Do you need to stay within melee range to use the help action with a familiar? I have a player using an owl with flyby and trying to fly in use help then fly out in the same turn. I feel that to distract someone you have to continue distracting them until an attack is made, otherwise when the attack is made the owl is no longer distracting the enemy as it has flown off.
Nope. Their useage is perfectly legal by the rules and the intended use.
Remember that all of the turns happen in the same 6-second round, so while you have turns in the initiative order, it is all happening nearly simultaneously over the same 6 seconds. So her owl flies in, squawks and flutters its wings in the enemy's face to distract it, causing the Help action and the next person in that round to attack the enemy to have advantage, and then it flies away, scott-free thanks to fly-by.
It is all legal and usable, both Rule as Written and Rules as Intended. The common advice for players is to get a feel for your table and your DM. Some folks are 100% fine with using this every round. Other folks are not, and in that case just save it for the rarer clutch usage. As you seem to be a DM that doesn't like to see this each round and think it is cheese, I would advise that you simply talk to the the player to let her know how you feel, but let them know that certain occasional use, you will let slide.
The other option is to let them use it, but have savvy enemies ready actions to attack the owl when it flies in (this gets by the Fly-by feature), and/or have some enemy range attack the owl, if able. The players still get the use out of having had the owl absorb one or more actions out of enemies attempting these actions, and you get to see it die.
Also, if you are not already doing so, you can make it more interesting by having the owl roll a separate initiative, so it is sometimes acting before the player and sometimes after.
But any changes should be addressed with the player beforehand and not just sprung on them during the next combat. That's the more baller way for a DM to handle things, in my opinion.
Do you need to stay within melee range to use the help action with a familiar? I have a player using an owl with flyby and trying to fly in use help then fly out in the same turn. I feel that to distract someone you have to continue distracting them until an attack is made, otherwise when the attack is made the owl is no longer distracting the enemy as it has flown off.
Keep in mind whole the game uses sequential actions each round the game itself assumes that all actions during a round happen simultaneously. So the owl is in game flying at the same moment the character is attacking.
The monster can always take the ready action to attack the familiar. Ranged enemies can also attack the familiar. Imps being Invisible are even worse. But most people should still hear the imp flying. Also AoEs may get the familiar.
And honestly with Vex running around it's not going to cause that big of a problem in the game.
Do you need to stay within melee range to use the help action with a familiar? I have a player using an owl with flyby and trying to fly in use help then fly out in the same turn. I feel that to distract someone you have to continue distracting them until an attack is made, otherwise when the attack is made the owl is no longer distracting the enemy as it has flown off.
Nope. Their useage is perfectly legal by the rules and the intended use.
Remember that all of the turns happen in the same 6-second round, so while you have turns in the initiative order, it is all happening nearly simultaneously over the same 6 seconds. So her owl flies in, squawks and flutters its wings in the enemy's face to distract it, causing the Help action and the next person in that round to attack the enemy to have advantage, and then it flies away, scott-free thanks to fly-by.
It is all legal and usable, both Rule as Written and Rules as Intended. The common advice for players is to get a feel for your table and your DM. Some folks are 100% fine with using this every round. Other folks are not, and in that case just save it for the rarer clutch usage. As you seem to be a DM that doesn't like to see this each round and think it is cheese, I would advise that you simply talk to the the player to let her know how you feel, but let them know that certain occasional use, you will let slide.
The other option is to let them use it, but have savvy enemies ready actions to attack the owl when it flies in (this gets by the Fly-by feature), and/or have some enemy range attack the owl, if able. The players still get the use out of having had the owl absorb one or more actions out of enemies attempting these actions, and you get to see it die.
Also, if you are not already doing so, you can make it more interesting by having the owl roll a separate initiative, so it is sometimes acting before the player and sometimes after.
But any changes should be addressed with the player beforehand and not just sprung on them during the next combat. That's the more baller way for a DM to handle things, in my opinion.
The find familiar rules of 2014 already state that the familiar has to role its own initiative by the way.
The Help action doesn't say you must stay where you are when you distract an enemy within 5 feet of you, but the DM could always rule this way.
Keep in mind whole the game uses sequential actions each round the game itself assumes that all actions during a round happen simultaneously. So the owl is in game flying at the same moment the character is attacking.
The monster can always take the ready action to attack the familiar. Ranged enemies can also attack the familiar. Imps being Invisible are even worse. But most people should still hear the imp flying. Also AoEs may get the familiar.
And honestly with Vex running around it's not going to cause that big of a problem in the game.