I’ve been working a few multi class ideas and having a ton of fun. I’ve been using hunter for various reasons including builds that are ranged as well as melee.
Concerning ranged attacks, the volley ability at level 11 is very interesting. I can see two main ways of interpreting its potential threatening space.
-One is to put a point in between squares threatening a total of 16 squares of space
- two is to put a point directly in the center of a square threatening a potential total of 25 squares of space seeing how the squares on the edges of the threatening space are still halfway within the abilities area of affect.
There is a potential third option in that, using option two, by placing the point in the center of the square would only allow you to attack 9 squares of space and not 25?
I’m sure different masters will rule this in many different ways but I’m wondering if there is a kind of formal reference for ruling this as appropriately as possible?
I typically read "a point" in this and generally, as not a square, but the intersection of four squares. Then a 10' radius would be two squares in each direction from that point, so 16 squares.
This is assuming you are using a grid with squares, as opposed to hexes, which some people prefer.
I think you get to choose the point... so if you place it in the center of a square then you should get the 25 square area.
Check with each DM. Try asking how they work the fireball spell area of effect and then mention your volley effect.
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"A rightful place awaits you in the Realms Above, in the Land of the Great Light. Come in peace, and live beneath the sun again, where trees and flowers grow."
— The message of Eilistraee to all decent drow.
"Run thy sword across my chains, Silver Lady, that I may join your dance.”
I would say either interpretation is fine, but really it describes a circle, which on the grid could be interpreted a number of ways: any square touching the circle, any square more than half covered, a square with a side length equal to the diameter, etc., centered anywhere you choose the point. All of that is between you and the other members of your group.
I tend to prefer to limit effects "within X' feet of a point" to either be a template circle or to cover a 2X by 2X area (i.e. 16 squares). My thought is that unless your character can see the grid, they can't center their point on a square, so some of the 25 possible squares that you could hit at maximum will be less covered (and not count) and others will be more covered (and count). I also tend to prefer more than half covering a square by an effect for it to count.
I realize that all of what I stated is opinion. Ask your DM for sure.
pocketmouse the DMG may be referring to an example to demonstrate how it works, I think the feature let's the caster choose.
the volley action still requires that you have ammunition for each attack... because of the cost on resources (arrows) I would let the volley affect any square within 10 feet of the point chosen (since the intended purpose of the volley is to attack any number of foes I would try to allow it to hit the most possible within the rules)... sort of a rule of cool thing.
on a side note if you multiclassed with fighter for at least 2 levels you would get action surge and be able to fire 2 volleys in one turn... just a thought
"A rightful place awaits you in the Realms Above, in the Land of the Great Light. Come in peace, and live beneath the sun again, where trees and flowers grow."
— The message of Eilistraee to all decent drow.
"Run thy sword across my chains, Silver Lady, that I may join your dance.”
It's specifically the combat section for using tactical maps (aka grids or hexes). I think of it as snap-to-grid. Player picks a spot, and between them and the DM they agree on which grid intersection that would snap to. And then from there you could make a ranged attack against any creature that occupies at least one square of those 16 squares around the decided point (ie, if you had a large creature who was occupying one of those squares, and the other 3 squares was outside of that 10' range, they're still a viable target.
For sure, It really seems like having a good chat about the space with everyone at the table is kind of the way to swing this one.
The Multi classing I was considering for the Volley user was most definitely part fighter as a Fighter Samurai Hunter...
A kind of ranger who is a samurai but also hunts soldiers and samurai.
On top of having action surge I was also considering getting them up to a few levels in rogue to get the assassin ability so they could theoretically assassinate, automatically critically hitting, A platoon of 16 or 25 enemy warriors all lined up in army ranks. Obviously a niche kind of flavorful thing but still a solid archer for most other circumstances as well.
These are some great examples guys I really appreciate it! Its great to get some community input for using this kind of ability before I started rolling all these dice 😅
I have always considered "points" to be the center of some square to standardize measurements, just as creatures are considered to be standing centered in some square and not straddling a line between two squares or an intersection of four. I don't want to be having to swap back and forth whether I'm measuring near edges, far edges, entire squares... everything is just squares on a grid for me, and chopped up into 5-foot increments. But I've never really dived into what the DMG and Xanathar's has to say about targeting, surprised to hear that it supports intersection-targeting.
me too... always thought you could choose... guess not
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"A rightful place awaits you in the Realms Above, in the Land of the Great Light. Come in peace, and live beneath the sun again, where trees and flowers grow."
— The message of Eilistraee to all decent drow.
"Run thy sword across my chains, Silver Lady, that I may join your dance.”
I have always considered "points" to be the center of some square to standardize measurements, just as creatures are considered to be standing centered in some square and not straddling a line between two squares or an intersection of four. I don't want to be having to swap back and forth whether I'm measuring near edges, far edges, entire squares... everything is just squares on a grid for me, and chopped up into 5-foot increments. But I've never really dived into what the DMG and Xanathar's has to say about targeting, surprised to hear that it supports intersection-targeting.
Weren’t we just talking about this in another thread?
I have always considered "points" to be the center of some square to standardize measurements, just as creatures are considered to be standing centered in some square and not straddling a line between two squares or an intersection of four. I don't want to be having to swap back and forth whether I'm measuring near edges, far edges, entire squares... everything is just squares on a grid for me, and chopped up into 5-foot increments. But I've never really dived into what the DMG and Xanathar's has to say about targeting, surprised to hear that it supports intersection-targeting.
It is specifically in the "Using Miniatures" section. It is the rule that also gives us the excellent nugget that calls out only circular spell effects as being able to be ruled 'more than half counts in the area.' I feel like if you are going to say that if an area covers more than half a square it counts, that doesn't need to only be circular areas. Nonetheless, the text on the page is different.
Of the 3 or so different places (PHB, DMG, XGtE) that rules for adjudicating areas are listed, they present several different styles and minor changes and inconsistencies (both between sources and things I just don't think make sense like above) such that I suggest you just choose a method and stick to it. That was essentially my previous advice on this post.
I prefer snap to grid and counting squares. I do tend to use templates and the "more than half" rule for circular areas larger than 10' radius where squares would be added if you used a square approximation instead.
I like your suggestions. And I prefer templates over tokens.
If volley can only affect 16 squares instead of 25... so be it. It was always intended to unload a bunch of arrows to a clump of enemies anyway, it's not that much more limiting really. I mean, think about it, how many enemies is the DM going to throw at you anyway?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"A rightful place awaits you in the Realms Above, in the Land of the Great Light. Come in peace, and live beneath the sun again, where trees and flowers grow."
— The message of Eilistraee to all decent drow.
"Run thy sword across my chains, Silver Lady, that I may join your dance.”
— A basic prayer.
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I’ve been working a few multi class ideas and having a ton of fun. I’ve been using hunter for various reasons including builds that are ranged as well as melee.
Concerning ranged attacks, the volley ability at level 11 is very interesting. I can see two main ways of interpreting its potential threatening space.
-One is to put a point in between squares threatening a total of 16 squares of space
- two is to put a point directly in the center of a square threatening a potential total of 25 squares of space seeing how the squares on the edges of the threatening space are still halfway within the abilities area of affect.
There is a potential third option in that, using option two, by placing the point in the center of the square would only allow you to attack 9 squares of space and not 25?
I’m sure different masters will rule this in many different ways but I’m wondering if there is a kind of formal reference for ruling this as appropriately as possible?
I typically read "a point" in this and generally, as not a square, but the intersection of four squares. Then a 10' radius would be two squares in each direction from that point, so 16 squares.
This is assuming you are using a grid with squares, as opposed to hexes, which some people prefer.
I think you get to choose the point... so if you place it in the center of a square then you should get the 25 square area.
Check with each DM. Try asking how they work the fireball spell area of effect and then mention your volley effect.
I would say either interpretation is fine, but really it describes a circle, which on the grid could be interpreted a number of ways: any square touching the circle, any square more than half covered, a square with a side length equal to the diameter, etc., centered anywhere you choose the point. All of that is between you and the other members of your group.
I tend to prefer to limit effects "within X' feet of a point" to either be a template circle or to cover a 2X by 2X area (i.e. 16 squares). My thought is that unless your character can see the grid, they can't center their point on a square, so some of the 25 possible squares that you could hit at maximum will be less covered (and not count) and others will be more covered (and count). I also tend to prefer more than half covering a square by an effect for it to count.
I realize that all of what I stated is opinion. Ask your DM for sure.
The DMG says "Choose an intersection of squares or hexes as the point of origin of an area of effect, then follow its rules as normal."
Birgit | Shifter | Sorcerer | Dragonlords
Shayone | Hobgoblin | Sorcerer | Netherdeep
So..... does it mean 16 squares in Dungeon Master's Guide??
pocketmouse the DMG may be referring to an example to demonstrate how it works, I think the feature let's the caster choose.
the volley action still requires that you have ammunition for each attack... because of the cost on resources (arrows) I would let the volley affect any square within 10 feet of the point chosen (since the intended purpose of the volley is to attack any number of foes I would try to allow it to hit the most possible within the rules)... sort of a rule of cool thing.
on a side note if you multiclassed with fighter for at least 2 levels you would get action surge and be able to fire 2 volleys in one turn... just a thought
It's specifically the combat section for using tactical maps (aka grids or hexes). I think of it as snap-to-grid. Player picks a spot, and between them and the DM they agree on which grid intersection that would snap to. And then from there you could make a ranged attack against any creature that occupies at least one square of those 16 squares around the decided point (ie, if you had a large creature who was occupying one of those squares, and the other 3 squares was outside of that 10' range, they're still a viable target.
Birgit | Shifter | Sorcerer | Dragonlords
Shayone | Hobgoblin | Sorcerer | Netherdeep
For sure, It really seems like having a good chat about the space with everyone at the table is kind of the way to swing this one.
The Multi classing I was considering for the Volley user was most definitely part fighter as a Fighter Samurai Hunter...
A kind of ranger who is a samurai but also hunts soldiers and samurai.
On top of having action surge I was also considering getting them up to a few levels in rogue to get the assassin ability so they could theoretically assassinate, automatically critically hitting, A platoon of 16 or 25 enemy warriors all lined up in army ranks. Obviously a niche kind of flavorful thing but still a solid archer for most other circumstances as well.
These are some great examples guys I really appreciate it! Its great to get some community input for using this kind of ability before I started rolling all these dice 😅
I have always considered "points" to be the center of some square to standardize measurements, just as creatures are considered to be standing centered in some square and not straddling a line between two squares or an intersection of four. I don't want to be having to swap back and forth whether I'm measuring near edges, far edges, entire squares... everything is just squares on a grid for me, and chopped up into 5-foot increments. But I've never really dived into what the DMG and Xanathar's has to say about targeting, surprised to hear that it supports intersection-targeting.
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I'm going to make this way harder than it needs to be.
me too... always thought you could choose... guess not
Weren’t we just talking about this in another thread?
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It is specifically in the "Using Miniatures" section. It is the rule that also gives us the excellent nugget that calls out only circular spell effects as being able to be ruled 'more than half counts in the area.' I feel like if you are going to say that if an area covers more than half a square it counts, that doesn't need to only be circular areas. Nonetheless, the text on the page is different.
Of the 3 or so different places (PHB, DMG, XGtE) that rules for adjudicating areas are listed, they present several different styles and minor changes and inconsistencies (both between sources and things I just don't think make sense like above) such that I suggest you just choose a method and stick to it. That was essentially my previous advice on this post.
I prefer snap to grid and counting squares. I do tend to use templates and the "more than half" rule for circular areas larger than 10' radius where squares would be added if you used a square approximation instead.
I like your suggestions. And I prefer templates over tokens.
If volley can only affect 16 squares instead of 25... so be it. It was always intended to unload a bunch of arrows to a clump of enemies anyway, it's not that much more limiting really. I mean, think about it, how many enemies is the DM going to throw at you anyway?