On the Dodge Action
lord save me from folks who misunderstand %.
it depends on what you want to talk about % of.
If you have 1$ and i give you 1$ i have given you 100% more money - YAY
if you have 500$ and i give you 100$ i have given you 20% more money.
Which would you rather take, the 100% deal or the 20% deal?
If you need an 11+ to hit and you get disadvantage you will now miss 5 more times in 20.
if you need a 20+ to hit and you get disadvantage you will now miss 19 more times in 400 or .95 more times in 20 (roughly)
What matters in the long run for both the money examples is how much you gain or lose in actual dollars or actual hits and misses - not the % increase from where you started. Nobody at the store is gonna turn away your 100$ because you started at 500 and neither are any of those 5 extra misses gonna count as hits because you started at 11+.
But hey, dont listen to me, dont go figure that out yourself, dont go roll a bunch of dice and track the results and dont by any means go learn math instead of parroting info from the net... cuz your math prowess wont ever be a problem for me.
EDIT to add - to further add to the folly here - if i am needing a 20+ to hit, i am g=better served to not try and get advantage on that roll. instead i should be looking for another action with better odds of success - like maybe switching to a grapple or shove prone or even just HELP to give someone with better chances advantage.
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Like many other things, dodge is situationally the right call. It is to me most often used when you don't have any effective recourse against a foe for a given round, either because that foe is unattackable for some reason or you are in a terrible position and need to get into better position. The two examples in a game I can think of were:
1) Our party had to cross a hall in a keep in which we discovered multiple murder holes existed with archers peppering anyone who came down the hall. We dodged to run the gauntlet to get to the door at the end where we could get out of danger and find the actual ingress to the rooms where said guards were located.
SIDE NOTE: Our DM tried that trick many levels later, when I was a 13th level Druid. I smiled, turned the walls of the murder-hall to mud and we finished off the guards then and there.
2) Our group once faced off against an invisible foe who would attack from invisibility, go back invisible next round, and attack from hiding again. On rounds we had no means of attacking him, I (as a wizard who didn't like getting hit) would dodge and take cover to reduce his hit chance (-2 on TOP of him losing his advantage!) and popped out to attack when he became visible.
Another highly situational aspect is when foes have some resource that keys on advantage - like say sneak attack. Dodge will not only neuter their advantage but can even if not countered stop even the regular sneak due to ally from working because they cannot have disad on the attack to get sneak dmg.
I say again - when is dodge good and bad is the better question to be able to answer in play than any generic attempt to assess its merit in an unknown situation.
TaranTheWanderer
Legend
but you can use your bonus actions to make off-hand attacks or cast quicken spells. There may be other potent/useful bonus actions that you can do as well. So, depending on what you have in your tool-box, you don't necessarily have to nothing...
smbakeresq
Explorer
Can you post the accurate math? From what has been posted here and elsewhere without your a**hole****ess advantage/disadvantage is a flat -5/+5. You clear have a different perspective then others
Post your academic credentials also so we can see if you actually know of what you speak. Since you are so confident it shouldn’t be a problem. Just post your solutions, if you don’t then we know who you are.
smbakeresq
Explorer
I didn’t see the other thread. It’s my fault. Did it show that it was awesome and should be used all the time?
smbakeresq
Explorer
One of the things that I am trying to see is if it’s awesome and I should use it all the time. So far it appears it is situational, which I always thought it was. I need to see what they other thread though says, which I didn’t see today when i posted.
Hjorimir
Adventurer
Consider also the number of times you might be attacked (that's a lot of zombies). So, let's assume that I (only) mitigate 15% damage from the horde of zombies that's cornered me here with the original example. That's still pretty attractive. What if I have a high AC and am already severely wounded? What if they need a 20 to hit? What if I'm already severely wounded? Your odds of rolling a 20 with disadvantage is 1in400. Substantial delta there. Fighting a fire-breathing dragon. Advantage on that DEX save sure starts to feel attractive. How much damage do I mitigate with a save? It's all contextual, but there are plenty of good reasons to dodge.
Bawylie
A very OK person
I achieved my doctorate in artful dodging in London under the tutelage of the esteemed Fagin.
Also, you mean I have a different perspective THAN others.
You know who I am.
Advantage is a flat +5 -5 for passive scores iirc... for other cases its effect varies.
For example...
Say i need a 16+ roll of the die to succeed. that is a 25% chance of success - about 5 times in 20 average.
With advantage - that goes to 43.25% chance of success - about 8-9 in 20 average. Good improvement but not the 50% a flat +5 would have given.
With disadvantage - that goes to 6.25% chance of success - a little more than 1 chance in 20 but certainly not the result of a -5 (which would be zero for skill and saves but 1 in 400 for attack rolls on a double 20.)
At needing an 11+ (50%) it also works out to be right on a +5 -5 swing.
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