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Message: <blockquote data-quote="CapnZapp" data-source="post: 6987465" data-attributes="member: 12731">I think we can get at the matter best by asking the following question:Can your players ever stop an ambush from happening? That is, get a warning in sufficient time to regroup, flee, barricade themselves or otherwise averting the significant detrimental effects of the ambush? To start the encounter when the enemy is still not prepared, coordinated, ready? And do all this by utilizing their watchfulness (i.e. Perception; not talking about having magical alarms go off etc). In real life, getting a 6 second warning is effectively useless. Ideally you'd want minutes to be able to prepare a meaningful response to a sudden attack. But I can live with unrealistic response and reaction times; it is after all a fantasy game where combats are over in seconds.If we need a definition, I would put a minimal amount of time for an encounter to qualify for this at 1 complete round, but ideally you'd need two turns: one for everyone to wake up and get their bearings, the other to grab your critical gear (your weapon, a quest item or whatever) and move to a better position (less exposed, closer to your allies, away from any major threats etc). That is, two (or one) complete turn(s) regardless of surprise or initiative. Obviously you can gain extra turns by winning initiative and/or not being surprised.I am fully aware there really aren't any rules for how you would realistically lack awareness if you're suddenly being kicked awake in the middle of the night. Some DMs would ask players to spend their action on "active Perception" or they would have to take their action "blind" (as in before the DM reveals the nature of the threat). If your answer isn't "yes", then my answer is "we're both playing 5E but in entirely different ways".---As I said, when I'm myself a player I abhor the notion that monsters just jump out of the shadows at my throat from nowhere. It might make for a good game, but to me it just feels so videogamey and artificial. So when I DM I try to avoid imposing that on my players. Or rather, I want a good reason if and when it happens. One such good reason is if the math tells me such a resolution is statistically plausible.</blockquote>

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