D&D 5E The Gloves Are Off?

[iserith]

It's simple. It's impossible for a turn based combat system like 5e's to be simultaneous no matter how you imagine it. You can imagine it, sure, but you are twisting it into a pretzel that it really isn't in order to imagine it that way.

The reason counterspell can counter a spell is because it's an instantaneous reaction. There isn't enough time in the fiction for the second counterspell to interrupt the first, because the spells are equally long. The first counterspell can stop the fireball since the fireball takes long enough to cast that the reaction can interrupt it and keep it from being successful. By the time the second counterspell is done and can interrupt a spell, the first finished and triggers just before that.

You have to start twisting the fiction where casters are simultaneously faster and slower than each other with the same spell or something equally absurd in the fiction in order to allow one to counter the other. For my current campaign I'm just ignoring the fictional flaw and the spell will be gone in the next one.

Seems to me the issue is trying to establish the fiction step by step rather than waiting till the entire interaction is resolved. As I said upthread, just dummy up until the damage or effect is applied. A wizard casting fireball has someone try to counterspell their spell, but the counterspelling caster is instead counterspelled by another caster. That's not very complicated and pretty easy to imagine in the fiction in my view.

 

[Vaalingrade]

People being able to react to and anticipate things breaks the fiction.

If you have ever flinched at something, you've shattered reallity.

 

[Maxperson]

Seems to me the issue is trying to establish the fiction step by step rather than waiting till the entire interaction is resolved. As I said upthread, just dummy up until the damage or effect is applied. A wizard casting fireball has someone try to counterspell their spell, but the counterspelling caster is instead counterspelled by another caster. That's not very complicated and pretty easy to imagine in the fiction in my view.

It also still fails to BE simultaneous. As people move, other people would alter their movements and actions to compensate. Waiting until the end is a way to run combat, but it still won't BE simultaneous even if you describe or imagine it that way.

 

[iserith]

It also still fails to BE simultaneous. As people move, other people would alter their movements and actions to compensate. Waiting until the end is a way to run combat, but it still won't BE simultaneous even if you describe or imagine it that way.

I don't see the problem though. Just describe it as I said above. Fireball goes off as two other casters cast counterspell. Roll saves, apply damage.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yeah. The only thing that a lot of people (including apparently WotC) think makes the new edition "backwards compatible" is that the core math remains the same. Changing the CR assumptions changes that math.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Duplicate post.

 

[hawkeyefan]

It's simple. It's impossible for a turn based combat system like 5e's to be simultaneous no matter how you imagine it. You can imagine it, sure, but you are twisting it into a pretzel that it really isn't in order to imagine it that way.

Wow. You just double down on telling someone else how their imagination must work, huh? Nary even a Principal Skinner moment of reflection before barreling ahead. Awesome.

The reason counterspell can counter a spell is because it's an instantaneous reaction. There isn't enough time in the fiction for the second counterspell to interrupt the first, because the spells are equally long. The first counterspell can stop the fireball since the fireball takes long enough to cast that the reaction can interrupt it and keep it from being successful. By the time the second counterspell is done and can interrupt a spell, the first finished and triggers just before that.

You have to start twisting the fiction where casters are simultaneously faster and slower than each other with the same spell or something equally absurd in the fiction in order to allow one to counter the other. For my current campaign I'm just ignoring the fictional flaw and the spell will be gone in the next one.

Or you could treat the entire sequence as not totally dictated by the turn sequence. The wizard goes to cast fireball, the opposing bard decides to counterspell it, but the wizard's sorcerer friend sees what the bard is up to and casts his own counterspell.

Pretty easy. You just have to drop the rigid turn structure for a moment.

 

[Maxperson]

I don't see the problem though. Just describe it as I said above. Fireball goes off as two other casters cast counterspell. Roll saves, apply damage.

I'm not saying it is a problem. I'm just saying it's not actually simultaneous combat. That I don't like it doesn't make it a problem.

 

[Maxperson]

Wow. You just double down on telling someone else how their imagination must work, huh? Nary even a Principal Skinner moment of reflection before barreling ahead. Awesome.

I haven't yet told you how your imagination must work. Can't double down on something I've never done.

Or you could treat the entire sequence as not totally dictated by the turn sequence. The wizard goes to cast fireball, the opposing bard decides to counterspell it, but the wizard's sorcerer friend sees what the bard is up to and casts his own counterspell.

Pretty easy. You just have to drop the rigid turn structure for a moment.

Sure, but that doesn't make it simultaneous, because the rigid structure is always going to be present in combat regardless of what I do. Short of completely re-writing how combat works anyway.

 

[Lanefan]

Is your D&D game depicting real events?

Within its own reality, yes - or at least it's trying to.

For the spell-counterspell-counterspell example to work, what in the fiction must be ignored?

That by the time the second counterspeller realizes the first counter is being cast* and can get her own away, it's already too late.

* - as opposed to any other reaction-speed spell that she wouldn't counter.