Opportunity Attacks and Theatre of the Mind

[Baptor]

Hey playground!

I DM a 5e game and we don't use minis or a grid but rather the "Theatre of the Mind" for combat simulations.

One thing that bugs us continually are the rules over OAs because often times we aren't on the same page as to whom is within 5ft of whom and so forth.

I was wondering two things:

1. How badly would the game get screwed up if I threw out OAs?

2. For those of you that use TotM yourself, have you made any houserules to help with it?

[Daishain]

1. movement based opportunity attacks are among the few solid means to discourage combatants from just going wherever, and make sure that a character that's faster than others isn't simply invincible vs melee. Without them, the enemy typically has no reason not to just chase after the squishies in the party and slaughter them first, and the fast dude can just kite that fighter to death.

2. can't comment, never used TOTM due to multiple issues with tactics like this one.

[Human Paragon 3]

Well, you could come up with some rough guidelines and try to stick to them as much as you can. Such as:

1) If you made a melee attack against a creature, you are "closed" with them and provoke an OA for leaving their reach

2) If you deliberately close with a creature for the purpose of battlefield control you are closed with them and provoke OAs for leaving their reach

3) If the DM describes a group of enemies as in "formation" or "a rough formation" passing by them (through the group) provokes until the DM says their formation is broken.

4) If the DM or a player says that a character stands in a position to block a path, passing by them provokes. The DM may say that the path is too wide to block.

And the inverse of all of these are true as well (if you close with an enemy, it leaving your reach provokes).

I recognize that it's still a little sloppy.

Taking out OAs all together... I'm honestly not sure. I don't think it would really ruin anything. Maybe you could put the onus on players to proactively make them. Like say you are fighting someone and don't want them to leave your reach. You could say "I intend to use my reaction to attack him if he tries to leave my reach." or "I intend to use my reaction to attack if he tries to pass by me," and just allow them to make the attacks even if they are not within 5 feet - essentially letting people add some movement to their OAs by declaring them.

Then you can use them with NPCs when it makes sense to you, and no one should complain since the players can make them whenever it makes sense to them too (though they have to declare it). Heck, maybe you should declare it, too.

[Alucard2099]

Hey playground!

I DM a 5e game and we don't use minis or a grid but rather the "Theatre of the Mind" for combat simulations.

One thing that bugs us continually are the rules over OAs because often times we aren't on the same page as to whom is within 5ft of whom and so forth.

I was wondering two things:

1. How badly would the game get screwed up if I threw out OAs?

2. For those of you that use TotM yourself, have you made any houserules to help with it?

What my team has done, is use it with what we call the engagement system. You can only get an OA on someone that moves out of your threat range if you have an engagement with them. If you attack a monster or they attack you, you are in an engagement. If you attack monster a, and someone else attacks the same monster, that other player is in the engagement. So you can move freely anywhere on the map until someone attacks or is attacked. Make sense? can elaborate farther if you wish.

[Human Paragon 3]

What my team has done, is use it with what we call the engagement system. You can only get an OA on someone that moves out of your threat range if you have an engagement with them. If you attack a monster or they attack you, you are in an engagement. If you attack monster a, and someone else attacks the same monster, that other player is in the engagement. So you can move freely anywhere on the map until someone attacks or is attacked. Make sense? can elaborate farther if you wish.

What if you want to block a path or divide the battlefield for tactical reasons?

[Alucard2099]

Like say you are fighting someone and don't want them to leave your reach. You could say "I intend to use my reaction to attack him if he tries to leave my reach." or "I intend to use my reaction to attack if he tries to pass by me,"

The problem is that this already exists. It's the same as using your action to "ready" another action.

[Raphite1]

We play TOTM and AOOs seem to be working as intended for us, although they probably occur less often than if we used a grid. The ones that get triggered simply from a character moving away from an opponent that they've been fighting in melee are easy to figure out. If characters are in a group melee then they'll generally trigger one or two from different enemies in the cluster, though of course the DM would let them know before they decided to move whether and how many AOOs would trigger.

Generally we don't bother with them when a character is simply moving from point A to point B and an opponent is "sorta" between those points, unless the enemy has explicitly been stated to be in the way, and the character doesn't have enough movement to circumvent them.

[Yagyujubei]

just make it perfectly clear when someone moves into melee range it's not so hard it also helps to fudge the numbers a bit as long as it makes sense. encourage your players to ask questions about spacial relations before they move, and when they do move make sure they declare they want to be in OA/melee range. like..

"ok im behind this table and there are two guys with swords and two with xbows, how far are they?"

"the two swordsman just stood up from a table 10 feet away, one crossbowman is across the 25 foot room by the hearth in the right corner, and the other has jumped behind the bar which is along the right wall about 16 feet away."

"ok, the two swordsman...how close together are they"

"they were sitting at opposite sides of the table probably within 6 feet of eachother"

"I'd like to jump up onto the table and get within melee range of both of them. Then a swing my axe in a descending arc at the closer of the two, and finish my motion facing more toward the one on the other side of the table ready to punish them if they try to get away"

"That sounds reasonable, roll your attack"

or something like that. The main problem in most situations like this is that players aren't paying attention fully when you make your descriptions so they get confused.

another helpful thing is to encourage the players (or do this yourself) to make out a quick sketch of what the battle field looks like to help them visualize everything. You don't need to use grid, but a simple representation of what it looks like goes a long long way.

also, this takes the immersion away a tiny bit, but it really helps to label each enemy like bandit 1, 2, and 3, with archer 1 and 2, and bandit captain.

[Alucard2099]

What if you want to block a path or divide the battlefield for tactical reasons?

If you want to block the path, you use the ready action. I'm not sure how dividing the battlefield has any impact on OA's

[Aurthur]

I haven't had much challenge with playing without a grid for OA...it's pretty straightforward so long as folks know their positioning. I also always try and prompt them when, in my mind, they have the opportunity to attack or are granting that opportunity before they commit their move.

"To be clear, that would provoke a possible opportunity attack from the griffon. Do you still wish to move away?"

Removing OAs would be a pretty big gimp to your tank folks insofar as controlling the battlefield. It also would make it challenging to use any creature who is slow (like zombies).

Cheers!

[Baptor]

I haven't had much challenge with playing without a grid for OA...it's pretty straightforward so long as folks know their positioning. I also always try and prompt them when, in my mind, they have the opportunity to attack or are granting that opportunity before they commit their move.

"To be clear, that would provoke a possible opportunity attack from the griffon. Do you still wish to move away?"

Removing OAs would be a pretty big gimp to your tank folks insofar as controlling the battlefield. It also would make it challenging to use any creature who is slow (like zombies).

Cheers!

I came up with an rule called "taunting" that's similar to the Mark rule in the DMG. Whenever someone makes a melee attack against an enemy, he can "taunt" it, forcing it to focus its attacks on him until he's out or someone else taunts it. I kinda feel this rule would make OA not necessary, what do you think?

[Nonah_Me]

My big issue isn't adjudicating Opportunity Attacks, but AoE spells like Fireball. I usually have to group baddies up so that I can keep track of them, and even then it's sometimes hard to keep people from getting hit. I frequently tell my group that AoE spells (unless you're an evoker) are not easily targeted and so you sometimes get caught in the backlash.

[Baptor]

My big issue isn't adjudicating Opportunity Attacks, but AoE spells like Fireball. I usually have to group baddies up so that I can keep track of them, and even then it's sometimes hard to keep people from getting hit. I frequently tell my group that AoE spells (unless you're an evoker) are not easily targeted and so you sometimes get caught in the backlash.

Isn't there a variant rule where you roll a die to see how many baddies are affected safely? I would do that and Evokers just hit them all.

[Vogonjeltz]

Hey playground!

I DM a 5e game and we don't use minis or a grid but rather the "Theatre of the Mind" for combat simulations.

One thing that bugs us continually are the rules over OAs because often times we aren't on the same page as to whom is within 5ft of whom and so forth.

I was wondering two things:

1. How badly would the game get screwed up if I threw out OAs?

2. For those of you that use TotM yourself, have you made any houserules to help with it?

Our group recently started doing more theater of the mind and this sort of thing came up pretty quickly, where it is critical to establish a mutual understanding of where characters are and what exists in the game environment.

If a players wants to be able to draw opportunity attacks, it becomes somewhat incumbent on them to say how they want to position themselves relative to the other enemies as well as each other.

This is definitely more cumbersome than just having a grid map that concretely establishes locations. If you're going to go whole-hog on theater of the mind, there's always the potential for complaints about characters being opportunity attacked by enemies (what, I had to specify that I don't get within his reach!?) and vice versa (what, he didn't have to run by me to get to flimsy wizard bill?!).

[Once a Fool]

I travel a lot when I DM, so minis and grid-maps eventually lost their appeal--where once (in the latter days of 2e and the early days of 3e) I felt they added something. By 3.5, I exclusively used minis for combats.

I started the transition back to Theater of the Mind during 4e. Believe me when I tell you, after running 4e without a grid, 5e is a piece of cake, OAs and all.

What I've found is that the DM needs to be clear about where the PC is moving in relation to the other (N)PCs before the player commits to a course of movement/action. And the players likewise need to specify where they want to be in relation.

It really isn't that hard--mostly the descriptions are just part of the natural dialogue of combat.

[Psikerlord]

We use totm and our rule is, if someone moves past or out of melee with you, you get a free hit. We have unlimited OAs. Works awesome.

[FightStyles]

I've kind of recently posted about AoO's and getting rid of them. My experience, it's a bad idea. I got rid of them so the PC's would move more around the battlefield (I also use TotM), and it did work. They moved, and moved, and moved and the monster's were unable to keep up. That is also not even mentioning that some feats (Sentinal and Polearm Master) use AoO's and either aren't worth the feat or become way too good. Besides, the players deserve the best from your monsters, this includes giving them their rightful AoO's.

As for AoO and TotM together, a rough sketch on a piece of paper in the middle with Initials of the character's and monsters works extremely well. With the battlefield in front of them they can organize your descriptions. Honestly, I couldn't imagine a team of 4-5 PC's and 3+ monsters being able to described well enough with the terrain and obstacles without a map not becoming a complete mess even for the DM who created the battle.

If people have questions about distances, encourage them to ask. TotM gives you, the DM, the freedom to adjucate distances depending on situations and allows scaling of the battlefield quite easily. You can draw 2 identical circles for battlefields, one is 30ft diameter, the other is 150 ft diameter; they both took 20 seconds to create. It also gives more strategy to the players on using AoE spells. Another benefit of TotM is the time required to prep battles is way less and a lot easier to make up on the fly.

tl;dr: Always use AoO's and create rough maps for battles with minitures or letters for creatures when using TotM.

[Dimcair]

From a player perspective I just highly recommend to drop the "theater of the mind" idea and use a grid system.
There are so many reasons why using a grid is better for the purpose of a DND based combat system.

/edit: What exactly are reasons to use TOTM over a basic grid system anyways? I cannot see convincing arguments.

[EvanescentHero]

/edit: What exactly are reasons to use TOTM over a basic grid system anyways? I cannot see convincing arguments.

Not having to buy or fabricate a grid, I guess? I dunno, not having a grid for large encounters is terrible.

[Daishain]

From a player perspective I just highly recommend to drop the "theater of the mind" idea and use a grid system.
There are so many reasons why using a grid is better for the purpose of a DND based combat system.

/edit: What exactly are reasons to use TOTM over a basic grid system anyways? I cannot see convincing arguments.

TOTM works well in small scale encounters. A duel, or chasing someone down, its easier to just describe what's going on than pause and set things up. In some specific cases, a good orator may find that whatever crude drawings/maps they have break verisimilitude compared to what their descriptions evoke in another's mind. I have used TOTM in some cases for these reasons.

However, as has been noted, the complexity goes up at an almost exponential rate the more factors become involved in a battle.

I like to run big fights from time to time. In one case, I had over 150 NPCs involved in a single fight (represented by about 30 minis, each of which were replaced by a group if directly engaged by PCs). It was an epic and complex struggle, and the players had to think fast to aid their allies without being overwhelmed. Limited to TOTM, I could not have run that fight, period. As it was, I was using quite a few simulation tricks to keep things together. Had I needed to describe what was going on at any point in time, my players would have spent multiple sessions just listening to me drone on about this one fight.

Now, I can understand the reluctance to use a grid in the face of how expensive miniatures can be. I probably wouldn't use them myself beyond getting a few for the players had a friend willing to lend not had a huge collection already. Here's the thing though, they aren't necessary. For around $30, you can get a grid map, a piece of thin plexiglass, dry erase markers to draw your terrain on said plexiglass, and simple chip tokens for your NPCs, and that kind of setup is really all you need. While having that $50 14 inch tall model of a purple worm to actually plunk down on the table and terrify your players with is nice, its a luxury, not a necessity.

[Thrudd]

Plop down markers or minis to represent the combatants' relative positions. Could be paper circles with names on them, lego people, board game pieces. Use a tape measure for distances, 5ft=1 inch, or 2cm, or whatever you think is right for the size of your markers. If there are important props or terrain features, use another marker for that, too. You don't need to buy or make a fancy grid map or terrain.

If any sort of mini representation is just impossible, just make OA happen when one combatant disengages from another, or tries to go past someone that is obviously described as blocking their path. It will reduce the utility of some feats and tactics, but that is just what happens. Theater of the mind is inherently, maybe purposefully less tactical, more narrative/cinematic. So focus on describing stuff in an exciting way and don't worry about rules of movement and range. Players should be thinking about describing how they interact with the environment you describe. You give them info like whether they are in bow range, throwing weapon range, melee range (where OA can happen), if enemies are spread out or in groupings.

For true theater of the mind, you need to make changes to the system if you want to avoid the inevitable confusion about who is where and how close they are. This has always been the case for D&D, since it has always used movement rates, concrete ranges for weapons and spells, and combat positioning has always been somewhat important. Discard concrete ranges and distances for things, use close, moderate, far. Bow range, thrown weapon range, melee range. Movement is changed from a number of feet to a range, like you can move from close to moderate range in one round, something that is far can't be reached unless you do a full run. Use dice to determine how many characters in a group are hit by area effects, unless it is obvious.

[Mjolnirbear]

Ive never played TOTM but wouldn't it immerse you far more into the game?

With a grid you're paying attention spacially, running tactics through your head and calculating movement speeds and who and when to attack. But i can picture theatre being more vivid. "You're in a room. The door is behind you. It's bathed in a candlelit glow. There are books on every surface and many chairs and tables for experiments or study." Vs a grid with no imagination.

Or "you're in a dungeon. It's dim. There is a faint smell of must or mildew. The walls look like they have water damage and the ground is damp with scattered puddles or mud paddies on the stone floor. There is no furniture to speak of; anything there might have been has mostly rotted away. Off to the west, the hallway goes lazily down as if there were no real construction plan. A whiff of rust is in that direction."

Perhaps it's just my games, but the grid system provides nothing so vivid as that. You look at a map and let the image do the imagination.

[EvanescentHero]

Ive never played TOTM but wouldn't it immerse you far more into the game?

Nothing about playing with a grid prevents you from doing that as well. Ideally you still provide description, but the grid helps some people imagine and define the space. Plus, for large combats with many participants, a grid can certainly help with positioning. I personally find it difficult to keep track of lots of different combatants with nothing more than my mind, and I know I'm not alone.

P.S. Does rust have a smell?

[Daishain]

P.S. Does rust have a smell?
Yes.

Here's a hint, imagine the smell of blood, really revel in the scent. (try not to be creepy about it) The dominant metallic scent found within is Iron Oxide.

@Mjolnir, The grid is good for the sake of spatial visualization, but it isn't meant to substitute for good oral descriptions, fortunately it doesn't have to. Nothing is stopping your DM from describing a scene just as vividly as if he were to use TOTM. If anything, a well set up grid helps the observer get a better sense of the scale of what you're describing.

[Elbeyon]

Ive never played TOTM but wouldn't it immerse you far more into the game?I don't see how having less information about the world around your character is more immersive. The constant misunderstandings generated by playing a grid based game without a grid have for me always outweighed the immersive nature of getting less information.

[Once a Fool]

Funny thing is (in my extensive experience), even though a grid doesn't mandate that descriptions get cut short, they still make immersion harder.

Part of that is that vivid description isn't inherently more immersive, anyway. In my experience, you get much more mileage out of using sparse but evocative details to set a scene and fill in the gaps as the players explore. In a sense, grid-games are a little too detailed for immersion, particularly since that detail is of a top-down nature instead of character-point-of-view.

But the other reason is because a grid automatically requires that a player step outside of the imagination head-space and compare it to a tangible representation. Now, that's not inherently a bad thing, but it is inherently a hurdle to immersion.

Also (and I'm over-generalizing here a bit), I find that grid-games tend to ask the rules for permission to accomplish things, while TotM only asks the rules how to accomplish them.

For instance, a DM running both types of game might be inclined to answer the following question in different ways: "Can I stand in the very center of a ten-foot wide doorway and use it as a choke point?"

The TotM DM might say, "Yes, but if two enemies try to run past you at the same time, you'll only be able to stop one of them by moving over to block. You can still attack the other as it runs by, though."

With a grid game, the answer is probably, "No. That's way too much of a headache to figure out. Just stand in the one square on either side."

Similar result, mechanically, but I find the first far more immersive. (And, by the way, that's a real example from a 4e game.)

I will say this, though. If you are using minis, using a piece of string marked in one-inch increments to measure distances (instead of drawing a grid) is a pretty good hybrid of the two styles.

[Once a Fool]

I don't see how having less information about the world around your character is more immersive. The constant misunderstandings generated by playing a grid based game without a grid have for me always outweighed the immersive nature of getting less information.

I guess that depends on what you mean by "immersive." You seem to be using it to mean "presents as clear a mental image as possible."

I use it to mean "can be resolved with minimal excursions outside of the fictional narrative/dialogue." Which is quite a different thing.

[Elbeyon]

It looks like we mean the same thing than. My immersion immediately breaks in a mapless game when I have to play 20 20 with the DM and other players. Trying to line up anything more detailed oriented than a basic attack can be quite the ordeal.

[calebrus]

I don't see how having less information about the world around your character is more immersive. The constant misunderstandings generated by playing a grid based game without a grid have for me always outweighed the immersive nature of getting less information.

D&D is not a grid based game.
In 1e, no grid was required.
In 2e, no grid was required.
In 3e, a grid was recommended but not required.
In 3.5, a grid was recommended but not required.
In 4e, a grid was generally accepted as required (but was in fact not required, strictly speaking).
In 5e, no grid is required.

Just because you're used to playing with a grid does not make it a "grid based game" in any way.

edit:
Our group uses a grid for boss fights and large scale battles, and that's it. Just like we did in 3.5. And even that grid is small scale, drawn on regular graph paper on corkboard, using thumbtacks to represent PCs and NPCs.
As for granting OAs, except when dealing with reach weapons (and even most of the time in this case), when you would receive an OA is almost always pretty straightforward and easy to judge. When dealing with AoEs, just ask the DM how many you can get.
It's not that hard, folks.

[Thrudd]

It looks like we mean the same thing than. My immersion immediately breaks in a mapless game when I have to play 20 20 with the DM and other players. Trying to line up anything more detailed oriented than a basic attack can be quite the ordeal.

That's why mapless games should just ignore specific movement rates and range and distance in combat. Use general terms, the position of most combatants is considered fairly fluid. When a player wants to do something, the DM just decides whether it is possible and what happens, and it is best to be somewhat more permissive than one might be in a grid situation.

The players' input may determine somewhat where the enemies are, the battlefield may be in somewhat of a probabilistic state. An OA happens if someone tries to break away from a melee, or if a character is described as blocking or covering a certain object or space and an enemy wants to move past them. If the player or the DM doesn't explicitly say: "this character is positioned to block someone from getting to X", then there won't be an OA for someone moving to X.

Players will ask things like "can I hit that monster with my javelin?" or "can I move over to that door on my turn?" "how many orcs can I hit with a fireball without hitting my friends?" and the DM will just decide the answer at that moment by whatever means they see fit. If a player thinks of something that would make the fight fun or cool, the DM should try to allow it, since it is pretty boring otherwise.

Less tactical, less mechanical thinking, no referring to the book, not all abilities in the game will be useful. more free flowing and DM judging based on common sense and what seems fair or fun. That should be TotM, at least if you want to avoid arguments about how far or close things are and complaints about "but my sheet says I can go 30 feet" or "I meant my character was by X, not by Y, so I can get an attack...". None of that matters, no measurements are given, if something wasnt communicated beforehand it wasnt there/didnt happen, and the DM always has the final say on what is and isnt possible and what happens.

[Thrudd]

D&D is not a grid based game.
In 1e, no grid was required.
In 2e, no grid was required.
In 3e, a grid was recommended but not required.
In 3.5, a grid was recommended but not required.
In 4e, a grid was generally accepted as required (but was in fact not required, strictly speaking).
In 5e, no grid is required.

Just because you're used to playing with a grid does not make it a "grid based game" in any way.

edit:
Our group uses a grid for boss fights and large scale battles, and that's it. Just like we did in 3.5. And even that grid is small scale, drawn on regular graph paper on corkboard, using thumbtacks to represent PCs and NPCs.
As for granting OAs, except when dealing with reach weapons (and even most of the time in this case), when you would receive an OA is almost always pretty straightforward and easy to judge. When dealing with AoEs, just ask the DM how many you can get.
It's not that hard, folks.

1e didnt require a grid, but it did assume you were using minis and measuring tape. That's why everything is given in ranges of inches, and the scale is specifically set to 10ft=1 inch, and gave the recommended scale of minis you should use. All missile weapons and spells have ranges, characters have a movement rate. It's possible to play without it, as I did at one time and many other people as well, but it does result in ignoring the tactical combat aspect of the game and some rules and abilities behave differently or aren't used at all.

I would call D&D, from the beginning, a game that assumes minis and tactical combat. That some people have always ignored that part of it and used a subset or modification of the rules doesn't change the wargame roots which never totally didappeared.

[FightStyles]

Grids can be better functionally in some instances just as TotM can. However, grids have always took longer for our group, but that is a little biased since we usually use TotM.

With that being said, drawing and using TotM on a grided paper isn't horrible.

Also, TotM is a better system for me to implement the "Rule of Cool". Not saying grids would prohibit it, just TotM is easier to apply it.

[calebrus]

That's all well and good that you feel that way, but D&D in general, and 5e specifically and explicitly, does not have to be a tactical grid based game. In point of fact, 5e goes oout of its way to make it clear that it is intended to be played without a grid. So calling 5e a grid based game is pretty ridiculous.
So as I said before, just because you're used to playing with a grid does not make it a "grid based game" in any way.

[Baptor]

What exactly are reasons to use TOTM over a basic grid system anyways? I cannot see convincing arguments.

1. The table we use isn't big enough. Its a breakfast nook table and it barely fits all of us anyways.

2. It's time consuming. Only one of my players whines about a grid, but I've told him if he wants to supply the materials and tokens/minis and a bigger table I'd happily do it. He's yet to take me up on my offer. All the others prefer TotM.

I agree with those who say grids were an assumption from 1st edition, but what about OAs? Those weren't in 1st or 2nd. I remember playing in huge battles in 2nd and there were no OAs and everyone was free to move about the table and we never had issues. What about 5e as opposed to 2e would make OA's necessary?

[Thrudd]

1. The table we use isn't big enough. Its a breakfast nook table and it barely fits all of us anyways.

2. It's time consuming. Only one of my players whines about a grid, but I've told him if he wants to supply the materials and tokens/minis and a bigger table I'd happily do it. He's yet to take me up on my offer. All the others prefer TotM.

I agree with those who say grids were an assumption from 1st edition, but what about OAs? Those weren't in 1st or 2nd. I remember playing in huge battles in 2nd and there were no OAs and everyone was free to move about the table and we never had issues. What about 5e as opposed to 2e would make OA's necessary?

1e and 2e did have oa's, only when someone retreated from melee. In 1e, you were not allowed to move and attack in the same turn unless you were charging. In 2e you could move half you movement and attack. Are they necessary? I suppose not. Taking them out may make things easier for your players, or may make it harder depending on how you play the monsters. It also might remove the use of some abilities, so make sure you look through the books and dont let your players take any feats or spells which have anything to do with OAs.

It's easy to use them when someone tries to leave melee, you dont need any measurements for that. It also leaves a little bit if tactical choice, if you allow an OA to be used by a character that is specifically guarding something or someone. You can say "this guy is standing in the middle of the hallway. You cant get past him without provoking an attack. " and a player can say "I stand in front of the wizard so no one can get to him without coming through me.", that would mean an OA if someone tried to move past to get at the wizard. If they dont say it on their turn, it isnt happening and someone can move past them to attack the wizard.