Negating advantage on attack rolls?

[heavyfuel]

Is there any way of negating Advantage on attack rolls other than the obvious "give the enemy disadvantage"?

I was thinking about building a Monk, who can Dodge as a Bonus Action, but then also has some way of negating enemy Advantage so that almost all attacks against him are made with proper Disadvantage.

[KorvinStarmast]

Is there any way of negating Advantage on attack rolls other than the obvious "give the enemy disadvantage"?

I was thinking about building a Monk, who can Dodge as a Bonus Action, but then also has some way of negating enemy Advantage so that almost all attacks against him are made with proper Disadvantage.
If you don't mind a magic item, a cloak of displacement does what you want.

[heavyfuel]

If you don't mind a magic item, a cloak of displacement does what you want.

Not really... It gives disadvantage rather than negating advatange.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Is there any way of negating Advantage on attack rolls other than the obvious "give the enemy disadvantage"?

I was thinking about building a Monk, who can Dodge as a Bonus Action, but then also has some way of negating enemy Advantage so that almost all attacks against him are made with proper Disadvantage.

I am not aware of anything that can negate Advantage that is not "grant disadvantage". As far as I know, the best you can do against someone who would otherwise have Advantage is make it a straight roll, and that's by design.

There are a few features that bypass this entirely, such as the hexblade's Armor of Hexes (when attacked, roll a d6; on a 4+ it just misses no matter the roll).

[kaervaak]

The alert feat prevents anyone from gaining advantage from being unseen

The wildhunt shifter race prevents anyone with 30' from gaining advantage on attack rolls against you while shifted

[Segev]

If you don't mind a magic item, a cloak of displacement does what you want.

No, that just gives the enemy disadvantage. He wants something that strips advantage so that the dodge action gives them disadvantage even when they would have had advantage.

To my knowledge, there is no general way to do what the OP was. You would have to deny the enejy whatever is giving him advantage. A headband of intellect or a high intelligence might let you ask the DM what enemies' sources of advantage are, and that would let you know what you need to deny them, though. For example: if they have advantage due to Pack Tactics, keeping from having more than one adjacent to you at a time would be the key.

[stoutstien]

To be fair if your DM is using ADV that often with npc tactics dodge is still a great reduction on incoming damage.

Saying that being adjacent to an ally is the most common way NPCs get adv so breaking up their formation might go a long way. That and vision blockers.

[JNAProductions]

Clockwork Sorcerer can, I think, make any roll with (dis)advantage a normal roll, as a subclass feature.

[Asisreo1]

To be fair if your DM is using ADV that often with npc tactics dodge is still a great reduction on incoming damage.

Saying that being adjacent to an ally is the most common way NPCs get adv so breaking up their formation might go a long way. That and vision blockers.
Yep, best way to negate advantage without granting disadvantage is to negate the method they used to gain advantage in the first place.

If you don't have the alert feat, the Search action would do so if they're hidden.

If its creatures with Pact Tactics, shoving all but one of them away from you should do the trick.

Truesight/blindsight against invisibility, darkvision in darkness, get up if you're prone, heal against other status effects.

[Kvess]

Advantage is more of a meta-condition than something that can be directly countered by abilities, spells and feats. Without inflicting a condition that imposes Disadvantage, the only way to negate Advantage is to negate whatever effect is giving your opponent advantage in the first place. (Edit: I stand corrected, re Clockwork Soul sorcerer.)

If you are worried about invisible opponents, blindsense or trueseeing would negate their advantage. For hidden opponents, I’d recommend boosting your passive perception. As a monk, you’ll have ways to ignore and shrug off many deleterious effects which could give your opponent advantage. If you want to prevent an opponent from casting spells that give them advantage, Shadow monks can cast Silence.

[chiefwaha]

Clockwork Sorcerer can, I think, make any roll with (dis)advantage a normal roll, as a subclass feature.

I don't believe this ability would work for the OP's idea, since the roll would already be a standard roll(dodge offsetting whatever advantage the enemy has).

[MaxWilson]

The alert feat prevents anyone from gaining advantage from being unseen

The wildhunt shifter race prevents anyone with 30' from gaining advantage on attack rolls against you while shifted

Yes, this.

E.g. Alert + Darkness = poor man's Blur spell.

Rogue 18 also prevents enemies from gaining advantage, as long as you're not incapacitated.

[DwarfFighter]

Alert is weird, usually there isn't a way to REMOVE advantage. I guess this is because they should have made it so that the defense is "disadvantaged" when you can't see the attacker, but that was hard to implement with static AC. Think about it: You're not really BETTER at hitting a static target's bull's eye if you HIDE before shooting!

The designers decided to leverage the advantage rules for unseen attackers, and improving the attack roll was the only option.

So in a situation where the defender has the Alert-level of awareness they have to remove the advantage to the attacker. Maybe they could have had something about the attacker not being "unseen" but I guess that would raise other issues: Alert is not See Invisibility, surely.

[Segev]

Alert is weird, usually there isn't a way to REMOVE advantage. I guess this is because they should have made it so that the defense is "disadvantaged" when you can't see the attacker, but that was hard to implement with static AC. Think about it: You're not really BETTER at hitting a static target's bull's eye if you HIDE before shooting!

The designers decided to leverage the advantage rules for unseen attackers, and improving the attack roll was the only option.

So in a situation where the defender has the Alert-level of awareness they have to remove the advantage to the attacker. Maybe they could have had something about the attacker not being "unseen" but I guess that would raise other issues: Alert is not See Invisibility, surely.

This actually raises an interesting question as to whether inanimate objects should ALWAYS grant attackers Advantage on attack rolls. Not only can the objects not see (nor sense in any way) the attacker, but they're literally not moving to dodge. Their AC is entirely due to size and toughness, and the attacker can take time to line up the attack without worrying about any prediction of movement.

[quindraco]

This actually raises an interesting question as to whether inanimate objects should ALWAYS grant attackers Advantage on attack rolls. Not only can the objects not see (nor sense in any way) the attacker, but they're literally not moving to dodge. Their AC is entirely due to size and toughness, and the attacker can take time to line up the attack without worrying about any prediction of movement.

Emphasis mine, PHB p195:


When a creature can't see you, you have advantage on attack rolls against it.

[Segev]

Emphasis mine, PHB p195:

Granted, but my question was, again, about whether they SHOULD. I suppose the idea could be that their not-dodgy-ness is already incorporated into their AC.

[Ortho]

Granted, but my question was, again, about whether they SHOULD. I suppose the idea could be that their not-dodgy-ness is already incorporated into their AC.

That could be a fun way to find mimics. Swing your sword at every single item in the room, and if you get advantage, it's a real object.


To the OP: There are a few ways to force your opponent to take the lower of two dice rolls that don't actually count as disadvantage - namely, the Lucky feat. You may also want to take a look at the spell Fortune's Favor*, which will enable the same thing once per casting.


*Explorer's Guide to Wildemont, pg 186