D&D 5E Reasonable Movement and Athletic Feats?

[Son of the Serpent]

grappling. we are actually pretty good at it.

 

[Garthanos]

he tore through the magical armor of grendel by ripping his arm off didn't he?

And fought under water for hours.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

oh yeah. and he basically went round two with his mom. xD

 

[doctorbadwolf]

This is why the earlier edition (2E IIRC) allowed different movement speeds as multiples of base speed and were better equipped than 5E in that respect. We have house-rules for running and sprinting as well. If you look at the calculations for a move + dash of 60 feet, that equates to 6.8 mph roughly, or a brisk jog (double-time).

Unless you have a class feature (e.g. Cunning Action), there is no way to "run" or triple your movement, or "sprint" which would be quadruple movement.

A "simple" house-rule would be something like this:

Run. When you take the dash action, you can use your bonus action to attempt to increase your movement again. You make a DC 5 Strength (Athletics) check. If you succeed, you gain additional movement equal to your speed, after applying any modifiers. The DC increases by 5 for each addition turn you run. If you spend one round without moving, the DC resets to 5.

Sprint. When you take the dash action, you can use your bonus action to attempt to increase your movement again. You make a DC 10 Strength (Athletics) check. If you succeed, you gain additional movement equal to twice your speed, after applying any modifiers. The DC increases by 5 for each addition turn you sprint. When you fail a check, you must spend a number of rounds equal to the number of rounds you spent sprinting using only your movement and no dash or run.

That is the basic idea. Tweak as desired.

That’s pretty simple and probably easy to remember. I might want to like...round up the result of the athletics check in feet or something, so it feels like you’re running faster when you’re on your A game than when not.

How do you handle opportunity attacks against sprinters? My instinct is keep it a flat roll because it’s advantage against a target that isn’t moving carefully, and disadvantage against a target that is moving very quickly.

But one thing I find satisfying in my WIP game that 5e does poorly, is the ability to put effort into physical movement.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

i believe poison gets him in the end. from the drake.

 

[Garthanos]

But one thing I find satisfying in my WIP game that 5e does poorly, is the ability to put effort into physical movement.

Spending HD might be some form of extra effort on any of these athletics things but the result need to be really big and important.

 

[Garthanos]

i believe poison gets him in the end. from the drake.

Poison is a hero bane. Herakles is poisoned doesn't die but the pain is so horrible the gods take pity and put him in the sky

 

[Garthanos]

Spending HD might be some form of extra effort on any of these athletics things but the result need to be really big and important.

Staving off exhaustion for instance that is pretty bloody big.

 

[billd91]

Realism should only be referenced, beyond basic “up is up and down is down and ranged weapons have limited range” type stuff, to make sure the player characters aren’t being limited beyond reality.

You're going to find that pretty much always is and has been a controversial opinion.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

Poison is a hero bane. Herakles is poisoned doesn't die but the pain is so horrible the gods take pity and put him in the sky

yeah. i've definitely noticed a thematic pattern. heroes who's identity within their lore strongly includes near invincibility are often taken by poison. or disease. it actually does make some sense too. toughness allows many people to tank a few broken bones. sometimes even a severed limb if they tie it off quick. but certain poisons will fell even a near invincible character almost always. like basilisk venom. or hydra. or dragon venom. and irl some poisons have very little difference in affect between a person with strong constitution verses those without.