possessedbyfiredemon
First Post
Sorry if this has been posted before but I was just thinking about this earlier, I know rules as written says you don't go beyond dis/advantage but how much of a difference would a third die make?
D&D 5E Doubling Up Advantage/Disadvantage
- Thread starter possessedbyfiredemon
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JiffyPopTart
Bree-Yark
I am not going to break out maths to give you a +/-X answer, however I have an alternative solution that I use that is quick and easy and encourages gaining multiple advantages...
In my game if you have more advantages than disadvantages, then you are advantaged. Same with disadvantages.
I think this encourages the players to use buff spells and combat options more often since that second or third advantage might help you versus an enemy spell or tactic that you weren't expecting.
DS
In my game if you have more advantages than disadvantages, then you are advantaged. Same with disadvantages.
I think this encourages the players to use buff spells and combat options more often since that second or third advantage might help you versus an enemy spell or tactic that you weren't expecting.
DS
the Jester
Legend
It would be significant. I don't think this is a good idea except under very, very unusual circumstances.
You could merely have a minor advantage or disadvantage, so you roll a d6 for example, a 50/50% chance to gain half again as much (dis)advantage. Say you have advantage against Phantasm, your Will save is 6 and you roll a 6, you now have +3 on that save, but if you rolled a 3 you merely don't have that benefit.
El Mahdi
Muad'Dib of the Anauroch
Stacking advantage or disadvantage does increase (or decrease) the chances of the desired (or undesired) result; but the increase is not cumulative...it's a little less with each additional D20.
It's kind of like walking towards a wall, but only walking half-way every time. You'll keep getting closer to the wall, though you'll never actually reach it (at least until you get to planck distance
), and each step will be smaller and smaller.
I like the extra dice and let advantage and disadvantage stack in my games, but be warned that the level of complexity rises faster than the gains due to stacking do. (more dice to roll meaning longer turns, for diminishing returns from stacking)
So, I think the effective bonus for a target of 10 with advantage is about +5. With double advantage (three D20's) it's something like +6.5/+7. With four D20's (triple advantage) it's something like +8. Five is something like +8.5, six +9, etc, etc.
I don't know the exact numbers and can't find where others had already figured it out that far, though there are lots of places on the internet you can run the probabilities. However, here are some links to some helpful sites/pages talking about this.
http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?323667-Probability-question-Advantage-and-Disadvantage
http://onlinedungeonmaster.com/2012/05/24/advantage-and-disadvantage-in-dd-next-the-math/
http://www.tabletopterrors.com/2014...d-the-true-odds-of-extra-d20s-by-kerne-fahey/
It's kind of like walking towards a wall, but only walking half-way every time. You'll keep getting closer to the wall, though you'll never actually reach it (at least until you get to planck distance
), and each step will be smaller and smaller.I like the extra dice and let advantage and disadvantage stack in my games, but be warned that the level of complexity rises faster than the gains due to stacking do. (more dice to roll meaning longer turns, for diminishing returns from stacking)
So, I think the effective bonus for a target of 10 with advantage is about +5. With double advantage (three D20's) it's something like +6.5/+7. With four D20's (triple advantage) it's something like +8. Five is something like +8.5, six +9, etc, etc.
I don't know the exact numbers and can't find where others had already figured it out that far, though there are lots of places on the internet you can run the probabilities. However, here are some links to some helpful sites/pages talking about this.
http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?323667-Probability-question-Advantage-and-Disadvantage
http://onlinedungeonmaster.com/2012/05/24/advantage-and-disadvantage-in-dd-next-the-math/
http://www.tabletopterrors.com/2014...d-the-true-odds-of-extra-d20s-by-kerne-fahey/
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Dragonsbane
Proud Grognard
Hmmm! Has anyone else used this? Sounds like an interesting idea!
jgsugden
Legend
Advantage and disadvantage are huge impacts to the game. Going more extreme with double advantage or double disadvantage would be very harsh - especially double disadvantage. Let's give you an example: Let's say a PC fighter has a 50-50 chance to hit a monster and the monster has a 50-50 chance to hit the PC - before applying advantage/disadvantage. The PC gets double advantage, the monster gets double disadvantage. The PC is going to crit just under 15% of the time, hit another 63% of the time and miss about 12.5% of the time. The monster will crit 0.0125% of the time (negligible), hit about 12.5% of the time and miss 87.5% of the time. If a crit does 50% more damage than a hit, the PC will out-damage the monster at a ratio of roughly 7 to 1. If we remove the disadvantage from the monster and only give the hero double advantage, the ratio drops to a mere 3 to 2, but if we flip that around and give the monster double disadvantage and strip the hero of all advantage, the ratio goes back up to a remarkable 4.4 to 1.
It is a bad idea to grant double advantage, but ridiculously bad to grant double disadvantage.
It is a bad idea to grant double advantage, but ridiculously bad to grant double disadvantage.
What some people might not realize is that advantage is already hugely powerful in 5E.
Most of the time, a PC has about a 50% to 80% chance of hitting most foes. With Advantage, his odds are now about 75% to 96%. That means that his chance of missing has gone from 50% to 25% through 20% to 4%, 1/5th to 1/2 the chance of missing. Sure, he'll miss in this scenario on occasion, but even so, this is mathematically large. The same as about 2 to 3 bonuses in earlier versions of the game.
As a DM, I almost never hand out advantage or disadvantage unless the rules indicate to do so. The one recent exception was for NPCs that knew (due to Scrying) where the PCs were, the road they were headed on, and they prepped a great ambush place ahead of time, so I gave them advantage on a group hiding check.
Double advantage or double disadvantage would never even be in my radar as a DM.
Zak S
Guest
I think if you are running an old-schol/sandbox enough game (like PCs are regularly up against challenges that should get them killed by any sane measure, period) I can see it.
Like my level 1 thief is trying to kill a stone giant. The giant is standing on a field of loose cantaloupes cleverly released by the thief: disadavantage.
Then the thief manages to get the giant drunk: double disadvantage.
The thief is still very likely a smear if the giant hits, but suddenly it's plausible, reasonable, exciting, and promotes clever gameplay.
I wouldn't give double advantage/disadvantage just for piling on spells, though, it has to be a use of the environment that can't just be done at will.
Like my level 1 thief is trying to kill a stone giant. The giant is standing on a field of loose cantaloupes cleverly released by the thief: disadavantage.
Then the thief manages to get the giant drunk: double disadvantage.
The thief is still very likely a smear if the giant hits, but suddenly it's plausible, reasonable, exciting, and promotes clever gameplay.
I wouldn't give double advantage/disadvantage just for piling on spells, though, it has to be a use of the environment that can't just be done at will.
Chocolategravy
First Post
It's no surprise people don't realize how potent it is as it's not a simple number and you get it from something as trivial as the enemy being prone. Despite that it's a bigger benefit than you gain from your proficiency bonus by going from level 1 to level 20!
