D&D 5E Can you use misty step to arrest a fall?

[UngainlyTitan]

Building on @Tonguez 's answer, previous editions were consistent that momentum is preserved when teleporting:

• From the 3.5e FAQ: "If you’re plummeting toward the ground when you cast teleport to reach a safe spot, you’d still be “falling” and would therefore take damage as appropriate to the distance you actually fell before teleporting."
• From the 4e Rules forum FAQ: "Is momentum conserved when teleporting? The designers lean towards yes"
• From an article written on the subject by a 4e designer (Stump the Game Lizards, a former D&D forum):
  • ... If you throw a stone through a portal, it comes out the exit still flying through the air. I can't imagine anyone saying that the stone just drops to the ground with all of its momentum somehow absorbed by the portal. (If that were the case, you couldn't even step through. Force is force.) The same thing applies if you leap through; you come out the far end mid-leap...
  • ... This type of teleportation, then, is intuitively correct—which means momentum is conserved...
  • ... An important addendum to what's written above is that momentum should be conserved when jumping through a portal relative to the portal. If I step into a magic circle on a flying boat and emerge in a magic circle on the ground, I don't have the boat's momentum; I have my momentum relative to the circle I stepped into.

From Jeremy Crawford in 2010 covering the history of Teleportation effects (the oft-quoted "teleportation does not set a prone creature upright"), effects are terminated simply because you teleport. It does stand to reason this doesn't get you out of falling (removing an effect of all your kinetic energy and momentum) any more than it does being prone.

In the real world, as has been pointed out, because the planet and universe is moving, if teleporting erased your momentum, you'd either (1) instantly be a stain upon a surface, or (2) shoot out into space at supersonic speeds.

However 5E is silent upon the matter. Sage Advice confirmed there is no official rule, and 5E leaves it to the DM whether they consider logic from prior editions to have precedent at their table.

So, take your pick.

There are 3 ways to play this, the spell compensates for momentum, angular velocity/Coriolis effects and you arrive where you intend to, so pretty much D&D as normal bar the odd misty step/dimension door/gate off a cliff as a readied action. The path of least hassle.

The physics geek version where you need to know (before teleporting) your exact latitude and longitude and height above sea level (including destination) and relevant orbital and stellar motion data and do the math for the time of transfer to occur. Definitely a ritual with sever consequences of an error.

Or only allow teleport to a destination that is a permanent circle where all the physics is handled by compensator in the transport buffers.

Your choice.

 

[Maxperson]

Ah! More evidence for my "Crawford is trolling people for asking questions he considers stupid" theory.

Yeah, I'm not using that one either.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Where are you getting that from? Nothing in Misty Step says anything about angles. All you can do is pick a square to appear in. It's not some sort of gate that spits you out where an opening is angled. Nor does Misty Step say that it stops momentum, so it doesn't.

It doesn’t have to. The rules don’t speak on it anywhere, and 5e is not a game built on “you can only do what the rules specifically allow”.

You fellas are missing the point that falling is instantaneous in D&D, except maybe if you are using Xanathar's variant falling rules and the initial height is higher than 500ft.

RAW, you reach the ground as soon as you leave the edge of the cliff, leaving no room for a Bonus Action spell.

Which is absurd. I’ve jumped off a 20ft thing, many times. You can shout whole phrases. You can throw something at a target. You can use a bonus action.

 

[Maxperson]

It doesn’t have to. The rules don’t speak on it anywhere, and 5e is not a game built on “you can only do what the rules specifically allow”.

The game isn't, with it's rulings over rules mantra. RAW is, though. RAW is only what is written. Nothing more.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

The game isn't, with it's rulings over rules mantra. RAW is, though. RAW is only what is written. Nothing more.

Nope. The game has no specific rule that applies here, and thus there is only rulings. RAW, the DM decides how to handle things not specifically covered by the rules.

 

[Maxperson]

Nope. The game has no specific rule that applies here, and thus there is only rulings. RAW, the DM decides how to handle things not specifically covered by the rules.

It has very specific rules. Misty Step is clear in what it allows. It allows you to appear in an unoccupied space. It does not allow you to angle how you come out, because that is not written. It does not allow a fall to end, because that is not written. Allowing either or both of those things are rulings that override RAW.

There are also the instantaneous falling rules, which stop a bonus action from working at 500 feet or less.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

It has very specific rules. Misty Step is clear in what it allows. It allows you to appear in an unoccupied space. It does not allow you to angle how you come out, because that is not written. It does not allow a fall to end, because that is not written. Allowing either or both of those things are rulings that override RAW.

Misty Step has no wording on facing, leaving it up to the people playing the game to just do what feels right or makes sense to them. Your reading, which is very much against the way 5e is written and explicitly meant to be read, would mean that when you teleport to behind someone from facing them, you cannot come out facing them from behind. And nothing in the rules supports that very silly conclusion.

There are also the instantaneous falling rules, which stop a bonus action from working at 500 feet or less.

That’s a separate issue, my dude. Don’t conflate things to try and make your argument seem stronger than it is.

 

[Deset Gled]

The rulings under both 3e and 4e rules was that momentum is conserved when teleporting - specifically that if a stone is thrown or arrow is shot through a portal it comes out still flying through the air and can hit a target. Equally a falling person affected by misty step is still falling after they teleport

I don't know of any ruling about this in 3e. I argued staunchly against it then, and I'll argue against it now.

I can give you some solid rules-lawyering in 3.Xe terms to support my side. In 5e, everything is a bit looser. My best reasoning is that Misty Step says "you teleport up to 30 feet" and it can be trivially proven that the Teleport spell allows you to muck about with momentum any way you want, so it follows that Misty Step does, too.

 

[Maxperson]

Misty Step has no wording on facing, leaving it up to the people playing the game to just do what feels right or makes sense to them.

Such a ruling constitutes a house rule. Only what is actually written is RAW. Nothing more. I mean, it's in the term. Rules as WRITTEN.

That’s a separate issue, my dude. Don’t conflate things to try and make your argument seem stronger than it is.

Wait. Falling rules are separate from falling?

The issues are 1) falling, and 2) Misty Step. Both are fair game in this discussion.

 

[Dausuul]

In the real world, as has been pointed out, because the planet and universe is moving, if teleporting erased your momentum, you'd either (1) instantly be a stain upon a surface, or (2) shoot out into space at supersonic speeds.

This would happen anyway. If you're at the equator of a spinning planet, you're moving roughly 1,000 miles per hour in the direction of the spin. Let's say it's dawn where you are; that movement is pointed straight toward the sun. What happens if you teleport to the other side of the planet, to a place where it's dusk? If momentum is conserved, you are still moving 1,000 miles per hour straight toward the sun, but everything at your destination is going 1,000 mph straight away from the sun; you are suddenly traveling 2,000 mph relative to your surroundings. Splat.

Even if you only teleport a couple hundred miles, you will experience a sharp, and probably very painful, change in relative motion. The only way for this to be averted is for teleportation to "align" your momentum to the destination. Whether it does so by trying to mimic your original momentum somehow (if you were falling, you're still falling), or simply overwriting it with the momentum of your new surroundings (if you were falling, you are now at rest), is an open question. Either one is equally valid.

As for portals, they clearly do not work the same way as teleportation spells. Transiting a portal is a continuous process, not an instantaneous one--there's a point when you are half on one side and half on the other--and it requires you to physically move. A portal is best understood as a wormhole, splicing together two separate points in space, and conserving your momentum relative to the portal itself.