D&D 5E hafrogman's Hoard of the Dragon Queen (full)

[Forged Fury]

So mechanically, there's enough smoke to cause us disadvantage on our attacks? With eight enemies, there's almost no way we're going to kill all of them before they get a chance to act in any event.

In that case, we could sneak up there, everyone launch ranged attacks, then Morgan and Hunter close range to get within melee so they can't easily escape?

 

[kuey1975]

Hmm, thanks. In other words, for ranged attacks, with the low visibility, it would be disadvantage but with advantage from the surprise, it nets to normal attack. But for melee, there would be no disadvantage due to visibility, and hence a net advantage (if the attacker can get within melee range without being seen). Did I get that right?

 

[hafrogman]

Hmm, thanks. In other words, for ranged attacks, with the low visibility, it would be disadvantage but with advantage from the surprise, it nets to normal attack. But for melee, there would be no disadvantage due to visibility, and hence a net advantage (if the attacker can get within melee range without being seen). Did I get that right?

That's more or less it. With the number of enemies involved, there are a few outside of the smoke (or at least the heavy smoke), but counting on picking them all off at range would be ill-advised.

 

[Forged Fury]

I don't think surprise grants advantage on attacks in and of itself, it's the unseen part that grants that, which often accompanies surprise from an ambush. But if the smoke is thick enough to affect our ability to shoot in, I would think it might allow us to be considered unseen.

ETA: After reading DM's response: maybe focus the initial ranged attacks on those outside the smoke and rush in to melee with those inside?

I think that's a generally solid plan, let's do it?

 

[kuey1975]

Yes, sounds good. Let's do it!

[MENTION=95059]Forged Fury[/MENTION], my take on the "unseen" and "surprise" issue is that if the target doesn't know that it is being attacked (i.e. surprised), it also didn't see the attacker, and hence, the attacker was unseen. How's that logic?

 

[Forged Fury]

It gets into the sticky wicket of being unseen versus being hidden, but I'm down with it if the DM is.

 

[kuey1975]

Yes, that's one of the frustrating part I've found about 5E sometimes - the vagueness of the mechanics of hiding, surprise, visibility, stealth, etc. But on the other hand, I also like it because it just boils down to common sense, which trumps mechanics any day.

 

[hafrogman]

Yeah, it all sort of comes down to interpretation, and moving forward I'll probably be terribly inconsistent about it moving forward, because I'm still a little new to DMing. But generally:

A party of adventurers fails their perception checks and a bunch of bandits get the drop on them.
Surprise!
Two bandits rush out of the trees and swing swords.
No advantage, they were unseen, but are not unseen when the attack was made.
Two bandits stay in the trees and shoot crossbows.
Advantage, they are still hidden/unseen, but become seen once they attack.

 

[hafrogman]

It seems like combat is starting. I'll try to get a combat map up later, but if people want to post general intentions and initiative rolls, I'll try to streamline everything when putting together the surprise round.

 

[Forged Fury]

What @hafrogman just wrote for surprise/advantage/etc.

Yeah, that's pretty much exactly how I play it. I can see situations where you would be surprised, but not grant the attacker advantage and situations where an attacker can have advantage against you but not be surprised.

As for combat, my apologies if we weren't ready, I'm just trying to move us along. I think we could all debate tactics for a long time, trying to find the optimal solution, but I don't feel like the IC situation really would allow us to do that.