Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 DateOfLies Oct 11, 2014 4:15:22	If someone jumps on a table, or is uphill, or is on 5 foot tall crate next to another creature? I'm refering to Melee but not sure if this would affect ranged attacks too?
#2 1eejit Oct 11, 2014 4:32:57	Not in the rules, but a DM can certainly houserule it. I might on occasion do so for melee, for ranged I wouldn't give advantage but  I would change weapon range for a significant height difference.
#3 Plaguescarred1 Oct 11, 2014 4:33:11	No advantage for Higher Ground, unless the DM determine otherwise of course!
#4 Yunru Oct 11, 2014 8:07:42	Hell if anything I'd give Disadvantage, and Advantage to attackers. Striking someone who's at your feet with something you're holding.your fists is a lot harder than vs someone at hand-height. Likewise, parrying someone swinging at your ankles is harder than someone swinging for your chest.
#5 Timborama Oct 11, 2014 12:40:33	Be careful if you make rules like this. Because Giants and Ogres exist...
#6 Yunru Oct 11, 2014 12:57:15	Yes but they're larger, with larger reaching weapons to compensate. Now if those ogres and giants were wielding Medium creature length weapons, yeah I'd probably give them disadvantage too.
#7 onceMoreIntoBreech Oct 11, 2014 13:45:40	I would give anyone with the high ground advantage, personally. Including giants and stuff.
#8 Novacat Oct 11, 2014 13:55:09	That entirely depends on what kind of weapon you're using. Man on a horse with a sword? No advantage. Put a spear in hand? Then we'll talk.
#9 paulstrait Oct 11, 2014 14:26:33	1eejit wrote:
#10 Psikerlord Oct 12, 2014 17:44:15	I would give a +1 for high ground, if it seemed significant. Depends on situation. Adv is too great a bonus IMO.
#11 J.Trudel Oct 14, 2014 7:06:02	I'd say it depends, the higher ground shouldn't automaticaly grant an advantage, but in some circumstances it might. If a player describe a specific and clever way to attack a monster on a higher ground, you may grant him an advantage for doing so. The key word here is clever, you should sometime reward your players for finding creative ways to tip the odds in an encounter. Don't be affraid to give advantages or disadvantages if you think you should, but don't make it a rule that say that any character who has higher ground automaticaly has an advantage.
#12 Noctaem Oct 14, 2014 7:51:17	You could also reward them with inspiration for example.  The answer though is that it's not in the rules, but the DM may decide to grant bonuses as DM fiat.  I personally wouldn't give advantage or disadvantage because the double rolls equal roughly +5 or -5 respectively.  Seems a bit much.
#13 paulstrait Oct 14, 2014 8:06:44	Yeah, a +2 seems closer to right if you think some bonus is called for.   It seems like if someone has, say, half-cover from ranged attacks, and you could occupy a higher position (say a tower or something) that would give you a straight shot, it wouldn't be unreasonable to rule that that cancels out the -2 penalty for half cover (or not; total DM call).  So in general, it seems more of a +2/-2 kind of situation than an advantage/disadvantage one.
#14 Gold_Katana Oct 14, 2014 9:05:27	Advantage seems too much a bonus for this.  Perhaps adv if you we're charging downhill with momentum.  But to simply attack from higher up the staircase or tabletop, +2 seems more appropriate.  With the table top, the lower creature would benefit from partial coverage, as well.
#15 Huntsman57 Oct 14, 2014 22:36:22	Gold_Katana wrote:
#16 paulstrait Oct 15, 2014 16:27:44	IIRC, when the first D&D next playtest was released, some people showed the mathematical effect.  Essentially, the biggest difference between a static bonus and advantage is that a static bonus always improves the probability of success by the same degree -- e.g., a +2 always confers a 10% bonus on a d20 roll, regardless of how hard or easy success was in the first place (bracketing off the situation where you already had 90% or higher chance of success, since you can never have more than 100% chance of success).  But advantage is variable -- it confers a much greater bonus if the DC is somwhere in the middle, and increasingly less advantage the further away you get.  I don't recall exactly but I think when they were comparing advantage to +5, it was something like a DC of 17 on an unmodified roll was the critical point were advantage was less valuable than the static +.  I'm sure those numbers are off a little bit, but it was something like that.  It would be fairly straightforward to rework the math out if you really wanted to know given a few minutes and a spreadsheet...
#17 paulstrait Oct 15, 2014 17:07:57	Here, I just redid the analysis, comparing advantage to static bonuses ranging from +1 to +5.    Basically, a +5 bonus is *always* better than or equal to advantage.  It is equal at the extremes (100% when you automatically succeed, 0% when you automatically fail) and when you need an 11 -- at every other point it is superior.  A +4 bonus is superior to advantage when you need a 2-6 or a 16 and up.  A +3 bonus is superior to advantage when you need a 2-4 or an 18 or higher.  A +2 bonus is superior to advantage when you need a 2-3 or a 19 or higher.  A +1 bonus is superior to advantage only when you need a 2 or a 20.  For all static bonuses less than +5, they are the worst compared to advantage the closer the required number is to 11.    Take a look at the chart if you are interested.  I just put it together and I may have made an error, but in any event I know for a fact that others have calculated this or something very similar to this before.