D&D 5E It's Official: I was wrong about Surprise!

[Hriston]

OK, so I guess seeing a kobold will keep you from being surprised by a dragon:

Q: Is a character or monster surprised if it doesn't notice one threat but does notice another, separate threat? - 04 Jan

A: "Is a character or monster surprised if it doesn't notice one threat but does notice another, separate threat?"No. 08:28 AM - 21 Jan 15

 

[Paraxis]

Yes surprise is an all or nothing thing. Once you see the kobold you are in combat and on alert, the dragon could still be hidden though so he would gain advantage on his first attack, or if it truly wanted to surprise the party could wait till the initial fight with the kobolds was over and the adventurers were looting corpses to surprise them.

 

[keterys]

Yep, that's why I didn't want to be an Assassin Rogue in Organized Play; figured it would be too hard to arrange surprise for predone adventures with semi-random comrades

 

[Paraxis]

This gave me an idea for a rude not nice DM trap.

Dragon has a few humanoid man sized guardians near his lair equipped with some nice magical armor, the best he has from his treasure horde. When the dragon realizes the PC's are in his place killing his guys and taking their stuff he waits hidden (invisible and perched somewhere) until the greedy as the dragon is itself heroes start stripping out of their armor to put on the new magic stuff. That is when he pounces the ill prepared characters, literally with their pants down and no buff spells up.

 

[Rune]

Just so you know, [MENTION=6787503]Hriston[/MENTION], you are inadverdantly summoning board members by posting those twitter posts verbatim, because the code matches the first username with matching characters and automatically mentions them whenever you use the "@" symbol.

This is true even if both are actually members here. For instance, if there were a "Rune!" here, mentioning him/her by using the "@" sign would summon me, instead. Using mention tags will get around that.

Just put a space after your "@" to avoid summoning anybody.

 

[TarionzCousin]

... he waits hidden (invisible and perched somewhere)....

If I go into a dragon's lair and his guards are active but the dragon is apparently gone, I'm going to use "See Invisible" or "True Seeing" or something similar. A party powerful enough to enter a dragon's lair should be a high enough level to do something like this.

Note: However, I really enjoy it when my players figure out one of my "DM Traps" like this.

 

[KarinsDad]

If I go into a dragon's lair and his guards are active but the dragon is apparently gone, I'm going to use "See Invisible" or "True Seeing" or something similar. A party powerful enough to enter a dragon's lair should be a high enough level to do something like this.

Not according to 5E adventure designers. Second or third level PCs encounter dragons in every module.

 

[KarinsDad]

Yep, that's why I didn't want to be an Assassin Rogue in Organized Play; figured it would be too hard to arrange surprise for predone adventures with semi-random comrades

I don't blame you.

My wizard PC just died and the DM allowed me to pick one uncommon and one rare item for my replacement PC (the other PCs have 2+ items each, so she started me with less gold, but 2 items). So, I picked +1 plate and a cloak of elvenkind for my 5th level Paladin (I suggested to the DM that I start out at level one to try that concept out in 5E, but she poo pooed the idea). With our DM using group stealth, it'll be nice to have a Paladin in plate that can surprise foes.

 

[Hriston]

Just so you know, [MENTION=6787503]Hriston[/MENTION], you are inadverdantly summoning board members by posting those twitter posts verbatim, because the code matches the first username with matching characters and automatically mentions them whenever you use the "@" symbol.

This is true even if both are actually members here. For instance, if there were a "Rune!" here, mentioning him/her by using the "@" sign would summon me, instead. Using mention tags will get around that.

Just put a space after your "@" to avoid summoning anybody.

I forgot that would happen. I tried your fix but it didn't seem to work, so I just got around it by changing it to Q and A. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[Hriston]

Yes surprise is an all or nothing thing. Once you see the kobold you are in combat and on alert, the dragon could still be hidden though so he would gain advantage on his first attack, or if it truly wanted to surprise the party could wait till the initial fight with the kobolds was over and the adventurers were looting corpses to surprise them.

I'm still not happy with this explanation. Why would a party of adventurers not be "on alert" when they are in a dungeon, for example, just because they hadn't seen anything yet? It seems strange for the game to assume that, and if that is the case it would be one of the few times where the game is telling players how their characters must act. Is there somewhere this is spelled-out in the rules?