D&D 5E I think I miss flat-footed, talk me out of it?

[Chris_Nightwing]

This came up when I was thinking about the list of conditions currently in the game. It feels to me like there isn't really a suitable condition for being surprised, or unable to react to things around you - instead this situation is manifested differently under different conditions. The key components of this condition that I feel is missing mostly relate to how you use your dexterity, which is why I was reminded of flat-footed from 3.X.

If a character is surprised, currently they cannot act in the first round of combat. This doesn't feel right to me, it doesn't seem *enough*, if I can explain further. Think of the classic thief sneaking up behind an unaware guard - currently the thief gets to take an action before the guard, perhaps two if they roll well on initiative, and the first attack they make has advantage because they are hidden. I sort of see where they are going with this, since you also get advantage to attack a blind opponent, so the idea is that if you can't see, you're easier to hit. The thing that silghtly bugs me about this is that there's no difference if the 'attack' you make doesn't use an attack roll, and it doesn't matter if the guard has no armour, but 20 Dexterity, vs. heavy armour and 10 Dexterity. If the thief has a wand of fireballs, the guard can react the same as he would normally *to an enormous sudden explosion*. It feels like they ought to have disadvantage on Dexterity saving throws, and that there should be a more significant effect of hiding from the the jack-be-nimble guard than the tank guard.

This is what led me to missing the flat-footed AC. I would like a condition for being unable to respond to attacks on your person. It would apply when you are surprised, by stealth or because you are blind and deaf, heck it maybe ought to apply when you are paralysed (you still get your Dexterity bonus to AC *when paralysed*!). I don't think the advantages/disadvantages that currenly apply are sufficient - I would enforce that for all purposes, when you are flat-footed, your Dexterity is 10 and attacks against you have advantage.

So, when you are surprised, you cannot act and you are flat-footed. When you are a blind, you automatically fail checks involving sight, have disadvantage on all attacks and you are flat-footed. Paralysis probably ought to involve your Dexerity being reduced to 0. I understand that everyone hates adjusting their ability scores - but surely that was from the overload of buffs we saw in 3.X? Can we return to only sensible uses of this practice where appropriate, or is it too difficult?

 

[Salamandyr]

Historically, a thief performing a backstab got a bonus to his attack roll. As editions rolled by 4e implemented what is my favorite version of this...combat advantage. A +2 bonus when you have your opponent at a disadvantage. I loved this, as it was simple, and applicable to many situations.

I never liked flat-footed AC, because it felt like an unnecessary complication in the system, and I didn't think it served verisimilitude. You may have caught the really agile guy by surprise, but it seems to me that he should still react to that better than the lumbering oaf. And it created the logical inconsistency that dex bonuses only apply sometimes, but penalties all the time. And the existence of flat-footed creates the necessity for things like "uncanny dodge" to allow some characters to keep their dex based AC. It's all just an unnecessarily complicated system that's handled easier by giving the attacker a bonus on his attack roll.

That way, if you catch someone by surprise, they're easier to hit (you get a bonus), but the agile guy is still harder to hit than the lumbering guy (AC stays the same).

EDIT: I see this is in relation to D&DNext. I'd say giving the attacker advantage (rolling two dice) is as good as a bonus to hit, and they don't really need anything else to make surprise worthwhile.

I don't have the doc's in front of me; did they remove advantage from surprise?

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

I'm slightly sold on treating both of my imaginary guards in the same way, but how about those reflex saves? Would you alter paralysis at all?

You get advantage if you attack from hidden, but not automatically if you surprise someone, this irks me a bit because you can't get the jump on someone by being tricksy to their face, you have to stealth.

 

[keterys]

Technically, you can still have it.

In a combat situation, everyone should be on the defensive as they move from point to point. So at the start of combat, clearly everyone should benefit from the dodge they did last round (see page 13 of How to Play). You lose that benefit if you're surprised, though.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

Technically, you can still have it.

In a combat situation, everyone should be on the defensive as they move from point to point. So at the start of combat, clearly everyone should benefit from the dodge they did last round (see page 13 of How to Play). You lose that benefit if you're surprised, though.

You're suggesting that everyone is taking the dodge action when they're not doing anything else? Seems a bit fishy. I notice that this means if an opponent turns invisible, you can just dodge to negate their advantage?

 

[keterys]

Nah, they're only taking the Dodge action when they're expecting combat and not doing anything else.

After all, there's no reason not to, and so many reasons to do so.

And yep, you can sacrifice your attacks to dodge to negate their invisibility.

P.S. While I am devil's advocating this only, it does actually address a number of "initiative is too important" and "combats are over in 1 round" problems I've been observing. I'm not sure it does so in a _fun_ way, of course.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Personally... I've always thought that the Coup de Grace action should be allowed to be used on Surprised individuals when used from the Hidden condition... not just on people suffering from the Unconscious condition.

As it stands now, an individual who is Unconscious but still has hit points can be Coup de Graced, and if the attack hits, they go immediately to 0 HP (and one already at 0 HP can be killed outright). I've always felt that needing the opponent to already be Unconscious for a Coup de Grace was eliminating that staple of combat, which was leaping up silently behind the unsuspecting guard and slitting their throat to take them out.

At the same time... allowing a Coup de Grace on someone who is just Surprised is too much... because it allows the attacker to do his full suite of actions during the first round (a move and an attack), which goes against the idea of a Coup de Grace. It makes it way too easy to do, plus it just doesn't feel right to me. You shouldn't be able to insta-knock out a guy by charging straight at him, or by casting a spell from in front of him, even if he was surprised by it (because even in those milliseconds of seeing the attacker before the blow hit, he should be able to move even the slightest bit to avoid an insta-knock out.) So allowing a Coup de Grace on JUST a Surprised individual would be out.

But if the defender is Surprised *and* the attacker is Hidden when he makes the attack? (A melee attack from within 5 feet, which means he had to sneak up on the individual in question?) At that point, I think I would like to see some allowance for allowing the Coup de Grace action to be used on that conscious individual to instantly knock out him (via the blow to the head or the slit throat or snapped neck or whatever).

And if that still seems to easy to do... then allow for the defender to make a saving throw (like a DC 10 Con save) if the Coup de Grace attack was successful. On a successful save, the attack is an automatic critical hit and does damage... on a failed save he's immediately knocked to 0 HP and falls unconscious just as he would have if he had been suffering from the Unconscious condition on a normal Coup de Grace.

So the entire process would be for the attacker to go into Stealth and become Hidden, sneak up to the individual in question via stealth, make an attack roll against him with Advantage to perform a Coup de Grace, and if the attack hits the defender makes a saving throw. DC 10 CON save that drives the defender immediately to 0 HP if the save was failed, and treated as an automatic critical hit if the save was made.

That seems to me to be the answer for my own "flat-footedness should mean more" issue.

 

[darjr]

I'm not a huge fan of flat-footed. But I do see your point. How about give them disadvantage on dex based rolls vs their surprising attackers as well as the attackers getting advantage.

How about for the Coup de Grace from hidden and surprise, use the sneak attack rules. The PC can do the Coup de Grace but they have to give up advantage. Saves two dice rolls, the advantage and the Con save. It also gives the attacker a choice. I wouldn't give non-rogues the sneak attack damage.

It gives everyone a potential rogue like attack at times and the rogue with the extra sneak attack damage is still better at it than everyone else.

 

[CAFRedblade]

You could apply the Massive Damage rules recently introduced, for a Coup de Grace.
Effectively if you do more than double their hp in damage it's an outright kill.

I know they were meant for PC's death and dying rules, but that easily translates over to NPC's.

Personally... I've always thought that the Coup de Grace action should be allowed to be used on Surprised individuals when used from the Hidden condition... not just on people suffering from the Unconscious condition.

As it stands now, an individual who is Unconscious but still has hit points can be Coup de Graced, and if the attack hits, they go immediately to 0 HP (and one already at 0 HP can be killed outright). I've always felt that needing the opponent to already be Unconscious for a Coup de Grace was eliminating that staple of combat, which was leaping up silently behind the unsuspecting guard and slitting their throat to take them out.

At the same time... allowing a Coup de Grace on someone who is just Surprised is too much... because it allows the attacker to do his full suite of actions during the first round (a move and an attack), which goes against the idea of a Coup de Grace. It makes it way too easy to do, plus it just doesn't feel right to me. You shouldn't be able to insta-knock out a guy by charging straight at him, or by casting a spell from in front of him, even if he was surprised by it (because even in those milliseconds of seeing the attacker before the blow hit, he should be able to move even the slightest bit to avoid an insta-knock out.) So allowing a Coup de Grace on JUST a Surprised individual would be out.

But if the defender is Surprised *and* the attacker is Hidden when he makes the attack? (A melee attack from within 5 feet, which means he had to sneak up on the individual in question?) At that point, I think I would like to see some allowance for allowing the Coup de Grace action to be used on that conscious individual to instantly knock out him (via the blow to the head or the slit throat or snapped neck or whatever).

And if that still seems to easy to do... then allow for the defender to make a saving throw (like a DC 10 Con save) if the Coup de Grace attack was successful. On a successful save, the attack is an automatic critical hit and does damage... on a failed save he's immediately knocked to 0 HP and falls unconscious just as he would have if he had been suffering from the Unconscious condition on a normal Coup de Grace.

So the entire process would be for the attacker to go into Stealth and become Hidden, sneak up to the individual in question via stealth, make an attack roll against him with Advantage to perform a Coup de Grace, and if the attack hits the defender makes a saving throw. DC 10 CON save that drives the defender immediately to 0 HP if the save was failed, and treated as an automatic critical hit if the save was made.

That seems to me to be the answer for my own "flat-footedness should mean more" issue.

 

[delericho]

The use of Advantage instead of flat footed is better. It really grated on quite a lot of people that the better your Dex the worse you suffered for being flat footed, and those complaints were not without merit.

Also, flat footed just lasted too long in 3e. On those rare occasions when he managed it, the Rogue getting several attacks at the start of combat, all with Sneak Attack damage, could really neuter an encounter. The issue could be fixed very easily - simply impose a surprise round at the start of every combat - but that was just adding yet more complexity on top of an overloaded system.

IMO, of course.