D&D 5E 12th Level monk with a speed of 50' had to use half her movement to stand up from prone!

[Klaudius Rex]

As a DM, i felt bad for my wife who plays a 12th level monk with a speed of 50'.

She was prone. To stand up from prone requires half your movement?

Does this seem legit?

I want to help her with this, but dont want to screw with the rules too much. So i come to you...

 

[posineg]

To make some amount of fairness, use half of the 30' speed or what ever the race base is. She would still have 35' movement opposed to 25'. Just think, it is better than 4E where it took your movement to stand.

 

[Corwin]

Have her look at the Athlete feat. Then it would only cost her 5.

 

[DEFCON 1]

On the one hand it does seem a bit weird that one character could lose 25 feet worth of movement standing up while someone else might only lose 10 (if they had a speed of 20'). But then again... if we take away the knowledge of how much a PC should be moving... two characters stand up from prone and one only gets to move 10 additional feet, while the other is moving 25! That's a huge difference.

And there's not really a way to "fix" it, because even if you were to change it from losing half your speed to losing a set amount of feet, you end up with the same problem but reversed... this time in terms of proportion. If you were to say that standing up from prone requires 10 feet of movement... the PC that moves 20 feet per round loses 50% of their movement just by standing up... whereas the person who moves 50 feet only loses 20%. And thus you then have to ask why does a faster walking person stand up so much quicker than one who doesn't?

On top of that... you then also have the issue that by making standing up only a certain number of feet, you are making it much less of a punishment for a faster character. A monk who moves 50 feet a round loses very little (proportionally) from having to stand up. Being knocked prone is no longer much of a punishment. The monk is still going to get to move 40 feet, which is still faster than almost every other character out there. By taking away a full 50% of every PCs movement... being knocked prone is an equal hindrance (proportionally) to every character. Yes, the faster character still gets move movement left over after they stand up... but they aren't proportionally even faster than a slower PC.

So while it seems counter-intuitive that a monk should "lose" so much speed just from standing up... in truth their walking speed is just so fast that even this "punishment" can be overcome. Your wife still gets to move 25 feet after standing up... while her platemail-wearing party member is possibly only going to get to move 10'.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[bganon]

Yes. Look at it this way, she can stand up and still have almost as much movement as any other character, and could spend a Ki point to get another 50' of movement.

If she really wants to bounce up without much penalty at all, there's the Athlete feat.

 

[UnknownDyson]

Take the athlete feat. The prone status condition isn't just about being on the ground. Prone almost works like the dazed condition in 4e. Effects that disorient your character momentarily are usually covered by the prone or stunned status condition. Everyone expends half movement to leave the prone state, that is one of the reasons why it is so effective. Not only that, but if you think about it from a combat stand point, it also makes sense. After you get knocked down, are you going to call a time out and expect the enemy to wait for you to take a fighting pose? Are they going to let you get up without attacking you again? Half movement seems a fair trade off, there could be opportunity attacks triggered by creatures trying to leave the prone state.

 

[CapnZapp]

If you're faster, losing three seconds because you stumble means losing more yards covered.

That just makes sense that a rabbit loses more ground by falling over than a turtle.

Tell wifey to recalibrate her sense of fairness

 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

This sounds like reasonable grounds for divorce if you ask me.

 

[jasper]

As a DM, i felt bad for my wife who plays a 12th level monk with a speed of 50'.

She was prone. To stand up from prone requires half your movement?

Does this seem legit?

I want to help her with this, but dont want to screw with the rules too much. So i come to you...

Had this come up in with a fifth level monk in my AL game. This is just a game thingy. Prone takes 1/2 of total movement make sense as easy rule. Everyone loses 1/2 movement barring feats about feets. This also helps the dm so he does not have check the MM to find out how much movement the monster loses if it is prone. Now have a prone slime mold is funny.
So some game thingys don't make sense all the time but are there to make the game easier.