D&D 5E What's up with Vicious Mockery?

[Dessert Nomad]

The problem that I've found in practice when using Vicious Mockery against big, dumb heavy hitters - which is where you'd think it would be the most effective - (such as the zombie t-rex in ToA) is that while they're likely to fail the Wis save, they're also likely to land attacks even with disadvantage due to really heavy melee attack bonuses (like +10). Disadvantage isn't that great against something that is going to connect with an attack roll of like 5 or higher. Basically, I do think it's a pretty great cantrip in tier one, but it hits the wall HARD at tier two.

The two CR7 giants both have a +9, so to hit on a 5 your melee combatants need to only have 14 AC in Tier two. Heavy armor types like STR fighters, Paladins, and melee clerics should have at least splint by then, giving them 17/19. Dex types should be around 15-16 (Studded leather plus 3-4 from Dex). Medium armor types should be 16-17 if they do a +2 dex and shield. Moon druids and barbarians will probably be in that 14-15 range since they rely on resistance or form HP, while Ranged attackers and casters should endeavor to stay out of melee. General buffs and reaction spells like shield can mess with this too, but I think it's fair not to worry about an EK rocking 24 AC for this comparison. When you take the +9 up against AC17, it's still quite effective (hitting on an 8), but that's a 65% chance of a hit normally vs a 42% with disad - it's not the drop from 50 to 25 that you get at 11, but I'd say it's still a pretty effective reduction. Down at 5 it's 80% normal 64% with disad, where I'd agree that it's not overly effective. As the long-running 11 vs 20 argument shows there's a lot of variation in opinions of how good disadvantage is, but I think that it's not unreasonable for a party to have good enough ACs in melee that disadvantage is still effective even with +9-10 attack bonus.

 

[Burnside]

The two CR7 giants both have a +9, so to hit on a 5 your melee combatants need to only have 14 AC in Tier two. Heavy armor types like STR fighters, Paladins, and melee clerics should have at least splint by then, giving them 17/19. Dex types should be around 15-16 (Studded leather plus 3-4 from Dex). Medium armor types should be 16-17 if they do a +2 dex and shield. Moon druids and barbarians will probably be in that 14-15 range since they rely on resistance or form HP, while Ranged attackers and casters should endeavor to stay out of melee. General buffs and reaction spells like shield can mess with this too, but I think it's fair not to worry about an EK rocking 24 AC for this comparison. When you take the +9 up against AC17, it's still quite effective (hitting on an 8), but that's a 65% chance of a hit normally vs a 42% with disad - it's not the drop from 50 to 25 that you get at 11, but I'd say it's still a pretty effective reduction. Down at 5 it's 80% normal 64% with disad, where I'd agree that it's not overly effective. As the long-running 11 vs 20 argument shows there's a lot of variation in opinions of how good disadvantage is, but I think that it's not unreasonable for a party to have good enough ACs in melee that disadvantage is still effective even with +9-10 attack bonus.

This is quite true. I guess I'm viewing it through the prism of my low-AC Tomb of Annihilation party where my bard (AC 15) is working with a tiefling tomelock (AC 13), Circle of Shepherd lizardfolk druid (AC 16), and a tabaxi scout rogue (AC 15). All level 5, and we tend to get hit by everything. More often than not, if I can save people a beating it's not by imposing disadvantage with VM, it's with Cutting Words.

 

[Stalker0]

One thing I keep seeing in this theoretical analysis is a comparison of "hit on an 11" vs "hit on a 20".

Thing is, only hit on a 20 just doesn't really happen in this edition. Monster ACs don't scale that much. Even a 1st level character can hit CR20+ creatures on more than a 20.

So that scenario doesn't really have any bearing to the effectiveness of a mechanic, doesn't matter if its an optimal math scenario or not.

 

[Dessert Nomad]

This is quite true. I guess I'm viewing it through the prism of my low-AC Tomb of Annihilation party where my bard (AC 15) is working with a tiefling tomelock (AC 13), Circle of Shepherd lizardfolk druid (AC 16), and a tabaxi scout rogue (AC 15). All level 5, and we tend to get hit by everything. More often than not, if I can save people a beating it's not by imposing disadvantage with VM, it's with Cutting Words.

Funny how that works, I'm in the opposite situation in my TOA game. My Cleric 1/Warlock 5 character is the low AC one at 16. The other regulars include two clerics who sport splint and shield for 19 (they love to cast guardian spirit and wade into the middle of enemies) and a wizard (with 1 level of cleric) who wears splint and shield AND has the shield spell on speed dial, so effectively has 24 most of the time.

 

[StateOfConfusion]

I love this thread. The funny part is as a re-entry DM (back to doing it after a long hiatus from RPGs) I got caught off guard with my rather large party of 7 players (all level 2) including 2 Bards. VM made it hard to get a hit in against the players and they just mopped up the rather large party of ghouls. so much so I thought I would look around to see thoughts on it. I don't want to be that DM who specifically adjusts encounters to fight a particular tactic but I am looking for suitable monsters with better wisdom saves...

 

[Dausuul]

I love this thread. The funny part is as a re-entry DM (back to doing it after a long hiatus from RPGs) I got caught off guard with my rather large party of 7 players (all level 2) including 2 Bards. VM made it hard to get a hit in against the players and they just mopped up the rather large party of ghouls. so much so I thought I would look around to see thoughts on it. I don't want to be that DM who specifically adjusts encounters to fight a particular tactic but I am looking for suitable monsters with better wisdom saves...

Generally, when the PCs have specialized in a particular tactic, I respond by cranking up the overall encounter difficulty, and designing most (but not all) encounters to be vulnerable to the chosen tactic, so it will bring the difficulty back down to "normal" level. This allows the players to really work their strategy and to feel that they made a good investment, while keeping things challenging and exciting for all concerned. Meanwhile, the few encounters where the tactic is not effective keep them on their toes.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Most fey have spell resistance...

 

[Mistwell]

Interesting to see the evolution of this thread over years.

For my part, a shield spell, one of the most popular spells in the game, gives a +5 AC, uses a reaction, and is a first level spell. It does last for all attacks for that round however.
A successful Vicious Mockery effectively gives roughly a +5 AC to the next person attacked by that target, AND does damage, though it does not last beyond that first attack and is cast as an attack instead of a reaction. However, it's also just a cantrip rather than a first level spell.

It's good. Darn good. Disadvantage on the next attack for a cantrip is a really effective use of your turn from range sometimes. It can save way more damage to someone than an ordinary attack cantrip can cause to a target.

 

[Blue]

Generally, when the PCs have specialized in a particular tactic, I respond by cranking up the overall encounter difficulty, and designing most (but not all) encounters to be vulnerable to the chosen tactic, so it will bring the difficulty back down to "normal" level. This allows the players to really work their strategy and to feel that they made a good investment, while keeping things challenging and exciting for all concerned. Meanwhile, the few encounters where the tactic is not effective keep them on their toes.

So many other DMs would go the other way but I really applaud you going this way. If they've doubled down on the feature, let it feel like it's making a real difference.

 

[Blue]

Interesting to see the evolution of this thread over years.

For my part, a shield spell, one of the most popular spells in the game, gives a +5 AC, uses a reaction, and is a first level spell. It does last for all attacks for that round however.
A successful Vicious Mockery effectively gives roughly a +5 AC to the next person attacked by that target, AND does damage, though it does not last beyond that first attack and is cast as an attack instead of a reaction. However, it's also just a cantrip rather than a first level spell.

It's good. Darn good. Disadvantage on the next attack for a cantrip is a really effective use of your turn from range sometimes. It can save way more damage to someone than an ordinary attack cantrip can cause to a target.

To compare it to Shield, it would need to force a reroll of the next hit, rather then d20 of what could both be misses. Because Shield doesn't even have a chance to trigger without a hit, so it's never wasted.

But yeah, it's quite good.