Flanking is imo a bad houserule

[strangebloke]

Flanking is a common houserule. More specifically, the idea that flanking should give advantage.

I also think its a bad one.

I ran with it for about two years, and here's what I noticed:

Flanking rules heavily favor ranged characters, as the risk of getting surrounded and flanked to death is far greater for melee characters and far outweighs the benefits of getting easy advantage.
Flanking makes features such as reckless attack and pack tactics and vow of emnity more or less irrelevant in melee - everyone is going to have advantage no matter what.
This actually makes a lot of melee synergy redundant. Proning an enemy for your ally? Why? They already have advantage.
Because of all this redundancy, you get some silly interactions. For example: one of my players, upon realizing he was about to get swarmed, fell prone. Why? Well the enemy was going to get advantage anyway, and proning would at least give him protection against the ranged attackers.


Tl;dr, it makes the game feel like leapfrog at times and heavily tilts things in a way I don't think people intend. Just have flanking confer a +2 or something.

[JNAProductions]

It's a variant rule in the DMG, so not exactly a houserule.

It is, however, a terrible rule!

I believe AvatarVecna made some decent Flanking rules.
Yeah, here (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?526311-Remixes-Of-Existing-Mechanics).
Dead simple, but not unreasonable.

[Dork_Forge]

I've always used it as a +1, players enjoy it and it doesn't cause any problems, but yeah the advantage isn't a house rule it's a variant.

[strangebloke]

It's a variant rule in the DMG, so not exactly a houserule.

It is, however, a terrible rule!

I believe AvatarVecna made some decent Flanking rules.
Yeah, here (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?526311-Remixes-Of-Existing-Mechanics).
Dead simple, but not unreasonable.

Yeah, that's loads better. +4 is still punishing, probably too punishing for poor melee saps to deal with, but it at least doesn't create warped situations like the one with the guy going prone in the middle of a melee.

[CheddarChampion]

I agree that it's a wonky/bad houserule as-is, though I disagree that it favors ranged characters.

A warlock/archer fighter/archer ranger is normally at a disadvantage in melee range, especially when ganged up on, but the flanking rule puts them at an even bigger disadvantage. Melee characters benefit from flanking about as much as they are made vulnerable by it, and they're more likely to be able to hit (and thus KO/kill) an enemy in melee... potentially un-flanking themselves.

[strangebloke]

I agree that it's a wonky/bad houserule as-is, though I disagree that it favors ranged characters.

A warlock/archer fighter/archer ranger is normally at a disadvantage in melee range, especially when ganged up on, but the flanking rule puts them at an even bigger disadvantage. Melee characters benefit from flanking about as much as they are made vulnerable by it, and they're more likely to be able to hit (and thus KO/kill) an enemy in melee... potentially un-flanking themselves.

I mean, inherently flanking is going to favor the side with more melee creatures, yeah? At least at my tables that's almost always Team Monster.

The first guy to run into melee doesn't get flanking. The second guy does. So even if you run with an 'oops, all melee' party with a barbarian, hexblade, cleric, and monk, 1/4 of them get no flanking benefit. On team monster, if they have 10 guys, only 1 misses flanking. The advantage goes to Team Monster.

I suppose something like animate objects or conjure animals could change the analysis. In fact I guess the flanking variant rule just really favors minionmancy as a whole, doesn't it? Another reason this houserule is not very good.

[Tawmis]

Flanking is a common houserule. More specifically, the idea that flanking should give advantage.


I never brought flanking into my game, for that reason.
If two melee rush a single target the ranged attackers (rangers, casters) suddenly have advantage if each melee claims to stand on the opposite side?
Naw.

As you said, makes things like prone, pack tactics, fairy fire, all null and void, since flanking would give everyone "pack tactics."

Naw, not happening.

[Dork_Forge]

I never brought flanking into my game, for that reason.
If two melee rush a single target the ranged attackers (rangers, casters) suddenly have advantage if each melee claims to stand on the opposite side?
Naw.


This makes it seem like ranged attacks get advantage if others are flanking an opponent, the advantage only applies to the flanking creatures.

There's also no 'claims' to stand on the opposite side, the rule is clearly meant to be used with a tokens/minis on a grid of some sort.

[Schwann145]

A victim of the (over)simplified rules.

Flanking should probably give some sort of advantage in combat, but granting Advantage just breaks things too much.

[DeadMech]

I mean, inherently flanking is going to favor the side with more melee creatures, yeah? At least at my tables that's almost always Team Monster.

The first guy to run into melee doesn't get flanking. The second guy does. So even if you run with an 'oops, all melee' party with a barbarian, hexblade, cleric, and monk, 1/4 of them get no flanking benefit. On team monster, if they have 10 guys, only 1 misses flanking. The advantage goes to Team Monster.

I suppose something like animate objects or conjure animals could change the analysis. In fact I guess the flanking variant rule just really favors minionmancy as a whole, doesn't it? Another reason this houserule is not very good.

The first person rushing up could up could hold action until a partner joined them. If they are low level enough to only have one attack or are perhaps something like a rogue or paladin who can add most of their damage as a rider to a successful attack rather than through multiple iterative attacks.

But otherwise yeah I think you're right about flanking not being particularly well designed.

[animorte]

I've seen many uses of multiple advantage. Like when you have an enemy flanked* that was just hit by guiding bolt* and your vow of enmity* is still active. Triple advantage, I get roll 4 dice instead of just 1 or 2 (with adv).

Of course that is with stacking advantage, which is strictly variant. That's a bit much though, I'll say it myself.

Although, I think it would be worth noting if an opponent does grant you disadvantage on an attack, not only does granting yourself advantage neutralize it, but reasonably (IMO) multiple forms of advantage should still provide you advantage for the attack roll.

[OvisCaedo]

Flanking is also just too easy to accomplish compared to some prior editions. Circling around an enemy in their reach doesn't provoke attacks, and you can make full attacks easily after circling around. It's borderline (but not always) automatic without any real tactical investment, so it can't really afford to give much benefit.

[Gryndle]

Reading some of these posts I have to ask-

Do you not use cover rules? Creatures in melee (allies and enemies) provide cover. EX-the ridiculous example of the flanked guy falling prove to cancel ADV from ranges attackers. There is SO much going wrong here-first being flanked by meleers does not give ranged attackers ADV. Second, unless the positioning is perfect (or they have Sharpshooter which is an entirely different problem), ranged attackers should be having to overcome cover.

Do you not use terrain features? That can heavily impact the ability to flank. So can intelligent monsters.

We use the Adv from flanking rule. The only time we have seen it devolve into a conga-line-of-death as described here is when the DM has been very lazy and put us in a fight with less than inventive monsters, AND in a large space AND with no terrain features. So yeah in a basically featureless "white-room" set up with dumb enemies, flanking is horrible. But to be honest, so is most of D&D.

Flanking can be made easy, but it also locks out a lot of mobility or tactical positioning. And often getting ADV is just not worth giving it up in return. This is when prone-ing, reckless attacker, pact tactics, etc. all become very valuable.

Flanking as ADV is only really useful when the players can focus fire one or two enemies at a time; which is a valuable tactic. But not one that could or should be applied to every fight.

[loki_ragnarock]

Flanking is a common houserule. More specifically, the idea that flanking should give advantage.

I also think its a bad one.

I ran with it for about two years, and here's what I noticed:

Flanking rules heavily favor ranged characters, as the risk of getting surrounded and flanked to death is far greater for melee characters and far outweighs the benefits of getting easy advantage.
Flanking makes features such as reckless attack and pack tactics and vow of emnity more or less irrelevant in melee - everyone is going to have advantage no matter what.
This actually makes a lot of melee synergy redundant. Proning an enemy for your ally? Why? They already have advantage.
Because of all this redundancy, you get some silly interactions. For example: one of my players, upon realizing he was about to get swarmed, fell prone. Why? Well the enemy was going to get advantage anyway, and proning would at least give him protection against the ranged attackers.


Tl;dr, it makes the game feel like leapfrog at times and heavily tilts things in a way I don't think people intend. Just have flanking confer a +2 or something.
I also don't like the flanking = advantage rule, but I'd like to point out that simply taking the dodge action negates it in that form.

A +2 is a +2 is a +2: there is no mitigating that. I'm not sure that would serve as a meaningful improvement.

[Chronos]

I think fundamentally, the problem isn't with flanking per se (though it does bring it to the forefront (and backfront)). Fundamentally, the problem is with rolling all circumstantial bonuses and penalties in combat into the advantage/disadvantage, and further making it so that multiple sources of each never matter. In a real battle, both sides should, realistically, be pursuing every edge they can: When possible, fight with the sun at your back, and from the high ground, and from a fortification, and while you're well-fed and well-rested but the enemy is tired and hungry, and with superior morale, and so on. But with the (dis)advantage system, as soon as you have one source of advantage for your side and one source of disadvantage for the enemies, there's never any point in pursuing any more.

Now, this does depend on just how easy it is to get advantage. If it's very difficult, then it'll be rare indeed to have more than one source, and so the stacking rules (or rather, lack thereof) are mostly irrelevant. And flanking makes it very easy, so the lack of stacking comes up more often. But even without flanking, it's still possible for the lack of stacking to come into play, and it's always jarring when it does.

[Kane0]

I believe only the creatures that are doing the flanking actually get the flanking bonus, but either way I dont like advantage and go with +1 instead.

[strangebloke]

The first person rushing up could up could hold action until a partner joined them. If they are low level enough to only have one attack or are perhaps something like a rogue or paladin who can add most of their damage as a rider to a successful attack rather than through multiple iterative attacks.

But otherwise yeah I think you're right about flanking not being particularly well designed.
This does work, and I let my players do this. For a while I was actually letting extra attack work on held actions too, which did make for a kind of fun everyone-attacks at once deal. But regardless, its generally true that the more people you have, the better flanking is going to be for you.

Flanking is also just too easy to accomplish compared to some prior editions. Circling around an enemy in their reach doesn't provoke attacks, and you can make full attacks easily after circling around. It's borderline (but not always) automatic without any real tactical investment, so it can't really afford to give much benefit.
yeah, this is part of why its a bad variant.

Reading some of these posts I have to ask-

Do you not use cover rules? Creatures in melee (allies and enemies) provide cover. EX-the ridiculous example of the flanked guy falling prove to cancel ADV from ranges attackers. There is SO much going wrong here-first being flanked by meleers does not give ranged attackers ADV. Second, unless the positioning is perfect (or they have Sharpshooter which is an entirely different problem), ranged attackers should be having to overcome cover.
I know that ranged attackers got advantage, I also know that melee provides cover. In the example the guy is falling prone to give disadvantage to ranged attackers. Its maybe not the most important thing, but it does work.


Do you not use terrain features? That can heavily impact the ability to flank. So can intelligent monsters.

We use the Adv from flanking rule. The only time we have seen it devolve into a conga-line-of-death as described here is when the DM has been very lazy and put us in a fight with less than inventive monsters, AND in a large space AND with no terrain features. So yeah in a basically featureless "white-room" set up with dumb enemies, flanking is horrible. But to be honest, so is most of D&D.

Flanking can be made easy, but it also locks out a lot of mobility or tactical positioning. And often getting ADV is just not worth giving it up in return. This is when prone-ing, reckless attacker, pact tactics, etc. all become very valuable.

Flanking as ADV is only really useful when the players can focus fire one or two enemies at a time; which is a valuable tactic. But not one that could or should be applied to every fight.
Why is it "dumb" for an enemy to use the conga line of death? And how do terrain features prevent flanking? Can't they just surround you at any point wider than 15'? Even if you're in a melee block of 2-3 people, it doesn't seem like terrain this actually prevents flanking, since its very easy in general to walk around a 'front line' of melee combatants without taking OAs.

I also don't like the flanking = advantage rule, but I'd like to point out that simply taking the dodge action negates it in that form.

A +2 is a +2 is a +2: there is no mitigating that. I'm not sure that would serve as a meaningful improvement.
I mean, you can mitigate it by dodging still. The effect of the dodge is larger than a +2 in all but the most extreme of cases.

I think fundamentally, the problem isn't with flanking per se (though it does bring it to the forefront (and backfront)). Fundamentally, the problem is with rolling all circumstantial bonuses and penalties in combat into the advantage/disadvantage, and further making it so that multiple sources of each never matter. In a real battle, both sides should, realistically, be pursuing every edge they can: When possible, fight with the sun at your back, and from the high ground, and from a fortification, and while you're well-fed and well-rested but the enemy is tired and hungry, and with superior morale, and so on. But with the (dis)advantage system, as soon as you have one source of advantage for your side and one source of disadvantage for the enemies, there's never any point in pursuing any more.

Now, this does depend on just how easy it is to get advantage. If it's very difficult, then it'll be rare indeed to have more than one source, and so the stacking rules (or rather, lack thereof) are mostly irrelevant. And flanking makes it very easy, so the lack of stacking comes up more often. But even without flanking, it's still possible for the lack of stacking to come into play, and it's always jarring when it does.

Advantage is fine as long as its restricted to things that are generally pretty rare/conditional. The situation where you have many redundant sources of advantage - a blind/paralyzed enemy who's being recklessly attacked for example - is pretty rare and unlikely to come up. It's a problem in theory but not one that's very common.

The problem is that flanking giving advantage makes these situations common, because flanking happens all the time.

[Keltest]

I happen to like flanking. It makes combat more tactical for melee warriors than just "get in melee range, roll D20 until the enemy is dead."

With flanking, they have to be aware of just charging off into the middle of a fight for the potential of being surrounded, and it makes it so that even low CR monsters without much attack bonus can still get in some damage if theres enough of them. Suddenly fighting with your back to the wall, or in a choke point so that they cant get around you easily, is extremely important when youre outnumbered.

[da newt]

I've played w/ the flanking rule quite a bit, and while I agree it's not very realistic, it also doesn't really cause any big issues. It does mean there are fewer melee misses - that's about it. I prefer flanking to provide a +2 to hit - it seems more fair / realistic to me, but ADV doesn't really throw off the balance of combat either.

The thing that I've seen used very sporadically and inconsistently are the rules for cover and also DISADV for ranged attacks if an enemy is within 5' and you aim for a target further away.

Lastly - if you prefer theater of the mind, I guess you can just ignore all these complications. Some folks like tactical positioning, some folks prefer the KISS combat method.

[stoutstien]

My personal rule is that flanking allows an ally to enter the reach of a foe without provoking an AO which is another rule I use.

[Mastikator]

IMO I think Flanking makes combat less tactical, it takes away several combat options by rendering them pointless. I play in games with flanking and DM without flanking, I think without is just much better.

[Keltest]

IMO I think Flanking makes combat less tactical, it takes away several combat options by rendering them pointless. I play in games with flanking and DM without flanking, I think without is just much better.

How so? I play with flanking, and my barbarian still uses reckless and my rogue still uses steady aim, because sometimes trying to position yourselves to be opposite another melee party means that the monsters go after the squishies, or just slap you around a bunch as you move past them. And even then, forming into groups like that means assuming fireball formation, which can interfere with your spellcasters if theyre launching friendly fire spells.

[J-H]

Yes, I agree with the OP. It's bad and I don't use it.

[TyGuy]

Flanking is a common houserule. More specifically, the idea that flanking should give advantage.

I also think its a bad one.

I ran with it for about two years, and here's what I noticed:

Flanking rules heavily favor ranged characters, as the risk of getting surrounded and flanked to death is far greater for melee characters and far outweighs the benefits of getting easy advantage.
Flanking makes features such as reckless attack and pack tactics and vow of emnity more or less irrelevant in melee - everyone is going to have advantage no matter what.
This actually makes a lot of melee synergy redundant. Proning an enemy for your ally? Why? They already have advantage.
Because of all this redundancy, you get some silly interactions. For example: one of my players, upon realizing he was about to get swarmed, fell prone. Why? Well the enemy was going to get advantage anyway, and proning would at least give him protection against the ranged attackers.


Tl;dr, it makes the game feel like leapfrog at times and heavily tilts things in a way I don't think people intend. Just have flanking confer a +2 or something.
Yes to all of this.
But the concept behind flanking is nice, to spice up an otherwise tactically flat system for melee characters.
So that's why there are better flanking rules.
Instead of granting advantage, grant +2 to attack roles. It's basically anti half-cover.
Instead of incentivizing the conga line, make it so someone that is flanked cannot contribute to the flanking bonus. Now a line of XOXO provides no bonus for ally or foe because right X is flanked and can't help left X to get the bonus, and same goes for the O's.

Edit: I will stamp this seal of approval as well. My players are super beer & pretzel casual and anything remotely complicated will throw them off. They get these flanking rules stronger than resting rules. And it allows sources of advantage to continue to shine. I'm pleased with this house rule.

[Lunali]

I mean, inherently flanking is going to favor the side with more melee creatures, yeah? At least at my tables that's almost always Team Monster.

In my experience, DMs tend to prefer smaller numbers of enemies as it makes less work for them. This means that at worst you get a 3:2 matchup of melee, which doesn't really favor anyone as both sides can only flank one of their opponents. The few times when the numbers have been more skewed toward the monsters, they also typically had pack tactics, so it didn't matter.

[Waterdeep Merch]

I like the idea of flanking, but dislike how it interacts with advantage. I've offered to use it to my players, which they voice some interest in doing so, but they tend to forget it quickly, rendering it moot.

It seems weird to me that people have been giving flanking advantage to ranged attacks. You're right that it causes problems, but why were you doing it in the first place? Maybe that isn't as obvious as I figured.

I've been toying with using multiple instances of advantage/disadvantage in a strategic way, which could greatly benefit flanking here (and a few other tactics). It's more complex and possibly fiddly, but I like the basic idea written in Battle Century G enough that I'm going to suggest it in my next session zero. It works like this-

You can have multiple sources of advantage and/or disadvantage, cancelling each other out on a one to one basis. For every extra advantage you're left with beyond the first, add +2 to your roll. For every extra disadvantage beyond the first, subtract -2.

Including this with (melee-only) flanking rules seems like it could dramatically change how players approach fights, leading to more attempts to find advantage, hence better tactical thinking and possibly roleplaying in combat. I'll have to see if my players agree with that sentiment.

[Ganryu]

My table has it as just melee range, and turns it to +1 to crit range. That way advantage is still rare in combat, it doesn't step on barbarian toes, and can still be meaningful. We've noticed a lot more barbarian use since it was implemented. It used to be advantage, but yeah, advantage should NOT be given easily in combat, as it just makes features that give it, which tend to be huge features, useless. Melee needs all the help it can get vs range.

[Mastikator]

How so? I play with flanking, and my barbarian still uses reckless and my rogue still uses steady aim, because sometimes trying to position yourselves to be opposite another melee party means that the monsters go after the squishies, or just slap you around a bunch as you move past them. And even then, forming into groups like that means assuming fireball formation, which can interfere with your spellcasters if theyre launching friendly fire spells.

In my experience flanking means that 80% or more of melee attacks have advantage, not only does that render class abilities that grant advantage pointless but it also eclipses tactics and turns it into "flank and also don't get flanked". Flanking may be good at your table but it's never done anything positive in my experience.

[Keltest]

In my experience flanking means that 80% or more of melee attacks have advantage, not only does that render class abilities that grant advantage pointless but it also eclipses tactics and turns it into "flank and also don't get flanked". Flanking may be good at your table but it's never done anything positive in my experience.

Ok, but why is it doing that? Are your PCs outnumbering enemies that badly all the time? Even if they want to my 5-person group can only get one target flanked most of the time simply because there are only 3 melee capable party members, one of them is a rogue and doesnt like to risk himself in the open, and one is a cleric who doesnt use his weapon attacks very often as it is.

[Zhorn]

Not fond of flanking advantage.
If players at my table want easy advantage, the Help Action has been pointed out. Plus they have a slew of other class/race abilities in the party to get advantage.

[stoutstien]

Ok, but why is it doing that? Are your PCs outnumbering enemies that badly all the time? Even if they want to my 5-person group can only get one target flanked most of the time simply because there are only 3 melee capable party members, one of them is a rogue and doesnt like to risk himself in the open, and one is a cleric who doesnt use his weapon attacks very often as it is.

You don't need to outnumber the enemies to use the DMG flanking option. All you need is an ally somewhere on the immediate opposite side of the target. Seeing how usually PCs tend to focus fire that's all it takes to leverage it. Both allies don't even need to be able to attack for this to work so you could use familiars or other disposable HP bags. Also the rules only dictate that the target needs to be seen not the ally so invisible type features basically means you can use a pact of the chain imp or whatnot to swoop in with little risk.

RaW melee combat already has a slew of issues and flanking just compounds them.

[False God]

I've always used it as a +1, players enjoy it and it doesn't cause any problems, but yeah the advantage isn't a house rule it's a variant.

Similar, I've done it as a +2. PCs/NPCs can also get "Surrounded" (4 or more enemies) to double the bonus and apply it to all attackers. They can also be "Overwhelmed" (all 8 squares occupied by an enemy) to make it a +6. Large enemies who take up multiple squares adjacent to a target do not count as multiple enemies and can prevent you from being or gaining Overwhelmed.

You must also maintain proper facing with your flanking allies, especially those at range.

You cannot be "Surrounded" or "Overwhelmed" by characters at range, but they can gain the +2 bonus at more angles.

[Keltest]

You don't need to outnumber the enemies to use the DMG flanking option. All you need is an ally somewhere on the immediate opposite side of the target. Seeing how usually PCs tend to focus fire that's all it takes to leverage it. Both allies don't even need to be able to attack for this to work so you could use familiars or other disposable HP bags. Also the rules only dictate that the target needs to be seen not the ally so invisible type features basically means you can use a pact of the chain imp or whatnot to swoop in with little risk.

RaW melee combat already has a slew of issues and flanking just compounds them.

If youre invisible you dont need to flank though, since you already have advantage? Ditto familiars, who cant typically actually attack on their own anyway but rather take the Help action to... give advantage.

[stoutstien]

If youre invisible you dont need to flank though, since you already have advantage? Ditto familiars, who cant typically actually attack on their own anyway but rather take the Help action to... give advantage.

But the invisible ally grants advantage to their friends and the familiar can now hide/dodge, which also doesn't stop flanking from working, so it means they get both get help 2.0 just by being there. This also means the standard helping familiar can potentially help one ally and then flank for another.

[Keltest]

But the invisible ally grants advantage to their friends and the familiar can now hide/dodge, which also doesn't stop flanking from working, so it means they get both get help 2.0 just by being there. This also means the standard helping familiar can potentially help one ally and then flank for another.

In my experience, trying to use a familiar like that, invisiblity and dodge or not, will just get it killed. They just dont have the stats to actually hang out in combat like that. You also need to be within 5' of a creature to Help somebody against it. If your DM is letting you get away with doing stuff like that, i would suggest that the DM should be playing the monsters a bit more reactively.

[stoutstien]

In my experience, trying to use a familiar like that, invisiblity and dodge or not, will just get it killed. They just dont have the stats to actually hang out in combat like that. You also need to be within 5' of a creature to Help somebody against it. If your DM is letting you get away with doing stuff like that, i would suggest that the DM should be playing the monsters a bit more reactively.

How would you suggest most NPCs dealing with an invisible imp who is hidden? With a +5 stealth and flight the target basically needs to walk into the imp. If they have to help at least it would expose them but with flanking it's a pretty low risk source if advantage.

[Keltest]

How would you suggest most NPCs dealing with an invisible imp who is hidden? With a +5 stealth and flight the target basically needs to walk into the imp. If they have to help at least it would expose them but with flanking it's a pretty low risk source if advantage.

Well frankly, i would probably say that a creature cannot be hidden if its flanking. The DM decides what circumstances are appropriate for hiding, and flanking comes from forcing them to engage you. I might alternatively say that a hidden creature does not count as an ally for the purposes of flanking, since theyre sitting there cowering and being unnoticed instead of, you know, fighting. Not exactly "ally" behavior even if you happen to know theyre there.

But baring that, the easy solution is just move so your back is to a wall, or an ally. No need to actually deal with the mystery imp immediately, just find a buddy.

[stoutstien]

Well frankly, i would probably say that a creature cannot be hidden if its flanking. The DM decides what circumstances are appropriate for hiding, and flanking comes from forcing them to engage you. I might alternatively say that a hidden creature does not count as an ally for the purposes of flanking, since theyre sitting there cowering and being unnoticed instead of, you know, fighting. Not exactly "ally" behavior even if you happen to know theyre there.

But baring that, the easy solution is just move so your back is to a wall, or an ally. No need to actually deal with the mystery imp immediately, just find a buddy.

But that's kinda my point how flanking just makes melee combat worse and it's starting in a precarious position.

[Keltest]

But that's kinda my point how flanking just makes melee combat worse and it's starting in a precarious position.

Define "worse" here for me please, because i generally consider adding an extra layer of things to consider, like relative positions, to be an improvement.

[stoutstien]

Define "worse" here for me please, because i generally consider adding an extra layer of things to consider, like relative positions, to be an improvement.
Forcing melee combatants into either hugging walls or formations that make them easy picking for AoEs when they already tend to deal less and receive more damage in the first place is pretty much worse. If you want to add more positioning and tactical combat opinions they should make melee more interesting and impactful.

[Keltest]

Forcing melee combatants into either hugging walls or formations that make them easy picking for AoEs when they already tend to deal less and receive more damage in the first place is pretty much worse. If you want to add more positioning and tactical combat opinions they should make melee more interesting and impactful.

I mean, i'd like to think that "dont let yourself get surrounded" is good general advice even without specific flanking rules for it. Controlling how many people can attack you and from what directions is already smart play for a front line fighter. Or anybody, really.

[Keravath]

I've seen many uses of multiple advantage. Like when you have an enemy flanked* that was just hit by guiding bolt* and your vow of enmity* is still active. Triple advantage, I get roll 4 dice instead of just 1 or 2 (with adv).

Of course that is with stacking advantage, which is strictly variant. That's a bit much though, I'll say it myself.

Although, I think it would be worth noting if an opponent does grant you disadvantage on an attack, not only does granting yourself advantage neutralize it, but reasonably (IMO) multiple forms of advantage should still provide you advantage for the attack roll.

Using flanking is a Variant rule since it is published as an option to consider in the DMG. That said, flanking as written is a terrible rule and I advise any DM I meet to steer well clear of it. If you want to give some bonus for playing tactically and ganging up on opponents, a +1 due to flanking is actually more than enough.

As for Stacking Advantage - as far as I know it isn't a variant at all - I don't think it is published in any official book - which makes it a homebrew house rule and not a variant.

[Mastikator]

Ok, but why is it doing that? Are your PCs outnumbering enemies that badly all the time? Even if they want to my 5-person group can only get one target flanked most of the time simply because there are only 3 melee capable party members, one of them is a rogue and doesnt like to risk himself in the open, and one is a cleric who doesnt use his weapon attacks very often as it is.

When I DM I do not use flanking. The combats I run sometimes have more enemies than PCs, sometimes fewer. I have had a positive experience not running flanking, I think the game is better without it from behind the DM screen.

In my experience as a player I've seen flanking have a negative effect on combat (already said why), but then I'm not the DM and can not control what the DM puts on the battlefield can I?

I also realize that every table is different, some tables may benefit from flanking, I've never been in such a table. I always think it has had a negative effect.

[nickl_2000]

Flanking is a common houserule. More specifically, the idea that flanking should give advantage.

I also think its a bad one.

I ran with it for about two years, and here's what I noticed:

Flanking rules heavily favor ranged characters, as the risk of getting surrounded and flanked to death is far greater for melee characters and far outweighs the benefits of getting easy advantage.
Flanking makes features such as reckless attack and pack tactics and vow of emnity more or less irrelevant in melee - everyone is going to have advantage no matter what.
This actually makes a lot of melee synergy redundant. Proning an enemy for your ally? Why? They already have advantage.
Because of all this redundancy, you get some silly interactions. For example: one of my players, upon realizing he was about to get swarmed, fell prone. Why? Well the enemy was going to get advantage anyway, and proning would at least give him protection against the ranged attackers.


Tl;dr, it makes the game feel like leapfrog at times and heavily tilts things in a way I don't think people intend. Just have flanking confer a +2 or something.

Our table uses flanking, but it is modified. If you are flanking, you get a +1 to your attack. You can only be flanking with a melee weapon. However, if you have advantage for some reason (prone, FF, pack tactics, hidden, whatever), then you don't get the +1 for flanking.

After having used it for 4+ years, I really like it. It makes melee fighters more tactical, it gives a reason for the striker to stay close in combat, and it's not overpowered.

[Skrum]

I've often wished the flanking rules didn't give advantage. As the OP said, it blurs too many tactics together. Quite a few class features give advantage, which flanking greatly devalues.

But, I still think this generally helps the players. They play with high tactics, often to a meta level. Monsters I play to their intelligence, which frequently enough isn't smart enough to get flanking. Or, they get dropped before their ally gets a turn.

[KorvinStarmast]

It is, however, a terrible rule!
As presented, yes.

Yes, I agree with the OP. It's bad and I don't use it.
Neither do I. We had it in a campaign a few years ago and it only benefits the side of the battle that has a numerical advantage.

[tokek]

I play in one online game with flanking and it has a few effects.

It benefits big sacks of hit points over high AC. Monsters tend to be like that but Barbarians are even more like that. Melee gish builds are hardest hit as they largely rely on high AC and that is the thing that works less well with easy ways to get advantage against them.

It makes AOE spells far more awkward to use as the melee gets very mixed up very fast.

Mobility classes and feats such as Monk, Rogue and Mobile feat are exceptionally good. The can use the Barbarian as an anvil to move in, strike with advantage, then move back out to avoid getting flanked in return. Lucky feat is even better than usual, if you get hit with advantage you have even more dice to pick from to try to make it miss (3 instead of the usual 2), its probably still best kept in reserve for making saves so better is still not the best use of it.

I don't love flanking and I don't hate it. Its still a fun game and I'm still enjoying it.

I would probably prefer a modifier rule over flanking as published but its a quick and dirty rule for a ruleset full of quick and dirty rules.

[Pex]

I prefer no flanking but play in a game with it. We're not suffering for it. I find it adds to the tactical sense of positioning a creature's/PC's speed matters because they might not have enough movement to get into flanking position. Personal bias playing a Battlesmith Artificer it gives more value to my Steel Defender. It's an extra ally on the battlefield I can maneuver to give myself or another player advantage. Applying disadvantage to one of an enemy's attacks is good on its own, but negating their flanking advantage denies the enemy a benefit the party still gets to enjoy.

[stoutstien]

I mean, i'd like to think that "dont let yourself get surrounded" is good general advice even without specific flanking rules for it. Controlling how many people can attack you and from what directions is already smart play for a front line fighter. Or anybody, really.

So it comes full circle. Getting into a good melee position is an issue, keeping the enemies there is the second one, and survival in that position is the third. Flanking does nothings to address any of this. If you are adding rules it should at least address something other than supercharging tactics that are already stronger. (Mass conjuring, kiting, area denial,..)

[strangebloke]

Define "worse" here for me please, because i generally consider adding an extra layer of things to consider, like relative positions, to be an improvement.

I don't have a problem with flanking as a thing - I've already mentioned a lot of other ways to implement it that I believe are good.

The problem with the form of flanking presented as a variant in the DMG is that it interacts poorly with many other abilities and ultimately removes more tactical elements than it adds.

[RazorChain]

I use the optional flanking rules from the DMG but the attacker only gets advantage if attacking from the back. Also I use the rule where you can use a reaction to change facing so it makes it harder to flank. This means it's much harder to flank than just enemies stand at the opposing sides.

This makes the game tactical and the PC and their enemies try to avoid being flanked while using the opportunity to flank others. It doesn't invalidate things like reckless attack, pack tactics or help action from a familiar. This also makes the disengage cunning action much more valuable for a rogue as they can often slip between enemies to flank.

[Kane0]

For reference, this conversation has occurred before

https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?603830
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?587264
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?582824
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?556179
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?466106
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?400762
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?394696

[Elder_Basilisk]

Chalk me up as another who likes flanking but doesn't like rolling it into advantage.

My entire 5e experience has been with the flanking=advantage optional rule and while I don't appreciate how easy it makes it to get advantage (the comparison to Pathfinder/3.x is a little misleading, yes you could get sneak attack on a flank in those systems but the way opportunity attacks worked made it a little more difficult to obtain a flank and less painful to move out of a typical flank). However more importantly, I don't like the "advantage is the only situational bonus" so that as soon as the bard casts faerie fire, there's no point in maneuvering for advantage and if you can easily get flank, there's no point in casting faerie fire. I want there to be advantages to be gained based on position, but I'd rather not have it crowd out all the other advantage granting mechanics. The +2 to hit but no advantage suggestion sounds a lot better to me.

[strangebloke]

For reference, this conversation has occurred before

https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?603830
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?587264
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?582824
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?556179
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?466106
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?400762
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?394696

Sorry for beating the dead horse.

I just had my most recent DM pull this on me and I know its a commonly used variant (Critical Role uses it) and it bothers me.

[Kane0]

Not so much a dead horse as pointing it out for others that may not have been around since the beginning, can help having some historical context.

[Witty Username]

I don't buy that flanking makes melee characters worse.
Many enemies like shadows, goblins and kobolds already have sources of advantage that are more consistent.
Some characters like barbarian already make this trade willingly.
Ranged characters don't benefit from flanking on their attacks.

On note, the dropping prone thing is dumb as it gives disadvantage on all attack roles made by the prone character. But furthermore, even if it works as described, it is something problematic for ranged characters which doesn't really exist in the game otherwise.

[Zhorn]

I don't buy that flanking makes melee characters worse.
My understanding of the "flanking makes melee characters worse" concept is it devalues the features and abilities melee characters could use to generate advantage.
It is essentially turning them into dead features, where they are taking up space on your characters level progression, but not actually supplying any meaningful benefit since everyone can opt to flank instead, not costing a resource consumption or needing a dedicated action.

[Kane0]

Also, giving basically everything a slightly different pack tactics is a direct buff to most monsters, the majority of which happen to be melee attackers. So melee PCs are forced to contend with that on a regular basis where ranged characters are not (unless dragged into melee).

[Mastikator]

I don't buy that flanking makes melee characters worse.
Many enemies like shadows, goblins and kobolds already have sources of advantage that are more consistent.
Some characters like barbarian already make this trade willingly.
Ranged characters don't benefit from flanking on their attacks.

On note, the dropping prone thing is dumb as it gives disadvantage on all attack roles made by the prone character. But furthermore, even if it works as described, it is something problematic for ranged characters which doesn't really exist in the game otherwise.

I'd say it makes them better if they don't have ways to generate advantage, flanking is like reckless attack on everyone, which makes barbarians stupid, it's one of their strongest thing and you just gave it to everyone. How would sorcerers feel if I gave wizards metamagic and sorcery points? Pretty bad I imagine.

[Chaos Jackal]

It's also a lot deadlier for melee. Now, in pretty much every combat that involves more than a couple melee enemies (and that's a lot of combats), melee are basically always being attacked with advantage, given how easy it is to position for flanking. It also makes the weakness of many melee against swarms even more grating; you already had issues dealing damage and handling the enemies moving around, now you're literally being put through the meat grinder the moment your DM decides to run a bigger group of opponents. Melee might be the ones benefitting the most out of flanking (I'd say that's at least debatable, but I don't wanna address it right now), but they suffer even more than they benefit.

And that's before you even get to how flanking makes an already not very tactical game even more shallow. Practically everything whose goal is to grant advantage to a melee character or monster, whether it's Reckless, Vow of Enmity or just plain old shoving, is thrown out the window. Advantage might not be hard to get, but everyone automatically getting it with little to no effort doesn't exactly offer layers of complexity, rather it removes them.

Flanking is a good idea, but as described in the DMG it's a frustrating mechanic that makes numerous abilities meaningless and forces DMs to either cut down greatly on melee opponents or risk killing their melee PCs every other fight.

[Monster Manuel]

If players at my table want easy advantage, the Help Action has been pointed out.

My houserule solution to the flanking dilemma is to allow creatures to use Help as a bonus action when they and an ally are flanking an opponent. This works brilliantly in my head, but in fairness, I've never actually played it out at a table...

I like that it still allows for the tactical maneuvering that flanking adds to combat, but doesn't make it automatic. Flanking is something that a player can take action to grant to someone else, rather than a passive benefit. You have to make a further tactical choice; is it worth my bonus action to give the paladin Advantage this round?

I would still allow rogues to get sneak attack on a threatened opponent, just as-written; I don't require flanking for it. Otherwise, it seems like a small up-tick in complexity in exchange for stepping on far, far fewer toes.

[Zhorn]

My houserule solution to the flanking dilemma is to allow creatures to use Help as a bonus action when they and an ally are flanking an opponent. This works brilliantly in my head, but in fairness, I've never actually played it out at a table...
ie: doing as Mastikator warned about before in stealing a signature ability from one class and blanket applying it to everyone


I'd say it makes them better if they don't have ways to generate advantage, flanking is like reckless attack on everyone, which makes barbarians stupid, it's one of their strongest thing and you just gave it to everyone. How would sorcerers feel if I gave wizards metamagic and sorcery points? Pretty bad I imagine.

In this instance, Help as a Bonus Action is a 3rd level Mastermind Rogue ability (Master of Tactics), and somewhat a signature of the subclass.

There's a lot of subclass abilities, and it's unrealistic to expect everyone to memorize all them. But still, it's always a good idea to skim through classes when thinking up houserules and understand when/how they might be treading on the territory of existing RAW.

[sambojin]

I'd probably give +1 to-hit and +1 damage for flanking, with no particular bonus to shooting (unless you're doing it at a 5' distance, thus at disadvantage, unless you can even this back with advantage gained somehow else).

Makes melee combatants a little stronger if used in concert with others, makes it more fun being a protector of party members, may even make taking an AoO worthwhile for positioning for flanking if you're going to nova, but doesn't mess up too much otherwise (note: things like Moon Druid being able to flank with a Summon by lvl3. They still tend to provide that enemy cover due to their size. If your DM ever remembers that rule. Conjure Animals is still terrifying though)

[loki_ragnarock]

There's got to be other pitches for flanking that aren't about accuracy bonuses, surely? Busting bounded accuracy isn't something I find particularly compelling from a design perspective. And making tank PCs significantly less tanky seems like yet another way to screw your melee PCs. There's gotta be something that can flip that script.

I mean, I guess forcing a morale check would require a morale system be put in place... or forcing the flanked being to roll an extra die when making morale checks while flanked and taking the worse result? I kind of like that; it's not player facing so it doesn't hurt the characters that are there for melee, but it gives a tactical advantage to melee PCs what do want to flank. But there've got to be other angles.

Penalties (-5, or something) to passive perception/investigation as the target's faculties are fully engaged not getting skewered? Maybe a little niche.

No line of sight past the creatures flanking, to similarly model being overwhelmed? Less of a problem for your tanky types, but an added layer of problems for your ranged types. Bit of a flip of the script, I kinda like it therefor.

+2 to damage instead of accuracy? Simple numerical bonus without the potential to break bounded accuracy.

There must be an angle that works without disadvantaging the characters that are there to work in melee.

[Emongnome777]

My experience with flanking (gaining advantage) isn't like many of these posts. Full disclosure, I was in a 3 year campaign that used it, went from 1st to 14th (PotA, only gained 14th at end of campaign). We also used battlemaps in person then converted to VTT in mid-2020 for obvious reasons. So we always played with a grid. Lastly, we had a large group, usually 6 but 7 players for the last 8 months at least.

First, I wonder about how other tables play when I see flanking described as always or often. Our encounters were a mixed bag in terms of number of enemies, but most of the time we were outnumbered. We had 2 dedicated melee combatants and two others that would join kinda infrequently. Neither side got flanking that much, I'd say closer to 20% of all melee attacks were done with advantage from flanking. I'll note that even into late tier two, we did occasionally fight the CR 1/8 cultist, so a few scattered enemies were one-and-done. I even took the telekinetic feat (wizard) to help move allies into flanking position. We also started combat further than 30 feet from the enemies (DM's way of doing things).

The way most combats went involved moving into position, getting to make melee attacks on round 2. Both sides made efforts to flank, but a creature died after maybe 1 turn happening with flanking. Then the melee combatants moved to the next enemy or had one try to move into a better flanking position. Even boss battles had flanking happen infrequently due to splitting attention or the enemies being quite mobile.

Also, using flanking with advantage generally sped up combat without affecting the overall outcome. Our combats were typically 4-8 rounds, so anything to speed them up was a good thing!

Lastly, we didn't have many other abilities to generate advantage like a barbarian's reckless attack (the rogue mostly stayed range so steady aim was on the table but never used). I agree with the arguments that it takes away from using other means to gain advantage, but it never came up too much for us (the bard had faerie fire and used it).

I'm DMing a ToD campaign (3 sessions in) and I changed the flanking to +2 from advantage just to see how it goes. So far, it hasn't changed much, but we only have 4 characters (5 if you count the dragon rider's pet dragon). This has been an interesting conversation, though, and I've learned a lot as usual. I appreciate everyone's insights particularly from those that have used it extensively.

[Kane0]

-Snip-

Curious, how often did terrain play a factor? Were at least some fights against hordes? Was flanking as a tactic commonly used or only with some creatures and not others?

[Snails]

I have been playing in a long running campaign, with flanking providing Advantage. IME all the criticisms offered are 99% off base.

Certainly the barbarian does mind the flanking, as it means he will does not have to suffer the downsides of Reckless this round. Certainly Pack Tactic is still great because those monsters can usually use numbers to deny flanks while gaining Advantage for themselves.

As for "you get some silly interactions", that point is arguably true, in some instances that have not come up very often. But overall you get fewer silly interactions, such as PCs getting surrounded and not caring when their are no negatives to getting flanked -- to our table that would seem computer gamey in a very bad way.

YMMV.

[Emongnome777]

Curious, how often did terrain play a factor?
Terrain was always a factor, though it was sometimes limited to a few pillars in a room, for instance. We almost always seemed to start so far away from the enemies, so it took time to engage in melee (a full round of movement prior to attacks).


Were at least some fights against hordes?
We did fight enemies that numbered 10+, mostly due to our party size, I suspect. The DM tended to break up larger groups into different tactics during a combat, so we didn't typically have large numbers swarm a single character. Some would attack the back (even circling around dungeon rooms to "flank" as a general battle tactic).


Was flanking as a tactic commonly used or only with some creatures and not others?
It was used by almost everyone that fought in melee. PotA didn't have much in the way of mindless creatures, such as skeletons & zombies. Those are ones I see that don't know to flank. Even animals know to flank, at least ones that are trained or have to fight to earn a meal. Many combats were with mixed enemies (ranged / melee), so melee enemies weren't often in overwhelming numbers. Some would also avoid the melee scrum and go after the squishy back line (I should know, I was the squishiest!).

I think our melee attackers could've made better movement choices that would've made flanking happen more. For instance, one character moves 20ft to an enemy and attacks without moving around the enemy. Another character moves 30ft to attack, but can't move into flanking position. Had the first character used 30ft to move around the enemy, then the 2nd would've had flanking. This happened several times. The ranged allies would focus on anyone attacking the melee allies, so those would die pretty quickly, often before flanking was established or very soon after. We did have maybe 3-5 instances of the "congo line effect", where there were 4+ in a line trying to set up flanking. That's over 3 years (playing monthly, 6-8 hours per session), so it didn't happen too much.

Sorry, I'm rambling a bit. Reading other posts, I understand the concerns, but it never made combat worse for us. I'm eager to see how well the +2 does. It's helped me as DM a little bit as I've had kobolds in my ToD campaign. That +2 stacks with pack tactics, so them nasty buggers are even a little meaner! It's been fun for me and I'm glad we use it, however I would never turn down a game that doesn't use flanking!

[Kane0]

Sorry, I'm rambling a bit. Reading other posts, I understand the concerns, but it never made combat worse for us. I'm eager to see how well the +2 does. It's helped me as DM a little bit as I've had kobolds in my ToD campaign. That +2 stacks with pack tactics, so them nasty buggers are even a little meaner! It's been fun for me and I'm glad we use it, however I would never turn down a game that doesn't use flanking!

No no, this is good input and helps combat the echo chamber effect.

[Miele]

We always used flanking in our games, it worked out just fine, adding strategic movement, for example sometimes PCs taking an OA to move in a better and safer place instead of getting flanked and using forced movement spells or abilities to help or prevent such situations.
Generally speaking it happens here and there, but it's not the norm, because it's melee only.

[Witty Username]

How would you suggest most NPCs dealing with an invisible imp who is hidden? With a +5 stealth and flight the target basically needs to walk into the imp. If they have to help at least it would expose them but with flanking it's a pretty low risk source if advantage.

Isn't that the same as the imp using the help action though?

[Kane0]

I think a reasonable houserule addition to make would be that if you are being flanked you cannot also provide a flank. That would counteract the conga effect.

[Elves]

Flanking makes features such as reckless attack and pack tactics and vow of emnity more or less irrelevant in melee - everyone is going to have advantage no matter what.

This one is the problem. Flanking works great in prior editions where it's one numerical bonus among many. It doesn't work when it's fulfilling the singular buff condition that 5e gameplay is centered on, obviating many player abilities. As a variant rule, it should simply be a +1 or +2 bonus. The slight skew in 5e's expected math is far less disruptive than the huge changes to the meta that come with the advantage version.


Either way, if you're using a grid (I don't know why they tried to design 5e as if people don't use grids, since I don't know in what situation you would be able to roll dice but not draw some gridlines on paper), consider using the 3e/4e version where flanking is for people across from a target, not just adjacent to the same target. That makes it harder to achieve.

[Mastikator]

I have been playing in a long running campaign, with flanking providing Advantage. IME all the criticisms offered are 99% off base.

Certainly the barbarian does mind the flanking, as it means he will does not have to suffer the downsides of Reckless this round. Certainly Pack Tactic is still great because those monsters can usually use numbers to deny flanks while gaining Advantage for themselves.

As for "you get some silly interactions", that point is arguably true, in some instances that have not come up very often. But overall you get fewer silly interactions, such as PCs getting surrounded and not caring when their are no negatives to getting flanked -- to our table that would seem computer gamey in a very bad way.

YMMV.
The barbarian doesn't not suffer the downsides of Reckless, he just has a dead class feature on level 2. The other class feature Danger Sense is all he has. The fighter also has advantage and his 2nd level class feature is going strong.



I think a reasonable houserule addition to make would be that if you are being flanked you cannot also provide a flank. That would counteract the conga effect.

If your ally is flanked your best strategy is to counter-flank one of the flankers, neither side will have flanking and you will have a conga line. In my opinion that is undesirable and I'd rather just skip flanking.

-
If you want to generate advantage for your melee allies and yourself such an option already exists: shove prone. That is a tactical option. Flanking doesn't add tactical options in the game, it adds one but subtracts other tactical options, in my opinion the tactical side is diminished.

[loki_ragnarock]

Another angle, maybe:

Flanked creatures can't make opportunity attacks. Flanking creatures may take opportunity attacks against flanked creatures when they move within their threatened range.

This angle takes it out of a simple accuracy bonus (so that you don't have a wolf pack throwing down with advantage *and* a +x bonus) while still potentially increasing lethality. It has the potential to add tactical depth by serving to lock things down; more of a problem for ranged characters looking to get away than for tank characters happy to keep enemies adjacent. Provides a means to nullify itself in the event a conga line of death emerges.

Unlike the other things I pitched earlier, I kind of like the shape of this one.

[follacchioso]

Another option is to play with Stacked Advantages.

A double Advantage is resolved by rolling two dice, then adding +1 to the total (as rolling three dice would be too much). Similarly, double Disadvantage take the lower result and subtract 1. Rogues only get Sneak Attack if they have at least one Advantage and no Disadvantage.

This system has the benefit of fixing other situations, apart from the flanking rule. Your party companion would think twice before falling prone when surrounded by enemies, as they would get a further bonus (we also play with an optional rule that requires a Dex check for standing up when prone in melee, to avoid an opportunity attack).

I've been playing with this system for over a year, and it works quite well. I think it comes from Grit and Glory, among other rules.

[Kane0]

Flanked creatures can't make opportunity attacks. Flanking creatures may take opportunity attacks against flanked creatures when they move within their threatened range.



I like your thinking, looks like its worth a test run.

[Spiritchaser]

So, I don’t use flanking, it invalidates some important abilities and makes Shepard druids (or anything with summons) stronger than they already are.

That said, I have played in a campaign where the DM used flanking rules.

He sweated enough details on the encounters to make positioning into a bit of a chess game… maybe more like othello actually. It didn’t always work out but it did make some (quite a few) encounters more interesting than they would otherwise have been.

I wouldn’t use the rules myself, but they can be fun, provided everyone is reasonable with them. I imagine his reaction to a character wh fell prone in melee would be fairly definitive.

[JNAProductions]

Another angle, maybe:

Flanked creatures can't make opportunity attacks. Flanking creatures may take opportunity attacks against flanked creatures when they move within their threatened range.

This angle takes it out of a simple accuracy bonus (so that you don't have a wolf pack throwing down with advantage *and* a +x bonus) while still potentially increasing lethality. It has the potential to add tactical depth by serving to lock things down; more of a problem for ranged characters looking to get away than for tank characters happy to keep enemies adjacent. Provides a means to nullify itself in the event a conga line of death emerges.

Unlike the other things I pitched earlier, I kind of like the shape of this one.

Yee. This is definitely worth trying-not sure if it'd work well in practice, but at least on paper I like the looks of it!

[Psyren]

We use flanking and it's been fine. Shove prone/Help/RA/etc are still valuable because flanking has exact positioning/terrain requirements while those don't.

And yes it favors mobs of little monsters, which (gasp) makes positioning and use of terrain important for the party melee, while giving the casters another reason to stay away from the frontline, both of which are intended.

[Pex]

Reckless Attack is not rendered useless. A barbarian doesn't always want to use it. With flanking he still attacks with advantage and now not everyone is attacking him with advantage. Reckless Attack is still relevant for when the barbarian is unable to flank someone for whatever reason.

The one instance where it could matter is DM dependent. The dependence is how often the DM purposely has the bad guys attack the barbarian precisely because they'll have advantage due to Reckless Attack where if the barbarian did not do it the bad guys would have attacked someone else.

[Snails]

The barbarian doesn't not suffer the downsides of Reckless, he just has a dead class feature on level 2. The other class feature Danger Sense is all he has. The fighter also has advantage and his 2nd level class feature is going strong.

Nah. The Barbarian still uses Reckless, he just uses Reckless a bit less often. The Barbarian has two "themes". One is "I hit a lot for good damage." The other is "I do not take much damage in the thick of a fight." Flanking For Adv ends up helping the second a bit more than the first. It is not as if the Barbarian is Reckless all the time even with the Core Rules, so Flanking can help his offense, too.

There are reasons the designers chose to not add Flanking to the Core Rules. There are reasons the designers chose to forego Stacked Advantage. They were trying to do the casual players a favor (albeit many non-casual players also prefer this). I respect that design choice, but I find it makes the game a bit bland in the eyes of some players used to handling more complexity on a tactical map.

The problem is less that the Flanking rules itself is bad, but that we lack rules for Stacked Advantage. It becomes pretty easy for PCs to get 2-3 different Advantage conditions if they put their minds to it. If you care about the level of detail that the Fighter, Paladin, Rogue seemed to get a bigger benefit from Flanking, there are small tweaks that will shift things closer to even.

[Elves]

When comparing flanking that grants advantage vs. flanking that grants +1-+2 to hit, the key point is: the slight skew in 5e's expected math from an extra +1 or +2 bonus is far less disruptive to the existing meta than the version that grants trivially achievable advantage to all melee.

[Kane0]

When comparing flanking that grants advantage vs. flanking that grants +1-+2 to hit, the key point is: the slight skew in 5e's expected math from an extra +1 or +2 bonus is far less disruptive to the existing meta than the version that grants trivially achievable advantage to all melee.

Especially if you rule that advantage replaces the +1 or +2 rather than stacks with it

[Snails]

When comparing flanking that grants advantage vs. flanking that grants +1-+2 to hit, the key point is: the slight skew in 5e's expected math from an extra +1 or +2 bonus is far less disruptive to the existing meta than the version that grants trivially achievable advantage to all melee.

The designer's opted for a Procrustean rule regarding Adv/Disadv in order to enforce a degree of simplicity. It was to discourage themselves from getting too clever, and keep the rules weight within certain bounds.

IMHO, 3e suffered from Way Too Much Of A Good Thing -- it is not any particular rule that was bad, but the collective weight of so many pretty well designed rules that added together into something that was hard on many players/DMs. The Adv/Disadv rules are disincentive to start adding a lot of "realism" here, there, everywhere.

That said, if one is willing to shoulder a little bit more complexity, it is not difficult to make the game more nuanced and tactical. Getting the math good enough is not hard. Making a more robust Stacked Adv/Disadv is pretty straightforward, and it will bend the Flat Math a little without breaking it.

[PhoenixPhyre]

The designer's opted for a Procrustean rule regarding Adv/Disadv in order to enforce a degree of simplicity. It was to discourage themselves from getting too clever, and keep the rules weight within certain bounds.

IMHO, 3e suffered from Way Too Much Of A Good Thing -- it is not any particular rule that was bad, but the collective weight of so many pretty well designed rules that added together into something that was hard on many players/DMs. The Adv/Disadv rules are disincentive to start adding a lot of "realism" here, there, everywhere.

That said, if one is willing to shoulder a little bit more complexity, it is not difficult to make the game more nuanced and tactical. Getting the math good enough is not hard. Making a more robust Stacked Adv/Disadv is pretty straightforward, and it will bend the Flat Math a little without breaking it.

Not just simplicity. There was, in the beginning, a reaction against the idea of being tactical as a virtue at all. Each edition reacts against the previous ones--in this case, there was an (internal) backlash against the "tactical miniatures" feeling of 4e. You were supposed to just stop at "ok, I've got one source of advantage, so I'll just do my thing and let someone else go". Instead of jockeying for ALL THE ADVANTAGES. There was an intentional deprioritization of turn optimization and "tactical depth".

Does that still apply with nu-WotC? :shrug:. But I saw Dragon podcasts where JC literally said about what I said up there. Just with slightly different words. So it wasn't just simplicity, but an affirmative "tactical depth is not what we're going for" aim.

But I very much agree with your 2nd paragraph.

[Psyren]

I for one think you can get to "tactical depth" without needing to tally up and tracking a dozen different sources of +1 bonuses every fight. Or at the very least, you can get to enough tactical depth, that you achieve engagement without sacrificing accessibility.

[animorte]

ie: doing as Mastikator warned about before in stealing a signature ability from one class and blanket applying it to everyone

There's a lot of subclass abilities, and it's unrealistic to expect everyone to memorize all them. But still, it's always a good idea to skim through classes when thinking up houserules and understand when/how they might be treading on the territory of existing RAW.

This is true of an awful lot of rules. The specifics can be discovered on how certain rules are expected to work in some rather unexpected areas. Only those of us that have enough time to cross reference are able find the details, and even then it still depends entirely on where you're looking and what you're looking for. Very different people in very different scenarios will happen upon entirely different details.

[Zhorn]

This is true of an awful lot of rules. The specifics can be discovered on how certain rules are expected to work in some rather unexpected areas. Only those of us that have enough time to cross reference are able find the details, and even then it still depends entirely on where you're looking and what you're looking for. Very different people in very different scenarios will happen upon entirely different details.
It's one of the major benefits to posting ideas on forums before implementation, getting more eyes to look over your idea in hopes of catching something you missed.
The problem arises though when someone posts an idea and then just runs it direct to implementation in spite of any feedback received, the "my precious homebrew" cases.

Person 1: "Here's an idea I have"
Person 2: "This will negatively interact with [X]"
Person 1: "I will use the idea unchanged anyway"It can defeat the whole purpose of posting to a forum

I think everyone should try their hands at homebrewing and experimenting with houserule ideas, it's a good way to learn about how things exist in RAW and learning what areas impact what.
But at the same time I'd hope more people would also learn restraint in such areas also. In design it can be just as important regarding what you don't touch as it is to what you do. Learning that having features that cannot "do it all" is good for the game as it leaves design space and territory for other features to exist and shine in.

[Elves]

Especially if you rule that advantage replaces the +1 or +2 rather than stacks with it


The designer's opted for a Procrustean rule regarding Adv/Disadv in order to enforce a degree of simplicity. It was to discourage themselves from getting too clever, and keep the rules weight within certain bounds.


I for one think you can get to "tactical depth" without needing to tally up and tracking a dozen different sources of +1 bonuses every fight.

I'm not saying to change the system --
I'm saying within the current system, flanking works better if it's one of the rare exceptions that does grant a bonus.

If flanking grants a small bonus, all that happens is that the accuracy curve changes slightly.
If flanking grants advantage, it makes advantage in melee ubiquitous and renders many player abilities, including class features, redundant.

The devs realized that the advantage version is problematic, which is why it's a variant rule.
But the bonus version is minimally disruptive and will slot more easily into existing games.

[RazorChain]

I just recommend using the facing rule instead of the flanking rule. That means you only get advantage when you attack somebody in the back, some creatures can see all around themselves so you can't get advantage this way against them. Also you get a reaction to change your facing if you can see your opponent, making it harder to attack you in the back.

Of course you have to use a bit of common sense when you grant advantage then this works pretty well like no runaround attacks. When fighting one to one you can't simply run around your opponent to get advantage from attacking your foe in the back.

I'm used to this from other system that grant you a bonus from attacking somebody in the back.

[Elder_Basilisk]

I can't believe people are seriously suggesting, "flanking is too complicated and problematic; let's introduce facing instead."

But since people are suggesting that, facing suffers from almost all of the problems that flanking for advantage does (trivializing advantage, unable to stack with other advantage granting conditions), and adds a bunch of new ones too. Even the "use common sense, you can't run around behind the opponent to get advantage in a one on one duel" stipulation points to the host of problems that will arise. RAW, you can definitely run around behind the opponent. So why don't you get advantage? If you can adjust facing out of turn to match, does it cost you your reaction? (So now, adjusting your facing means you can't take an opportunity attack, cast shield, use polearm master, take advantage of riposte or use one of the bardic college reactions). If we assume that when you run around behind the monster, it turns to follow, does that mean that ranged attackers can now get the "shoot in the back" advantage?

[Demonslayer666]

I agree, and we use flanking as +2.

I don't like the idea of flanking an opponent as doing nothing, but advantage seems like too much.

[Miele]

Technically speaking, flanking gives advantage in reality as well, if the fight is 2v1.
When it grows in terms of number of people involved, several different things may or may not happen.
In my opinion 5e combat is better than old d&d, a tad more dynamic, but not by much. It still feels static and it could use some options to shake the melee combat a bit.
Flanking DMG rule is not perfect, but it's something. Maybe we'll houserule a few more things to keep advantage more scarce, but I'm not a huge fan of static bonuses.

[strangebloke]

I don't really understand the idea that flanking makes combat more dynamic.

It's another rule, sure, but its a rule that makes lots of features irrelevant in many situations. Reckless attack might still get used, but the main result of flanking as a rule is that it will get used less. The difference between features that are nominally pretty similar, like Fighting Spirit and Precision Attack, becomes vastly different since one stacks with flanking and the other doesn't.

And what I think is telling here, is that people are saying that flanking works for their table because it rarely comes up. Can a mechanic be said to be good because a DM scrupulously makes it very hard to use? And really, I'm skeptical that either the players or the enemies are really trying hard to flank their opponents. Summons are a very easy source of flanking, and are already some of the strongest tools present in the game. Heck, you can do it with a familiar, and you're generally happy if the enemy is attacking them instead of you. Is every fight taking place in a 10-foot wide corridor?

Again, this isn't theoretical. I played with this for two years. If this isn't a problem at your table... well, fine. But I don't really see how it enhances anything, or why a single +2 bonus is hard to keep track of. 3.5 became hard to track because there were many bonuses that changed from attack to attack. Having exactly one such modifier shouldn't(?) be that hard I think.

[Miele]

Not a question of "hard to track", I simply happen to enjoy the simplicity of advantage/disadvantage and leave it at that.
Not to mention that 4 kobolds with a +2 hit/dmg become a murder sentence vs anyone in tier 1 if this static bonus stacks with pack tactics.

We do use flanking, we get sometimes flanked, all that happens is that more damage will be thrown around, which makes us more careful about resources and rests and stuff like that. It's not that every fight we get to form a nice line of flank me / flank you, nope, far from that, but our fighter and our paladin make use of it when the situation is advantageous (heh).

Having a table that is as far as possible from min-maxing, helps as well. Our PCs are functional, but not optimized for damage, nor action economy (except yours truly, I just enjoy it more I guess).
Two melee, two ranged, a support/healer... it's not that we can flank more than one creature, two if we put someone more at risk than they should be.
If it's team monster outnumbering us, well... up to us to change the tide of the battle in our favour, this includes avoiding getting flanked, or worse surrounded.

As I said, I find it a decent rule, it adds something for us, it's also okay that is optional.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Here's a thought (one I'm not wedded to, but...):

Movies and fiction generally are full of people who are unable to fight as a coordinated unit (and thus benefit strongly from outnumbering their opponents/flanking them). In fact, it's often noted (realistically or not) that having a bunch of people who aren't used to fighting together trying to attack the same person at the same time often benefits a skilled defender--the attackers get in each other's way.

Building on this, the default rule makes sense as a manifestation of tropes--it takes training or nature or a special something (in the view of the fiction/genre) to successfully "flank" someone. The game represents that special thing as Pack Tactics and Sneak Attack (the latter being more selfish--taking advantage of a moment's distraction rather than creating openings for other people). So just being next to someone, by this logic, shouldn't give any special benefit.

That is, the game's proper representation of the tropes (if not the reality) of flanking granting a benefit is Pack Tactics. Wolves get it (by nature). Kobolds work together culturally. Thugs (the NPC) have it because they tend to work in packs/groups.

So flanking as a "generic capability/rule" shouldn't exist. Question mark?

[Psyren]

Here's a thought (one I'm not wedded to, but...):

Movies and fiction generally are full of people who are unable to fight as a coordinated unit (and thus benefit strongly from outnumbering their opponents/flanking them). In fact, it's often noted (realistically or not) that having a bunch of people who aren't used to fighting together trying to attack the same person at the same time often benefits a skilled defender--the attackers get in each other's way.

Building on this, the default rule makes sense as a manifestation of tropes--it takes training or nature or a special something (in the view of the fiction/genre) to successfully "flank" someone. The game represents that special thing as Pack Tactics and Sneak Attack (the latter being more selfish--taking advantage of a moment's distraction rather than creating openings for other people). So just being next to someone, by this logic, shouldn't give any special benefit.

That is, the game's proper representation of the tropes (if not the reality) of flanking granting a benefit is Pack Tactics. Wolves get it (by nature). Kobolds work together culturally. Thugs (the NPC) have it because they tend to work in packs/groups.

So flanking as a "generic capability/rule" shouldn't exist. Question mark?

So (non-kobold) fighters, paladins and rangers wouldn't know how to flank? Only rogues?



And what I think is telling here, is that people are saying that flanking works for their table because it rarely comes up.

Not sure which "people" you're referring to here but I at least said no such thing. We flank all the time.

[Kane0]

Here's a thought (one I'm not wedded to, but...):

Movies and fiction generally are full of people who are unable to fight as a coordinated unit (and thus benefit strongly from outnumbering their opponents/flanking them). In fact, it's often noted (realistically or not) that having a bunch of people who aren't used to fighting together trying to attack the same person at the same time often benefits a skilled defender--the attackers get in each other's way.

Building on this, the default rule makes sense as a manifestation of tropes--it takes training or nature or a special something (in the view of the fiction/genre) to successfully "flank" someone. The game represents that special thing as Pack Tactics and Sneak Attack (the latter being more selfish--taking advantage of a moment's distraction rather than creating openings for other people). So just being next to someone, by this logic, shouldn't give any special benefit.

That is, the game's proper representation of the tropes (if not the reality) of flanking granting a benefit is Pack Tactics. Wolves get it (by nature). Kobolds work together culturally. Thugs (the NPC) have it because they tend to work in packs/groups.

So flanking as a "generic capability/rule" shouldn't exist. Question mark?

So it should be more like a fighting style, subclass feature or feat bullet? That is already partially the case (see Totem Barbarian)

[PhoenixPhyre]

So it should be more like a fighting style, subclass feature or feat bullet? That is already partially the case (see Totem Barbarian)

Correct, presuming that thought passes muster (which I'm still unsure on[1]). And anyone else could stand next to an enemy, which allows those trained in taking advantage of that fact (ie rogues) to benefit from Sneak Attack. But that's lesser than truly coordinated working together (aka proper "flanking").

[1] parentheticals in parentheticals[2]
[2] and nested footnotes...but really, I don't use flanking for the reasons outlined in the OP. Doesn't add enough depth for what it takes away.

[Kane0]

It should be noted that the major difference between flanking and pack tactics is that the former requires you be on opposite sides the target creature and the latter merely have another within 5'. So pack tactics is still a small upgrade from standard flanking in that there is less stringent positioning required (good for tight spaces, lots of cover, etc). But that's pretty minor given 5e's relatively lenient movement.

Edit: I could see flanking being a good fighting style. It would only benefit you and not the other flanker, rogues and barbarians have access to sneak attack and wolf totem to make up for the lack of native access to fighting style, and monks have their own suite of features for moving, stunning and proning. Rangers would love it with their ways of getting pets and summons, and a melee accuracy boosting fighting style is a niche still largely empty that doesn't stack with advantage.

[Keltest]

I think flanking would be a terrible fighting style because it competes with options that are always active (for the correct equipment) and need no special triggers.

[loki_ragnarock]

Here's a thought (one I'm not wedded to, but...):

Movies and fiction generally are full of people who are unable to fight as a coordinated unit (and thus benefit strongly from outnumbering their opponents/flanking them). In fact, it's often noted (realistically or not) that having a bunch of people who aren't used to fighting together trying to attack the same person at the same time often benefits a skilled defender--the attackers get in each other's way.

I've been studiously not making reference to Jean-Claude Van Johnson for this entire thread, but now I just can't not.*

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yemfA6wBuiQ



*I might have already. My memory isn't so great.


Edit: I could see flanking being a good fighting style. It would only benefit you and not the other flanker, rogues and barbarians have access to sneak attack and wolf totem to make up for the lack of native access to fighting style, and monks have their own suite of features for moving, stunning and proning. Rangers would love it with their ways of getting pets and summons, and a melee accuracy boosting fighting style is a niche still largely empty that doesn't stack with advantage.
... that's not bad, actually.

[Yakk]

Make "Flanked" a status condition.

You are "Flanked" if you end your turn surrounded (until the end of your next turn).

Attacks on Flanked creatures have advantage.

This has the positional play of standard flanking, but it is no longer automatic. Most importantly, it opens up counter-play; when a flank is threatened, you can maneuver. Similarly, preventing a foe from moving opens them up to being flanked.

It also makes OAs tempting to soak (for both sides). Because you can just move away when you are surrounded (usually) at the cost of taking OAs from all adjacent foes. Depending on the situation, that might be better than staying exposed.

Also, all of those neat abilities that grant advantage? Grant things that this rule doesn't, because you don't have to wait for it to work. So they aren't redundant.

Finally, all of those "push back" abilities that big bad monsters have? Work great with this rule -- the monster can push the PCs out of flanking position.

[Kane0]

I think flanking would be a terrible fighting style because it competes with options that are always active (for the correct equipment) and need no special triggers.

No worse than Protection, Interception or Two-Weapon. A Flanking style would require A) an ally across from the enemy and B) a melee attack instead of particular equipment being in use, action expenditure or certain actions from the enemy in question.
Yes, it would be reliant on a creature other than yourself. I don't think that's a deal-breaker in a party-based game featuring many ways of getting said other creatures even if you aren't counting potential 'special cases' like Echo Knights and Dancing swords.


Make "Flanked" a status condition.
You are "Flanked" if you end your turn surrounded (until the end of your next turn).
Attacks on Flanked creatures have advantage.

You may want to specify melee attacks getting advantage.

[Witty Username]

I would submit that Reckless attack gets used more often when the flanking rules are applied. Barbarians tend to be advised to not use reckless when outnumbered because of the downsides of granting monsters advantage. Flanking negates that downside, allowing the barbarian to be reckless to their hearts content.

Pack tactics allows for greater defensive positions since it allows formation fighting to overcome flanking as does fighting spirit.

The flanking optional rule makes these features better, not worse.

[Kane0]

I would submit that Reckless attack gets used more often when the flanking rules are applied. Barbarians tend to be advised to not use reckless when outnumbered because of the downsides of granting monsters advantage. Flanking negates that downside, allowing the barbarian to be reckless to their hearts content.

Fair. If enemies are going to have advantage against you regardless, you may as well go reckless for your own advantage especially if you don't have a flanking buddy.



Pack tactics allows for greater defensive positions since it allows formation fighting to overcome flanking as does fighting spirit.

Fair. Adding a comparable mechanic reliant on positioning leads to more focus on positioning and counterplay.



The flanking optional rule makes these features better, not worse.

This doesn't follow. The features haven't changed, what has changed is that there is now one extra means of gaining advantage outside of (and competing with) them. The positioning factor is doing the hard work here.

[Mastikator]

I would submit that Reckless attack gets used more often when the flanking rules are applied. Barbarians tend to be advised to not use reckless when outnumbered because of the downsides of granting monsters advantage. Flanking negates that downside, allowing the barbarian to be reckless to their hearts content.

Pack tactics allows for greater defensive positions since it allows formation fighting to overcome flanking as does fighting spirit.

The flanking optional rule makes these features better, not worse.

??? Flanking doens't negate the downsides of reckless attack, it just negates reckless attack. If a barbarian is flanking and therefore not using reckless, then they. are. not. using. reckless.
If they wouldn't have used it but are benefiting from flanking then they are still not using reckless.
If they would have used reckless but are benefiting from flanking then they are now not using reckless.

They're not "benefiting from reckless without the downside" if they don't use it. They're benefiting from flanking. Flanking has eclipsed reckless. Flanking- a thing everyone can use, has replaced the one of the strongest things barbarian on the barbarian's class features.

If you put a barbarian next to any other melee martial they are a net loser, those other classes are also benefiting from flanking, but the fighter still has his action surge which stacks fine with flanking, the paladin still has their divine smite which stacks fine with flanking. What does the barbarian have? Diddly squat.

[Kane0]

Proposed compromise: Flanking grants +2 to melee attack rolls which is superceded by advantage. Which is to say, you have +2 to hit when flanking unless you get advantage from something, then you use that instead.

Optionally, add in that neat idea from before that a flanked creature cant make opp attacks.

[RazorChain]

I can't believe people are seriously suggesting, "flanking is too complicated and problematic; let's introduce facing instead."

But since people are suggesting that, facing suffers from almost all of the problems that flanking for advantage does (trivializing advantage, unable to stack with other advantage granting conditions), and adds a bunch of new ones too. Even the "use common sense, you can't run around behind the opponent to get advantage in a one on one duel" stipulation points to the host of problems that will arise. RAW, you can definitely run around behind the opponent. So why don't you get advantage? If you can adjust facing out of turn to match, does it cost you your reaction? (So now, adjusting your facing means you can't take an opportunity attack, cast shield, use polearm master, take advantage of riposte or use one of the bardic college reactions). If we assume that when you run around behind the monster, it turns to follow, does that mean that ranged attackers can now get the "shoot in the back" advantage?

5e gives a lot of movement alongside making attacks. RAW doesn't account for everything, you can't pin an opponent unless taking a feat....so is this impossible for the normal human? my group they dogpiled an enemy to take him alive and by RAW they could only restrain him with a grapple...nothing else. There are no rules for called shots......so last session when the bad guy was going to throw a torch at barrels of smokeless powder should I've denied the Warlock to try to eldritch blast the torch from his hands?

If you shoot somebody in the back why wouldn't you get an advantage? In fact the dmg states "The DM can also decide that circumstances influence a roll in one direction or the other and grant advantage or impose disadvantage as a result." So when I want to use common sense to disallow advantage from a runaround attack because it's stupid and doesn't take into account that the real world combat doesn't take turns, it is within RAW.


Here's a thought (one I'm not wedded to, but...):

Movies and fiction generally are full of people who are unable to fight as a coordinated unit (and thus benefit strongly from outnumbering their opponents/flanking them). In fact, it's often noted (realistically or not) that having a bunch of people who aren't used to fighting together trying to attack the same person at the same time often benefits a skilled defender--the attackers get in each other's way.

Building on this, the default rule makes sense as a manifestation of tropes--it takes training or nature or a special something (in the view of the fiction/genre) to successfully "flank" someone. The game represents that special thing as Pack Tactics and Sneak Attack (the latter being more selfish--taking advantage of a moment's distraction rather than creating openings for other people). So just being next to someone, by this logic, shouldn't give any special benefit.

That is, the game's proper representation of the tropes (if not the reality) of flanking granting a benefit is Pack Tactics. Wolves get it (by nature). Kobolds work together culturally. Thugs (the NPC) have it because they tend to work in packs/groups.

So flanking as a "generic capability/rule" shouldn't exist. Question mark?

That's true but then again fighting multiple opponents is harder (my experience for SCA viking fighting and martial arts) and getting attacked from behind is tantamount to just dying or getting hit, you don't have eyes in the back and you can't block or parry.

Then again we are talking about DnD here so when do the characters stop fighting unskilled opponents? Level 2? 3?

[Mastikator]

Proposed compromise: Flanking grants +2 to melee attack rolls which is superceded by advantage. Which is to say, you have +2 to hit when flanking unless you get advantage from something, then you use that instead.

Optionally, add in that neat idea from before that a flanked creature cant make opp attacks.

The compromise I run is that when I DM I just don't use flanking, but when I'm a player I don't complain about flanking.
:smalltongue:

[Snails]

Again, this isn't theoretical. I played with this for two years. If this isn't a problem at your table... well, fine. But I don't really see how it enhances anything, or why a single +2 bonus is hard to keep track of. 3.5 became hard to track because there were many bonuses that changed from attack to attack. Having exactly one such modifier shouldn't(?) be that hard I think.

I apologize for not answering your concerns precisely and completely. I would agree that a +2 bonus for flanking is better rule IMO (for those who do not mind tracking such things). I do strongly believe that the various (mostly) genuine concerns about Flanking Adv. do not make that rule "bad", and the bad-ness is much exaggerated.

[Snails]

Movies and fiction generally are full of people who are unable to fight as a coordinated unit (and thus benefit strongly from outnumbering their opponents/flanking them). In fact, it's often noted (realistically or not) that having a bunch of people who aren't used to fighting together trying to attack the same person at the same time often benefits a skilled defender--the attackers get in each other's way.

...

So flanking as a "generic capability/rule" shouldn't exist. Question mark?

First of all, I like that you are asking about what qualities in the game experience we are trying to achieve.

Second of all, that is really two questions. Who qualifies as a Skilled Attacker? Who qualifies as a Skilled Defender? This has the whiff of something that may get too complicated for many tables...

IMNSHO the default rules should presume the PCs are highly competent. To do otherwise may accidentally introduce the equivalent of the "3e Feat Tax", that is only negatively affects the players who happen to be playing frontliners. How this is handled with monsters I care less about, the idea of some monsters simply having abilities (e.g. Pack Tactics) by DM handwaving is already a known thing.

[Yakk]

You may want to specify melee attacks getting advantage.
Nope.

If you are Flanked (end your turn surrounded), you can't effectively defend against any attacks. That is intentional. All attacks get advantage.

Shutting down a flank becomes quite important, defensively. It makes combat less static, unlike standard Flanking which makes combat more static.

[Dork_Forge]

Nope.

If you are Flanked (end your turn surrounded), you can't effectively defend against any attacks. That is intentional. All attacks get advantage.

Shutting down a flank becomes quite important, defensively. It makes combat less static, unlike standard Flanking which makes combat more static.

This just feels like it would make things worse to be honest, it's incredibly punishing and would push players to stay ranged or immensely fear hordes of mooks.

Add on to that creatures that get benefits from advantage (like Shadow Demons) and things get real nasty.