D&D 5E Ranged party member keeps running off the map

iserith said:

Cold comfort when the rest of the party is pushing up daisies because you didn't put your character in harm's way to take some of the heat off your allies. Excellent teamwork!

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You're blaming the wrong guy in this case. The bad teamwork belongs to the PCs who failed to exploit the fact that they had sniper overwatch. Instead of remaining on pure offense, they can afford to go to defense (Dodge + cover) and threaten opportunity attacks to keep the enemy pinned more-or-less in place while the sniper kills it.

If they instead keep rolling attacks as normal, and then die, that foolish mistake is on the PC who made it. (Note: on the PC, not necessarily on the player.It can be fun to roleplay a PC who makes foolish mistakes which the player would not make.)

I like when artillery characters move out and snipe. They're supposed to. It's good.

And it works very well when you have a decent frontline tank with robust support and a skirmisher looking for openings. I enjoy a lot of tactical play.

And that setup there is plan A for a whole lot of groups who design characters and party together, and who view combats as a coordinated effort toward a shared goal. (Which of course it is. And you CAN win and you CAN lose).

So when I design encounters and encounter spaces (or run them from published materials) I tend to look for a way to push the players off plan A and into plan B. Not further than that though. Too much according to plan feels too "by-the-numbers," while too much chaos feels like decisions don't matter. So there is a sweet spot.

Anyway, if that's their plan A, then a little cover, corners, and concealment will help push them off their preferred tactics. And an occasional enemy skirmisher or artillery wrecking their support or the PC artillery will be pretty good. Often all we're talking about is the occasional fireball or sneak attack. Sometimes a snare trap catching your artillery and dangling them upside down while a brute wig a cleaver approaches can be a nice "oh crud" moment too.

Thing is, as players, they can come up with one good idea each, any time. Whereas as DM, you can only come up with one in any moment. Therefore pre-load the scene with one or two good ideas before they show up. It doesn't have to be a lot of work, either. Me? I like kill boxes. That's my trick.


-Brad

lowkey13 said:

All answers can be found in the wisdom of Gygax.

Let's see ... handling troublesome players from the DMG-

"Strong steps short of expulsion can be an extra random monster die, obviously rolled, the attack of an ethereal mummy (which always strikes by surprise, naturally), points of damage from "blue bolts from the heavens" striking the offender's head, or the permanent loss of a point of charisma (appropriately) from the character belonging to the offender."

Ethereal mummy, ftw.

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Every time someone quotes him for DMing "wisdom", I think, "Yep, Gygax has all the answers. You just read whatever he said as if it was prefaced with, "Never do the following. Err toward the opposite, if possible."

Hemlock said:

You're blaming the wrong guy in this case. The bad teamwork belongs to the PCs who failed to exploit the fact that they had sniper overwatch. Instead of remaining on pure offense, they can afford to go to defense (Dodge + cover) and threaten opportunity attacks to keep the enemy pinned more-or-less in place while the sniper kills it.

If they instead keep rolling attacks as normal, and then die, that foolish mistake is on the PC who made it. (Note: on the PC, not necessarily on the player.It can be fun to roleplay a PC who makes foolish mistakes which the player would not make.)

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You will note that my initial comments were made with very particular circumstances in mind, subsequent sidetracks from other posters notwithstanding. I also think that your take on this makes sense, but is also only valid in very particular circumstances. In general though, I think some players are prone to hoarding hit points to the detriment of the team. To that end, I think it's fair to say that's a bad practice when it leads to the rest of the party having a harder time of things (assuming that's not desirable).

Sacrosanct said:

Another thing I don't get is the "player X isn't benefiting from player Y's AC or HP" I mean, I get that the more people there are the more attacks get spread around, but player X isn't player Y, so of course they won't get those benefits. But generally player Y, based on his or her role, is going to have lower AC and HP than the people actually designed for melee combat. It's like saying, "The QB isn't benefiting from the defensive back's blocking skills." Well yeah, but the defensive back is doing other things, like keeping the other team from scoring, or getting a turnover, which in turn helps the QB. Just like player Y is hitting targets player X can't (which can be great for things like forcing opposing casters to make a concentration save.) Putting player Y into melee when they aren't designed for it just so player Y can die faster makes about as much sense as putting a defensive back as an offensive lineman.

As a player of a PC, I don't share my HP or any other stat with any other party member. No one says, "Well, I've taken 45 hp of damage, and you've only taken 10, so you need to be a team player and take more damage." if my role isn't to be front line fighter and theirs is. We don't add everyone's HP together as some sort of weird metric to track who's contributing and who's not.

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This. My wife's Paladin and the group's dwarven Immortal Mystic (flavored as a dragon sorcerer) don't complain that the shadar-kai monk teleports around and is often obscured in shadows or outright hidden when not attacking. They celebrate that while they pin enemies to themselves, someone is ganking the everloving crap out of them. And since they both do strong damage themselves, enemies die fast when these tactics are being used.

We now have a sniper of sorts in the form of a Nomad Mystic, and a mixed range controller in the form of a land druid, in addition to the skirmishing ranger and the pyro-mage and the warlock. We sometimes have as many as 8 people on the team, but usually the monk and ranger are NPC mode, or circumstance requires the team to split up to reach their goals.

But even when it's just the main party, and no ranger or monk, you've got two Tough Guys, a and 4 mixed ranged or purely ranged combatants. If one of them is out of harm's way, sniping, they love that. They want at least one guy on a rooftop, in a tower, or on a nearby hilltop, sniping enemies. It makes the party more tactically effective, even when outnumbered. The sniper can punish enemies for moving tactically, and can get advantage on attacks by being hidden. I even houserule in an Aim action that uses a bonus action on a turn where you haven't' moved, that just gives you Advantage, and reworked Sharpshooter to replace the -5/+10 mechanic with getting a damage bonus when you Aim.

Which means you want to get far out and/or up high, and then post there until the enemy identifies your position and figures a way to threaten you, and then kite or sneak your way to a new position.

If my player's werent' into this sort of creative tactical thinking, I still can't imagine it being a problem to have a PC do the same basic thing.

iserith said:

You will note that my initial comments were made with very particular circumstances in mind, subsequent sidetracks from other posters notwithstanding. I also think that your take on this makes sense, but is also only valid in very particular circumstances. In general though, I think some players are prone to hoarding hit points to the detriment of the team. To that end, I think it's fair to say that's a bad practice when it leads to the rest of the party having a harder time of things (assuming that's not desirable).

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I think its important to consider the player side of an encounter is a collection of assets that include HP, AC, actions, spells, etc. And the characters bring those assets to bear in order to mitigate enemy liabilities (incoming damage, debuts, enemy AC & HP, etc).

There IS a problem when a player takes off with a handful of assets without mitigating "their fair share" (or a reasonable amount, whatever) of liabilities. Of course, circumstances vary. Like hiding NOW for a sneak attack LATER is fine. Absconding from a melee while your poor buddies get smashed by baddies is not fine. (That's true of hanging out with me irl as well).

The line though isn't hard and fast, and it depends on the group and the players (and characters) trust and expectations. It's not about a shared pool of HP, per se. It's about standing up when your buddies are counting on you to do so. Or attracting some threat your way to take some heat of someone else who's in a bad way. Like I said? The circumstances matter, and it's not a formula. It's a relationship.


-Brad

Bawylie said:

I think its important to consider the player side of an encounter is a collection of assets that include HP, AC, actions, spells, etc. And the characters bring those assets to bear in order to mitigate enemy liabilities (incoming damage, debuts, enemy AC & HP, etc).

There IS a problem when a player takes off with a handful of assets without mitigating "their fair share" (or a reasonable amount, whatever) of liabilities. Of course, circumstances vary. Like hiding NOW for a sneak attack LATER is fine. Absconding from a melee while your poor buddies get smashed by baddies is not fine. (That's true of hanging out with me irl as well).

The line though isn't hard and fast, and it depends on the group and the players (and characters) trust and expectations. It's not about a shared pool of HP, per se. It's about standing up when your buddies are counting on you to do so. Or attracting some threat your way to take some heat of someone else who's in a bad way. Like I said? The circumstances matter, and it's not a formula. It's a relationship.

-Brad

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Right. There's some if's and contingencies that play into whether a player is being a good teammate. As I said, it depends on the game and what's going on.

iserith said:

You will note that my initial comments were made with very particular circumstances in mind, subsequent sidetracks from other posters notwithstanding. I also think that your take on this makes sense, but is also only valid in very particular circumstances. In general though, I think some players are prone to hoarding hit points to the detriment of the team. To that end, I think it's fair to say that's a bad practice when it leads to the rest of the party having a harder time of things (assuming that's not desirable).

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I'm not sure I agree with your generalizations or allocation of blame, but I agree with the bolded truism: for all undesirable outcomes BO, any practice P is a bad practice to the extent that it leads to an outcome from BO. Sure, that's fair, and it goes for everybody.

All I'm pointing out here is that having sniper overwatch does not, in general, make things harder for the rest of the team if they behave sensibly--it makes things easier.

randrak said:

They got sharpshooter feat and a artificer(gunsmith) rifle. Every single fight they use their movement to get further and further and further away to the point where I sometimes run out of map... Plus, they get so far away that no enemy can reach them and they end up not really getting damaged at all.

I've thought about having random monsters pop out since they get so far... what else can I do?

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If you figure it out, let me know. I'm dealing with the same problem with a champion archer fighter in my game: Action Surge for four arrows that crit on a 19+. *Shudder*

Dungeons help. Can't get 600 feet away and still see through the door.
I dig your random monster idea as well.

Hemlock said:

I'm not sure I agree with your generalizations or allocation of blame, but I agree with the bolded truism: for all undesirable outcomes BO, any practice P is a bad practice to the extent that it leads to an outcome from BO. Sure, that's fair, and it goes for everybody.

All I'm pointing out here is that having sniper overwatch does not, in general, make things harder for the rest of the team if they behave sensibly--it makes things easier.

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Sure, and to be clear, I don't claim that it does make things harder. (Unless and until it does.)