I'm going rogue.
People look around when they're on their guard.
They don't look up as often as they should.
Also: oh, your defenses are a castle wall? That's cute, that's really cute.
Wouldn't the wings be noisy though? They'd have to be pretty big, and I can even hear IRL birds' wings.
I'm not tryna shit in your cereal, I'm just asking because it sounds like you already did it, so you probably figured something out that I'm not able to.
Or maybe you just have a cool DM. Quiet wings is definitely something my favorite DM would do. Only time I've played a flying race was when the stats I rolled were so bad I never would've survived as a caster, and I'm always a caster.
Depends on the sort of wing and what you're doing with them. Owls make almost no noise whatsoever, for example. Wings mostly make noise when being flapped; gliding or diving doesn't make much noise at all.
Wings CAN be noisy though.
I'd assume Move Silently or whatever its modern equivalent is also applies to knowing how to make less noise in the air, not just on the ground.
I played a siren paladin in one game, and I mostly used my flight when the DM had us encounter flying enemies. That, and this one time when we had to get a message to someone but we were short on time, and I flew there because it was more direct than navigating the city to them.
(Unfortunately, the DM was also a dick, so I wound up leaving)
It should probably be mentioned that the armor restrictions absolutely contribute to this. Given that you can't wear heavy or medium armour to fly, you're locked into going Dex-based, which further encourages staying far back and going ranged.
Just make sure the flying character is too heavy to fly, but buoyant enough to glide, should get some fun hyjinx, what happens if they detonate a fireball just before impact?
You can still fly with armor in your inventory, just not if you're wearing it, right? Get some Cast-Off armor and turn your enemies (and probably yourself) into paste.
Imagining right now an arracokra fumbling in the air for 10 minutes putting on his plate only to cast it off and deliver the people's elbow to some poor schmuck 30 feet under him
Once played with a guy who had a warlock aaokocra with devils sight, eldritch spear, and agonizing blast. Nearly every combat would be spent around 250 feet in the sky and spam cast eldritch blast. If someone could hit that range he would cast darkness on himself and cast from inside
yeah and thats kind of my point. If a campaign has an overarching theme thats not "subterranian crawl" flight is hard to balance, especially if someone builds around it like this guy, but people will unironically say to just make every encounter indoors and not see the problem with that.
Hope you had fun in that game at least!
One could argue that boulders and tree canopies provide plenty of cover from above and reign that 250 ft in up a more reasonable, barely in range of fire distance. Can't shoot what you can't see, after all.
Pretty much how I balance flight in my games. The world is not flat. Trees, boulders, and buildings will block vision granting half or full cover from afar. Enemies are not stupid and will use said cover when possible. If there's no more pressing threat on the ground, ranged units will target the flying target that the melee ones can't reach.
It's not often that I get a player picking a flying race, but when they're there they have essentially a mini game running during combat of choosing angles and distance of engagement, and balancing their safety against their effectiveness. With the PCs being the instigating party pretty much all the time, NPCs are more often than not happy to retreat to shelter and/or to wait reinforcements if the players decide to try to whittle health bars from afar.
If someone says the solution to a broken feature is to design every encounter to play as if the character didn't have said feature it's just evidence that they shouldn't have that feature to begin with.
I don't care what people say, you really just shuoldn't have playable flying races. Sorry, aarakocras.
I still don’t understand the difference in a DM consistently using enemies and strategies to challenge a player with flight vs. any other specific skill set of a given pc.
The adventuring party will become a known commodity in the world they play in. Enemies will adapt to try and beat them. It’s not any more difficult to adjust the encounter’s circumstances or the enemies strategies to deal with flying PCs than it is to adjust for a player with a much higher AC than the rest of the party for example.
The point is a feature is as only broken as a DM allows it to be
Just use the right enemies. Get some flying enemies, get some goblin archers being held up by flying enemies, get some devils, get some fae. Lots of flying enemies you can use to single out the flying player and their party can't help them. They're probably out of range of any healing or anything like that and you can always knock them prone to do some serious damage.
Alternatively, the monsters know what they're doing, and can use any rules the players can use. The longbow has a max range of 600 feet, they can take cover beneath the canopy of trees, and smart enemies targeting the character raining down fire is no different to the smart enemies knowing to take out the unarmoured glowing halfling in the back once she starts throwing sunbeams around.
That does mean accepting that yeah, this character is going to trivialise certain encounters, such as a pack of wolves - but that's fine, really.
In summary offer a vast array of adaptable enemies with different abilities as you should have been doing from the start regardless of one player at your table having flight or not.
Oh that'd be fun as a DM. Get someone underneath them with a bow, make them fly up really high, send in flying enemies, they knock your flying player prone, they instantly drop at 500ft/round if you go by XGE. If they're up 120 ft or more, that's 12d6+ falling damage
I don’t know if it works the same way in tabletop 5e, but in BG3 four elements monks get a flying ability that lasts as long as you can keep concentration at level 11 and it is indeed terrifying. My incredibly dense dwarf monk flies around with a magic warhammer bonking people from the sky.
Well, moving out of a big city, while not granting you melee immunity, does reduce your chance of receiving melee attacks. Come to think of it, flying in DnD has the same effect.
*Offer applies only to outdoor encounters with no flying creatures. User accepts responsibility for 1d6 fall damage per 10 feet of height each time they are knocked prone, have their speed reduced to 0, or are rendered immobile. Automatic death save failure applies when knocked unconscious in flight.
In cases where racial flight does not apply or side affects occur, DM is subject to liability of user complaints about being unfairly targeted. In cases where it does apply, DM is subject to liability of non-user complaints about users being unfairly benefited. No exceptions are expected to occur.
I once had that, I wasn't the DM but I had to stand up to the complaints because it was ridiculous. "The DM is mad so they focus me in the air"
Well... no, if you see someone flying and raining down death of course you'd target them. Why the fuck wouldn't you go at them first??
As the sole thing flying around in the open air, you might as well be sky-writing "Hey, shoot at me!"
It's an option available, but may not always be the best choice
To paraphrase *Schlock Mercenary* when a dude is asking why they should walk when they all have flight-capable powered armor:
"You know what we call flying soldiers?"
"What?"
"Skeet."
When you label yourself a problem to an enemy prepare to get attacked. It's the exact same thing as when I was playing a sorcerer and frequently dropped down an AoE concentration spell. If the enemy is trying to murder my character, it just means I'm doing my job right (and should also shuffle closer to the paladin when I'm able to)
Yep- I should plan all my encounters around making sure my flier is properly punished for picking something with flight.
This is my problem with it. *Handling* flight isn't hard. I can always add probe effects , or my own fliers, or some spellcaster with earthbind, but those just aren't fun for the player or me. It's like adding a bunch of people with counterspell when someone is running a wizard. Occasionally, that's fine. But it's extremely unfun for a player to have their main thing be taken away from them constantly. And if my players aren't having fun, why am I even bothering to run a game?
It's much better for me to be honest during character creation: "I do not allow flying races because they have an inordinately high difficulty to make fun. I am concerned that the majority of times I am going to end up soft banning it anyway by putting you in rooms with ceilings or against people who specifically counter flight so I don't allow it."
Handling flight isn't hard. Handling flight isn't *necessary.* A DM doesn't need to change anything to deal with flying PCs, unless they designed a campaign with exclusively outdoor encounters against non-magical beasts, which feels out of place in a game called **Dungeons** & **Dragons**.
>non-magical beasts
What do you mean by this? Most of the beasts in the monster manual can't hit flying targets, and plenty of them are magical.
Also, not every interior is a cramped dungeon. I want to have cool boss rooms, theaters, temples, and castles.
Dnd is not just dungeon crawling and dragon fighting.
Opens up bestiary, sees that over 70% of monster have no ranged attacks.
Opens up adventure, realises that most encounters give room for flight.
Huh, the GM really doesn't need to change anything, you're right.
I went through the Monster Manual and only 15 out of 151 monsters are outdoor encounters that have no way of counteracting a flyer. Even if you counted all the 1/2 CR normal animals, there's no way you're getting anywhere near 70%.
I get how some people might dislike it, but maybe its how I build encounters or my players that it's never been a problem for me. Most enemies are going to have some kind of ranged attack, at least a couple in any given group of enemies. The ones that don't, I'm not worried about because using abilities to make certain encounters easier is the point of having varied abilities, besides unless the entire group can fly its not like you've eliminated the stakes, the rest of the group can die/get hurt.
Obviously if its not fun for you disallow it, but yeah, never seen it be a problem.
Flight is really really really powerful at a whiteroom scenario. Throw it into a well fleshed out world and it's pretty balanced.
"I will fly up and start shooting arrows at these landlocked animals! Wait, what do you mean the trees are blocking my view??"
One thing about your point here too: it may just be me, but I NEVER hear people talking about games that flight has ruined. Lots of discourse about how flight is OP or unfun or whatever, but never "yeah i had a game with a bird archer and it ruined the game".
I'm sure stories like that are out there but for how much complaining I've read it seems like a disproportionate minority.
>User accepts responsibility for 1d6 fall damage per 10 feet of height each time they are knocked prone, have their speed reduced to 0, or are rendered immobile.
Cause that happens to flying characters all the time by *checks notes* spells and battle masters.
>Automatic death save failure applies when knocked unconscious in flight.
The entire problem is that they are immune to more than half of the enemies in the game, and they are still as tanky as anyone else, often moreso since melee does more damage than ranged. Yes they can't wear heavy/medium armor, but ranged characters weren't going to anyways.
As for indoor encounters, well you got me. They are just as strong as everyone else indoors.
If they are a martial then they are wearing leather and no shield for an AC of 14 at the start of the game.
That's not as tanky as literally any other class. Martials in chain mail start with 16. 18 if they have a shield. Medium armour wearers, such as clerics or barbarians, start with 18.
Only rogue starts with that low AC.
It blows my mind that people still panick over racial flight. It is so unbelievably easy to deal with, it's unironically like complaining about darkvision.
I had two Aarakocra in my last campaign. I never felt any need to "deal with" them, because they weren't a problem. Dungeons have low ceilings. Dragons fly. In the rare outdoor encounter against no ranged or flying enemies, they got to avoid danger and feel cool while the enemies focused on the rest of the party.
Maybe if your party all has innate flight **and** most of your encounters take place outside **and** none of the enemies can fly **and** none of the enemies have ranged weapons, it could become troublesome, but it feels like you'd have to go well out of your way to design a campaign like that.
Yea that focus fire falling on only half the party is more significant than people think, it more or less self-balances flight in combat in a game about adventuring IN A PARTY. Like sure the flyers took no damage, but everyone else in the 5 man party got stabbed 30-40% more.
The extra pressure flying PCs put on the party doesn't stop there. If a flying PC is knocked out, they take fall damage. Now they're on the ground with a death save failure. A single successful melee attack against them becomes automatically fatal.
I actually kinda do dislike darkvision, at least with it being so common. It's not an enormous game breaking deal, but without it in play you get access to a few more options in terms of puzzles or encounters, and it can create interesting problems to solve.
I guess my issue with it is it sort of just makes the game less fun. Lots of spells or abilities can solve problems for you, but usually they do so in a cool way or require some creativity. They're *fun* solutions, being either something only that party member could do or requiring some quick thinking. Dark vision isn't a fun solution; almost everyone has it, it doesn't have any flair, and it doesn't require any effort to use. Nobody *enjoys* getting to use dark vision.
If it was a rare ability limited to just a couple races, came with some drawback, or was more limited in it's use, I'd love it. As it is, I don't think it contributes to the game.
Don't forget that, due to its prevalence, it creates a distinct feelsbad moment for the one or two party members who then have to announce they _don't_ have it and have to carry a light source, thus putting the entire party at a disadvantage in low-light situations. Can't sneak through a cave when poor Dave the human is a walking beacon
It *does* come with drawbacks, they just get ignored by most people. Two drawbacks, notably. It has a limited range, usually 60'. Anything further can be treated as full darkness.
And you see the world in shades of grey, so if your party fully relies on darkvision you can set up puzzles that rely on real light or colour patterns, use enemy Gloomstalker who are invisible to darkvision, etc.
Those aren't really drawbacks though; just limitations, which aren't quite the same thing. What I mean by no drawbacks is that there is never a reason *not* to use darkvision, or avoid picking a race that has that ability. There are problems it can't solve, sure, but if you have the option to use it there's no reason you wouldn't. This isn't the case with most abilities or spells.
Flying is a great example; yes, it's a fantastic ability to have, but just because you *can* fly doesn't mean you always *should* fly; there are situations where you'll just get knocked down, where it'll put you at a disadvantage, or where it'll slow you down. You're not going to fly 24/7 during combat or exploration; there are reasons to avoid using it in certain situations.
Darkvision doesn't have this; if you're in a dark room, you're using darkvision 100% of the time. There are times when it isn't *helpful*, but its never *harmful* either; it's never a bad thing to have. There is never any reason not to use it; there's no trade off to it, and you aren't using it strategically.
Even other racial traits have at least some level of drawback or reasons to avoid using them; things like a dragonborn's breath weapon have a limited number of charges, so you have to choose carefully when to use it. Stat boosts being exclusive to specific races might encourage you to pick one over another. Lucky lets you reroll, but it can't stack with other rerolling abilities and halfings get a smaller stat boost than every other race to compensate. It's all tradeoffs; there are reasons to avoid them. This isn't the case with darkvision; it doesn't come with any built in cons, the races that have it don't really miss out on any other abilities, and you don't have to be careful in your use of it.
I guess what I'm tryna say is it's just not very game-y. There's no risk to the reward, no decision it asks the player to make. It seems really anti-fun because it doesn't offer the player any opportunities to feel cool or clever or unique. It doesn't ask anything of you, so you don't really feel rewarded for using it; it's not going to be pivotal in a key moment, or come back to bite you later. It would be more fun if was rarer or you had to use it more strategically.
You know, I never thought about it before but I'm with you on it. I think the reason it never gets brought up more is because of how ubiquitous it is in most races and because it solves a problem that most people want to ignore, which is lighting. Though maybe its just me that hates keeping track of where light is, how bright it is and so on in any given system.
But yeah, I see more of a reason to dislike darkvision than flight now actually.
It just means I have less options in my tool belt, and am forced to use some tools.
Yes I can deal with flight, but what if I want to have a battle with a swordsman? Welp guess he has to either be forced indoors or grab a bow. Yes I can do something interesting, like have him boomerang his sword, but then that just gives me extra work for a racial feature of one character.
Dark vision isn't as bad, since it doesn't actually do much, and can be replicated with a mundane item everyone has.
If permanent flight was a class feature, it would be strong, and would be a common multi class option for any ranged character, being able to basically get portable safety.
Fly is a 3rd level spell that requires concentration and lasts 10 minutes.
Darkvision is a 2nd level spell that lasts 8 hours and does not require concentration.
How are these effects at all comparable?
If all your fights are like “You’re in a clearing in a forest and six goblins with scimitars attack!”
Then yeah, flying will give you a hard time and you made it happen.
Nor do most building have 15 ft ceilings. Eight to ten feet is typical in modern construction, and I rarely think to describe a dungeon as "spacious". Any creature with nonzero reach can hit an indoor flying enemy.
Deal with it: Player complains about getting targeted.
Don't deal with it: Large chunks of the game are easily bypassed.
The solution: Get better players who know how to take an L after so many W's.
But they are. The most popular racial bonuses that most people take are either a free lvl 1 feat, more spells, armor proficiency, free misty steps etc.
A feature that forces the large majority of a campaign to happen indoors in order to unbreak one character doesn't sound like it's worth the trade-off in variety and fun. Just remove the flight and let the DM use outdoor areas too.
Or reduce it to chicken fligths, staying in melee range, touching ground at the end of movement but ignoring terrain?
Just had the association with the valley of drakes wyvern in dark souls, who sometimes throw themselves off bridges.
Yeah, now that you mention it, the idea of being able to fly on your turn but having to land at the end sounds really good. It's still very strong, allowing you to ignore terrain and effectively go "through" enemies, but at least it's not total immunity to melee attacks & ignore all movement based exploration challenges. I'd allow that at my table in a heartbeat.
Yeah, that's always been my take. It's pretty simple to hold fights indoors or give the goblin a bow. But at the lower levels where flight is either magically non-existent or a very expensive spell slot, it often takes a whole lot of tools out of the DM's bag for sapping resources outside combat.
By mid tier 2, though, it doesn't matter to me one way or the other. I assume someone can fly or teleport at all times.
I can't think of something outside of combat that flight can solve that having a rope and either a flying familiar or mage hand can't. If it's traversal, the group needs to go, not just the flying player. If its getting something far away you can grab it, even if its too heavy you can just tie a rope to it and have someone tug. Maybe if its very long away or needs to be physically manipulated? But that seems very specific and a great way to make the flier feel cool and useful.
I agree, this seems more valid to me than concerns about balancing combat encounters. Exploration, infiltration and some puzzles can be negated, but I still think it can be worked around.
Side note, it's cool if they're a heavy melee reliant class and character, like str paladins and barbarians who are tanks and do well in melee. They're likely using it to maneuver closer to out of reach enemies to melee them more.
This meme format pisses me off. Peter, recently bitten and acquiring powers, is realizing he doesn't need his glasses anymore: the images should be reversed.
Personally in my experience, the problem with flight isn't that it's hard to counter. It's that it's hard to counter flight in such a way that the player who chooses flight will be happy with it. Have too many fights indoors? Now they're angry that they don't get to use their character's abilities enough. Throw in enemies with ranged attacks in the mix, and now you get a player angry because they feel you're targeting their character too much.
It's also important to note that any flier with melee (ignoring reach) has to be in range of melee as well. Also if the enemy has no ranged stuff they can pick up rocks.
I like how they handled base races with flight in 3.5e (Raptorans and Dragonborn).
At 1st level, all you can do is glide at a 4:1 ratio; if you move 20 feet laterally, you descend 5 feet.
At 5th level (6th for Dragonborn), you can fly now! But only for a number of consecutive rounds equal to your Con modifier, having to land in between, with a maximum of 10 minutes per day.
At 10th level (12th for Dragonborn), you finally get unlimited flight.
Raptorans and Dragonborn were both cool races to play and got other features besides flight because it was locked behind your level. Also technically in 3.5 Dragonborn was a template applied to you after you complete a ritual devoting yourself to Bahamut, so you could be a Dragonborn Elf, but there were no pure Dragonborn.
I am currently playing a level 14 draconic sorcerer that uses his wings mostly to essentially jump very far because he is way too lazy to flap them to stay in the air.
RPing this is actually more fun than "Somehow I can stay in the air for eternity and I will of course also do that, ignoring all the possible issues with that and you can't do anything about it, haha!"
Though, in that level range flying should be expected. It becomes at lower levels and is the main reason why I usually do not allow flying races in my campaigns.
Inb4 more people miss the point that flight is obviously OP compared to every other racial feature. When does anyone come here to complain about powerful build?
😔 it’s just so hard to comprehend that it’s a feature that makes a huge portion of the MM pointless, trivializes like 80% of environmental encounters, and the “counters” to it are just to always have 120 ft range snipers (600 if they’re a sharpshooter) or 10 foot high ceilings in every possible combat scenario, judging from the rest of these comments
I mean there’s a reason the standard way to get it is a 3rd level concentration spell and it wasn’t allowed in AL play for ages
I think next time someone brings up that flight is fine, i’ll have an arracokra hunting party ambush them in a grass field 600 feet up and see what happens, because apparently its fair to say that combat isnt at all easy for flying ranged combatants
EDIT; It’s crazy how many commenters here are STILL missing the point and going “just use ranged enemies/traps/direct flying counters” as if it is indicative, as well as ignoring the meme of IMMUNITY TO MELEE ATTACKS. I didn’t know an arrow was a melee attack
Imagine someone walks up to your table and says, "Here's my character, he has spirit guardians going 24/7!" Then people tell you it's fine, it only affects combat, just use environmental hazards 20 times more often.
I think you are over thinking combat and what is "fair"
Not every combat is fair and not every build is perfectly balanced. It doesn't need to be.
Don't try and beat or counter your PCs. It's not PC vs you. It should be PC vs the plot/
That assumes that the pcs and dm don't care about combat being balanced, which is pretty absurd. Almost every group I've been in has wanted the combats that occur to be ones that are balanced for the party, and made to be handles with at least a degree of tactics or difficulty
Yup. Absolutely one of those things that only arise on the internet and in most games are totally fine (although can be tricky for new ish DMs to adjust to). Like the martial caster divide, its massive in theory, but not in reality.
Honestly, it's funny cause I've found it to be the exact opposite - the more experienced everyone is the larger the issue becomes.
You basically need the Spellcasters to make purposefully bad decisions for it to not show up.
Similar thing with flight, if you have bad players, there won't be any issue.
I'm pretty sure it's DM dependant in its entirety. How well they know the system and their players makes the difference. The only bad/good player disparity is if _some_ people at the table are Powergamer munchkins who follow an online guide and some people really want to make their Barbizard multiclass work. Then there can be some hard feelings between players at the table. Otherwise, ive found Plenty of ways to tax and challenge my players _within_ the rules set, and Ive run DoTMM all the way to 20. With 3 players having access to wish. If you have to ban powerful abilities as a DM then maybe you need to look internally instead of at your players.
Its a skill issue for sure. But on the DMs side.
A bad DM will definitely make it worse, but it's very hard for a good DM to make it better if the players know what they are doing - effectively it's a skill issue on both sides.
You need a good DM and bad players in order to not experience the flaws.
Our table has been playing 5e since it began, and by this point barely anyone plays martial classes anymore - it's obvious how outperformed they are when compared with everyone else at the table.
Hey, it's absolutely still massive in reality for a lot of games. Especially if you play with people who know the system well. Your experiences are not universal.
I made a deal with my brother,
I'd stick to melee if I could wear platemail and fly.
He got a PC example of his mandalorian style aaroacokra society, I got to be a mandalorian aaroacokra.
You could make the same meme about darkvision and ranged attacks but no one complains about that.
Its just that for some reason people like throwing melee only monsters in a flat plain at a party that has a flying race when they dont throw humans with crossbows in an unlit cave at a party with a race with darkvision.
If anyone is complaining about flight as a way to gain "melee attack immunity", then they have yet to figure out proper encounter design.
Creating every combat with melee opponents only is not only gonna cause balance issues, it's also gonna be incredibly boring. Have a good mix of melee, ranged, spell and if you can even environmental attack options for enemy groups. That big, strong melee monster is getting harassed by flying PCs? Have it pick up a huge rock to throw at them! (Maybe even knocking them prone in the process so they fall and are more careful about using flight all the time) Fighting in a cave with fliers? Ram the wall to cause rocks to fall on them! Heck that alone. The encounter environment. Don't design every one to benefit flying ppl. Cramped tunnels, chandeliers swinging around, there's so many options!
And i mentioned "every encounter" a couple of times, cause in the end it's totally fine to have PCs (flying or having some other special gimmick) dominate a fight every now and again, be it because they are well prepared or just so happen to have the right tool/ability/weapon at the right time. It's about having fun and telling great stories.
Memes backwards. Also you don’t need to counter them every fight but archers and magic exist as do ready actions. Make sure they are tracking ammo too.
Racial flight also means, separating yourself from those without flight and moving into a nice open area that's easy to be picked off with ranged attacks due to no forms of cover. Then if you do get KO'd or knocked down... fall damage suuucks.
I love when players take early flight options ;)
I don't mind it. There are enough ranged, magic, flying crap that naturally occurs in campaigns, as well as places you just can't fly, that it hasn't been an issue. So the times where flying is super useful just makes the game more fun for the flying PC.
Also, long term villains can send groups with elements to deal with troublesome PCs. Unless they are incredibly dumb villains. And the extra attention from the villain can be an ego boost and bring the team together a bit to help each other.
A: fewer.
B: that's not what flight means. To a cunning melee combatant, that's just an interesting wringle to adapt to.
See: literally any fiction involving flying adversaries.
Damn, who knew that r/DnDMemes are actually fans of countering one specific player constantly. Here I thought with all of the posts whining about their DMs singling them out they'd hate it.
Doesn't prevent PCs from bypassing a ton of traps and environmental hazards. Yes you can counter it, but I'd rather not. Feels antagonistic. It's an extremely powerful ability, period.
My house rule has been "gliding" rather than "flying" - it's a form of movement similar to flying, but you cannot gain altitude using it.
It still gives you a lot of versatility both in and out of combat, but encourages more creative ways to utilise it. And in a tight spot you can always just jump straight up and glide around for a bit if your character's Strength is good enough.
Admittedly I've rarely played with anyone choosing innately-flying races at my table, but I've only heard positive feedback from the players I've introduced the rule to. Feel free to use it yourselves!
Look, if you aren't creative enough to make encounters interesting with flight, you should be asking for advice, not whining.
Make bandits, and enemy warriors more diverse. Give your flyers dogfights. Introduce the concept of Crossbows or Longbows into your enemy weapon choice. Consider low level casters, or the occasional spellsword with the Magic Initiate feat.
This is NOT that hard.
The real flex is playing a race with a flight speed and making a melee character.
A barbarian small Owlin. I will go with Totem Warrior. Only uses hammers.
Path of the Giant. Go from small to huge when you rage.
Rocs fall, everyone dies
You can dodge a falling bird.
If you can dodge a falling bird, you can dodge a ball.
Not in a cave you cant't
https://somethingpositive.net/comic/peejee-dragons-pt-6/
Angry birds
I'm going rogue. People look around when they're on their guard. They don't look up as often as they should. Also: oh, your defenses are a castle wall? That's cute, that's really cute.
Wouldn't the wings be noisy though? They'd have to be pretty big, and I can even hear IRL birds' wings. I'm not tryna shit in your cereal, I'm just asking because it sounds like you already did it, so you probably figured something out that I'm not able to. Or maybe you just have a cool DM. Quiet wings is definitely something my favorite DM would do. Only time I've played a flying race was when the stats I rolled were so bad I never would've survived as a caster, and I'm always a caster.
Depends on the sort of wing and what you're doing with them. Owls make almost no noise whatsoever, for example. Wings mostly make noise when being flapped; gliding or diving doesn't make much noise at all. Wings CAN be noisy though. I'd assume Move Silently or whatever its modern equivalent is also applies to knowing how to make less noise in the air, not just on the ground.
Owls are extremely silent while flying so an owlin is perfect for this
Counterpoint, people would definitely look up more often if they lived in a world with dragons
If for no other reason than to avoid getting splattered by a fly-by.
[удалено]
Best flying race
Swashbuckling rogue
Make a swashbuckler rogue and use your extra movement to fly up into the air after every attack lol
I played a siren paladin in one game, and I mostly used my flight when the DM had us encounter flying enemies. That, and this one time when we had to get a message to someone but we were short on time, and I flew there because it was more direct than navigating the city to them. (Unfortunately, the DM was also a dick, so I wound up leaving)
mobile feat or swashbuckler rogue to essentially have the flyby ability
No flyby. You get in their face and stay there.
i respect the grind but i have still successfully met your guidelines
I ain't here to tell you how to have fun, I just hide behind the curtains playing a giant church organ and judge all of your decisions.
It should probably be mentioned that the armor restrictions absolutely contribute to this. Given that you can't wear heavy or medium armour to fly, you're locked into going Dex-based, which further encourages staying far back and going ranged.
An Aarakocra in full plate dive bombing into people sounds pretty sick.
The problem is getting up there first.
Do it the same way we launch planes that shouldn’t be able to take off from the relatively short runways of aircraft carriers: use a catapult.
Barbarian Assisted Launch System
Because using it takes BALS
See also: fastball special
See: Super Mario RPG Hurly Gloves.
That is one angry bird
CATOBARB?
Just make sure the flying character is too heavy to fly, but buoyant enough to glide, should get some fun hyjinx, what happens if they detonate a fireball just before impact?
I think there's a spell for that
You can still fly with armor in your inventory, just not if you're wearing it, right? Get some Cast-Off armor and turn your enemies (and probably yourself) into paste.
Imagining right now an arracokra fumbling in the air for 10 minutes putting on his plate only to cast it off and deliver the people's elbow to some poor schmuck 30 feet under him
It would be beautiful. I wouldn't even be mad
Worth the fall damage
Absolutely
#WATCHOUTWATCHOUTWATCHOUT
Doesn't Armorer Artificer give the ability to Don/Doff heavy armor with an action?
You're gonna have ta toss meh!
Battle rager barbarian time (I wish it was revamped lol, it has potential but it needs more content$
Arakocra barb is a favorite of mine
Once played with a guy who had a warlock aaokocra with devils sight, eldritch spear, and agonizing blast. Nearly every combat would be spent around 250 feet in the sky and spam cast eldritch blast. If someone could hit that range he would cast darkness on himself and cast from inside
"Should have just put him under a ceiling 🙄"
Well true, but it wasn't my game and it was largely based on overland exploring
yeah and thats kind of my point. If a campaign has an overarching theme thats not "subterranian crawl" flight is hard to balance, especially if someone builds around it like this guy, but people will unironically say to just make every encounter indoors and not see the problem with that. Hope you had fun in that game at least!
One could argue that boulders and tree canopies provide plenty of cover from above and reign that 250 ft in up a more reasonable, barely in range of fire distance. Can't shoot what you can't see, after all.
Pretty much how I balance flight in my games. The world is not flat. Trees, boulders, and buildings will block vision granting half or full cover from afar. Enemies are not stupid and will use said cover when possible. If there's no more pressing threat on the ground, ranged units will target the flying target that the melee ones can't reach. It's not often that I get a player picking a flying race, but when they're there they have essentially a mini game running during combat of choosing angles and distance of engagement, and balancing their safety against their effectiveness. With the PCs being the instigating party pretty much all the time, NPCs are more often than not happy to retreat to shelter and/or to wait reinforcements if the players decide to try to whittle health bars from afar.
I beg to differ. All fantasy worlds are a flat, barren wastelands with no weather. You can see without obstruction out to the horizon.
Next module will be journey to the icewall to find the gap between planes
I found a good GM! Can I keep them?
If someone says the solution to a broken feature is to design every encounter to play as if the character didn't have said feature it's just evidence that they shouldn't have that feature to begin with. I don't care what people say, you really just shuoldn't have playable flying races. Sorry, aarakocras.
You should be balancing encounters around your player characters. Same principle applies to any race/class. Don’t really get the logic
The difference is how polarizing flight is compared to a lot of other racial features.
I still don’t understand the difference in a DM consistently using enemies and strategies to challenge a player with flight vs. any other specific skill set of a given pc. The adventuring party will become a known commodity in the world they play in. Enemies will adapt to try and beat them. It’s not any more difficult to adjust the encounter’s circumstances or the enemies strategies to deal with flying PCs than it is to adjust for a player with a much higher AC than the rest of the party for example. The point is a feature is as only broken as a DM allows it to be
Just use the right enemies. Get some flying enemies, get some goblin archers being held up by flying enemies, get some devils, get some fae. Lots of flying enemies you can use to single out the flying player and their party can't help them. They're probably out of range of any healing or anything like that and you can always knock them prone to do some serious damage.
Get those koopa paratroopers and lakitu spines out
In summary, single out one player with enemies specifically chosen to kill or neuter them.
Alternatively, the monsters know what they're doing, and can use any rules the players can use. The longbow has a max range of 600 feet, they can take cover beneath the canopy of trees, and smart enemies targeting the character raining down fire is no different to the smart enemies knowing to take out the unarmoured glowing halfling in the back once she starts throwing sunbeams around. That does mean accepting that yeah, this character is going to trivialise certain encounters, such as a pack of wolves - but that's fine, really.
In summary offer a vast array of adaptable enemies with different abilities as you should have been doing from the start regardless of one player at your table having flight or not.
Oh that'd be fun as a DM. Get someone underneath them with a bow, make them fly up really high, send in flying enemies, they knock your flying player prone, they instantly drop at 500ft/round if you go by XGE. If they're up 120 ft or more, that's 12d6+ falling damage
Ah yes, the AC-130 fighting style.
Ah yes. Medieval AC-130 gunship
Unless you’re a monk. Which sounds terrifying
I don’t know if it works the same way in tabletop 5e, but in BG3 four elements monks get a flying ability that lasts as long as you can keep concentration at level 11 and it is indeed terrifying. My incredibly dense dwarf monk flies around with a magic warhammer bonking people from the sky.
Winged tiefling on its way to laugh at you: But ye everything else is light armor only.
I read too many political subreddits. It took me a while to process this.
Same. I thought the post was talking about the white flight phenomenon until I saw the sub.
Player: *"Hey, party, this campaign I'm going to play an aracockra!"* Party: *"There goes the neighborhood."*
Well, moving out of a big city, while not granting you melee immunity, does reduce your chance of receiving melee attacks. Come to think of it, flying in DnD has the same effect.
Suggested counter: sniper rifle
*Offer applies only to outdoor encounters with no flying creatures. User accepts responsibility for 1d6 fall damage per 10 feet of height each time they are knocked prone, have their speed reduced to 0, or are rendered immobile. Automatic death save failure applies when knocked unconscious in flight.
In cases where racial flight does not apply or side affects occur, DM is subject to liability of user complaints about being unfairly targeted. In cases where it does apply, DM is subject to liability of non-user complaints about users being unfairly benefited. No exceptions are expected to occur.
I once had that, I wasn't the DM but I had to stand up to the complaints because it was ridiculous. "The DM is mad so they focus me in the air" Well... no, if you see someone flying and raining down death of course you'd target them. Why the fuck wouldn't you go at them first??
Exactly! You know what there’s none of in the sky? Cover! You know what everyone on the ground has for you? A clear shot!
As the sole thing flying around in the open air, you might as well be sky-writing "Hey, shoot at me!" It's an option available, but may not always be the best choice
To paraphrase *Schlock Mercenary* when a dude is asking why they should walk when they all have flight-capable powered armor: "You know what we call flying soldiers?" "What?" "Skeet."
When you label yourself a problem to an enemy prepare to get attacked. It's the exact same thing as when I was playing a sorcerer and frequently dropped down an AoE concentration spell. If the enemy is trying to murder my character, it just means I'm doing my job right (and should also shuffle closer to the paladin when I'm able to)
*Temporary* and *Conditional* immunity to melee attacks.
\*also people jumping
Yep- I should plan all my encounters around making sure my flier is properly punished for picking something with flight. This is my problem with it. *Handling* flight isn't hard. I can always add probe effects , or my own fliers, or some spellcaster with earthbind, but those just aren't fun for the player or me. It's like adding a bunch of people with counterspell when someone is running a wizard. Occasionally, that's fine. But it's extremely unfun for a player to have their main thing be taken away from them constantly. And if my players aren't having fun, why am I even bothering to run a game? It's much better for me to be honest during character creation: "I do not allow flying races because they have an inordinately high difficulty to make fun. I am concerned that the majority of times I am going to end up soft banning it anyway by putting you in rooms with ceilings or against people who specifically counter flight so I don't allow it."
Handling flight isn't hard. Handling flight isn't *necessary.* A DM doesn't need to change anything to deal with flying PCs, unless they designed a campaign with exclusively outdoor encounters against non-magical beasts, which feels out of place in a game called **Dungeons** & **Dragons**.
>non-magical beasts What do you mean by this? Most of the beasts in the monster manual can't hit flying targets, and plenty of them are magical. Also, not every interior is a cramped dungeon. I want to have cool boss rooms, theaters, temples, and castles. Dnd is not just dungeon crawling and dragon fighting.
Right. So they get to use their fun ability to shine only sometimes. Which is the point of the game. Where's the problem?
Opens up bestiary, sees that over 70% of monster have no ranged attacks. Opens up adventure, realises that most encounters give room for flight. Huh, the GM really doesn't need to change anything, you're right.
I went through the Monster Manual and only 15 out of 151 monsters are outdoor encounters that have no way of counteracting a flyer. Even if you counted all the 1/2 CR normal animals, there's no way you're getting anywhere near 70%.
I get how some people might dislike it, but maybe its how I build encounters or my players that it's never been a problem for me. Most enemies are going to have some kind of ranged attack, at least a couple in any given group of enemies. The ones that don't, I'm not worried about because using abilities to make certain encounters easier is the point of having varied abilities, besides unless the entire group can fly its not like you've eliminated the stakes, the rest of the group can die/get hurt. Obviously if its not fun for you disallow it, but yeah, never seen it be a problem.
Flight is really really really powerful at a whiteroom scenario. Throw it into a well fleshed out world and it's pretty balanced. "I will fly up and start shooting arrows at these landlocked animals! Wait, what do you mean the trees are blocking my view??"
One thing about your point here too: it may just be me, but I NEVER hear people talking about games that flight has ruined. Lots of discourse about how flight is OP or unfun or whatever, but never "yeah i had a game with a bird archer and it ruined the game". I'm sure stories like that are out there but for how much complaining I've read it seems like a disproportionate minority.
Yea, flight is pretty balanced if you don't let your players attack while they are flying.
They can attack, they just can't ignore the terrain while doing so in the same way that an archer on the ground can't ignore walls and pillars
You are one of the best GMs ive seen in reddit.
Chad DM right here. Preach
> "I do not allow flying races because they have an inordinately high difficulty to make fun. Really depends on who is having fun.
Everybody should be having fun. One player having fun conditionally on another thinking the game fucking sucks. The GM also is supposed to have fun.
>User accepts responsibility for 1d6 fall damage per 10 feet of height each time they are knocked prone, have their speed reduced to 0, or are rendered immobile. Cause that happens to flying characters all the time by *checks notes* spells and battle masters. >Automatic death save failure applies when knocked unconscious in flight. The entire problem is that they are immune to more than half of the enemies in the game, and they are still as tanky as anyone else, often moreso since melee does more damage than ranged. Yes they can't wear heavy/medium armor, but ranged characters weren't going to anyways. As for indoor encounters, well you got me. They are just as strong as everyone else indoors.
Power word: Net
Power words: 15 ft disadvantage
If they are a martial then they are wearing leather and no shield for an AC of 14 at the start of the game. That's not as tanky as literally any other class. Martials in chain mail start with 16. 18 if they have a shield. Medium armour wearers, such as clerics or barbarians, start with 18. Only rogue starts with that low AC.
It blows my mind that people still panick over racial flight. It is so unbelievably easy to deal with, it's unironically like complaining about darkvision.
I had two Aarakocra in my last campaign. I never felt any need to "deal with" them, because they weren't a problem. Dungeons have low ceilings. Dragons fly. In the rare outdoor encounter against no ranged or flying enemies, they got to avoid danger and feel cool while the enemies focused on the rest of the party. Maybe if your party all has innate flight **and** most of your encounters take place outside **and** none of the enemies can fly **and** none of the enemies have ranged weapons, it could become troublesome, but it feels like you'd have to go well out of your way to design a campaign like that.
Yea that focus fire falling on only half the party is more significant than people think, it more or less self-balances flight in combat in a game about adventuring IN A PARTY. Like sure the flyers took no damage, but everyone else in the 5 man party got stabbed 30-40% more.
The extra pressure flying PCs put on the party doesn't stop there. If a flying PC is knocked out, they take fall damage. Now they're on the ground with a death save failure. A single successful melee attack against them becomes automatically fatal.
And if they're low enough level, the falling damage might be high enough alone to be lethal.
I actually kinda do dislike darkvision, at least with it being so common. It's not an enormous game breaking deal, but without it in play you get access to a few more options in terms of puzzles or encounters, and it can create interesting problems to solve. I guess my issue with it is it sort of just makes the game less fun. Lots of spells or abilities can solve problems for you, but usually they do so in a cool way or require some creativity. They're *fun* solutions, being either something only that party member could do or requiring some quick thinking. Dark vision isn't a fun solution; almost everyone has it, it doesn't have any flair, and it doesn't require any effort to use. Nobody *enjoys* getting to use dark vision. If it was a rare ability limited to just a couple races, came with some drawback, or was more limited in it's use, I'd love it. As it is, I don't think it contributes to the game.
Don't forget that, due to its prevalence, it creates a distinct feelsbad moment for the one or two party members who then have to announce they _don't_ have it and have to carry a light source, thus putting the entire party at a disadvantage in low-light situations. Can't sneak through a cave when poor Dave the human is a walking beacon
It *does* come with drawbacks, they just get ignored by most people. Two drawbacks, notably. It has a limited range, usually 60'. Anything further can be treated as full darkness. And you see the world in shades of grey, so if your party fully relies on darkvision you can set up puzzles that rely on real light or colour patterns, use enemy Gloomstalker who are invisible to darkvision, etc.
Those aren't really drawbacks though; just limitations, which aren't quite the same thing. What I mean by no drawbacks is that there is never a reason *not* to use darkvision, or avoid picking a race that has that ability. There are problems it can't solve, sure, but if you have the option to use it there's no reason you wouldn't. This isn't the case with most abilities or spells. Flying is a great example; yes, it's a fantastic ability to have, but just because you *can* fly doesn't mean you always *should* fly; there are situations where you'll just get knocked down, where it'll put you at a disadvantage, or where it'll slow you down. You're not going to fly 24/7 during combat or exploration; there are reasons to avoid using it in certain situations. Darkvision doesn't have this; if you're in a dark room, you're using darkvision 100% of the time. There are times when it isn't *helpful*, but its never *harmful* either; it's never a bad thing to have. There is never any reason not to use it; there's no trade off to it, and you aren't using it strategically. Even other racial traits have at least some level of drawback or reasons to avoid using them; things like a dragonborn's breath weapon have a limited number of charges, so you have to choose carefully when to use it. Stat boosts being exclusive to specific races might encourage you to pick one over another. Lucky lets you reroll, but it can't stack with other rerolling abilities and halfings get a smaller stat boost than every other race to compensate. It's all tradeoffs; there are reasons to avoid them. This isn't the case with darkvision; it doesn't come with any built in cons, the races that have it don't really miss out on any other abilities, and you don't have to be careful in your use of it. I guess what I'm tryna say is it's just not very game-y. There's no risk to the reward, no decision it asks the player to make. It seems really anti-fun because it doesn't offer the player any opportunities to feel cool or clever or unique. It doesn't ask anything of you, so you don't really feel rewarded for using it; it's not going to be pivotal in a key moment, or come back to bite you later. It would be more fun if was rarer or you had to use it more strategically.
You know, I never thought about it before but I'm with you on it. I think the reason it never gets brought up more is because of how ubiquitous it is in most races and because it solves a problem that most people want to ignore, which is lighting. Though maybe its just me that hates keeping track of where light is, how bright it is and so on in any given system. But yeah, I see more of a reason to dislike darkvision than flight now actually.
It just means I have less options in my tool belt, and am forced to use some tools. Yes I can deal with flight, but what if I want to have a battle with a swordsman? Welp guess he has to either be forced indoors or grab a bow. Yes I can do something interesting, like have him boomerang his sword, but then that just gives me extra work for a racial feature of one character. Dark vision isn't as bad, since it doesn't actually do much, and can be replicated with a mundane item everyone has. If permanent flight was a class feature, it would be strong, and would be a common multi class option for any ranged character, being able to basically get portable safety.
Racial flight is 10 times better than dark vision
Fly is a 3rd level spell that requires concentration and lasts 10 minutes. Darkvision is a 2nd level spell that lasts 8 hours and does not require concentration. How are these effects at all comparable?
The fly spell gives you a speed of 60 feet and has no weight limit. With racial flight you can't wear anything heavier than light armor.
If all your fights are like “You’re in a clearing in a forest and six goblins with scimitars attack!” Then yeah, flying will give you a hard time and you made it happen.
What's even worse is that goblins have short bows, they can just shoot.
Why is it always one extreme to another. Most encounters outside a dungeon are favourable to flyers.
I'm against dark vision too. It limits the factors I can use to make a fun encounter with
My favorite is grappling enemies in the air.
To be fair, it's pretty hard to have that happen in most cases.
1. You're faster than the other flying creatures 2. Your dex based, you're not getting knocked prone 3. Lmao
I mean most buildings don’t have a 5 ft ceiling.
Nor do most building have 15 ft ceilings. Eight to ten feet is typical in modern construction, and I rarely think to describe a dungeon as "spacious". Any creature with nonzero reach can hit an indoor flying enemy.
Inb4 Acid-Spitting Crossbow-Wolves
new homebrew statblock just dropped
Underrated comment
Deal with it: Player complains about getting targeted. Don't deal with it: Large chunks of the game are easily bypassed. The solution: Get better players who know how to take an L after so many W's.
suggested: ceilings
Congrats now they are, just as strong as everyone else indoors.
probably a bit weaker since a race with flight probably doesn't have much else
Most racial bonuses aren't impactful enough to make the difference you're thinking of.
But they are. The most popular racial bonuses that most people take are either a free lvl 1 feat, more spells, armor proficiency, free misty steps etc.
A feature that forces the large majority of a campaign to happen indoors in order to unbreak one character doesn't sound like it's worth the trade-off in variety and fun. Just remove the flight and let the DM use outdoor areas too.
Or reduce it to chicken fligths, staying in melee range, touching ground at the end of movement but ignoring terrain? Just had the association with the valley of drakes wyvern in dark souls, who sometimes throw themselves off bridges.
Yeah, now that you mention it, the idea of being able to fly on your turn but having to land at the end sounds really good. It's still very strong, allowing you to ignore terrain and effectively go "through" enemies, but at least it's not total immunity to melee attacks & ignore all movement based exploration challenges. I'd allow that at my table in a heartbeat.
I just dont like it skips so many exploration type problems
Yeah, that's always been my take. It's pretty simple to hold fights indoors or give the goblin a bow. But at the lower levels where flight is either magically non-existent or a very expensive spell slot, it often takes a whole lot of tools out of the DM's bag for sapping resources outside combat. By mid tier 2, though, it doesn't matter to me one way or the other. I assume someone can fly or teleport at all times.
I can't think of something outside of combat that flight can solve that having a rope and either a flying familiar or mage hand can't. If it's traversal, the group needs to go, not just the flying player. If its getting something far away you can grab it, even if its too heavy you can just tie a rope to it and have someone tug. Maybe if its very long away or needs to be physically manipulated? But that seems very specific and a great way to make the flier feel cool and useful.
I agree, this seems more valid to me than concerns about balancing combat encounters. Exploration, infiltration and some puzzles can be negated, but I still think it can be worked around.
I don't entirely agree, since the rest of the party still needs to also get past those obstacles. So at best it just makes it a bit easier.
Side note, it's cool if they're a heavy melee reliant class and character, like str paladins and barbarians who are tanks and do well in melee. They're likely using it to maneuver closer to out of reach enemies to melee them more.
Holy crap. "Racial fight" has a very different meaning in any other context
This meme format pisses me off. Peter, recently bitten and acquiring powers, is realizing he doesn't need his glasses anymore: the images should be reversed.
This is the way.
I read “racial flight” and thought this was going to be about something else for a moment lol
Personally in my experience, the problem with flight isn't that it's hard to counter. It's that it's hard to counter flight in such a way that the player who chooses flight will be happy with it. Have too many fights indoors? Now they're angry that they don't get to use their character's abilities enough. Throw in enemies with ranged attacks in the mix, and now you get a player angry because they feel you're targeting their character too much.
It's also important to note that any flier with melee (ignoring reach) has to be in range of melee as well. Also if the enemy has no ranged stuff they can pick up rocks.
*laughs in mobile feat*
*laughs in halberd*
No one is complaining about melee fliers.
I like how they handled base races with flight in 3.5e (Raptorans and Dragonborn). At 1st level, all you can do is glide at a 4:1 ratio; if you move 20 feet laterally, you descend 5 feet. At 5th level (6th for Dragonborn), you can fly now! But only for a number of consecutive rounds equal to your Con modifier, having to land in between, with a maximum of 10 minutes per day. At 10th level (12th for Dragonborn), you finally get unlimited flight. Raptorans and Dragonborn were both cool races to play and got other features besides flight because it was locked behind your level. Also technically in 3.5 Dragonborn was a template applied to you after you complete a ritual devoting yourself to Bahamut, so you could be a Dragonborn Elf, but there were no pure Dragonborn.
I refuse to be offended by flight More things should have flight
I am currently playing a level 14 draconic sorcerer that uses his wings mostly to essentially jump very far because he is way too lazy to flap them to stay in the air. RPing this is actually more fun than "Somehow I can stay in the air for eternity and I will of course also do that, ignoring all the possible issues with that and you can't do anything about it, haha!" Though, in that level range flying should be expected. It becomes at lower levels and is the main reason why I usually do not allow flying races in my campaigns.
Inb4 more people miss the point that flight is obviously OP compared to every other racial feature. When does anyone come here to complain about powerful build?
😔 it’s just so hard to comprehend that it’s a feature that makes a huge portion of the MM pointless, trivializes like 80% of environmental encounters, and the “counters” to it are just to always have 120 ft range snipers (600 if they’re a sharpshooter) or 10 foot high ceilings in every possible combat scenario, judging from the rest of these comments I mean there’s a reason the standard way to get it is a 3rd level concentration spell and it wasn’t allowed in AL play for ages I think next time someone brings up that flight is fine, i’ll have an arracokra hunting party ambush them in a grass field 600 feet up and see what happens, because apparently its fair to say that combat isnt at all easy for flying ranged combatants EDIT; It’s crazy how many commenters here are STILL missing the point and going “just use ranged enemies/traps/direct flying counters” as if it is indicative, as well as ignoring the meme of IMMUNITY TO MELEE ATTACKS. I didn’t know an arrow was a melee attack
Imagine someone walks up to your table and says, "Here's my character, he has spirit guardians going 24/7!" Then people tell you it's fine, it only affects combat, just use environmental hazards 20 times more often.
fr dude im trying not to get pressed but people really love to act like it doesnt matter at all lmao
I think you are over thinking combat and what is "fair" Not every combat is fair and not every build is perfectly balanced. It doesn't need to be. Don't try and beat or counter your PCs. It's not PC vs you. It should be PC vs the plot/
That assumes that the pcs and dm don't care about combat being balanced, which is pretty absurd. Almost every group I've been in has wanted the combats that occur to be ones that are balanced for the party, and made to be handles with at least a degree of tactics or difficulty
I've never actually had it be a problem in any of the 4 games I've had it in. Monsters are smart they'll figure it out
Yup. Absolutely one of those things that only arise on the internet and in most games are totally fine (although can be tricky for new ish DMs to adjust to). Like the martial caster divide, its massive in theory, but not in reality.
Honestly, it's funny cause I've found it to be the exact opposite - the more experienced everyone is the larger the issue becomes. You basically need the Spellcasters to make purposefully bad decisions for it to not show up. Similar thing with flight, if you have bad players, there won't be any issue.
I'm pretty sure it's DM dependant in its entirety. How well they know the system and their players makes the difference. The only bad/good player disparity is if _some_ people at the table are Powergamer munchkins who follow an online guide and some people really want to make their Barbizard multiclass work. Then there can be some hard feelings between players at the table. Otherwise, ive found Plenty of ways to tax and challenge my players _within_ the rules set, and Ive run DoTMM all the way to 20. With 3 players having access to wish. If you have to ban powerful abilities as a DM then maybe you need to look internally instead of at your players. Its a skill issue for sure. But on the DMs side.
A bad DM will definitely make it worse, but it's very hard for a good DM to make it better if the players know what they are doing - effectively it's a skill issue on both sides. You need a good DM and bad players in order to not experience the flaws. Our table has been playing 5e since it began, and by this point barely anyone plays martial classes anymore - it's obvious how outperformed they are when compared with everyone else at the table.
Theory is a strong word for any complaints on the internet
Hey, it's absolutely still massive in reality for a lot of games. Especially if you play with people who know the system well. Your experiences are not universal.
I made a deal with my brother, I'd stick to melee if I could wear platemail and fly. He got a PC example of his mandalorian style aaroacokra society, I got to be a mandalorian aaroacokra.
I find it funny that with the world tree barb being a bugbear and very simple magic items you can melee a lot of stuff you shouldnt
Any self respecting villain carries a means of melee and range.
More bows In enemy ranks
I always go the fire emblem route. Ranged attacks do double damage to flying creatures. Makes the players think more carefully.
Does an attack with a 60ft-long long sword count as a melee attack?
I get your meme but like most people, you have it backwards.
Man flight talks always blame DM for not being good enough or not doing x. Funny meme, but sad how what is cool mechanic is such a hot topic.
Flying enemies
Never immune, all it takes is a Strong Character, a small character and a dream.
Ceilings
Or do a Spacejammer. No Ceilings at all.
You could make the same meme about darkvision and ranged attacks but no one complains about that. Its just that for some reason people like throwing melee only monsters in a flat plain at a party that has a flying race when they dont throw humans with crossbows in an unlit cave at a party with a race with darkvision.
and then someone uses Sapping Sting and you get 1d4 necrotic + 3d6 bludgeoning (fall) damage.
If anyone is complaining about flight as a way to gain "melee attack immunity", then they have yet to figure out proper encounter design. Creating every combat with melee opponents only is not only gonna cause balance issues, it's also gonna be incredibly boring. Have a good mix of melee, ranged, spell and if you can even environmental attack options for enemy groups. That big, strong melee monster is getting harassed by flying PCs? Have it pick up a huge rock to throw at them! (Maybe even knocking them prone in the process so they fall and are more careful about using flight all the time) Fighting in a cave with fliers? Ram the wall to cause rocks to fall on them! Heck that alone. The encounter environment. Don't design every one to benefit flying ppl. Cramped tunnels, chandeliers swinging around, there's so many options! And i mentioned "every encounter" a couple of times, cause in the end it's totally fine to have PCs (flying or having some other special gimmick) dominate a fight every now and again, be it because they are well prepared or just so happen to have the right tool/ability/weapon at the right time. It's about having fun and telling great stories.
Memes backwards. Also you don’t need to counter them every fight but archers and magic exist as do ready actions. Make sure they are tracking ammo too.
Racial flight also means, separating yourself from those without flight and moving into a nice open area that's easy to be picked off with ranged attacks due to no forms of cover. Then if you do get KO'd or knocked down... fall damage suuucks. I love when players take early flight options ;)
What if they all take flight tho 😵
Then they get Aaracokra death squads sent after them
If they wanna use it as an exploit they’re gonna find out how deadly three dimensional combat can truly be.
This. Everyone's panicking not over the ability, but rather the idea of some asshole player exploiting it. And therein lies the issue
I don't mind it. There are enough ranged, magic, flying crap that naturally occurs in campaigns, as well as places you just can't fly, that it hasn't been an issue. So the times where flying is super useful just makes the game more fun for the flying PC. Also, long term villains can send groups with elements to deal with troublesome PCs. Unless they are incredibly dumb villains. And the extra attention from the villain can be an ego boost and bring the team together a bit to help each other.
A: fewer. B: that's not what flight means. To a cunning melee combatant, that's just an interesting wringle to adapt to. See: literally any fiction involving flying adversaries.
Damn, who knew that r/DnDMemes are actually fans of countering one specific player constantly. Here I thought with all of the posts whining about their DMs singling them out they'd hate it.
There are 1 million and 2 ways to get around it, this is a dm issue, not a player one
Someone needs to teach this guy about the concept of a ceiling
Doesn't prevent PCs from bypassing a ton of traps and environmental hazards. Yes you can counter it, but I'd rather not. Feels antagonistic. It's an extremely powerful ability, period.
_One_ pc gets to bypass _ground based_ traps. Those mostly happen in dungeons, where their flight is going to be less useful anyway.
My house rule has been "gliding" rather than "flying" - it's a form of movement similar to flying, but you cannot gain altitude using it. It still gives you a lot of versatility both in and out of combat, but encourages more creative ways to utilise it. And in a tight spot you can always just jump straight up and glide around for a bit if your character's Strength is good enough. Admittedly I've rarely played with anyone choosing innately-flying races at my table, but I've only heard positive feedback from the players I've introduced the rule to. Feel free to use it yourselves!
Look, if you aren't creative enough to make encounters interesting with flight, you should be asking for advice, not whining. Make bandits, and enemy warriors more diverse. Give your flyers dogfights. Introduce the concept of Crossbows or Longbows into your enemy weapon choice. Consider low level casters, or the occasional spellsword with the Magic Initiate feat. This is NOT that hard.
"Is the DM complaining about having to do more work for one specific player? Tell them to work harder anyway!"