How do people deal with distances in combat?

[dethhhollow]

This is something I've never really understood. I'm new to 5e overall and I've never been on a text-based site for it, so how do you deal with battle maps here when it's such a weird specific thing for the game? Is there some way to do it with text? Do you just put a screenshot out there from the DM and then just have people state what part of the grid they want to go to? Are people just expected to log onto another system like Roll20 and move tokens around? With how weird some spell ranges can be and how opportunity attacks and stuff work, I'd assume there has to be something but I'm not sure how exactly you'd get that to work out, you know?

[ImproperJustice]

Gonna depend entirely on your GM.

Some like battle mats. So me use Roll 20.
Many use the “theatre of the mind”, and attempt to utilize good narration descriptions and make judgement calls on the fly of what can or can’t be affected by an attack.

[dethhhollow]

Okay, so people just do whatever and go with what they feel works best? Even if it involves top-tier fighting game characters? Cool.

[GreyBlack]

Okay, so people just do whatever and go with what they feel works best? Even if it involves top-tier fighting game characters? Cool.

Well.... yeah. It's been that way ever since the game's inception. Some people went with the wargaming side of things, some went to the more Q&A/theater of the mind side and making the players draw the map to keep track of where they were.

D&D has a long history of just doing whatever. It happens. Just try not to rain on anyone else's parade.

[Dr. Cliché]

Related question - how accurate do you allow people to be with spells?

e.g. if someone wants to use a Fireball, do you allow him to position it precisely, or does he have to just pick a point within range and hope his allies are outside the radius?

[Unoriginal]

Okay, so people just do whatever and go with what they feel works best? Even if it involves top-tier fighting game characters? Cool.

What do you mean by "top-tier fighting game characters"?

[BreaktheStatue]

What do you mean by "top-tier fighting game characters"?

Blanka, Sub-Zero, Siegfried, Heihachi. Probably.

[No brains]

What do you mean by "top-tier fighting game characters"?


Blanka, Sub-Zero, Siegfried, Heihachi. Probably.

It's funny that Fox would not be considered S tier in D&D. The skill ceilings go off in different non-euclidean directions.:smalltongue:

[Derpaligtr]

Few months ago I was in an AL game and the DM set the battle up like a warhammer game. Just used the tables, some minis, some cardboard cutouts, and we went to town.

We used a ruler to measure distance but always approximated worked via rule of cool.

[Louro]

Close range, you can move and attack.
Mid range, you can move and dash and get to melee range.
Far range, you can't reach that target.

As for fireballs, tricky question. It depends on your playstyles.
If you allow for "tactical open play" then fireballs are on point. On the contrary, if you play hiding info (PCs HP left, number of failed death saves, conditions duration...) then fireballs are approximately on point.

With open play players focus on maximize their options, numerically speaking.
With closed/hidden play players must rely a bit more on roleplaying.

[No brains]

On the subject of coping without a grid/ benefiting from the abstraction: one 'hack' that I've never seen pulled off without a grid (and some 3d abstraction) is air-bursting fireballs to only hit large targets nearby. If the AoE terminates 5 feet from the ground, a medium party is safe while large enemies take the hit. I don't know if anyone using theatre of the mind would ever permit this. Has anyone ever done this off of a grid?

[Louro]

...one 'hack' that I've never seen pulled off without a grid (and some 3d abstraction) is air-bursting fireballs to only hit large targets nearby.
I allow wizards to cast fireballs hitting as many enemies as possible. However, when they try such things I ask for an INT check to see if their trigonometric calculations were on point.

[dethhhollow]

Okay, so hypothetical, someone's running a game that's playing it out through text with 'close, mid, far' as like the key words for if you can hit something or not. I show up with a Tabaxi Sorcerer/Monk who knows Haste and has the Mobile feat so I can just rush in, hit someone, and then be out of their dash range immediately.... The only way to hit him is to either shoot an arrow and pray he doesn't catch it, use long-range magic, or position guys around super strategically to make sure he can't get away without taking some hits because Mobile only works on the one you try to attack.

Would you just have to rely on super specific wording to describe how the guys are closing in and what the general environment's like so the speedster knows when they need to just rush off somewhere else with disengage and make some room? Or would it just be like "Oh, they just surround you at close range, you can't do that anymore unless you can hit all three guys in one turn or something."

[Unoriginal]

Okay, so hypothetical, someone's running a game that's playing it out through text with 'close, mid, far' as like the key words for if you can hit something or not. I show up with a Tabaxi Sorcerer/Monk who knows Haste and has the Mobile feat so I can just rush in, hit someone, and then be out of their dash range immediately.... The only way to hit him is to either shoot an arrow and pray he doesn't catch it, use long-range magic, or position guys around super strategically to make sure he can't get away without taking some hits because Mobile only works on the one you try to attack.

Not really? with Haste, Mobile and Monk, you can easily rush in melee, do your melee attack(s), then run far away enough they won't catch you with a dash. Might require you to Dash yourself, though.

Also arrow-catching is not a common capacity at all, it likely won't happen unless you're facing monks.



Would you just have to rely on super specific wording to describe how the guys are closing in and what the general environment's like so the speedster knows when they need to just rush off somewhere else with disengage and make some room? Or would it just be like "Oh, they just surround you at close range, you can't do that anymore unless you can hit all three guys in one turn or something."

You could just ask the DM how far they are in ft to make sure you can run far away enough.

[Derpaligtr]

On the subject of coping without a grid/ benefiting from the abstraction: one 'hack' that I've never seen pulled off without a grid (and some 3d abstraction) is air-bursting fireballs to only hit large targets nearby. If the AoE terminates 5 feet from the ground, a medium party is safe while large enemies take the hit. I don't know if anyone using theatre of the mind would ever permit this. Has anyone ever done this off of a grid?

I had an online group that didn't use a grid with 4e.

I played a Sorcerer/Warlord build that I actually got the idea from this forum. Was a red mage that used melee and a lot of blasty spells.

Blasting the giants in the crotch with Blazing Starfall meant that our Halflings were nowhere near getting hit.

[Grear Bylls]

Related question - how accurate do you allow people to be with spells?

e.g. if someone wants to use a Fireball, do you allow him to position it precisely, or does he have to just pick a point within range and hope his allies are outside the radius?

I always use cutout templates for my spells.

If I have players, I let them out the template down on the map. It shows EXACTLY how many enemies (and allies) are hit. I let them be uber accurate, as their occupation is wizard. They know how to use spells. Otherwise, it's like an accountant adding up wrong numbers a bunch. They deserve to get "fired".

Pun intended

[Laserlight]

I show up with a Tabaxi Sorcerer/Monk who knows Haste and has the Mobile feat so I can just rush in, hit someone, and then be out of their dash range immediately.... The only way to hit him is to either shoot an arrow and pray he doesn't catch it, use long-range magic, or position guys around super strategically to make sure he can't get away without taking some hits because Mobile only works on the one you try to attack.


You Ready an action.
Or use a ranged attack or spell, as you mentioned. As I recall, catching an arrow takes his reaction so you fire several shots at him.
Taking down a monk can be a pain, whether you're on a grid or not.

[Spectrulus]

My groups do Theatre of the Mind if there's less than 3 enemies, and the environment isn't a factor. We pull the grid out when it gets complicated, using printed cardstock "minis" when glass pieces won't do.

[Mortis_Elrod]

Dm usually describes a distance and we work with that. If there’s a lot of moving parts or enemies we’ll use a grid like r20

In online groups roll20 is pretty standard and super useful.

For IRL groups I’ve done mostly theater of the mind and sometimes makeshift minis we do on the spot

[Ganymede]

For my in-person game sessions, I've been projecting battle maps onto a big screen TV with Roll20; the players use a wireless mouse in order to move their tokens, and I use a laptop as both my DM screen and as a way to manipulate the DM's only version of the map.

[dethhhollow]

Hmm, interesting. So I'm seeing a lot of people who just run with it in text until something more complex is needed and then they just work with Roll20 or whatever they have on-hand. Makes sense to me, lol.

[Knaight]

On the subject of coping without a grid/ benefiting from the abstraction: one 'hack' that I've never seen pulled off without a grid (and some 3d abstraction) is air-bursting fireballs to only hit large targets nearby. If the AoE terminates 5 feet from the ground, a medium party is safe while large enemies take the hit. I don't know if anyone using theatre of the mind would ever permit this. Has anyone ever done this off of a grid?

Has this come up in 5e specifically? No. Have very similar things popped up in other games I play more often? Absolutely - and in terms of abstraction that 5' from the ground trick would could potentially fail, as without the defined grid you run into how medium targets could easily be 6' tall.

[Thrudd]

Yeah, play by post (text only) isn't really great for d&d. Despite what the rule book says (that playing without minis is just fine), d&d has precise measurements and positioning built into the combat rules, abilities and spells, that only minis and a tabletop battlefield of some kind can resolve properly.

You'd need to create house rules that change everything that refers to distance or exact position with a system of descriptive ranges and positions (melee, close, middle, far) as people have suggested (that the game designers would have already done if they really thought that it should be played without minis).
This isn't a minor revision- though you can do it piecemeal, just ruling on the abilities and spells the players actually have access to at the moment.

This will affect how some abilities work and what is/isn't possible in some cases- that's just the price for the convenience of playing without tabletop battlefields.

[Demonslayer666]

When playing theater of mind, you just tell the DM what you want to accomplish in general terms, not how you accomplish it.

Or better yet, tell them what you want to do, and ask them specific questions to see if it's worthwhile. "Can I cast fireball and avoid hitting my friends? How many can I get?"

[Careless]

On the subject of coping without a grid/ benefiting from the abstraction: one 'hack' that I've never seen pulled off without a grid (and some 3d abstraction) is air-bursting fireballs to only hit large targets nearby. If the AoE terminates 5 feet from the ground, a medium party is safe while large enemies take the hit. I don't know if anyone using theatre of the mind would ever permit this. Has anyone ever done this off of a grid?
In the last campaign I played in we used theater of the mind a fair bit, as well as just tracking distances without actually using a grid (because aerial combat did not facilitate that at all). Air-burst fireballs and even using trig to calculate exactly how we could hit our targets with airbursts was fairly common. As long as you could recite the math for your plan when your turn came around, it generally was allowed.

[ZorroGames]

Conversely always played with miniatures (as a fantasy/SF/VSF/Historical Wargames guy from before OD&D I have never been without a box of miniatures.)

Biggest decision has usually been hexes or squares.

[Man_Over_Game]

Look up 13th Age.

It's an RPG from the makers of 4e, who focused their design on open-ended combat.

One of the things they removed was the grid system. Everything is based on Adjacent, Near (within movement distance), Far (within ranged distance, 2 movements away), Very Far (visible but out of ranged distance, 3+ movements away). Everything has a relative distance to each other. For example:

Dragon: Adjacent to Fighter, Far from Mage, near to Goblin
Goblin: Adjacent to Fighter, Near to Mage, Near to Dragon
Fighter: Adjacent to Dragon, Adjacent to Goblin, Far to Mage
Mage: Far to Dragon, Far to Fighter, Near to Goblin.

From this example, we could see that the fighter is sandwiched between the dragon and goblin, the goblin is fairly close to the Mage, who is keeping his distance. The dragon is at the far side of combat.

For spells and such, they used relative radiuses, such as "all enemies that are Near to the target".

13th age was a lot of work for the GM, though, as this is difficult to manage, but it could work for what you're looking for.

[Rebonack]

I'm a fan of using a whiteboard along with little cardboard cutouts. Ruler to keep track of distances. I typically use a 1 inch = 10 feet scale. Whenever I've done play by post, I've always included a map where relevant.

[Waterdeep Merch]

I use pre-drawn maps, a blank map with markers done up on the fly, 3-D terrain, JRPG style 'you hit who you hit and standing doesn't really matter', and a more involved Theater of the Mind, depending entirely on which set up I think will best facilitate each fight. I can use multiple different forms in a single session.

When dealing with distances on non-maps, I call for specific skill checks. Arcane spellcasters use Arcana to determine how many enemies they can hit, equal to their result -10 (minimum 1). I allow a spell capable of friendly fire to target one more enemy for also hitting an ally, up to the number of combatants present. Divine casters do the same with the Religion skill, while Druids and Rangers use Nature.

To deal with possible attacks of opportunity, I let players use Acrobatics to maneuver around them, opposed by potential enemy passive Insight. Failure means there's definitely someone there and they can use their reaction to AoO you.

Chasing someone that is running requires Athletics, with a +1 for every 5 feet of movement you have over the runner's speed. If you fail, it means they escape sans a chase sequence, which is a whole 'nother ordeal.

Part of this is to make the skill system feel more vibrant.

[furby076]

Blanka, Sub-Zero, Siegfried, Heihachi. Probably.

what are those?

[NorthernPhoenix]

what are those?

Why, they're top tier (at some point...) Fighting characters of course! ;)

[BW022]

This is something I've never really understood. I'm new to 5e overall and I've never been on a text-based site for it, so how do you deal with battle maps here when it's such a weird specific thing for the game?

I'm not sure battle maps are that weird. It's just a large grid. Typically D&D maps are drawn on a small grid when the module/adventure is designed. At the table, you merely redraw it on a battle map and then position and move figs around. Distances are just counting squares.



Is there some way to do it with text?


Battle maps are optional. Lots of options.

1. Just do it in your head. Enemies are about 30 ft. away, half of them close. Use approximations for everything. Works fine for simple combats, but can get confusing and for some people slow combat down as you have to re-explain where everyone is.

2. Just use a normal table and a ruler.

3. Use a chess board. Print off the map such that squares are about an inch.



Do you just put a screenshot out there from the DM and then just have people state what part of the grid they want to go to?


Unless players are in combat, it generally isn't necessary to draw anything. The DM can explain things...
DM "You see a clearing about a hundred feet across. There is an old, two story house covered in vines. The roof has partially collapsed. It's about sixty feet across. There are three lower windows and a half-open rear doorway."
PC1 "I want to check out the door way"
PC2 "I look in the windows"
PC3 "Are there any other doors?"
DM "You can't see from the rear."
PC3 "I move along the left of the building."

You can do all this in your mind, or the DM can just sketch it out. If PC1 triggers and encounter... say two orcs rush out of the doorway at him... then you might draw the area out on a battle map, play PC1 in front of the doorway, put PC2 20' to his right looking in windows, and PC3 around the side of the building. Then roll for initiative. If you don't use a battle map, you just note that PC1 has two orcs in front of him, PC2 is 20' away, and PC3 is say 40' away and can't see anyone else.


Are people just expected to log onto another system like Roll20 and move tokens around?
I've certainly never used it at the table. Only time I would use a tool like Roll20 is if I was playing online.



With how weird some spell ranges can be and how opportunity attacks and stuff work, I'd assume there has to be something but I'm not sure how exactly you'd get that to work out, you know?

90% of time, ranges are kind of moot. Most encounters (due to the nature of adventuring in towns, dungeons, forests, crypts, etc.) tend to be within 60' anyway. Most creatures can adjust their positions to get within shorter ranges if necessary. If you aren't using a battle map, you can wing it most of the time. In the above, PC1 is in melee with the orcs so opportunity attacks apply if he (or the orcs) try to move away. PC2 and PC3 are out of melee so you don't need to worry about it. For range, either PC2 or PC3 could close if they needed to.

[Thrudd]

I've certainly never used it at the table. Only time I would use a tool like Roll20 is if I was playing online.


OP is clearly asking about playing online, specifically play by post on this site. And not using a map or a grid or any sort of counters on the tabletop by which you can measure the positions and distances between combatants for movement and ranges and area of effect is clearly taking something away from D&D, the way it is designed. Of course we can just try to keep it in our head, use impromptu approximations or decide it doesn't really matter and just do combat narratively, but there's a whole chunk of the game, a rather large chunk, that makes use of tactical movement and measurements for which you would require table top. Playing online, you'll need a digital tabletop like Roll 20 if you want to include that rather significant part of the game. Play-by-post, text only, is a significantly reduced D&D (and, I'd argue, any RPG not designed specifically for text-only) experience.