D&D 5E Improvised actions in combat

[Geeknamese]

My Artificer who has Expertise proficiency in carpenter's tools, leatherworker's tools, mason's tools, smith's tools, thieves' tools and tinker's tools wants a chance to see if his expertise in all things crafted will allow him to determine where exactly to fire a Thunder Monger blast at the archway or wooden balcony supports to bring it down on the big bad. If the DM says it's not even remotely possible because he's not cool with improvised actions in Combat and it's not in the rulebook, I'm finding another DM.

If I wanted to play a game with no improvisation at all, I'd play a video game rpg, wargaming or The Legend of Drizz't board game.


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[Rocksome]

exactly to fire a Thunder Monger blast

The artificer in my game calls his the Glob Lobber.

 

[Lanefan]

Right... so if I want to cleave, I can make a check to do it?

Sure, if your initial swing kills your target with 10 or more points of damage to spare; but even if your check succeeds your follow-through will be less controlled than your initial swing (so at best a big minus {or disadvantage in 5e} on the follow-through to-hit roll) and there's no guarantee you'll hit who or what you want to. High risk, variable reward.

Lan-"we've done it this way for nearly ever, only without the check"-efan

EDIT: p.s. I see the 10-to-1 in favour ratio has held consistently steady since the poll opened.

 

[dave2008]

I'll totally let you spend thirty minutes beforehand digging a 10' deep pit with Mold Earth, then camouflage two guys near the pit while a third guy baits the Fire Giant into chasing him to where the pit is, and then you push him in for 10d6 falling damage (actually I'd make it 40d6 because the Fire Giant is Huge, and I double falling damage per size category over Medium).

Sorry to go off topic but this jumped out to me. First, since it was 10d6 falling damage, don't you mean 100' pit? 2nd, the giant is Huge, so the relative distance it is falling is less, couldn't or shouldn't that counter act the size difference. In D&D giants generally act as if they are perfectly scaled humans, ignoring the square-cube-law, so wouldn't it be more accurate to also reduce the relative distance of the fall? So Huge creature takes damage for every 30 feet it falls. Thus your giant takes 12d6 falling damage.
Or, would it make sense to have the damage relate to the HD, since that is size based. So:

1d6 / 10ft for small
1d8 / 10 ft. for medium
1d10 / 10 ft. for Large
1d12 / 10 ft. for Huge
1d20 / 10 ft. for Gargantuan

I still think the distance of the fall should be adjusted, but maybe just reduce the absolute distance by the size. So a huge creature reduces the distance by 15 ' or 30' if you want to use the 2x size category the falling rules seem to assume.

I think this might work. So your giant falls 100', but it only takes damage for every 10 feet after the first 30 feet, so the falling damage = 7d12. This seems more reasonable to me. Thank you for getting me thinking!

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Sorry to go off topic but this jumped out to me. First, since it was 10d6 falling damage, don't you mean 100' pit? 2nd, the giant is Huge, so the relative distance it is falling is less, couldn't or shouldn't that counter act the size difference. In D&D giants generally act as if they are perfectly scaled humans, ignoring the square-cube-law, so wouldn't it be more accurate to also reduce the relative distance of the fall? So Huge creature takes damage for every 30 feet it falls. Thus your giant takes 12d6 falling damage.
Or, would it make sense to have the damage relate to the HD, since that is size based. So:

1d6 / 10ft for small
1d8 / 10 ft. for medium
1d10 / 10 ft. for Large
1d12 / 10 ft. for Huge
1d20 / 10 ft. for Gargantuan

I still think the distance of the fall should be adjusted, but maybe just reduce the absolute distance by the size. So a huge creature reduces the distance by 15 ' or 30' if you want to use the 2x size category the falling rules seem to assume.

I think this might work. So your giant falls 100', but it only takes damage for every 10 feet after the first 30 feet, so the falling damage = 7d12. This seems more reasonable to me. Thank you for getting me thinking!

Yes, I did mean 100'. 10' was just a typo. It takes a while to dig (call it thirty minutes of hard work) because even if the ground is suitable (dirt and not stone for a hundred feet straight down) you have to play some games with ramps in order to make it happen.

The giant's nature *does* sort of counteract the size difference--that is, the giant has lots of HP (162 HP IIRC) because it's a giant, and those HP help it survive 100' of falling better than most humans could. After taking 40d6 damage, it will still have about 20 HP left. A human falling a similar distance is likely to be insta-killed by 10d6 damage, unless it's a high-level adventurer.

I really dislike the idea of reducing falling damage for large creatures, as you propose, because between their high HP and the reduced falling damage, it means that elephants/dragons/giants/etc. can be nonchalant about falling damage. The doubling method I mentioned previously was chosen because I like how it stacks up against these creatures' typical HP: even a max damage fall won't kill a dragon, generally, but it will severely injure most of them enough that they need to take falls seriously. Knocking a dragon out of the sky = seriously injured dragon. I would not like it to be otherwise.

 

[dave2008]

Yes, I did mean 100'. 10' was just a typo. It takes a while to dig (call it thirty minutes of hard work) because even if the ground is suitable (dirt and not stone for a hundred feet straight down) you have to play some games with ramps in order to make it happen.

The giant's nature *does* sort of counteract the size difference--that is, the giant has lots of HP (162 HP IIRC) because it's a giant, and those HP help it survive 100' of falling better than most humans could. After taking 40d6 damage, it will still have about 20 HP left. A human falling a similar distance is likely to be insta-killed by 10d6 damage, unless it's a high-level adventurer.

I see your point, but the distance the giant is falling is only about 5x its height, versus 16x+ for the human. Not 100% sure on all of the physics, but for D&D it just doesn't seem right to me. Do you apply this doubling of size in other areas or just falling? Do giants get 120 feet of movement and more damage (8d6 instead of 6d6 for its greatsword)? It would seem odd to me to revise one aspect of the effect of size on the rules for pseudo-science / realism reasons and not others.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I see your point, but the distance the giant is falling is only about 5x its height, versus 16x+ for the human. Not 100% sure on all of the physics, but for D&D it just doesn't seem right to me. Do you apply this doubling of size in other areas or just falling? Do giants get 120 feet of movement and more damage (8d6 instead of 6d6 for its greatsword)? It would seem odd to me to revise one aspect of the effect of size on the rules for pseudo-science / realism reasons and not others.

For parsimony's sake, I like to keep my mechanical changes to 5E relatively few and elegant, so when I make a change it's more likely to be to a rule than to a stat block. You get more bang for your buck that way.

Therefore, I use MM stats for giants. If I were writing my own stats for giants I probably would scale them up a bit, probably giving logarithmic increases in movement speed due to having longer pendulums for legs. (Hmmm, that actually jives pretty well with MM stats after all, e.g. Frost Giants have 40' move, and Storm Giants have 50' move.)

In any case, falling damage scales up due to the physics of falling; walking speed scales differently due to the physics of walking. By doubling the falling damage, what I'm really doing is saying "you have to absorb eight times the kinetic energy, but D&D tropes and the fact that you aren't debiliated by the square-cube law imply that your basic physiological frame is roughly twice as strong as a human's, pound for pound, so call it effectively twice the kinetic energy; and damage is kinda sorta the square root of kinetic energy, so that means you take double damage from falling." But it would be silly to assume that having legs three times as long makes you walk four times as fast--it would really only be 1.73 times as fast (because sqrt(3) = 1.73), and 30' * 1.73 = 51.9, so I find 5E's numbers of giant movement rates to be adequate. (The slow movement speeds for quadrupeds and fliers in 5E bug me a lot more, and may be houseruled at some point, but that has nothing to do with them being larger.)

 

[CapnZapp]

There is no consensus.

For one gamer, improvisation is essential. For another, it's just a source of imbalanced favoritism.

Sent from my C6603 using EN World mobile app

 

[dave2008]

For parsimony's sake, I like to keep my mechanical changes to 5E relatively few and elegant, so when I make a change it's more likely to be to a rule than to a stat block. You get more bang for your buck that way.

Therefore, I use MM stats for giants. If I were writing my own stats for giants I probably would scale them up a bit, probably giving logarithmic increases in movement speed due to having longer pendulums for legs. (Hmmm, that actually jives pretty well with MM stats after all, e.g. Frost Giants have 40' move, and Storm Giants have 50' move.)

I agree, but isn't that a bit half-way though. DnD physics does not = real world physics / mechanics. They way the game is played giants are perfectly scaled, if they are 8 times heavier they are 8x stronger and should be 3x faster. Now I guess if we assume the giant it not doing everything in a round to make an attack that a human is, then that changes the equation - so to speak The big issue is really strength and damage. I giant should do enormous amounts of damage, but since damage and HP are an abstraction I can roll with it.

In any case, falling damage scales up due to the physics of falling; walking speed scales differently due to the physics of walking. By doubling the falling damage, what I'm really doing is saying "you have to absorb eight times the kinetic energy, but D&D tropes and the fact that you aren't debiliated by the square-cube law imply that your basic physiological frame is roughly twice as strong as a human's, pound for pound, so call it effectively twice the kinetic energy; and damage is kinda sorta the square root of kinetic energy, so that means you take double damage from falling." But it would be silly to assume that having legs three times as long makes you walk four times as fast--it would really only be 1.73 times as fast (because sqrt(3) = 1.73), and 30' * 1.73 = 51.9, so I find 5E's numbers of giant movement rates to be adequate.

I think you are miss using the "pound for pound" idiom (but I could be wrong). If a giant was 2x as strong pound for pound it would be 16x as strong in reality (since it is 8x the weight), which would imply it takes even less damage than a human when falling. But I get what you intended or may be actually saying, depending on the application of the idiom in relation to the square-cube-law (which it really isn't meant for IDT). However, hit points and damage is really much more abstract than a simple extrapolation of kinetic energy. Even in reality it can get very complex very easily. Obviously use what works for you, I was really just interested in the mindset of how you picked and chose what to modify - and you have answered that. Thank you!

(The slow movement speeds for quadrupeds and fliers in 5E bug me a lot more, and may be houseruled at some point, but that has nothing to do with them being larger.)

Me too - I increase them on a case by case basis. I generally assume the speed for flying animals is a hover in combat speed and it can go much faster when moving in straight line (though it may take a round to get up to full speed).

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I agree, but isn't that a bit half-way though. DnD physics does not = real world physics / mechanics. They way the game is played giants are perfectly scaled, if they are 8 times heavier they are 8x stronger and should be 3x faster.

I question this claim, especially the "3x faster" part. Can you explain why you think this?

Now I guess if we assume the giant it not doing everything in a round to make an attack that a human is, then that changes the equation - so to speak The big issue is really strength and damage. I giant should do enormous amounts of damage, but since damage and HP are an abstraction I can roll with it.

I think you are miss using the "pound for pound" idiom (but I could be wrong). If a giant was 2x as strong pound for pound it would be 16x as strong in reality (since it is 8x the weight), which would imply it takes even less damage than a human when falling.

Strength in reality doesn't scale with weight; it scales with cross-sectional muscle area. In reality, something linearly 2x as big (12' tall giant) has 4x the strength; but due to D&D tropes, it needs to have 8x the strength to function correctly; therefore the missing 2x strength has to be supplied by an improved Giant-ish fantasy physiology. They must have ligaments and such which are twice as strong, pound for pound, as human ligaments.

But I get what you intended or may be actually saying, depending on the application of the idiom in relation to the square-cube-law (which it really isn't meant for IDT). However, hit points and damage is really much more abstract than a simple extrapolation of kinetic energy. Even in reality it can get very complex very easily. Obviously use what works for you, I was really just interested in the mindset of how you picked and chose what to modify - and you have answered that. Thank you!

No problem.