D&D 5E Reactions

[Sword of Spirit]

When I saw this question I thought, "Dang, that's a really good question!" I started reading replies, and then skipped ahead to the end to see if any consensus has been reached, and apparently it has not.

It seems to me that the RAW provide a straight up contradiction. Both Uncanny Dodge and the inability to take a reaction imposed by shocking grasp happen on the exact same triggering event, ie, on the hit.

So it is literally a contradiction with no answer. We'll need to rule it ourselves or get a Sage Advice designer opinion, but RAW, there appears to be no answer except ERROR: Does not compute.

 

[Ovinomancer]

When I saw this question I thought, "Dang, that's a really good question!" I started reading replies, and then skipped ahead to the end to see if any consensus has been reached, and apparently it has not.

It seems to me that the RAW provide a straight up contradiction. Both Uncanny Dodge and the inability to take a reaction imposed by shocking grasp happen on the exact same triggering event, ie, on the hit.

So it is literally a contradiction with no answer. We'll need to rule it ourselves or get a Sage Advice designer opinion, but RAW, there appears to be no answer except ERROR: Does not compute.

It's not on the same trigger -- the shocking grasp rider doesn't trigger with a hit, it happens on a hit. There's no timing there. Hit? Rider. Done. UD does trigger on, and goes after the hit.

And there was a sage advice, in the thread. Crawford said no Uncanny dodge, yes, shield.

 

[WhimsyTheFae]

For those saying that there's a sequence to attacks that puts a break between a hit and effects, can you answer me this:

I declare a readied action to strike an enemy if they hit me. An enemy obliges. When does my attack go -- after they hit but before the effects of that hit, I would assume, as the hit is my declared trigger and there's space there according to the construct. So, if I react and hit the enemy, and then kill it with my readied action, do I prevent their damage or other effects of their hit?

My reading of the rules as having no sub-sequence would handle this very well -- the enemy goes, hits, and does damage before the readied action occurs because there is no break and the readied action has no wording that it interrupts or interacts with any part of the enemy hit, so it goes after and doesn't modify the enemy hit in any way. If I'm still standing, I hit back. Neat, tidy, and doesn't require weird things like being hit but killing the enemy before I take his damage and/or further restrictions on triggers for readied actions to avoid the invented sub-sequence steps.

EDIT: for the sake of consistency, I would allow the readied action to occur after the damage was applied, but before you saved against a ghoul's paralyzing touch. Just, you know, in case you were wondering.

I would rule thusly: Your character takes damage and must save vs paralysis, but you also make an attack roll, and if it hits, you inflict damage. This would be easily described as making a desperate attack as paralysis is setting in. I don't believe this interpretation is against RAW, but I did not take the time to open my PHB ir DMG.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I would rule thusly: Your character takes damage and must save vs paralysis, but you also make an attack roll, and if it hits, you inflict damage. This would be easily described as making a desperate attack as paralysis is setting in. I don't believe this interpretation is against RAW, but I did not take the time to open my PHB ir DMG.

Absolutely,. If it were a fire elemental, though, that sets you on fire on a hit, you'd be on fire before you could use the readied action. If the fire does enough damage, you might even die in the fire before you could use the readied action. Theoretically.

 

[WhimsyTheFae]

Absolutely,. If it were a fire elemental, though, that sets you on fire on a hit, you'd be on fire before you could use the readied action. If the fire does enough damage, you might even die in the fire before you could use the readied action. Theoretically.

If a ghoul casts shocking grasp...

 

[Ovinomancer]

If a ghoul casts shocking grasp...

You don't get to react, but you also don't have to save against paralysis.

 

[Uller]

For those saying that there's a sequence to attacks that puts a break between a hit and effects, can you answer me this:

I declare a readied action to strike an enemy if they hit me. An enemy obliges. When does my attack go -- after they hit but before the effects of that hit, I would assume, as the hit is my declared trigger and there's space there according to the construct. So, if I react and hit the enemy, and then kill it with my readied action, do I prevent their damage or other effects of their hit?

I'd allow it and it would work just as you described. No. It wouldnt prevent the hit if the attacker died. The hit still happens. The effects still apply. Both characters could kill eachother. Which would be cool.

I've never had a player try to be so precise with their timing...my players don't word things mechanically. They tell me what they want to do or cause to happen then I advise them how best to do that within the rules. If a player wants to ready an attack "against anyone who attacks the prince" I'd ask do they want to go before or after the attack on the prince...usually it will be before so I'll help them word their trigger to be "when I see someone move to attack the prince" or some such...but yeah...if they insisted on it being that precise I'd let them. The only reservation I would have is it would be very hard to time something like that. So I might require a check...but probably not. Generally I'm a "yes but..." DM.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk

 

[Oofta]

When I saw this question I thought, "Dang, that's a really good question!" I started reading replies, and then skipped ahead to the end to see if any consensus has been reached, and apparently it has not.

It seems to me that the RAW provide a straight up contradiction. Both Uncanny Dodge and the inability to take a reaction imposed by shocking grasp happen on the exact same triggering event, ie, on the hit.

So it is literally a contradiction with no answer. We'll need to rule it ourselves or get a Sage Advice designer opinion, but RAW, there appears to be no answer except ERROR: Does not compute.

I don't personally think there has to be "one true answer" to minor issues like this. If it ever actually happened in a game I'd make a ruling and move on.

There's always going to be a balancing act for designers between allowing DMs and players the sense of freedom to use the rules to describe what the characters are doing and putting a straight jacket made of layers of rules on people.

This is such an edge case that I'd be surprised if it ever happens. So the designers have a choice. They can try to make a rule system so comprehensive that it addresses edge cases such as this but have a game that gets bogged down in rules and people flipping pages trying to find that one line that says how to do anything.

Or they can have a system that tries to strike a balance and give a reasonably comprehensive rule set that gives a lot of flexibility to change the tone of the game as the people playing see fit.

I'm glad they went with the latter style, I think it makes a better game overall. Even if once in a blue moon a DM just has to make a ruling that's not covered by the rules.

 

[seebs]

What is a hit event?

The thing you later refer to: The thing which triggers "on a hit" effects.

Regardless, the reaction occurs after the trigger unless otherwise noted. Shocking Grasp includes the wording, "On a hit, the target... can't take reactions until the start of it's next turn." This tells us what happens on a hit. Since UD can only occur after the hit, and the loss of reactions occurs with the hit, not after it, then UD would go after the restriction is in place because it goes after the hit. And, therefore, can't be used. The words tell us what happens. We just have to read them and not add words.

But if we follow this exact same reasoning, "on a hit, the target takes damage" would work the same way, and would result in attacks which knock someone out preventing uncanny dodge, since it goes after the hit.

And uncanny dodge never says it goes before the damage, it just specifies what it changes about the damage.

I declare a readied action to strike an enemy if they hit me. An enemy obliges. When does my attack go -- after they hit but before the effects of that hit, I would assume, as the hit is my declared trigger and there's space there according to the construct. So, if I react and hit the enemy, and then kill it with my readied action, do I prevent their damage or other effects of their hit?

Of course not.

And I think it's worth pointing out: I don't think uncanny dodge prevents shocking grasp from taking effect. I just think that it means you can't take reactions between when we apply the damage and a round later or whatever. You can still take reactions before it took effect.