During an encounter my party was fighting, there were 3 dinosaurs. They had the ability to after getting reduced to 0hp to make a con save and if they pass they go to 1 instead. There were 3 we killed 2. The last one ran away we made 3 opportunity attacks. The problem came when our DM said all opportunity attacks resolve at the same time so when it was reduced to zero 0hp and came back up the last attack doesn't happen because it was apart of the attack that brought it to zero. We argued only the attacks the brought it to zero happened so far so it would have to take the last attack. He said no then said combat was over because it ran away but me and our spell caster had more than enough range to hit it on our turns which were next. So it got away. For me wrong about how opportunity tax work or was he?
You can make an opportunity attack when a hostile creature that you can see moves out of your reach. To make the opportunity attack, you use your reaction to make one melee attack against the provoking creature. The attack occurs right before the creature leaves your reach.
You can avoid provoking an opportunity attack by taking the Disengage action.
First, did the creature take a disengage action?
Second, those opportunity attacks were all reactions, so a new turn would begin.
Third, DMs are allowed to rule as they wish at their table.
Near as I can tell, the issue is that everyone felt the dinosaur should have died, the dinosaur disagreed so didn't, ran away, and there were no attacks allowed on it after it was getting away, despite it being in spell range.
To the point of "did the opportunity attacks come after the main attacks -- yes, they did.
Could they have resolved simultaneously -- per the rules, yes, because the rules don't break down a six second round any further.
should you have been able to attack it from behind as it ran away -- per the rules DM's call.
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Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Well, that sounds like the DM was set on some of the enemies escaping because regardless of how the opportunity attacks resolve your party should have been free to pursue or use ranged attacks on their turns as normal. In D&D I find combat is very sticky and it can be very hard for one party to escape or to transition from a combat scene to a chase scene. This is all just to say it sounds like your DM was in a hard spot and trying to do their best to do what they felt was required by the story.
As for the question about Opportunity Attacks the answer is it depends. An Opportunity Attack is triggered when a creature leaves another creatures reach, so the order of the attacks depends on how the dinosaur moved and how your parties reaches overlapped. If you were all clustered around one corner or side of the dinosaur, then the dinosaur moving directly away from you would trigger all of the Opportunity Attacks at the same time.
I don't know how exactly the dinosaur's staying at 1hp works exactly but I see two possible scenarios. First, and I think most likely, maybe it works like a Zombie and instead of dropping to 0hp they drop to 1hp. In this case they are still a valid target of the following Opportunity Attack and that is resolved as normal. The second scenario is maybe it works like the Troll regeneration feature. In this scenario they drop to 0hp and fall Unconscious, they are still a valid target for the following Opportunity Attack but now if hit they suffer automatic death save failure(s) instead of damage. Either way I don't see a scenario where the dinosaur suddenly becomes an invalid target for an Opportunity Attack.
Could they have resolved simultaneously -- per the rules, yes, because the rules don't break down a six second round any further.
I disagree with this. D&D is a turn-based game. Nothing ever resolves at exactly the same moment -- an order of how things resolve must be determined. The core books do not spell out how to determine this order so it is assumed that the DM simply decides.
However, in the optional Xanathar's Guide To Everything book, a method for resolving simultaneous effects is given:
In rare cases, effects can happen at the same time, especially at the start or end of a creature’s turn. If two or more things happen at the same time on a character or monster’s turn, the person at the game table — whether player or DM — who controls that creature decides the order in which those things happen. For example, if two effects occur at the end of a player character’s turn, the player decides which of the two effects happens first.
So, in this case, the dinosaur is controlled by the DM and it is the dinosaur's turn when these opportunity attacks occur. So, the DM decides (on behalf of the dinosaur) the order in which these opportunity attacks should be resolved. But they do resolve in order. So, one opportunity attack is resolved and the dinosaur makes a successful CON save to end up at 1 HP. After that, the next opportunity attack needs to be resolved and if that is a hit and damage is dealt the dinosaur will have to pass another CON save to stay at 1 HP. And then again for the third opportunity attack.
Another way to think about this is -- would you want your PC to be subjected to simultaneous opportunity attacks which could be added together to potentially result in an Instant Death by Massive Damage when remaining damage beyond 0 equals or exceeds your HP maximum? No. Each of those attacks would be deemed to be dealing damage separately / from separate sources and would instead result in falling to 0 and then auto-failing death saves -- or, probably more accurately if the first opportunity attack drops the foe to 0 then the second opportunity attack cannot occur since an unconscious creature cannot be in the process of moving outside of the reach. The point is, these things are put into an order and are resolved sequentially.
As for the DM deciding that combat ended while the dinosaur was still in range, that's just silly.
Imean, we know there is an order to things, we know that these things happen in six seconds, it takes no time at all to break it down into single second increments as move it forward.
However, the last time I pointed this out, I was accused of making it all up and I took offense. (what I want to say is based more in my ego and having far, far more experience than the person who was informing me of this).
I would have let the dinosaur die and "created" a new one if I needed one later, and let them have the ranged attacks.
However, I generally make it a rule not to second guess other DMs lest I encourage rules lawyering.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
probably more accurately if the first opportunity attack drops the foe to 0 then the second opportunity attack cannot occur since an unconscious creature cannot be in the process of moving outside of the reach.
I don't quite agree with this interpretation.
It is true that the effects of an Opportunity Attack are resolved before their trigger is resolved, i.e. the attack is made and damage is dealt before the foe actually leaves your reach. But I don't believe that if an effect of an Opportunity Attack prevents the foe from leaving that it means that the trigger didn't occur.
A similar reaction is Counterspell. If a foe casts a spell multiple players might attempt to Counterspell it. We can use Xanathar's to decide what order to resolve the Counterspells but all the player's that declared they were casting Counterspell still spend the corresponding spell slots. If the spell is successfully countered before all the Counterspells are resolved then the remaining Counterspells fizzle as there is no longer a valid target and the spell slot is still spent (also per Xanathar's).
With Opportunity Attacks the creature still exists after dropping to 0hp so I see nothing that would prevent the subsequent Opportunity Attacks from being resolved as normal. The foe was attempting to flee when the decision to make an Opportunity Attack was made and so they should all be resolved.
But I don't believe that if an effect of an Opportunity Attack prevents the foe from leaving that it means that the trigger didn't occur.
I see where you are going with that but I really do not like that interpretation and in fact it's probably just incorrect based on the RAW. This is different than your Counterspell example. In that case, the opponent really was trying to cast the spell so there was a trigger. In this case, the opponent never actually leaves your reach so there actually is no trigger.
From Chapter 9 we have:
You can make an opportunity attack when a hostile creature that you can see moves out of your reach.
But also:
The attack occurs right before the creature leaves your reach
I believe that it was designed this way pretty much for this exact reason. So, when the first opportunity attack renders the foe unconscious, that foe remains in the adjacent square that it was trying to flee from. No other opportunity attacks can trigger since the unconscious creature is no longer moving. I believe that there have been threads regarding the feats which cause a creature's speed to be reduced to 0 in such situations and they come to the same conclusion -- that the creature never actually exited beyond the reach so no other opportunity attacks can trigger. (unless you believe in the unwritten D&D physics ;-) )
Think about what happens to your PCs in your interpretation -- a PC desperately runs away from 3 foes. The first one takes an opportunity attack and drops the PC to 0. Now the second opportunity attack gets to happen at advantage? And it's an auto-crit, causing 2 failed saves? Then the third opportunity attack also happens at advantage and causes 2 more failed saves, killing the PC on the spot before any allies get a chance to assist? That's pretty nasty. I think it's more reasonable for the first one to knock the PC out and then the other two foes have to wait until their turn rolls around before hitting that PC while he's down.
It's hard to make a rule interpretation without the dinosaur statblock and the trait or feature used to be reduced to 1 hit point. instead of 0 hit point.
Multiple action or attack triggering on the same event is the closest you can have of things happening simultaneously and many time table handle them all at once despite the game usually tend to treat in sequential resolution, where each triggering event are distinct reaction attack that can potentially trigger an effect or reaction to them. Other scenario where we often see simultaneous events occuring parrallely is when multiple creature Ready an action with the same trigger.
In order to better illustrate the situation, imagine a orc leaves the reach of 3 characters, provoking an opportunity attack from each of them while one of them has the Sentinel feat. Wpuld the feat's user OA going first cancel all others by reducing the orc's speed to 0 before it can resolve movement or because it was leaving their reach prior to that then the others still get to make one since they react to something happening before any effect can result from those attacks?
It's hard to make a rule interpretation without the dinosaur statblock and the trait or feature used to be reduced to 1 hit point. instead of 0 hit point.
Multiple action or attack triggering on the same event is the closest you can have of things happening simultaneously and many time table handle them all at once despite the game usually tend to treat in sequential resolution, where each triggering event are distinct reaction attack that can potentially trigger an effect or reaction to them. Other scenario where we often see simultaneous events occuring parrallely is when multiple creature Ready an action with the same trigger.
It is likely one of the zombie dinosaurs from Chult with the typical zombie con save when hitting 0 with the DC equal to 5+damage dealt. However, that is a guess on my part.
DMs can run their games however they like. They can change rules, make up rules, use house rules or whatever they like. HOWEVER, the fundamental requirement for play is that the DM and the players share the same rules. It doesn't matter what those rules are, it matters that the players are aware of how the DM runs things in their world.
In this case, resolving all the opportunity attacks as one attack - is that correct according to Rules As Written (which is the popular thing in these forums), likely No. There have been several good arguments plus the citation from Xanathar's for resolving simultaneous effects that would support that opportunity attacks should be resolved sequentially even if they share a triggering event. Can a DM do it that way if they want? Absolutely yes ... but they should let the players know if at all possible (sometimes rulings come up in the moment and a DM hasn't encountered that situation before so they rule spontaneously and keep the game going - in those cases though the DM will consider the ruling after the game, possibly consult the players and the rule books, decide if it was a correct ruling and let the players know whether it will be that way in the game from now on or if the DM decided to change their mind).
That is how DMing works.
However to the OP. The DM in this case appeared to want the dinosaur to escape for some reason. Why? I have no idea. So the DM made a few rulings to force this to happen which is often not the best approach.
1) Resolving all the opportunity attacks so that there is only one roll for the zombie dinosaur.
2) Allowing the monster to be immediately beyond reach of the characters so that they could take no more attacks.
The first is a rule they decided on. The second is a situational ruling that doesn't make much sense on the face of it unless the dinosaur was very fast and the area of the combat was a jungle with lots of cover that would prevent the use of long range attacks. Without the circumstances, it is impossible for everyone here to reach a reasonable conclusion.
In this case, resolving all the opportunity attacks as one attack - is that correct according to Rules As Written (which is the popular thing in these forums), likely No.
One attack is definitely not the way to go. Regardless of how a DM resolve it, i think there should always be 1 attack roll per Opportunity Attack made, wether they happen simultaneously all at once or in sequence one after the other.
In this case, resolving all the opportunity attacks as one attack - is that correct according to Rules As Written (which is the popular thing in these forums), likely No.
One attack is definitely not the way to go. Regardless of how a DM resolve it, i think there should always be 1 attack roll per Opportunity Attack made, wether they happen simultaneously all at once or in sequence one after the other.
I agree. The question in this case was really whether the damage from all the successful attacks could be combined into one constitution save for the zombie dinosaur or whether a separate check should be required for each successful attack. I'd lean towards a roll for each attack being RAW.
In this case, resolving all the opportunity attacks as one attack - is that correct according to Rules As Written (which is the popular thing in these forums), likely No.
One attack is definitely not the way to go. Regardless of how a DM resolve it, i think there should always be 1 attack roll per Opportunity Attack made, wether they happen simultaneously all at once or in sequence one after the other.
I agree. The question in this case was really whether the damage from all the successful attacks could be combined into one constitution save for the zombie dinosaur or whether a separate check should be required for each successful attack. I'd lean towards a roll for each attack being RAW.
Me too i don't see why RAW each instance of attack's damage reducing the Dinosaur Zombie to 0 hit points wouldn't trigger it's Undead Fortitude Trait. The DM's ruling seem to ensure the monster's escape for some reasons.
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During an encounter my party was fighting, there were 3 dinosaurs. They had the ability to after getting reduced to 0hp to make a con save and if they pass they go to 1 instead. There were 3 we killed 2. The last one ran away we made 3 opportunity attacks. The problem came when our DM said all opportunity attacks resolve at the same time so when it was reduced to zero 0hp and came back up the last attack doesn't happen because it was apart of the attack that brought it to zero. We argued only the attacks the brought it to zero happened so far so it would have to take the last attack. He said no then said combat was over because it ran away but me and our spell caster had more than enough range to hit it on our turns which were next. So it got away. For me wrong about how opportunity tax work or was he?
relevant rule:
First, did the creature take a disengage action?
Second, those opportunity attacks were all reactions, so a new turn would begin.
Third, DMs are allowed to rule as they wish at their table.
Near as I can tell, the issue is that everyone felt the dinosaur should have died, the dinosaur disagreed so didn't, ran away, and there were no attacks allowed on it after it was getting away, despite it being in spell range.
To the point of "did the opportunity attacks come after the main attacks -- yes, they did.
Could they have resolved simultaneously -- per the rules, yes, because the rules don't break down a six second round any further.
should you have been able to attack it from behind as it ran away -- per the rules DM's call.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Well, that sounds like the DM was set on some of the enemies escaping because regardless of how the opportunity attacks resolve your party should have been free to pursue or use ranged attacks on their turns as normal. In D&D I find combat is very sticky and it can be very hard for one party to escape or to transition from a combat scene to a chase scene. This is all just to say it sounds like your DM was in a hard spot and trying to do their best to do what they felt was required by the story.
As for the question about Opportunity Attacks the answer is it depends. An Opportunity Attack is triggered when a creature leaves another creatures reach, so the order of the attacks depends on how the dinosaur moved and how your parties reaches overlapped. If you were all clustered around one corner or side of the dinosaur, then the dinosaur moving directly away from you would trigger all of the Opportunity Attacks at the same time.
I don't know how exactly the dinosaur's staying at 1hp works exactly but I see two possible scenarios. First, and I think most likely, maybe it works like a Zombie and instead of dropping to 0hp they drop to 1hp. In this case they are still a valid target of the following Opportunity Attack and that is resolved as normal. The second scenario is maybe it works like the Troll regeneration feature. In this scenario they drop to 0hp and fall Unconscious, they are still a valid target for the following Opportunity Attack but now if hit they suffer automatic death save failure(s) instead of damage. Either way I don't see a scenario where the dinosaur suddenly becomes an invalid target for an Opportunity Attack.
I disagree with this. D&D is a turn-based game. Nothing ever resolves at exactly the same moment -- an order of how things resolve must be determined. The core books do not spell out how to determine this order so it is assumed that the DM simply decides.
However, in the optional Xanathar's Guide To Everything book, a method for resolving simultaneous effects is given:
So, in this case, the dinosaur is controlled by the DM and it is the dinosaur's turn when these opportunity attacks occur. So, the DM decides (on behalf of the dinosaur) the order in which these opportunity attacks should be resolved. But they do resolve in order. So, one opportunity attack is resolved and the dinosaur makes a successful CON save to end up at 1 HP. After that, the next opportunity attack needs to be resolved and if that is a hit and damage is dealt the dinosaur will have to pass another CON save to stay at 1 HP. And then again for the third opportunity attack.
Another way to think about this is -- would you want your PC to be subjected to simultaneous opportunity attacks which could be added together to potentially result in an Instant Death by Massive Damage when remaining damage beyond 0 equals or exceeds your HP maximum? No. Each of those attacks would be deemed to be dealing damage separately / from separate sources and would instead result in falling to 0 and then auto-failing death saves -- or, probably more accurately if the first opportunity attack drops the foe to 0 then the second opportunity attack cannot occur since an unconscious creature cannot be in the process of moving outside of the reach. The point is, these things are put into an order and are resolved sequentially.
As for the DM deciding that combat ended while the dinosaur was still in range, that's just silly.
I don't disagree with this at all.
Imean, we know there is an order to things, we know that these things happen in six seconds, it takes no time at all to break it down into single second increments as move it forward.
However, the last time I pointed this out, I was accused of making it all up and I took offense. (what I want to say is based more in my ego and having far, far more experience than the person who was informing me of this).
I would have let the dinosaur die and "created" a new one if I needed one later, and let them have the ranged attacks.
However, I generally make it a rule not to second guess other DMs lest I encourage rules lawyering.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
I don't quite agree with this interpretation.
It is true that the effects of an Opportunity Attack are resolved before their trigger is resolved, i.e. the attack is made and damage is dealt before the foe actually leaves your reach. But I don't believe that if an effect of an Opportunity Attack prevents the foe from leaving that it means that the trigger didn't occur.
A similar reaction is Counterspell. If a foe casts a spell multiple players might attempt to Counterspell it. We can use Xanathar's to decide what order to resolve the Counterspells but all the player's that declared they were casting Counterspell still spend the corresponding spell slots. If the spell is successfully countered before all the Counterspells are resolved then the remaining Counterspells fizzle as there is no longer a valid target and the spell slot is still spent (also per Xanathar's).
With Opportunity Attacks the creature still exists after dropping to 0hp so I see nothing that would prevent the subsequent Opportunity Attacks from being resolved as normal. The foe was attempting to flee when the decision to make an Opportunity Attack was made and so they should all be resolved.
I see where you are going with that but I really do not like that interpretation and in fact it's probably just incorrect based on the RAW. This is different than your Counterspell example. In that case, the opponent really was trying to cast the spell so there was a trigger. In this case, the opponent never actually leaves your reach so there actually is no trigger.
From Chapter 9 we have:
But also:
I believe that it was designed this way pretty much for this exact reason. So, when the first opportunity attack renders the foe unconscious, that foe remains in the adjacent square that it was trying to flee from. No other opportunity attacks can trigger since the unconscious creature is no longer moving. I believe that there have been threads regarding the feats which cause a creature's speed to be reduced to 0 in such situations and they come to the same conclusion -- that the creature never actually exited beyond the reach so no other opportunity attacks can trigger. (unless you believe in the unwritten D&D physics ;-) )
Think about what happens to your PCs in your interpretation -- a PC desperately runs away from 3 foes. The first one takes an opportunity attack and drops the PC to 0. Now the second opportunity attack gets to happen at advantage? And it's an auto-crit, causing 2 failed saves? Then the third opportunity attack also happens at advantage and causes 2 more failed saves, killing the PC on the spot before any allies get a chance to assist? That's pretty nasty. I think it's more reasonable for the first one to knock the PC out and then the other two foes have to wait until their turn rolls around before hitting that PC while he's down.
It's hard to make a rule interpretation without the dinosaur statblock and the trait or feature used to be reduced to 1 hit point. instead of 0 hit point.
Multiple action or attack triggering on the same event is the closest you can have of things happening simultaneously and many time table handle them all at once despite the game usually tend to treat in sequential resolution, where each triggering event are distinct reaction attack that can potentially trigger an effect or reaction to them. Other scenario where we often see simultaneous events occuring parrallely is when multiple creature Ready an action with the same trigger.
In order to better illustrate the situation, imagine a orc leaves the reach of 3 characters, provoking an opportunity attack from each of them while one of them has the Sentinel feat. Wpuld the feat's user OA going first cancel all others by reducing the orc's speed to 0 before it can resolve movement or because it was leaving their reach prior to that then the others still get to make one since they react to something happening before any effect can result from those attacks?
It is likely one of the zombie dinosaurs from Chult with the typical zombie con save when hitting 0 with the DC equal to 5+damage dealt. However, that is a guess on my part.
DMs can run their games however they like. They can change rules, make up rules, use house rules or whatever they like. HOWEVER, the fundamental requirement for play is that the DM and the players share the same rules. It doesn't matter what those rules are, it matters that the players are aware of how the DM runs things in their world.
In this case, resolving all the opportunity attacks as one attack - is that correct according to Rules As Written (which is the popular thing in these forums), likely No. There have been several good arguments plus the citation from Xanathar's for resolving simultaneous effects that would support that opportunity attacks should be resolved sequentially even if they share a triggering event. Can a DM do it that way if they want? Absolutely yes ... but they should let the players know if at all possible (sometimes rulings come up in the moment and a DM hasn't encountered that situation before so they rule spontaneously and keep the game going - in those cases though the DM will consider the ruling after the game, possibly consult the players and the rule books, decide if it was a correct ruling and let the players know whether it will be that way in the game from now on or if the DM decided to change their mind).
That is how DMing works.
However to the OP. The DM in this case appeared to want the dinosaur to escape for some reason. Why? I have no idea. So the DM made a few rulings to force this to happen which is often not the best approach.
1) Resolving all the opportunity attacks so that there is only one roll for the zombie dinosaur.
2) Allowing the monster to be immediately beyond reach of the characters so that they could take no more attacks.
The first is a rule they decided on. The second is a situational ruling that doesn't make much sense on the face of it unless the dinosaur was very fast and the area of the combat was a jungle with lots of cover that would prevent the use of long range attacks. Without the circumstances, it is impossible for everyone here to reach a reasonable conclusion.
One attack is definitely not the way to go. Regardless of how a DM resolve it, i think there should always be 1 attack roll per Opportunity Attack made, wether they happen simultaneously all at once or in sequence one after the other.
I agree. The question in this case was really whether the damage from all the successful attacks could be combined into one constitution save for the zombie dinosaur or whether a separate check should be required for each successful attack. I'd lean towards a roll for each attack being RAW.
Me too i don't see why RAW each instance of attack's damage reducing the Dinosaur Zombie to 0 hit points wouldn't trigger it's Undead Fortitude Trait. The DM's ruling seem to ensure the monster's escape for some reasons.