136
votes
After successfully hitting with an attack roll, when rolling for damage, if you roll a 1, is that a negative crit?
No, this is not normal.
By the book, critical failures only (kind of) happen on death saving throws.
Even for DMs that use crit fails on attack rolls, they are usually only on the attack roll (the d20)...
- 28.4k
110
votes
Accepted
Weapon attacks compared with damaging cantrips?
It is cantrips that can not keep up, if you get Extra Attack
Weapon attacks alone are not competitive, a 14th level Wizard does more damage with a cantrip than with a dagger1. Class features like ...
- 62.5k
78
votes
Accepted
How can 16th-level characters mitigate damage from a lethal (long) fall?
In short: Don't do this.
I would suggest that starting your game with a challenge or scenario that has the potential to immediately kill one or more characters is setting a poor tone for the game.
I'm ...
- 72.8k
72
votes
Accepted
Is my Ranger doing more damage than they should?
You are doing wildly too much damage.
A ranger's damage shouldn't be out of line with the other characters. While some classes and weapon choices hit harder than others, it shouldn't be more than 20% ...
- 72.8k
70
votes
Is there an official rule that the minimum damage can't be negative?
The rules in the SRD say:
"With a penalty, it is possible to deal 0 damage, but never negative damage."
- 12.8k
67
votes
Accepted
Can a 6th level monk choose to not deal magical damage with unarmed strikes?
Ki-Empowered Strikes aren't magical attacks to begin with!
Ki-Empowered Strikes state this explicitly:
your unarmed strikes count as magical for the purpose of overcoming resistance and immunity ...
- 65.5k
65
votes
One PC doing too much damage
I'm not sure this is a problem if you're actually reading and applying the rules for poisons in 5e.
Poison is bought in single doses. How much were they allowed to buy? And how much did they buy them ...
- 845
64
votes
Accepted
How many times do you roll damage for Magic Missile?
Rules designer Jeremy Crawford addressed this question in a September 2016 tweet:
Magic missile. RAW: You roll 1 damage die (see "Damage Rolls," PH, 196). RAI: It doesn't matter; you choose....
- 28.5k
63
votes
Tiny Creatures Can't Kill Players, Right?
There is no such rule.
I have over 1500 D&D 5e posts on this site and have read the PHB and DMG cover to cover numerous times, as well as every other supplement at least once. I am confident there ...
- 144k
60
votes
Is my Paladin stacking Smite spells correctly?
This is correct, but note how much of his available resources this character is using up for each of these attacks. If there's another battle before he gets a long rest, he's not going to be nearly as ...
- 1,480
59
votes
Accepted
Can massive damage knock out rather than causing instant death?
These rules have two entirely separate triggers, and if a single attack satisfies both, then so be it.
The attack reduced the creature to 0 hit points, and it was a melee attack. So you can choose to ...
- 144k
58
votes
Accepted
Does dealing 0 damage to a concentrating spellcaster require a saving throw?
No saving throw is triggered
I found two relevant Q&A twitter posts from Jeremy Crawford (the Lead Designer and Managing Editor for DnD 5e) that shed some light on this. However, Jeremy's tweets ...
- 10.2k
58
votes
Accepted
Interactions between unarmed strikes, negative strength and an unconscious target
Unarmed attacks can crit, but do not do double damage
Can an unarmed strike crit? - Yes
If you roll a 20 on an unarmed strike, it is considered a critical hit.
This means that it will ...
- 93.9k
57
votes
How do we deal with my DM's house-rule about critical damage?
Adamantine armor
It has the property:
While you're wearing it, any critical hit against you becomes a normal
hit. (DMG 150)
It is only classified as uncommon, but it is still a magic item. Depending ...
- 61.4k
55
votes
Accepted
How much fire damage does igniting Grease deal?
Grease cannot be ignited.
Spells only do what they say they do, nothing more.
The full text of Grease is:
Slick grease covers the ground in a 10-foot square centered on a point within range and turns ...
- 63.4k
55
votes
Accepted
Can massive damage kill you while at 0 HP?
Yes, Massive Damage can kill you at 0 HP
Damage at 0 Hit Points. If you take any damage while you have 0 hit points, you suffer a death saving throw failure. If the damage is from a critical hit, you ...
- 52.3k
55
votes
If a College of Creation bard created 829 tons of iron on top of a guard shack, how much damage would it to do to people inside?
Either 0 damage, or you cannot create the object.
The Performance of Creation feature states:
The item must appear on a surface or in a liquid that can support it.
Therefore, either the guard house ...
- 144k
54
votes
Would wearing full plate armor cause slashing damage to be converted into bludgeoning damage?
As an addendum to Thomas Markov's excellent answer, I'd like to add the old adage that "HP are not meat points". 5 HPs of slashing damage does not directly translate to a slashing wound, and ...
- 2,034
52
votes
Accepted
Which damage dice exactly does the Great Weapon Fighting fighting style allow you to reroll?
From Sage Advice — Rules Answers: April 2016:
If you use Great Weapon Fighting with a feature like Divine Smite or a spell like hex, do you get to reroll any 1 or 2 you roll for the extra damage?
...
- 707
52
votes
Accepted
What happens when an unconscious but stabilised character is hit?
The creature takes death saving throw failures on the initial hit
Unfortunately for the character in question, your first scenario is correct.
A stable creature is unconscious with 0 hp - the fact ...
- 25k
52
votes
Is my Ranger doing more damage than they should?
D&D Wiki is notorious for overpowered fan-created content.
D&D Wiki (dandwiki.com) is infamous for fan-created game content with two major issues: it is often wildly overpowered, and it is ...
- 78.9k
51
votes
Accepted
Is there a minimum damage rule?
It is correct to say the 3.5e rule no longer appears in 5e. Another tweet (god I wish we had that back in the 90s) clarifies that the minimum is indeed 0.
JeremyCrawford
@JeremyECrawford
There ...
- 1,063
50
votes
How to halve the damage on a successful saving throw?
The rule is “half damage”, not “half the damage dice” or “half the damage die size”. All the dice are rolled and then the total is halved (rounded down, per PHB page 7).
So in the case of fireball, ...
- 243k
50
votes
Accepted
Does a concentrating caster damaged by Ice Knife require two concentration checks?
The target would need to make up to two saves.
The short answer:
Since Ice Knife deals damage twice, the target would indeed make up to two saves.
The long answer:
The rules for Concentration say (...
- 6,534
50
votes
Accepted
Does the Cure Wounds spell damage undead?
Nope, this is no longer the case!
Spells (and all features etc) do only what they say they do. Cure wounds very specifically says:
This spell has no effect on undead or constructs
So in fact it ...
- 27.7k
50
votes
How do we deal with my DM's house-rule about critical damage?
Play as a Grave Cleric
The Grave Cleric domain from XGtE (p. 20) has the following ability at level 6:
As a reaction when you or a creature you can see within 30 feet of you suffers a critical hit,...
- 36.3k
47
votes
Would wearing full plate armor cause slashing damage to be converted into bludgeoning damage?
No, there is nothing in the rules indicating this is the case.
If plate armor had this effect, we would find it in the item description or rules for armor, and we don’t. Weapons generally deal the ...
- 144k
45
votes
Accepted
Expected damage of a moonblade with 𝑛 runes?
I wrote a python script to calculate answers accurate to several decimal places. I created a Moonblade object, and added a specified number of runes just as the rules suggest (with the one alteration ...
- 685
45
votes
This can't be right? 61 damage in one blow as a 3rd-level paladin?
Sure, once per day, if they roll max on everything
This works. But there are some caveats:
They can only do this once per day at level 3, because they do not have enough spellslots to do the combo ...
- 36.3k
45
votes
Can I throw dynamite from inside the effects of sanctuary?
God knows what you did.
When sanctuary was originally published, it was available only to Clerics and Paladins. This gives some insight into the original intent for the spell's function. The question ...
- 144k
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