Sage Advice Compendium Update 1/30/2019

[Ovinomancer]

"@JeremyECrawford

More Jeremy Crawford Retweeted Draconis
The simple by-the-book way (RAW) to determine whether you've completed an action is to finish the whole action.

Yet you fulfill our design intent (RAI) with the Attack action if you make at least one attack with it, since that is how we define the action in its basic form."

Here he is saying that the action is not instantaneous. It doesn't end until you finish the whole action. That's RAW. You are in error with your interpretation.

You do realize that that has been my argument all along, yeah? How am I in error? You should actually read posts and stop kneejerking responses to usernames. This is the second time in a row in this thread you've told me I'm wrong while repeating my position back to me as right.

 

[Maxperson]

You do realize that that has been my argument all along, yeah? How am I in error? You should actually read posts and stop kneejerking responses to usernames. This is the second time in a row in this thread you've told me I'm wrong while repeating my position back to me as right.

No it hasn't. Your argument is that the action is done with instantly and the effect lasts until it is over. That's very different than the action lasting until it's over. Nice try at covering up, though.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Wow, I am surprised that no one has yet mentioned Crawford's tweets from earlier today (Monday) where he basically confirms what some of us here said that bonus actions that are triggered by an attack can occur in between the attacks provided by Extra Attacks. Here are a couple of relevant comments:

"Summary: the trigger is the attack that's part of the Attack action, not the entire action."

"As DM, I allow the bonus action of Shield Master to happen after you make at least one attack with the Attack action, since making one attack fulfills the action's basic definition (PH, 192). If you have Extra Attack, you decide which of the attacks the bonus action follows."

Cool, that is exactly what our group has been doing all along. You attack, bonus shove, and continue attacking if you have them.

 

[Ovinomancer]

No it hasn't. Your argument is that the action is done with instantly and the effect lasts until it is over. That's very different than the action lasting until it's over. Nice try at covering up, though.

Oh, right, you're back to that, which is both wrong about my position (protip: instantly has nothing at all to do with my argument) and also fails to resolve the Dodge issue of continued actions.

I'll ask you directly: under your theory, when does the Dodge action end?

For me, it ends when I note the effects, because that's what it says. The effect then ends at the beginning of my next turn or if my speed is reduced to 0. Much like the Attack action isn't the attack, the Didge action isn't the effect. The Attack action includes making an attack, and is finished when that attack is executed. The Dodge action includes instantiating an effect, and is finished when that effect is instantiated. The effect can persist after the action has comcluded what it does. There is no "the action is the effect; the effect is the action."

 

[Umbran]

Gentlemen, please take a moment to consider why you are arguing. Please ask yourself if it is worth the acrimony.

 

[5ekyu]

"@JeremyECrawford

More Jeremy Crawford Retweeted Draconis
The simple by-the-book way (RAW) to determine whether you've completed an action is to finish the whole action.

Yet you fulfill our design intent (RAI) with the Attack action if you make at least one attack with it, since that is how we define the action in its basic form."

Here he is saying that the action is not instantaneous. It doesn't end until you finish the whole action. That's RAW. You are in error with your interpretation.

Actually, according to Sage Advice Compendium, the JEC tweets are now considered unofficial rulings and only the stuff in the SAC are official at all.

What he is describing as the intent in that and the other tweets from yesterday is exacly yhow we have ran it since before that older of the older tweets etc... but his tweets are not RAW or official anymore. (That was how they buried all those old contradictory tweets on this subject.)

 

[Hriston]

Of course it's important. But it's informal and has no mechanical value at all. If a player declares his PC is going to look for secret doors on the south wall, there is nothing mechanical there. His PC goes over to the south wall and looks around. Until I call for the roll to try and find something, mechanics don't play any part. Combat is the same. He can tell me he is going to attack the kobold, but there's nothing mechanical there at all until he actually rolls to hit. It's just an informal declaration that lets me and the other players know what is happening.

This is basically what I was saying up-thread about 5E's basic pattern of game-play. Players declare actions for their characters. The DM resolves those actions, using the rules and mechanics as tools to do so when appropriate.

It has no mechanics associated with it whatsoever. Only the actual attack roll when the Attack action is taken has mechanics associated with it. Until then, it's just a non-mechanical statement.

This doesn't seem right to me. Surely, the player, when declaring that his/her character attempts to smash the kobold with a mace, has a certain expectation about which mechanics are going to be involved in the resolution. An attack roll will be made and compared to the kobold's AC, followed by a damage roll if a hit is scored. Now, unexpected things sometimes happen in the game, and there's no guarantee that the action's resolution will follow those steps, but I think it's a stretch to say there's no association whatsoever between the player's action declaration and the mechanics that are typically used to resolve it.

Sure, but the Attack action has not been taken until the first attack has begun, and the attack must be finished before anything else can be done.

Is that what this is about? I think we agree that taking the Attack action typically involves making one or more attacks, and that you haven't taken the Attack action until the attack(s) you're making with it has/have at least been attempted. That isn't in contention, at least not for my part.

Where I think we disagree is that you look at "you take the Attack action on your turn" as an event which must occur before the bonus action which is conditioned upon it, whereas I look at it as a statement about what you do on your turn which, if true about your turn, allows you to also use a bonus action to shove at a time of your choosing during your turn.

 

[Hriston]

Those examples show the paradox. If you don't take the Attack action, you are not satisfying the requirement in Shield Master which allows the bonus action to begin with. In order to gain the bonus action, you must take the Attack action on your turn. I am showing you exactly how you can be denied your Attack action, thus you have no granted Bonus action. But, oh, wait, you already used it! How can that be since you didn't meet the requirements for it??? THAT is the paradox you seem oblivious to...

But that "paradox" is of your own creation and is easily solved! Don't allocate a bonus action to the shove-attempt until the condition for it has been met. See how easy that is?

This is getting laughable. You are basically arguing this: you shove, and if that shove is followed by the Attack action, then you must have used a bonus action to do it because you are using the Attack action now. But, if for some reason, you are denied your Attack action after the shove, then you are just saying your Attack action is what was used for the shove. I'm sorry, but that is pretty bad logic there. You have to decide the source of the ability that allows you to take an action before you use it, not afterwards.

Why?

You cannot exchange bonus actions for actions and vice versa.

I'm not doing that.

The paradox is that you used a bonus action granted by a feat and then did not satisfy the condition required to earn that bonus action. "The incongruity seems to arise from assigning a bonus action to the shove-attempt before the condition has been met for using one." Exactly, THAT is precisely what you ARE doing!

No, it isn't. That's precisely what I'm recommending you not do to avoid creating the paradox you keep creating.

If you want to shove, how are you doing it? Are you using your Attack action to shove? Ok, go ahead. Are you using the bonus action from Shield Master? Sure, but only if you take the Attack action. No problem I suppose--UNLESS you are denied the ability to take the Attack action. Again, paradox.

Suppose you have 1 hit point left and you are facing an orc and a goblin. The orc is going first and the DM decides to Ready the orc's action to Attack if you shove the goblin and knock him prone. You turn comes and you knock the goblin prone using your bonus shove from Shield Master. Since the triggering event occured, the DM has the orc use its reaction to attack you and it hits, knocking you to 0 hit points. You are now unconscious. You used the bonus action from Shield Master, but never used the Attack action that would grant it. Again, paradox. You can't switch what action caused you to shove after the fact.

This is a very odd view of the rules which keeps coming up in this conversation. It's the idea that my character needs explicit permission from the rule-books to do something entirely mundane that anyone in the real world can do. In the real world, if I want to shove someone, I don't need to "use an action" to do so. I can just extend my arm, or whatever, and apply the physical force that I wish to. That's all that's required of my action-declaration in the game as well. All I need to express at the table is that my character shoves a creature within 5 feet, and that my character's goal is to push the creature back or to knock it prone. It isn't an action or a bonus action that causes my character to shove a creature. It's my action-declaration that causes it.

Except for the fact that he reversed his original ruling on how Shield Master works, so you can doubt it all you want but the evidence of his reversal suggests otherwise.

No, it doesn't. He also reversed his ruling on War Magic. I think the reason for his reversal should be taken at face-value: he decided that the conditions for both the War Magic and Shield Master bonus actions (among others) do indeed constitute a timing specification. I'll repeat that he has gone on record that the decisions made in development about bonus action timing weren't made for balance reasons, but rather to keep the game moving.

Except you have. You gained the shove. What benefit is that to you without your Attack action to follow it? Maybe not much, except if you have allies nearby who can still benefit from it. What benefit the bonus action Shove is without your own personal Attack action is situational.

But I could have shoved a creature anyway. Therefore, gaining the ability to shove a creature is of no additional benefit.

Good, we are making progress at least. We agree you can always shove if you have another means of making an attack, such as through the Attack action.

I don't see how this is progress. I've never held or expressed any other opinion. Have we overcome some assumption you were making about me?

You keep bringing War Magic into this. Maybe that was my fault and I did a while back, I honestly don't remember, but can we agree to keep War Magic out of it? It is a needless complication which cannot prove your point, however much you like to think possible RAI can.

No, I won't agree to that. Here's the full tweet of the ruling dated July 6, 2015:

Does the “when” in the Eldritch Knight’s War Magic feature mean the bonus attack comes after you cast the cantrip, or can it come before? The intent is that the bonus attack can come before or after the cantrip.​

This unequivocally establishes RAI for bonus action timing of "conditioned" bonus actions like the shield master shove, i.e. there is no specified timing. You may remember that the RAI of Shield Master was a contentious issue up-thread in my conversation with [MENTION=6921966]Asgorath[/MENTION], and I'm somewhat surprised they haven't conceded the point in light of this overwhelming evidence.

There is no lack of timing. It is very explicit in the SA for Shield Master.

I said, "intended lack of a timing specification." The timing specification that Jeremy Crawford has added to the game since he revised the War Magic ruling in the 2017 Sage Advice Compendium is the unintended result of a hyper-literalistic reading of rules-text which failed to reliably convey its intended meaning to enough people. It's a terrible reason for a ruling, IMO. What they should have done instead is issue errata to make the text in question conform more closely to its intended meaning.

The point above indicates you don't understand the official ruling on the timing element of Shield Master, which of course is the entire basis for the point that the shove comes after you've taken the Attack action.

I'm sorry, but I'm not following what point you think indicates this. I'm pretty confident that I understand Crawford's reasoning, though. I just don't agree that his is the only valid interpretation.

You can disagree with it all you want. Heck, I don't agree with it, and if that is all this boils down to then what are we wasting all this time for? Just say you house-rule it and be done with it. Is there some reason you don't want to say that? Do you think house-rules are a bad thing?

We've house-ruled it. I can freely say that. Our table doesn't like the official ruling so we allow the attack-shove-extra attack variant that we like. It sort of follows the official rule... you did take the Attack action first, but we just don't follow part 2 that the Attack action must be completed in its entirety. Works for us.

I find it odd how much you conflate the official ruling with the rules (RAW). They aren't the same thing, and not following Crawford's ruling doesn't require a house-rule, which I have nothing against, but in this case it isn't necessary.

Now, it is late. I've had a long day at work and the next few days will also be long days. If you reply and I don't have time to respond before the weekend, please be patient and accept my apologies.

No worries!

 

[Asgorath]

No, I won't agree to that. Here's the full tweet of the ruling dated July 6, 2015:

Does the “when” in the Eldritch Knight’s War Magic feature mean the bonus attack comes after you cast the cantrip, or can it come before? The intent is that the bonus attack can come before or after the cantrip.​

This unequivocally establishes RAI for bonus action timing of "conditioned" bonus actions like the shield master shove, i.e. there is no specified timing. You may remember that the RAI of Shield Master was a contentious issue up-thread in my conversation with @Asgorath, and I'm somewhat surprised they haven't conceded the point in light of this overwhelming evidence.

JEC has come out and said that tweet was incorrect. Here's a tweet from this week with the word "intent" in it, just so there's no confusion:

https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/1105204044610428929

"The simple by-the-book way (RAW) to determine whether you've completed an action is to finish the whole action.

Yet you fulfill our design intent (RAI) with the Attack action if you make at least one attack with it, since that is how we define the action in its basic form."

This unequivocally establishes RAI for bonus actions with conditions as having a timing requirement, and that the action must come before the bonus action. I could list the dozens of other tweets from JEC recently where he corrects his earlier mistake, if you like.

Edit: And here's the reasoning behind the correction:

https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/1105200842347405312

"To be clear, the clarification was that the bonus action couldn't come before you made any attacks, since you have to actually take the Attack action for the feat to work."

And, just for fun, the Attack action means actually making one or more attacks:

https://twitter.com/JeremyECrawford/status/1105201861819158529

"The action doesn't exist if you haven't done it. The Attack action in D&D isn't an abstraction; it means an actual attack has occurred."

Thus, you cannot shove until you have made at least one weapon attack from the Attack action. Strict RAW is all the attacks, RAI is at least one.

 

[Mistwell]

Wow, I am surprised that no one has yet mentioned Crawford's tweets from earlier today (Monday) where he basically confirms what some of us here said that bonus actions that are triggered by an attack can occur in between the attacks provided by Extra Attacks. Here are a couple of relevant comments:

"Summary: the trigger is the attack that's part of the Attack action, not the entire action."

"As DM, I allow the bonus action of Shield Master to happen after you make at least one attack with the Attack action, since making one attack fulfills the action's basic definition (PH, 192). If you have Extra Attack, you decide which of the attacks the bonus action follows."

I laughed. I am not laughing at you. I am laughing that Crawford tweeted that, and the chaos that's about to happen from it. Thank you for posting it.