D&D 5E Sage Advice August 17th

[Mistwell]

Personally, I would just end the spell at the usual time, even if the caster Delays. You're already house-ruling Delay, why not house rule it in a sensible way that doesn't mess with spell durations?

Because you're now adding yet another layer, another real-time delay to the game. Now you're tracking two initiatives for one guy in one round, one for his spell, and one for his turn? And it gets worse at higher levels when multiple spellcasters do it and foes do it as well? I mean, if that's good with your game cool. For me, I don't want those kinds of delays.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Because you're now adding yet another layer, another real-time delay to the game. Now you're tracking two initiatives for one guy in one round, one for his spell, and one for his turn? And it gets worse at higher levels when multiple spellcasters do it and foes do it as well? I mean, if that's good with your game cool. For me, I don't want those kinds of delays.

I don't think you have to do that...if he casts his spell on round 1 and then on round 2 his initiative comes up and he says "I delay" you can just end the spell there, no?

Not that I'm trying to support the Delay action because I can't stand it. I just don't think that has to be an issue.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Because you're now adding yet another layer, another real-time delay to the game. Now you're tracking two initiatives for one guy in one round, one for his spell, and one for his turn? And it gets worse at higher levels when multiple spellcasters do it and foes do it as well? I mean, if that's good with your game cool. For me, I don't want those kinds of delays.

Well, in my game it's a total non-issue because I use AD&D-style/Speed Factor initiative instead of cyclic. But as Hawkeyefan says, I don't see why you now have to track two separate initiatives--only one of them is ever relevant at a time. Spell durations just seems like a straightforward problem, easily fixed, for people who want to use both cyclic initiative and Delay. Tables that care about it can implement a fix with minimal complexity cost.

 

[Ristamar]

Well, in my game it's a total non-issue because I use AD&D-style/Speed Factor initiative instead of cyclic. But as Hawkeyefan says, I don't see why you now have to track two separate initiatives--only one of them is ever relevant at a time. Spell durations just seems like a straightforward problem, easily fixed, for people who want to use both cyclic initiative and Delay. Tables that care about it can implement a fix with minimal complexity cost.

How do you handle ongoing effects or damage, especially if a PC is near death and is hoping he can get healed or have an ally dispel the effect before his next turn comes up? Does the PC just pick a slower action and hope for a low initiative roll?

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

How do you handle ongoing effects or damage, especially if a PC is near death and is hoping he can get healed or have an ally dispel the effect before his next turn comes up? Does the PC just pick a slower action and hope for a low initiative roll?

It's pretty simple. All turns happen concurrently within the round, so any rule which says "at the beginning of your turn" happens at the beginning of the round (before actions are declared), and anything which happens "at the end of your turn" happens after all actions are resolved. So if you knock someone unconscious on round 1, they'll make a death save at the beginning of round 2, and then you'll declare actions for round 2.

This does mean that certain ongoing effects like a monk's Stunning Strike get better: a monk who rolls a 28 on initiative and then manages to stun a vampire will both prevent the vampire from acting on round 1 (because he's stunned) and give advantage to all his allies on round 1, and then on round 2 the vampire will still be stunned and unable to act. So high initiative matters a lot, as well as [tangent] high intelligence (because characters declare actions in order of Intelligence, lowest first, highest last). And I'm totally okay with both those effects.

Interestingly, I've seen lots of players pump Intelligence even if it buys them no mechanical advantage whatsoever. E.g. I've seen Death Clerics drop an ASI into +2 Intelligence, and a Shadow Monk/Druid boosted his Int from 9 to 12 over the course of two ASIs, after he'd finished maxing out his AC. I asked the players about it and they confirmed that they really like being smarter than the monsters as much as possible, so they can plan their actions more effectively and avoid being surprised.[/tangent]

So anyway, there would be no point in the PC picking a "slower action" in order to get healed first. What he is really hoping for is that his buddy will cast a healing spell or Otiluke's Resilient Sphere on him before the bad guy's initiative. His own initiative is pretty much irrelevant unless he's trying to e.g. Disengage before the bad guy can hit him.

P.S. The way I implement Delay is that you can declare "Delay" as your action, which means you automatically lose initiative to everyone who is declaring now, but you get to declare your action after everyone else's actions are resolved. You're basically waiting to see what happens before committing to anything.

 

[Saeviomagy]

To be fair, a spell already right in the PHB heals more. Aura of Vitality, a 3rd level spell, cast by that same Life Cleric 1/Bard X or Life Cleric 1/Paladin X, heals 2d6+4/round for 10 rounds. That's 110 hit points on average. When you divide that by the spell points to account for it being 3rd level instead of 1st level, you find it's still more powerful than Goodberry cast by the Life Cleric under this ruling.

Achievable at level 7 or level 10 depending on whether you go bard or paladin compared to level 2, and does use a resource. Apart from the fact that a level 3 spell is quite potent almost regardless of your level while a level 1 spell tends not to be, there's also the fact that unless you ambush your PCs every night, goodberry only costs you slots that you didn't need to use yesterday, not actual slots today.

So when you cast an effect that ends at the end of your next turn (there are a lot), and your caster always delays that next turn to the end of the round to get an extra round of effect out of it that was never intended by the spell design, you have no issue with that?

Like I said, trivial to adjudicate. You delay, any spell with a duration of X rounds ends because the round has passed. I don't know if any spells still use the "until the end of the target's turn" duration, but if they do, then such spells would end once the target takes the delayed turn.

 

[Mistwell]

Achievable at level 7 or level 10 depending on whether you go bard or paladin compared to level 2

But nobody does it at level 2 that I've seen. You'd have to go Druid 1 / Cleric 1, not a popular combination. Naw, we see how it's done all over the message boards and Roll20 when people do it. And it's usually Life Cleric 1, Lore Bard 6, or else it's done using a feat at level 4 of the Cleric. Roughly the same levels as Aura of Vitality. And...the game never breaks from Aura. Which was my point.

and does use a resource. Apart from the fact that a level 3 spell is quite potent almost regardless of your level while a level 1 spell tends not to be, there's also the fact that unless you ambush your PCs every night, goodberry only costs you slots that you didn't need to use yesterday, not actual slots today.

Uh, everyone already heals overnight without any spell. This is purely for between encounters. It happens at a point where you have no idea what the rest of the day will bring. I am not saying a person might not choose Goodberry over Aura of Vitality - I am saying we already know the game doesn't break with such a spell as it's already in the game.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Of course it was the intent. 5E is targeted at casual players, and by the encounter guidelines only the rare "Deadly" encounters should have even a chance of PC death or failure. 5E is designed around constant fighting, most of which consists of unfair fights tilted steeply towards PC victory.

While I'm not really disagreeing with your opinions about how 5e plays, I do think the stated goals behind 5e account for it, without assuming it's targeting casual players who somehow dislike being challenged.

5e's goals included 'fast combat,' and 5e combats are fast. Fast often means 'easy' in the sense we're using. 5e also tried to capture that classic D&D feel, and, compared to 3e rocket-tag (then top off with
WoCLW) or 4e grinds (then top off with Surges), that means challenge through attrition over multiple combats, putting pressure on daily resources, including actual hps, not just hp-restoring resources like HD or potions or spells. Each individual combat may be easy, but the idea is that managing a whole 6-8 encounter day of them will be challenging, and it's only if you're not entering the last combat of the day at less than full hps, that you can really say you haven't been challenged. That's not something meant to appeal to new or casual players, but to long-time and returning players, the 'everyone who's every loved D&D' that 5e was meant to be D&D 'for.'

 

[Saeviomagy]

Uh, everyone already heals overnight without any spell. This is purely for between encounters. It happens at a point where you have no idea what the rest of the day will bring. I am not saying a person might not choose Goodberry over Aura of Vitality - I am saying we already know the game doesn't break with such a spell as it's already in the game.

You don't heal at night with the goodberries. You keep them for the next day. One of these scenarios is improving the effect of a spell by ~60%. The other one is improving a spell by 400%.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

RE: "Invulnerable" paladins, let's re-iterate their weaknesses. Based on having actually DM'ed and played sorcadins, they're great defensively and decent-ish offensively, but they still have some real weaknesses too that other PCs need to cover.

1.) Getting to quasi-"invulnerable" range (AC 28-30) requires a lot of specific investment by the paladin. Giving up two-handed weapons/GWM in order to have a shield; giving up other fighting styles for Defense; giving up Smiting spells and other concentration spells for Shield of Faith; multiclassing to sorcerer or wizard for Shield spell; giving up Counterspell and AoOs in exchange for Shield (this makes you a worse tank--even Sentinel won't help you protect the party if you blew your reaction already on Shield); getting another PC to give up their concentration to Haste you.

2.) If you're letting the sorc Haste you, you just inherited new vulnerabilities along with the spell. If the Stone Giant hits the sorc with a thrown boulder, you lose your next turn. Haste creates risk and ties you more strongly to the party, which means more than ever that attacking the party is attacking the paladin. The paladin can't afford to just ignore the rest of the party.

3.) The paladin is relying on buff spells, so he's vulnerable to delays. If the fight is going sour, the enemy can potentially break contact and open the range for a few minutes while the buffs wear off. I've found that players get very nervous about leaving active hostiles in the neighborhood--they're not equipped to simply ignore the enemy right back, they will pursue. Which leads to...

4.) The paladin is still vulnerable to things that bypass AC, like falling damage from getting shoved into a spiked pit, or hitting a ghast's poison cloud. Aura of Protection helps somewhat, but it mostly just compensates for non-proficiency. It's only Wisdom and Charisma saves where a paladin feels semi-invulnerable. On Dex and Con saves he feels strong-ish but he still hates having to make repeated saves. See above #1 for opportunity cost: if he's got Shield of Faith up he doesn't have Bless to protect his saves. Combine #3 and #4 to encourage the paladin to get ahead of the party and chase the monsters into an area where this weakness can be exploited.

5.) The paladin's AC-based defenses are mostly magical in nature. In an anti-magic field, or after a Dispel Magic, he's exactly as durable as a Defense-specialized Champion Fighter in the same plate armor + shield, and perhaps less durable than the equivalent barbearian or rogue.

6.) And of course there's the infamous Grapple/Prone combo. It's often not worthwhile against characters with low AC because you can just kill them, but the harder it is for you to hit someone, the more actions it's worth spending degrading their defenses. Remember that the paladin only gets one attempt per round to break the grapple, and he can be grappled by more than one opponent at a time.

You always have the option of going after other PCs, but the above ideas illustrate how you can threaten the paladin personally, in ways that are about as threatening to the paladin as they are to the other PCs.