D&D 5E The Gloves Are Off?

[Bill Zebub]

New thought experiment: there's a character at one end of a 20' long corridor. At the other end, in an open room, is a caster controlling a flaming sphere, which they are currently standing behind.

1) On the first character's turn, they use their 30' of movement to go down the corridor and into the room. They use their last 10' to go sideways into a corner.

2) On the caster's turn, they move their flaming sphere down the 20' corridor to the other end.

According to the rules, the first character didn't encounter the flaming sphere.

Does it bother anybody that the only way for that to be true is for the turns to actually be sequential, not simultaneous?

 

[Swarmkeeper]

New thought experiment: there's a character at one end of a 20' long corridor. At the other end, in an open room, is a caster controlling a flaming sphere, which they are currently standing behind.

1) On the first character's turn, they use their 30' of movement to go down the corridor and into the room. They use their last 10' to go sideways into a corner.

2) On the caster's turn, they move their flaming sphere down the 20' corridor to the other end.

According to the rules, the first character didn't encounter the flaming sphere.

Does it bother anybody that the only way for that to be true is for the turns to actually be sequential, not simultaneous?

 

[Mort]

If they were, it would say so. Even with that it still would not be possible to recognize/feel such a fluctuation and respond in time to beat something that happens in a fraction of a second. Especially since the thing you are responding with takes an equal amount of time.

I added flavor text to justify the fact that the rules DO say so and have been confirmed to say so.

Time to perceive + Reaction > Reaction alone. For you to be right, the second caster has to see the future and begin casting his counterspell so that it can go off before the first counterspell and counter it.

Not at all, there is A LOT of wiggle room in the 6 second round. It's fast but not THAT fast. The big concession you have to make is that the caster has to be able to interrupt his own spell to counterspell. But because it's so quick, time is not a factor.

This is still perception + reaction > than reaction. You're arguing that perception(positive amount of time) + reaction(positive amount of time) < reaction(same positive time as first reaction) alone. That's not how math works.

You're not accounting for the fact that not all time in the round is actually accounted for and that it's all just an approximation anyway.

Your biggest hangup, that the casting mage wouldn't have time to observe to counter? The mage is already observing his targets, if one of them moves to react, the mage is going to be ready for it! If it's some unperceived (or even hidden) counterspeller? then no, the mage can't counter - because the spell itself says he can't.

Now THAT is adversarial DMing.

Yes, and it sets a precedent I wouldn't be comfortable with. But stuff like this happens all the time.

 

[Maxperson]

There's nothing that says that casting counterspell is always done exactly the same way by everyone who uses it.

But there is RAW that says that the entire reaction spell from start to finish takes a fraction of a second. That applies to all counterspells and is exactly the same for everyone that uses it, because it's RAW.

There's nothing that says that the counterspell cannot be interrupted. In fact, we've been told the opposite.

The rule, yes. It's the fiction that gets twisted to fit that rule.

There's nothing that says that magic spells cannot interact with each other in mysterious and unexpected ways.

Okay, but if the DM didn't apply that house rule evenly across the board I'd call shenanigans. If the occasional fireball didn't interact in a mysterious and unexpected way with say mage armor every once in a while, that would also be twisting the fiction to suit the rule.

There's nothing that says that the person casting the second counterspell didn't intuit what the other was doing and beat them to the punch...

Yes. I acknowledge that seeing into the future was a way to do it. Now show me the rule that allows casters to see into the future? The only one I see is Foresight the 9th level spell.

that the order of events for the characters MUST match that of the players. A lot happens in a round, and expecting that every participant is just standing around in stasis except on their turn is bonkers.

Itis bonkers, but that's what has to happen in a turn based system. Or you can just ignore it and not think about it too closely. If you want to try and turn it into simultaneous combat, though, the fiction has to be twisted to the rules, because the rules simply do not allow for simultaneous combat to occur.

Even if you imagine that people who have determined the order they do things in with initiative rolls are not truly going in that order, a true simultaneous combat would allow the participants to react and move differently than they will in turn based combat, as well as change targets and attack types based on what others in the combat are doing. This does not occur in 5e's turn base combat, so no matter how you choose to imagine it, the combat is not truly going to be simultaneous. It's impossible with 5e's system.

 

[Micah Sweet]

To me it seems like it is: the question of whether or not a certain approach to game play is disruptive, or unbalanced, or otherwise unsatisfactory is a meaningful question about something that is occurring in the real world.

Whereas a "realism" argument about whether or not someone casting a magical spell Dr Strange-style can interrupt it to cast a Counterspell is a contradiction in terms - the answer is entirely made up, either directly or as part of some extrapolation or building on some prior conception of how the magic works which was entirely made up. There are no constraints, and where there are no constraints I don't see how their can be argument at all.

Sorry, the "it's all just a magical elf-game anyway" argument holds no water with me.

 

[Xamnam]

Does it bother anybody that the only way for that to be true is for the turns to actually be sequential, not simultaneous?

I say this earnestly, not dismissively, but no, it doesn't bother me. Given that it only does damage if you end the turn next to it, or if it rams into the creature, it's easy enough to visualize the scenario as narrowly outracing the sphere's movement, sliding in the corner of the hallway, or just diving through the edge of it.

 

[Maxperson]

I added flavor text to justify the fact that the rules DO say so and have been confirmed to say so.

I agree. The rules allow it. The rest is twisting the fiction to match those rules, since the fiction wouldn't allow it to happen if you relied on the fiction alone.

Not at all, there is A LOT of wiggle room in the 6 second round. It's fast but not THAT fast. The big concession you have to make is that the caster has to be able to interrupt his own spell to counterspell. But because it's so quick, time is not a factor.

There isn't 6 seconds. RAW explicitly says that reaction spells take a fraction of a second. That's it. The first counterspell takes a fraction of a second and the second takes a fraction of a second. You have to perceive the first one being cast within 60 feet in order to counter it, so what I said was factual.

Counterspell two is Perception + reaction and counterspell one is just reaction. The first will always take more time than the second.

The full 6 second round is for actions, movement and other things, not for the two counterspells.

You're not accounting for the fact that not all time in the round is actually accounted for and that it's all just an approximation anyway.

Because I don't need to. RAW is explicit. I'll quote it again.

"Some spells can be cast as reactions. These spells take a fraction of a second to bring about and are cast in response to some event. If a spell can be cast as a reaction, the spell description tells you exactly when you can do so."

That is RAW. The full round is irrelevant.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Says who? a lunge happens in a fraction of a second - are you saying it's impossible to parry? Or better yet a riposte (more appropriate here) is a VERY short quick move, is that impossible to parry? A fraction of a second is up to a second (and, frankly, considering the use of natural flowery language it could actually be any time at all - but up to a second fits the shortened requirement). That's long enough to still be reacted to.

If a caster knows what a reaction spell is, they will look for the signs and know to react to them.

I can certainly understand many of the reasons to ban counterspell, or ban counterspelling counterspell. But the timing issue doesn't bother me.

A lunge is not a reaction. It's an action. IMO, you simply shouldn't be able to react to a reaction. All of this goes away if you make that change.

If the timing doesn't matter to you, then we really have nothing to discuss. No one's going to persuade anyone here.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

I believe that @Sabathius42 was assuming that all combat participants use the same 6 seconds.

Why, except in a stop-motion world, would people just be running up to one another and "swinging" without some sort of back-and-forth, attempts to parry and block, etc?

That is indeed what I'm saying. A round of combat represents 6 seconds of narrative time. All combatants are doing something (in a narrative sense) for the full 6 seconds.

A wizard is probably using a staff to parry a blow or a rogue may be diving behind and back out from a pillar in those 6 narrative seconds, but those do not have to correspond to game level "actions" like attacks or reactions.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Just for funnsies, If I magic missle my target and he throws up shield can I counterspell his shield? Can one of the targets buddies counterspell my counterspell?

They shouldn't be able to, and I wouldn't allow it at my table, but I believe you can by RAW.