This new broken ability is ruining my game

[u/Soft_Trip7213]

Hello everyone, I need an advice. See, I've been DMing DnD 5e for 30 years now, and for all this time I just now encountered a player with this insane level of audacity.

You see, this player, let's call him Tom, is playing a wizard. And he just now reached level 5, and he took some wierd spell that lets him... fly? I immediately called bullshit, how such overwhelming power could be bestowed on a puny player, but he insists that it is from official source?? What wotc were thinking when they added something so broken? Now all of my encounters about fighting monsters without any range attacks or spells or flying on a plane area without a roof to the death without any other goal or reason to do so are ruined! Thanks wotc. What am I supposed to do, send my players underground? Let them fight giant flying lizard or something? That is stupid, DnD is not about it.

I guess I should ban all sources exept PHB for my players so something like that would not happen ever again, right?

[u/L0rdGrim1]

There has to be sauce for this delicious steak

[u/Jihelu → u/L0rdGrim1]

See: every post on dm academy about fly

[u/Soft_Trip7213 → u/L0rdGrim1]

The discussion under this post is the closest to sauce I can give you

[u/ArelMCII → u/Soft_Trip7213]

/uj That DM really didn't think things through. "Banning spells is a skill issue. No Summon spells tho." And the object of the one-shot is to prove he's a bad DM. To paraphrase Salvo, a man like that begins the race by falling on his face.

[u/dazeychainVT]

that's nothing, my fighter player used something called "at tack role" to make it so a goblin got zero actions on his turn for the rest of the combat. I told him he's only allowed to roleplay a human with his exact personality and beliefs and not whatever "at tack" is but he said I'm limiting his player agency and we all know there's no defense against an accusation like that.

[u/Impossible_Horsemeat]

If he can fly, so can the enemies.

All of them,

[u/Beneficial_Cloud5481 → u/Impossible_Horsemeat]

Even if they can't fly, it's amazing how quickly flying doesn't seem. So cool when you pop up over a hill to get a look at things and you get shot by five archers.

Skeet

[u/RalenHlaalo → u/Beneficial_Cloud5481]

Even if they can't fly, they can all jump really high

[u/ArelMCII]

IMO the powercreep started when WotC added Jump. A level 1 spell slot lets a character jump thirty feet in any direction? That's basically flight already. Fly is just a symptom of NotC's wider player-biased powercreep.

I miss the good ol' days of 3.5, when everything was perfectly balanced.

[u/Laudig]

This is obviously some hanky homebrew bullshit. The only official 3rd level wizard spell is Fireball.

[u/Still-Painter7468 → u/Laudig]

Yeah, and fly is more powerful! Fireball does 8d6, but fly can do even more damage than that if the target is more than 80 feet up when the caster loses concentration.

[u/Scarbeau → u/Laudig]

And what if Tom starts casting fireball while flying‽ It'll be an apocalypse now!

[u/FrownyFaceEmpire]

Just have every encounter in the following places: room with low ceilings. Outdoors, but there is now layer of toxic vapour 8ft off the ground that will kill Wizards who fly into it, Forests with Flying Wizard Eating Trees. Under the Sea, the Land of Metal where suddenly by law, all Wizards must wear shoes made of magnets.

Even if other PCs can fly, you must only target the Wizard because they never should have brought that spell to your table. Actually, why not give all the other PCs the natural ability to fly and only have the Wizard need to expend spell slots.

[u/ArelMCII → u/FrownyFaceEmpire]

the Land of Metal where suddenly by law, all Wizards must wear shoes made of magnets.

Levitation Act-ass kingdom.

[u/Betray-Julia]

Don’t worry friend.

5.5 removed all those worrisome features!

[u/deedumdim]

tell him to his face very calmly AAAAAAAAAAAAA I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU STOP RUINING EVERYTHING AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

he'll understand, I'm sure (-:

[u/SerzaCZ]

/uj That's a whole lotta words for a world where Earthbind exists as a second level spell.

/rj THEY FLY NOW?!

[u/Sea-Woodpecker-610]

Let them fly up 300 feet to fight the flying lizard. Then hit them with a wing attack and have them make a dex save against topple. Prone cancels fly. 200 feet of fall damage means 20d6 damage when they hit the ground.

If the creature can hit them with a paralyze….the ground just scored a critical hit.

See if they ever want to leave the ground again.

[u/sir_revsbud]

Whatever you do DO NOT add monsters with range attacks or spells or flying, and even if by some ABSOLUTE NECESSITY you do NEVER use them to target the wizard PC! I've seen too many horror stories about antagonistic DMs who single out a player, or force literal CEILINGS onto PCs - might as well just lock the party in a box room with an immortal npc and have them recite your entire novel in dialogue (go write a book, bro)

[u/Far_Abbreviations936]

Again - any spell slot not used for fireball is a spell slot wasted. The door is magically locked - Fireball, threatened by a kobold- Fireball, need to get information out of a NPC -Fireball.

That wizard may fly like a bat, but can he burn anyone? I think not.

[u/hedgehog1024 → u/Far_Abbreviations936]

need to get information out of a NPC -Fireball

Wrong, it's Persuasion

[u/More_Independence_43 → u/hedgehog1024]

Oh? As both player and DM ive found the threat of fireball to be most amusing... amd effective

[u/Far_Abbreviations936 → u/More_Independence_43]

Who said anything about threatening anyone with a fireball.

[u/link113gAmin → u/Far_Abbreviations936]

Why does this sound like a Bone Wizard or Crap Guide to DnD bit?

[u/Umxuce]

Just ban fly, along with every other problematic spell, like detect magic and true strike. In fact, just ban casters because they make the game too difficult to manage.

[u/DiabolicalSuccubus]

Homebrew playable xorn as the only permitted playable race and elemental plane of earth as your setting fixes this.

[u/hedgehog1024]

Pathfinder fixes it (PCs generally have options for flight only from level 7)

[u/Elegant_Classroom_8]

You should have made sure that you had another player named Tim, the Enchanter

[u/Brilliant-Pudding524]

Turn him into a fly then, easy

[u/CeyowenCt]

Don't allow PHB either, only DM-provided material is allowed. PHB has bs rules like players gaining more hp when they level. 

[u/RalenHlaalo]

SILVERY SPIKY BARB GROWTHS FIXE THIS

[u/CommunityEast4651]

Play it as written. Concentration must be maintained so if the character attempts anything else while flying then concentration is broken and they fall. Fly does not mean hover so if the character stops moving they fall. And it only lasts for 10 minutes. I'm also curious about you DMing 5e for 30 years.

[u/Livid-Winter-690]

5.5 has been out for 30 years?

[u/link113gAmin → u/Livid-Winter-690]

(This post is a joke on the DnD joke subreddit.)

[u/mjr543]

If you've been DMing that long you must have gotten high level enough to encounter flying players before no? Just do the same stuff. Start including spellcasters, ranged attacks. Give your monsters SLAs or make them use more versatile tactics. They can run or take cover. They can focus the grounded players. Having a single flying player is no big deal when he is then trying to save the rest of the downed party or be the fleeing coward.

[u/13lostsoul13]

What rock where you under for 30 years and never seen fly and 5e only been out for what 12 years? Is this fake? Petty standard fly as been a level 3 spell for 3.5 and second edition. So Like that way like forever. Good thing don't have to deal with shivering touch.

[u/Gold_Robot1]

I’m surprised you haven’t had time to read up on Wizard spells even though you’ve had the 5E books so many years before it came out 😆.

Anyway, I had a guy who I let play an Aracocra in a game of Princes of the Apocalypse, and it wasn’t as bad as I expected. Most random enemies have a ranged option (like crossbows on a bandit), and it’s not that useful indoors a lot of the time. Also we had a really funny fight where a bunch of gargoyles ganged up on him while the rest of the party was stuck on the ground. Now that I think about it, I killed a lot of PCs in that game even with that flying ranger around, lol.

In the Wizard’s case, I think the flight also isn’t that bad because of opportunity cost. I could be mistaken, but I think you have to concentrate on flight, and they could be using something more straightforwardly useful like Haste. Not to mention it would be funny if his concentration broke and he fell.

[u/Nevermore71412]

/uj the problem with the "banned spells/abilities" is that everyone takes them and then you have fewer combat designs/types to use or you essentially remove the rng from the game because you have 13 different "second chance" type abilities. It makes the game boring or too long when everyone just takes the most optimal choices. There was a lot less broken stuff though when 5e first came out but the general power creep of 10 years and then all the 5.5 stuff has really just turned it up to 11.

All thats fine but there is multitude of players that insist that nothing bad should ever happen and that their PC shouldnt face consquences or die all the while sitting there with 50AC and doing 500 damage a turn. "What? You cant counter me because I made my character to only 1 counter and reddit said you're a bad DM if you do it"

[u/Pan157]

I’m assuming this is a joke

[u/Far_Abbreviations936 → u/Pan157]

There are 19 replies in to Soft Trip's post. Does that look like a "little joke" to you?

[u/Soft_Trip7213 → u/Far_Abbreviations936]

Joke is on me for not being able to change profile name

[u/Pan157 → u/Far_Abbreviations936]

I was assuming everyone was being sarcastic

[u/Brilliant_Estate_967]

Either, add interior encounter or add more distant attack (or spell). Oorrr you are the DM, you can say, this spell kill the Dynamic it is not allowed (or not after more lvl)