D&D 5E (2014) The Bard's Combat Inspiration is Messed Up

[SkidAce]

Yup, announce die result.

Sans modifiers, and proficiency.

They make the call.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I would just let the them use it after I call a hit

 

[Ashrym]

I just roll in front and it takes the player less time to see a high or low number than it does for me to add it up quickly. Brief pause works fine. If a DM chooses to roll behind the screen narrate the roll as high, moderate, or low somehow to give the player an idea and opportunity to use the ability works fine.

 

[77IM]

Other abilities that boost AC let you see the results and turn a hit into a miss, right? (like shield and Defensive Duelist and the battlemaster fighter has a thing, I think.) So it should be OK to allow that here too.

 

[I'm A Banana]

It's not a great wording. Even the intent is not so great (it presumes too much about the game flow to be useful). Using it after a hit is probably OK. The power gain for the bard will be marginal. There weren't a whole lot of situations where it makes a difference and the outcome is so randomized that even there, it doesn't always do anything.

 

[Blue]

It's not a great wording. Even the intent is not so great (it presumes too much about the game flow to be useful). Using it after a hit is probably OK. The power gain for the bard will be marginal. There weren't a whole lot of situations where it makes a difference and the outcome is so randomized that even there, it doesn't always do anything.

The way I see it, it would be a nerf to the bard. If the only information they have is "hit", they don't know if it hit by a lot or a little. It could be wasted on a hit they couldn't change. Could be a 19 on the die from the BBEG that they wouldn't be able bring down to a miss no matter what.

After a few rolls of seeing the die and choosing to use their ability or not, the bard should have a rough idea of foes to-hit modifier. If the DM wants to hide all rolls (which means houseruling this ability) and still keep this ability with around the same level of utility, they should probably announce hit/miss/possible, with "possible" being from a near miss to it'll hit until it's a maximum on your inspiration die. That would keep the utilities around the same. On the other hand, that's a pain in the neck to do the math and probably slows down the game.

 

[occam]

Arguably the provision "after seeing the roll" is meant to imply "after the attack is declared but before the roll is made". But that doesn't really matter for the results.
I imagine the "see the die" requirement is for the aforementioned 2s and 19s so you can know not to waste the inspiration. But I don't see that working well in play.

Thoughts?

Agreed, I just noticed this the other day, and it is awkward. I intend to be more relaxed about it. My group is generally in the habit of announcing the modified roll; I don't see a problem with letting the declaration of use come after that, even if it's a little better than what RAW says. The RAW assumes too much about a particular flow of play.

 

[Pickles JG]

I have an equivalent power in 4e & what usually happens is that the DM rolls & if he gets huge or tiny numbers he calls "Hit hit, miss" etc. If he gets something middling he will go "Does 26 hit your AC?" at which point I know whether to intervene or not. Its tougher with the bardic one as the bonus is variable so there is a bit of calculation based decision making on the part of the player which could slow things down.

This also rules out the chance that you hit by 5 but still in theory want to chance the d6 inspiration die. My view on this is that it just removes bad options so I'm fine with it.

 

[KarinsDad]

I suspect that some players have a rough idea of NPC bonuses anyway. Kobolds +4, Ogres +6, Giants +8 or more. With bounded accuracy, it's not that hard to figure it out, especially in round 2 or later.

The purpose of the ability is to give a bonus when needed. Doing it when the PC is "hit" means that it will fail maybe 60% of the time (i.e. the successful to hit roll was too high to be affected). So, doing it on the observed (or stated by DM) roll lowers that failure chance to maybe 25%.

We have a Bard in our group and it has just worked as advertised. We have not noticed an issue.

 

[Schmoe]

I usually roll in the open, so it probably won't be an issue at my table. That being said, if I didn't want to roll in the open, I would just call out the total with modifiers and still let the Bard use his reaction. It's still variable and not a sure thing, and it is only a minor boost to the strength of the ability.