D&D 5E Initiative and Delay

[Kaychsea]

I think it's silly to argue that tactics are so black and white that they can only be used by highly-trained military squads or not at all.

Not saying that. What I'm saying is how in the name of the seven hells do a bunch of characters who just met in a bar/inn/walking down the road mesh in perfect harmony before they can get each other's names straight without badges? That's without specific class/race issues. Go up a few levels and maybe they do learn what works, but straight off the bat?

 

[KarinsDad]

Not saying that. What I'm saying is how in the name of the seven hells do a bunch of characters who just met in a bar/inn/walking down the road mesh in perfect harmony before they can get each other's names straight without badges? That's without specific class/race issues. Go up a few levels and maybe they do learn what works, but straight off the bat?

It's called metagaming. Oh wait, I didn't just say that. Forget I mentioned it.

 

[keterys]

"Charge", like Delay, is also something that disappeared with this edition.

Except, well, in the form of a feat. Perhaps a good feat can be made that allows Delay, along with other benefits. +5 Initiative, ability to Delay, and something else minor like once per rest you can swap your initiative with an ally's.

Course, that doesn't solve the "Just make up your mind. Okay, you delay until you figure it out" form of keeping the game going

 

[Sunseeker]

Not saying that. What I'm saying is how in the name of the seven hells do a bunch of characters who just met in a bar/inn/walking down the road mesh in perfect harmony before they can get each other's names straight without badges? That's without specific class/race issues. Go up a few levels and maybe they do learn what works, but straight off the bat?

Player/Character dichotomy. I do try to encourage my players to RP it up, use a 'free action' to shout brief commands at each other. Rarely have I seen perfectly executed strategy. Random alignments of the fate are the only thing that make for perfect battles.

 

[Lanefan]

I do try to encourage my players to RP it up, use a 'free action' to shout brief commands at each other...

Normal speech in character (as opposed to casting a spell or some other game-mechanic-affecting thing) has always been a free action 'round here; particularly as I use 30-second rounds. The best part is when a couple of combatants are trash-talking each other during a fight and I get to be one of 'em.

Lanefan

 

[Teflon Billy]

2) Tables where the player doing the Delay is slow or asks a bunch of questions. I could easily see such a player asking if he can do x, y, or z, and then deciding to not do so. Even deciding whether to Delay in the first place can take some time. Later on in the round, the same thing happens when he wonders if he should take his turn or not. Finally, the player takes a turn and again he is slow. So instead of one set of slowness / question asking, it might be 2 or more because the player might be stopping the game to ask questions more often.

That's actually a really good point.

 

[rocket1969]

i'm playing it as written. Ready serves the purpose good enough and frankly a melee is a confusing messed up clash of individuals. a druid, fighter, rogue, bard and monk are not a spartan phalanx. To put it another way--as my coach (stealing it from somewhere else) told me before i got in the ring--"everyone has a plan until they are hit in face." If the archer is in position then he goes after the fighter charges. if the fighter charges on three and the archer has an initiative of 25 he can simply state--i shoot the first guy who comes at the fighter--if I'm generous--he can declare he picks the most powerful looking opponent who enters his field of vision. for the record--i have lowest initiative declare first--this allows for the higher ones to react to declared actions in terms of movement and choice. It works for us so far.

 

[S_Dalsgaard]

In the brief time I've played 5e, I've found one particular situation in which not being able to delay my place in the initiative is incredibly annoying. I'm playing a Rogue|Arcane Trickster with an Owl familiar. The intent is for my familiar to use the Help action to grant me advantage on my attacks. With the Owl's flyby ability, it can move 30', use the action to grant advantage and fly back out 30' without drawing an OA. Pretty cool when it works, as it very reliably sets up sneak attack at just 3rd level.

However, in combats where initiative rolls split us up, it often doesn't work at all. The worst case is when the Owl rolls initiative shortly after me. Because I go first, I make my attack without advantage. The Owl follows, granting advantage on the next ally attack against the target. That can leave as many as four party members to follow up, one of whom is pretty likely to take a shot at my target, and also the enemy itself, which might simply move out of range before I come back around in the initiative sequence.

Granting advantage to a teammate is hardly the worst thing that can happen, but it's generally better for me to have it than anyone else since I get to apply extra damage on the hit. And it also kind of sucks that my familiar, which I'm in constant mental contact with, can't be better coordinated with my own actions.

RAW, the only thing I can do to guarantee I get advantage in those cases is to take a Ready action, but that's an awful option as it costs me both my Cunning Action to Disengage/Hide after an attack as well as any Reaction I might need to take on defense (Uncanny Dodge, etc.)

TL;DR: It'd be swell if I could make sure I go after my own familiar in the initiative order, but the rules really don't take that into account.

Unless you have simultaneous initiative, I don't see this working. If you are after the owl, it has already moved away before your turn and it can't grant you advantage for being close to the opponent. If you are on the same initiative, I guess it might work, but I am not sure I would allow anyone to use delay that precisely, if I decided to allow it in my campaign.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I've always found delay to be an annoying option that allows players an exceptional amount of control over the flow of combat. Because we use a map, players are already capable of knowing exact ranges and things like that, so to me, allowing them to delay just adds to the amount that they are calculating and trying to gain an advantage.

If a round is six seconds long, I think it's just too short a time to allow for that level of control. I suppose if someone told me they wanted to act on a lower initiative result at the very start of battle, I'd allow that. Otherwise, I treat the initiative order as locked in place, and readying an action is the option to use of you want to act at another point in the round.

Otherwise I feel like the characters are like little battle computers that are measuring and analyzing every detail to spit out the best course of action. And while it takes the players a couple minutes to do this, in game it is almost instantaneous for the character.