D&D 5E rogue-bladesinger?

[Flamestrike]

So basically they did not go past me and kill the rest of the party like you said they would all the way back in the begining of this whole thread. We took the room with no casualties.

Yay for you! For all the good it does you.

Its your turn 2. Did you use shield to stop the javelin, and what do you do on your turn?

 

[Flamestrike]

Based on what you just said here, if I opened with fireball like you wanted the surviving Orogs and the probable one orc that survived would have done the exact same thing.

You Fireball. 30 damage or more kills the Orcs regardless of saves. Then Bladesong. Then advance. Then threaten the two badly wounded Orog survivors with your AC 19 and your Sentinel feat and shield spell (or simply block their escape into room 2)

If they attack you, shield it. Orog 1 runs away, you stop him with sentinel. If Orog 2 runs away and makes it into the next room alerting encounter 2?

Presuming he cant be reached by either of your archers, your party advance to you, with the archers taking the ready (attack) action or finishing off the wounded Orog, and the cleric casting bless on the three of you.

You're basically ready for encounter 2 now regardless of him getting away with ready actions, you in bladesong and the party blessed.

 

[Flamestrike]

The moral of the story is, if you're dodging, you are not presenting a threat. There is no 'draw agro' there - you're not only extremely hard to hit via dodge, you're also not acutally doing anything offensively to make you a threat.

A Barbarian (for example) using reckless attack draws attacks because he hits like a truck, and everyone gets advantage to hit him.

A Dodging blade-singer does not draw attacks because his AC is too high, and he's not actually doing anything else offensively.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

A prime example of this is the Baldar's Gate 3 early access. The AI is currently rather simplistic, and enemies simply target whoever is easiest to hit (most carry bows). So, if you want enemies to ignore you, have a high AC (Mirror Image is great for this because of the way it is implemented). If you want to draw fire, have a low AC, but lots of hp and resistances.

 

[Flamestrike]

If you have a high AC and are near impossible to hit, why bother wasting actions attacking you, and if you're not actually doing anything other than dodging... why bother attacking you?

 

[auburn2]

You Fireball. 30 damage or more kills the Orcs regardless of saves. Then Bladesong. Then advance. Then threaten the two badly wounded Orog survivors with your AC 19 and your Sentinel feat and shield spell (or simply block their escape into room 2)

If they attack you, shield it. Orog 1 runs away, you stop him with sentinel. If Orog 2 runs away and makes it into the next room alerting encounter 2?

Presuming he cant be reached by either of your archers, your party advance to you, with the archers taking the ready (attack) action or finishing off the wounded Orog, and the cleric casting bless on the three of you.

You're basically ready for encounter 2 now regardless of him getting away with ready actions, you in bladesong and the party blessed.

This is such BS and you know it. Even with good rolls where I kill all four orcs (which is odd since our rolls are terrible until now) and if I advance and threaten both orogs, I only get one OA and 1 orog still gets away EVERY SINGLE TIME. There is no way at all to keep him, even if it is only 1, from leaving and raising the alarm. I fireball, get lucky and kill every single orc, the two orogs flee. I get an OA on one of them and get lucky again and hit so he can't move (and by the way the only reason I can stop this one is because I took the "useless" sentinel feat). Even if I do both of those things and get great rolls on the fireball, and good rolls on the OA, one Orog still escapes through the other door to raise the alarm. With the other party members all the way back in the hall 50+ feet away from the door they can't get to him. The only way it doesn't happen is if they decide not to flee if they are fireballed, and that is really what would have happened if I played this like you wanted me to play this, isn't it?

Bottom line here is you want your players to do what you want them to do and you will completely eliminate player agency to force that to happen. You want the fireball and so instead of playing the enemy from a mindset or basic strategy or plan you play them to punish the player if they don't do exactly what you want in the first round. If the enemies base strategy is to flee and raise the alarm as soon as they see any intruders, fine but that is not the mindset and it is not how you played it to start and it makes no sense that they would shift the strategy now in round 1 based on what was presented to them. If they fought for a round or two and got nowhere, and were getting annihilated (as they will likely) absolutely then it would make total sense to retreat and regroup, but not on seeing someone open a door.

You were all gung-ho on running into battle and downing the rogue in round 1 when they saw all four party members, and they were even going to go through the door and out into the hall to do it. Now that there is a lone elf in the doorway all 6 are all of a sudden going to flee? Not one or two to raise the alarm, but all six!

 

[auburn2]

If you have a high AC and are near impossible to hit, why bother wasting actions attacking you, and if you're not actually doing anything other than dodging... why bother attacking you?

Because I don't have a sign around my neck saying I have a high AC. At this point I am one elf standing in a doorway with a human behind her that some of them can see.

 

[auburn2]

The moral of the story is, if you're dodging, you are not presenting a threat. There is no 'draw agro' there - you're not only extremely hard to hit via dodge, you're also not acutally doing anything offensively to make you a threat.

"Not a threat" yet all 6 enemy flee from battle without even trying.

In case you missed we took the room, we won the fight and we used less resources than otherwise would have. And that was the whole point of this discussion, the thread where they are now raising the alarm is nothing but a misdirection and way off what this topic was about.

Let's get back to the original point - your whole point in this entire thread is that the bladesinger is not helping the party in combat if she takes dodge. That she should never do it and the enemy will ignore her and it will hurt the party. Having numerous options with other rooms and a horde of orcs on the other side of a door overly complicates things and makes this a role play and not a combat encounter and as I pointed out earlier it is role play with no player agency since the alarm is raised no matter what I do.

How about if this is a 40x40 barracks room with no exit other than the "normal door" she is standing in? That makes it a lot simpler, we are just looking at the fight itself, which is what this discussion is really about.

My bladeisnger opens the door on the barrakcs there are 4 orcs and 2 orogs in it and no other exits. She goes into bladesong and takes dodge. Your turn, what do they do.

 

[auburn2]

The moral of the story is, if you're dodging, you are not presenting a threat. There is no 'draw agro' there - you're not only extremely hard to hit via dodge, you're also not acutally doing anything offensively to make you a threat.

The moral of the story is the enemy can't effectively get to any other party member, you know it, you have been exposed and that is why they are all running away.

Like I said above it is a 40x40 barracks with a normal door and no other exit .... that scenario really speaks to the fundamental question we have here, whether the bladesinger is ever helping the party by using dodge and guarding a choke point. She opens the door on a barracks with no other exit, 2 Orogs and 6 Orcs, goes into bladesong and takes dodge action.

Or do you not want to play that game?

Maybe you have me in your game as a player, so every single room in every single dungeon has another exit with a horde of orcs on the other side of it. That way you can force me to play like you want to tell me to play!

At some point, ANY POINT are you going to be willing to say it works?

 

[auburn2]

A prime example of this is the Baldar's Gate 3 early access. The AI is currently rather simplistic, and enemies simply target whoever is easiest to hit (most carry bows). So, if you want enemies to ignore you, have a high AC (Mirror Image is great for this because of the way it is implemented). If you want to draw fire, have a low AC, but lots of hp and resistances.

I agree, a few things though.

First the enemy never flee in BG3 because of AC (at least that I have found). And you can certainly draw fire onto a high-AC character by keeping other characters back out of the battle and then bringing them in at the opportune time. What I am talking about here works extremely well in BG3. Although to be fair the enemy is overly stupid in that game and the battles are all way to easy.

Second I have no problem with enemies seeking out and TRYING to attack softer characters if they can, as a matter of fact they should but the party should also make that difficult to do. It is kind of cheesy in round 1 to avoid a high AC character solely because of AC when they don't know what they are up against, but I have no real problem other than that.

Circling back to the initial discussion point though - It was said that the bladesinger is not survivable in the front of the party where she can get attacked by multiple enemies in melee, that as a wizard she won't survive up there toe to toe with the enemey because of the low hps. Well, if she is not going to get attacked based on her AC alone .... then I think I can rest my case and it is clear she is survivable in melee.