Creative Combat Strategies

[Melphizard]

Hey there!

I'm someone who both DMs and players a lot of D&D both homebrew and Adventurer's League, so much so that I've played almost all classes except sorcerer for I have sworn to never play it. I've done quite a few classes more then once such as wizard and/or druid since they're always good fits in a party. In all my playing though, I always seem to be surprised with new creative combat strategies I've never thought of before appearing before me.

I'll lend you an example I recently employed:

Creation Bard 14 - No spellcasting for you today

1. Locate a target who seems to be a spellcaster without any martial experience and/or strength and get yourself within 10 ft. of them using misty step and/or other forms of movement.
2. Use your 3rd level ability, Performance of Creation upon the wizard. The text states it can "create one nonmagical item of your choice in an unoccupied space within 10 feet of you," and your 14th level ability, Creative Crescendo, allows for an infinite gp limit to what you create as well as the ability to make items equal to your Cha mod.
3. Create Plate armor upon the enemy spellcaster and surround them with 100,000 gp diamonds with the rest of your spell slots so you can use them later for true resurrection.

Congrats! If your enemy is a lich who has no heavy armor proficiency, they no longer can cast spells and have disadvantage on all saving throws! This is because according to page 144 of the Player's handbook,
Armor Proficiency: lf you wear armor that you lack proficiency with, you have disadvantage on any ability check, saving throw, or attack roll that involves Strength or Dexterity,and you can't cast spells.

With your other summons you now have presumably around 4-5 100,000 gp diamonds which are useful as spell components. Creation bards are truly amazing ay?


So now I ask of you, what are your favorite creative strategies for combat that are outside the norm?

[JNAProductions]

That'd require you to be able to summon an object on someone. Notably, you need an unoccupied space. A space containing a Lich is not that.

[JackPhoenix]

It's also very much the GM's decision to rule that TEMPORARY diamonds can be used as material components.

[Melphizard]

Shoot well the armor trick may not work for creation bards then that's my misreading. Guess its better sticking to illusionist to do the armor on spellcasters trick.

[Catullus64]

The Illusory Fog technique is one of my favorite multi-purpose combat tactics when dealing with spellcasting enemies or ranged attackers. Using an actual Fog Cloud to provide concealment is only marginally helpful because of how advantage and disadvantage from visibility interact. But create a Silent Image of a fog cloud over your allies, and things are looking much better: physical interaction with the illusion reveals its unreality to your allies, but not to enemies outside the fog. Hey presto, ranged attack advantage for your party, disadvantage for ranged enemies, and no sight-dependent spell targeting. Useful whether you cast your Silent Image from spell slots or Misty Visions.

[Greywander]

Casting Haste on the boss. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJ9WNHy924E)

More seriously, the best and most creative strategies are going to be those that rely on teamwork. Things that a single character wouldn't be able to do by themselves. A few simple examples would be grappling and shoving prone so your mates can beat the monster down, casting Hold Person to set the rogue and paladin up for auto-crits with Sneak Attack and Smite, someone with PAM and Sentinel who can stop enemies before they reach you combined with a warlock with Repelling Blast to continually knock the enemies back, anything that creates a hazard combined with anything that forces movement (grappling, Repelling Blast, Telekinetic, Crusher, etc.), a rogue with Mounted Combatant riding a Rune Knight to give them Evasion and get essentially perma-advantage on attacks, give but a few examples.

I know I've also mentioned a powerful defensive combination before as well: A paladin, whose Aura of Protection boosts the saving throws of all their party (which can be further improved with Bless). An Artillerist artificer who grants temp HP (and later, half cover) to the party every round as a BA. And a Life cleric, who heals any damage that gets past your AC and saves, and gets through the temp HP the artificer is giving you every round. Everyone in heavy armor takes HAM, to further reduce damage taken. Everyone also takes Shield Master, to get pseudo-Evasion (Aura of Protection and half cover both help bolster DEX saves as well). This trio is extremely hardy, if a bit lacking in offensive ability. What I'd probably add to this is a Peace cleric 1 / wizard X for utility casting and AoE blasting, and perhaps some kind of warlock or archer for ranged damage.

I'm sure there are some rather complex multi-person setups out there that no one has thought of yet simply because we tend to only think in terms of our own character.

[No brains]

If you have the right build, you can grapple an enemy and drag them for damage that doesn't take an action.

Assuming your DM lets you move in what is essentially a 3D grid, you can grapple an an enemy, drag them into the air with a jump, and let them fall more than 10 feet to take damage and possibly fall prone.

There's two ways to do this. Either you can use a long jump to jump 5 feet (usually requiring a 20 foot log jump), and drag an enemy diagonally upward so they end up above your space and fall further than you do. Alternately, you can use the falling onto a creature rules from Tasha's for a risker maneuver that doesn't need as much space. Just high jump 10 feet (maybe 15 feet) onto your target's head.

This requires a good athletics skill, high speed, and possibly a way to pass dexterity saves. The Jump spell is useful here. Tabaxi can use their extra speed to get enough distance to a jump while moving at half speed. Any bonus action dash (Expeditious Retreat, Cunning Action, and especially Step of the Wind) helps, but it misses the magic mark of 'no action' damage. Fly and Haste help with your speed, but you should be sure you're ready to commit the investment of those spells to a risky melee maneuver. Riding a mount theoretically could work with this.

As always, your mileage may vary, consult your DM before taking any sanity-straining activity, watch out you don't get dragged around yourself.

[Ortho]

In my last campaign, I played a Graviturgy Wizard, and I got a lot of mileage out of the spell Immovable Object.

Immovable Object is notable for three reasons - 1) it has a range of touch; 2) it doesn't require an attack roll or saving throw - it just connects [though you can make a Strength check to move it up to 10ft, so it's not entirely immutable]; and 3) it can target an object that is being worn or carried.

Do you see where this is going? You can walk right up to an enemy spellcaster, touch their wand/staff/spellcasting focus, and all of a sudden they can't cast spells with somatic components. Or, you can freeze an enemy's sword in midair. Or, if you're facing a squishy spellcaster, target their robes and leave them unable to do anything. And if you don't want to get that close to the enemy, you can send in your familiar to do it for you, since Immovable Object is a touch spell.

Facing someone in armor? Well, the spell can affect a maximum of 10 pounds, even when upcast, so you're out of luck. Unless you can cast Reduce on them beforehand, thereby making them and their armor weigh 1/8 as much....

The really evil part is that if you upcast the spell to 6th level, the duration becomes permanent, and the DC to move the object increases by 10. So you can turn someone's clothes into their tomb.

[NecessaryWeevil]

Not sure how creative this is, but we recently fought a rival adventuring party on a high bridge in Sharn.
Our sorceror landed a Hold Person on their Barbarian.
Next up, my Protector Aasimar Cleric grappled the immobilized Barbarian and stepped off the bridge.
Too bad we were playing via Roll20. I would have liked to see everyone's faces.

[Mitchellnotes]

Reducing movement speed can hurt a lot of creatures. The despair shadowspawn can decrease it by 20, lethargic blast and ray of frost can also decrease it. Not only can you get a creature stuck, but if you knock it prone, and reduce movement speed, there are a lot of creatures that may not be able to get back up.

Also, charmed can have uses in combat as well

[Rukelnikov]

In my last campaign, I played a Graviturgy Wizard, and I got a lot of mileage out of the spell Immovable Object.

Immovable Object is notable for three reasons - 1) it has a range of touch; 2) it doesn't require an attack roll or saving throw - it just connects [though you can make a Strength check to move it up to 10ft, so it's not entirely immutable]; and 3) it can target an object that is being worn or carried.

Do you see where this is going? You can walk right up to an enemy spellcaster, touch their wand/staff/spellcasting focus, and all of a sudden they can't cast spells with somatic components. Or, you can freeze an enemy's sword in midair. Or, if you're facing a squishy spellcaster, target their robes and leave them unable to do anything. And if you don't want to get that close to the enemy, you can send in your familiar to do it for you, since Immovable Object is a touch spell.

Facing someone in armor? Well, the spell can affect a maximum of 10 pounds, even when upcast, so you're out of luck. Unless you can cast Reduce on them beforehand, thereby making them and their armor weigh 1/8 as much....

The really evil part is that if you upcast the spell to 6th level, the duration becomes permanent, and the DC to move the object increases by 10. So you can turn someone's clothes into their tomb.

The usual strategy is not using it on enemies but on your party, during dowtime cast the permanent version on your clothes so that you (and your party) can move them normally, now nothing can move you, since clothes are all fixed in space for everything, enemy grapples you? Well they are gonna need to spend an action if they want to move you, since your clothes require a strength check to move.

Also, since your clothing is immovable, just leaning against a door means that door is blocked, someone on the otherside would need to move the clothes to open the door.

Put it on your partys weapons and shields, they can leave the weapons floating in midair if they need a free hand, enemies cant disarm the party, since to move the object they need to spend an action, you can use any weapon to do Thor's trick of leaving Mjollnir in a prone enemy so they can't get up.

It gets sillier when you start using stuff like napkins and just carry some in your belt which you can drop as your object interaction. So prone an enemy, and drop a napkin, now they need to spend an action if they wanna move.

[Segev]

The usual strategy is not using it on enemies but on your party, during dowtime cast the permanent version on your clothes so that you (and your party) can move them normally, now nothing can move you, since clothes are all fixed in space for everything, enemy grapples you? Well they are gonna need to spend an action if they want to move you, since your clothes require a strength check to move.

Also, since your clothing is immovable, just leaning against a door means that door is blocked, someone on the otherside would need to move the clothes to open the door.

Put it on your partys weapons and shields, they can leave the weapons floating in midair if they need a free hand, enemies cant disarm the party, since to move the object they need to spend an action, you can use any weapon to do Thor's trick of leaving Mjollnir in a prone enemy so they can't get up.

It gets sillier when you start using stuff like napkins and just carry some in your belt which you can drop as your object interaction. So prone an enemy, and drop a napkin, now they need to spend an action if they wanna move.

I had not thought of that. No idea how many DMs actually would permit it, but it's neat.

As an addendum to the napkins, you could have them set up to only allow your familiar to move them. Keep them in a bag of holding most of the time (so you're not moving them; they're in an extradimensional space and you're just moving the portal), or just keep your familiar out all the time. Your familiar can place the napkins in mid-air to make stairs and the like for the rest of the party!

A variant on this would be to have each party member have their own collection of napkins only they can move, so they can set up stuff for each others' use. Be careful how you carry these, though, lest you make it impossible for your allies to move your body should you be incapacitated or killed.

[Rukelnikov]

I had not thought of that. No idea how many DMs actually would permit it, but it's neat.

This is TO for me, I wouldn't allow that spell, its horribly broken, I'd remove the clause that you can select a group of people who can move it normally if you want to make it permanent. And probably also remove the 24 hr duration option. Idk, its a spell that spits magic items, its gotta cost more than 25gp a piece.

If you want even worse stuff, a Net, by RAW, becomes permanent immobilization, you need to spend an action to attempt to break it or escape from it, but you also need to spend an action to be able to move it, a DM might rule 1 attempt every 2 turns, but by RAW unless you have Action Surge, you cant do both things in the same turn


As an addendum to the napkins, you could have them set up to only allow your familiar to move them. Keep them in a bag of holding most of the time (so you're not moving them; they're in an extradimensional space and you're just moving the portal), or just keep your familiar out all the time. Your familiar can place the napkins in mid-air to make stairs and the like for the rest of the party!

A variant on this would be to have each party member have their own collection of napkins only they can move, so they can set up stuff for each others' use. Be careful how you carry these, though, lest you make it impossible for your allies to move your body should you be incapacitated or killed.

Exactly, that's why I put "and your party" between parenthesis, it would be a problem if you were KOed and your party needed to drag you.

[JackPhoenix]

If you want even worse stuff, a Net, by RAW, becomes permanent immobilization, you need to spend an action to attempt to break it or escape from it, but you also need to spend an action to be able to move it, a DM might rule 1 attempt every 2 turns, but by RAW unless you have Action Surge, you cant do both things in the same turn

It does not, for the same reason the napkin thing doesn't work: it stops moving the moment it leaves your hand. You can't throw the net to catch the enemy, and the napkin won't drop. In addition, the spell specifies the object is immovable when it is "fixed in the air". Worn clothes are not fixed in the air, so it doesn't stop the wearer from being pushed around- you push the wearer, and he takes the clothes with him. And the object itself is not indestructible, or even protected from damage.

[Ortho]

The usual strategy is not using it on enemies but on your party

Yeah, but if you cast it on your enemies you get to see your DM's look of dawning horror.


This is TO for me, I wouldn't allow that spell, its horribly broken, I'd remove the clause that you can select a group of people who can move it normally

...I've just realized that I've completely forgotten about that clause for the entire campaign.

Ah, well, it's usually funnier if neither me nor my teammates can move it either.

[DarknessEternal]

Haste requires a willing target.

[Rukelnikov]

It does not, for the same reason the napkin thing doesn't work: it stops moving the moment it leaves your hand. You can't throw the net to catch the enemy, and the napkin won't drop.

This is true, it would need a rope attacked to the net, so it doesn't stop in midair.


In addition, the spell specifies the object is immovable when it is "fixed in the air". Worn clothes are not fixed in the air, so it doesn't stop the wearer from being pushed around- you push the wearer, and he takes the clothes with him. And the object itself is not indestructible, or even protected from damage.

"You touch an object that weighs no more than 10 pounds and cause it to become magically fixed in place. You and the creatures you designate when you cast this spell can move the object normally. You can also set a password that, when spoken within 5 feet of the object, suppresses this spell for 1 minute.

If the object is fixed in the air, it can hold up to 4,000 pounds of weight. More weight causes the object to fall. Otherwise, a creature can use an action to make a Strength check against your spell save DC. On a success, the creature can move the object up to 10 feet."

The object is fixed in place wherever it is, if its in the air, there's a clause about how much weight it can withstand. Clothes would be fixed in place for every creature and object except you and the other party members, and the spell clarifies that trying to forcefully move one of these objects requires an action.

[Phhase]

It does not, for the same reason the napkin thing doesn't work: it stops moving the moment it leaves your hand. You can't throw the net to catch the enemy, and the napkin won't drop.

That's a miniscule technicality on the flavor of the napkin action. You could, you know. Place it in the right place instead of droping it.