D&D 5E Darkness and Disengage

[FrogReaver]

Oh, I see. Sorry. You're asking about the if the first time this came up, the situation were reversed. That's a little harder. I think if the weirdness of it struck me, I would allow the disengage in that instance and then have a post-session discussion about it to let the table decide how we wanted to play it.

I wouldn't. I'd just allow the disengage unless I thought it was really nagging at someone.

In the OP's case I would rule against him because I dislike the notion that the player feels he is entitled to an OA so much that he would push for the enemy to not be able to disengege.

 

[abirdcall]

Well, the target can certainly try. The question is if they don't know where the potential attacker is, is that certain to be effective enough to grant immunity from OA? Consider that in the process of "backing away", the target could bump right into the potential attacker.

By that reasoning the NPC should trigger OAs just for being there.

 

[Ziolupo]

Ok, thanks to everyone for the answers, I will carry the informations I have collected to the group, and the DM will decide how to rule this particular situations.

A quick answer to FrogReaver, I don't feel "entitled to OA", I was just curious to understand if a certain tactic could work. I always envisioned a battle as a chaotic mess, with people shouting orders, the clashing of weapons and the roar of spell explosions. I find quite unrealistic that even someone with the best battle experience, who become suddenly blinded by darkness in the middle of this chaos and he's still able to keep his cool and his bearing in order to disengage with a perfect maneuver that deny any OA.
WotC already has a rule to deny disengage in the form of sentinel feat, so I don't feel that it's a taboo argument to discuss.

Thanks again for all the answers.

 

[FrogReaver]

Ok, thanks to everyone for the answers, I will carry the informations I have collected to the group, and the DM will decide how to rule this particular situations.

A quick answer to FrogReaver, I don't feel "entitled to OA", I was just curious to understand if a certain tactic could work. I always envisioned a battle as a chaotic mess, with people shouting orders, the clashing of weapons and the roar of spell explosions. I find quite unrealistic that even someone with the best battle experience, who become suddenly blinded by darkness in the middle of this chaos and he's still able to keep his cool and his bearing in order to disengage with a perfect maneuver that deny any OA.
WotC already has a rule to deny disengage in the form of sentinel feat, so I don't feel that it's a taboo argument to discuss.

Thanks again for all the answers.

It’s a turn based time simulating real time combat.

In real time I don’t envision an enemy just allowing himself to be engulfed in a cloud of darkness. He’s going to run away from it.

Turn based rules don’t simulate that well. But disengage gets us to a closer state of what the real time would look.

 

[Iry]

I don't think you need to keep your cool to Disengage, anymore than you need to keep your cool to Attack or Cast. I know a soldier who literally shat their pants in fear, but still did their job. There's a middle ground where emotions mess with us but we're still mostly functional. For extreme situations we have Conditions.

 

[BluejayJunior]

Well, not quite. Everyone else in the area makes attacks against everyone else as normal (because they are both unseen and can't see), but are at disadvantage attacking the warlock; whereas the warlock is at advantage attacking them. But other party members might still be annoyed at not being able to see the creatures inside the darkness (b/c they can't benefit from any source of advantage if there is any source of disadvantage, or b/c they need to see to target someone with a spell), and so the idea was to "turn it off" between the warlock's turns, preserving their own advantage, but leaving allies unaffected on their turns.

That is correct. I wasn't using disadvantage in terms of mechanics. I should have said, they are fighting at a detriment, while the warlock is fighting with a benefit.

 

[FrogReaver]

Well, not quite. Everyone else in the area makes attacks against everyone else as normal (because they are both unseen and can't see), but are at disadvantage attacking the warlock; whereas the warlock is at advantage attacking them. But other party members might still be annoyed at not being able to see the creatures inside the darkness (b/c they can't benefit from any source of advantage if there is any source of disadvantage, or b/c they need to see to target someone with a spell), and so the idea was to "turn it off" between the warlock's turns, preserving their own advantage, but leaving allies unaffected on their turns.

I would allow the turn off at end of turn. Doesn’t annoy other players. Warlock gets his cool trick. Also removes enemy disadvantage on attacks against him. I think that’s a fair trade.

 

[BluejayJunior]

Sure, but you're bound to be less effective at guarding against a threat that not only can you not see, you don't have any idea where it is coming from. It's the same reasoning that leads to an unseen attacker having advantage - and that's just unseen.

I see OAs and disengage less as the the defender guarding against threats and more as the attacker taking advantage of an opening made possible by the defender dropping their guard to move. Disengage is just using your action to move cautiously and keep your guard up, thus preventing an opening that could turn into an OA.

 

[Esker]

I would allow the turn off at end of turn. Doesn’t annoy other players. Warlock gets his cool trick. Also removes enemy disadvantage on attacks against him. I think that’s a fair trade.

I agree. They're spending their concentration and an invocation to give themselves advantage; seems fair.

 

[Stalker0]

Disengage works even if the enemy has a Hide check over 9000.

but does not work if the enemy is Chuck Norris