Party members Alex, Bart, and Caroline are in combat with a Drow, in that turn order (A, B, C, D).   Alex uses the help action on the Drow, being within 5ft.  If Bart chooses not to attack on her turn, can Caroline attack with advantage because of Help?  If Bart decided to attack, would Bart have gotten advantage instead?  Does a specific ally need to be named to benefit from the advantage?  Or is it first-to-attack?
122907
I am aware that usually one has to specify who is to benefit from one's Help action. However, when it comes to using it in combat,  by Jeremy Crawford says:     If you use the attack-aiding option in Help, the next ally who attacks the target gets the benefit.   However, maybe one wants to help a specific ally (e.g. enable a rogue to Sneak Attack) but initiative puts them much later in the round. Still, for some other tactical reasons, it might make next to no sense for the remaining allies to avoid attacking that target in the meantime.  Of course, one could argue that, as long as you can describe reasonably how you provide help to exactly that one specific ally without influencing the rest of the fight, something like this should be allowed. But I wonder if there is any explicit mention of this in the rules.  I've been referred to this extremely similar question:   My main point of interest is the issue that is raised in  and the comments below it. Since this discussion is about a year old, maybe the remaining unclarities could be solved by more recent publisher's comments?  Thanks a lot for your help! (Horrible pun not intended.)
19688
This example is a somewhat simplified version of what happened during the last game I DMed for a bunch of friends. A party of PCs was trudging through the woods when they happened upon a very small outpost in a clearing containing hostile elves. The rogue goes and checks it out, and sees two hostiles patrolling, one near the northern edge of woods (Elf1), one on a stone platform about 15 ft from the southern edge of the forest (Elf2).   The rogue goes back and relays the information. If the warrior of the party would simply trudge into the middle of the clearing, all enemies would be aware of a threat and the enemy wouldn't be surprised. They want to start combat with an edge, so they formulate a plan that would cause the enemies to be surprised: the rogue will go stealth up to the northern edge of the clearing, wait for Elf1 to get close, and sneak attack him. When that happens (it's a small clearing, so it's within his vision) the warrior in the party, who will attempt to sneak up to the southern edge of the forest, will run for Elf2 and beat him up. They both roll great stealth checks and head to their positions. So far so good.   The rogue waits for Elf1 to get close and attacks with his short sword. Time for combat, and this is where things got confusing, and where a discussion broke out between players:  According to page 189 of the PHB:   Determine surprise — Both Elf1 and Elf2 are surprised, because they didn't notice any threat. Establish positions — Should be clear from the description of the situation above. Roll Initiative — The warrior gets a 20, Elf2 a 15, the rogue a 5, and Elf1 a 1. Take Turns — The warrior can go first. However, as the party discussed before, he was supposed wait until he sees the rogue hit Elf1. The rogue's attack is what started the combat encounter, yet the attack hasn't been resolved yet due to his poor initiative roll. And .   Option 1: Some people at the table argue that he can't yet run into the clearing because that would pose a clear and noticeable threat and the elves would not be surprised. He should wait for the rogue to hit Elf1 and use the Ready action on his first turn. This option seems to punish the warrior for rolling well on his initiative.  Option 2: As determining surprise occurs before the initiative roll according to page 189 of the PHB, I would argue that the rules support that the warrior should be able to run up to Elf2 and hit him, without breaking surprise. The fact that the attack that caused the surprise hasn't yet been resolved and that this goes somewhat counter against their agreed plan of waiting for the rogue to hit Elf1, makes this option incredibly unintuitive though.  Which of these options is the correct one? Or is there a hidden option 3?
69510
Most of the time, it should be really easy to determine who is my ally and who is not. The people who try to kill me are most likely my foes, whereas the people who entered the dungeon with me are probably my allies.   But sometimes it’s not that simple. What if one of my party members got replaced by an evil doppelganger, who plans to kill me in the near future? What if one of my allies infiltrated the court of the evil king and I accidentally have to fight her, while she is (unbeknownst to me) under the effect of a  spell? What if a character fell in love with the BBEG and just wants to save him from himself, while the BBEG hates the character and actively tries to murder him?  Most spells and abilities that affect others specify the targets as “creatures” or “willing creatures”. Some explicitly affect allies only. That’s why I want to know, how to determine who’s allied with whom. Do I have to think that someone is my ally for someone to count as my ally? Does someone else have to believe to be my ally in order to count? Do both of us have to agree on being allies? Is there an objective observer who determines who’s allied? Can Person A be the ally of Person B, while Person B is not the ally of Person A?  There are many examples for spells/abilities that care about allies, among others:   the Exalted Champion feature from the  (SCAG, p. 132-133), that grants allies within 30 feet advantage on Wisdom saving throws. the Inspiring Surge feature from the  (SCAG, p. 128), that allows one or two allies within 60 feet to make a melee weapon attack as a reaction.   With features like this, you could accidentally affect someone who’s not actually your ally. You could fail to affect someone who is actually your ally, but you don’t know it (yet). Or you could affect someone who doesn’t want to be affected (because they don’t want to be allied with you). This all depends on the interpretation of the word “ally”. I’m not sure if "ally" is a defined game term (but I don’t think so), or if I have to rely on the dictionary definition. That’s why I want to ask:  How do I determine who’s allied with whom?
69604
This situation came up last week during our session. The party was facing a pretty difficult mob of enemies and one of the party members was knocked unconscious. Seeing the situation worsening, one of the players decided to use the  (DMG p. 197). In the text, it says:     The rod then instantly transports you and up to 199 other willing creatures you can see to a paradise that exists in an extraplanar space.   At first glance I thought this was actually a pretty good time to use the rod. The question came up though, what about the party member who is unconscious? In the end I made the call that the character went with them to keep things moving and more fun.  However, I'm feeling like back pedaling a bit and notifying my players that for future uses, the line "... willing creatures..." will be more strictly enforced as I don't feel like an unconscious creature could be willing.  Did I handle this the right way?
25972
There are a number of skills that provide benefits to a player "and their allies".  Do any of these include creatures summoned by a witch doctor?    Examples:   Does a Monk heal affect summons? Do non-witch doctor abilities buff them? If you have two witch doctors in a party, can they buff each other's summons?
15954
My friends and I are trying to come up with ways to get around the drow's sunlight limitations. We thought of using spells, but Darkness makes it impossible to see, which would defeat the purpose.  The best I've been able to come up with is lashing a large patio umbrella to a mule and making it follow the drow everywhere. Would this work, at least for a low level melee character?  What other options does our drow have?  This question is about what I can do as a player to take advantage of RAW; the players in my group don't mind being munchkin-y. Telling the GM to make the campaign take place at night isn't an option.
63483
My DM's saying that since the Help action is found in the actions in Combat in the PHB, he's disallowing use of it outside of combat. It's true that it's found in that part, but I thought you could use it even when there's no fighting happening. Is there a particular ruling for this?
23296
The entry for Shield says that the reaction is triggered by being hit by an attack, which would tend to imply that you can wait to see if your opponent actually succeeds on their attack roll (otherwise they would not be hitting you with their attack) to beat your AC before deciding whether or not to cast the spell. However, wouldn't that be considered meta gaming? After all, my character does not know whether the attack will hit or miss; only that he or she is being attacked.
99304
I need to build a tank for a party limited to the classic four: cleric, fighter, rogue, wizard. He should have following abilities:   Prevent other party members from harm in direct martial confrontation Thriftily spend HP while drawing the focus of foes, to ease the party healer's job Kill or lock down at least one enemy per encounter   All three goals are contradictory to each other. I put them in order of priority. I would be pleased to trade off points in a lower priority in favor of improving a higher one.  The second and the third tasks have pretty obvious ways to be achieved. But I could not find useful traits or skills that would help to hold off foes from weak party members. Enemies can always ignore moderate damage from me (I'm not a damage dealer) and pass by me to attack other party members.  The Fighter has a great access to feats, I can take several chains of them. They would be of use to my personal offensive and defensive abilities but not for protecting others.  Most source books are allowed.  Party is moderate about power playing. In fact I'm the only one who is concerned.  Yes, it has to be a fighter. The classes are set by game master. He have a nice background story for them and create module for them specially. 9-12 levels. Just normal party, rogue, wizard, cleric and fighter.
50175
A hidden ranger with Extra Attack attacks a surprised creature. Do both attacks benefit from Advantage, or just the first one?  If the ranger used Horde Breaker on another creature, would this attack benefit from Advantage?
113605
Goblin bosses can use their reaction to redirect a successful attack against them to another goblin within melee range by swapping places with the other goblin. (Source: MM)  RAW this ability does not state (unless I've missed it) that the goblin receiving the damage, that was originally intended for the Goblin boss, has to be an ally of the Goblin boss. This seems to imply that an enemy Goblin boss could use this ability to redirect a successful attack against a PC playing a goblin (Source: VGM) or a party allied NPC goblin?   Is this a correct RAW understanding, or have I missed something?  Has there been any official or semi-official clarification (Sage advice, relevant tweets, etc) that show whether this reading is "rules as intended"?
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The rules say that creatures in a heavily obscured area "effectively suffer from the blinded condition".   The  condition states:      Attacks rolls against the creature have advantage, and the creature's attack rolls have disadvantage.   So when the  spell (to use one example) is cast, combatants gain advantage and disadvantage when attacking others who are also inside the area, .   Since they then cancel each other out and attacks are made normally, what really changes?
42418
When you get the Extra Attack action, you can break up your movement and attack different targets at varying distances from your starting point.   Does the same apply with TWF? As in, can I approach my first target, use my attack action, then move, and use my bonus action to attack a different target?  From PHB 195:     "When you take the Attack action and attack with a light   melee weapon that you're holding in one hand, you can   use a bonus action to attack with a different light melee   weapon that you're holding in the other hand."   The key seems to be how to interpret "when:" either "immediately after" or "whenever (during your turn)."
12832
Suppose that, on your turn, you ready an action to hit the enemy in front of you if he tries to hit your friend.  What else can you do in the turn you ready the action?   (I'm asking about the turn during which you decide to ready the action "hit the enemy" - not about extra things to do as part of the readied action itself, e.g. "hit the enemy and then move away".)  Can you, for example, move close to an enemy and then ready the attack if he hits your friend?  Can you move closer to an enemy, hit him with your offhand weapon (bonus action) or use some other abilities (Second Wind for fighters) and then ready the action to attack if he hits your friend?
51693
In a recent question -  - it was pointed out that you couldn't Sneak Attack an invisible opponent because the rules specifically state that you cannot use Sneak Attack if you have disadvantage on the attack roll. However, it would not be impossible for the rogue to also have advantage on the attack, by virtue of being hidden or invisible himself.   In this context, where a character has both advantage and disadvantage on a single attack/check, the rules mention that the roll is resolved normally: you roll a single d20 and that's it. Does that mean that you are no longer considered advantaged/disadvantaged?  If so, and assuming the presence of an ally within 5 feet of the invisible enemy, it could mean that an invisible rogue could sneak attack an invisible opponent while a visible rogue couldn't. Is that correct? Or are you, in fact, still considered both advantaged and disadvantaged, and thus can't perform a Sneak Attack?  Precision: Sneak Attack is the use case that triggered the question. That being said, there are probably other things that require advantage/disadvantage to be activated, so answers should focus on the relationship between advantage and disadvantage, and not on Sneak Attack necessarily.
74536
We're a new group playing DnD 5e. Three of us have no prior experience (and I'm one of them, never played the earlier editions) whilst two of us have some to good experience with other editions.  I'm DMing Rise of Tiamat and I'm really struggling with giving the players any kind of challenge. We've got a Paladin with Sentinel and a Halberd, almost stopping everything in its tracks when they attack, a Wizard with Fireball (he might have found a spellbook), Minor Illusion and the Tiny Hut spell (which really messes up any kind of surprises I have in store for the night), a Druid which doesn't do much and a Rogue which died last session because of PVP (he got the option to sacrifice one player by an evil fountain spewing blood, he took it - and it didn't pay off in the end).  Just a bit of context.  My question is this: our Wizard is because of his familiar (a rat which he has on the inside of his robe) constantly throwing advantage on all of his D20 rolls. I said I won't allow this in the future sessions because the familiar needs and initiative, and also needs to somehow confuse or do whatever with the mobs to allow advantage.  He does, however, claim that the familiar gives him an advantage on all skill checks as well, in and out of combat. Is this according to the rules?
71090
I have two examples of different scenarios that are confusing to me.  First, if I have a 1/1 creature with first strike and deathtouch, and my opponent blocks it with a 2/2 creature, will my creature die? I can see two alternative ways this could play out and I'm not sure which is correct.   My creature deals his first strike damage, immediately killing the opponent's creature before he is able to deal combat damage as a state-based effect. My creature deals his first strike damage, which would normally be lethal due to deathtouch, but state-based effects are not checked, and thus the opposing creature deals his damage and both die.   I'm almost positive in this case that it's the first option above.  What gets trickier is, for example, if a creature has first strike and a triggered ability "Whenever this creature deals combat damage to a creature, return that creature to its owner's hand."  This is not a state-based effect, but rather uses the stack. Similar to above, there are two possibilities.   My creature deals his first strike damage, and his triggered ability is placed on the stack. The stack waits to resolve until after all combat damage is dealt, so the opposing creature still kills mine. My creature deals his first strike damage, and his triggered ability is placed on the stack. Both players now gain priority between first strike and combat damage (which I don't think normally happens, thus my confusion). The stack finishes resolving, and the opponent's creature doesn't have a chance to deal damage.   Can someone clarify this area of the rules?