November's SAGE ADVICE Is Here!

November's Sage Advice column by WotC's Jeremy Crawford is up. This month deals with lightfoot halfing and wood elf hiding racial traits, some class features, backgrounds (you can have only one!), muticlassing, surprise rounds in combat, and more. Check out this month's Sage Advice here. The advice here has been added to the Sage Advice Compendium.

 

[ChrisCarlson]

I'm intrigued by the ruling confirming you can Dash more than once in a round. This allows for otherwise particularly fast characters to get a bit out of hand, IMO.

 

[JackOfAllTirades]

This is correct, but not relevant -- in order to Sneak Attack, you must be using a ranged weapon or a finesse weapon. An unarmed strike is not a weapon, so doesn't apply.

It's worth noting that Monks get to use DEX for Unarmed Strikes.

 

[Tazawa]

It would have been nice if this had been spelled out somewhere. I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of players playing melee characters with shields aren't aware that they're supposed to be allowed to bash with them as a bonus action every turn. I sure wasn't.

I don't think it will work that way. A shield, even if used as an improvised weapon, does not have the "light" weapon property. I would rule that it doesn't even work with the Dual Wielder feat, as a shield is not a "melee weapon" either. The only time that this is really useful is when you lose your weapon for some reason and have no other choice.

Happy gaming!

 

[Lord Twig]

It seems fundamentally flawed that the attack that starts a combat would fail to surprise its target. Would it be so bad if the character were surprised until the start of his second turn? I understand that this might grant TWO surprise attacks against a surprised target that rolled low on initiative, but WotC didn't seem to have any problem with Ambuscade. Plus, being surprised in an ambush is a bad thing. There's no reason the rules can't reflect that.

 

[Pauper]

It's worth noting that Monks get to use DEX for Unarmed Strikes.

Not sure why -- unarmed strikes aren't weapons, and thus even though monks can use Dex for the attack, it's not an attack with a finesse weapon.

Of course, a DM running her own game could choose to rule differently (see the first rule of Sage Advice), and that observation might help convince such a DM to allow unarmed Sneak Attacks.

So maybe worth noting after all.

--
Pauper

 

[garnuk]

We always roll initiative after the first action that starts combat, not right before that action is taken, unless both groups are hostile and aware of each others presence.

 

[Leugren]

We always roll initiative after the first action that starts combat, not right before that action is taken, unless both groups are hostile and aware of each others presence.

That's a pretty common interpretation, but it's not RAW. The Sage Advice clarification is not so great for Assassins, but it's no surprise to many. A lot of people extrapolated this from the fact that a surprised creature gets to take Reactions after its turn passes in the first round, even though it did not get to take any actions on that turn. The conclusion: since you can take reactions, you are no longer surprised. I admit that I myself didn't see it until someone else pointed it out, and even then I remained skeptical.

 

[Xeviat]

> If you attack with a shield—most likely as an improvised weapon—do you keep the +2 bonus to AC? Attacking with a shield doesn’t deprive you of the bonus to AC.

This seems like it has a huge impact on the action economy, especially at lower levels.

It wasn't initially obvious to me how this interacted with the Shield Master feat, as I thought it was redundant with the benefit that lets you shove with the shield as a bonus action. It turns out that you can only shove as part of the attack action, so implicitly not with an attack made as a bonus action with an offhand weapon. This implies that for a normal character with a shield, you can make an off-hand bonus action attack with a shield as an improvised weapon (so no proficiency bonus), and the Shield Master feat gives you the additional option of shoving as a bonus action.

It would have been nice if this had been spelled out somewhere. I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of players playing melee characters with shields aren't aware that they're supposed to be allowed to bash with them as a bonus action every turn. I sure wasn't.

The shield isn't a light weapon, though, so it won't work with Two-Weapon Fighting without the Dual Wielder feat, no?

 

[AverageCitizen]

The shield isn't a light weapon, though, so it won't work with Two-Weapon Fighting without the Dual Wielder feat, no?

It isn't a weapon at all, so it doesn't even work with it. The ruling is really just for hitting people with a shield when you don't have a weapon.

 

[garnuk]

That's a pretty common interpretation, but it's not RAW. The Sage Advice clarification is not so great for Assassins, but it's no surprise to many. A lot of people extrapolated this from the fact that a surprised creature gets to take Reactions after its turn passes in the first round, even though it did not get to take any actions on that turn. The conclusion: since you can take reactions, you are no longer surprised. I admit that I myself didn't see it until someone else pointed it out, and even then I remained skeptical.

RAW is that the DM decides when to ask for initiative to start combat.
Surprise is determined before rolling initiative.