D&D 5E BBEGs and Counterspells

[RangerWickett]

When I ran the playtest for the War of the Burning Sky adventure path, I had one player who really loved Magic, and wanted to dive headfirst into spell dueling. Some clever techniques he developed:

• The Pump Fake. Make a Deception check to pretend to cast a spell (as a bonus action), and if you beat their Wisdom check to detect your trick, they cast their counterspell to soon, letting you cast your real spell. (We used to play basketball, and he'd do this all the time, feigning a jump shot so we'd go up to block, but waiting to actually jump until we were coming back down.)
• The Tree. Duck behind cover and cast your spell where your opponent has no line of sight.
• The Gunslinger. Step out of cover but ready an action to cast acid arrow the moment your opponent starts to cast anything. Get into a staredown as each waits for the other to move first. (Hopefully your opponent doesn't realize that the spell you cast when you were behind a tree was invisibility, on the party's rogue, who should be stabbing your opponent right about . . . now.)
• The Phantasmal Tree. As above, but the spell you cast is an illusion of yourself. Next turn direct that illusion to pop out and pretend to cast a spell, drawing your opponent's counterspell. Then step out and hit the opponent with your real spell.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Nothing whatsoever. I guess you could argue it either way. Myself, I feel like Joe "Intelligence Dump Stat" Barbarian shouldn't be able to see a wizard cast a spell and go, "Wizard cast Otiluke's resilient sphere! Joe smash!"

Back in 2E, our house rule was that anyone can recognize a spell that they would be capable of casting. So a wizard will recognize wizard spells, a cleric will recognize cleric spells, etc.

 

[TheGorramBatman]

What do the rules actually say about identifying spells as they are cast? I'm inclined to believe that they would lean more toward automatic identification, rather than nobody ever having any idea.

I honestly don't think it matters anymore rules-wise. Counterspell is just another reaction now, just one that requires a spell slot. As with any reaction, it requires an offending action to have been announced first.

The DM says the big badguy throws out fireball at the group and starts marking out the AoE. The Wizard says "no, thank you. I use my reaction to cast Counterspell." They roll for it if necessary and that's that.

It makes me feel better to assume the counterspelling caster is nullifying an effect in progress rather than stopping that effect from occurring in the first place. Rather than describing a spell fizzling out before it casting has completed at all, it works better to imagine a disintigrate beam firing straight at the Barbarian and the counterspelling caster blasting it out of existence before the damage is done. It is easier to visualize the badguy's Lightning Bolt crackling to life around their hand only to discharge harmlessly before the it can be lobbed at the party.

In hindsight, Spellcraft Checks to identify a spell as it is being cast just feels like one more thing slowing down the pace of the game. We'll see how I feel in a month or two, but for now I'm glad they're gone and I have no issues outright telling my players what is being cast and allowing them to stop it if they feel like using a reaction and a spell slot.

How you deal with counterspell-happy players is easy: Throw more than one enemy caster at them. They only get one reaction per round. Replan your evil caster BBEG as creepy twins. Done and done.

 

[ccooke]

I honestly don't think it matters anymore rules-wise. Counterspell is just another reaction now, just one that requires a spell slot. As with any reaction, it requires an offending action to have been announced first.

The DM says the big badguy throws out fireball at the group and starts marking out the AoE. The Wizard says "no, thank you. I use my reaction to cast Counterspell." They roll for it if necessary and that's that.

It makes me feel better to assume the counterspelling caster is nullifying an effect in progress rather than stopping that effect from occurring in the first place. Rather than describing a spell fizzling out before it casting has completed at all, it works better to imagine a disintigrate beam firing straight at the Barbarian and the counterspelling caster blasting it out of existence before the damage is done. It is easier to visualize the badguy's Lightning Bolt crackling to life around their hand only to discharge harmlessly before the it can be lobbed at the party.

In hindsight, Spellcraft Checks to identify a spell as it is being cast just feels like one more thing slowing down the pace of the game. We'll see how I feel in a month or two, but for now I'm glad they're gone and I have no issues outright telling my players what is being cast and allowing them to stop it if they feel like using a reaction and a spell slot.

How you deal with counterspell-happy players is easy: Throw more than one enemy caster at them. They only get one reaction per round. Replan your evil caster BBEG as creepy twins. Done and done.

This is a really nice way to view it - thanks!

 

[MarkB]

Casting from cover has been mentioned, so I'll add casting from concealment / invisibility. The enemy mage can't react to what he can't see.

The other option is to find a way to make that enemy caster burn his reaction - or regret it if he doesn't.

 

[Wild Gazebo]

I think if the PCs are willing to blow two spells and two reactions to avoid one BBEG spell...let them. That is a fair amount of resource in exchange for one simple and direct bad guy tactic.

I really like the spell feint idea...can't believe I never thought of that before.