D&D 5E (2014) It's Official: I was wrong about Surprise!

[green_destiny]

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?

Well good point but even if the party is "on alert" they still dont know when danger is eminent. So if a threat was spotted they know that danger is coming next or soon for that start of the encounter.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

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?

Because being in kill mode all day will drive you psychotic.

There's nothing stopping you from going through all day in combat mode: have everyone declare their actions for this round ("I move ten feet closer to the door to the room and listen"), roll initiative for the round (Speed Factor variant from the DMG), repeat six hundred times per hour. But I think if you actually do this you will quickly find that your players prefer to have the PCs drop back to a lower state of readiness, and while they are in that lower state of readiness it is still possible to catch them by surprise, which means they momentarily continue doing what they were doing up until just then ("look for secret doors") instead of perceiving and instantly responding to the new stimulus ("an arrow is flying through the air towards you"). Even in this situation the PCs quickly adapt and commence killing things, and any PC with the Alert trait is like the dude at the beginning of Captain America 2: so ready for danger that even when someone throws a shield through a window at his head while he is in the middle a conversation, he still instantly flips into combat mode and evades it. But most people aren't like that, not even most PCs.

 

[Hriston]

Well good point but even if the party is "on alert" they still dont know when danger is eminent. So if a threat was spotted they know that danger is coming next or soon for that start of the encounter.

Ah yes, so surprise is not knowing that there is going to be a fight, a lack of foreknowledge at the start of the encounter, perhaps. I like that better.

 

[Hriston]

Because being in kill mode all day will drive you psychotic.

There's nothing stopping you from going through all day in combat mode: have everyone declare their actions for this round ("I move ten feet closer to the door to the room and listen"), roll initiative for the round (Speed Factor variant from the DMG), repeat six hundred times per hour. But I think if you actually do this you will quickly find that your players prefer to have the PCs drop back to a lower state of readiness, and while they are in that lower state of readiness it is still possible to catch them by surprise, which means they momentarily continue doing what they were doing up until just then ("look for secret doors") instead of perceiving and instantly responding to the new stimulus ("an arrow is flying through the air towards you"). Even in this situation the PCs quickly adapt and commence killing things, and any PC with the Alert trait is like the dude at the beginning of Captain America 2: so ready for danger that even when someone throws a shield through a window at his head while he is in the middle a conversation, he still instantly flips into combat mode and evades it. But most people aren't like that, not even most PCs.

So you're telling me that a combat encounter is a function of the mental state of the PCs. So if the players tell me they are putting their characters into "kill mode" then I am obligated to begin a combat encounter whether there is any threat or not. Please point me to the rules that tell me that this is how things work.

 

[Kaychsea]

So you're telling me that a combat encounter is a function of the mental state of the PCs. So if the players tell me they are putting their characters into "kill mode" then I am obligated to begin a combat encounter whether there is any threat or not. Please point me to the rules that tell me that this is how things work.

Not so much that, more the fact that people constantly looking for the threat that's going to kill them go nuts. After months of this with a few stays in town to "relax" leaves them in a similar state to people coming back from 'Nam.

 

[Hriston]

Not so much that, more the fact that people constantly looking for the threat that's going to kill them go nuts. After months of this with a few stays in town to "relax" leaves them in a similar state to people coming back from 'Nam.

...Or like a party of PCs coming back from the Caves of Chaos. If people and worse are trying to kill you and you don't know where they are, you're probably going to be at the hyper-vigilant end of the spectrum as long as you're in that situation, and adjusting to "civilian" life when all that is over is going to be difficult. You can have PCs with shell-shock. There are rules in the DMG for that. With that being said though, just because my players tell me that their characters are "on alert" doesn't mean that I'm going to hand-wave that they cannot be surprised under any circumstances, so why would I confer that advantage on them for the same mental state simply because it was induced by the actual presence of a threat. In that case it isn't the mental state, which after all is completely under the control of the players, but the direct sensory knowledge of the presence of the threat itself which is responsible for the unsurprised state of the PCs going into combat. I think the rules are pretty clear on this.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

So you're telling me that a combat encounter is a function of the mental state of the PCs. So if the players tell me they are putting their characters into "kill mode" then I am obligated to begin a combat encounter whether there is any threat or not. Please point me to the rules that tell me that this is how things work.

"So you're telling me that a combat encounter is a function of the mental state of the PCs." Well, yeah. A function of the mental states of both combatants. For example, if someone sneaks up on a sleeping PC and attacks him, you don't roll initiative, you just make the attack. (Some DMs will skip even that and just declare an auto-kill.) You're skipping the full combat rules because they don't apply when both sides aren't in kill mode. In particular, I'm telling you that the ability for a PC to act/react during a combat encounter is a function of his mental state, and that is what the surprise rules seem to be modelling.

"Please point me to the rules that tell me that this is how things work." We're discussing the rationale behind the rules, so the rules you're asking me to point you to are just the ones that started this thread: the surprise rules. If you don't believe the rationale I've conjectured you are free to come up with your own rationale, or to house-rule surprise to work differently.

 

[Hriston]

"So you're telling me that a combat encounter is a function of the mental state of the PCs." Well, yeah. A function of the mental states of both combatants. For example, if someone sneaks up on a sleeping PC and attacks him, you don't roll initiative, you just make the attack. (Some DMs will skip even that and just declare an auto-kill.) You're skipping the full combat rules because they don't apply when both sides aren't in kill mode. In particular, I'm telling you that the ability for a PC to act/react during a combat encounter is a function of his mental state, and that is what the surprise rules seem to be modelling.

Ah, now I understand. We're using the combat round differently. I begin the first round when either side becomes aware of the other, whenever there is the potential of a fight breaking out. I don't assume that anyone is or needs to be in "kill mode" because the characters or monsters involved may or may not decide to even commence hostilities. Surprise simply gives one side the opportunity to act first, whether it's to attack, close to attack, open a parlay, or run away. Combat itself is hardly ever a forgone conclusion. I usually know what the monsters/NPCs are going to do, but even when that is to attack, the players could decide that their characters try to avoid the fight, so I'd hardly call that going into "kill mode," but it does happen within the context of a combat round, at least it does in my games.

"Please point me to the rules that tell me that this is how things work." We're discussing the rationale behind the rules, so the rules you're asking me to point you to are just the ones that started this thread: the surprise rules. If you don't believe the rationale I've conjectured you are free to come up with your own rationale, or to house-rule surprise to work differently.

The rationale I've come up with in reaction to Crawford's response, and a post up-thread, is related to how I use the combat round to reflect the fact that at least one side knows about the other. Surprise is simply the state of becoming a participant in a combat round without knowing about the presence of the other side from the outset. You are surprised when, at the start of the encounter, they know you are there and you don't know they are there. That's enough for me and doesn't require any of the participants to have a particular mental state. I let my players decide what their characters are thinking in and out of combat, and whether it's round one or round two.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I let them decide what they're thinking too. If someone declares a continuous held action, "If anything pops up from that rock I shoot it," I let them, and surprise doesn't come into play.

Sometimes this results in accidental civilian casualties.

In other words, you can notice a threat which is purely imaginary, and that prevents surprise too.

 

[Hriston]

I let them decide what they're thinking too. If someone declares a continuous held action, "If anything pops up from that rock I shoot it," I let them, and surprise doesn't come into play.

Sometimes this results in accidental civilian casualties.

In other words, you can notice a threat which is purely imaginary, and that prevents surprise too.

If it's purely imaginary and there's no one behind the rock then why would surprise come into play? On the other hand if there really is a hidden threat behind the rock that means that the PC in question does not hear, smell, or sense in any way the hidden threat, and is just happening to point his arrow at the rock based on what? Maybe it looks like a good place for someone to hide. The thing is he doesn't know if anyone is there at all. On the other hand, the guy behind the rock knows all about the PC. He probably knows the PC's approximate location from the dry leaves crunching under his footsteps and the sound of him drawing his bow. Unfortunately for the PC, a readied action won't carry through into the first round if he's surprised, but he's probably pointing his bow at the left side of the rock while his assailant leans out from the right side and fires off a shot at him. Now it's time for round two.