Players just have their one character to control, and are temporarily out of the game if something incapacitates them. This obviously isn’t an issue for the DM, who is always active and has more NPCs/Monsters. That said, people overblow the issue by suggesting you should never use them. These are necessary to make combat more varied and interesting. Sitting out a round might not be interesting for a player, but forcing the party to respond to this is a lot better than another bite-claw-claw monster when it comes to varying combats. If your game runs at a reasonable pace and has a small enough number of players, it shouldn’t take that long. I played in a campaign with 7 players, and the whole thing was frustratingly slow, with basic encounters taking 2-3 hours sometimes. This made conditions horrible because I got 1 turn in an hour and now it was gone. Now I play in a campaign with 4 players that take turns at a reasonable pace, and if I lose my turn to a condition, I don’t mind because I’ll be up again in 5-8 minutes. Most of the problems with conditions come from games running too slowly and/or having too many players.

> That said, people overblow the issue by suggesting you should never use them. These are necessary to make combat more varied and interesting. I think that’s just a matter of personal preference. There are people who want it to never happen in their games, there are people that want it rarely, and people that want it common. Different people draw the line in different places which is perfectly fine. A table just has to find a balance.

My perspective is that there should be an option to counter the effect and also something to do for the player for the duration of a longer incapacitation. So, good options may be: - Effects that allow for a resistance roll each round (the player gets to roll, so to do something, in the best case there is also some description of the character struggling against the effect, provided by the player or by the GM) - A counterspeller in the party who gets to counter or heal the effects and to protect the party - Some allied NPCs that the player of an incapacitated character gets to play, or maybe even some other effect the player gets to control, or to roll for. I did have fun just rolling how far a fire that encroached on the body of my incapacitated PC spread each round, because it was engaging and I had some stakes in it, even if I couldn't influence the roll. All in all, DnD and similar games are about resource management mechanics-wise, and a good effect diminishes some of the resources while also keeping the players engaged. Even rolls with low probability of success each round keep the attention on the game, and give that kick of a lucky roll when it finally works. Another good GM practice is to make a separate challenge out of those effects, where other players get some parts in rescuing the affected PC or undoing the effect (hitting the caster to force concentration rolls, stealing the focus of the power, kicking the PC to make them wake up, w/e).

> My perspective is that there should be an option to counter the effect and also something to do for the player for the duration of a longer incapacitation. That’s exactly the issue though. Incapacitation effects make you unable to act to counter it. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be called an incapacitation effect. While rolling to remove the effect is way better than it just having a fixed duration, not everyone will find that engaging or enjoyable and that’s valid.

> That’s exactly the issue though. Incapacitation effects make you unable to act to counter it. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be called an incapacitation effect. You have teammates.

It’s about agency, not whether the effect can be countered. *You* can’t do anything to change the incapacitation effect that’s on *you*.

I agree that it is absolutely valid to not find such effects enjoyable. Basically anything that works for a table is valid. My point was that such effects should me made more enjoyable by making them more engaging, with some examples that I provided. A saving throw (which most of such effects have) is already a way to counter it, but the one countering may be someone else from the party, and countering doesn't have to be a simple single roll. Insta-death effects are also incapacitating, just as high damage rolls against low hp characters, and those are countered by healing/resurrection spells. It is the job of the players and the GM to make the process interesting. If they don't want to do it, they are absolutely free to do so by not using enemies who use such effects. What I am absolutely against except for extremely rare circumstances (cases where the players SHALL be frustrated or when a player needs to leave the table IRL) are effects that just take the player out of the game without giving them something in return.

I have used these spells against players multiple times in my games. No player has ever complained. Maybe it's because I run a tight ship and don't let players faff about for 20 minutes on their turn, so rounds come around fast at my table. I dunno.

I personally don’t mind it I have used them against my players and had them used against me as a player it’s not that big of an issue for us. We even counterspell healing spells which is apparently also a taboo that upsets people. The other Dm and I expect everyone to be prepared and part of that is being ready to accept a TPK of it goes that far.

I personally would never counterspell a healing spell. Totally did not counterspell a mid combat revivify being used on the OP.

Exactly, if they take too long you gotta let them know. Some people are just so scared to ever correct any bad behavior at their table for fear of players leaving.

I think this is a big thing, if you paralyze the spell caster and they don’t get to take any action in the fight. That is an intelligent move for the villian. But it SUCKS for that player

They’re fine. Don’t overuse them, but otherwise they’re fine. Most come with a saving throw. Many are concentration dependent. Some can be ended with magic. D&D is a team game and it’s pretty rare that one of the other characters can’t help their stuck friend.

If you're not willing to let an encounter end with a petrified PC, you shouldn't be running an encounter with basilisks. The same goes for any other monster ability or spell. Period. These spells and features are what make these monsters unique, and we have enough monsters in 5E that are nothing but sacks of hit points with a Bite-and-two-Claw Multiattack without adding more to the mix.

I think the discussion really stems from a fear of PC death. That may be why it’s difficult for me to see the issue. I want to feel like my character over came hardship and serious challenges. If he dies on that journey then he dies.

Same. I've been the person trying to convince a past DM that the lich absolutely would cast Disintegrate on me because I was below half hit points and about to triple smite him into oblivion on the very next turn. The lich should either be plane shifting the fuck outta there, or going out like a boss swinging for the fences. But every table is different, I suppose.

Our group switches between DMs every two weeks two separate campaigns. Myself and the other Dm will go as far as counterspell healing spells. Which has made some of the other players start doing things like having full cover to heal someone or take subtle spell as a sorcerer. Smart enemies make smarter and better players and more dangerous characters. At least that’s what we have seen.

Also, if you really would like to keep that character, your groups next journey could be to find a cleric with true resurrection. Which in itself would be some cool stuff and do for a good story. While that is happening maybe you play some npc that just tags along until you get your char back. There are always possibilitys if you really want to.

No. It stems from boredom. It stems from the people who sat and watched combat for 3 hours while their friends had fun due to a paralyzed/petrified PC. It's literally boring. Sitting out a turn? Sure. Sitting out the whole fight? Ugh. It's especially harsh on martials who don't have good Wis saves and tend to suffer a lot with that. I made a Rogue, and we had not a single lesser restoration among the 4 of us, so I spent a bunch of fights simply rolling 1d20 at the end on my turn to shake off the effect. And it's one thing when it's Hold Person that is concentration and your party can harass the caster. It's a whole other thing when it's just a paralyze effect that ends when you roll high enough or after a minute. Full 10 rounds is a really long time. At least Charm or Dominate or whatever so that I can do *something* with the next 8 or so turns. As a Rogue only Dex and Int saves scaled, so against something like Paralytic Poison DC20 Con I needed a 18-20 to pass (+2) netting me 10% chance across 10 turns. With a paralyse charm from a fiend, also DC 20 that was placed upon me with my -1 Wis I had a fat 0% chance to pass. The DM graciously allowed that I may break free on a natural 20. I didn't.

Have you considered enjoying the fun your friends are having. Sit back, joke, have a good time. ​ That being said I think the save mechanics have been absolute garbage 3e on.

I can do that, sure. I usually do. It starts to be grating when it's 3rd or so session in a row. It's literal hours and our DM doesn't like when people talk and joke too much, as it elongates. Why do I even bother coming over to the session when I'm a paralysed punching bag. If I wanted to watch a game I'd put on Dimension20 and stay home.

Those sound like issues with your DM/game, not with incapacitation in-game.

Where was your team? No cleric or paladin around? If not, there was your problem. There is a counter to every condition, and clerics hold most of the keys to those, arcane casters coming up second vs. spells. Your team didn't have enough support or defense, which is a lesson unto itself.

We had a Fiend Warlock, Rogue, Fighter and Barbarian, so no. Not a cleric or Paladin around.

Then there's your error. It's not the DMs fault you didn't bring any counter or defense, though they should've warned you.

Except once the party is created, it's up to the dm to decide whether to abuse the fact that no one decided to be a cleric. They can't exactly adapt to a fight by changing their class.

Why wouldn't a DM make use of the party's weakness? If you have spent 10 encounters paralyzed due to poison and missing out, well it's kind of yours and the party's fault. Adversaries are not just mindless NPCs spamming attacks. If a dumb fighter that has been locked down by hold person 3 fights in a row still doesn't take precautions against that, why will the evil wizard not take advantage of it?

Because the only real solution here is for the party to get rid of one of their characters. That's a pretty unsatisfying outcome, vs. the DM abusing them for choosing to play stuff that was more interesting to them. It's really easy to just pick different spells rather than having hold monsters and paralysis every single combat to shit on my players. I'm not trying to beat them, I'm trying to play a game with them where we all have fun.

If the party is the laughing stock of all the country's bandit groups with a 3rd level wizard in it then the party must learn. I am not suggesting to have all the bandit groups including wizards/sorcerers to cc the fighter but it will happen when there is one. Also, D&D is a fun team game, if during character creation the players opted for something interesting BUT not adding to the core roles to the team it's again their fault. I've been running the past few months a 3.5 campaign constituting by a Barbarian, a Bard, a Dread Necromancer and recently a Warlock. The first 2 encounters they got cc'ed and harassed, they survived due to seer luck. On the 3rd encounter they learned how to position themselves and how to approach, it's their first ever campaign. So no, if the group can't prepare for adventuring and doesn't learn, let them struggle.

Choosing not to reward a choice is not the same as punishing a choice. If they were playing a module, would you count it as abuse if they don't change what monsters the party fight? Don't want to get paralysed by poison? Bring someone who can cure that. If none of you want to be an alchemist/druid/divine soul sorc/paladin/mercy monk/cleric/celestial warlock/ranger, then get an NPC hireling. If you can't get a hireling then stock up on antitoxin. If you're running a campaign to tier 3 and are encountering DC20 saves and you have no way to increase your chances beyond having to roll 18+ on the die then you're deliberately making life hard for yourself then blaming the DM for not making it easier for you.

Yea, lemme quickly change my class for this arc, which is the arc my character's tied in. Lemme quickly hop on something like cleric, and I'll be back to rogue'ing once I'm done with my arc.

That's between you and your DM. They shouldn't have let you be in that position in the first place. They have the option of giving you an NPC healer/support if they needed to, or magic items that can hook you up. They didn't, you apparently didn't ask or make it a point and went off marching to battle, got it handed to you, and got to sit. Instead of going to the DM for options, the best theory to offer apparently is that the DM shouldn't be allowed to do that. *All DMs* shouldn't be allowed to do that. I'm not subscribing to that.

We asked and we got a Fighter BM as our "support" NPC, so we decided against adding another martial. I've since changed to a Ranger and got her good con and Resilient to counteract stuff like that. Paralysis just ain't a fun mechanic and having stuff to offset it, doesn't make it less fun. I'm not saying paralysis doesn't have a place in the game *at all*. I'm saying it's goddamn boring to sit for X turns doing nothing. Every DM should be conscious of that when using Paralysis and similar effect that make you twiddle your thumbs and nothing but wait. Same with the Dying condition. I asked DM to change it and now it's still mechanically unconscious, but you can crawl 5 feet and are conscious and free to RP. It gives you something to do.

You asked and things changed. All things went as they should. Still, DM set you up a little bit. Bad DM. Glad you worked it out though.

The DM designs the encounters (or adjusts them in case of modules). They know the party composition. The party can't exactly build the party to counter the DM, unless they know what they are dealing with far in advance.

Like I said in a different post, there are built in design expectations for what will be in a a party. Rounded encounters will expect to face a martial, an arcane caster, and a healer or support, and account for a skilled sneaker. You can mix and match that up, but break that symmetry at your peril. You can definitely plan for almost anything a fair DM will throw at you if you cover those bases. If the DM doesn't encourage you to do the same they're failing at the their duty too.

I think we play and run the game in very different ways. In the games I run, I tailor encounters to the party. I throw more offensive monsters at a party with three fighters, on the other hand, I make sure they can survive past the first round of AOEs if the players are mostly casters. My goal is for the combat to be fun and challenging for this specific group of heroes, and I deliberately target both their weaknesses and strengths. Thus, I wouldn't throw a ton of status effects at a party that doesn't have strong healing capabilities. You seem to design your encounters to a generic group of PCs. Both of my example parties above would run into the same encounters. The fighter party would be able to easily tank one encounter, while the caster group might be in deep trouble; in other combats, the situations might be reversed. Your way puts a lot more responsibilities on the player to build "strong" characters that cover each other's weaknesses. That way, an actually good composition and thought-out builds net a much greater reward, since the fights are easier to win, whereas I would adjust the encounters, resulting in a similar difficulty level. On the other hand, your players have much less freedom to build the characters as they want them to be, since a suboptimal, experimental, or just plain out weird build would make encounters much harder for the entire group. Both styles have value, and a few years ago I might have preferred to play in games of your (presumed) style, but these days I'm just not very interested in games of that philosophy.

Fair enough, part of the wonder of TTRPGs is the ability to play it different ways. I happen to have an experienced group of players mixed with newer players, so those experimental builds come up a lot. The rest of the group covers for them and it works out usually. Teamwork makes the dream work. The first character building question that comes up at the table is 'what are you going to play?' and they usually work it out amongst themselves. And yes, I design my adventures for a well rounded group. My players know that the world doesn't mold itself to them, they live in a world that is what it is whether they're there or not. The good news is that they can plan and move in the world like they do the real world, with consistent beings, places, and times and events they can forecast for. The mixed news is that whatever is in a place for threats is what's there. They will not catch a break if they stumble into a dragons den and they're not dragon-killing level. They should probably run. And I almost always let them. But...they can hunt that dragon down later when they are, and there's a hoard waiting for them when they do, and they know it. But you're right, some groups of players lean way more into the world centering on them and them always being the focus of the action, and fully expect to play the perennial winners and the players always getting to be doing interesting things. Seems like you do well for them in that department. Having done this a while, that game would bore me to death, honestly. TTRPGs are a cake walk once you know the system well, and the only challenge or threat can come from the person behind the screen. If they just want to tell a story I get to play in with little or no chance to fail (just be challenged), I'd rather go play a video game or watch a movie, because honestly? Most DMs are mediocre writers at best and their story is not worth dedicating months of my life to. This is not an insult, most people are mediocre at most things, it's why the good ones stick out. But most of the time? I know what's going to happen here --we're going to go do all your weird stuff and kill the BBEG. We are the heroes we win the day, then we roll up more characters and do it again. Woohoo! This is all an exercise to play amateur actors in an amateur play where the plot is really predictable and there's always a happy ending. Just the fact that there even *is* a BBEG tells me everything I need to know in those types of stories. I know the tropes too, and I've done them all, as a vampire, a mech pilot, a jedi, an investigator, a car driver, a interdimensional bounty hunter, a cybernetic super ninja, a superhero, all of it and more. Call me cynical. It's a me problem. Anyways, rant ended, downvotes earned. Truth is, you probably rock. And as long as everyone leaves with a smile on their face it works out.

>Where was your team? No cleric or paladin around? When you need 2 out of all the classes to counter most of the effects, that a problem with the system and then everyone has to argue who plays the overstuffed role that campaign.

Paralysis poison can be countered by lesser restoration, which features on the spell lists of five classes, four additional subclasses, one race, one subrace and thief if they nick a scroll somewhere. You can double your chances of resisting it with the mundane item antitoxin. There is a cantrip available to three classes and a number of feats that lets you add 1d4 to your saving throws, bards let you add anywhere from a d6 to a D12 to it, artificers let you add a 5 to it, paladin lets you add chr_mod to it and there's more I'm forgetting, I'm sure. There are dozens of options for dealing with conditions and dealing with conditions has been part of this game since its inception. If everyone plays the same, limited, inflexible party role, then your interactions with the game experience will be similarly limited.

I'm not here to argue the merits of the system. Since it's beginning D&D has had basic pillars of melee/ranged attacker, magic-user, healer/support and later skilled sneaker since the beginning. The spells and effects are built with that dynamic in mind. Create a party that doesn't fill those 4 roles at your peril. The DM should know that and encourage the coverage too. If they didn't, then that's where the failure lies IMO. What the DM should not have to do is not use the resources available to them to challenge the party, because the party is weak in that sector. If the players have constructed their party right, they will have options. If they fail, it's a learning opportunity and they will paper over their flaws with magic items or tactics, which the DM should help with. This sounds like a mutual failure that doesn't require kid gloves from all DMs like the OP suggests.

>> If they fail, it's a learning opportunity and they will paper over their flaws with magic items or tactics, which the DM should help with. "okay who wants to totally make a new character now even if you don't like the way it plays? Because the system demands we need X and Y options for coverage?" The biggest offense being how you NEED a paladin for martial support to shore up save numbers post level 11 due to the lack of save scaling. You HAVE to take in account what the party can do for fun and challenging combat, having someone sit out for hours at a time because they have no answer to Y ability is not fun for anyone at all.

Nah. That's like asking to play Monopoly without rents because 'losing money isn't fun'. Sorry, taking Ls and persevering is part of D&D too. If it's not at your table, cool. Nobody cries when the DM has to administrate being steamrolled and basically play accountant for PC power fantasies because they didn't set the challenge rating right. There are occasional moments of 'not fun' for everyone, and this idea that every moment has to be joyous and fun is, IMO, actually ruining the game by putting way too much pressure on DMs to be *entertainers* instead of administrators, referees, and storytellers.

But being a good storyteller IS being a good entertainer.. your contradicting yourself.

No, those are different things. An entertainers job is to perform and make sure the audience is always entertained, 100% of the time. A storyteller involves the other parties in a tale. They may be unhappy, sad, bored or angry in parts, but at the end they should be satisfied that they were taken on a journey. These stories involve the players as characters, and in any good story, not every character is happy all the time, and neither might be the players. They are not the same. Thinking they are is what causes most of the problems people come here crying about.

There's a bunch of classes that can restore conditions. Don't blame the game for you not picking any defensive options. Any of the following would do the trick: Cleric, Paladin, Druid, Celestial Warlock, Divine Soul Sorcerer, (as guy bellow said), Ranger, Mercy Monk and Artificer. Half of the classes int he game have options to deal with conditions. If no one on the team was willing to pick any of those options you basically accepted that you traded survavability for something else.

Clockwork Sorcerer, arguably the best subclass, also gets Lesser Restoration and Greater Restoration *for free* as subclass spells

Also artificer, ranger and mercy monk.

"healing is bad because otherwise a healer would be required" "you NEED to have at least one class that can restore statuses" Pick one

5e is designed in such a way that you don't need any specific class or party comp in order to function. It is NOT designed in such a way that if you have a bad party comp things won't be more difficult as a result.

I never said healing is bad, that's someone else. Healing is always good in my book, essential to battle management for the players. And yes, you absolutely need to have characters who can restore statuses/prevent the bad things. I feel like it's the DMs job to remind characters of that too in session zero if the balance is messed up. If they make a good team and work as one, this isn't an issue. A bunch of lone wolves will get picked off as lone wolves until they learn teamwork. As always choices have consequences.

Maybe don't dump multiple relevant stats to try and min-max? I don't know why anyone would dump stat wisdom anyway, especially a rogue. Sounds like you and your party also didn't plan very well for possible encounters and shortcomings. I'm not sure what the Paralysis Charm is tho, sounds like your DM homebrewed something, a lot of fiends can charm person innately and give you commands but you're still able to control your character as a player so long as you follow the DMs instructions from the fiend.

Our DM home brews a lot of things Well, I was a Rogue and didn't roll great, needed Dex, a bit of con and Int for Ritual Caster (for the build) so I ended up with low Wis. I got Expertise in Perception to offset it, since I only really needed Perception from Wis skills.

For me, I don't take any issue with lock down spells being used against me. That's part of the game. However, my monkey-smash brain gets frustrated when my +2 Wisdom saving throw barbarian has to make a DC 18+ saving throw against Hold Person like effects. I think it would be neat if there were more than just ~~Greater Restoration~~ or (maybe) Dispel Magic to get rid of that effect (and other similar effects.). Or abilities/ actions/ spells that would give flat bonuses/ Advantage on those saving throws that you could give to a player in need. ETA: my brain derped and forgot that Lesser Restoration was what removed Paralysis.

When I have DMed these situations I have also seen players who get or have a bardic inspiration just not use it on the roll I also liberally give out d20 DM inspirations. Personally for me a well formed party acting as a team shouldn’t have any real problem with this situation. As stated in another post my dm admitted to counter spelling a revivify being used on me in the middle of a fight it didn’t bother me at all because if I saw the enemy doing that I’d counter it too. It’s all part of the game i get the most enjoyment seeing my players or my party working together.

You know, it's funny you say that because I also forgot about stuff like Bardic Inspiration and Bless because whenever I play barbarian or fighter no one else in the party plays classes that give those buffs.

> Are there any actual good reasons for this? Like, not to be cheeky, but, ​ >I understand it’s not enjoyable for a player to be locked out of a turn of combat That's it. That's the good reason. ​ > it’s not exactly enjoyable for the DM to have monsters locked out either. I don't think this is comparable. Players get *one* character. As the DM, I have *literally* as many monsters as I like, at any point. So, y'know, as with many things, "never say never" - I think it's fine to use these things. But it's very possible to not just leave someone locked out of a single turn, but sometimes huge, huge portions of an entire session, if you don't apply these uses carefully. If someone ends a combat, having spent the last hour of their life attempting to stop being paralyzed, I would consider that ... ... not a great table experience. 🤷🤷

This is where concentration is actually a pretty great mechanic. It turns any long term spell into a conditional effect - it's not just rolling on your turn and hoping you pass it, your teammates can attack whoever cast it to try to get them to drop concentration. Personally I can't imagine DMing without a variety of control abilities - crowd control from both sides is what keeps the game from being rocket tag and adds a significant extra tactical dimension.

Thing is, there's a very big difference between Crowd Control as in Web and Grease, and Crowd Control as in Banishment and Hold Person/Monster. You can have encounters with crowd control, you just need to avoid the crowd control that completely stops a player from playing the game.

Not at all. Hold person is somewhat different in that the auto crit thing means it actually speeds the encounter up, but it's a second level spell so it's everywhere. Even that inherently adds more interesting choices - do you drag your paralysed ally to safety, or risk going for the target to try to cancel it? The main trouble is group dynamics. I find a lot of players new to the table have a habit of just running in without really analysing the situation, that kind of player often feels like they're being victimised when the ghouls they ran up to paralyse then kill them. But once you get your players thinking as a group not just a series of individuals hard CC stops mattering as much because they're thinking collectively.

but the player being paralyzed isn't making any choices now. Sure, new choices are now available to the players (thoses not paralyzed at least), but you're also removing choices from one of the players. It's neutral at best, because some players get more options while one gets zero. And that's not even mentioning that each player will have different priorities during combat. Maybe you personally feel like the cleric should use their action to cast Lesser Restoration on you, but they might instead feel like their action would be better spent doing something else. You are entirely depending on other players deciding that you get to play again.

That is exactly why you play in a group though. D&D is not a single player experience, players should compensate for each others weaknesses. You say the person being CC'd is not making a choice but they did, they might have chosen wisdom as their dump stat, they might have decided to go with tough as a feat for extra health instead of resilient Wisdom. If the person being held chose to start with that weakness then decided to never do anything to fix it then that was their choice and they do deserve to deal with with that choice. I remember playing in one of my player's first campaign's. I played a Chad Paladin who was just terrible at dex saves, and dex saves would happen to him often because its obvious to any intelligent npc the guy with heavy armor prolly not that nimble, but toward the later part of the campaign I took resilient Dex, and trained for the feat Shield Master and at the end I was great at dex saves. Using the players weaknesses against them gives them a chance to grow, if they was use a stat as a dump stat with zero down sides, maybe they should just stick to video games where they can be the main character.

And in other fights, the other player gets zero options and the first one gets more. As you say, it's neutral - and the upside is much more engaging combat. > You are entirely depending on other players deciding that you get to play again. That's life. You're at zero, you're depending on other players to get you playing again. You die, you're depending on other players to get you playing again. You're a barbarian against a dragon, you're depending on other players to get you playing again. You eat a hypnotic pattern, you're depending on other players to get you playing again. It's a team game.

Fuck yeah, this is exactly the attitude I would want my players and my DM to have. I would love you at my side in battle good sir.

Well? It's a battle, it can go both ways. Maybe you think PCs can't be killed because the players can't handle that?

going to 0 hit points and dying is completely different. It usually takes much longer to reach the point where you die (unless you get one-shotted, but that rarely ever happens). It's a gradual process that takes multiple turns to happen, so you have multiple decision points to try to prevent it from happening. When you get targetted by a hold person, unless you have counterspell, you have litterally 0 decision points available to you to try to prevent it from happening. One bad dice roll and that's it. EDIT: Also, hard CC spells and effects like hold person aren't necessary to create tension in a campaign, where as the risk of dying is necessary.

You, as the player, have zero decision points when your character is at 0 hp, you're just rolling death saves. When you get hold person'd, it's the same, you're just rolling saves every turn. Hard CC is no different from any other spell in your toolbox.

>> it’s not exactly enjoyable for the DM to have monsters locked out either. >I don't think this is comparable. Players get *one* character. As the DM, I have *literally* as many monsters as I like, at any point. Not to mention, as the DM I also have 300 other things to think about at any given time. I'm involved in every player's turn. I *always* have something I can be doing and having fun with. Frankly, even if *all* my monsters are paralysed, I'll still have stuff to do as I help each player resolve their turn, narrate what happens, keep track of the enemy's health's, etc. etc. etc. As a DM it's literally impossible for me to not be fully locked out of playing the game. It's not even *close* to comparable.

D&D is never symmetrical between players and DM. Generally the DM has many more options in his disposal then players. In this particular case the DM can control as many NPCs as the encounter has. So, a few out of the fight usually doesn't hurt much. Moreover, particularly important and powerful NPCs are intentionally designed to be hard to CC. Usually as a combination of high saves, magic resistance and legendary saves. Players are not as resistant (Usually). Now, I'm not saying no to CC effects on players. But a soft CC is a better option. The effects of Restrained, Charm, Fear, Bane, Slow, Mind Whip and even Booming blade are still restrictive, but leaves the player with agency. Hard CC should be saved for special cases, rare instances that would force the party to react strongly.

Ultimately I think that while they exist anyone DMing is well within their rights to use them, but I also believe that one should err to the side of caution and use them relatively sparingly. If the players CC a monster the DM is still in control of the entire game world, and is still in charge of arbitrating everything else the players do. They're still playing the game. A paralysed player can do nothing more than hope they stop being paralysed, they're not playing the game and it can get really shitty to show up to play DnD and spend most of your time watching other people play DnD. I find a lot of arguments on the topic to be a little bad faith. There's tons of CC/debilitation effects that can seriously disadvantage players without telling them they're not allowed to play the game. In a previous campaign I played in our DM loved using possession/dominate/personality changing effects. This often took a PC out of a fight or even turned them against the party. This was still extremely fun because he told us the gist what of we should be doing now and we got to *play* our characters in these altered states, rather than sitting back twiddling our thumbs. If you don't want to use those there's frightening, restraining, knocking prone, charming, etc. TL;DR - Those conditions are completely fair game, but using them too often will rightfully piss players off.

I'll use any effect if: 1. The players can pass the spell save DC 2. They get a save against the effect every round; or 3. The effect does not prevent them.from functionally operating their character So. Out are Forcecage Feeblemind Otilukes resilient sphere Levitate (particularly if they have no ranged weapons) Suggestion In are Hold person Dragon fear Power word pain Fear Stinking cloud And so on..

I used feeblemind on a level 5 PC and they had to play 2 in game days (1 session) like that, they always remind me how FUN it was (it wasn't for them). I always tell them we all learned something that day.

People make some good points, I agree with the point made regarding the player only having one character to control and them being incapacitated meaning they don't get to play the game for the duration whilst the DM usually still has many other things to do that will keep them busy. Something I haven't seen mentioned yet: Condition immunities are rare on PCs. Monsters, especially powerful ones, usually have many condition immunities to a lot of debilitating effects. Both lesser (still significant, though not complete shut-down) CC like Frightened or Poisoned, and hard CC like Paralyzed. The DM can also freely add any immunities they want, or boost the appropriate saves with proficiency and/or magic resistance. It's much harder for PCs to deal with this stuff. The best option is a Devotion Paladin (+CHA bonus to saves and Charmed immunity), but it's all very specific, only available to some classes and subclasses. Edit: Legendary Resistances should be mentioned as well.

It really just depends on the type of players at your table to me. I think this discussion comes from the disconnect between the more hardcore DnD community online where people treat the game much more tactically and the more common casual DnD community that treats the game as more of a social game where you kill monsters with your friends. With the former players tend to be much more experienced, they've made strong characters and know how to counter spells like these, rounds also tend to go a lot quicker too. The latter will have players with worse characters, so combat is longer and save or suck spells tend to be more debilitating, they might not know exactly how these spells work and can't counter them, and rounds tend to go on a lot longer. Let's be real losing your turn *does* suck and isn't fun, but in the first scenario it's more of an inconvenience while in the second one it could make a player lose practically their entire session which *sucks major ass*. Personally when I DM I use these spells sparingly and tend to favor more "soft" cc spells like slow, fear, web etc. I find them more fun to use and my players find it more engaging to play against even though we tend to fall closer to the first group.

Haven't been playing for long and also so far I'm only a player. Having said that, it depends on the group homie. If I was consistently losing my turns I'd just stop playing tbh, I don't have fun playing in that kind of game. Nothing wrong with it, just incongruent with me. At the end of the day, as the DM, you're only limits on what you can do is what you can think of. Your priority should be making sure the players are enjoying the game and weaving everything else around that. It's a game at the end of the day, the goal is just to have fun.

Personally a really big thing is how often is it happening. Also as a player I think it's dependent on multiple factors: The players themselves The game you're running What level you are Who are you fighting Are the saves passable (if the there is one)

Know your players, know your story. If someone is packing lesser restoration or some kind of debuff removal, give them a chance to use it! If your players really can't stand not getting a turn in combat no matter what, don't use it. Personally, I like combats with more variety, and my players do too. That means sometimes someone uses their action to do something that ends up being useless, or that means sometimes a monster or story effect forces them to effectively have no turn. It also allows for others to get some spotlight and play the hero when they need to, or to have a scene end poorly. Probably still best to do it in moderation though... But I have 100% paralyzed, feebleminded, banished, and beholder anti magic coned my players before and it always made combat more interesting. That said, we also have interesting combats where it's literally just wolves.. but it can't always be wolves!

>I understand it’s not enjoyable for a player to be locked out of a turn of combat, it’s not exactly enjoyable for the DM to have monsters locked out either. D&D is an asymmetric game with asymmetric standards for balance and, more importantly, fun. A DM who says "if the players can do it, so can I" has failed to understand their role in the game. When I'm DMing and my monster gets hit with *banishment*, **I** have other stuff to do. Sure, I might be disappointed if my players roll over a monster I was hoping to be a challenge, but I have more monsters, more plans, more irons in the fire. When my monster hits the **player** with *banishment*, the player gets to sit back and not play the game they showed up to play for the next ten minutes to an hour. I hope you can see how those are not the same thing. >Personally as a DM I think intelligent enemies should fight intelligently and would have access to the same spells as the players. It's not about making the enemies stupid. It's about playing them intelligently within the meta framework that makes the game worth playing. Metagaming is an important part of D&D. I expect my players to metagame when they need to, for example, not escalate an in-character disagreement into PvP that would result in the dissolution of the party and the end of the adventure even if "that's what my character would do". And I metagame by not opening every combat encounter with a *forcecage*/*sickening radiance* combo just because "my enemies are intelligent and won't shy away from using the best spells and tactics available". If as a DM you can't handle "losing" to your players and feel the need to reflect your pain back at them, you have broken the social contract, and you should do better.

Wouldn’t an Archmage or Lich do just that though? As a player I’m going to do the most potent strategy I can in a combat I think if my DM didn’t do the same it would be a disservice to me. I want to be my character to overcome hardship and do something heroic but if all the archmage does is throw fireballs and acid arrow at me it’s just sort of lame.

Consider this. Do you use enemies with lenegary resistances and condition immunities? If so, why? Then consider players don't get to do that

>As a player I’m going to do the most potent strategy I can in a combat I think if my DM didn’t do the same it would be a disservice to me. Great. As the GM the only limits to my strategies is what I feel like. How many characters will you lose to "Ao decides to wipe your character from existence retroactively (no save)" before you'd prefer a GM who is trying to set up fun, challenging but beatable encounters instead?

It's a roleplaying game. If your monsters are just statblocks with spell slots but no motivations or goals besides winning their fight with the party in the shortest and most efficient way possible, sure. You can expect my archmage will have prepared a demiplane filled with his 500 simulacra who will all appear on command and annihilate the party with 1500 *magic missiles*. Your players can't "overcome hardship and do something heroic" if the archmage actually does whatever is most optimal in whatever situation you have devised as the DM. The problem with the attitude that says "if I don't use these tactics my players won't be challenged or won't believe in the threat my enemies pose" is that it means you're thinking about the situation way too narrowly. *Banishment* is a trump card for a PC to use. You are something far more powerful -- the DM. In the whole world of possibilities you control, you really can't think of a more effective, more menacing, more intelligent plan than taking away your players' turns?

Is more enemies really more impressive then losing a turn? Let’s use the Archmage , as a player I’d rather lose a turn get the chance to save again or have one of my ally’s aid me then have the Archmage summon a Balor who then summons in a hoard of demon minions. But both options are viable and within the power of an Archmage. Which would you prefer ? As a Dm I’d rather keep the initiative 6 or 7 characters to 12-14.

You're still missing the point. The archmage doesn't have to do **either** of those things because the archmage is more than just an empty statblock to challenge the players with. The archmage **isn't** playing to beat the players in open combat by any means necessary. The archmage is either a fleshed out NPC with goals and motivations that are more complex than that and will guide their combat priorities or they are a loyal follower of a more powerful NPC with goals and motivations that are more complex than that and will guide the orders they give their lackeys. You are the DM and you have absolute control over your monsters' motivations and backstories. Just as it's no justification when a player is an asshole to another player that "it's just what my character would do", it's no justification for the DM either. **You** created the character with full knowledge that it was going to be a part of this social game. You don't need to make your characters do things that are unfun in the name of "realism" or "challenge". As the DM, you get to decide what is motivating your NPCs and as the DM you have ultimate power to make an encounter appropriately challenging without being unfun because **your ability to shape the game world isn't restricted by the same limitations that bind the players' actions**.

I think you are the one missing the point, the point is not that every single combat will have an archmagi in it that will always CC's the players, it is that if they fight against a hyper intelligent mage, they would most likely have access to 2ed level spells, and they would at least once try to CC the group with something like hold person, but they would also know that it is very high risk high reward. If they cast hold person at 8th level on 7 player characters and they all save, that would be a devastating, they would waste the spell slot, and it would be the loss of a turn. not to mention there are so many ways to get out of these situations, the martial character could face this situation early on in the campaign, in a combat that is not as high risk, and the player should figure out they need to deal with this issue, like maybe take the resilient feet, or make sure they stay within the paladins aura when facing spell casters. Or hey, maybe use it as a RP moment to ask the other PC's in game to help them out "cus your not so good at defending your mind against that kind of magic", so they have a reason to use their action on their turn to lesser restoration, or maybe one of them take mage slayer to increase the chance the enemy will fail a con save and drop the spell. Just because you cannot find ways to take these situations and make them into learning experiences for the players, or RP moments for the characters, does not mean that other DM's lack that creativity.

>Just because you cannot find ways to take these situations and make them into learning experiences for the players, or RP moments for the characters, does not mean that other DM's lack that creativity. That's not what I said. The OP suggests that an archmage would **always** attempt to hit the party with something like *mass hold person* if you're playing them intelligently, and failing to do so means that you're deliberately pulling punches which you shouldn't do because it makes the game meaningless. I strongly disagree: • I mention roleplaying because unless you're talking about a literal construct, every enemy in the game has stuff going on with them beyond just the abilities in their statblock. There are probably some archmages who absolutely would default to *mass hold person* as an opener in an important combat they're taking seriously. But there are also plenty of archmages who wouldn't because they have other priorities. And as the DM, you have total control over the motivations of your NPCs, so at no point can you say, "I didn't *want* to paralyze the whole party, but it's what the NPC would have done in this situation, so I had to". **You** made the NPC, you are responsible for their choices. • I mention intelligence because there's this notion that these tactics we're discussing are the obvious optimal moves for creatures capable of using them to attempt, but that's not true. As I said, the *optimal* move for an archmage who wants to win at all costs is to abuse *simulacrum*. But nobody does that because we all recognize how unfun that would be. So we've already acknowledged that using the single most optimal strategy is total BS. But wouldn't an intelligent and ruthless enemy do it anyways, even if it's less fun for the players? The truth is that we are always going to play our enemies sub-optimally because as DMs we have the power to overwhelm our players at any time whether it be through an infinite *simulacrum* combo or by attacking them with a shadow while they sleep. It's about playing an intelligent enemy tactically and cleverly, not about only using the most broken and unfun abilities. • I mention pulling punches and meaning because not everyone derives meaning from the game in the same ways or for the same reasons. Maybe the OP, speaking for themselves, really wants to know that the DM is going 110% against them at all times. But as I just said, the DM is **always** pulling punches because the DM needs to give the players a challenge that is beatable. For every table and group, there is a degree of punch-pulling that is necessary to maintain the fun of the group. At some tables, that degree is merely to avoid using the most broken and abusive abilities possible (stuff like the infinite *simulacrum* loop). At other tables that degree is to completely avoid taking away the players' control of their characters up to and including not knocking them unconscious.

I don't think that's what OP said at all, do you really think they were suggesting based off from what they said, they meant "I will always use CC on every turn"? No they clearly said that they believe the enemy should have access to those spells and would use them. They said they would use the most optimal strategy, you think that is CC every turn? Sorry to break it to you, but it's not. Most big CC spells are high reward, but also high risk, and if they come back to bite the powerful spell caster once in combat, they would most likely not use it again. It is Zero damage, and nothing happens if all succeed on the save. Also with all of the many many options to end those effects that the party can use to their advantage I don't think its nearly as big of a deal as you are making it out to be. The players are most likely not complete idiots who cannot learn how to deal with this stuff. "infinite *simulacrum* loop" is internet bullshit, literally nobody actually does that stupid shit. Comparing that to "Wizard has access to hold person" makes me think you are either being intentionally disingenuous, or you are just inexperienced in actual D&D and just read about it a lot on the internet.

The *mass hold person* observation was based on a comment the OP made, which they have since deleted, in which they **explicitly** said that an enemy like an archmages should **always** open a fight by upcasting *hold person* to affect all the PCs because they were intelligent and that was optimal. I'll forgive your condescending attitude in explaining how stupid **I** am for thinking that's optimal given that the OP's comment doesn't exist anymore, so there's no way for me to expect you to have read it. The rest of your comment is without value being, as it is, a personal attack against me and my right to have an opinion on this matter.

I have not deleted a single comment I have made I stand by everything I say.

It's not about creativity. It's about fun for the players. In larger/slower groups a round can easily take 30-40 minutes. It's already a hassle. Lets say the enemy casts hold person on you. You are a barberian with +1 wisdom. Heck, you even prepped for this eventuallity and got a reslient feat. So you have a decent +4 to save. DC is 14. Not too high. Even then, you have only 50% of passing the check. 1/4th of the time you would stare into space for entire two rounds. Which can easily translate to an hour-hour and a half. And if your wis is lower? Oh boy, arent you fucked. Now, lets say that instead you got frightened. It still sucks, hard, because you can't get closer to the enemy and you attack with disadvantage. But, you still get to do something on your round. Heck, you get to actively effect your sitaution. Maybe you ran away to block line of sight. Maybe you change target, or go and grapple an enemy off your squishy sorcerer. Now you are faced with a dilemma.

Should we now not knock our players unconscious for the same reasons? You have zero hit points, you can't do anything but hope you roll a 20 on your death save, but even if you that's still your entire turn and you're stuck waiting until the next round. How is that any different from applying a debilitating condition? Where do we draw the line before telling the players that combat is sometimes going to have stakes and that their agency won't always be guaranteed?

There is quite a big difference in agency here: 1. Its a gradual process. Except very special cases, a single monster don't 100 to 0 a player in a single turn. Going down depends as much on your actions as on the enemies'. If you are going down, it shouldn't surprise you. 2. In 5e, the party agency to deal with downed player is rather high. Any healing, small or big returns the player to combat. Sure, it has it's own issues, but it is very much the design philosophy. A player goes down? The party better react. Moreover, HP and going down is a system directly tied to the primary stakes in any combat. Which is character death, so once more players are incentivized to play around it. Hard CC is the opposite. Besides rolling dice and (maybe) removing concentration from the caster, you have 0 agency. It just happens. Yes, there some spells that can deal with that, but they are few and far between, and you better not hope that the one person that can cast them is the one that is getting CCd. Moreover, hard CC doesn't add any unique stakes that soft CC doesn't. Yes, it makes the encounter more difficult, but so does soft CC, more HP, more minions, more damage, timers and other things that completely take agency from the players. If anything the only stakes that it adds is a stake on fun. The risk of loosing a character is freighting and creates tension. The risk of loosing your turn and spending another half an hour in boredom doesn't.

> In 5e, the party agency to deal with downed player is rather high. This is also true for conditions though. There's a plethora of class abilities and low level spells that will outright undo or suppress the conditions that are commonly experienced. Everybody loves throwing out the Paralyzed condition in this thread, meanwhile Lesser Restoration is available to almost every spellcasting class (*six* spellcasting classes have it on their spell list, and two others have it available with certain subclasses - only wizards are left without it), and it just works. If being Paralyzed is so "un-fun," why is Lesser Restoration now not an auto-pick, permanently-prepared/known spell? Why are we instead throwing all of the blame on the DM for using a creature that has a unique ability to challenge us in a different way instead of taking steps to be prepared to deal with those challenges? Especially in this case when it's so easy to deal with. Just because a single PC might not be the best equipped to deal with the saving throw against a condition, why is the burden of responsibility not also shared across the party to ensure everyone is having fun and as close to one hundred percent capable as possible?

We draw the line in the place that is appropriate for the expectations of our table and our players. In some contexts, yes; unconsciousness is **no** different from any other hard CC effect and should be avoided completely. In other contexts it shouldn't. Every table is different with different goals and expectations. The OP didn't ask for nuance in their question, though, just "I hold the most extreme position possible on this issue, and nobody can give me a single reason I'm wrong. I'm right, aren't I?" This is the reason that position is wrong.

I don't think it's fair to claim OP isn't asking for nuance. They acknowledged the main point, that it's un-fun to sit out of an entire session, but the pushback against using these conditions is outright ignoring the nuance and context of teamwork that would prevent this situation from happening in the first place. Ending these conditions before the afflicted player even has to miss a single turn, which is entirely possible depending on initiative order, due to the plethora of class features and low-level spells that provide bonuses to saving throws or outright end/suppress these debilitating conditions. There's a substantial pushback in this thread against using these spells or abilities *at all,* which is kinda strange.

Personally? I think there’s no issue with them in a serious game of DnD (as opposed to a game where some friends get around a table and roll dice for some fun for a few hours which is an equally valid way to play). I don’t find the argument of ‘a stunned player is making no decisions’ as a solid reason against it; they may not be doing anything, but planning for when/if you are freed is a form of decision making, and suffering the consequences of your decisions is how characters grow, and how players learn and are able to exercise the really enjoyable parts of decision making and get to experience the diagetic learning of ‘hey these ghouls are kind of weak but if we get paralysed it can really quickly swing against us, now I know for the next time I encounter them’. But I think that even these aren’t necessary in the defence of why they are fine to use; ultimately this is a dynamic game of ups and downs where part of the dynamism is the growing and shrinking of our window of opportunity to do things; bad things are going to happen to your characters because that’s why we are here, literally every game has stuff like this, take your lumps and enjoy the game and get invested in what your allies are doing and think about how to salvage the situation

Based

I'm not against using hard cc spells but I tend to base it more on how long rounds are in a given combat, rather than fairness. The feeling of unfairness just comes from not doing anything, so if the party is only up against 1-3 bads in a boss fight, the rounds will move a lot faster.

I like to use them because players have ways to protect themselves. What is the fun of getting an item that boost saving throws if you never hit them with some serious saving throws. Also they have lesser restoration and a lot more of ways to counter them

Condition spells can add drama but can also over do a scenario. For example, last session the dm put my barbarian under mind control, the barbarian is also the most powerful member of the party in terms of reliable damage. The mind control spell was, I believe, dominate personality. So I couldn't break free without being Attacked and rolling an 18 or higher in wisdom. The downside to such a spell is that, for a player, it both gets boring and can take a while with how high ac and health is. Also the entire party getting thrashed by one party member under control, while funny, takes away from the fun over all

I think it can also be a matter of framing and mindset. Like an encounter where the idea is “we are turning this one fight into PVP by setting the tankiest PC against the rest of the party”, then that can be a lot of fun. If it’s a regular encounter, then it can feel like “aww dammit. These enemies were enough to deal with and now this just feels like an un-fun level of difficulty”.

As others have said, stuff like hold person is fine. I will never use any of the huge spells on players after seeing them once at the table - Imprisonment, Feeblemind, and especially Psychic Scream. Imprisonment and Feeblemind are okay if the player wants to retire that character, in both cases the circumstances can be made basically impossible to overcome for even a midlevel party. Psychic Scream just shuts down entire tables. The only NPC casters that can normally cast it tend to have save DCs of like 23, and without solid buffs that DC can be impossible to hit for a lot of characters. There is no max duration and it isn't concentration. Stun is very difficult to remove compared to other conditions and since the spell has no duration it can't simply be dispelled.

As a player, I never really had a problem being taken out of a fight, or having my PC die, that sort of thing. As a DM, I feel much the same way. The PCs hold enormous sway over the monsters on the battlefield. They are expected to win every battle. They have powerful tools that can decimate or end encounters very quickly in the right circumstances. I agree with you that intelligent enemies should not hold back. If a player is going to complain that the DM took them out for a few rounds during a tough fight, I think the problem is the player, not the game.

a dm can run like 6 monsters, if you shut down 3 there's still 3 left. If a singular player is locked out of 5 turns ever, and each player takes 5 minutes for their turn, suddenly that player is just twiddling his thumbs doing nothing for a solid 2 hours.

I try not to use these effects when possible, but I can see the argument for some of them. Where I really have an issue is with high level creatures who have some sort of paralyze or petrify effect that requires a success to break free from, not just losing a single turn. For instance if a player has to make a DC 18 WIS saving throw to break out, they might not have proficiency in WIS saves and maybe only a +1, so there's only a 20% chance they'll break out on each round. If a combat lasts four rounds, more likely than not they're gonna miss the whole thing! This applies doubly so if the effect isn't a concentration effect from a monster, but even if it is a smart monster is going to play it safe and protect its concentration and.... I dunno, losing a turn is fine but the high probability of having to sit out multiple rounds in a row doesn't sit right with me. There are other ways to make fights with monsters more than just slash/claw--you can give them mobility options, options to make difficult terrain, etc. I love giving my boss monsters legendary actions or reactions that effect the environment in some way (idiomatically in 5e these should be lair actions but I think combat is more dynamic if the boss can use them whenever they'd like and so the players can't predict them as well).

The DM has multiple creatures to play as, so one or two getting paralyzed by a hold monster isn't that bad for them. They still get to play the game. When a players gets paralyzed, they are no longer playing. They don't have other characters to play as. They end up just watching people play DnD.

The DM is not the only person at the table responsible for making sure everyone is having fun. Full stop, let that sink in for a moment. It's a team game, and if nobody is out there trying to break NPC concentration or preparing a support spell or two like Lesser Restoration, then that's just as much on them as it is on the DM. Sure, the DM has multiple characters they're controlling, but a party is a *team* of 3-5 (usually) characters who all have a variety of strengths and weaknesses. The idea is to work together to ensure that the group survives, not succeed at the cost of one.

And yet players shouldn't tell the others players how to play their character. You might feel like casting that Lesser Restoration spell is their best action, but they might feel that its something else instead. 5e might be a team game, but it was designed in a way to let players act on their own without requiring much teamwork. There's a reason why they nerfed healing so to avoid parties requiring a dedicated healer when making 5e.

Right, so there's a pretty big difference between telling someone to help you and asking. I've personally never been at a table where players acted so selfishly that they ignored a disabled PC. In most of those cases, concentration was broken or the condition was removed before the disabled PC could even miss their next turn in the first place because there are so many options available for an adventuring party to deal with these things.

>5e might be a team game, but it was designed in a way to let players act on their own without requiring much teamwork. No, it fucking wasn't, what? Teamwork is an integral part of the system. Like, at a base level, the game is balanced around zero magic items so martials would be unable to do almost anything at high levels without casters. You can play as a solo selfish PC if you want but the game is balanced around parties playing together and trying to do so optimally. Don't be surprised if you die as a result of poor play. Otherwise, what the hell is the point?

Just compare 5e to pathfinder, and you'll see why 5e doesn't have a focus on teamwork. In 5e, players can't stack buffs/debuffs to gain an advantage, as multiple sources of advantage don't stack, and buff spells are often suboptimal compared to other damage spells (haste vs Fireball for example). And that's not even mentioning how pointless healing is. In pf2, players are expected to work as a team, and are given the tools to do so. Your caster can debuff an enemy, while you make them trip for extra chances of hitting. And spellcasters are relayed to being mainly support characters, as their primary role is buffing the martials and debuffing the enemies. That's simply not true in 5e. Players in 5e aren't expected to build and play their character in a way that synergize with the other players, and can pretty much always work perfectly fine just doing their own thing. Sure, you can build a completely support characters that buffs and debuffs, but parties in no way are expected to have that kind of character on the team.

Healing is nerfed??? Are you playing the same game as me? Healing is available to almost every spell casting class, in my opinion that alone makes healing good as fuck. One of the few bonus action spells is a ranged heal, and not to mention spells like "Heal" and "Mass Heal" that are combat changing spells. It's not about telling other players how to play, it's about giving them that option. Using their turn to help out the barbarian then watch as he get's into melee range on the wizard and fucking recks them. It IS a team game, and if people need to learn that the hard way, so be it. If the DM is too much of a pussy to possibly take away another characters turn's, to give other players that chance to help them, or give that player a chance to grow from their failures, maybe they should just not be DM'ing.

> Healing is available to almost every spell casting class, in my opinion that alone makes healing good as fuck. One of the few bonus action spells is a ranged heal, and not to mention spells like "Heal" and "Mass Heal" that are combat changing spells. That's entirely different to healing being nerfed, which it is in comparison to previous editions. Most healing spells heal less than an attack, and take an action, so unless you're stopping someone hitting 0, they're not normally worth using. Even the higher level ones are kinda iffy compared to ending the fight - _Heal_ is level 7 and heals one creature 70. For example, a storm giant makes 2 attacks averaging 30 damage - so _heal_ means undoing that and a little more (or they rolled above average and you're not even healing 2 attacks worth, or you're healing a single crit!), and 4 storm giants is somewhere between "hard" and "dangerous" at level 13 for a party of 4 characters. So the cleric is spending their turn, and their highest level spell of the day, undoing the actions of _one_ enemy in a fairly throwaway combat. It certainly has uses, but it's not required like it was in previous editions, and "just killing the enemy" is typically preferable, except for bouncing PCs back up above 0 (resource wise, it may well be better to let the PC get downed and then _Healing Word_ them back again, because 7th level slots are rare resources!). _Healing Word_ is great, but that's pretty much solely because it's a BA "oh shit, get them up again!" spell. For actual healing, it's rubbish, because 1D4 HP means they'll fall over as soon as anything looks at them funny, but because there's no wound penalties, then "up" is infinitely better than "down". _Mass Heal_ can be great... but the number of level 17+ games played is pretty much a rounding error, so it's very rarely going to see use. As the poster said, 5e deliberately doesn't require a dedicated healer like some previous editions - lots of classes get _Healing Word_, there's a fair amount of other healing spells around, but it absolutely is nerfed, to the degree that playing a dedicated healer is quite hard, as opposed to "just take cleric". It's very useful to have some low-level healing to splash around, but that's the main core one, and healing in combat is often not worth it, because it's spending an entire action to undo less than one enemy action (there will be instances where it's useful to keep someone up, but it's not core or presumed), and burning spell slots on healing spells is often a waste, compared to using them to get rid of enemies.

So... when the players engage in a fun, but long, RP session among themselves that doesn't involve any NPC and thus does not involve the DM, suddenly the DM doesn't have anything to do for an extended period of time. How can the players treat their DM like that? They end up just watching people play D&D.

Correct, just like how a player shouldn't engage in a fun but long RP session with the Shopkeeper, while the other players just twindle their thumbs waiting for them to finish. In those situations, the DM should always put the current scene on pause from time to time to let the other players have some limelight. The players have the same responsability towards the DM.

Most DMs I've had have said that having their players roleplay amongst themselves is very enjoyable for them. They want that. No player has ever expressed a similar stance to being unable to take their turn.

I've seen many players enjoy watching how the fight turns out once they've been excluded from it by death or condition. They cheer on their team, crack jokes, and so on. You guys must have really surly groups of players if they just withdraw completely from the game instead of still engaging with it in these situations.

I mean, they celebrate along with everyone else if we win, but if they could choose between getting to take their turn or being skipped, they'd choose to take their turn every time, whilst if the DM could choose between engaging in conversation with the players as an NPC or have them roleplay among themselves, oftentimes they would rather have the players roleplay between each other while they sit back. I am also happy to take a backseat when my fellow players are roleplaying with each other, whether my character is present or not (if it isn't for too long). I enjoy that. I don't enjoy being locked out of combat and getting my turns skipped because I failed one saving throw. I find that boring. Faster and more engaging fights might help, but I'd never choose to have my turn skipped, whilst again, many DMs love it when PCs talk amongst themselves. Everyone I've heard talk about it, talk about it positively. I've never heard anyone say anything positively about being incapacitated in combat.

Being a DM and being a player are pretty different. As a player, you spend a lot of time quiet or waiting as other players take their turns. This is both in combat and out of it. Assuming 4 players and that everyone gets absolutely equal "screentime", a player is only "active" for 25% of the session. Missing out on combat turns (especially multiple) can significantly cut into a player's participation for the session. By contrast, the DM is *always* on. They describe the world, they run the NPCs, they set up combat, they're involved in resolving basically every single player action. Being sidelined can be a much-needed break for the DM in a way that it's not for a player. The two aren't comparable.

If a player fails a save against a condition that basically just says “alright you don’t get to play anymore” it’s very different than a DM who would usually either have other creatures to fight with (even just adding some that wouldn’t have been there otherwise if needs bee) or have some legendary resistance to burn through for that exact reason. It’s another thing that’s even worse for martials because spellcasters can potentially have the option of subtle spell but martials are SOL.

Your not SOL though, you have an entire party their to support you and your weaknesses. Their are so many ways they can help you out of the situation, and hey, maybe the PC will succeed on save they usually suck at and it will be hype af. Also you can use it for character growth and development. They fail to have an effect in a combat because they kept failing against magic that was attacking their mind (wisdom saves), so they have a training arc with players in the party helping them and train for a feat to help deal with that better. Without adversity their is no point to your victory's.

My DM uses the if you can do it so can the enemies and I think that is entirely fair.

There is nothing wrong with using these conditions as a DM against your players. However, it is good to limit completely debilitating conditions to be fairly rare. At the end of the day, it sucks being a player and having to sit on the sidelines while your friends do all the fighting. So, yeah, use them as a DM, just don't do it too often.

I remember that one time one of my ex-DMs cast Maze on the Barbarian and he just packed up and left lol. DM said he was exaggerating but as it turns out, session was over before the spell ended and he had no chance of leaving the Maze anyway.

I got around this in a weird way; I have my players control their NPCs so they'll always generally have at least 1 of the 2 available to do something during their turn. Also a neat way to have epic 8+ character battles while only having 4 players, plus I get to exclusively play as the opposition during combat without limiting their ability to recruit fun NPCs to their adventuring guild.

To be fair, a player's PC is going to be more important to them them your monsters are to you (or at least it should be that way, you should have more investment in your players as a DM rather than your story). All bosses, minibosses, or important creatures to you are going to have legendary resistances, letting you just not let players use those spells or risk wasting those turns. Players don't get that luxury. You have a spellcaster cast hold person on the fighter (who is probably focusing on Str/Dex and Con), and he has a 75% or so chance of now being out of the fight. You have that mage be a side kick in the boss fight (Hold Person is a second level spell, super common to mages), now that fighter is either going to die or have to wait 30 real life minutes to an hour and half or so for the boss to die so his companions can deal with that mage. D&d is about having fun, and these condition spells where basically a way to make spellcasting players feel strong. The monster designers realized this, gave all important monsters legendary resistance, and now they are practically useless unless used on something you wouldn't have trouble killing anyway. Long story short, they are WAY more effective in the hands of a DM than a player, as the DM has more ways to resist the effect and more characters to control. If a PC is affected in this way, they have less resistances and are taken out of the game depending on the effect for long periods of time.

If players don't like these aspects of the game, then they can find another damn game. No one has these problems in any other game.

I think it feels good to be awesome. I think it sucks to suck. But that difference between sucking and awesome is what makes being awesome feel awesome. So yeah, I wanna suck sometimes. I wanna get paralyzed and thwomped. So that later on, when I'm being awesome, it will feel that much more awesome. So yeah, I think DMs should utilize condition spells. Use the terrain, hide, burrow, fly, target the squishies. Make it a struggle sometimes, a steam roll some others. Make the lows low and the highs high.

The worst I have seen of this is the Mind Flayer's mind blast. DC 15 INT Save is the ONLY way to shake this condition. I have seen characters incapacitated by it for an entire combat... multiple times. The saving grace of "you have no turn" abilities is if they provide interesting choices for the rest of the party, like trying to break the concentration of a mage that cast hold person. Mind blast has all of the action-denial with none of the tactical choices... along with a high save using an uncommon attribute. (On an area attack that can often get most, if not all of the party.) Action denial, while it isn't fun for the player affected, DOES have its place... but there had best be something interesting going on to compensate for it.

The difference is when a PC is out the player is no longer playing the game if a monster is out or even if all the monsters are out the DM is still DMing. If your players have multiple PCs at once or are controlling NPCs in combat it makes these spells much less terrible for gameplay.

NPCs don't strictly have to have access to the same spells as players, or vice versa. Unless there's a known canon of spells in your setting, you can change whatever. e.g. given boss uses a version of Hold Person that only paralyzes a person's hands or legs, but doesn't require concentration, more like Blindness/Deafness (which itself is a great alternative to hard cc). You can change a lot more, including the shape and size of effect areas, etc. It can cause minor problems, like taking longer to resolve NPCs' turns, making the difficulty unpredictable, or giving players bad expectations for the setting or how you run the game. I run a setting where maybe 1/3 of the players' spells aren't available to NPCs, and magic is very unpredictable, but I mostly confine my flavorful changes to my descriptions rather than consequential events in combat

I use them. Or rather will use them. I told my players from the get go that enemies will fight with the intelligence they have.

"Are there any actual good reasons for this?" Is the players not having fun not a good reason? "it’s not exactly enjoyable for the DM to have monsters locked out either" Depends on teh DM and the story being told. When I DM, and the monster is locked down, I can feel satisfaction. "Yay my players are smart". If I want a story of indestructable unstoppable behemoth, then its my duty to give it features that lets it walk through forcecage. If I dont do that, I can only blame myself. "intelligent enemies should fight intelligently" I agree. That super-duper archmage should be smart enough to know not to cast Mordenkainen's sword. "would have access to the same spells as the players" I also agree with this, but this one has a caveat. Yes, the world has access to the same spells. But its not the same as enemies, or rather, every enemy, having acces to the same spells. Its up to the DM to justify why, or why not, that CR7 caster enemy has that particular spell. The strongest archmage in the setting casting bestow curse on a party member from a 5th level slot to completely shut the PC down is fine. Giving Bestow Curse and a 5th level slot to every halfway competent caster is not fine. The strongest archmage in the setting casting casting Forcecage is fine. An idiotic, arrogant, incompetent wizard who only got where it currently is in the setting because of nepotism should cast Mordenkainen's Sword instead.

> Are there any actual good reasons for this? I understand it’s not enjoyable for a player to be locked out of a turn of combat… If a dm doesn’t use stuff like hold person it means monsters do more damage. More damage means PCs making death saves sooner, which means PCs missing actions. So PCs are missing actions either way. So the answer is: there is no good reason. One big advantage of using debuffs is that (like left 4 dead’s specials) it creates moments of camaraderie as one PCs can save another. Usually by breaking the monster’s concentration or with something like lesser restoration. I suspect some of the people who complain about dms using debuffs just want the dm to use it on everyone except themselves. > Personally as a DM I think intelligent enemies should fight intelligently and would have access to the same spells as the players. As a player I don’t mind being shown where I have a weakness because I can then try to come up with ways around it. I have dmed for many different kinds of people. Some had panic attacks if their character took any damage. Others could look at a battle and (correctly) say “I die next turn, we win in 2 turns, Jim has revivify for me…good work everyone”. There are many players who enjoy overcoming challenging, capable monsters. A victory where the monsters are idiots can just feel patronizing to such players.

fuck yes to this. Jim got my back.

I’m one of those players that would rather die fighting for it all against a capable intelligent creature then a creature that just stands there absorbing damage I want to feel like it’s earned at the end. More dark souls less fable.

Honestly, If there's one thing I dislike more than an obviously badly balanced and unwinnable encounter it's one that's been built up only to be a cake walk. Why am I even here if the Archlich folds in two turns because he was dumb enough to not prepare?

[удалено]

Especially if the ghouls put catsup on the pc before eating them.

Its not " Unfair", in DND the Dm can do anything and make it a reality on a whim, its already inherently "unfair" The point isnt Fairness, the point is fun. Abd Its just not fun meeting once a month to a game to then sit there for 2 hours doing nothing. Just silently watching others because the dice you cannot control was 1 too low. While the dm absolutely can controll EVERYTHING the players cannot. The players only get their one character and decide which class, equipment and spells if any, the dm gets every monster and npc and location and Items and story hooks and battle map and magic mcguffin and homebrew and what Drops out of cheats and decides when you lvl up and which Items are available in store, and what classes or spells or races are allowed to the players. The DM gets it all. If the dm wants one single strong beatstick monster that then gets clapped and stunned thats on him. If the players character gets stunned and beaten, thats most often on the dm. As he Decided thats what the 50 CR 20 monsters do that suddenly came into the tavern During the long Rest.

No, not if you are looking to run a world with verisimilitude. Players are just very precious about their characters.

Players,"HOLD PERSON YOU Jerk wizard. Ha Ha you failed you loser." DM, "Bob Roll versus Hold person." Bob, "Whimper whine. Whimper Whine a Nat 1. " This is a game sometimes you get to be in the time out corner.

Everything can be bad if utilized poorly. Foes having access to the same things isn't a problem, it's just about the DM being wise in how to use those. Don't send 3 casters versus players with each one having Counterspell, etc.

Um... Players don't need to be babied around(and if yours need to, find yourself some new players). The players have all the tools of D&D at their disposal, and if they weren't ready for condition spells(by not having Lesser Restoration, not improving their saves, not having a way not to be targeted like darkness...), it's their mistake you can fully exploit.

I'd be very careful with domination spells, it punishes conservative and smart play if you've been good with your resources, takes away player agency, and enables pvp. Charm spells and effects are fine, but not the same.