D&D 5E Initiative and Delay

[mflayermonk]

Why was Delay removed, and have others put it back in the game?

I don't know. Does it cause conflicts with the concentration mechanic for spell casters?
I have not put it back into the game.

Do you just let people lower their initiative count on their own?

Not in 5e, but yes in other systems.

Am I missing an existing rule to deal with this?

If the players are unhappy and you are unhappy the house rule seems like a good way to handle this.

 

[keterys]

A reasonable houserule might be that when initiative is rolled, you may voluntarily lower it as far as you want. Lets people drop initiative to below an ally, if that's a thing they want to do.

The biggest loss is the ability to go "You're taking too long to decide, you delay. Next" for slow players. That said, I'm otherwise surprised that removing delay has worked as well as it has.

Personally, I'd have been fine removing Ready and keeping Delay, as another alternative.

 

[the Jester]

I don't think allowing Delay as an action in the first round is going to hurt anything; all the mechanical considerations seem to come up only after combat begins.

HOWEVER!

There is something to be said for an approach that is more like, "The party is not automatically a well-oiled machine that never errs in combat, and you guys cannot always silently coordinate exactly what you want, so no, no delays."

But I come from a pretty old-skool "No kibitzing!" kind of approach. Sooo make of that what you will.

 

[skotothalamos]

If there are more than 6 combatants in a fight (which is likely, given a 4-5 pc party), then we are talking about split-second accuracy on your coordination, which I've always found ludicrous.

You rolled an 18 and want to do something after the guy who rolled a five? great. 18 next round is after 5 this round. I, too, like the chaos int he system.

They have a rule in football for guys who roll too high on initiative. It's called "offside."

 

[KarinsDad]

I don't think allowing Delay as an action in the first round is going to hurt anything; all the mechanical considerations seem to come up only after combat begins.

HOWEVER!

There is something to be said for an approach that is more like, "The party is not automatically a well-oiled machine that never errs in combat, and you guys cannot always silently coordinate exactly what you want, so no, no delays."

But I come from a pretty old-skool "No kibitzing!" kind of approach. Sooo make of that what you will.

Yeah, that's were I come from too.

If there are more than 6 combatants in a fight (which is likely, given a 4-5 pc party), then we are talking about split-second accuracy on your coordination, which I've always found ludicrous.

Yup.

 

[MarkB]

If acting too early is problematic, then exactly what advantage do you gain by Delaying that you couldn't gain by skipping your turn? Functionally, there's no difference between acting first in round 2 and acting last in round 1.

 

[Paraxis]

If acting too early is problematic, then exactly what advantage do you gain by Delaying that you couldn't gain by skipping your turn? Functionally, there's no difference between acting first in round 2 and acting last in round 1.

You might want to act after some of the enemy moves into a good position for an AOE or close enough for a move and attack, but you don't want to wait for all of the enemies to go. Or you might want to wait just a bit till after the cleric casts bless or mage casts faerie fire.

 

[Cyan Wisp]

I, too, questioned the removal of the very oft-used tactic of delaying in 5e. You actually all make good points for and against. I am leaning towards No Delay simply because I can't gauge the impact on the new system yet, though I may experiment with it to see what, if anything, breaks.

A relevant question for DMs out there, though: Imagine 3 monsters all on the same initiative count, lets say orcs. Will you always move Orc1 first, then Orc2, then Orc3 (effectively giving them an order of initiative within their count). Or do you tend to move whichever orc is most beneficial to your tactics against the party? I do the latter!

If you find yourself moving Orc1 first one round and Orc3 first the next, isn't this just Delaying on a mini scale? If this is justifiable, why can't the party do it?

DMing 5e, I have defaulted to delaying within one initiative count because I am so used to the 3.5e Delay rules. I'll need to rein this in in 5e or the monsters will have a tactical advantage over the PCs who are stuck in their order for the whole combat.

 

[MarkB]

You might want to act after some of the enemy moves into a good position for an AOE or close enough for a move and attack, but you don't want to wait for all of the enemies to go. Or you might want to wait just a bit till after the cleric casts bless or mage casts faerie fire.

Yeah, but that's not the same as wanting to roll a lower initiative, or to choose your place in the initiative order at the beginning of the first turn, as the OP has described. That's choosing the exact most opportune moment to act, and it has nothing to do with whether you're in the first round of combat, or the fifth.

 

[pming]

Hiya.

After reading most of the posts I still find myself scratching my head as to what the problem is. Is it really that prevalent in games for players to say "I Move, Attack, Move", "I Ready", "I Dash", I Disengage" as the primary means of describing what they want their characters to do? If so, then this is definitely reminding me of a few threads from when 5e was first released. I kept asking people to "stop thinking like 3.x/PF/4e"...because 5e is not that kind of beast.

In all the games I've ever played (including 3.x/PF, btw), players would say "I step around the table, hack at the kobold and if I kill it, I'll continue to move closer to the far door", or "I noch an arrow and aim it to the three robed guys in the back. If one starts to cast a spell I'll shoot him", or "I run like h#!! as fast as I can to the far side!", or "Oh gawds no! I back up away from this creepy thing, just defending and trying not to get nibbled on again!". Once the descriptions were done, I'd assign an actual "move" if needed. (KEY NOTE: Description first, applicable game action second).

In the case of this thread, we have no problem with a player saying "I'm going to wait to see what they are going to do", and if I (the DM) say "Ok, after a couple of seconds and sly glances at each other, they draw their daggers"...to which the player says "So that's how it is. Ok, I'll throw a flask of oil in front of them". I honestly can't see any situation where a PC who has a higher initiative than someone else in the combat can't reasonable 'delay'. So the fact that there is no "Delay" 'action choice' is pretty much irrelevant to an and all games of D&D that I've ever played. I mean, if a player wants to do X, and there isn't a rule that fits X, then the DM simply uses modified Y or just makes something up, no? How is this any different?

EDIT: I actually kinda remember one game of 3.5e where the DM broke everything down into a 'move'. It was rather annoying, frustrating and boring. It was "Move to here", "Attack that", "Ready an Attack if he Casts Spell". Ugh...welcome to Boringville!

Honestly confused,

Paul L. Ming