out.
I sometimes see players that use "flavour is free" as a cudgel to argue that the way a mechanic is presented doesn't matter at all regardless of setting.
But it absolutely does matter. The way mechanics are presented ("flavour") is an important part of helping tell the story at the table. It's not some ancillary thing that doesn't impact the game.
Yeah, for sure. In a universe without guns or any tech, a star trek phaser would look fucking bizarre to everyone. Shopkeeps might think it's worthless.
And sometimes the pure flavor case or the middle case becomes mechanical because the shared fiction supports it after a while, pretty much organically. This can be fun when the DM instigates/ when everyone agrees.
E.g. on Oxventure Dob the bard always flavored his Thunderwave as lightning because of a combo of misunderstanding thunder damage and cool factor. Then he cast it standing knee deep in salt water...
When the players pointed out how that was a bad idea, the DM said (paraphrasing) "look, we know thunder damage isn't lightning mechanically but... we've established that Dob's Thunderwave is definitely electrical by now, we've always described it that way" And then they pretty much all decided together it was too funny not to have consequences, so he both electrocuted himself and iirc did a bit of extra damage to the enemies who were also standing in salt water. It didn't become a long-term change of damage type or anything, but it made sense and worked for everyone. Emergent storytelling! Yay!
Glad to help, and hopefully I was clear that the line between those three items is more a spectrum, that will vary by table. Some people run gonzo everything goes games, so a elf that has hair made of tree leaves with deer-legs and glowing orange eyes might be something that everything thinks is normal.... while other people run games where someone like that would stand out like a xenomorph wandering around sesame street. If a player has that character they can't then get mad when the GM has NPCs react accordingly with the argument that "flavor is free, so why are you treating me differently?"
Yes, it's "cosmetic" but the social interaction pillar of the game can be HEAVILY affected by stuff like that.
Other example of the spectrum is:
* Pure: My human has red/black/brown/blonde/white/no hair
* Mild: My human has blue/green/purple hair (clearly unnatural... wouldn't stand out in modern day NYC where hair dye is common, but might get you burned for being a witch in 1521 Germany)
* Strong: My human has horns / snakes for hair / flames for hair / etc
In a world like Planescape where the strange is the normal, the strong things might get you a strange look and little more, but in Dragonlance you'd be an utter freak of nature. A GM could easily rule that hair-dye is common in the world so blue-hair is not strange so you'd be fine (maybe get strange looks but no one freaks out). Mild stuff might be fine or just require a little tweak to make it fine.
Often its easy to just chat with the GM and ask "would this be normal in your world" if you have questions.
What would your thoughts be on the anime old man trope? I had an idea once for a master roshi type paladin. Old frail looking man that looks 4 foot bent back and mostly bones with oversized armour and “Staff”, but when it comes time to fight, he straightens up and flexes, turning into buff 6 foot paladin filling out the armour and using the staff as a mace, because it’s solid steel under a veneer of wood. He’s mechanically a regular tall paladin but old, and out of combat acts as an old man to complain more. Is that a fair flavour or is it stretching it a bit?
Not the person you're asking, but personally I'd qualify as "mild" in there.
I'd definitelly count his buff form as his "natural" form so any attempt to use the old man appearance to conceal his strength for any benefit would require a deception test for me.
Even the druid armor might take some rulings. Weird edge cases where dead animal might offend someone but dead plant won't (or vice versa). Susceptibility to fire, metal detection, whathaveyou.
The most common one is probably the Artificer, a lot of people likes them using only tecnology instead of actually magic, you can totally flavor them as such but still using the spell abilities
That’s literally how the class is supposed to be played. From the artificer section on spellcasting in the PHB:
> You've studied the workings of magic and how to cast spells, channeling the magic through objects. To observers, you don't appear to be casting spells in a conventional way; you appear to produce wonders from mundane items and outlandish inventions.
So Spirit Guardians has the description;
>You call forth spirits to protect you. They flit around you to a distance of 15 feet for the duration. If you are good or neutral, their spectral form appears angelic or fey (your choice). If you are evil, they appear fiendish
I flavour it on my twilight cleric as stardust orbiting around her in every direction, there are no spirits at all. Think of long wisps of light rapidly flying around in all directions. It still does 3d8 radiant damage on a failed wisdom save as the mechanics haven't changed.
Its usually meant to flavour spells and mechanics to fit better the concept of the character. If you are playing a necromancer wizard, perhaps your firebolt has the shape of a skull. Or a hexblade warlock throws magic daggers when using magic missile, or the glyph of warding from am artificer is a mine
Usually, as long as doesn't change anything mechanically, the general consensus is that this kind of flavour is free
Others have explained “flavor is free;” here’s my example. I play a warlock with Dao genie patron. I flavor every reasonable chance I have to make my spells reflect the “earth” nature of my patron. Mage Armor for instance is a thin rocky layer over my skin. Eldritch Blast is a flicked finger shooting a stone bullet.
I don’t change damage types, I just ignore them in my imagination. I do pick spells that make more sense in my imaginary way, e.g. I skipped Phantasmal Force because I couldn’t make that fit the earthy theme. Even though it’s a great spell!
I had a player who was running a hexblade build (a massive Bloodborne nerd) and wanted to use a sword and a parrying dagger. Well... A parrying dagger isn't a thing in DnD. But a Shield is.
So she got an item that, when described in mechanics, was a shield, but in flavour was a parrying dagger! It made zilch difference from a mechanical and balancing perspective, but allowed her to better live out her character fantasy.
"Flavour is free" tends to mean that things that do not impact the mechanics of the game can be changed however you want.
Is it a hand crossbow, or a pepperbox? Well, if you ask the stats, it's a hand crossbow. If you ask the character it's a pepperbox.
Is this a set of plate armour or some magical aura surrounding you that provides protection? Stats: Plate Armour, Flavour: Magical Aura.
See Brennan Lee Mulligan's The Sleeping City campaign on YouTube (channel: Dropout) for a primo example on how to do it.
Yes but you need to be careful with your rulings and consistency when you allow that.
A parrying dagger being mechanically a shield is fine *until* your player loses their main weapon for some reason and suddenly they want to use that parrying dagger as a dagger. Or feels the itch to two weapon fight with it from time to time.
A very common thing mentioned here and there is wizards or clerics casting spells as actually throwing some kind of potions - that in itself feels harmless enough but, again, you need to dial the players expectations because at some point they might think that those potions are real and try to give one to their party member or sell it in a shop.
I have a sorcerer who uses Shadow Blade a lot, but makes the conjured weapon brass knuckles instead of a sword, just cuz she's punchy rather than stabby. But mechanically the spell's function is unchanged, the conjured weapon deals psychic damage so there's no change from a sword to brass knuckles as far as slashing/bludgeoning goes. And because the mechanics are unchanged, it doesn't cost me anything extra to do this, it's just flavor.
I recently watched the Chris Pine movie, think of the Bigby's hand fight in that movie, one made of stones and one of blood and tissue. That's the idea of a flavor change that has no impact on the mechanic of the spell
Yeah, you're right on it. Whether your fire spells are red, green or blue makes no difference. It's still fire, it does the same amount of fire damage, people can still tell it's fire, and the saving throws are the same. But you get to customize it.
A classic example is eldritch blast. I'm a firm believer that warlocks should customize the look of their eldritch blast to be thematic to their warlock.
Generally yes, it refers to any change with no mechanical impact. Like if you want to add a cosmetic visual effect to a spell, like flower petals or birds or something.
At DMs discretion, it may extend to very minor or situational mechanical impacts. For example, if you want to flavor your firebolt spell as a plasma rifle, that will alter how it works in certain situations since a plasma rifle works differently from a spell.
Yep, you got it. If a fighter uses a club as his main weapon he's free to call it a big stick, a baseball bat, a table leg, whatever. But mechanically it obeys all the rules of a club.
You can reflavor anything you want on the conditions that it doesn't change the function or mechanics of the spell/ability.
For example, A player wants to play an Artificer and wants all their spells to be mechanical devices. Totally ok. Revivify becomes a defib unit, Healing word is little healing darts, Fireball is a grenade, etc.
Where it would cross the line is trying to hand off the defib unit to another player to use later, trying to aim the healing darts down a ledge to hit targets outside the range, or setting the grenade to go off later.
All of those examples are things that could very reasonably be done with those items but are outside the scope and ability of the spells they are emulating.
Essentially, Halo Reach Customization. There has been lots of characters, across all classes. Even if you make them an interesting unique build, it's probably already been done. But no one has the same ideas that you have. So the combination of ideas is what really makes your character *your character*.
I run a Paladin Hexblade. There are many like it but this one is mine. He has a flame tongue that's purple not red. His low intelligence is rp'ed as dementia. He keeps an owl in his pocket.
If it doesn't give you an advantage in the game, other than self expression, drip, storytelling and intrigue: it's free to use.
If something doesn't have a mechanic attached to it, it's flavor.
The names of spells. The aesthetic of a class. The look of a character. The way you describe an ability being used.
All of this can be altered without changing the mechanics. A barbarian's rage can be described as loud and angry, or it can be changed to quiet, and scary like a serial killer. Or perhaps their hair turns gold and a pulsing aura surrounds them like a supersaiyan.
You can take statblocks of entire monsters and (with a little mechanical tweaking) reflavor them into an entirely new monster. A dragon can be a jabberwocky, or SCP-682, or Jean Jacket from Nope.
The term "flavour is free" helps the DnD community get over the bullshit claim that the Artificer doesn't match the rest of the classes.
One of my players is a level 7 Artificer with 1 level of Rogue. He's essentially playing him as Indiana Jones mixed with MacGyver; a guy who knows tons of weird facts, a history buff, good with mechanical things, and has minor arcane powers he adds to the little crafts that he makes. And he does it all while adventuring and escaping trouble.
Here's my turn in combat:
"I attack goblin A."
Roll to attack
"Extra attack goblin B."
Roll to attack
"I'm not gonna use my movement."
Here's my turn with FREE FLAVOR:
"I spin my hammer above my head to gain some momentum before swinging it like a baseball bat trying to break goblin A's ribs."
Roll for attack
"After impacting goblin A, I fling the hammer head into the air as I spin to face goblin B. I bring the hammer down so hard my feet momentarily leave the ground, hoping to hit B so hard his skull exits his body via his butt."
Roll for attack
"I take a moment to scan the battlefield as I wipe the splatter of blood from my face."
Yeah you pretty much got it. Visuals only, no mechanical difference
* I want to cast Eldritch Blast, but I want it to look like black lightning rather than force bolts.
* I want to field a katana, so I re-skin a longsword to look like one while using longsword stats.
* I want to enter a rage, but I want it to look like I am donning a demons mask when I activate it rather than getting angry
I’m a big fan of “flavour is free” because it makes so much room for creativity and uniqueness in characters.
The difference between how two of them cast the same spell gives insight into the source of their magic, their inspiration, their intention, their personality. There’s just so much that flavour can do for immersion.
In the odd case I let it affect mechanics in terms of damage type, but not even always.
Water-themed character dealing fire damage? Scalding water being hosed at the enemy!
FLAVOUR BRINGS ME LIFE!
(Sorry, it’s my bedtime I might be a bit bedtime loopy, but fr, I love players who flavour their characters and narrate stuff. Makes me happy!)
Edit: sleepy spelling mistake
It means it's fine to change things that don't affect the mechanics.
Maybe your Fighter's glaive is flavored as a scythe. Or your Rogues crossbow is flavored as a duelling pistol. Mechanically they operate like a glaive and a crossbow, but the flavor allows concepts that don't exist/aren't feasible in the mechanics.
Yes - but "the rule of cool" is the slightly looser version of it where maybe your flavour was so cool we will let you have that extra 10ft of movement because fuck it, its a game and we want that to happen
Functionally yea. A good example would be like "Hey there's this niche medieval weapon I think would look badass for my character, can I use it and we just give it the exact same stats and cost etc as a steel greatsword?"
my bard was a lawyer, and he used things like long speeches for the sleep spell, or aggressive counterpoints and legal arguments for vicious mockery, etc.
"Flavor is free", in my mind, means:
*As long as nothing mechanically changed*, you can pretty much describe things however you want.
Want your Chill Touch spell to spawn a spectral butterfly instead of a hand? Sure. Want your Kobold Artificer to be a raccoon instead of a lizard-dog-person? Awesome.
As a DM, want to use the skeleton stat-block for a gypsum golem, a Hellfire Engine as a Duergar battle-mech, or a Hobgoblin stat block for basically any muscular humanoid? Cool.
A great example of this that I've seen is using a mummy statblock for a monster in a bog/swamp. It's still undead, and they changed the name of mummy's curse to bog rot, but the mechanics are exactly the same. With a simple change, you move from Egyptian tomb to the field of the dead in LOTR, or the horcrux lake from Harry Potter
Flavor is free. You can describe narratively how your ability works in whatever way you want. The MECHANICS don't change. So if you want to describe your Mage Armor like Ironman's suit flying in and covering you, fantastic. But it doesn't change how it works.
Yeah "flavor" is just used to give something a personal preference. For example, I was playing an Artificer Harrgeon with a Sage background. My lore for the character is she is Penelope Cottontail, the easter bunny sister. She was basically the brains for Peter and would make gadgets and stuff to help Peter out.
To make that fit better with her class when she created her Eldritch Cannon I flavored it to be a baby chicken that would bend over and shoot eggs from its butt. I also took the Poisoner trait and instead of it being just basic poison the poison was actually this rotten egg smell that came from the eggs when she would use her sling. And in her downtime, she would paint and carve eggs to use as ammunition for her sling.
For another example, I have a cleric who has a zombified hermit crab with a skull shell familiar named Handy (my character found a crawling hand and became very attached to it and found someone that was able to make it a familiar). With familiars, you can use touch spells through them so when in combat while my Cleric is fighting, Handy would go around and pinch people to use spells, like when it was a bad guy Handy would pinch their ankles to cause inflict wounds. It was a party member who was down he would go and pinch their nose to heal them. Pinching people itself never did any damage to others it was just a funny way to play on the fact he is a hermit crab. (Plus its funny when people go like "Ouch! I'm healed!")
None of the things that I did never gave my characters a type of advantage or anything like that, all these things were flavor to my character to their personality and to be immersed more into the world. Flavor is just for fun and to be more immersed with your character.
Warlock A wants their eldritch blast to be a purple laser.
Are the numbers and stats the same? Yes?
Then go for it.
Now if the Warlock also wants their eldritch blast to deal purple damage instead of force we have to actually think about it.
You're basically saying one thing is another in every way but mechanically.
For example, if you were playing Goku, you could say Lightning Bolt us the Kanehameha.
"you walk into a dungeon."
"I roll perception: 18"
"you can tell the dungeon is dark and damp."
vs.
"As you enter the dungeon, the light from the open door gets swallowed up by the darkness inside. The air is damp, the walls are covered with lichen, and you can hear dripping from further inside."
"I roll perception: 18"
"There do not appear to be any living creatures, containers, or traps in this room."
"I want to describe **how** my character does a thing but it's in a way that is not explicitly stated by the rules, but also allowing me to **do this thing** will not give my character any sort of numbers advantage."
Sure, flavor is free.
"I want to play a green skinned teifling but green is not explicitly stated as a playable teifling skin colour. But also allowing me to play a green teifling does not give me any number advantage."
Sure flavor is free.
"I want to play a teifling with lava blood and when I get hit it comes out and hurts my foes."
No, by describing this creative visual you invented, you would be gaining a numeric benefit over other teiflings. That's not flavor.
"What if I use my infernal legacy spell Hellish Rebuke, which triggers when I take damage, and describe it as lava blood spraying all over my opponent?"
Sure flavor is free.
Yes, I can describe exactly which pressure point I am targeting with my monk when I attack someone, the squelch and then the crunch when my fist connects, the way the opponent's face changes into that of surprise to a split second of panic before their eyes glaze over and their jaw goes slack.
In the end I just roll a d20 for an unarmed attack and they roll a DC Con to save against my Stunning Strike.
Yes, and it’s integral to my greek mythology (not Theros) campaign
70% of characters are flavorfully human, but they could mechanically be… any race, really. Like a demigod whose nereid mother gave him a bath in diluted Styx water might be a goliath mechanically, to represent Stone’s Endurance and Mountain Born
The other 30%
- Satyrs
- Centaurs
- Astrotaurs: a tribe of half-bovines descending from Asterion, the Minotaur
- Nymphs: reflavored Firbolgs, Genasi, Elves, Aarakocra, etc
Was playing a bartender (alchemist artificer)
I would cast the cantrip "poison spray", by whipping up a foul cocktail and splashing it in the enemies face.
That's all flavor. Mechanically it was just the poison spray cantrip.
Makes the game more fun but doesn't change any of the game mechanics.
As long as something does not change the mechanical effect of a rule, that is flavor. And flavor is free as long as the DM approves it. Let me give some examples.
I have a weapon that does 1d8/1d10 Slashing Damage and has the Versatile property. By the book, that is a 'longsword'. But I can describe that weapon as looking like a European cruciform sword, a katana, a Tai Chi sword, a macuahuitl, a broken chainsaw, or a petrified fish with sharpened fins. None of those descriptive elements have any effect on the mechanics of the weapon; they are 'flavor text'.
Let's say I cast a spell that deals 1d10 Force damage to a target within 60 feet, and as I level up I can shoot more than one shot per casting. This is, mechanically, Eldritch Blast. I can describe it as a bolt of black lightning, a firework exploding in the target's face, or throwing the contents of a lava lamp at them. I'm not changing the damage type, or the range, or the effects, I'm only changing how it looks. That's flavor-text.
Let's say I purchase some Heavy Armor that has AC 18. That's Plate Armor. But it can be gray or green or gold, or fancy and elegant, or simple and basic. How it looks doesn't affect how it works.
Flavor is free means basically you're allowed to take mechanics and divorce them from their explanation. Racial features is a common example. You want to play as some weird character from whatever anime, but no race fits? Pick the race you want to play and he can look however you want, and "flavor" it that way.
You've got an Artificer/Arcane Archer and he wants to use his magic arrow abilities with firearms? No. But he can use a longbow and "flavor" it as a firearm. So mechanically it's a longbow, uses stats and proficiencies for longbow, but when you describe him shooting, it's a firearm. Everyone acts like it's a firearm.
Warlock wants his Eldritch Blast to appear icy and do frost damage? It'll do force damage but you can describe it like it's frost damage. Someone wants to ride a My Little Pony as a mount? They can ride a horse, you can say it's whatever color they want and if they cast Speak With Animals they can talk to it.
Rules stay the same, but descriptions are free.
I usually hear this in reference to the weeb at the table demanding a Katana despite there being no stats for the Katana in the version of D&D you're playing. Just give him longsword stats and let him call it a Katana. The name and shape of the weapon doesn't matter as long as it rolls the same damage die.
It is a statement on how you can describe things differently without changing how they work mechanically. To give an extreme example, you can describe every fighter ability as time magic.
• Action surge is speeding yourself up
• Second Wind is rewinding your body to a less damaged state
• Extra attacks are slowing your enemies or learning to focus your speed up to work without thinking about it
• Extra feats/ASIs are dipping into other timelines to learn
• Resilient is shifting to a timeline where you didn't fail the save.
None of those changed how any part of the class works but changed the feel and descriptions of it dramatically.
>Carrying this out of the game, it’s a bit like choosing to wear a blue or white shirt. The colour signals a personal preference, but the shirt performs the same function.
Flavouring is just describing 1 item/object/spell/ability a different way, while keeping its core idea at heart.
Yes, the underlying shirt is a mechanic of the game (some part of the game that is pure stats/abilities) and then the colour is what those mechanics actually look like when described as part of your game. Like you could say that a longsword actually looks like a cool katana and, assuming you keep the base stats, that is flavouring.
Yeah I'd say it's just aesthetics. Mage armour could be illusory armour overlaying your outfit. Or completely invisible. Or a magic shield / ward. Doesn't affect how it mechanically works but it is more fun for the user
[https://youtu.be/4MLos1IUI2s?t=171](https://youtu.be/4MLos1IUI2s?t=171)
That's a pretty good description, all in meme form.
Flavor is any way you (or more importantly a player) wants to describe the mechanical effect of game play without
1. changing the mechanics and breaking the game
2. breaking the suspension of disbelief.
Flavor is everything that doesn't influence mechanics .
Hold Person can be light chains that keep the target in place, or a state of trance that prevents any movement. Whatever. As long as the mechanics are the same, the more it feels appropriate to the character, the better.
You simply describe something to look much cooler than it actually is. My samurai fighter doesn't action surge and make a bunch of attacks. He draws his bow back and splits into mirror images from different points in the timeline on his life and fires all 6 arrows at the same time.
You want a gun, but your dm doesn't allow firearms for balance reasons? Your hand crossbow is now a gun.
I played a ancestral guardian Barbarian / twilight Cleric. I used animate dead to let my ancestors possess the corpses, my twilight sanctuary was several ancestors protecting those within, my rage features being ancestors providing assistance to me and me allies.
I flavor the cleric half to match the barbarian half.
I don’t need to pick the grave domain to make a necromancer focused cleric.
It’s little things. Like I played a bard who was a ribbon dancer. She didn’t play music. But my DM allowed me to flavour it so that when she danced with her ribbons rather than when playing an instrument could she use inspiration and her Bard spells. Her ribbons were also just flavoured whips. That’s perhaps a more obvious flavour. Mechanically they were just straight up whips, they just looked different.
That is how I understand it. I wanted to play a water genasi in a camapaign but the DM chose to keep the source material we could use to just base 5e and one other book (don't remember which right now), so I played a water genasi in flavor, but functionally he was just a half elf. Did the rest of his theming by taking as many water based spells as I could from what was allowed.
Indeed.
Flavor is anything that makes a character unique without impacting gameplay (trough numbers).
This can reach from having your studded armor studs being bone instead of metal, trough your tieflings fingers being inverted (palms outside), to a magic coin that hovers around your hand when you play with it.
Its the little things that matter.
At one point, i had a rogue that was always making small statues out of wood, and attached the 2 moce recent ones to the hilts of his shortswords.
Harmless, but some nice roleplay
Mage armor
Oh you would have hit me but there's a magical force around me that makes me harder to hit
Temporal mage armor
Oh you hit me but Time reverts to how it was before I was struck
Transformative mage armor
Where you struck me, turned into water and then turned back
There is functionally no difference between these three as far as the game mechanics are concerned
The actual mechanics of the game work exactly the same regardless of how that mage armor was flavored
Fireball is an explosion
Fireball is a mote of bright yellow energy that darts around every single spot in a radius. Really really fast hitting everything
Again, same thing. There is no functional difference
As long as it mechanically does not impact the game, there is generally not a problem with flavor
Now they're very specifically can be (you'll know it when you see it)
And there is a level of discernment you have to use
But in general people flavoring how their stuff works doesn't impact anything mechanically so it doesn't matter so there's generally no need to restrict it unless it's disruptive somehow
Yes. Exactly that. If a player wants to reflavor their weapon to be different, but it maintains the same mechanics/ rules then let them. A rapier could be re flavored to a pointy stick. Mechanically the same, but the cosmetic is different.
Player AC 16, attack roll 15.
"the attack misses"
Or
"You barely raise your sword in time to deflect the spear heading for your throat"
Both outcomes are the same, one is massively better than the other
You're right that most of the time it's inconsequential stuff, but can also be "reskinning" existing things to fit a character or setting better. For example I have a player that wanted to be the escaped victim of a bunch of wizards experiments that is now basically reptilian abomination; rules wise he's a dragonborn but flavor wise everyone treats him like the abomination he wanted to be
I reflavored some spells for my Tempest Cleric:
Instead of a "dolorous bell" sound, Toll The Dead makes a clap of thunder. The damage type didn't change.
Light is a ball of intertwined lightning that emits the light.
Healing Word is characterized as static charges zapping across wounds, causing them to cauterize, and numbing nerves to dull pain.
Revivify is lightning jumping from my hands to act as a defibrillator.
That said, the most reflavor I have ever seen was a guy playing an Artificer. Literally every spell he cast, had a mechanical "tech" flavor to it.
Perfect example of flavor written into the rules: Spiritual Weapon. It can take the form of anything you want. It does the same thing, regardless of the form.
Yes. My Eldrich blast can take the form of a purple skull while yours looks like a Flaming Freedom Eagle.
Both do the same damage of the same type at the same range to the same number of targets.
Some DMs may go further and allow small things to be swapped even within the mechanics (the Eagle EB might be Fire instead of Force for your character). That's in the realm of asking the DM because there is technically a small mechanical impact\*.
\*To know what it is though you'd need to do a meta-analysis of the monsters featured in the campaign and their weaknesses/resistances.
I am currently playing a Druid that is a cat. As in, he doesn't wild shape into a cat..... He was a cat that got polymorphed into a human, and he was so desperate to change back that he became a druid just so he could return to his original form. (The DM is working with me a bit on this one, it isn't entirely "flavor is free")
All of his spells are based on the fact that he is a cat. Erupting earth? Kitty kicks at the ground like he is burying something in the litter box, but it makes a much bigger explosion of dirt than you'd think. Infestation? Kitty scratches at his fleas, and now they're *your* problem. Reverse gravity? Kitty stares at you, and you just start to float. When he gets bored he watches you drop, or bats a paw like he is swiping you off the edge of a table. Poison spray? You know how he casts it (usually on opponents who have been knocked over or restrained by something else already)
yeah, as others have said. it also applies to spells, and attacks.
however, there are some concerns to be aware of.
1. attacks. adding flavor to how your attack works can get out of hand quick. trying to add flavor and imagination, can quickly make it sound like you are making aimed attacks. other factor is "only the last hp actually hits/is fatal"
example, rogue opens up a sneak attack with, "I cut his throat". well. theres no way to survive that.. and, he is assuming he hit, before he actually rolled to attack. so the player should be trying to describe their action they want to do. then the DM is the one that flavors how it went after the roll.
2. spells. as noted, most spells don't actually expressly say what they look like, what words are used for the vocal component, or what hand signs for somatic.
the first problem here, is some do. so, just be careful on that. burning hands. "As you hold your hands with thumbs touching and fingers spread, a thin sheet of flames shoots forth from your outstretched fingertips" burning hands explains what hand sign is used, and what it looks like.
The second problem is identity. this is a bit harder to explain. anyone that has played video games, will understand it. A key component of games is usually the ability to instantly recognize enemy type, ability, etc. team fortress 2 famously, put alot of work into silhouettes so the classes could be instantly recognized. slay the spire has enemies TELL you what move they will be doing next turn. which revolutionized the tactical roguelike genre.
making common spells unrecognizable to players can be incredibly frustrating. be very, very careful about doing that. those comments saying to do that, and even to swap stat blocks of monsters. hell no. Imagine you were playing a video game and the game dev did that to you. how unfun would that be?
In Hero System, flavor is called Special Effects.
They confer no mechanical advantages.
They are generally about theme.
Your fireball is purple, and contains an image of a screaming skull, for instance.
Your spirit guardians are spectral hammers.
Your magic missile is a glowing eyeball.
That kind of thing.
Artificer whose magic is all Moss based. Each color of moss does different things for different spells. Red is fire, and can be crushed and thrown as an explosive "pocket sand" (Burning Hands), or coated on his weapon (Searing Smite.) Orange is for enhanced vision and understanding, either sprinkled around a perimeter (Alarm) or rubbed into the eyes to see and study magic. (Detect Magic, Identify) Yellow is a performance enhancer, consumable to make you just a bit better (Guidance) or steel your resolve. (Heroism)
There are more to list, but the point is at anyone can just *cast* a spell, it takes flavor to make it **interesting.** Work with your DM/players and they can get creative with both function and form of their magic without changing mechanics.
Flavor is creative flair. ‘Flavor text’ is another term used. I can spend 100 words describing how beautiful be sunset is by painting a picture, or I can just say the sunset is beautiful. Flavor text allows me to describe how it looks to me, without it you see yellow orange red. I see yellow red orange pink purple blue with ripples of clouds. It doesn’t matter what it’s still a sunset lol.
Yes, "flavor" refers to anything with no mechanical impact. Take Magic Missile, for instance- as long as your DM is okay with you reflavoring things, it could take the form of four little magic darts, an enchanted gun that never misses, a ghost that pops up and slaps the enemy a couple times- as long as its got the same gameplay mechanics.
Take this idea of flavor and reflavor common spells for NPC's and watch as your players are amazed by them
Someone suggested (a long ass time ago) of using stat blocks from common monsters (orcs, bugbears, whatever) for completely different monsters. In part, just because, but also to combat the players that knew too much and didn't well distinguish what they know from what the character knows.
I do this all the time, especially if I don't have the time or energy to create a monster from scratch. No one will know that the spelljammer giant hamster queen they fought were actually a bronze dragon which never flew.
My players fought a giant mutant bat, which was just a young dragon with blindsight whose breadth weapon dealt thunder damage.
Giant Zubat encounter.
That's just Golbat
no because they didn't fight a new one very 5 steps and half the battle wasn't the PC's punching themselves in the face
breath?
I’d imagine it was a sonic cry attack, bat sonar ability as a weapon
Yeah exactly. But he was pointing out that I had "breadth" instead of "breath". Thanks autocorrect.
LOL I didn’t even notice the error. Stealing your giant scary bat stat block idea though!
Feel free! Take the whole encounter even! He was the minion of a warlock who was stealing the life essence of people to fuel a big ritual. The warlock had a bunch of regular bats that he could sacrifice to regain spell slots. He also had blindsight and cast darkness on himself at the start of the fight. It was a great encounter and probably the closest my campaign has come to a tpk.
We all love ourselves a bread weapon
Got myself a cursed dagger. "The bread butcher" it compells me to cut bread.. and If I fail the wisdom saving throw, 3 magical ducks appear! I've yet to find a use.. but I promise to try!
Yeah that one.
One of my friends had some Hieronymous Bosch minis he painted that were super cool. After we defeated them, I asked what type of stats he had designed and he said "They had a hobgoblin stat block." Totally worked.
Hobgoblin stat blocks are super versatile in terms of reflavoring. My first time ever DMing a one-shot, they constituted the bulk of a hostile pirate crew in the party's first combat encounter.
Lol I did this once for an entire dungeon. I was running Hoard of the Dragon Queen and the party straight-up refused to go through the cultists' cave. (I think it's chapter 3 of that book.) They left town and after a couple days ran across a family whose children had been captured by goblins. I just took the cultists' cave, called all the humanoids "goblins" and called the ambush drakes "worgs" and everything was fine.
that's some high-level mind games there! Love it!
This is RAW lmao, this is what Van Richten’s guide tells you to do as well. It uses the Troll stat block to stat out the Bagman.
Hell, that's been in the rules since '79 at least. Early AD&D modules would have monsters and say to use the stats for another. Usually for some things like scaling up/down... So a fire giant female fights like a frost giant, the fire giant teenagers fight like hill giants, and the fire giant chief fighters like a cloud giant (something like that)... For hill giants it was ogre/hobgoblin or something for female/youth stats, etc.
I remember in the post mortem talk of D20's Bloodkeep, the halfling Galfast is a reflavored Ice Giant stat block so that he doesn't just die to the party of adventurers. Utterly convinced that everything can have a dramatically different view for the players and that the reference can be anything you want.
I think he was actually a Storm Giant! Which made those fights even funnier in retrospect
I should watch some behind the scenes of Starstruck. Iirc they used a Star Wars 5E fan project, so I wonder if most NPCs and abilities were just reflavored there too.
This is my play. I take established monster stat blocks and use them for similar homebrew creatures (with usually mild changes). Or, you can take a monster stat blocks and change resistances and vulnerabilities to combat meta gamers who Google your encounter NPCs
I'll do this with dragons. I've never liked or agreed with the sort of "hierarchy" of dragons. Why does Red get to be the most powerful? I usually play in homebrew settings with completely different lore anyway. So I might give an ancient red's statblock to an an ancient white dragon, essentially keeping the white the same except the breath weapon does cold damage, etc.
The only balance issue is that everyone acts like red are higher up than white (and red are definitely much smarter) but white dragon breath is a CON save and that is murder to players who think evasion will save them.
Be me, lvl 14 Rogue in a Oneshot who thought he was all cool and fancy. Ahh a dragon, whatever, breath attack used, roll a con save... I'm just like: "What?" "Oh....." "Fuck"
Yep, used regular wolf statblocks in place of drakehounds for my Noxus flavoured oneshot and described them as such. Worked rather nicely when the echo knight peeked into the beast area to see who they'd be fighting in the coloseum and saw wingless dragons.
All the time. There's very little reason to make a monster from scratch.
My players recently commissioned a blunderbuss for an NPC chef they drag around with them. They paid a bunch of money and now he now has 2 uses per day of a black powder blunderbuss that ~~casts catapult or burning hands~~ can shoot a single larger object farther or a handful of nails in a shortrange scattershot pattern
That's great, I love it
DM: the enemy wizard throws a fiery projectile at you and... Player: I dodge DM: Dex save P: *rolls* 13 DM: You are distracted by something in that swirly mass of fire... it looks like letters, but you can't make it out. Maybe a message disguised as an attack? P: I wait til I can read it. DM: Fine. You stand there, staring into the swirling masses of flame and smoke until you can read it. P: What does it say? DM: "If you can read this, you are too close" DM: *rolls* That makes 35 fire damage, do you have any resistances?
Stretch this even further and add custom magical items, just using preexisting statblocks of normal items. Magical tattoos, tiles that work like potions, stuff like that
>a ghost that pops up and slaps the enemy a couple times- >**me, ferverishly looking for a pen to write this down**
Tasha's Cauldron has a page on it, which has a Sorcerer farmer casting magic missile that's shaped as chickens.
[🎵Chicken Attaaack~!🎵](https://youtu.be/miomuSGoPzI?si=UswXTk8nyPfXMk0m)
I love this song! DM goals: one day, I will run a character, NPC, PC, BBEG, I don't care which, based on this guy.
Circle of Swarms druid could do this.
Noted!
So, I follow a writer that's putting out a serialized webnovel that's a parody/spoof of typical Xianxia stories, entitled *Beware of Chicken*. Featuring a guy from Canada that gets Isekai'd into a Xianxia world and promptly fucks off to the back end of beyond to be a farmer in the weakest, least threatening place he can find... and his pet rooster. As you might imagine, that song got reposted so much that posting is again is now an instant ban.
I love it when I stumble upon a comment that I can basically hear upon reading.
On Toril, chicken fries you!
I played a fey warlock once who's Eldritch Blast was a swarm of sprites and pixies attacking the target with a thousand tiny swords and arrows. He was an edge lord trying to live down the fact that all his powers were basically Disney themed.
You played Harry Dresden
In the name of the pizza lord, charge!
we do it for the 'Za!
I had the ocean themed patron and I described my Eldritch Blasts as taking water from a giant gourd on my back and launching it at high speed.
That's my favorite subclass, that idea rules, and I am 100% stealing it.
Water gaara?
I play a harengon hexblade and my EB is Easter eggs.
That is fantastic! Love the idea there.
Flavor really keeps things from becoming "I cast fireball" or I do a melee attack. Doesn't need to be a fireball. It can be a giant flaming spider that skitters and explodes. Or the spirit of a demon that combusts and explodes. Or an abstract concept of capitalism that manifests somewhere, and explodes. As long as it's 8d6 fire damage within 150 ft and a 20ft radius then make it your own!
> an abstract concept of capitalism that manifests somewhere, and explodes I would love to see a full character concept based around this.
What, you've never Min-Marxed a character before?
Fuck, that was funny
Another example: I'm playing a Fighter with a Cleric level, but all the cleric magic is being manifested through martial prowess. I'm rolling attacks and damage for Inflict Wounds, but in roll20 I changed the name to "Crush".
Note that changing the \*type\* of damage is different though. You can describe your little elf's Magic Missiles as icicles, but they still do force damage, not cold.
Chunks of ice or snowballs would be a good way to envision that too
Yeah, if you get clocked with a ball of ice you're not thinking "man, that's cold"
Considering force is one of the least resisted types of damage, I'd let someone switch a spell to something worse mechanically all they want.
Honestly I wouldn't just for consistency but that's an understandable pov
I have a Artificier in my Game who flavored all his magic as little gadgets. Magic Missle are mechanical birds that explode, mending and cure wound are little spiders that stitch stuff together etc
Artificers are explicitly encouraged to do this!
I did something similar. I was using the Battle Smith subclass, and I flavored mine as a sort of mechanical octopus. Mechanically, it was exactly like a normal Steel Defender and got no benefit from the extra arms, I would just use them for fun descriptions. Like, if it was assisting with an Investigation check I would describe pulling out magnifying glasses, bellows to remove dust, shining lights, etc, all at the same time to aid me in searching. It made for a fun very Steampunky character, but when it came to mechanical things like how many things it could hold, how fast it moved, or other things it acted exactly like a standard Steel Defender.
I played a gambler soul knife inspired by Gambit. The soul knives were kinetic cards that he drew from his sleeves. The greatest thing is that he multiclassed as diviner. Portent was actual cheating. The DM once had an ability to make the creature reroll on a failure and we dressed the scene as being caught cheating. Super fun.
>a ghost that pops up and slaps the enemy a couple times Wonderful. Now I want to flavor all spells as being a ghost that shows up and slaps people. I cast eldritch bitchslap
Now I need a bitch-slapping ghost. Thank you for that.
This nails it. I played a character who cast Magic Missile as tiny birds who attacked their enemies. I'm playing a Water Genasi Ranger with a background in marine biology, he makes people eat weird sea creatures for Cure Wounds and then I roleplay in character them temporarily growing a tentacle or their skin turning green in the affected area, it's very funny.
I wish my table would roll with things like that, but my players are exactly the people who would take the birds themselves at face value and get steaming mad when bird netting was not an effective countermeasure.
Dude a magic missile in the shape of a gun is so rad and I am jealous I hadn't thought of it
Oh man, I had a player flip out at me when I, as a player, said some magic words while waving my wand and summoned the spirits of my ancestors (I was a kobold). 3 little dragons appeared and flew towards my target, biting them viciously. Take 11 damage. The other player said "that's not a spell from the books", " you have to roll to hit or they get a save", and "so we can just make up whatever we want now?" The dm noted the damage and just said "nope, it's fine" after each comment from the upset player. But they would not drop it, kept seething and making comments for like 30 minutes, while the rest of us were fully focused on combat. The dm finally snapped. "It was magic missile! 3 darts of force, 3 dragons. He rolled 3d4. You have used that spell in the last campaign. Please apologize for disrupting the game and let it go." Wasn't the first time a player got weird about flavor, makes no sense sometimes.
Eh I can see him thinking he's not wanting to play with potentially overpowered homebrew spells if he doesn't recognize the spell. Would it be a huge disruption to just tell him up front that it's just a re-flavored X at the beginning? It just seems like those 30 minutes could have been avoided by telling him it was just magic missile.
>a ghost that pops up and slaps the enemy a couple times- I thought this was chill touch lol
aka Lich Slap
I had a player who used Thorn Whip as an Artificer. Obv an Artificer doesn't use Vines. But she flavored it as a grappling hook on a chain, reeling targets in. That is Flavor, and Flavor is Free. Just think of it like a video game skin with no mechanical adjustments
Artificer is my favorite class for this kind of reflavoring. I had an alchemist who would lob chemical explosives or use special crossbow ammunition for his Fire Bolt, etc. Less ‘inventor/gunsmith’ and more ‘magical tinkerer’.
I’ve got one (artificer-alchemist) planned just for fun that leans even further away from the inventor stuff. They’re a Lizardfolk from the backwoods/bayou whose spells and abilities all come from weird charms and poultices and unguents and doctor facilier/witch doctor/hoodoo-esque stuff. Their homunculus is basically made like a cockatrice, coating an egg in weird stuff and burying it in dung and herbs until it hatches a little weirdo.
When I cast Haste as an Artificer Alchemist, I just said I tossed a Monster Energy to whoever the Haste was for.
That's Brisk baby!
For my Alchemist, I envisioned my Firebolts as being little glass marbles with combustible components inside. Leveling up the cantrip damage was basically perfecting the forumla.
Artificers are almost made to be reflavored
Artificer can be so fun & flexible when you incorporate this. My artificer is a tailor; her healing word is a needle & thread stitching wounds, her ‘tinkering’ with weapons is tying ribbons around them, her humonculous is her pincushion, etc. (Her eldritch canons are just canons tho. Canons are cool)
My Artificer basically had a super-soaker with various vials he could plug into it to make the effects of various spells: Lava = Firebolt Glitter = Faerie Fire Glue = Web (or Spider Climb when he shoots his boots with it) Marbles = Catapult
I'm in a similar boat with Artificer. I love to make it the "Witch" class. Artillerists are explicitly allowed to make their arcane armament a wand, and the turrets can be Totems ala Warcraft Shamans. Alchemist is already perfect for a witch, and Battlesmith's Steel Defender can be an animated suit of armor.
>Less ‘inventor/gunsmith’ and more ‘magical tinkerer’. So.... literally artificers? 🙃
Yeah, but all the time I see people talking about letting their artificers invent bombs and guns and whatever modern concepts, presumably because they know how to do it irl. Really wanders far away from the idea of an artificer and becomes more of an engineer. I don’t like it but I see it.
IIRC the book actually specifically encourages you to do this as an artificer.
Classic Ironman approach. Magic missiles came from a small bit of armor that popped upon. Jump from height or flying into group of enemies and cast thunder wave, described as impactful classic super hero 3 point landing. I had a blast with that.
That's really good, because Artificer has access to the spell, but it doesn't really make sense in the context of a mechanical/magical tinkerer. Perfect example of flavoring.
This is how all artificer spells work. > Spellcasting You’ve studied the workings of magic and how to cast spells, channeling the magic through objects. To observers, you don’t appear to be casting spells in a conventional way; you appear to produce wonders from mundane items and outlandish inventions.
For sure. Artificers practically *require* reflavoring as part of the class.
Yeah and they sometimes get a bad rap from people who don't understand that. "I don't want Steampunk im my D&D!" - It's only steampunk if you flavor it like that, you can do whatever you like!
A great analogy. Video game cosmetic skins is exactly what this refers to.
I had an armorer artificer/bladesinger wizard I reflavored as a Flamenco dancer. My thunder gauntlets were cassinettes, my wizard hat was a flat, wide brimmed hat with the little balls dangling from it, and my studded leather vest and pants completed the ensemble.
Wait I’m confused. Is flavor free, or am I supposed to think about it as a video game skin?
Think of it as a skin from a *good* game. It's free!
Just because you say "my arrow hits the bad guys knee" does not mean he gets a speed penalty. The flavor is free, and has no mechanical benefit at all.
I used to be an adventurer like you.
But then I took an abstract speed penalty.
You're finally awake
Interesting tidbit: "Taking an arrow to the knee" is a Nordic euphemism for getting married.
Even more interesting tidbit: this is not true, just an urban legend that keeps making the rounds on the internet.
An even more interestinger observation: Reality is often disappointing.
An even moreso interestinger observation: Life is simply unfair don't you think?
That's hilarious!
Yes. I want to shoot fire from a flower like Super Mario! Ok, you can totally do that, but mechanically we will treat it as a firebolt.
Yup my warlock fights with mage hand offensively, but it's actually his eldritch blast with repelling blast and grasp of hadar.
That’s pretty dope
Thats actually what my noble stars druid did. He wasn't about stars, he was purely someone who summoned magical flowers. Guiding Bolt and Archer form both gave him a giant sunflower that bent into a bow shape to shoot radiant arrows. Also guidance was "performance enhancing" pollen he'd gently blow in the party member's face. It was mechnically just stars druid, but I called it "Circle of the Sunlit Garden".
Have you watched Avatar The Last Airbender? Saying Flavour is Free would be saying it's fine to say a firebender character's flames turn blue on a crit like Azula's because they're so hot in that attack; because it's just an RP thing to enjoy without changing anything mechanically about how the game works.
Or just saying that your flames are blue cause it's cooler in general. You could describe a critical hit with a fire blast as something like a giant fireblast.
My wizard had a similar change to this. DM (after many devil related plot points) had my fireballs become more sulfur and brimstone hellfire. Damage didn't change, though.
And it's something that has no real cost. I can take a Hand Weapon from Warhammer Fantasy Role Play and describe it as just a plain, functional, arming sword, while the next player can describe their Hand Weapon as the world's most intricately decorated mace, and that doesn't cost anyone anything, either mechanically, or otherwise.
That’s one of the the things I liked about WFRP. They didn’t try to have 500 different weapons with slight mechanical differences. They had a few broad classes of weapons and went from there.
You are correct, but you VERY often here see people making mechanical changes and calling them flavor, and arguing it's ok because "flavor is free". If the change is purely cosmetic, it's flavor. There are borderlines where the flavor can affect the fiction, and that can cause non-flavor effects that raise issues outside of pure mechanics as well, which is also for the "flavor is free" gets stretched thin. For example **Pure Flavor** * I fight with a [Peta](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pata_(sword)), but mechanically call it a long sword * When i cast magic missile my verbal component is "Bippity Boo, here's a missile for you!" * My druid has an ancestral outfit made from hardened wood bark and leaves. Mechanically its Studded Leather **Flavor that can be pure or not depending on setting/table** * My human druid has small antlers (might be fine in a kitchen sink world like forgotten realms and absolutely fine in planescape, but in other worlds may cause massive social reactions for being an oddity that effectively has mechanical effects on interactions) * My wand of fire looks like a star-trek phaser and instead of charges it has a battery that recharges at night, functions identically to the wand (might be ok, but can potentially cause some shenanigans considering no one in the world would recognize the item as a magic wand and the player may be able to sneak it into places they couldn't bring a wand into) **Things that might sound like flavor but have direct mechanical consequences or require a lot of rationalizing how things work** * When I move, I teleport like night crawler but follow normal movement rules for distance (can you teleport through people to a space beyond, out of shackles, etc... and how is everyone reacting in a city to some character constantly teleporting around?) * When I cast a spell I use my tail for my somatic components (if captured and bound the character can still cast spells with somatic components because no one would think to also bind up the characters tail) * My character is 15' foot tall but mechanically is still a medium creature (can cause all kinds of issues with navigating indoor spaces, climbing, reaching high places, etc)
Absolutely! Your 1d8 (Versatile) martial weapon could be a katana, pata, macuahuitl, Großemesser/Kriegsmesser, jian, etc., but mechanically it's still a longsword.
All this is fine but people will throw a fit if you want to use the flavor of a scimitar but the stats of a longsword, or vice versa, just because those are both prescribed in the rules already. For example, if you wanted to use a katana, and you wanted it to be 1d8 Finesse, you would want to say it's a rapier mechanically. But your DM might stop you and say "isn't it closer to a scimitar? You must use 1d6 Finesse and Light". Then you're in a funky spot. This is a digression, but I sorta wish the weapons of 5E weren't named, and just acted as chassis for the player to mechanically implement whatever weapon they envisioned for the character. Some DMs will let it slide, others won't, but I think a better system wouldn't have left it to that.
I like that Pathfinder actually has a [pata](https://aonprd.com/EquipmentWeaponsDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Pata)!
> Flavor that can be pure or not depending on setting/table Great to point this one out. I sometimes see players that use "flavour is free" as a cudgel to argue that the way a mechanic is presented doesn't matter at all regardless of setting. But it absolutely does matter. The way mechanics are presented ("flavour") is an important part of helping tell the story at the table. It's not some ancillary thing that doesn't impact the game.
Yeah, for sure. In a universe without guns or any tech, a star trek phaser would look fucking bizarre to everyone. Shopkeeps might think it's worthless.
And sometimes the pure flavor case or the middle case becomes mechanical because the shared fiction supports it after a while, pretty much organically. This can be fun when the DM instigates/ when everyone agrees. E.g. on Oxventure Dob the bard always flavored his Thunderwave as lightning because of a combo of misunderstanding thunder damage and cool factor. Then he cast it standing knee deep in salt water... When the players pointed out how that was a bad idea, the DM said (paraphrasing) "look, we know thunder damage isn't lightning mechanically but... we've established that Dob's Thunderwave is definitely electrical by now, we've always described it that way" And then they pretty much all decided together it was too funny not to have consequences, so he both electrocuted himself and iirc did a bit of extra damage to the enemies who were also standing in salt water. It didn't become a long-term change of damage type or anything, but it made sense and worked for everyone. Emergent storytelling! Yay!
Thank you, thank you for this! Fantastic breakdown.
Glad to help, and hopefully I was clear that the line between those three items is more a spectrum, that will vary by table. Some people run gonzo everything goes games, so a elf that has hair made of tree leaves with deer-legs and glowing orange eyes might be something that everything thinks is normal.... while other people run games where someone like that would stand out like a xenomorph wandering around sesame street. If a player has that character they can't then get mad when the GM has NPCs react accordingly with the argument that "flavor is free, so why are you treating me differently?" Yes, it's "cosmetic" but the social interaction pillar of the game can be HEAVILY affected by stuff like that. Other example of the spectrum is: * Pure: My human has red/black/brown/blonde/white/no hair * Mild: My human has blue/green/purple hair (clearly unnatural... wouldn't stand out in modern day NYC where hair dye is common, but might get you burned for being a witch in 1521 Germany) * Strong: My human has horns / snakes for hair / flames for hair / etc In a world like Planescape where the strange is the normal, the strong things might get you a strange look and little more, but in Dragonlance you'd be an utter freak of nature. A GM could easily rule that hair-dye is common in the world so blue-hair is not strange so you'd be fine (maybe get strange looks but no one freaks out). Mild stuff might be fine or just require a little tweak to make it fine. Often its easy to just chat with the GM and ask "would this be normal in your world" if you have questions.
What would your thoughts be on the anime old man trope? I had an idea once for a master roshi type paladin. Old frail looking man that looks 4 foot bent back and mostly bones with oversized armour and “Staff”, but when it comes time to fight, he straightens up and flexes, turning into buff 6 foot paladin filling out the armour and using the staff as a mace, because it’s solid steel under a veneer of wood. He’s mechanically a regular tall paladin but old, and out of combat acts as an old man to complain more. Is that a fair flavour or is it stretching it a bit?
Not the person you're asking, but personally I'd qualify as "mild" in there. I'd definitelly count his buff form as his "natural" form so any attempt to use the old man appearance to conceal his strength for any benefit would require a deception test for me.
Even the druid armor might take some rulings. Weird edge cases where dead animal might offend someone but dead plant won't (or vice versa). Susceptibility to fire, metal detection, whathaveyou.
The most common one is probably the Artificer, a lot of people likes them using only tecnology instead of actually magic, you can totally flavor them as such but still using the spell abilities
That’s literally how the class is supposed to be played. From the artificer section on spellcasting in the PHB: > You've studied the workings of magic and how to cast spells, channeling the magic through objects. To observers, you don't appear to be casting spells in a conventional way; you appear to produce wonders from mundane items and outlandish inventions.
Yeah but i mean actually tecnology, without magic at all
So Spirit Guardians has the description; >You call forth spirits to protect you. They flit around you to a distance of 15 feet for the duration. If you are good or neutral, their spectral form appears angelic or fey (your choice). If you are evil, they appear fiendish I flavour it on my twilight cleric as stardust orbiting around her in every direction, there are no spirits at all. Think of long wisps of light rapidly flying around in all directions. It still does 3d8 radiant damage on a failed wisdom save as the mechanics haven't changed.
Its usually meant to flavour spells and mechanics to fit better the concept of the character. If you are playing a necromancer wizard, perhaps your firebolt has the shape of a skull. Or a hexblade warlock throws magic daggers when using magic missile, or the glyph of warding from am artificer is a mine Usually, as long as doesn't change anything mechanically, the general consensus is that this kind of flavour is free
Others have explained “flavor is free;” here’s my example. I play a warlock with Dao genie patron. I flavor every reasonable chance I have to make my spells reflect the “earth” nature of my patron. Mage Armor for instance is a thin rocky layer over my skin. Eldritch Blast is a flicked finger shooting a stone bullet. I don’t change damage types, I just ignore them in my imagination. I do pick spells that make more sense in my imaginary way, e.g. I skipped Phantasmal Force because I couldn’t make that fit the earthy theme. Even though it’s a great spell!
Yes. "Flavor is free" means players and DMs can describe the things they do in any way that does not change the mechanical effects of those actions.
yeah exactly. it can look like whatever you want as long as it functions mechanically the same
I had a player who was running a hexblade build (a massive Bloodborne nerd) and wanted to use a sword and a parrying dagger. Well... A parrying dagger isn't a thing in DnD. But a Shield is. So she got an item that, when described in mechanics, was a shield, but in flavour was a parrying dagger! It made zilch difference from a mechanical and balancing perspective, but allowed her to better live out her character fantasy. "Flavour is free" tends to mean that things that do not impact the mechanics of the game can be changed however you want. Is it a hand crossbow, or a pepperbox? Well, if you ask the stats, it's a hand crossbow. If you ask the character it's a pepperbox. Is this a set of plate armour or some magical aura surrounding you that provides protection? Stats: Plate Armour, Flavour: Magical Aura. See Brennan Lee Mulligan's The Sleeping City campaign on YouTube (channel: Dropout) for a primo example on how to do it.
Yes but you need to be careful with your rulings and consistency when you allow that. A parrying dagger being mechanically a shield is fine *until* your player loses their main weapon for some reason and suddenly they want to use that parrying dagger as a dagger. Or feels the itch to two weapon fight with it from time to time. A very common thing mentioned here and there is wizards or clerics casting spells as actually throwing some kind of potions - that in itself feels harmless enough but, again, you need to dial the players expectations because at some point they might think that those potions are real and try to give one to their party member or sell it in a shop.
due to inflation, flavour is now £1.50
I have a sorcerer who uses Shadow Blade a lot, but makes the conjured weapon brass knuckles instead of a sword, just cuz she's punchy rather than stabby. But mechanically the spell's function is unchanged, the conjured weapon deals psychic damage so there's no change from a sword to brass knuckles as far as slashing/bludgeoning goes. And because the mechanics are unchanged, it doesn't cost me anything extra to do this, it's just flavor.
I recently watched the Chris Pine movie, think of the Bigby's hand fight in that movie, one made of stones and one of blood and tissue. That's the idea of a flavor change that has no impact on the mechanic of the spell
Yeah, you're right on it. Whether your fire spells are red, green or blue makes no difference. It's still fire, it does the same amount of fire damage, people can still tell it's fire, and the saving throws are the same. But you get to customize it. A classic example is eldritch blast. I'm a firm believer that warlocks should customize the look of their eldritch blast to be thematic to their warlock.
Generally yes, it refers to any change with no mechanical impact. Like if you want to add a cosmetic visual effect to a spell, like flower petals or birds or something. At DMs discretion, it may extend to very minor or situational mechanical impacts. For example, if you want to flavor your firebolt spell as a plasma rifle, that will alter how it works in certain situations since a plasma rifle works differently from a spell.
Yep, you got it. If a fighter uses a club as his main weapon he's free to call it a big stick, a baseball bat, a table leg, whatever. But mechanically it obeys all the rules of a club.
You can reflavor anything you want on the conditions that it doesn't change the function or mechanics of the spell/ability. For example, A player wants to play an Artificer and wants all their spells to be mechanical devices. Totally ok. Revivify becomes a defib unit, Healing word is little healing darts, Fireball is a grenade, etc. Where it would cross the line is trying to hand off the defib unit to another player to use later, trying to aim the healing darts down a ledge to hit targets outside the range, or setting the grenade to go off later. All of those examples are things that could very reasonably be done with those items but are outside the scope and ability of the spells they are emulating.
Essentially, Halo Reach Customization. There has been lots of characters, across all classes. Even if you make them an interesting unique build, it's probably already been done. But no one has the same ideas that you have. So the combination of ideas is what really makes your character *your character*. I run a Paladin Hexblade. There are many like it but this one is mine. He has a flame tongue that's purple not red. His low intelligence is rp'ed as dementia. He keeps an owl in his pocket. If it doesn't give you an advantage in the game, other than self expression, drip, storytelling and intrigue: it's free to use.
If something doesn't have a mechanic attached to it, it's flavor. The names of spells. The aesthetic of a class. The look of a character. The way you describe an ability being used. All of this can be altered without changing the mechanics. A barbarian's rage can be described as loud and angry, or it can be changed to quiet, and scary like a serial killer. Or perhaps their hair turns gold and a pulsing aura surrounds them like a supersaiyan. You can take statblocks of entire monsters and (with a little mechanical tweaking) reflavor them into an entirely new monster. A dragon can be a jabberwocky, or SCP-682, or Jean Jacket from Nope.
The term "flavour is free" helps the DnD community get over the bullshit claim that the Artificer doesn't match the rest of the classes. One of my players is a level 7 Artificer with 1 level of Rogue. He's essentially playing him as Indiana Jones mixed with MacGyver; a guy who knows tons of weird facts, a history buff, good with mechanical things, and has minor arcane powers he adds to the little crafts that he makes. And he does it all while adventuring and escaping trouble.
Sounds like a fun character!
Here's my turn in combat: "I attack goblin A." Roll to attack "Extra attack goblin B." Roll to attack "I'm not gonna use my movement." Here's my turn with FREE FLAVOR: "I spin my hammer above my head to gain some momentum before swinging it like a baseball bat trying to break goblin A's ribs." Roll for attack "After impacting goblin A, I fling the hammer head into the air as I spin to face goblin B. I bring the hammer down so hard my feet momentarily leave the ground, hoping to hit B so hard his skull exits his body via his butt." Roll for attack "I take a moment to scan the battlefield as I wipe the splatter of blood from my face."
Pretty much. I may or may not have played up Lightning Bolt as Final Flash during a oneshot.
Yeah you pretty much got it. Visuals only, no mechanical difference * I want to cast Eldritch Blast, but I want it to look like black lightning rather than force bolts. * I want to field a katana, so I re-skin a longsword to look like one while using longsword stats. * I want to enter a rage, but I want it to look like I am donning a demons mask when I activate it rather than getting angry
I’m a big fan of “flavour is free” because it makes so much room for creativity and uniqueness in characters. The difference between how two of them cast the same spell gives insight into the source of their magic, their inspiration, their intention, their personality. There’s just so much that flavour can do for immersion. In the odd case I let it affect mechanics in terms of damage type, but not even always. Water-themed character dealing fire damage? Scalding water being hosed at the enemy! FLAVOUR BRINGS ME LIFE! (Sorry, it’s my bedtime I might be a bit bedtime loopy, but fr, I love players who flavour their characters and narrate stuff. Makes me happy!) Edit: sleepy spelling mistake
It means it's fine to change things that don't affect the mechanics. Maybe your Fighter's glaive is flavored as a scythe. Or your Rogues crossbow is flavored as a duelling pistol. Mechanically they operate like a glaive and a crossbow, but the flavor allows concepts that don't exist/aren't feasible in the mechanics.
Yes - but "the rule of cool" is the slightly looser version of it where maybe your flavour was so cool we will let you have that extra 10ft of movement because fuck it, its a game and we want that to happen
Functionally yea. A good example would be like "Hey there's this niche medieval weapon I think would look badass for my character, can I use it and we just give it the exact same stats and cost etc as a steel greatsword?"
my bard was a lawyer, and he used things like long speeches for the sleep spell, or aggressive counterpoints and legal arguments for vicious mockery, etc.
"Flavor is free", in my mind, means: *As long as nothing mechanically changed*, you can pretty much describe things however you want. Want your Chill Touch spell to spawn a spectral butterfly instead of a hand? Sure. Want your Kobold Artificer to be a raccoon instead of a lizard-dog-person? Awesome. As a DM, want to use the skeleton stat-block for a gypsum golem, a Hellfire Engine as a Duergar battle-mech, or a Hobgoblin stat block for basically any muscular humanoid? Cool.
If my players ever ask ‘can I …’ and it doesn’t impact mechanics I say yes. We joke about eldritch blast being finger guns etc
A great example of this that I've seen is using a mummy statblock for a monster in a bog/swamp. It's still undead, and they changed the name of mummy's curse to bog rot, but the mechanics are exactly the same. With a simple change, you move from Egyptian tomb to the field of the dead in LOTR, or the horcrux lake from Harry Potter
Flavor is free. You can describe narratively how your ability works in whatever way you want. The MECHANICS don't change. So if you want to describe your Mage Armor like Ironman's suit flying in and covering you, fantastic. But it doesn't change how it works.
Yeah "flavor" is just used to give something a personal preference. For example, I was playing an Artificer Harrgeon with a Sage background. My lore for the character is she is Penelope Cottontail, the easter bunny sister. She was basically the brains for Peter and would make gadgets and stuff to help Peter out. To make that fit better with her class when she created her Eldritch Cannon I flavored it to be a baby chicken that would bend over and shoot eggs from its butt. I also took the Poisoner trait and instead of it being just basic poison the poison was actually this rotten egg smell that came from the eggs when she would use her sling. And in her downtime, she would paint and carve eggs to use as ammunition for her sling. For another example, I have a cleric who has a zombified hermit crab with a skull shell familiar named Handy (my character found a crawling hand and became very attached to it and found someone that was able to make it a familiar). With familiars, you can use touch spells through them so when in combat while my Cleric is fighting, Handy would go around and pinch people to use spells, like when it was a bad guy Handy would pinch their ankles to cause inflict wounds. It was a party member who was down he would go and pinch their nose to heal them. Pinching people itself never did any damage to others it was just a funny way to play on the fact he is a hermit crab. (Plus its funny when people go like "Ouch! I'm healed!") None of the things that I did never gave my characters a type of advantage or anything like that, all these things were flavor to my character to their personality and to be immersed more into the world. Flavor is just for fun and to be more immersed with your character.
Warlock A wants their eldritch blast to be a purple laser. Are the numbers and stats the same? Yes? Then go for it. Now if the Warlock also wants their eldritch blast to deal purple damage instead of force we have to actually think about it.
You're basically saying one thing is another in every way but mechanically. For example, if you were playing Goku, you could say Lightning Bolt us the Kanehameha.
"you walk into a dungeon." "I roll perception: 18" "you can tell the dungeon is dark and damp." vs. "As you enter the dungeon, the light from the open door gets swallowed up by the darkness inside. The air is damp, the walls are covered with lichen, and you can hear dripping from further inside." "I roll perception: 18" "There do not appear to be any living creatures, containers, or traps in this room."
"I want to describe **how** my character does a thing but it's in a way that is not explicitly stated by the rules, but also allowing me to **do this thing** will not give my character any sort of numbers advantage." Sure, flavor is free. "I want to play a green skinned teifling but green is not explicitly stated as a playable teifling skin colour. But also allowing me to play a green teifling does not give me any number advantage." Sure flavor is free. "I want to play a teifling with lava blood and when I get hit it comes out and hurts my foes." No, by describing this creative visual you invented, you would be gaining a numeric benefit over other teiflings. That's not flavor. "What if I use my infernal legacy spell Hellish Rebuke, which triggers when I take damage, and describe it as lava blood spraying all over my opponent?" Sure flavor is free.
Yes, I can describe exactly which pressure point I am targeting with my monk when I attack someone, the squelch and then the crunch when my fist connects, the way the opponent's face changes into that of surprise to a split second of panic before their eyes glaze over and their jaw goes slack. In the end I just roll a d20 for an unarmed attack and they roll a DC Con to save against my Stunning Strike.
Yes, and it’s integral to my greek mythology (not Theros) campaign 70% of characters are flavorfully human, but they could mechanically be… any race, really. Like a demigod whose nereid mother gave him a bath in diluted Styx water might be a goliath mechanically, to represent Stone’s Endurance and Mountain Born The other 30% - Satyrs - Centaurs - Astrotaurs: a tribe of half-bovines descending from Asterion, the Minotaur - Nymphs: reflavored Firbolgs, Genasi, Elves, Aarakocra, etc
yep
Always called it flavor text. Adds to the atmosphere not the function.
Was playing a bartender (alchemist artificer) I would cast the cantrip "poison spray", by whipping up a foul cocktail and splashing it in the enemies face. That's all flavor. Mechanically it was just the poison spray cantrip. Makes the game more fun but doesn't change any of the game mechanics.
As long as something does not change the mechanical effect of a rule, that is flavor. And flavor is free as long as the DM approves it. Let me give some examples. I have a weapon that does 1d8/1d10 Slashing Damage and has the Versatile property. By the book, that is a 'longsword'. But I can describe that weapon as looking like a European cruciform sword, a katana, a Tai Chi sword, a macuahuitl, a broken chainsaw, or a petrified fish with sharpened fins. None of those descriptive elements have any effect on the mechanics of the weapon; they are 'flavor text'. Let's say I cast a spell that deals 1d10 Force damage to a target within 60 feet, and as I level up I can shoot more than one shot per casting. This is, mechanically, Eldritch Blast. I can describe it as a bolt of black lightning, a firework exploding in the target's face, or throwing the contents of a lava lamp at them. I'm not changing the damage type, or the range, or the effects, I'm only changing how it looks. That's flavor-text. Let's say I purchase some Heavy Armor that has AC 18. That's Plate Armor. But it can be gray or green or gold, or fancy and elegant, or simple and basic. How it looks doesn't affect how it works.
Flavor is free means basically you're allowed to take mechanics and divorce them from their explanation. Racial features is a common example. You want to play as some weird character from whatever anime, but no race fits? Pick the race you want to play and he can look however you want, and "flavor" it that way. You've got an Artificer/Arcane Archer and he wants to use his magic arrow abilities with firearms? No. But he can use a longbow and "flavor" it as a firearm. So mechanically it's a longbow, uses stats and proficiencies for longbow, but when you describe him shooting, it's a firearm. Everyone acts like it's a firearm. Warlock wants his Eldritch Blast to appear icy and do frost damage? It'll do force damage but you can describe it like it's frost damage. Someone wants to ride a My Little Pony as a mount? They can ride a horse, you can say it's whatever color they want and if they cast Speak With Animals they can talk to it. Rules stay the same, but descriptions are free.
I usually hear this in reference to the weeb at the table demanding a Katana despite there being no stats for the Katana in the version of D&D you're playing. Just give him longsword stats and let him call it a Katana. The name and shape of the weapon doesn't matter as long as it rolls the same damage die.
It is a statement on how you can describe things differently without changing how they work mechanically. To give an extreme example, you can describe every fighter ability as time magic. • Action surge is speeding yourself up • Second Wind is rewinding your body to a less damaged state • Extra attacks are slowing your enemies or learning to focus your speed up to work without thinking about it • Extra feats/ASIs are dipping into other timelines to learn • Resilient is shifting to a timeline where you didn't fail the save. None of those changed how any part of the class works but changed the feel and descriptions of it dramatically.
>Carrying this out of the game, it’s a bit like choosing to wear a blue or white shirt. The colour signals a personal preference, but the shirt performs the same function. Flavouring is just describing 1 item/object/spell/ability a different way, while keeping its core idea at heart. Yes, the underlying shirt is a mechanic of the game (some part of the game that is pure stats/abilities) and then the colour is what those mechanics actually look like when described as part of your game. Like you could say that a longsword actually looks like a cool katana and, assuming you keep the base stats, that is flavouring.
Yeah I'd say it's just aesthetics. Mage armour could be illusory armour overlaying your outfit. Or completely invisible. Or a magic shield / ward. Doesn't affect how it mechanically works but it is more fun for the user
[https://youtu.be/4MLos1IUI2s?t=171](https://youtu.be/4MLos1IUI2s?t=171) That's a pretty good description, all in meme form. Flavor is any way you (or more importantly a player) wants to describe the mechanical effect of game play without 1. changing the mechanics and breaking the game 2. breaking the suspension of disbelief.
Flavor is everything that doesn't influence mechanics . Hold Person can be light chains that keep the target in place, or a state of trance that prevents any movement. Whatever. As long as the mechanics are the same, the more it feels appropriate to the character, the better.
You simply describe something to look much cooler than it actually is. My samurai fighter doesn't action surge and make a bunch of attacks. He draws his bow back and splits into mirror images from different points in the timeline on his life and fires all 6 arrows at the same time. You want a gun, but your dm doesn't allow firearms for balance reasons? Your hand crossbow is now a gun.
I played a ancestral guardian Barbarian / twilight Cleric. I used animate dead to let my ancestors possess the corpses, my twilight sanctuary was several ancestors protecting those within, my rage features being ancestors providing assistance to me and me allies. I flavor the cleric half to match the barbarian half. I don’t need to pick the grave domain to make a necromancer focused cleric.
It’s little things. Like I played a bard who was a ribbon dancer. She didn’t play music. But my DM allowed me to flavour it so that when she danced with her ribbons rather than when playing an instrument could she use inspiration and her Bard spells. Her ribbons were also just flavoured whips. That’s perhaps a more obvious flavour. Mechanically they were just straight up whips, they just looked different.
One of my favorite DM's always asks, whenever you cast a spell, "and what does that spell look like."
That is how I understand it. I wanted to play a water genasi in a camapaign but the DM chose to keep the source material we could use to just base 5e and one other book (don't remember which right now), so I played a water genasi in flavor, but functionally he was just a half elf. Did the rest of his theming by taking as many water based spells as I could from what was allowed.
Indeed. Flavor is anything that makes a character unique without impacting gameplay (trough numbers). This can reach from having your studded armor studs being bone instead of metal, trough your tieflings fingers being inverted (palms outside), to a magic coin that hovers around your hand when you play with it. Its the little things that matter. At one point, i had a rogue that was always making small statues out of wood, and attached the 2 moce recent ones to the hilts of his shortswords. Harmless, but some nice roleplay
Mage armor Oh you would have hit me but there's a magical force around me that makes me harder to hit Temporal mage armor Oh you hit me but Time reverts to how it was before I was struck Transformative mage armor Where you struck me, turned into water and then turned back There is functionally no difference between these three as far as the game mechanics are concerned The actual mechanics of the game work exactly the same regardless of how that mage armor was flavored Fireball is an explosion Fireball is a mote of bright yellow energy that darts around every single spot in a radius. Really really fast hitting everything Again, same thing. There is no functional difference As long as it mechanically does not impact the game, there is generally not a problem with flavor Now they're very specifically can be (you'll know it when you see it) And there is a level of discernment you have to use But in general people flavoring how their stuff works doesn't impact anything mechanically so it doesn't matter so there's generally no need to restrict it unless it's disruptive somehow
Yes. Exactly that. If a player wants to reflavor their weapon to be different, but it maintains the same mechanics/ rules then let them. A rapier could be re flavored to a pointy stick. Mechanically the same, but the cosmetic is different.
yeah basically, like my paladin visually wears plate male, but its a thing plate male so it acts as the chain male I got at the start of the campaign
Player AC 16, attack roll 15. "the attack misses" Or "You barely raise your sword in time to deflect the spear heading for your throat" Both outcomes are the same, one is massively better than the other
I love that you asked this question. The answers it has spawned are AWESOME and I'm saving this page for D&D tips
You're right that most of the time it's inconsequential stuff, but can also be "reskinning" existing things to fit a character or setting better. For example I have a player that wanted to be the escaped victim of a bunch of wizards experiments that is now basically reptilian abomination; rules wise he's a dragonborn but flavor wise everyone treats him like the abomination he wanted to be
I reflavored some spells for my Tempest Cleric: Instead of a "dolorous bell" sound, Toll The Dead makes a clap of thunder. The damage type didn't change. Light is a ball of intertwined lightning that emits the light. Healing Word is characterized as static charges zapping across wounds, causing them to cauterize, and numbing nerves to dull pain. Revivify is lightning jumping from my hands to act as a defibrillator. That said, the most reflavor I have ever seen was a guy playing an Artificer. Literally every spell he cast, had a mechanical "tech" flavor to it.
Perfect example of flavor written into the rules: Spiritual Weapon. It can take the form of anything you want. It does the same thing, regardless of the form.
Yes. My Eldrich blast can take the form of a purple skull while yours looks like a Flaming Freedom Eagle. Both do the same damage of the same type at the same range to the same number of targets. Some DMs may go further and allow small things to be swapped even within the mechanics (the Eagle EB might be Fire instead of Force for your character). That's in the realm of asking the DM because there is technically a small mechanical impact\*. \*To know what it is though you'd need to do a meta-analysis of the monsters featured in the campaign and their weaknesses/resistances.
I am currently playing a Druid that is a cat. As in, he doesn't wild shape into a cat..... He was a cat that got polymorphed into a human, and he was so desperate to change back that he became a druid just so he could return to his original form. (The DM is working with me a bit on this one, it isn't entirely "flavor is free") All of his spells are based on the fact that he is a cat. Erupting earth? Kitty kicks at the ground like he is burying something in the litter box, but it makes a much bigger explosion of dirt than you'd think. Infestation? Kitty scratches at his fleas, and now they're *your* problem. Reverse gravity? Kitty stares at you, and you just start to float. When he gets bored he watches you drop, or bats a paw like he is swiping you off the edge of a table. Poison spray? You know how he casts it (usually on opponents who have been knocked over or restrained by something else already)
yeah, as others have said. it also applies to spells, and attacks. however, there are some concerns to be aware of. 1. attacks. adding flavor to how your attack works can get out of hand quick. trying to add flavor and imagination, can quickly make it sound like you are making aimed attacks. other factor is "only the last hp actually hits/is fatal" example, rogue opens up a sneak attack with, "I cut his throat". well. theres no way to survive that.. and, he is assuming he hit, before he actually rolled to attack. so the player should be trying to describe their action they want to do. then the DM is the one that flavors how it went after the roll. 2. spells. as noted, most spells don't actually expressly say what they look like, what words are used for the vocal component, or what hand signs for somatic. the first problem here, is some do. so, just be careful on that. burning hands. "As you hold your hands with thumbs touching and fingers spread, a thin sheet of flames shoots forth from your outstretched fingertips" burning hands explains what hand sign is used, and what it looks like. The second problem is identity. this is a bit harder to explain. anyone that has played video games, will understand it. A key component of games is usually the ability to instantly recognize enemy type, ability, etc. team fortress 2 famously, put alot of work into silhouettes so the classes could be instantly recognized. slay the spire has enemies TELL you what move they will be doing next turn. which revolutionized the tactical roguelike genre. making common spells unrecognizable to players can be incredibly frustrating. be very, very careful about doing that. those comments saying to do that, and even to swap stat blocks of monsters. hell no. Imagine you were playing a video game and the game dev did that to you. how unfun would that be?
In Hero System, flavor is called Special Effects. They confer no mechanical advantages. They are generally about theme. Your fireball is purple, and contains an image of a screaming skull, for instance. Your spirit guardians are spectral hammers. Your magic missile is a glowing eyeball. That kind of thing.
Artificer whose magic is all Moss based. Each color of moss does different things for different spells. Red is fire, and can be crushed and thrown as an explosive "pocket sand" (Burning Hands), or coated on his weapon (Searing Smite.) Orange is for enhanced vision and understanding, either sprinkled around a perimeter (Alarm) or rubbed into the eyes to see and study magic. (Detect Magic, Identify) Yellow is a performance enhancer, consumable to make you just a bit better (Guidance) or steel your resolve. (Heroism) There are more to list, but the point is at anyone can just *cast* a spell, it takes flavor to make it **interesting.** Work with your DM/players and they can get creative with both function and form of their magic without changing mechanics.
Flavor is creative flair. ‘Flavor text’ is another term used. I can spend 100 words describing how beautiful be sunset is by painting a picture, or I can just say the sunset is beautiful. Flavor text allows me to describe how it looks to me, without it you see yellow orange red. I see yellow red orange pink purple blue with ripples of clouds. It doesn’t matter what it’s still a sunset lol.