D&D 5E Heat Metal Rules Interp / Minor Nerf

[Majoru Oakheart]

If you've setup the set piece boss encounter and you have the boss there solo with no cronies...Heat Metal or not, that's going to be a meh battle. Not sure why a boss, wouldn't just escape with odds like that.

I'm not sure exactly HOW bosses escape in your games. One of the longest running rules for being a D&D DM is "Never have an opponent that you want to live get within sight range of the PCs" because once they are, there are about 100 different ways for the PCs to prevent them from leaving: Silence to prevent spellcasting, grappling to prevent them from running away, Hold Person spells, Entangle, or just the ability for most PC groups if they throw everything at a problem to do 100% of the hitpoints of most enemies in one to two rounds, often before they can even take an action to try to run away. That's in addition to the large number of opportunity attacks they tend to provoke as they try to leave melee range.

Running away often requires 2 or 3 rounds just to leave the range of the PCs ranged attacks. If the PCs chase, they often move faster than most enemies, so it's impossible to lose them.

The only possible way to get away is pretty much a teleport spell of some kind and given how high level that spell is, the trick only works at high levels. Even then, it only works with spellcasting enemies.

Basically, if an enemy fights the party, they are dead. Reoccurring villains only work if they mock the PCs from afar and act only through minions. It's been like this since the beginning. Dragon Magazine was filled with people writing in and asking "How can I keep reoccurring villains alive?" and the answer was pretty much always "Don't let the PCs get within sight range of them. There's no way to guarantee they get away."

 

[Brandegoris]

Recurring Villain's work just fine. It just requires the DM knowing he wants the villain to escape and fleshing out a way to do that. Sure it isn't always 100% guaranteed because players will often surprise you ( That's what Simulacrum is for ) But its more than possible.

Also I was reading the wrong edition spell description as was pointed out ( thank you).
But still the point stands, that you can just change the duration of the spell from Concentration up to 1 minute to: 1d4 rounds.... I think that's simple AND effective.
I know that's not complicated enough for some people though....

 

[Oofta]

you can just change the duration of the spell from Concentration up to 1 minute to: 1d4 rounds.... I think that's simple AND effective.

But that's what much of this discussion is about. That as written, heat metal is too powerful for a second level spell. No save to avoid damage or disadvantage if cast on metal armor.

 

[Brandegoris]

But that's what much of this discussion is about. That as written, heat metal is too powerful for a second level spell. No save to avoid damage or disadvantage if cast on metal armor.

Fair enough. So now its just a discussion about how BEST to Nerf it?
LOL
At least I will be prepared for my players this Friday if they discover the loop hole of heat metal!

 

[Geeknamese]

I'm not sure exactly HOW bosses escape in your games. One of the longest running rules for being a D&D DM is "Never have an opponent that you want to live get within sight range of the PCs" because once they are, there are about 100 different ways for the PCs to prevent them from leaving: Silence to prevent spellcasting, grappling to prevent them from running away, Hold Person spells, Entangle, or just the ability for most PC groups if they throw everything at a problem to do 100% of the hitpoints of most enemies in one to two rounds, often before they can even take an action to try to run away. That's in addition to the large number of opportunity attacks they tend to provoke as they try to leave melee range.

Running away often requires 2 or 3 rounds just to leave the range of the PCs ranged attacks. If the PCs chase, they often move faster than most enemies, so it's impossible to lose them.

The only possible way to get away is pretty much a teleport spell of some kind and given how high level that spell is, the trick only works at high levels. Even then, it only works with spellcasting enemies.

Basically, if an enemy fights the party, they are dead. Reoccurring villains only work if they mock the PCs from afar and act only through minions. It's been like this since the beginning. Dragon Magazine was filled with people writing in and asking "How can I keep reoccurring villains alive?" and the answer was pretty much always "Don't let the PCs get within sight range of them. There's no way to guarantee they get away."

One of the main concepts in my campaign and one that I stress very strongly (and my PCs learned the hard way) is that my campaign world is a sandbox - true sandbox where encounters are just that, encounters. They're not all potential combat encounters. The world doesn't just magically scale to the PCs like some video game. So my bosses make cameos, they use mooks, they get within sight of my PCs and don't automatically assume that they're supposed to fight the boss. There's banter that goes on...there's enmity. There's taunting of the PCs...The PCs understand that the boss may just be more powerful than they can handle. I allow the PCs to grow in power and experience to be able to face the boss eventually. Those are the most rewarding bosses, the ones that keep thwarting the PCs and they finally overcome them. Yes, there are little mini bosses and PCs win the battles and not the war but eventually they get the chance to win the war.

Aside from that, set piece battle encounters should hav dynamic environments, difficult terrain, obstacles, multiple levels of height, mooks, etc. I never just put a boss in a room with one door with nowhere to go. That would only happen if the PCs devise a way to surprise the boss or control the time and place of the encounter. Otherwise, the combat environment should have a lot the PCs can interact with and the NPCs can react with. It's a more rich experience and make the encounters more memorable. Really, no Final Fantasy bosses sitting in the boss room waiting to be killed by the PCs.





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[Demonthrall]

I agree, it is very powerful but first you have to think on both sides of the equation, if enemies can take this as can players so they can infer disadvantage on the BBEG to make them feel pretty awesome. Another thing of note might be for the cleric to yell you to the group: "I can't get the blasted heated armor off of me. Guys! I need some help, we have to take down that evil wizard!" All in all, yes it is a very powerful ability but in the end both PCs and enemies can take it, the cleric should realize this when they pick heavy armor (if they didn't just go easy on them and only use it once or twice for bosses). As for your question about the rules it is a perfectly correct interpretation of the rules but there are far worse things that you can inflict with a level 2 spell slot (Sugggestion anyone?)

We have always played with adapted rules for this spell, as we must maintain sight and range of the spell during the duration of the spell, as is is a duration concentration, as it is too op as it is, as a pc can slot it higher for bonus damage, shapechange, and fly away. We are talking 255 damage base, plus 50% more per spell slot higher used over just 60 seconds.

 

[werecorpse]

Is a person wearing a suit of metal armour in “physical contact” with it?
I am not a person with knowledge of how armour is worn but I would have thought most metal armours have a layer of non metal (cloth or leather) between them and the wearer thus Preventing physical contact (indeed in very cold or very hot climates not doing so would cause real problems).
The spell specifically says that a person must be in physical contact with the object to take damage and suffer other deleterious effects….and even if it’s normal to be in “physical contact” couldn’t armour be designed to avoid such an issue?
Thus making the spell only damaging against creatures who haven’t taken this precaution.

 

[jgsugden]

NOTE: This is a necrothread responding to 2017.

Is a person wearing a suit of metal armour in “physical contact” with it?...

While there is some room for discussion, most DMs would rule that you're in contact with the armor as the intent seems explicitly to be for the damage to take place.

D&D is an RPG - a role playing game. Characters play a role in a story. We like the story to present a variety of challenges. Sometimes, those challenges force a group to change their standard tactics. If the lizardfolk shaman often use this spell, perhaps the cleric will want to skip the armor for a bit and take a different tactic. That type of response to a situation is a good thing for a game as PCs problem solve the problems that arise for them.

On the other hand, I rarely have NPCs use just the spells listed in the MM for them. I usually tweak it quickly to select a variety of spells, including homebrew, so that PCs do not face the same thing over and over and over and over and over. The last time the PCs faced a Lizardfolk Shaman in my game, the shaman started off with a Slow Spell, then turned the ground beneath the feet of the PCs to quicksand (homebrfew 2nd level spell), and then used Enemies Abound to turn the Barbarian on their allies.

This is a huge critique I have of the new design of spells in the new books - the monsters become 'flat' because we're intentionally limiting the options for what they can do in combat by giving them a much narrower selection of options.

 

[Oofta]

Is a person wearing a suit of metal armour in “physical contact” with it?
I am not a person with knowledge of how armour is worn but I would have thought most metal armours have a layer of non metal (cloth or leather) between them and the wearer thus Preventing physical contact (indeed in very cold or very hot climates not doing so would cause real problems).
The spell specifically says that a person must be in physical contact with the object to take damage and suffer other deleterious effects….and even if it’s normal to be in “physical contact” couldn’t armour be designed to avoid such an issue?
Thus making the spell only damaging against creatures who haven’t taken this precaution.

Almost any armor that was at all effective had padding underneath, a gambeson. It's a thick padding usually made of two layers of cloth such as linen or wool with various materials (horse hair, scrap material) sewn between. Despite what movies tell you, it was frequently worn as the only armor and could be fairly effective on it's own. That, and of course armor is not really just one hunk of metal so I have a problem with the spell right there. Chainmail is hundreds of individual pieces of metal.

In my home game, casting it on armor doesn't cause disadvantage, auto damage every round as a bonus action is already powerful. The other way I've seen it ruled in AL (Adventurer's League, the public game) is that the disadvantage only applies if they fail a con save. They get a con save every round you apply damage.

 

[jgsugden]

....That, and of course armor is not really just one hunk of metal so I have a problem with the spell right there. Chainmail is hundreds of individual pieces of metal.
...

Truly curious here: Does it bother you that enchanting chainmail requires one suit of armor to be enchanted, or should it require about 45,000 rare enchantments (200+ million gp) to make a +1 Suit of chainmail? I'm not asking if you'd really make that be the cost - that seems like an obvious no - just whether it bothers you as much as the heat metal.