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<blockquote data-quote="Quickleaf" data-source="post: 8615637" data-attributes="member: 20323"><p>Don't know if you played 4th edition, but one of the reasons combat was painfully slow in that edition was the proliferation of Reaction abilities. Everyone and their henchman's hamster had reactions. 5th edition drastically cut back on the number of Reaction abilities.</p><p></p><p>Regardless of whatever else your proposed house rule would do, it would increase combat handling time. Because now every time a saving throw is made, the DM and/or a player needs to mentally track "that guy has used its reaction." While for small numbers of foes and lower levels, the time increase would probably be negligible, I could see this being a significant cause for grind with more foes and higher levels.</p><p></p><p>For me, whatever nuance would be gained in verisimilitude / simulation would not be worth the negative impact on gameplay. EDIT: But if I were to implement this, I'd prioritize looking for ways to decrease handling time. For example, maybe I cluster this group of gnolls to take the same action, and even if they don't all need to roll a saving throw, I can mentally check off the "saving throw made" box for all the gnolls (and thus I would not have any of the gnolls use reactions this round).</p><p></p><p>EDIT EDIT: One potential implication of this house rule would be favoring whichever side has greater numbers capable of forcing saving throws. For example, if a party encounters a cabal of cult fanatics who spam <em>hold person, </em>and a PC uses their reaction to save against the first <em>hold person... </em>does that mean they would automatically fail their save (no more reactions) if subsequently targeted by another <em>hold person </em>or a<em> dominate person </em>cast by a cultist?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Quickleaf, post: 8615637, member: 20323"] Don't know if you played 4th edition, but one of the reasons combat was painfully slow in that edition was the proliferation of Reaction abilities. Everyone and their henchman's hamster had reactions. 5th edition drastically cut back on the number of Reaction abilities. Regardless of whatever else your proposed house rule would do, it would increase combat handling time. Because now every time a saving throw is made, the DM and/or a player needs to mentally track "that guy has used its reaction." While for small numbers of foes and lower levels, the time increase would probably be negligible, I could see this being a significant cause for grind with more foes and higher levels. For me, whatever nuance would be gained in verisimilitude / simulation would not be worth the negative impact on gameplay. EDIT: But if I were to implement this, I'd prioritize looking for ways to decrease handling time. For example, maybe I cluster this group of gnolls to take the same action, and even if they don't all need to roll a saving throw, I can mentally check off the "saving throw made" box for all the gnolls (and thus I would not have any of the gnolls use reactions this round). EDIT EDIT: One potential implication of this house rule would be favoring whichever side has greater numbers capable of forcing saving throws. For example, if a party encounters a cabal of cult fanatics who spam [I]hold person, [/I]and a PC uses their reaction to save against the first [I]hold person... [/I]does that mean they would automatically fail their save (no more reactions) if subsequently targeted by another [I]hold person [/I]or a[I] dominate person [/I]cast by a cultist? [/QUOTE]
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