Okay, so half of the stuff I post is about grappling, but here it goes.
I'm a huge creature with a 10-foot reach, (or a battlemaster fighter with Lunging Attack*?) and I grapple a creature that's not adjacent to me but within my reach. Unless that creature also has a >5-foot reach, they can't use the action-efficient shove to break the grapple, because despite me literally holding them I'm out of their reach.
Next scenario, I'm grappling a creature and holding them over a big-cliff-of-doom (reach is irrelevant here). If they either break the grapple with an action, or shove me, they fall. If I have 10-foot+ reach and hold them more than 5 feet away from the edge, as before, they'd be unable to shove, but breaking the grapple would send them to their death without a reasonable chance of grabbing something.
Next. I grapple a creature in round 1. In round 2 (assuming they can't break free on their turn), I walk 10 feet, do a high jump into the air. Suppose my Strength mod is +2 or greater. I jump at least 5 feet up (with no check). I hold the grappled creature above me, at an angle so that they are at least 10 feet up, and not directly over me. I drop them with no action. They take falling damage (by RAW Acrobatics doesn't help them, unless I'm missing something). They land prone. I land with no problem because I was only 5 feet up, not 10. I use my action to grapple them again. I use my bonus action to teabag them.
*Lunging attack extends the reach of a melee weapon attack, but a grapple is a "special melee attack", so I'm almost certain that the battlemaster can't initiate a grapple at reach with lunging attack. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong.
Drag someone whose action has already come around through a Transport via Plants so it ends (or just dispel it) before they have a turn to go back through, trap them halfway around the globe. This also works with things like Arcane Gate though it's more limited in the destination range, and best of all Demiplane if you can time it right.
You can also do that with a portable hole, but then you need them to fail a DC 10 strength check, which requires another effect to perform reliably (somehow making them incapacitated, or paralyzed, or unconscious, or whatever).
Fly speeds let you do all sorts of fun things of course, especially when you can dash as a bonus action.
The interaction of Earth Glide with Grapple, and the effect of releasing a grappled creature mid earth glide, are unexplored, and fun to explore :-)
Yup, flying makes my third option even more fun if you can boost your speed. I'm trying to figure out a way to use grappling to get a creature to take damage multiple times from a hazard. Unfortunately spells like wall of fire won't do damage multiple times if you fly above a wall and drag the poor sucker through it. Nor can you drag a guy through a gauntlet of your buddies to give them opportunity attacks. Best you could do is have a caster conjure the wall over the guy, and hold his head into it. Alternatively, have your entire party ready an action to attack, knock the guy prone, and drag him through the gauntlet. I'm not sure how any of this would interact with the spike growth, but the spell seems to imply that each square would cause damage. There may be some debate as to whether a creature can take damage in this way from forced movement.
Here's the situation. Fly first, grapple the guy from above on your first round. Second round, shove the person prone. Note you can do these both in the same round if you have multiple attacks. Have your friends ready an action to attack when within range. Have a caster with spike growth cast it around the edge of a cliff. Drag the guy through the (circumference of) the spikes, where your allies are waiting to strike as he is pulled through. Teabag as bonus action before you let the target go into the pit. Extra points if you can rig a wall of fire to cover the pit, or some sort of nasty portal to orbit.
I'm a huge creature with a 10-foot reach, (or a battlemaster fighter with Lunging Attack*?) and I grapple a creature that's not adjacent to me but within my reach. Unless that creature also has a >5-foot reach, they can't use the action-efficient shove to break the grapple, because despite me literally holding them I'm out of their reach.
Whichever hand you're using to seize them is within 5 feet of them, and therefore so are you. They can arguably shove you; at the very least, they can definitely attack you.
Next. I grapple a creature in round 1. In round 2 (assuming they can't break free on their turn), I walk half my speed, do a high jump into the air. Suppose my Strength mod is +2 or greater. I jump at least 5 feet up (with no check). I hold the grappled creature above me, at an angle so that they are at least 10 feet up, and not directly over me. I drop them with no action. They take falling damage (by RAW Acrobatics doesn't help them, unless I'm missing something). They land prone. I land with no problem because I was only 5 feet up, not 10. I use my action to grapple them with advantage (applies to any attack roll within 5 feet), since they are prone. I use my bonus action to teabag them.
Grappling is not an attack roll, so you don't get advantage from grappling someone that's prone.
Also keep in mind you need to move 10 feet, not half your speed, to get the full vertical jumping distance, and then still need 5 feet for the jump itself. If your original speed is less than 30 for whatever reason, that's not possible, since your halved speed would be less than 15.
Finally, also remember this strategy can be stopped by grappling you back.
*Lunging attack extends the reach of a melee weapon attack, but a grapple is a "special melee attack", so I'm almost certain that the battlemaster can't initiate a grapple at reach with lunging attack. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong.
Correct. The "special melee attack" isn't a weapon attack, so it's not applicable to Lunging Attack. Also, Lunging Attack arguably requires an attack that can result in a hit and has a damage roll.
Whichever hand you're using to seize them is within 5 feet of them, and therefore so are you. They can arguably shove you; at the very least, they can definitely attack you.
Jeez. Do they have a centralized place I can go for Twitter errata?
Grappling is not an attack roll, so you don't get advantage from grappling someone that's prone.
Also keep in mind you need to move 10 feet, not half your speed, to get the full vertical jumping distance, and then still need 5 feet for the jump itself. If your original speed is less than 30 for whatever reason, that's not possible, since your halved speed would be less than 15.
Finally, also remember this strategy can be stopped by grappling you back.
Sure. I was mislead by grappling technically being a "special melee attack". All valid points, but you still can't rain on my parade. Suppose I'm a 5th-level fighter. I take Athlete if I'm a dwarf. I get two attacks per action. In this plausible case, I could do all of the above in one turn. The enemy gets no chance to counter my grapple (aside from succeeding on the opposed check).
The text says you can drag them with you. It doesn't say you can position them.
Moving a Grappled Creature. When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you.
When you move you can bring them along. Now you want to body slam a goblin from time to time? That's cool your DM will probably let that happen, but don't try and stand behind the rules and say. "I can do this without a check" 'cause That's not what the rules say.
The implication of control over your opponents position, is only implied and not specifically granted.
Moving a Grappled Creature. When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you..
"Carry" blows open an interpretive can of worms, especially since the rules generally frown upon two medium-sized creatures occupying the same space. My relatively simple interpretation is that if a character has the muscles, there's no reason why you can't allow them to reposition another creature as long as the space in which you're placing them is unoccupied (I'd usually always require a roll before allowing them to take environmental damage). A simple rule requiring they follow you makes it unwieldy or impossible to do things like switch positions, or to take advantage of a hazard, wall, or other terrain feature. How would such a rule allow a you to move a creature into a dead end or carry them ahead of you in general? Or to move sideways with the target keeping the same relative position? You'd run out of movement making wacky zig-zag movements before being able to pull of half of these relatively simple maneuvers. Or you'd have to have a high-level fighter's arsenal of attacks, shoving the entire time and breaking your own grapple.
And supposing I jump directly upward while grappling a creature. The "follow" rule would imply that for a high enough jump (over 5 feet), I'd eventually fall straight through the target, eventually hitting the ground with the target floating above me like one of those weird bugs from Assassin's Creed. Yeah, you know the ones.
Now, suppose we nerf grappling further, we can still perform my silly maneuver, it would just be quite a bit more complicated. A fighter uses the charger feat + bonus shove, then jumps with remaining motion and uses more shoves with their attack action. Okay fine, but if we really really hate fun, then we can declare that shoving only works in vectors along the approximately flat manifold of 5ft-by-5ft-by-5ft cubes adjacent to the surface of the planet, or worse, that shoves only work in precisely one dimension rather than allowing diagonal shoves, and/or rule super conservatively that the movement caused by jumping or falling is indivisible, so that no character can take actions during that movement.
Welp, then barring a fighter than can charge through the ground directly upward into their foe my suplex is gone--and as collateral damage we've basically ruled out all sorts of rad situations that can happen when we allow 3-D combat, none of which are game-breaking, and most of which are clearly sub-optimal anyway. No more kung-fu in mid-air. No more using an enemy to brace your fall. No more drop kicking a guy off a horse from a hilltop. No more crouch-upper-cutting your enemy into a Mortal Kombat-esque ceiling of spikes.
Thankfully, like any doctrinal text, these things were left open to interpretation.
Jeez. Do they have a centralized place I can go for Twitter errata?
They're rulings, not errata. Jeremy doesn't change the rules on Twitter, just explains what they're supposed to mean. Anyways, you can search Twitter "from:jeremyecrawford grappled" to see answers that include the word "grappled"
All valid points, but you still can't rain on my parade. Suppose I'm a 5th-level fighter. I take Athlete if I'm a dwarf. I get two attacks per action. In this plausible case, I could do all of the above in one turn. The enemy gets no chance to counter my grapple (aside from succeeding on the opposed check).
Which is fine. It's not that great if you think about it. You're making two contested checks and probably using up all your movement to grapple someone, knock them prone and deal 1d10 damage but risk failing the second check and leaving them ungrappled. Or you could just shove them prone and hit them for more than 1d10 damage.
I'm also of the opinion that the carrying capacity rules should apply if you want to lift a grappled enemy above your head but there's really not that much advantage to doing this so it's not worth fighting over.
Moving a Grappled Creature. When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you..
"Carry" blows open an interpretive can of worms, especially since the rules generally frown upon two medium-sized creatures occupying the same space. My relatively simple interpretation is that if a character has the muscles, there's no reason why you can't allow them to reposition another creature as long as the space in which you're placing them is unoccupied (I'd usually always require a roll before allowing them to take environmental damage). A simple rule requiring they follow you makes it unwieldy or impossible to do things like switch positions, or to take advantage of a hazard, wall, or other terrain feature. How would such a rule allow a you to move a creature into a dead end or carry them ahead of you in general? Or to move sideways with the target keeping the same relative position? You'd run out of movement making wacky zig-zag movements before being able to pull of half of these relatively simple maneuvers. Or you'd have to have a high-level fighter's arsenal of attacks, shoving the entire time and breaking your own grapple.
And supposing I jump directly upward while grappling a creature. The "follow" rule would imply that for a high enough jump (over 5 feet), I'd eventually fall straight through the target, eventually hitting the ground with the target floating above me like one of those weird bugs from Assassin's Creed. Yeah, you know the ones.
Now, suppose we nerf grappling further, we can still perform my silly maneuver, it would just be quite a bit more complicated. A fighter uses the charger feat + bonus shove, then jumps with remaining motion and uses more shoves with their attack action. Okay fine, but if we really really hate fun, then we can declare that shoving only works in vectors along the approximately flat manifold of 5ft-by-5ft-by-5ft cubes adjacent to the surface of the planet, or worse, that shoves only work in precisely one dimension rather than allowing diagonal shoves, and/or rule super conservatively that the movement caused by jumping or falling is indivisible, so that no character can take actions during that movement.
Welp, then barring a fighter than can charge through the ground directly upward into their foe my suplex is gone--and as collateral damage we've basically ruled out all sorts of rad situations that can happen when we allow 3-D combat, none of which are game-breaking, and most of which are clearly sub-optimal anyway. No more kung-fu in mid-air. No more using an enemy to brace your fall. No more drop kicking a guy off a horse from a hilltop. No more crouch-upper-cutting your enemy into a Mortal Kombat-esque ceiling of spikes.
Thankfully, like any doctrinal text, these things were left open to interpretation.
I completely agree, the 'drag behind only' interpretation requires ignoring the word carry, but I respectfully disagree that freely re positioning is actually allowed by RAW, for two reasons:
1) There are no rules added for moving them without cost to your own movement. If you're ok with this, cool, but then the idea is that moving them to the other side of you (10' of movement, or 15', depending on how you handle diagonals) has no inherent movement cost. It does not matter how much you move them, it's a free action to do so.
2) This makes the "When you move" portion of the rule pointless and obsolete. Why must you move, if moving them is a free action? Why write it in that way at all? Would not a better writing of that read as follows? "You can reposition a grappled target freely around you, though you must keep the target within reach as you move. While repositioning the grappled target during movement, your movement speed is halved." If written in that way, there would be no question.
The interpretation of instead "When you move, you may drag or carry the grappled target with you", with the assumption being you maintain your relative positioning if you do so, accounts for all words of the RAW being as they are, does not confer abilities not granted by the text, and needs no rules for moving them without moving yourself. It explains why you must move for them to be moved, and treats it in a logically consistent and easily understood manner, for anyone who has ever driven a forklift at least. I know this whole debate is pointless since apparently Crawford weighed in with support for the freely repositioning camp, but do you see where I'm coming from? If you can reposition them freely, why must you move in the first place?
(I also want to point out that under the new rules detailed by Crawford, two fighters or barbarians who spend their turns in the following strange dance actually move nearly as fast as dashing: 1 is 5' ahead of 2. 1 grapples 2, moves forward 5', and puts 2 in front of him. He moves ahead (since you can move through friendly space) to be in front of 2 again. He grapples 2 again, moves forward 5', and again puts 2 in front of him. On 2's turn, he does the same thing to 1. Total amount moved? 50' each. If it makes sense to you that alternately carrying each other, at purportedly half speed, gets them 5/6 of the movement speed of a full out sprint, then I don't think we look at the rules the same way. Incidentally following my 'interpretation' of the RAW, alternately grappling each other and moving in the most optimal way (1 grabs 2, moves 15' forward, then 2 grabs 1, moves 15' forward) results in moving at exactly half the speed of a full sprint. Strange coincidence?)
The text says you can drag them with you. It doesn't say you can position them.
Moving a Grappled Creature. When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you.
When you move you can bring them along. Now you want to body slam a goblin from time to time? That's cool your DM will probably let that happen, but don't try and stand behind the rules and say. "I can do this without a check" 'cause That's not what the rules say.
The implication of control over your opponents position, is only implied and not specifically granted.
I suspect I'd edited this post after you'd started writing your reply, which I'm afraid causes some confusion.
Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that the rules Do Not let you freely hold your opponent over your head, over a cliff, or anything, but your DM likely will. However, you won't be able to use it effectively or predictably, because the result will be entirely at the DM's discretion. (which is to say, the book doesn't grant your character this power)
If you slam dunk a kobald and it takes falling damage that's cool. But when you try and do it later with that angry Basilisk. Your DM will say "you struggle to move the monster as you drag it behind you for 15 feet." You do not have a leg to stand on if you point at this rule. "I can drag OR carry it! I choose to carry it and then drop it off the cliff." Is simply not going to fly.
The text says you can drag them with you. It doesn't say you can position them.
Moving a Grappled Creature. When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you.
When you move you can bring them along. Now you want to body slam a goblin from time to time? That's cool your DM will probably let that happen, but don't try and stand behind the rules and say. "I can do this without a check" 'cause That's not what the rules say.
The implication of control over your opponents position, is only implied and not specifically granted.
I suspect I'd edited this post after you'd started writing your reply, which I'm afraid causes some confusion.
Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that the rules Do Not let you freely hold your opponent over your head, over a cliff, or anything, but your DM likely will. However, you won't be able to use it effectively or predictably, because the result will be entirely at the DM's discretion. (which is to say, the book doesn't grant your character this power)
If you slam dunk a kobald and it takes falling damage that's cool. But when you try and do it later with that angry Basilisk. Your DM will say "you struggle to move the monster as you drag it behind you for 15 feet." You do not have a leg to stand on if you point at this rule. "I can drag OR carry it! I choose to carry it and then drop it off the cliff." Is simply not going to fly.
Note that what you're referring to is not actually an ambiguity in the rule at all. Carrying already has rules, detailed in the section on using ability scores. You can *absolutely* say you can drag Or carry it, and for a Basilisk, I find it unlikely (it only being a medium monster) that such would be disputed. A Behir, on the other hand, being huge, would likely result in your DM pointing out that though you are enlarged, which lets you grapple it at all, your normal carry capacity for max lift at strength 16 is only 480 lbs (you can carry 240, you can lift up to 480), doubled since you're enlarged to 960lbs. The Behir being huge, weighs many tons, potentially 10,000lbs or more, and though the grapple ability grants you the ability to drag, or carry, the enemy, you lack the requisite strength to actually do so.
Seriously, the rules are a lot more well defined than people are making them out to be. The concept of carrying something is not some nebulous, amorphous construct referenced only in grappling. Why are people acting like it is?
(And as to the assertion it does not give you the ability to do so, it most certainly does! It gives you the ability to carry them! If you pick up a laundry basket, and walk to the edge of a cliff, carrying the laundry basket with you, is the laundry basket now over the edge of that cliff? If I grab a chair, and carry it to the edge of a cliff, is the chair over the edge of a cliff? Seriously, carrying something is not a strange or undefined concept! It does not require special rules clarifications to allow you to do things with the carried object which can be done with *any* carried object!)
The text says you can drag them with you. It doesn't say you can position them.
Moving a Grappled Creature. When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you.
When you move you can bring them along. Now you want to body slam a goblin from time to time? That's cool your DM will probably let that happen, but don't try and stand behind the rules and say. "I can do this without a check" 'cause That's not what the rules say.
The implication of control over your opponents position, is only implied and not specifically granted.
I suspect I'd edited this post after you'd started writing your reply, which I'm afraid causes some confusion.
Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that the rules Do Not let you freely hold your opponent over your head, over a cliff, or anything, but your DM likely will. However, you won't be able to use it effectively or predictably, because the result will be entirely at the DM's discretion. (which is to say, the book doesn't grant your character this power)
If you slam dunk a kobald and it takes falling damage that's cool. But when you try and do it later with that angry Basilisk. Your DM will say "you struggle to move the monster as you drag it behind you for 15 feet." You do not have a leg to stand on if you point at this rule. "I can drag OR carry it! I choose to carry it and then drop it off the cliff." Is simply not going to fly.
We agree that the rules are silent on what each of these things mean. I also think we agree on more than we disagree. Also, the basilisk case could be dealt with simply by saying that a basilisk is too heavy to carry. Grappling + movement is constrained by carrying capacity in RAW, as we see below. But as for dropping something over a cliff, why not? The grappler has successfully made an opposed strength check. In the case of a BBEG or PC I might give the situation an extra roll. But as a DM, if I put a big effin' cliff in my encounter, I certainly don't want to make it hard for people to actually use it.
Also, we should be very clear that there are multiple points of potential failure here. This strategy is not possible without some rolls here or there. In every round you repeat this strategy, you need to make a new grapple check, as you'd have to let go of the creature. After each of your rounds, the creature could attempt to grapple you, break the grapple, or shove you. That's potentially two or more checks per round, all to deal 6 points of damage max. Truth be told, I'd probably just tell my player to roll a regular old attack roll and make it a narrative body slam.
The text says you can drag them with you. It doesn't say you can position them.
Moving a Grappled Creature. When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you.
When you move you can bring them along. Now you want to body slam a goblin from time to time? That's cool your DM will probably let that happen, but don't try and stand behind the rules and say. "I can do this without a check" 'cause That's not what the rules say.
The implication of control over your opponents position, is only implied and not specifically granted.
I suspect I'd edited this post after you'd started writing your reply, which I'm afraid causes some confusion.
Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that the rules Do Not let you freely hold your opponent over your head, over a cliff, or anything, but your DM likely will. However, you won't be able to use it effectively or predictably, because the result will be entirely at the DM's discretion. (which is to say, the book doesn't grant your character this power)
If you slam dunk a kobald and it takes falling damage that's cool. But when you try and do it later with that angry Basilisk. Your DM will say "you struggle to move the monster as you drag it behind you for 15 feet." You do not have a leg to stand on if you point at this rule. "I can drag OR carry it! I choose to carry it and then drop it off the cliff." Is simply not going to fly.
Note that what you're referring to is not actually an ambiguity in the rule at all. Carrying already has rules, detailed in the section on using ability scores. You can *absolutely* say you can drag Or carry it, and for a Basilisk, I find it unlikely (it only being a medium monster) that such would be disputed. A Behir, on the other hand, being huge, would likely result in your DM pointing out that though you are enlarged, which lets you grapple it at all, your normal carry capacity for max lift at strength 16 is only 480 lbs (you can carry 240, you can lift up to 480), doubled since you're enlarged to 960lbs. The Behir being huge, weighs many tons, potentially 10,000lbs or more, and though the grapple ability grants you the ability to drag, or carry, the enemy, you lack the requisite strength to actually do so.
Seriously, the rules are a lot more well defined than people are making them out to be. The concept of carrying something is not some nebulous, amorphous construct referenced only in grappling. Why are people acting like it is?
(And as to the assertion it does not give you the ability to do so, it most certainly does! It gives you the ability to carry them! If you pick up a laundry basket, and walk to the edge of a cliff, carrying the laundry basket with you, is the laundry basket now over the edge of that cliff? If I grab a chair, and carry it to the edge of a cliff, is the chair over the edge of a cliff? Seriously, carrying something is not a strange or undefined concept! It does not require special rules clarifications to allow you to do things with the carried object which can be done with *any* carried object!)
Correct. This is what RAW have to say about carrying:
Lifting and Carrying
Your Strength score determines the amount of weight you can bear. The following terms define what you can lift or carry.
Carrying Capacity. Your carrying capacity is your Strength score multiplied by 15. This is the weight (in pounds) that you can carry, which is high enough that most characters don't usually have to worry about it.
Push, Drag, or Lift. You can push, drag, or lift a weight in pounds up to twice your carrying capacity (or 30 times your Strength score). While pushing or dragging weight in excess of your carrying capacity, your speed drops to 5 feet.
Size and Strength. Larger creatures can bear more weight, whereas Tiny creatures can carry less. For each size category above Medium, double the creature's carrying capacity and the amount it can push, drag, or lift. For a Tiny creature, halve these weights.
Furthermore, the grappling rules explicitly forbid grappling a creature of more than one size category larger than you. You can use the optional DMG rules to climb aboard, but that gives you no option to force movement anyway.
The heart of the disagreement is that nowhere does it specify what restrictions exist on where grappled creatures are held relative to the grappler. That aspect of the rules is VERY nebulous, and for good reason. Let's face it, the grappler has succeeded on an opposed strength contest... that should probably give them some power over positioning. Similarly, the rules discourage multiple creatures from occupying the same space. Also, occupying the same space, or the proposed "grappled creature enters previously occupied space" don't fly if you're grappling more than one creature, which is an excellent strategy for grappler builds.
I just want to point out as well, as it's come up multiple times across various threads that "normally carried objects are in your square", but that's not necessarily true. If 4 people are carrying a cart because the horses all died, the cart they're carrying is not in their square, and I doubt anyone would have any questions about how that would work, positioning wise. Similarly, if 1 strong person is carrying a 5' long bench along in front of them, the bench is not in their square, and again, there's no question. So when grappling someone who is not in your square, let's please not pretend this is some totally isolated case which no one understands how to handle by the rules. Carrying stuff that isn't in your square is just like carrying stuff that *is* in your square, and normally the pivoting of such objects, or whatever else you're going to do with it, requires no special rules other than those put on it by real life (pivoting in narrow hallways is a pain, for example). Special restrictions are already put in place by the requirement that you move them when you move, and you move them with you, specifically, but yeah, carrying things in squares other than yourself is again not some strange, nebulous, unknowable act, just saying. Does anyone *truly* have no idea how it would work for someone to (generally speaking) carry an object which is not in their square? Truly?
Okay, so half of the stuff I post is about grappling, but here it goes.
I'm a huge creature with a 10-foot reach, (or a battlemaster fighter with Lunging Attack*?) and I grapple a creature that's not adjacent to me but within my reach. Unless that creature also has a >5-foot reach, they can't use the action-efficient shove to break the grapple, because despite me literally holding them I'm out of their reach.
Next scenario, I'm grappling a creature and holding them over a big-cliff-of-doom (reach is irrelevant here). If they either break the grapple with an action, or shove me, they fall. If I have 10-foot+ reach and hold them more than 5 feet away from the edge, as before, they'd be unable to shove, but breaking the grapple would send them to their death without a reasonable chance of grabbing something.
Next. I grapple a creature in round 1. In round 2 (assuming they can't break free on their turn), I walk 10 feet, do a high jump into the air. Suppose my Strength mod is +2 or greater. I jump at least 5 feet up (with no check). I hold the grappled creature above me, at an angle so that they are at least 10 feet up, and not directly over me. I drop them with no action. They take falling damage (by RAW Acrobatics doesn't help them, unless I'm missing something). They land prone. I land with no problem because I was only 5 feet up, not 10. I use my action to grapple them again. I use my bonus action to teabag them.
*Lunging attack extends the reach of a melee weapon attack, but a grapple is a "special melee attack", so I'm almost certain that the battlemaster can't initiate a grapple at reach with lunging attack. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong.
Anybody have any more fun grapple shenanigans?
Drag someone whose action has already come around through a Transport via Plants so it ends (or just dispel it) before they have a turn to go back through, trap them halfway around the globe. This also works with things like Arcane Gate though it's more limited in the destination range, and best of all Demiplane if you can time it right.
You can also do that with a portable hole, but then you need them to fail a DC 10 strength check, which requires another effect to perform reliably (somehow making them incapacitated, or paralyzed, or unconscious, or whatever).
Fly speeds let you do all sorts of fun things of course, especially when you can dash as a bonus action.
The interaction of Earth Glide with Grapple, and the effect of releasing a grappled creature mid earth glide, are unexplored, and fun to explore :-)
Yup, flying makes my third option even more fun if you can boost your speed. I'm trying to figure out a way to use grappling to get a creature to take damage multiple times from a hazard. Unfortunately spells like wall of fire won't do damage multiple times if you fly above a wall and drag the poor sucker through it. Nor can you drag a guy through a gauntlet of your buddies to give them opportunity attacks. Best you could do is have a caster conjure the wall over the guy, and hold his head into it. Alternatively, have your entire party ready an action to attack, knock the guy prone, and drag him through the gauntlet. I'm not sure how any of this would interact with the spike growth, but the spell seems to imply that each square would cause damage. There may be some debate as to whether a creature can take damage in this way from forced movement.
Here's the situation. Fly first, grapple the guy from above on your first round. Second round, shove the person prone. Note you can do these both in the same round if you have multiple attacks. Have your friends ready an action to attack when within range. Have a caster with spike growth cast it around the edge of a cliff. Drag the guy through the (circumference of) the spikes, where your allies are waiting to strike as he is pulled through. Teabag as bonus action before you let the target go into the pit. Extra points if you can rig a wall of fire to cover the pit, or some sort of nasty portal to orbit.
Whichever hand you're using to seize them is within 5 feet of them, and therefore so are you. They can arguably shove you; at the very least, they can definitely attack you.
"If you're playing without a grid, distances in the D&D rules are meant to be read in their natural English sense. For example, I'm within 5 feet of you if any part of me is within 5 feet of you. We don't mean for you to mentally project a grid onto the action."
"A creature grappled by a giant octopus can attack the octopus via the grappling tentacle."
Grappling is not an attack roll, so you don't get advantage from grappling someone that's prone.
Also keep in mind you need to move 10 feet, not half your speed, to get the full vertical jumping distance, and then still need 5 feet for the jump itself. If your original speed is less than 30 for whatever reason, that's not possible, since your halved speed would be less than 15.
Finally, also remember this strategy can be stopped by grappling you back.
Correct. The "special melee attack" isn't a weapon attack, so it's not applicable to Lunging Attack. Also, Lunging Attack arguably requires an attack that can result in a hit and has a damage roll.
Jeez. Do they have a centralized place I can go for Twitter errata?
Sure. I was mislead by grappling technically being a "special melee attack". All valid points, but you still can't rain on my parade. Suppose I'm a 5th-level fighter. I take Athlete if I'm a dwarf. I get two attacks per action. In this plausible case, I could do all of the above in one turn. The enemy gets no chance to counter my grapple (aside from succeeding on the opposed check).
The text says you can drag them with you. It doesn't say you can position them.
Moving a Grappled Creature. When you move, you can drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved, unless the creature is two or more sizes smaller than you.
When you move you can bring them along. Now you want to body slam a goblin from time to time? That's cool your DM will probably let that happen, but don't try and stand behind the rules and say. "I can do this without a check" 'cause That's not what the rules say.
The implication of control over your opponents position, is only implied and not specifically granted.
Extended Signature
I've had this discussion many times. First, RAW:
"Carry" blows open an interpretive can of worms, especially since the rules generally frown upon two medium-sized creatures occupying the same space. My relatively simple interpretation is that if a character has the muscles, there's no reason why you can't allow them to reposition another creature as long as the space in which you're placing them is unoccupied (I'd usually always require a roll before allowing them to take environmental damage). A simple rule requiring they follow you makes it unwieldy or impossible to do things like switch positions, or to take advantage of a hazard, wall, or other terrain feature. How would such a rule allow a you to move a creature into a dead end or carry them ahead of you in general? Or to move sideways with the target keeping the same relative position? You'd run out of movement making wacky zig-zag movements before being able to pull of half of these relatively simple maneuvers. Or you'd have to have a high-level fighter's arsenal of attacks, shoving the entire time and breaking your own grapple.
And supposing I jump directly upward while grappling a creature. The "follow" rule would imply that for a high enough jump (over 5 feet), I'd eventually fall straight through the target, eventually hitting the ground with the target floating above me like one of those weird bugs from Assassin's Creed. Yeah, you know the ones.
Now, suppose we nerf grappling further, we can still perform my silly maneuver, it would just be quite a bit more complicated. A fighter uses the charger feat + bonus shove, then jumps with remaining motion and uses more shoves with their attack action. Okay fine, but if we really really hate fun, then we can declare that shoving only works in vectors along the approximately flat manifold of 5ft-by-5ft-by-5ft cubes adjacent to the surface of the planet, or worse, that shoves only work in precisely one dimension rather than allowing diagonal shoves, and/or rule super conservatively that the movement caused by jumping or falling is indivisible, so that no character can take actions during that movement.
Welp, then barring a fighter than can charge through the ground directly upward into their foe my suplex is gone--and as collateral damage we've basically ruled out all sorts of rad situations that can happen when we allow 3-D combat, none of which are game-breaking, and most of which are clearly sub-optimal anyway. No more kung-fu in mid-air. No more using an enemy to brace your fall. No more drop kicking a guy off a horse from a hilltop. No more crouch-upper-cutting your enemy into a Mortal Kombat-esque ceiling of spikes.
Thankfully, like any doctrinal text, these things were left open to interpretation.
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They're rulings, not errata. Jeremy doesn't change the rules on Twitter, just explains what they're supposed to mean. Anyways, you can search Twitter "from:jeremyecrawford grappled" to see answers that include the word "grappled"
I suspect I'd edited this post after you'd started writing your reply, which I'm afraid causes some confusion.
Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that the rules Do Not let you freely hold your opponent over your head, over a cliff, or anything, but your DM likely will. However, you won't be able to use it effectively or predictably, because the result will be entirely at the DM's discretion. (which is to say, the book doesn't grant your character this power)
If you slam dunk a kobald and it takes falling damage that's cool. But when you try and do it later with that angry Basilisk. Your DM will say "you struggle to move the monster as you drag it behind you for 15 feet." You do not have a leg to stand on if you point at this rule. "I can drag OR carry it! I choose to carry it and then drop it off the cliff." Is simply not going to fly.
Extended Signature
Also, we should be very clear that there are multiple points of potential failure here. This strategy is not possible without some rolls here or there. In every round you repeat this strategy, you need to make a new grapple check, as you'd have to let go of the creature. After each of your rounds, the creature could attempt to grapple you, break the grapple, or shove you. That's potentially two or more checks per round, all to deal 6 points of damage max. Truth be told, I'd probably just tell my player to roll a regular old attack roll and make it a narrative body slam.
Correct. This is what RAW have to say about carrying:
Furthermore, the grappling rules explicitly forbid grappling a creature of more than one size category larger than you. You can use the optional DMG rules to climb aboard, but that gives you no option to force movement anyway.
The heart of the disagreement is that nowhere does it specify what restrictions exist on where grappled creatures are held relative to the grappler. That aspect of the rules is VERY nebulous, and for good reason. Let's face it, the grappler has succeeded on an opposed strength contest... that should probably give them some power over positioning. Similarly, the rules discourage multiple creatures from occupying the same space. Also, occupying the same space, or the proposed "grappled creature enters previously occupied space" don't fly if you're grappling more than one creature, which is an excellent strategy for grappler builds.
I just want to point out as well, as it's come up multiple times across various threads that "normally carried objects are in your square", but that's not necessarily true. If 4 people are carrying a cart because the horses all died, the cart they're carrying is not in their square, and I doubt anyone would have any questions about how that would work, positioning wise. Similarly, if 1 strong person is carrying a 5' long bench along in front of them, the bench is not in their square, and again, there's no question. So when grappling someone who is not in your square, let's please not pretend this is some totally isolated case which no one understands how to handle by the rules. Carrying stuff that isn't in your square is just like carrying stuff that *is* in your square, and normally the pivoting of such objects, or whatever else you're going to do with it, requires no special rules other than those put on it by real life (pivoting in narrow hallways is a pain, for example). Special restrictions are already put in place by the requirement that you move them when you move, and you move them with you, specifically, but yeah, carrying things in squares other than yourself is again not some strange, nebulous, unknowable act, just saying. Does anyone *truly* have no idea how it would work for someone to (generally speaking) carry an object which is not in their square? Truly?
It's not "do you even lift?", but "how do you even lift?" *bong rip*
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Extended Signature