D&D 5E D&D 5E Does flanking grant advantage ?

[Awesome Adam]

The math depends on how good both creatures are at doing the task.

If they are equally good at the task, the help action is generally inferior, since the reduced damage potential.

Where it becomes useful is if one creature is inferrior to the other. A goblin can Help a bugbear, who has a much greater damage potential, to increase their odds of doing greater damage.

Of course, if the goblin had enough movement, and terrain allowed, he could attemp to flank the hero, and grant him and the Bugbear advantage

 

[Reynard]

The math depends on how good both creatures are at doing the task.

If they are equally good at the task, the help action is generally inferior, since the reduced damage potential.

Where it becomes useful is if one creature is inferrior to the other. A goblin can Help a bugbear, who has a much greater damage potential, to increase their odds of doing greater damage.

That makes sense. I think a good application might be the worg riding goblin. He is actually more useful giving his mount advantage, i think.

Of course, if the goblin had enough movement, and terrain allowed, he could attemp to flank the hero, and grant him and the Bugbear advantage

No he can't. That is the whole point. There is no flank in the standard rules. That is what Help is for.

 

[Awesome Adam]

If you are discounting the optional rules an average gnome can carry THREE other gnomes and make a 10ft jump with them on his shoulders, with a running start.

Flanking is in the DMG, it's not a house rule, it's not a DMsguild supplement, it's in a core rulebook.

If it's in a core rulebook then is a STANDARD rule to my gaming group.

I really get that people may not like the rule, but maybe take "Alternatives to Flanking in 5E" to another thread on that topic instead of trying to ignoring the rules existance in a thread asking for where the rules for flanking can be found, when the question was answered conclusively in the third post of the thread, on page 1.

 

[Reynard]

If you are discounting the optional rules an average gnome can carry THREE other gnomes and make a 10ft jump with them on his shoulders, with a running start.

Flanking is in the DMG, it's not a house rule, it's not a DMsguild supplement, it's in a core rulebook.

If it's in a core rulebook then is a STANDARD rule to my gaming group.

I really get that people may not like the rule, but maybe take "Alternatives to Flanking in 5E" to another thread on that topic instead of trying to ignoring the rules existance in a thread asking for where the rules for flanking can be found, when the question was answered conclusively in the third post of the thread, on page 1.

Threads evolve. We stopped discussing where it was with that answer you mentioned. We have been discussing the value of flanking and its alternatives ever since.

My point was that there is a reason it is an optional rule and not a standard rule, and Help is what takes the place of flanking in the standard rules. You can assert all day long that the way you play the game is the right way, go ahead, but don't assert flanking as you prefer to use it is the standard way the rules are intended to be used. many people in this thread have pointed out how flanking affects the game and how certain elements, including feats and class abilities and special monster abilities, will be impacted if you use that optional rule. The very fact that you have to make such considerations and might well imbalance combat if you don't should illustrate pretty succinctly why it is an optional rule.

 

[Awesome Adam]

No he can't. That is the whole point. There is no flank in the standard rules.

Are you familiar with the phrase "the pot calling the kettle black"

You asked a question, I answered, and you told me what the "standard" was, and then scolded me about about delcaring what my standard was.

 

[Reynard]

Are you familiar with the phrase "the pot calling the kettle black"

You asked a question, I answered, and you told me what the "standard" was, and then scolded me about about delcaring what my standard was.

I was referring to the rules of the game not the rules of your table. In the standard rules of the game, there is no flanking. That is a simple, irrefutable fact. i don't even know why we are arguing about it, to be honest.

 

[Awesome Adam]

It's not an irrefutable fact. Your defining "standard" as not to include "optional" while I'm defining "standard" to inlcude all rules from core rulebooks.

You chided me when I mentioned using the very rule this thread is about. How do you not see the irony ?

 

[Hriston]

Help is a poor substitute for Flanking. Two creatures of equal ability flanking an opponent gain no benefit whatsoever by one of them taking the Help action. In fact, they are halving their damage while maintaining the same chance to hit they would have if both attacked. This doesn't resemble Flanking in the slightest and is an option no one will take.

 

[Rhym]

Yes the Help action is only useful if the hit would be more damaging for the creature getting helped.

Mathematically it would be something like this (I'm ignoring extra damage from the crit for simplicity, the doubling of only the damage dice make it complicated):

Creature A would hit only on an 18,19,20 for 10 avg damage. Creature B would hit on 18,19,20 for 5 avg damage.

If B helped A instead, he would replace his 15% chance to deal 5 damage to a 15*(1-0.15)=12.75% chance to deal 10 damage. The (1-0.15) is due to the lowered chance of the second die mattering, aka the first die rolled 18,19,20.

Over time, B would increase his average damage from 5*0.15 =0.75 damage to 10*0.1275 = 1.275 damage by consistently helping A instead. A 70% increase in damage.

Note that it is only as high as 70% due to the low chance to hit. The higher the chance to hit on the first die, the less advantage will help you.

 

[Reynard]

Help is a poor substitute for Flanking. Two creatures of equal ability flanking an opponent gain no benefit whatsoever by one of them taking the Help action. In fact, they are halving their damage while maintaining the same chance to hit they would have if both attacked. This doesn't resemble Flanking in the slightest and is an option no one will take.

Remember that flanking as a 3.x game construct doesn't resemble anything in real life. In the first place, if a single fighter is opposed by two fighters it does not really matter whether they are on exactly opposite sides of him or not. Second, flanking is actually more effective in ranged combat: getting into a position so your target has no cover is what flanking is for. So, arguing whether the Help action resembles flanking on makes sense in the context of "how much 5E plays like 3.x." And since 5E is not designed or intended to play the same way as 5E on a tactical miniatures level, "Help is not inferior to flanking, it is the replacement for it.

5E abstracts the combat is a way that is similar to earlier editions. As such, combat rules that rely on position and/or precise movement and location don't fit without a lot of modification being done. A perfect example is the new way attacks of opportunity happen: because the intent is not to track every 5 foot square the characters and monsters pas through, AoOs only occur when you leave the opponent's reach. This is a call back to old rules about getting whacked when you turn and run from a fight. the Disengage action exists to mitigate this: you are giving up your attack in order to withdraw carefully so as not to take that hit. So, because of the way AoOs work in 5E, the 5 foot step rule is as inappropriate in the game as flanking.

None of this is to say that you can't reintroduce those tactical elements into play, and it is clear the design team expected some folks to do just that given a few of the optional rules (like 3.x style flanking). But doing so requires a lot of care and you have to expect that some rules or abilities won't work quite as they were intended. Some things will become useless while others will become overpowered. That is always an possibility with house rules, of course, but because D&D is traditionally an action oriented game with lots of combat, changes to the combat rules will have a disproportionately large impact on play, as opposed to, say, making the Silence spell require only somatic components.