The D&D thread

Does anyone have a good reference on how to run combat in DnD 5e? I mean a real basic tutorial on using a monster stat block to have them fight effectively. I just want to make sure I'm not missing anything.

Last night I got the party to come into Venomfangs lair. I told them I wanted to parley. I said I had trouble with a rival dragon and needed their help. I played it like I was nervous about spies from the rival stalking me. I tried to draw them in close by revealing his location on a map and telling them how to beat him. Once they were in as close as I felt I could get them I said: "Here is where you will find.... Death"

*Roll for Initiative*

This is where we left off:




The stats:




So he can fly around, I get that
He gets 2 claw one bite per round, I get that
Breath weapon... fires it and has to recharge it... is that on top of the 2x claw + Bite?

Dashel said:

Does anyone have a good reference on how to run combat in DnD 5e? I mean a real basic tutorial on using a monster stat block to have them fight effectively. I just want to make sure I'm not missing anything.

Last night I got the party to come into Venomfangs lair. I told them I wanted to parley. I said I had trouble with a rival dragon and needed their help. I played it like I was nervous about spies from the rival stalking me. I tried to draw them in close by revealing his location on a map and telling them how to beat him. Once they were in as close as I felt I could get them I said: "Here is where you will find.... Death"

*Roll for Initiative*

This is where we left off:

View attachment 276876


The stats:

View attachment 276881


So he can fly around, I get that
He gets 2 claw one bite per round, I get that
Breath weapon... fires it and has to recharge it... is that on top of the 2x claw + Bite?

Click to expand...

I've always played it as the dragon can either use it's breath weapon or melee attacks, not both in the same round. No idea if it's the official rules or not, but that's how I do it and it works for my guys.

Correct. A dragon can use it's breath weapon OR make it's normal attacks, this is excluding the Legendary Actions that stronger dragons get.

It rolls each round, as a Free Action, to get it's breath back.

Depending on how you want to play the dragon, it would likely try to take to the air when it is low (sub-50%) on Hit Points, then either swoop around until it's breath weapon is ready - using it from the air to chase the players out of it's territory/kill them or flee - if the players have enough ranged output to harm it further/threaten to kill it.

Yeah I'm thinking lead off with the breath, and I'd love to grab one of them, fly up and drop them. Just for dramatic effect.
I don't know the rules around this though. Grapple I'd guess, and I'm sure they have some saves or something.

Have him fly up into cover. Not sure what else.

If things go really bad for the party, the Druid Reidoth is going to come help.

Grapple, fly and drop. Pretty sure DC on the grapple is STR. Good luck rolling to out grapple a dragon lol.
Pretty sure you can be attacked by the grappler and your only recourse is break the grapple, being let go or getting the shit beat out of you.

If you are grappled by a dragon, the best course of action is usually to attack it, as grappling does not prevent any action save for movement (which becomes Zero - though an enemy can choose to move you with them at half their base speed). And yeah, the dragon is going to be biting/clawing/breathing on you the entire time, it is rough.

A young green dragon 'only' has a +4 to it's Grapple Attack, which you oppose with an Athletics or Acrobatics check (your choice), so it is not the best choice of action, most likely, unless you are going after a caster.

Yeah the thing is I don't want to wipe the party. I'm trying to figure out how to make it so the dragon rips through them, but they dont all die. He will fly away after 50% hp is gone.

Party has between 23 and 38 hp. So one breath can wipe them lol. One bite could kill a player.

I'm thinking the dragon will get through his first round with a breath attack and fly up to the rafters. Round 2 is claw, grapple and drop someone. If they can't do any damage or start dying, I'll have the druid NPC come in and help.

Green dragons are notorious for their guile. They aren't the strongest dragons in a straight up fight so they won't get into one unless they know they'll be able to pull it off. Young dragons are generally a bit more ferocious but their bark is worse than their bite. It could just turn out that the dragon has a bad round and bugs out.

But also remember that the dragon should have probably set a trap of some kind for them. Immediately breath on them and see what kind of damage that does. If they just rip through his hp without taking much damage you could have him fly away but cause a bunch of structural damage to whatever he's in and have it fall on them.

Dashel said:

Does anyone have a good reference on how to run combat in DnD 5e? I mean a real basic tutorial on using a monster stat block to have them fight effectively. I just want to make sure I'm not missing anything.

Last night I got the party to come into Venomfangs lair. I told them I wanted to parley. I said I had trouble with a rival dragon and needed their help. I played it like I was nervous about spies from the rival stalking me. I tried to draw them in close by revealing his location on a map and telling them how to beat him. Once they were in as close as I felt I could get them I said: "Here is where you will find.... Death"

*Roll for Initiative*

This is where we left off:

View attachment 276876


The stats:

View attachment 276881


So he can fly around, I get that
He gets 2 claw one bite per round, I get that
Breath weapon... fires it and has to recharge it... is that on top of the 2x claw + Bite?

Click to expand...

As has been said he can only use multiattack OR the breath weapon in a round. A dragon will always open with his breath weapon (its rough, but dragons are dangerous!) then fly out of reach. Greens are intelligent, it wouldn't be beyond the realms of possibility that unless the players have ranged options that are doing serious damage it would fly around out of melee reach until it recharges its breath weapon and come down for another swoop. This can encourage players to try and use the environment to get within reach but depending on your players they might not think of it and make a shitty combat.

If your players are spread out its AC and HP are high enough that it would swoop down for claw and tail attacks then fly out of reach and just eating any attacks of opportunity - that fly speed of 80ft is a lot. If you're worried about a TPK, like someone mentioned above, green dragons are devious, and may be more interested in using the players in exchange for their lives to do favours for it. Having it fly away at 50% is good, but it might stick around a bit longer if it isn't getting stomped.

If course your players might surprise you and steamroller it. Have they talked to the druid that's around thundertree that hates the dragon? He might intervene if your players are struggling.

Edit: also google The Monsters Know - it's a really good blog that gives a tactical advice for DMs for a huge range of monsters.

WELL! Apparently Dwarves are poison resistant. So a successful Constitution save was 1/4 damage total.
It was a lot of death. They revived each other with heal potions. Venomfang used 3 breath attacks, grapple, drop, and go hide in 3/4 cover.
Feather fall saved the mage, he then Magic Missiled a few times. Along with a few questionable things like "Does a Spirit Weapon offer flanking?"

Venomfang was driven off successfully. It would have been very close had it been a fight to the death.

fyi, there is no flanking in RAW 5e. there's, i think, an optional rule that gives the DM some guidance on using it, if they want. so basically, if you WANT the spiritual weapon to offer flanking, then yes it does.

we play that spiritual weapon doesn't have any extra effects like that, so it won't get opportunity attacks, doesn't assist with getting rogues sneak attack, etc.

anyway, my current campaign we are all dwarves and it's so great whenever the DM says "everyone make a constitution save. uh... at advantage... because it's poison..." then he'll roll a ton of dice and just sheepishly says "you all take... 4 damage."

Hah yup it was exactly like that. 12d6 damage! Halved... halved again... ok 11 damage wtf.

I allowed the Spirit weapon flanking then immediately went right at the Cleric who cast it and killed him.

I'm going to have a rematch in Wave Echo Cave. To the death. No punches pulled.

Anybody have experience with FoundryVTT? Thinking of picking it up alongside dungeondraft and wonderdraft for a campaign I'm building.

Vimeseh said:

Anybody have experience with FoundryVTT? Thinking of picking it up alongside dungeondraft and wonderdraft for a campaign I'm building.

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It looks neat, but their public test webpage was buggy as hell. No idea if that's a representation of the released product but it turned me off of it.

Drakurii said:

the redhead is pissed beyond belief LOL...epic shit

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I'm an avid Critter, got into CR just a month or two after they started streaming, been to 3 of their live shows (LA, London, Austin) and this was the only time I considered Matt to have utterly failed as a DM. Hell, even the other players failed, to an extent. I think it's awesome that Joe *wanted* to steal the hand, but it's complete bullshit that Matt allowed all that went in to it, without any other player doing anything.

Arkhan cuts off his own hand - 1 action
Arkhan attaches it - arguably free (interacting with object), but still something
regenerates himself - 1 action
say "i'm sorry it was just business" - not an action necessarily, but still time spent
cast teleport - 1 action

ALL of that (18-24 seconds of 'time') transpires while this group of literal LEGENDS sits around with their collective thumbs up their asses. Now, if all 7 of them want to say "I sit and watch, mouth agape, as Arkhan claims the essence of the demigod we just spent months in conflict with", I'd allow that (but think less of them). But Matt definitely should have said to the other players, what do y'all do. Essentially "do you react or not". I understand the players themselves are taken aback by the betrayal and rendered speechless, but their characters are legendary heroes, and would not (necessarily) have the same reaction. Which is why Matt absolutely should have stepped in.

And before you say "rule of cool bro, rule of cool!" Arkhan definitely could still have gotten away with it, even if Scanlan throws a counterspell and Grog tries to grapple (IE followed combat initiative). Hell, that would have made it even MORE epic if he had succeeded. Instead of just "I take it and leave lol." On the spot I would have directly asked the players if they reacted, but as I type this I thought it'd be better (hindsight 20/20) to just re-narrate Arkhan's actions in an attempt to snap my players out of their daze. So just after Joe says his stuff, I'd say something like "you watch as Arkhan's axe slams down, severing his hand from his body, blood spurting from the newly formed stump. He quickly grabs the Hand of Vecna and places it on his arm, his skin glowing as he channels healing energy. He then raises his new Hand, looks at Grog and says 'I'm sorry, it was just business" and begins to cast teleport." And I'd be looking my players dead in the eyes, thinking HELLO, HE'S TAKING THE HAND OF VECNA, WAKE UP. Then, if they STILL didn't react, ok, Vox Machina completely and utterly failed right at the finish line, but at least the gap was bridged between stunned real people playing a game and uber fictional characters being heroic.

tl;dr I refuse to believe that every one of those badass heroes in Vox Machina would simply sit and watch as Arkhan did all that, and Matt should have given the players at least one chance to react as their characters would react. Yes, Arkhan had been a good guy & compatriot so his betrayal would be surprising/confusing, but the Hand of Vecna is practically the Evil to end all Evil, and any fucking with it should have spurred most (if not all) of those characters to react to some degree, despite them being drained from the epic battle they just had with Vecna.

Hell, in my regular game (5e, characters started at level 1, all around level 15 now - High Magic (Sane Magic Prices), Homebrew World), the DM regularly has to tell people they cannot attack while the NPC/Enemy is being introduced. There is rarely monologuing allowed, save for when it is dramatically proper. The rule books would have hit the table if a player tried to pull off what Arkhan was allowed to in a single round.

Rulebooks are just a rough idea of guidelines.

That aside. It was probably also loosely scripted. Just not everyone was in on it.

if i remember correctly, scanlan had no more spell slots left for counterspell. and that whole moment with joe would've only taken 2 rounds at most. chop the arm off (action), pick it up and attach it (free action) --end of first round-- 2nd round would have just been teleporting out as an action. it's also possible that his teleport was a short range bonus action teleport, we don't know WHICH teleport it was, but paladin's have access to misty step as a bonus action (i think that's only 30 feet, but it might be 60?) or it could have been a magic item that he used.

on top of that, the CR crew are in character 95% of the time. one of the things i love about them is that they absolutely do not meta game. someone COULD have said, waaaaait, i should have time for a reaction and then etc. but THEY were stunned. sure Vox Machina are "legendary" heroes, but the truth is they are just a bunch of "legendary" idiots. they've said that themselves.

anyway, i think there's definitely room for criticism on them, but i also think matt did a perfectly fine job DM'ing for his own personal game.

Anyone have a good rec on a next DnD 5e campaign? We'll be done with Lost Mine of Phandelver soon.

We want something that is at least up to level 10

These are the 4 I'm looking at:

Curse of Strahd
Tomb of Annihilation
Ghosts of Saltmarsh
Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus

bigmark268 said:

Rulebooks are just a rough idea of guidelines.

That aside. It was probably also loosely scripted. Just not everyone was in on it.

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Might have been, although I read Joe's looking at Matt while standing up to be like "is it cool is it cool aaand i'm out". I could be wrong though. I would submit to the court, however, that him getting up and leaving could very well have prevented anyone from trying to do anything. It added a finality to his actions. It's kinda awkward to try and react to a character who literally physically left the game.

j00t said:

if i remember correctly, scanlan had no more spell slots left for counterspell. and that whole moment with joe would've only taken 2 rounds at most. chop the arm off (action), pick it up and attach it (free action) --end of first round-- 2nd round would have just been teleporting out as an action. it's also possible that his teleport was a short range bonus action teleport, we don't know WHICH teleport it was, but paladin's have access to misty step as a bonus action (i think that's only 30 feet, but it might be 60?) or it could have been a magic item that he used.

on top of that, the CR crew are in character 95% of the time. one of the things i love about them is that they absolutely do not meta game. someone COULD have said, waaaaait, i should have time for a reaction and then etc. but THEY were stunned. sure Vox Machina are "legendary" heroes, but the truth is they are just a bunch of "legendary" idiots. they've said that themselves.

anyway, i think there's definitely room for criticism on them, but i also think matt did a perfectly fine job DM'ing for his own personal game.

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I just used Scanlan's counterspell as an example. He could have done anything; any of them could have, is my point. And we'd definitely disagree about "picking it up and attaching it" as a free action. Picking up sure, but he said "use my healing pool to heal" which is Lay on Hands, which is, you guessed it, a capital-A Action. So we're 100% at at least 3 full actions and 2 free actions (picking up + talking) in game terms, and 5 actions in terms of narrative. That's a lot of shit going on from 1 person. I listened again and he actually says two things, first "I'm sorry, it was just business." Then after a short pause, "Until we meet again." Joe bro, you can NOT do all that. Plus I was assuming that his teleport was a power gifted by the Hand, so while it may not require a ritual to attach (or maybe it does? lol) it'd definitely be well beyond a Free Action to get it and attach it, imo. [Just googled, Teleport is indeed granted by the Hand. So I'd say heck no it'd not be a Free Action to get the hand on enough to also use its power!]

Regardless, my point is that there should have been a broad "Ok, Arkhan wants to do all that, does anyone want to react?" Not to ruin the moment by being a rules-lawyer and counting out each and every action/bonus action/free action/reaction, but definitely something to keep some semblance of structure. And I'm with you that CR is the best because of their avoidance of meta, but adhering to rules of combat/initiative isn't meta'ing. If they walked in to the fight with Vecna and Matt went "Disintegrate! Disintegrate! Disintegrate!!" that wouldn't be meta, that'd just be breaking the rules, and not fun for anyone. But that's literally what Joe did, and Matt let him get away with. You can hear Joe's voice how he's rushing through his sentences, trying to make it fast because he wants/needs to do so much but he doesn't want anyone to react. That bamboozles the human players sitting at the table, but it doesn't change the 'reality' of the time in-game that it would take to actually do it all.

I'm not trying to say they're playing their characters wrong. VM are definitely fuck-ups. And if it was just "I grab the hand as I cast teleport!!" I'd totally let it slide, the people are stunned and the characters are stunned. But he wanted to do way too much, and the 'proper' Dungeon Master action would have been to slow Joe's role. As it played out, VM was stunned by his hand cut, and continued to be stunned while he healed himself and attached it, and CONTINUED to be stunned while he both cast the Verbal-component spell Teleport AND said his motive AND his good bye. Shit's dumb, and precisely what a good DM would help avoid, or at least clarify with "y'all are really just sitting there doing fuck all while he goes through this entire rigmarole?" And to reiterate, I love the fact that Joe WANTED to do this. It just needed to play out better.

And fuck it I might as well go for full Lithose status with one last point. I'd say the other two contributing factors are that the people of CR are very friendly to guest players, and they're all very cognizant of the "Yes and" aspect of improve. Neither of these are bad in and of themselves, in fact they're quite good. But in this case, I'd say both these aspects were what let everyone sit there while Joe said "I do this and I do this and I do this and I say this" and just simply accept it. Because, yes and! See you in the next campaign! Liam literally says this. I find that especially ironic since he's definitely the most rules-lawyer of the bunch (probably because he DMs for his kids).