D&D 5E Is the Help action broken?

R

Reynard

Legend
I don't normally worry too much about rules. If the game is fun I tend to accept it, warts included. But in my regular campaign a player has exposed something I did not see before: the help action seems really over powered. The character is a wizard with a familiar. The familiar basically uses the Help action all the time, granting the wizard Advantage on most actions. In combat, the familiar grants one of the main combatants Advantage.

Help does not require a roll. There are no prerequisites for Helping on any given action. For the low low cost of a find familiar spell, the wizard is able to bypass the series of choices that make Advantage possible.

Thoughts?
 

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doctorbadwolf

doctorbadwolf

Heretic of The Seventh Circle
The familiar can be a mostly always on advantage, sure.

I don't see the balance issue, here. Instead of choices about their own actions, they have to choose what to have the familiar do. It shouldn't always be better to have the familiar Help than do something else, is the thing. And even if you are using a blaster mage with the familiar calling shots...cool! I really like that flavor, honestly.

And I would definitely have intelligent ranged enemies target the familiar every once in a while. Especially when the wizard crits because they have advantage from the familiar.
 

Shardstone

Shardstone

Hero
When someone ask if something in 5E core is broken, I want to smack them in the face.

No. Help is not broken. There many things an action can be used for, and buffing up a partner, etc, is not a broken thing to do.
 

Lehrbuch

Lehrbuch

First Post
Reynard said:
The familiar basically uses the Help action all the time, granting the wizard Advantage on most actions.
Click to expand...

Yes, this is the point of a familiar. However, just make sure that you not making it too good by misreading the rules.

Outside combat, the familiar can only provide help to Ability Checks if the familiar can do the action himself (see PHB, page 175, Working Together).

In combat, the Help action (PHB, page 192) either:
a) gives Advantage to Ability checks taken by the helped character (Attack rolls, including spell casting Attack rolls are not an Ability Check), or
b) gives Advantage to an Attack roll against an opponent within 5' of the helper (which makes the familiar vulnerable to being thumped).
 

Xeviat

Xeviat

Hero
The fragility of the familiar makes this difficult to keep going. If you're worried about it being a problem, you can limit help to only work on things the helper could do too. A tiny familiar can't help you with a Str check to push open a stuck door, for instance. But distracting someone so you can get a better shot; great. Remember, allies provide cover for ranged attacks, and if the familiar isn't between you and your target, it can get surrounded easily.

Compare find familiar to bless. Instead of being concentration, it dies in one hit.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 


ad_hoc

ad_hoc

(they/them)
Help is fine. A familiar using help for attacking is not.

A ritual spell that provides advantage in combat until an opponent successfully attacks it is broken. It doesn't matter that it only takes one hit. That is still enough.
 



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