D&D 5E Challenging High-Level 5e Characters

[ECMO3]

.I was going to throw together some grid mockups showing how unlikely it is that "enough movement" is going to be a non issue during actual combat conditions but I think I'd rather set the bar higher and instead ask you to show three combos conditions where enough movement is a plausible limiting factor without resorting to a narrow hallway type scenario. I say three because it seems reasonable to expect if this is going to be an at all common thing rather than an extreme edge case given how static and unmoving 5e combat tends to be when PCs are past the close to target initial phase and plausibly involved enough to have low hit points where a hypothetical touch healing word might be needed.

Instead of posting some hypotheticals, I'm going post some actual combats online that proves this out. Here are the last three D&D streams from the favorite DM I follow on You Tube:

1.
This is a 4 hour single combat and very few PCs were in movement distance of one another the whole fight. At one point one PC starts moving towards another for 3 straight rounds to try to get into touch range of another frightened PC (and never actually gets there).

2:
There are three combats in this stream, the first one starting at 58 minutes and through that 4-round combat all 4 Pcs were never within 30 feet of each other (note the squares are 10 foot each).

There is a second combat that starts at 2:13 and again at no point are all 4 PCs within movement of each other.

There is a 3rd combat in this starting at about 2:58 and the end of round 1 is the only time they are all within movement range of each other. It looks like at the begining of round 1 they are, however there are two allies between the northmost and southmost ally, and difficult terrain to the east, so they can not all reach each other until the one ally moves out of the way near the end of the round. A bad guy then moves into the gap and makes it two groups of two and then one of the weaker characters backs up, as a result it is part of one round out of seven they can all reach each other.

3:
There are two combats in this stream. A combat starts at about 20:00 and they are all within reach of each other in most of the rounds. They were within reach not for the begining of round 2 and rounds 9, 10 and 11, but they are for all the rest So overall I will say 8 of 11 rounds they were all within movement range of each other.

Another combat starts about 2:30 and the PCs are all within walking distance of one another in round 1 and 3 out of four rounds of combat

Result:
So in those three streams you have about 40 rounds of combat or so and the PCs are all within walking distance of one another about 13 out of those 40 or so rounds. I think this is pretty typical. Note I did not look for examples to prove my point, these are the last 3 D&D games this DM posted.

 

[tetrasodium]

I think you mean annoying smart gameplay. RAW there is nothing stupid about yo-yoing party members. As a matter of fact it is usually smart to wait until they are down to heal them. Keeping your allies at 4 or 5 hps means the enemy can only do 4 or 5 damage and from a resource management perspective it is far better to cast healing word 3 times in a row instead of 1 heal that will last 3 rounds.

Yes there is. It's literally PCs "face rolling" through combat.

Instead of posting some hypotheticals, why don't you post some actual combats online that proves this out. Surely if this is ubiquotous there should be many examples of the thousands of streams online

For my part here are the last three D&D streams from my favorite DM to watch:

1.
This was a 4 hour single combat and very few PCs were in movement distance the whole fight.

2:
there are combats in this stream, the first one starting at 58 minutes and through that 4 round combat all 4 Pcs were never within 30 feet of each other (note the squares are 10 foot each).

There is a second combat that starts at 2:13 and again at no point are all 4 PCs within movement of each other and for most of it only 2 of them can reach each other

There is a 3rd combat in this starting at about 2:58 and the end of round 1 is the only time they are all within movement range of each other. It looks like at the beginign of round 1 they are, however there are two allies between the northmost and southmost ally, and difficult terrain to the east, so they can not all reach each other until the one ally moves out of the way near the end of the round. A bad guy closes in a bit later and makes it two groups of two and then one of the weaker characters backs up, as a result it is part of one round out of 7 they can reach each other.

3:
A combat starts at about 20:00 and at the begining they are all within reach of each other in most of the rounds. They were not for the begining of round 2 and rounds 9, 10 and 11. So overall I will 8 of 11 rounds they were within movement range of each other.

Another combat starts about 2:30 and the PCs are all within walking distance of one another in round 1 and 3 out of 4 rounds of combat


So in those three streams you have about 50 rounds of combat or so and the PCs are all within walking distance of one another about 13 out of those 50 or so rounds. I think this is pretty typical.

I'll accept this as a clear admission that you can not demonstrate how shifting healing word from bonus action ranged to bonus action touch would be a meaningful hurdle. You seem to have posted a snipe hunt consisting of hours of video rather than showing or describing a grid combat where the need to move in range to deliver a touch spell to an ally is notably difficult to achieve with 5e style movement and opportunity attacks. Moving around the battlefield is trivial by design under those conditions until you have "narrow hallway" . When the best you can do is a scenario where the group is spread over more than the caster's move speed is a failure to operate as a team where players need to learn each other's strengths weaknesses and needs or do better working within them rather than over extending in a way that ignores healers and support classes.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think you mean annoying smart gameplay. RAW there is nothing stupid about yo-yoing party members. As a matter of fact it is usually smart to wait until they are down to heal them. Keeping your allies at 4 or 5 hps means the enemy can only do 4 or 5 damage and from a resource management perspective it is far better to cast healing word 3 times in a row instead of 1 heal that will last 3 rounds.

Yup. It is an intensely frustrating tactic encouraged by the rules.

 

[ECMO3]

I'll accept this as a clear admission that you can not demonstrate how shifting healing word from bonus action ranged to bonus action touch would be a meaningful

As you noted I posted "hours of video" of real play where a touch spell was not possible. I think that very effectively demonstrates it, whether you want to admit it or not.

You seem to have posted a snipe hunt consisting of hours of video rather than showing or describing a grid combat where the need to move in range to deliver a touch spell to an ally is notably difficult to achieve with 5e style movement and opportunity attacks. Moving around the battlefield is trivial by design under those conditions until you have "narrow hallway" .

No it was not a snipe hunt. It was the last three D&D videos posted by this DM and I pointed out the start time for EVERY single combat in those three videos and looked at EVERY single round of combat in those 6 combats, counting which ones all PCs were within 30 feet movement of each other.

If you want me to show a still grid describing a combat where PCs can't reach each other, ok, that is far easier here you go - These are grids from REAL combats played, NONE of these are a "narrow hallway" and in none of them can all the PCs reach each other for a touch spell. There are PCs out of reach for a touch spell in all of these examples.

Example 1:

Combat with a bunch of giant spiders around and between PCs. There is 40 feet between the East and West PC, so even if the spiders weren't there they would be unreachable.

Example 2 - 5 PCs with 120 feet between them fighting 5 monsters (3 off screen), also note 1 PC is frightened and can't even move towards the two in the Northwest at all.

Example 3: Two Westmost PCs can't reach eastmost PC due to difficult terrain, allies and enemies in the way:

Example 4: 5 PCs spread over a greater area than movement allows:

Example 5: I don't think ANY PC is within range of touching another PC:

 

[tetrasodium]

As you noted I posted "hours of video" of real play where a touch spell was not possible. I think that very effectively demonstrates it, whether you want to admit it or not.



No it was not a snipe hunt. It was the last three D&D videos posted by this DM and I pointed out the start time for EVERY single combat in those three videos and looked at EVERY single round of combat in those 6 combats, counting which ones all PCs were within 30 feet movement of each other.

If you want me to show a still grid describing a combat where PCs can't reach each other, ok, that is far easier here you go - These are grids from REAL combats played, NONE of these are a "narrow hallway" and in none of them can all the PCs reach each other for a touch spell. There are PCs out of reach for a touch spell in all of these examples.

That is very much preferable to "here's a video, go find it and figure out the point @ECMO3 wants to draw attention to but didn't really detail yes...

Example 1:

Combat with a bunch of giant spiders around and between PCs. There is 40 feet between the East and West PC, so even if the spiders weren't there they would be unreachable.

View attachment 356778

This is not a problem with the healer being incapable. This is a problem where one player allowed themselves to be surrounded rather than leaning on things like battlefield control from allies. Since this is apparently 2014 wotc 5e it's safe to assume that the player who allowed themself to be surrounded felt that ignoring support classes while putting themselves in that situation was a scenario with minimal risk when it should be one of extreme risk.

Example 2 - 5 PCs with 120 feet between them fighting 5 monsters (3 off screen), also note 1 PC is frightened and can't even move towards the two in the Northwest at all.

Don't split the party in the middle of a fight. Don't split the party to seek out a second fight while part of the party is already in a fight either. I'm pretty sure that Sun Tsu wrote about the risks of battling on multiple fronts. This is not a problem of difficulty getting to someone, it's a problem of poor choices. If the party was split because of adventure design forcing it, there still is not a need because the purpose of that sort of fork is to deliberately make the party need to be careful and think about things a bit more

Example 3: Two Westmost PCs can't reach eastmost PC due to difficult terrain, allies and enemies in the way:

View attachment 356780

Again. This is a bone headed choice to play action hero with assumed plot armor levels of safety rather than tackling the encounter with more caution and relying on support like battlefield control

Example 4: 5 PCs spread over a greater area than movement allows:

View attachment 356781

Self inflicted wounds caused by recklessly poor choices and a total absence of battlefield control seems to be a running theme

Example 5: I don't think ANY PC is within range of touching another PC:

View attachment 356782

How many games is the GM running here? Are there multiple GM's? The party should be working together and doing things like covering for each other father then whatever this chaos of main characters soloing at the same table was... See the running theme problem above .

 

[Distracted DM]

That is very much preferable to "here's a video, go find it and figure out the point @ECMO3 wants to draw attention to but didn't really detail yes...

This is not a problem with the healer being incapable. This is a problem where one player allowed themselves to be surrounded rather than leaning on things like battlefield control from allies. Since this is apparently 2014 wotc 5e it's safe to assume that the player who allowed themself to be surrounded felt that ignoring support classes while putting themselves in that situation was a scenario with minimal risk when it should be one of extreme risk.

Don't split the party in the middle of a fight. Don't split the party to seek out a second fight while part of the party is already in a fight either. I'm pretty sure that Sun Tsu wrote about the risks of battling on multiple fronts. This is not a problem of difficulty getting to someone, it's a problem of poor choices. If the party was split because of adventure design forcing it, there still is not a need because the purpose of that sort of fork is to deliberately make the party need to be careful and think about things a bit more

Again. This is a bone headed choice to play action hero with assumed plot armor levels of safety rather than tackling the encounter with more caution and relying on support like battlefield control

Self inflicted wounds caused by recklessly poor choices and a total absence of battlefield control seems to be a running theme

How many games is the GM running here? Are there multiple GM's? The party should be working together and doing things like covering for each other father then whatever this chaos of main characters soloing at the same table was... See the running theme problem above .

Ok to be fair, they did make grid combat scenarios as requested.
But

1. The scenarios are incredibly unlikely unless the party has been so conditioned by ease of 60ft bonus action healing that they can just go action hero all over the place and not really function as a party, leaving the stressed out support character asking why did they do this.

2. Again, the intent with healing word as a touch spell is to make things more challenging. Because if parties are regularly putting themselves in the above situations... Well if they're having fun then more power to them. But clearly these players aren't looking for things to be a little less ... Faceroll-ey.

 

[Shardstone]

For the record, I love both running and playing 2-hour long dynamic combats, climaxes, and boss battles.

 

[DrJawaPhD]

I think you mean annoying smart gameplay.

No I mean annoying/stupid. Those are clearly subjective opinions, and I stated my opinion. You can disagree if you wish.

Doesn't really matter to me, it's really easy to remove yo-yo'ing by using negative HP, so it's never been an issue for me. I also use Lingering Injury optional rules, set to trigger when reaching 0 HP, so yo-yo'ing in my games is pretty risky.

 

[Distracted DM]

No I mean annoying/stupid. Those are clearly subjective opinions, and I stated my opinion. You can disagree if you wish.

Doesn't really matter to me, it's really easy to remove yo-yo'ing by using negative HP, so it's never been an issue for me. I also use Lingering Injury optional rules, set to trigger when reaching 0 HP, so yo-yo'ing in my games is pretty risky.

Which lingering injury rules? Is it anytime they drop to 0?

 

[DrJawaPhD]

Which lingering injury rules? Is it anytime they drop to 0?

Good question, actually I use a homemade combination of injuries that I cobbled together using the DM guide and various 3pp stuff from DM's Guild. DM rolls a d100 any time a player (or notable NPC/monster) hits 0 HP, and that determines the narration of the blow that downs them and results in a lingering injury that will heal over time but not with standard magical spells. So (almost) nothing that would ruin a character's build permanently, but enough to present a temporary setback that players will be worried enough about to want to keep their HP up.