Conditions Question

[The Cartographist]

I'm in an "argument" with some other players, and to decide the outcome, we decided to come here.

The issue concerns the severity of the various conditions listed in Ch9 of the PHB.

From least severe to most severe, in what order would you place the following: Blinded, Dazed, Deafened, Dominated, Helpless, Immobilized, Marked, Prone, Restrained, Slowed, Stunned, Surprised, Weakened.

From all of us, thanks in advance.

 

[James McMurray]

These are pretty clear
Helpless - can't do nuffin, really easy to kill
Dominated - can do stuff, but only against your friends or yourself
Stunned - can't do nuffin, grant CA
Surprised - can't do nuffin, grant CA in limited situations
Dazed - can do something, but just one thing

The rest are pretty situational, and there's no way I could give universal ratings to them.

Blinded & Weakened - depends on what you wanted to do, and whether the enemy is insubstantial or not.

Restrained is worse than immobilized, which is worse than slowed and almost tied with prone, but they're not that big of a deal if you don't want to move anyway.

Marked - this can be a major pain if it's a fighter mark, or a nonissue if you wanted to attack the marker anyway.

Deafened - definitely last on the list except in rare situations

 

[Starglim]

Good question! I'll be interested to see the responses.

Marked (the condition alone - it becomes more problematic when the attacker has related abilities. But you could say that about most of these)
Deafened (the condition alone - but often has a long duration)
Prone
Slowed
Grants combat advantage (not on your list)
Dazed
Weakened
Immobilized
Restrained
Blinded (the condition alone - but often has a long duration)
Surprised
Stunned
Dominated
Petrified (not on your list - depends on what level your companions are)
Unconscious (not on your list)
Dying (not on your list)

It's not really possible to rank Helpless because you're hardly ever Helpless alone, but only as a result of being Unconscious.

 

[James McMurray]

Oops. I put mine in order from most disabling to least.

 

[The Cartographist]

@James - Thanks for your thoughts. I looked at yours initially, and it took me a second but then I realized what you had done.

@Starglim - Actually, Helpless is one of those conditions that we're most interested in, because we have a couple of house-ruled powers that cause the target to become helpless. The result is almost as if the target is completely bewildered by the combat going on around them and so don't react at all.

Basically, the impetus for the question was us designing new powers and looking at the conditions and ordering the effects properly to ensure that the powers scale appropriately. That, and arguing about the relative strength of currently existing powers.

 

[ValhallaGH]

Helpless would fall inbetween Unconcious and Dying. Helpless doesn't mean you're bleeding to death, however you are still obviously conscious and ripe for killing.

Side note: the powers you and your friends are discussing sound like they would be better modelled using the Stunned condition (no actions, grant combat advantage).

 

[Rafe]

Side note: the powers you and your friends are discussing sound like they would be better modelled using the Stunned condition (no actions, grant combat advantage).

Yeah, that sounds right. Dazed and Immobilized could also work and are relatively similar to Stunned.

 

[James McMurray]

Anything that makes the target helpless should be incredibly high level. coup de grace is nasty in 4th. It's not likely to kill at higher levels, but a mostly free crit with a 3[W]+ attack and a magic weapon is going to ruin anyone's day.