D&D (2024) Why is wotc still aiming for PCs with 10 *real word* feet of range? W/o vision range penalty/limit rules for the GM?

[Hriston]

This is the kind of thing that would have been really useful in the DMG. All of those operational-level rules for giving combats context were excised from 5e after the playtests, though yes, some of the DM screens still have bits and pieces. They might as well have put it in a toilet, behind a sign saying 'beware of the leopard'.

Why does where it's published affect its utility? I find it useful for my games because I don't want to be bothered with having to decide on an encounter distance and the encounter distance table gives some reasonable variation depending on terrain type, which I also use. It was left out of the base game because it's superfluous. The game doesn't require the DM to use the table. However, It does require the DM to establish an encounter distance under "Combat Step-by-Step" where it says:

2. Establish positions. The DM decides where all the characters and monsters are located. Given the adventurers' marching order or their stated positions in the room or other location, the DM figures out where the adversaries are--how far away [emphasis added] and in what direction.​

The table is a tool that can help the DM design encounters and provides an idea of the kind of distances the writers had in mind.

@tetrasodium has a unique posting style, and is getting a lot of pushback, but they have a strong point. If combat encounters are meant to include the sorts of weapon ranges listed, the rules are clearly unworkable. The scale is unmanageable, advantage/disadvantage is far too crude, concealment is too weak, and some character abilities (like sharpshooter) become boring I-win buttons.

If, OTOH, tactical combats are not supposed to extend to those ranges... Where is this stated? Where are the rules for encounter distance, or long-range skirmishing outside of initiative, or scouting and ambushes?

The whole thing is an inadequate mess. Replies saying 'just wing it' are unhelpful.

I think this analysis is entirely overblown and bordering on hyperbole. Do you have any examples from actual play to back up these seemingly unfounded statements?

 

[Hussar]

For context, the short grass prairies of the American Midwest had heights of only .5-1 ft at most. Areas of Buffalo grass could be even shorter.

The long grass prairies had 6-8 ft tall grasses.

So yes there are praries you could absolutely hide in, and ones were it would be quite difficult. Both are plausible depending on the terrain the dm has envisioned.

Even with grass that short, terrain means that you can hide in there. Go prone behind a small, one foot ridge with one foot of grass and you vanish. It’s not like prairies are salt flats.

Again, if it was impossible to hide in the prairie, every predator would starve to death.

Outside of on water or some pretty rare terrain, the notion of 600+ foot sight lines are not very plausible. And that’s ignoring weather and time of day.

Again I really have to wonder why we need to fix this. It’s such a rare occurrence. Still have yet to see a published example from all the tens of thousands of encounters published for DnD.

 

[Nine Hands]

It's one of the reasons when I built my mecha game, it is designed to play on a single Chessex Mondo-Mat. The longest ranged weapons are around 120 hexes. Medium range are around 60 (half the length), short range is 25 (quarter length) and close in weapons are 12 hexes or so (about 1/8th the length). If I had a smaller mat, the game's ranges would have been different.

 

[Willie the Duck]

For context, the short grass prairies of the American Midwest had heights of only .5-1 ft at most. Areas of Buffalo grass could be even shorter.
The long grass prairies had 6-8 ft tall grasses.
So yes there are praries you could absolutely hide in, and ones were it would be quite difficult. Both are plausible depending on the terrain the dm has envisioned.

Even with grass that short, terrain means that you can hide in there. Go prone behind a small, one foot ridge with one foot of grass and you vanish. It’s not like prairies are salt flats.
Again, if it was impossible to hide in the prairie, every predator would starve to death.
Outside of on water or some pretty rare terrain, the notion of 600+ foot sight lines are not very plausible. And that’s ignoring weather and time of day.

So we're kind of back to the old question of is D&D medieval Europe with a frontier aesthetic*, the American Wild West with swords and bows*, the wider world in pre-/early-gunpowder era*, fantasy mélange informed by whatever media the DM most consumes, or Minecraft grid world where lines are straight and anything not specifically spelled out on the battlemap exists. *and magic and dragons, etc. etc.

I think, if ones' main argument is realism, than one should take into account those realistic things like not being able to pinpoint your target after a short distance in many-to-most situations. If the primary argument is gamist/playability, than I guess it matters how the DM feels about these issues.

Why does where it's published affect its utility? I find it useful for my games because I don't want to be bothered with having to decide on an encounter distance and the encounter distance table gives some reasonable variation depending on terrain type, which I also use. It was left out of the base game because it's superfluous. The game doesn't require the DM to use the table. However, It does require the DM to establish an encounter distance under "Combat Step-by-Step" where it says:

2. Establish positions. The DM decides where all the characters and monsters are located. Given the adventurers' marching order or their stated positions in the room or other location, the DM figures out where the adversaries are--how far away [emphasis added] and in what direction.​

The table is a tool that can help the DM design encounters and provides an idea of the kind of distances the writers had in mind.

I'll go to bat for publication location being an issue. From my perspective (so 'IMO'), the rulebooks, particularly the core rules and definitely the DMG, ought to be designed to help new players and especially new DMs. Help them by giving them easy onramps to the game, showcasing what the default intended game looks like and not steering them into places where they are likely to run into frustration (or, in the DM's case, also frustrating their players). That can mean things like default distance charts, sample 5-room dungeons, charts for random dungeon design or adventure hooks, and all sorts of stuff you might later outgrow maybe ought to be in the book you know the DM will have (or at least shouldn't complain if they don't), as opposed to a DM screen they might not know even exists. By the time you get to the level of investment most of us have in the game, we barely need rules at all, much less care if the core books have some extraneous stuff we don't need.

I think this analysis is entirely overblown and bordering on hyperbole. Do you have any examples from actual play to back up these seemingly unfounded statements?

Again I really have to wonder why we need to fix this. It’s such a rare occurrence. Still have yet to see a published example from all the tens of thousands of encounters published for DnD.

I generally am in agreement that I think this situation isn't all that common for most games. That said, I don't think any of us really know that. Certainly not for the vast swaths of gamers who aren't using published adventures.

 

[Hriston]

I'll go to bat for publication location being an issue. From my perspective (so 'IMO'), the rulebooks, particularly the core rules and definitely the DMG, ought to be designed to help new players and especially new DMs. Help them by giving them easy onramps to the game, showcasing what the default intended game looks like and not steering them into places where they are likely to run into frustration (or, in the DM's case, also frustrating their players). That can mean things like default distance charts, sample 5-room dungeons, charts for random dungeon design or adventure hooks, and all sorts of stuff you might later outgrow maybe ought to be in the book you know the DM will have (or at least shouldn't complain if they don't), as opposed to a DM screen they might not know even exists. By the time you get to the level of investment most of us have in the game, we barely need rules at all, much less care if the core books have some extraneous stuff we don't need.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think the topic of this thread is the purpose for which the core rulebooks should be designed. I don't think @tetrasodium (or anyone else participating in this thread for that matter) is a new player, and they seem to be aware of the existence of the chart, so if the complaint is that the rules don't put limits on the range at which encounters take place, then why not use the chart? [Edited to add: There are plenty of good reasons not to, including not wanting to offload encounter design onto random tables, but I don't think "It's not in the core rulebooks" is one of them.]

I generally am in agreement that I think this situation isn't all that common for most games. That said, I don't think any of us really know that. Certainly not for the vast swaths of gamers who aren't using published adventures.

I'm still trying to get an idea of what the situation actually is. I have yet to see a description in this thread of what's happening at the table to cause the dissatisfaction expressed in the OP.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think the topic of this thread is the purpose for which the core rulebooks should be designed. I don't think @tetrasodium (or anyone else participating in this thread for that matter) is a new player, and they seem to be aware of the existence of the chart, so if the complaint is that the rules don't put limits on the range at which encounters take place, then why not use the chart?

I would generally agree.

I'm still trying to get an idea of what the situation actually is. I have yet to see a description in this thread of what's happening at the table to cause the dissatisfaction expressed in the OP.

You are not alone.

 

[Willie the Duck]

Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think the topic of this thread is the purpose for which the core rulebooks should be designed. I don't think @tetrasodium (or anyone else participating in this thread for that matter) is a new player, and they seem to be aware of the existence of the chart, so if the complaint is that the rules don't put limits on the range at which encounters take place, then why not use the chart? [Edited to add: There are plenty of good reasons not to, including not wanting to offload encounter design onto random tables, but I don't think "It's not in the core rulebooks" is one of them.]

Gorice's actual statement was "This is the kind of thing that would have been really useful in the DMG." You asked why its' location mattered. I made a case for why rule placement matters and thus why Gorice had a point. What tetrasodium or anyone else here does, knows about, or is capable of, is beside the point.

That said, beside the point or not, I agree. tetrasodium and everyone else here are widely experienced and invested gamers and perfectly capable capable of utilizing material from anywhere including supplemental products, homebrew, and forum suggestions. As I just said, "By the time you get to the level of investment most of us have in the game, we barely need rules at all, much less care if the core books have [more or less than we need]."

I'm still trying to get an idea of what the situation actually is. I have yet to see a description in this thread of what's happening at the table to cause the dissatisfaction expressed in the OP.

OP certainly hasn't tied it to their own table experience strongly*. They do provide a few hypotheticals and in-adventure module examples, and Stalker posits a scenario. If we accept in-good-faith/for-the-purpose-of-argument that everyone complaining about the status quo have experiences similar to the hypotheticals brought up*, it paints a picture of groups where encounters start at sizable distances and the archery-based characters duke it out for many rounds before the melee combatants can engage (effectively determining the outcome, to a lessor or greater degree), making the players of those melee-characters feel dissatisfied with their lot in the game. Also something about the size of the effective battlescape when mapped 5'=1" that was a primary subject of the Original Post, but seems to have gotten dropped**.
*and at least once argued that individual tables were not the best unit of observation, to which I disagree (issues that occur at actual game tables are the only ones worth concerning ourselves).
**and that most people in that camp have similar complaints, a less reasonable assumption but one that can be addressed by individual clarification
***or at least I couldn't see much response to people's solutions like TotM, special notation, etc.

 

[nevin]

Because it’s not fun.

For the other players or for them

for some players it is fun. If not for you don't do it. keep to cities, forests and mountains where they have to be closer.

 

[nevin]

Gorice's actual statement was "This is the kind of thing that would have been really useful in the DMG." You asked why its' location mattered. I made a case for why rule placement matters and thus why Gorice had a point. What tetrasodium or anyone else here does, knows about, or is capable of, is beside the point.

That said, beside the point or not, I agree. tetrasodium and everyone else here are widely experienced and invested gamers and perfectly capable capable of utilizing material from anywhere including supplemental products, homebrew, and forum suggestions. As I just said, "By the time you get to the level of investment most of us have in the game, we barely need rules at all, much less care if the core books have [more or less than we need]."

OP certainly hasn't tied it to their own table experience strongly*. They do provide a few hypotheticals and in-adventure module examples, and Stalker posits a scenario. If we accept in-good-faith/for-the-purpose-of-argument that everyone complaining about the status quo have experiences similar to the hypotheticals brought up*, it paints a picture of groups where encounters start at sizable distances and the archery-based characters duke it out for many rounds before the melee combatants can engage (effectively determining the outcome, to a lessor or greater degree), making the players of those melee-characters feel dissatisfied with their lot in the game. Also something about the size of the effective battlescape when mapped 5'=1" that was a primary subject of the Original Post, but seems to have gotten dropped**.
*and at least once argued that individual tables were not the best unit of observation, to which I disagree (issues that occur at actual game tables are the only ones worth concerning ourselves).
**and that most people in that camp have similar complaints, a less reasonable assumption but one that can be addressed by individual clarification
***or at least I couldn't see much response to people's solutions like TotM, special notation, etc.

This is an issue in all combat related games. For centuries Artillery was king. No one wants to charge artillery, bows, guns. It sucks in any tactical situation. The only way to fix it in the rules is to use magic to protect yourself or pull a paizo and make rules that make no sense.
If you don't want to deal with it. don't put your players in those situations.

 

[tetrasodium]

for some players it is fun. If not for you don't do it. keep to cities, forests and mountains where they have to be closer.

That's exactly why the rules should fail-safe in favor of empowering gm fiat for everyone's fun when justified rather than expecting the GM to do what the rules failed to while failing secure against gm fiat. With that switch in the design goals the game changes to one where If such a player exists at a table then the onus is on that player to loop everyone else into their plan of rods from god style volley fire in a way that the gm agrees is fun to enough of the table to justify applying fiat to empower it.