D&D 5E Altitude and range

[Greenstone.Walker]

While GMing the flameskull in Wave Echo Cave, I came across an issue dealing with altitude and range.

The flameskull has a fire ray with a range of 30 ft. At the time, it was 40 ft in the air. A player asked, "How can it hit me, it's out of range."

The question surprised me a bit because I've always just ignored altitude as being to difficult to calculate at the table. Who wants to do square roots while playing D&D?

I guess a similar question would be if a character was at the top of a cliff. Could they shoot spells or missiles at targets at the bottom of the cliff, if the cliff face was higher than the spell or weapon's range?

How do you deal with this?

Is there a way of factoring in altitude while keeping the activity at the table fast?

 

[Mouseferatu]

You can just use the greater of the two distances. That is, if it's 30 feet away horizontally but 40 feet away vertically, it's 40 feet away. That's nowhere near real-world accurate, but it at least takes height into account, and it keep things going quickly.

But yeah, altitude should factor in somehow. It's still distance.

 

[Lehrbuch]

The flameskull has a fire ray with a range of 30 ft. At the time, it was 40 ft in the air. A player asked, "How can it hit me, it's out of range."

If the flameskull is shooting downwards then it may still be in range, if a fire ray has mass, rather than just being an effect that simply ends at a certain distance.

On the other hand, if a player brought this up in play, I'd say "good point", and next turn the flameskull would either move so that it was in range or shoot at something different.

If I really wanted to do something about this in play, the simplest thing would be just apply Pythagoras' Theorem and do the appropriate square roots. It's not that hard. But of course, that doesn't take into account ballistics or wind or aerodynamics and so forth, so at least as ridiculously unrealistic as just simply using the horizontal range.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

Here's what I do:

1) Put a die next to any flying creature to note how many squares upward the creature is from their position on the table.
2) Measure distance the same way you would for a non-flying creature that was the number of spaces indicated on the die to the right or left of their position on the table.

 

[Rushmik]

Here's what I do:

1) Put a die next to any flying creature to note how many squares upward the creature is from their position on the table.
2) Measure distance the same way you would for a non-flying creature that was the number of spaces indicated on the die to the right or left of their position on the table.

This thread got me thinking (since I've always just ballpark yes-or-no'd it, as a DM) and this seems to be an excellent solution. I will be using this!

 

[Rya.Reisender]

I wouldn't completely ignore altitude (in fact, I often give advantage/disadvantage based on it), but rather than calculating the exact distance I'd just make the Flame Skull move between the attacks. Like "It comes down until it can reach you, attacks, then moves back up". If case a player wants to use a reaction to counterattack it, I already know the player needs to have a range of at least 30ft to be able to do it, without knowing the exact placement.

 

[NotActuallyTim]

Movement between attacks is legal! For everyone!

Shot on The Run, how I love you so!

 

[devincutler]

This is a reason the play with a grid. Then you can easily count the distance by quickly drawing out a side view to scale on the margins of the battlemat and counting the squares.

 

[E. Tallitnics]

Here's what I do:

1) Put a die next to any flying creature to note how many squares upward the creature is from their position on the table.
2) Measure distance the same way you would for a non-flying creature that was the number of spaces indicated on the die to the right or left of their position on the table.

This is what I do and it works great on a grid!

The simple math is that both numbers need to be equal to or less than the spells range.

So if the range is 30' (6 squares) and you're 30' (6 squares) from the target but 40' (8 squares) in the air you're too far away.

 

[Nine Hands]

You can just use the greater of the two distances. That is, if it's 30 feet away horizontally but 40 feet away vertically, it's 40 feet away. That's nowhere near real-world accurate, but it at least takes height into account, and it keep things going quickly.

But yeah, altitude should factor in somehow. It's still distance.

This is flat out the easiest solution and I've used it in Mekton for the last 10 years. There is no room at the game table for a calculator