DreamLyrics™ Play-by-Post Forums Fantasy SKT: The Storm King's Thunder OOC thread

(OOC - DM rolling like that just encourages casters to resort to casting straight damage spells that at least do half damage if saved instead of trying to be inventive. No criticism. You don't control the dice. )

I have not heard that for a =very= long time. Thanks. It is one of 'those' songs for me!! <g>

The Disturbed Remake is incredible.

Oh and I hate it when a new edition changes the rules.

I guess Sindar will need a way to cast dispel magic that doesn't involve a Verbal component.

Oh and is there any way that Sindar would be able to figure out where the Silence spell came from?

I believe he has a target for Phatasmal Killer, he had saved for the other boss.

I love the hand-drawn sheet music that is, yes, actually the song. I hadn't listened to/watched the remake all the way through until your comment and yeah, it is pretty incredible.


Assuming anyone will ever cast that spell on him again


I assume you're asking if you know who the caster was? Given he's to the north and you were looking to the south casting your eldritch blast, I'm thinking you wouldn't have seen the hand motions, although it probably wouldn't be too hard to deduce it. But that spell requires a verbal component, not sure what you mean by "saved" ... and whether that method requires a verbal component.

Heh I meant saved as in not used. The other boss was too far away. Once Sindar figures it out, he will have a new target to use his 4th level toy on.

First he needs to figure out how to get out of the cone sphere of silence.

Would Davroar know anything about how a silence spell works? Would he know it is an area of effect type of spell and has a size limit?

As a spellcaster who has likely traveled with bards, clerics, or rangers, Davroar would likely have heard of the spell's existence, or be smart enough to equate it to "Darkness" which would have similar effects, just on a different sense. Not having ever cast it himself I don't think he would know the precise range, but any competent spellcaster could likely make a reasonable guess in the 15-25 foot range.

He would not know/detect where the center is, but could probably assume from observing everyone else that they were impacted.

I suspect once he got to the logical step of thinking that moving 25 feet east or west would both get him out of the silence he'd realize that's also the exact area the wind wall is protecting, and utter an expletive (that nobody would hear).

So bottom line, he'd probably be able to guess within about 5 feet where it's centered and within about 10 feet where the boundary likely is, and given that everyone else is shooting arrows or waving swords except this one mysterious dude with a mace, he'd guess who cast it. Although all of this is a guess, without certainty.

I'm fine with you, the player, using the precise knowledge in your tactics, of course.

Sindar has Silence prepared in his daily spell list, so he is familiar as well.

I would assume that sometime in their hours/days traveling together, Sindar would have shared the knowledge of the spell and its effects with Davroar. So really you just have to guess at the center of the AOE.

That should require an arcana check. That's what it's there for

Yeah, thought about that, but gave information based on the DC0 level... there's always an assumption of background communication between characters and if one magic-wielding character in a party has a spell prepared I can't imagine that the topic didn't come up at some point on the road, out of sheer boredom.

The initial response was "as a guess" and an arcana check would have brought "certainty" but I didn't think that made much of a difference in tactics.

DM

OOC: Nep has helpfully pointed out that a statement I made was overly broad and incorrect as stated.

I want to clarify Jaliera's hiding state and its impact. I did research this, relying on this answer (among others) when I made my comment, but only read the first answer. Some things are clear, some aren't.

I said:

To be more precise:

1. Regardless of whether Jaliera can re-hide, the location has been given away. "If you are hidden—both unseen and unheard—when you make an attack, you give away your location when the attack hits or misses." (PHB, p. 195). So even if the attackers can't see Jaliera, they could target her location.

2. It is possible to re-hide, however, "in combat, most creatures stay alert for signs of danger all around...." (PHB p.177). Per sage advice addressing this exact situation, the advice is that the stealth check to re-hide in the same location should be at disadvantage. (The second answer at the RPG SE link clarifies this as well.)

So an updated ruling:

Jaliera may attempt to re-hide. I need a Stealth Check at disadvantage.

Also as I implied in my original reply, this may be a moot point even if she fails the check, if the creature she is sneak-attacking is adjacent to an ally, which may soon be the case for most of her targets.

Yes, but...

Making an Attack

Jaliera can't be targeted, but that location can be targeted. The archers could fire an arrow at that grid square. They may not know if Jaliera is still there or has sneakily moved elsewhere, but the location itself is known as "someone shot an arrow from here six seconds ago". If Jaliera is present but unseen the attack would be at disadvantage; if she's moved the attack would be against the bush she was hiding behind, and it might lose some foliage.

(OOC - Re: Jaliera - It would be the same rules as attacking an invisible creature I would think: "Attacks against invisible creatures are at disadvantage unless they can be “seen” by magical means or through blindsight or truesight. In addition, opportunity attacks against the invisible creature can't happen at all without magical means or ways to see without using normal vision" - Player's Handbook
Nep - We don't usually play it that way in our games, but it makes more sense once the Rogue reveals himself and Hides again than to just say he is invulnerable to anything but an AOE spell.)

DM

OOC: Thanks Nep and Zeim for all the clarifications.

To avoid beating a dead horse (of which there are now several thanks to Zhu) here's a summary of the above back-and-forth:
1. My original statement "you can't re-hide in the same spot" was incorrect.
2a. Jaliera can re-hide in the same spot with a Stealth check at disadvantage. (This is my judgment call as DM. Other DMs may rule differently.)
2b. Jaliera can move and re-hide in a different spot with a Stealth check.
3. If Jaliera successfully re-hides, her (current) location is unknown and enemies have to guess at her (current) location. However, they are aware of her former location. If they target a location in which Jaliera happens to be (of which the former location is the most likely candidate), the attack roll is at disadvantage.
4. If Jaliera is within reach (melee) of a target but is still hidden, her movement out of reach does not trigger an opportunity attack.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled horse BBQ.

Measuring Distance

Hey all... up until now I have been measuring distance on diagonals following the "every other diagonal move counts 2x" rule.

However, since:
1. Our combat map is on Roll20,
2. Roll20 provides a lovely ruler tool to measure distance, and
3. The ruler tool uses the formula max(horizontal,vertical) to measure distance
and
4. More than one of you has made movements based on the tool's measurements that I didn't think were worth calling out, so it seems that "ruler" tool is in widespread use...

I'm "officially" stating that I am switching movement/ranged attack to follow the above rules, so we're all being consistent.

TLDR: Feel free to use whatever the ruler on Roll20 says. Your movements and ranged attacks are limited by a box/square rather than a sphere/circle.

[[ FWIW ... I have never been able to get Roll-20 work on this machine, so feel free to move me as needed. ]]

Just describe how you want to be moved and I'll make sure to post more screen caps for your benefit. QQ: do you want to follow Zhu and Kriv eastward to get closer to the other half of the party, particularly since Zhu has just BBQ'd half of your targets?

Replying to this post from the game thread



Well, that's half the rule Read on. But first, since you're playing a rogue in our home game and my brother is currently running, I'll let him come up with this. I promise to remember when I'm running again

This topic is one of the most confusing and argued in the game. There's a whole long discussion about the subject here: here in Sage Advice.

When ruling on area of effect attacks if a target is in the area it always works unless you must target a creature and you can't see that creature. Of course, I can't think of a single AOE spell that targets a creature. It's usually "a point you can see". There are a few spells like Sleetstorm where you don't need to "see" the point you target, which is quite interesting. And unless the wall is made of lead, if Superman's behind a wall and someone throws kryptonite against that wall, he's going to feel it.

In combat, targeting what you cannot see is really tricky to rule on. It needs to be looked at as both from the DM and player perspective. As a DM, if a creature turns invisible and then moves I'm going to "hide" the token on my VTT and ask "which square are you targeting?" Then I might ask to roll with disadvantage. If the attacker picks the right spot, and managed to roll both dice over the AC, it would be a hit. However, is that fair? As a DM I always know where a player's token is. I guess saying that you roll with disadvantage no matter which direction you point your arrow at is fair if it's applied to both DM and player. It's ridiculous in logical real world.

But if you read the PHB rule carefully, it implies that the scenario I just stated is exactly what should happen. It's the bolded clause in the rule which is the kicker:

With melee your chances of targeting the correct square is basically 1:8 (the 8 squares around you). With a range weapon it's 1:N where N is the area of the range of your weapon. It's basically the same odds as me getting a hole-in-one on a 120 yard par 3 and I can see that target!

So, in effect, I, as a DM, will handle by letting PCs try and guess where the target is and as a DM I won't even try.

Well that also depends. If a hidden creature pops up out of hiding and attacks it reveals itself. It then cannot be hiding while it is moving. It can only hide AFTER its move is finished, in which case any enemies who noticed it know exactly which square it moved to, they just can't see it now and so they would automatically attack the proper spot, just with disadvantage.

For the record, I'm 100% in agreement with Neptune's post above. I'll just post some commentary here:

1. As I've said a few times, my original "you can't hide in the same spot" was in error. You can.

2. The location from which you fired is known. This changes the "1:8" and "1:N" chances Nep cited, because (a) there may be fewer than N hiding places on the grid, or (b) the shooter might have an especially good hiding spot they don't want to leave.

3. Enemies in combat are alert, which is why there needs to be at least a Stealth check to hide in combat.

4. It's a subjective DM call whether the same spot confers disadvantage on the stealth check. Certainly if it's the only hiding place nearby. Likely not if every place is equally hide-able. I haven't really specified that on our battle grid as I didn't think it was very important, but mentally assumed more sparse vegetation (as the map kinda shows). As such, I'm leaning more towards disadvantage. It's entirely reasonable for other DMs to rule on this differently.

5. This is all a fun conversation but the way things are about to play out, is likely to have zero actual impact in the game.