Distract drop invisibility?

[jaelis]

Not quite. The dragon breath example fails due to OAs being melee attacks.

Obviously the creature you breath on must be in your reach, but if so, how is it not a melee attack? You are attacking a creature in melee.

The Mirror Image one is less clear, but can still be supported by the fact that choosing a target is unaffected by mirror image, and magic missile always strikes it's target. That could go the other way, and, in fact, I allow Mirror Image to interact with Magic Missile in exactly that way.

If you can't target an image here, then how can you ever target an image with any attack? It is neither a creature nor an object, which is what most attacks specify. Not that you have anything to defend here, since you seem to be playing it consistently.

 

[Oofta]

Obviously the creature you breath on must be in your reach, but if so, how is it not a melee attack? You are attacking a creature in melee.

Thanks for reminding me of why I've given up on this thread. A dragon is attacking (whether you rule it as an "attack" or not) when he breaths fire, but it is obviously not a melee attack. You're just twisting words to continue the argument for no reason.

 

[jaelis]

Thanks for reminding me of why I've given up on this thread. A dragon is attacking (whether you rule it as an "attack" or not) when he breaths fire, but it is obviously not a melee attack. You're just twisting words to continue the argument for no reason.

No, I'm twisting words to make the point that you are also twisting words. "Twisting words" is the same thing as "interpreting words," the only difference is whether you agree with the interpretation or not. If you have a rational argument for why we should interpret "attack" in natural language but "melee attack" as game language, then lets hear it. Otherwise I stand by my claim that you aren't interpreting the rules, you're just telling us how you like to play.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Obviously the creature you breath on must be in your reach, but if so, how is it not a melee attack? You are attacking a creature in melee.

Hey, that sobs awesome! Dragons could use a boost. Great ruling! Let us know how it turns out!

If you can't target an image here, then how can you ever target an image with any attack? It is neither a creature nor an object, which is what most attacks specify. Not that you have anything to defend here, since you seem to be playing it consistently.

Huh, I'm not sure how you got that from what i said, but, hey, sounds good, that should work out great! Let us know how it works out!

 

[Ovinomancer]

No, I'm twisting words to make the point that you are also twisting words. "Twisting words" is the same thing as "interpreting words," the only difference is whether you agree with the interpretation or not. If you have a rational argument for why we should interpret "attack" in natural language but "melee attack" as game language, then lets hear it. Otherwise I stand by my claim that you aren't interpreting the rules, you're just telling us how you like to play.

Uh, huh, sure, if you really believe that, sounds great! Follow your passion, man!

 

[nswanson27]

Uh, huh, sure, if you really believe that, sounds great! Follow your passion, man!

Regardless of what he believes or whether he's right or not, he's inviting an explanation to an apparent double-standard. Answering it would settle the issue. A smug dismissal doesn't simply demonstrates that you've got nothing else to validate your side of the argument.

 

[Oofta]

No, I'm twisting words to make the point that you are also twisting words. "Twisting words" is the same thing as "interpreting words," the only difference is whether you agree with the interpretation or not. If you have a rational argument for why we should interpret "attack" in natural language but "melee attack" as game language, then lets hear it. Otherwise I stand by my claim that you aren't interpreting the rules, you're just telling us how you like to play.

TLDR: I'm tired of the rules lawyer argument.

Long version:
There's a difference between having a difference of opinion on how to interpret the rules differently and obfuscation/straw man/twisting words beyond reasonable interpretation.

Just like there's a difference between debate and trolling.

You're doing the latter in both cases.

In addition, there's no option for nuanced response in twitter, no chance for further clarification. Which is one of the reasons I don't use it.

In this case, I'd be curious what he would have said about the dragon breath breaking invisibility but it probably wouldn't change my ruling. I think the overly-technical reading of the rule leads to a whole host of issues I don't want to argue about in game. I don't want to have to look up page ___ of the PHB to get the technical definition of what an attack is (or any number of other similar issues), I just want to make a judgment call that makes sense to me and my players and move on.

To me that's one of the strengths of 5E. Want a more relaxed game that doesn't promote rules-lawyering? Go for it! Want to parse the words like a legal document, want to be a rules lawyer? More power to you!

Once again, you choose the latter. Have fun with that.

 

[nswanson27]

TLDR: I'm tired of the rules lawyer argument.

Long version:
There's a difference between having a difference of opinion on how to interpret the rules differently and obfuscation/straw man/twisting words beyond reasonable interpretation.

Just like there's a difference between debate and trolling.

You're doing the latter in both cases.

In addition, there's no option for nuanced response in twitter, no chance for further clarification. Which is one of the reasons I don't use it.

In this case, I'd be curious what he would have said about the dragon breath breaking invisibility but it probably wouldn't change my ruling. I think the overly-technical reading of the rule leads to a whole host of issues I don't want to argue about in game. I don't want to have to look up page ___ of the PHB to get the technical definition of what an attack is (or any number of other similar issues), I just want to make a judgment call that makes sense to me and my players and move on.

To me that's one of the strengths of 5E. Want a more relaxed game that doesn't promote rules-lawyering? Go for it! Want to parse the words like a legal document, want to be a rules lawyer? More power to you!

Once again, you choose the latter. Have fun with that.

So I guess in your case I think the correct term that's being claimed is that yours is a "house interpretation". A houserule is probably not the correct term here. It's a difference in the way you on how you read the rules, not on what any particular rules says. You way of doing it is perfectly fine. But if you think that your way of interpreting the rules is the way the designers do, then I think you are factually incorrect. There's evidence from sage advice to support this claim - not completely conclusive, but I haven't seen anything from sage advice that lends itself to your way of interpreting the rules. But again, if what the designer think about how to interpret the rules is not your concern, then there it is, and a lot of this thread is due to not understand where you're coming from.
Is this getting closer to the mark?

 

[Arial Black]

I don't want to have to look up page ___ of the PHB to get the technical definition of what an attack is (or any number of other similar issues), I just want to make a judgment call that makes sense to me and my players and move on.

Interesting.

This is a thread asking about what the rules are (motivated by playing in AL), but you don't want to have to look up the rule to find out what the rule is, you just want to make it up as you go along....!

As a statement of how you run your game....okay...but as an answer to a question about the rules it is totally useless.

 

[Arial Black]

And yet for some reason (or no reason?), just as in the PHB he either refuses or neglects to add the 1-3 words that would completely and utterly put the matter to rest. Make that "if" into "just if" or "exactly if" or tack "otherwise, no" onto the end and all doubt is removed.

We have to balance a tiny quibble about 1-3 words to make it even more clear versus an absolute certainty that if he wanted dragon breath and other non-attack, non-spell casting actions to pop invisibility then he would not answer the question by stating that 'attack' means 'attack roll' or 'explicit statement'.

In order to make his statement match the strict interpretation even you only need to add 1-3 words (because it works as is for me), but to make the statement match the looser interpretation of 'any offensive action pops invisibility' you would have to change the entire statement!

The two interpretations of his statement simply do not carry the same weight.