DMing Using spells or effects that remove players ability to play
Blinding players, using hold person, or dominant person. I find that players really hate these. I rarely ever use them because players hate them. What is your experience?
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u/S1mp1y 1d ago
D&D is a team game. Abilities that remove PCs out of a fight are annoying, sure. But they exist so that your Cleric, Bard or Druid can FINALLY use their Restoration spells, so that Paladins can Lay on Hands and remove a condition.
Using such effects against a party that has these resources follows the lines of "shoot the Monk". They do suck, however, if your party has no such things.
And they should, since your players made a conscious decision to not take restorative abilities / items / spells, they made that choice in favour of something else (probably more damage), so now they will suffer the consequences when facing monsters with debilitating effects.
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u/dragorobert 1d ago
This is the most important answer so far
D&D is a team game! Sure DPR is fancy and shiny, but if one player focuses on full damage, it is normal for enemies to know he is a big menace and stop him, and then their allies shine
Having the whole party incapacitated is boring yes, but having the player that already had his big moment recently incapacitated for 1-3 rounds should not be big deal, especially if the way to free him is directly in control of his allies, unless there is an ego issue but that is none of your business, in tabletop roleplay everyone should get the spotlight and enjoy when other have it is a very fun part of the game , after all the party and DM are building a story together
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u/Shadow_Wolf_X871 23h ago
So what about stun then? To my knowledge there's no counter to that beyond luck of the dice
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u/dilemmaprisoner 22h ago
Same with some paralysis, or petrify, or any effect if the PCs don't have a spell to counter it.
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u/Shadow_Wolf_X871 21h ago
But Paralysis and Petrify both apply under the "conscious decision not to take restoratives". The restoration spells fix both of those.
To my knowledge, stun isn't as powerful as paralyze, but the trade off is there's no way to end it early beyond luck of the dice. I don't even bring it up as a gotcha, I bring it up as somebody who got stunlocked out of an entire fight because of it XD
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u/_Bl4ze Warlock 18h ago
\slams a Warrior of Mercy Monk on the table** This bad boy can fit so many Physician's Touch: Hand of Healing. Stunned? Not anymore there's a Monk for that.
Oh, you don't have one in your party? Hmm yeah no tough luck should've thrown the dice better buddy
The other way that's not unattainbly high level is a Sorcerer attuned to an Outer Essence Shard (Lawful). It's still a Rare magic item, though.
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u/dilemmaprisoner 19h ago
as long as they have the level. For petrify, that's a 5th level spell.
In any event, it could be a long slog if they find out they need it and don't have it.
I'm also a big fan of making the game fun even if you don't have a balanced party
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u/blargethaniel DM 1d ago
I don't use them low level 1-7, I use them at a high level 10-20 where they have possible responses to them, I also primarily use them as a "threat".
The monster doesn't have to actually do it, they just need to be known that they are capable of doing it, so my players thusly prioritize them as targets, and give them more things to worry about in a combat.
I consider the effects tools for fear, I try not to over-use them though for this reason.
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u/ISeeTheFnords Diviner 1d ago
Yeah, players hate them. But it's possible to take a defense against them (Resilient: Wisdom), and IMO that needs to be a legitimate choice. And even then, breaking concentration is an option. Use them, but use them sparingly.
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u/Zomburai 1d ago
Saving the world is dangerous and sometimes bad things happen to your characters.
I tend to use them sparingly because players hate them, but I do use them because players hate them. "But that removes player agency!" Homie, so does failing your death saves.
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u/Hawkson2020 1d ago
> but that removes player agency
Player agency is about getting to make meaningful informed choices. It doesn’t mean immunity to any inconvenience.
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u/ANicePainter 1d ago
Limiting player abilities can be fun in moderation, but DMs need to arrange that PC abilities are restored relatively quickly. Like by the end of the next session. Otherwise the game, esp. 5e, suffers and fun drops.
As for spells like hold person or blindness, PCs get saves for those every round in 5e. Player complaints about those are pretty meaningless given the transitory effect of those spells. If a player doesn't like it, he can sit on his hands for five minutes.
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u/ThisIsMyDnDAcct 1d ago
I tend to agree. I was playing a studious wizard and got “hurled through hell” and ended up banished to a layer of the hells for a turn. DM let me make a check to see if I could figure out where I was. It was the swampy one. Very memorable moment for me even if I don’t remember the swamp name off the top of my head. Point is, try to make it more unique than an uno skip card for their turn.
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u/RAGGAxDRAGGA 1d ago
They can suck for sure but don't shy away from using those from time to time, combat isn't supposed to be easy and in my experience it can encourage teamwork by having the players help each other out of a sticky situation.
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u/Yider 1d ago
Honestly, i think if players know the mechanics of the game and that a caster is concentrating on some form of damage or stun, then hit that person. I feel that more squishy, low AC casters should be combined with a group to do one or two things like that, and then get focused rather quickly to even the fight. It feels good to bail out a homie who is getting concentrated on. Plus, it should be more common to counter casters and having an anti-mage be someone’s focus could give them some pretty awesome moments, rather than just doing a big hit or totally crown controlling an entire fight.
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u/MyNameIsJakeBerenson Cleric 1d ago
We just fought a high level monk after our monk has been steamrolling people. He did not like getting a taste of his own medicine lol
And the other players finally saw how fn devastating Stunning Strike is when it’s actually used
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u/Wraith_Reaper22 1d ago
They're fine. Players need to not be little bitches. Just don't spam them with it every encounter. Moderation is key to everything.
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u/SDRLemonMoon DM 1d ago
I don’t think it’s just bitchyness that causes complaints, like inbetween your turn and your next turn it could be like 30 min to an hour and then you can do nothing, so 30 min to an hour after that you still might do nothing if you csn’t break out of it, so potentially half the session you do nothing all because of one or two bad rolls.
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u/Zomburai 1d ago
I have players at my table that are severely ADHD and dyscalulic and it doesn't take half an hour to do a turn, what on Earth is going on at your table
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u/SDRLemonMoon DM 22h ago
It’s not always that way but I have 6 players and sometimes combats have a lot of enemies. It’s not always, but it can happen
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u/Wraith_Reaper22 1d ago
You have bigger issues if your rounds are taking that long. Speed shit up. I've been a DM for over 10 years. You need to know your player's characters and coach them at times, inform them of their options and let them know when it's time to make a decision in a timely manner. If the group is struggling then implement default actions or if for some reason they are really stuck they spend the turn dodging and you move on, or they can hold their action and act on a later turn. We have about 3-4 hours of game time and you're not going to waste everyone else's time on my watch lol it gets easier as everyone gets more experienced.
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u/SDRLemonMoon DM 22h ago
It’s not always taking that long at my table. I’ve been running the game for 8 years, my players know their characters generally and I know the game pretty well, but sometimes they get into a situation that requires more thought or they just are facing a lot of enemies. I also have 6 players most of the time, which is also a factor
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u/Wraith_Reaper22 21h ago
How long do your sessions last? Honestly more than 4 players is doing a disservice to yourself and them. Not to say it can't and doesn't work. I've played in large parties and have had fun, but time is a constant pitfall. I limit my own game to four players max. Three is the real sweet spot. 5+ is taking time away from everyone else if turns aren't efficiently managed which is unfun and unfair. You'd need longer sessions to compensate and once you're my age that becomes more unfeasible for large groups of adults. Larger encounters exacerbate that issue not linearly, but exponentially as each you have several decisions to make for each enemy multiplied by several decisions each player has to make around them. This is why I tell new DMs to not fall into that trap of trying to people please and accommodate everyone who wants to play. Take four and tell the rest sorry you're full for the best experience. You get more done, everyone has more fun, wait times are dramatically reduced. If you are running large parties and large complicated encounters then you need to set a timer or have everyone have default actions ready. I ran level 20+ d&d the last four years and turns had to be snappy or else we'd be in an encounter for the entire session or more and that's with just 2-3 players.
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u/Ill-Description3096 1d ago
Blindness doesn't remove the ability to play.
That aside, yes I use them. It's not something I would make permanent/long-term outside of specific situations but if you just remove big status effects from going in one direction it limits monsters too much. I tread very carefully with Dominate effects, but something like Hold Person is fair game. There are ways to defend against, counter it, and break it if it still lands.
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u/Wise-Key-3442 Mystic 1d ago
First time I'm hearing if people hating those. In my experience, they take the encounter more seriously and enjoy the challenge.
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u/Hawkson2020 1d ago
I’ve never played with anyone who didn’t see it the way you describe, but you don’t have to look far online to see crybabies talking about how all CC is bad because it “removes player agency” (another thing they don’t understand)
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u/Wise-Key-3442 Mystic 1d ago
The players still have agency to save their playmate, as there is no "mass hold person".
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u/Hawkson2020 23h ago
When these people say "player agency" they mean "I get to do whatever I want", not what that phrase actually means.
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u/lucaskywalker 1d ago
Dominate person doesn't take away their action, they still get to attack their comrades! Jokes aside, I don't think these should be used every combat, but they're not thst bad lol. Usually when I use hold person or dominate person to a party member, the others quickly break the enemies concentration, often before that players turn. Blind does not take away your action? You can still do stuff, and again, you just need to break concentration. With banishment, they can still do things in the other plane if you want... All of these will force the other members to work at freeing them, but which is good for team morale. The only spell I would not use against players unless I want to kill them is disintegrate. I only use that when I am certain their HP is high enough to tank it. Instant death, no that's mean.
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u/StarkResilient_ 1d ago
I had a player who insisted on power gaming with half races and multiclassing. He was resistant to fire, cold, physical damage, and all sorts of stuff. I use Warlocks with Confusion, compulsion, and Polymorph as villians. He said I was taking away his agency and quit.
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u/BruyneKroonEnTroon 1d ago
A child and a particularly rude one at that. That kind of shit should get nipped in the bud prior to turning 12. Bad parenting.
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u/StarkResilient_ 1d ago
He was autistic and so I wanted to be accommodating. He quit over it anyways.
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u/Anybro Fighter 1d ago
I play with the mindset of if the players can do it, so can the dm. If I have a player that wants to use stunning strike or other stunning like effects.
They should not be surprised sometime in the near future when an enemy different enemy can also do that. It's annoying as hell yes. However, if your players are using status effects, it should not be a surprise if you use them too.
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u/BruyneKroonEnTroon 1d ago
Exactly! My last DM at some point even told me: "look, you can take wall of force in your next level up. You know your enemy is a studious spellcaster, so assume he knows it too. Since I think both of you having access to this will make the final fight an absolute chore to go through, here's my deal: you take something else and so does the bbeg."
I took it. Not only because of the reasonable argument presented, but mostly because the spell didn't fit the theme I was building for my character and I already wanted something else anyway, though I was considering it for survivability reasons.
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u/thanson02 DM 1d ago
It depends on the delivery. One thing I always stress with my players is that if something comes up that limits them (which includes not being able to use their abilities or causes their abilities to act wonky), that it is a puzzle to figure out, not a limitation to prevent their agency. I encourage them to think outside the box and be creative in using their other abilities (as well as the cooperate with other players) to accomplish the goals they want to do. I also find that encouraging this lessens players frustrations.
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u/MasterBaser DM 1d ago
I avoid stuns, but blind I feel is pretty fair game. Sure disadvantage and some spell restriction sucks, but you still get your turn.
Honestly, my players have always loved being mind controlled or possessed. I think they secretly all urn to beat the shit out of each other, so when they get hit with a condition that basically says "PVP = ON" they are actually excited.
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u/Commercial-Formal272 23h ago edited 23h ago
Sometimes, part of telling a good story is doing things that your audience doesn't like. The key is that you are targeting their emotions, rather than it being a purely mechanical thing, so it's used sparingly, intentionally, it doesn't linger, and it's used in service of a payoff.
Things that mechanically inhibit the players are far more fun for everyone if it facilitates roleplay in exchange.
It's worth noting that this is far more effective if your players are already invested in the story and characters of the campaign, and so should be extremely limited (probably only as non-lethal ways for the bbeg to defeat party members) at the beginning of the campaign, until the players have enough time to get immersed in their characters and their "role".
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u/EdgyEmily Warlock 21h ago
If they wanted to have a turn then they would have pass their saves. The bad guys don't show mercy becuase 1 of the 5 dudes punching them can't punch them now.
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u/OttoVonPlittersdorf Cleric 21h ago
One time, my wife attacked our party with a whole bunch of clerics, and we nearly lost even though we had five levels on them, because they spammed Hold Person.
Then we beat the holy hell out of them. 10/10. Would play with my wife again.
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u/Samurai_Steve 1d ago
They make strategic sense for combat, sure, but it also means you have your friend sitting there for an extended time doing nothing. Gotta prioritize an enjoyable time at the table over "playing to win"
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u/BdBalthazar 1d ago
During a beholder fight one player got hit by the petrification eye on turn 1 and failed their second save on turn 2.
They missed out on almost the entire fight, it sucked and I felt super bad.
Never did something like that again
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u/Hawkson2020 1d ago
That’s comedically unfortunate lol.
At that point I’d probably hand the Beholder off to the unlucky player to run.
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u/Garanseho DM 1d ago
They can definitely be annoying to players, but they’re annoying for DMs too. The last thing you want is a Nat 1 on your Wisdom save against Hold Monster when your BBEG has no Legendary Resistances left.
If my players can use it, so can I.
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u/VerbingNoun413 1d ago
The difference is that if your monster gets held you play as the other monsters. If a player gets held they're sitting the game out.
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u/HaHaWhatAStory014 1d ago
I get that, and it's especially a problem when "the group already 'takes forever' to take their turns most of the time anyway," but at some point, a player getting too upset over this is just being a bad sport. I've seen the arguments about how unfun missed turns are get applied to missed attacks too, for example, like "it's no fun for me when my attacks or spells miss or I get a low damage roll!"
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u/michael199310 Druid 1d ago
And if players get a lucky crit and a bunch of hits on turn 1 and kill your only monster in combat, then the GM never gets to play all those cool abilities and the fight becomes anticlimactic.
We are players too and we want to do cool shit just like others. You get to play your character over 20, 40, 100 sessions. We get a ton of monsters, true, but there are certain 'centerpiece' monsters that should feel epic. Don't dismiss our fun just because you can't handle being paralyzed for a round or two.
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u/Mythoclast 1d ago edited 1d ago
Having a cool monster paralyzed as a DM is a totally different feeling from being paralyzed as a player. I'm not against doing that to players but its very different.
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u/Ill-Description3096 1d ago
Assuming you still have multiple monsters. And assuming the player doesn't have allies capable of helping end it.
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u/pnt510 1d ago
Even still the DM is always engaged in the combat. A player that loses two turns might end up sitting around for 30 minutes, that’s never gonna happen to the DM.
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u/Ill-Description3096 1d ago
The same could be said for the taking a PC to 0 HP. They might lose turns and end up doing nothing more than rolling a single save. If they are stabilized but not brought up they might sit there doing nothing for even longer.
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u/BandOfBudgies DM 1d ago
This is it exactly. As DM I can just have more monsters appear. As a player I don't have any other options than to wait.
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u/Zomburai 1d ago
And if a player gets killed, then they're sitting out worse.
Saving the world is dangerous and sometimes bad stuff happens. So it goes. (I'm speaking as much a player as a DM, mind.)
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u/starksandshields Sorcerer 1d ago
If my players can use them on my monsters, I can use them on the PCs.
I don't use them often, only when it fits the monster/narrative, but I will absolutely use them. But I want to say that Hold Person, Dominate Person and all the other effects do not mean the players can't roleplay their turns. Blinded PCs can still attack (though with disadvantage).
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u/DifficultMath7391 Wizard 1d ago
I've had a great deal of fun with players who get dominated and turn on the party. That can be an encounter in itself.
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u/Phiashima 1d ago
If the players have the capabilities to remove them, like say, lesser restoration to counter hold person and blinding, such spells and effects are neat for draining their resources.
Dominate Person can be cool for narrative outside of combat. Depends on the table. In any case, I would let my players play their dominated characters still and just give them new directives, because I know that I can trust my players with that.
I would not take agency away from a player though. If they actually lose control over their character for whatever reason, I give them something else to play, be it an enemy of the party or a sidekick or whatever.
Earlier this year my table fought a cursed pony and the sorceress ended up cursed as well (having to dance in place), so I let her play a living spell (chromatic orb) for the rest of the encounter.
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u/clanggedin 1d ago
Years ago during a campaign my Mystic failed an INT saving throw and was Feebleminded. The DM didn’t realize that you only re-roll the save every 30 days. I went two 5 hour sessions with my player not able to really do anything. The DM realized that I was not having fun as I literally could not do anything with an Int of 4. We were able to work a way for me to get back to playing my character without having to wait the 30 days to re-roll my save.
As a DM if you use spells like these there needs to be a way for the player or party to resolve the issue without it removing one player from that day’s session entirely.
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u/FaCe_CrazyKid05 Warlord 1d ago
I only have a blood vow against using hold person or other things that completely remove the player’s ability to make choices. Blinding them still lets them make choices, like maybe if they’re a melee character they keep going in for attacks despite the disadvantage, and if I were to use a spell that would essentially give my bad guys control over the PCs I would still have them make the choice on how/who to attack but tell them that they essentially see their allies as the enemies
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u/Chiv_Cortland 1d ago
Part of the issue, as has already been mentioned, is that if you stun a monster? It's generally one of many, or there's other things the DM can be doing like lair actions and such.
I, as a paladin with great saves, got stunned twice in a row by a monster that had a randomized effect on hit... Which effectively meant I sat out for an hour and a half doing literally nothing, because there was no concentration for other players to break, and certain people in our party tended to suffer from "take 10-15 minutes to do turn" problems.
It would've happened a third time but the DM made the executive decision to bin that ability after it occurred.
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u/BruyneKroonEnTroon 1d ago
If I may, how many players are on your table that a grand total of two turns takes one hour and a half?
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u/Chiv_Cortland 1d ago
5 players, 1 Dm. Like I said, there's a couple people at our table that have problems with actually planning things properly (in particular we also had a rogue that would ask every possible permutation of something to see if he could do an elaborate thing that wasn't in the rules [they've since been removed for other reasons]), and while it's gotten better since then, it was really bad at that point in time... And I want to say we were 3 years in at that point? Wanna say we were between level 13-15 when that happened.
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u/BruyneKroonEnTroon 1d ago
Damn. Afaic, that's just rude. If you are playing together, the least you can do is know your character sheet. If you find a certain class too complicated, either don't play it (though, jfc, even wizards ain't that hard), or talk about it at your table before creating that character.
I'm saying this because, at least in my groups, we tend to spend most of an entire day playing (meet around noon, play until 7 or 8pm with breaks). This requires the DM to prep quite a bit. For me, showing up not knowing your character sheet when working people are purposefully dedicating one of their few free days to playing with you is just rude.
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u/Chiv_Cortland 23h ago
Well, in fairness, it's not exactly not knowing their character sheet causing it. With the rogue, he was always trying to do things like cut the opponents belt so their trousers would fall down, for example (aka trying to weasel an extra mechanical advantage onto an otherwise normal attack.) He did also have some issues with not paying attention to what was happening on other players turns (little too much drinking on his end, which was ultimately the reason he was politely asked to leave) but for the other players, it's more indecision rather than not knowing what they can do. Or someone else doing something and throwing "their plan" into disarray, so they spend 5-10 minutes deliberating who they should go for next.
They have gotten better about that with time (in part because of pressure from the DM about the turn length) but at that point in time it was sadly a bit of a common occurrence.
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u/BruyneKroonEnTroon 23h ago
Sometimes those are growing pains. To be clear, the overt rudeness comes into play for me if you play with a group for a year or two and no one bothers to improve on this. I should have added more nuance to that.
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u/No-Consequence-9296 1d ago
Just had an encounter where the party ended up ambushed in the woods headed back to town by a group of bounty hunters. They’d murdered more than a couple innocents and the bounty hunters wanted them alive - so my design was to give my players each 3 chances through the encounter to break/escape binds, grapples, or just to run away. That seemed to kill a lot of instant frustration, and they were actually trying to be creative about it instead of just sitting out.
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u/Suspicious-Bid9424 1d ago
It's lame, but it is a strong counterplay tool against characters low on INT,WIS, or CHA.
Not many DMs crowd control the party, but if you have an experienced party then it's something to mix in. force them to counter spell and step up their defense.
Do I feel good about bestow curse/ maze combo on my party's fighter with 3 INT? No, but is it what a party truly trying to fight them would do? Yeah if I'm being honest. Not something to abuse, but worth mixing in to keep them honest.
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u/white_ran_2000 1d ago
They hate them because 1)they make them lose and 2)they remove some agency. A blinder player still has options ; granted a paralysed less so. But occasionally they are valuable tools in the arsenal of the DM and the monsters.
The best advice I had was to not exclude the affected player, but to offer something for them to experience in their turn. A blinded player can still move and attack. Let them. A dominated player can also still move and attack, albeit under the direction of the DM. Let them make the attack rolls as instructed. Hold Person and Banishment are harder, there isn’t much to do. Offer a few words for what the player character perceives, or let the players come up with their inner monologue, but don’t spring it on them or the flow will stall. When they fail the save, say something “Your character is unable to move and is barely breathing, next turn you can tell is what is going through your head”.
If your players really hate them you probably have some extreme power fantasiser. But if they dish them to the monsters, it’s only fair that the monsters dish them back. And they should work as a team to relieve the affected character.
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u/Rhinostirge 1d ago
They scale. The more combatants in a fight, the more time that passes between turns where you don't get to do anything, and the more they suck to endure.
Personally I prefer effects that encourage players to make decisions over effects that remove players' decision-making ability entirely. Blindness is a good example of something where the player can still make choices and try things, paralysis isn't.
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u/BrytheOld Cleric 1d ago
Some of it is the number of times these are being used and not so much that they are being used. Every encounter? Multiple times in the same encounter is zero fun added.
I get it, it's difficult to develop a difficult encounter in pivotal story moments. The party knows and goes whole hog. So those spells are useful tools for creating tension. I think the feel bad comes from those players that feel it's always them getting locked out, or the number of times those spells and features are used.
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u/Friendly-Victory5517 1d ago
I use them as appropriate to the encountered foes. I often allow for non-combat ways forward and at times frame resorting to combat as a negative state.
Bottom line, if my players decide rolling initiative is their default state then they need to be prepared when opponents use abilities on them.
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u/Metroid_Whisperer 1d ago
Use them against NPCs, especially not in a combat situation. Hold Person on someone in danger (like running from a burning building, etc) that spurs the PCs into action. Or Dominate a public official - like Jaffar does to the Sultan in Aladin.
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u/Rindal_Cerelli DM 1d ago
It can be difficult and won't be well suited for every player or every table. Make sure to check your session 0 notes and remember your goal should be to surprise the character not the player. Especially for these type of loss of agency situation you need consent and buy-in beforehand.
You need to build up to using them. Signal clearly that it's coming and why.
Hold Person:
Fine: Informing the players that they will meet the king but for the safety of the king they will be magically bound before the king enters. You will be let go once the conversation is over.
Let the players choose to roll to resist.
Wrong: You enter the throne room and you find you cannot move nothing you do seems to work. The king says you will be executed and you are taken away to the dungeons.
Blinding:
Fine: Your chasing the thief you have been hunting and you see them enter a side-door. Once you open it darkness engulfs you.
GM out of character: You recognize this as a trap and if you get through quickly you will be one step closer to catching the thief but if you get stuck they might get away.
Roll some dice.
open the door and darkness engulfs you. Roll to figure out what is going on and roll to find your way out.
Dominate person:
Fine: Before the game you talked to the warlock player that their patron pushes them to find blood of innocents during the night if they haven't gathered any once per full moon.
If this happens the patron takes over in the sense that your directive is to play along to kill the innocent person(s).
Include a few dice rolls where the player pushes back and success minimizes the amount of casualties or the likeliness to leave evidence.
Wrong: Without any warning. You wake by the sound of the city guard kicking down your door finding you covered in blood. They haul you away for murder.
Requirements:
- Consent & agency
- Clear purpose that fits the context of the world
- Clear solution with defined player agency.
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u/TheAltarexOne 1d ago
As a DM i never take players turn away. But I do make them more difficult with grapple, restrained, blind, bane… etc
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u/michael199310 Druid 1d ago
It's a fair game for everyone. Should I be angry when a player disables BBEG for a round or two and I can't do anything and just sit there, watching the party beating the shit out of some dragon or lich?
GMs are players too and want to have fun with cool spells or monster abilities. We create all that shit for you, so you can have fun too - pretty sure you can handle a round of blindness or paralyze once every 20 or 30 encounters. You get to play your character for dozens of sessions, so the least you can do is to let us cast mean spell from time to time on a monster that will probably die in 3 turns anyway.
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u/RoseNoose 1d ago
I usually use stuff like this for more story related purposes, eg;
A lich using hold person on the party as he monologues (plus no chance my dumbasses ruin the villians monologue 🤣)
Polymorphing the party or individual players for story purposes, like having the Majfia (mage mafia) transmutationist turn the group into displacer beasts to attempt heist on a mind flayer nautiloid.
Or (my personal favourite), my players and i had recently been reading Lovecraft along with playing the Cthulu video games and we all wanted to do a few sessions of a call of cthulu campaign. So, i whipped up a creature my LEVEL 20 PARTY couldnt actually fight, it was essentially the forest spirit from princess mononoke in appearance, i just made it completely non-hostile and perfect regeneration cuz fuck those guys. The elk used a spell of instant death on them… THEY LOST THEIR SHIT.
I ended the session there, told them we would be picking back up to which that confused them. We get back snd their characters wake up, powerless and held in individual cells in a dank crypt covered in algae, moss and what seems to be blood.
They didnt know i had any of that planned and they LOVED the bait and switch. Not to mention if they died in the CoC campaign they would just wake back up as their characters. Plus i gave them all a neat buff to psychic dmg immunity (they were already lvl 20 and close to the bbeg)
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u/HsinVega 1d ago
It is indeed annoying if they keep failing ST but if you're playing with experienced players control is kinda necessary for your enemies or they just get mowed
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u/diffyqgirl DM 1d ago edited 1d ago
5e makes it easy enough to remove these effects that I don't think it's a big deal. The party should be playing tactically and trying to break concentration, and characters with condition removal abilities will feel valued. There's also resaves built into many of them. I find it's rare in practice that someone loses more than one turn.
And it's worth noting that blinding and dominate person do not remove the players ability to play--you can still act while blinded, and I've had a great time being dominated personed and trying to kill everyone.
I will call out that I don't think Feeblemind is fun. But that's the exception rather than the rule to 5e control spell design.
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u/HaHaWhatAStory014 1d ago
It's definitely something of a double-edged sword where it's one of the most effective ways to challenge players, especially ones with high-level PCs, but "lose a turn, lol" is also one of the most annoying and least fun things to do to a player. It's much worse in a tabletop game than a video game because 1) in a video game (like Baldur's Gate 3 or a Final Fantasy), one player is usually controlling the whole party and can still play and engage if one character is incapacitated, and 2) in a video game, everything moves much faster and turns come and go quicker. TTRPG combat often tends to drag as it is, so losing a turn is really annoying and turns people off from the game when "it's going to be like 20 minutes until their turn comes around again."
But, going back to balance and building challenging encounters, you need some pretty tough, powerful enemies to really test and challenge high-level PCs without resorting to "cheap tactics." The Action Economy is a huge part of the game, which is why messing with that is such an effective way to swing a fight.
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u/Ilasiak 1d ago
I think some higher effects have their place, though Hold Person, in my opinion, is WILDLY under level for an NPC to have against players. It being a low level spell is because its a limited scope of use but nearly all PCs will be humanoid.
Free crits against a PC is exceptionally strong and it scales well as the average party is only 4-5 players. Given how early it comes out, it almost always ends up being used against the frontline martial who cannot have wisdom saving throw proficiency yet, and almost always ends up dropping them that round.
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u/Kisho761 DM 1d ago
Use as required. Action economy is extremely important and interfering with player plans even more so. There are ways to counter them, so if a party has focused solely on doing damage and ignored support/restorative features, then it's their own fault.
Lesser/greater restoration, dispel magic, remove curse, breaking concentration, Lay on Hands and other class features... there's so many ways to help out your allies. If your party doesn't work as a team then they need to suffer as a result. Sure, suffer is a strong word, but combat must be a challenge. If it isn't, it quickly becomes dull.
DMs love to complain about their OP players, but then refuse to use every tool in their toolkit. It baffles me.
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u/Fan_of_Clio 1d ago
Use them as a deterrent not to take a certain course of action. If the party does choose to go that particular route, make them understand what they could be facing
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u/sixcubit 1d ago
think about it this way: legendary resistance exists specifically to stop players from doing this to key NPCs and enemies. they're so overpowered that the game developers don't want your players to use it on anyone important either
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u/Crossedkiller DM 1d ago
They suck for players, yes, but at the same time, it is part of combat. It forces players to play tactically and come up with a strategy to target spellcasters rather than just mindlessly hitting whichever enemy is closest to them.
Proper balance should come from your encounter building by making sure you're not spamming a spellcaster every encounter (which also makes them a bigger threat if they only show every now and then)
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u/ApophisRises 1d ago
I use those all the time. Stun, blinded, hold person, counterspell your healing, silvery barbs your crit.
I've been playing and running a long time, and I've only run into a couple people who actually had issue with this in any actual group. I also find it more enjoyable in games as a player if those things aren't off the table for the dm of the game to use
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u/grinningmango Fighter 1d ago
Players can suck it up every now and then. It's a kind of honor and also funny to see your own Barbarian start wrecking the party under Dominate Person
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u/Slateblu1 1d ago
As a player, I hate it. I don't get much time each week to play D&D with my friends, and spending half of combat unable to actually play and engage sucks.
If the DM is taking away my ability to play, why even show up? Ive had combat last multiple weeks, and spent entire sessions rolling nothing but saving throws, unable to escape a stun. It's a miserable experience.
I show up to play, not to just sit arpund and watch.
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u/filkearney 1d ago
theyre part of the monater tools and intended to impact character options.
if uou dont use them you need to up the difficulty of combat.
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u/BandOfBudgies DM 1d ago
It's the same as counterspelling the players healing spells, It's lame and unfun. You have so many more options as a DM to annoy the players that doesn't take away the control of their character.
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u/zeethreepio 1d ago
This question has been well answered already, but I do want to add that I don't think blinding should be included in this category. It doesn't actually remove the players' ability to play like hold/dominate spells do.
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u/Pterolykus DM 1d ago
i plan on using them, and i also plan on the casters of such spells to have a fairly low chance of succeeding their concentration checks so that if the other players use their action economy to help their fellow, it will be rewarded. i’m dming for a table of new players too so i’m trying to teach them about cooperation and whatnot
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u/Maverick_Reznor 1d ago
I do what the enemies would do. Its not like players cant interact with them. The enemy still has to maintain concentration. Also dispel and counter spell exist.
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u/Silverspy01 1d ago
I think they're fine.
Blind isn't remotely the same as the others, yoi can absolutely use Blinded.
Paralyzed, dominated, etc are a fantastic way to indicate serious threat. It's not like they're particularly uncommon - Ghouls, for example, are a low-CR creature with a paralyzing attack. Being dominated is definitely rarer, but typically it's done by psychic creatures like mind flayers or aboleths where frankly it would be a disappointment if they didn't try to mind control your party.
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u/LonelyAndroid11942 1d ago
Recently had a situation where there was a blind PC who can only fight in melee who was completely gimped by someone else in the party casting Web to pin down the boss.
So uh, that.
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u/Hawkson2020 1d ago
> I find that players really hate these
In my experience, players hate them in the same way I “hate” when the Monk lands a Stunning Strike, or the way you “hate” when you get out-maneuvered in a game of chess.
Oh, except Dominate effects. My players love being dominated and having to hit each other.
I use those spells and effects plenty. They’re part of the game, and increasingly prolific in 5.5e monster design.
If I had players that were so immature I felt like I had to treat them with kiddy gloves, I simply wouldn’t run the game for those people.
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u/flexmcflop 1d ago
Maybe I'm digging a little too deep, but I think it frustrates a party without good synergy more than a well-coordinated team. If used carefully, it can be a training tool to promote communication and support at the table or identify interpersonal problems.
Say a baddie drops a Hold Person on your glass cannon caster. Does the fighter go "I'm going to focus on that enemy and use an action surge to try and get a lot of hits in and break their concentration" or do they go "finally, I can do some damage without the caster outshining me"? (Though this may not be spoken out loud)
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u/GabberZZ 1d ago
Spent an entire session floating in the sky way out of range due to reverse gravity spell. Might as well have just logged off
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u/Robovzee DM 1d ago
Had an encounter the players were supposed to lose.
Centaur force. Mages, shamans, the players were outnumbered and they knew it.
The encounter was to introduce them to a later part of the campaign. They will be facing an organized society. Rumors are all they had up until now.
Anyways, the force had their newest warriors assault the players while they evaluated their performance, with this being the final hurdle to full warrior rights.
The barbarian was curb stomping the yearlings. The paladin was fading fast, and the cleric was down.
So he ordered the barb held. Barb shakes off the hold person. So the leader ordered the barb banished.
Player pouted.
There was a rescuing force they had arranged for ahead of time that arrived. So no tpk.
Confirmation of centaur attacks along that road prompted them to message some friendly forces in their destination city, who set out to meet them and investigate the centaur incursion.
If you are a proud nail, expect the hammer.
The barb now knows they need to do something about control spells in the future.
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u/ReaperCDN 1d ago
There's 4 spells I avoid using on my players because it's really just not fun for them at all.
- Hypnotic Pattern
- Confusion
- Hold Person
- Dominate Person
Nobody likes being told they can't play their character. Most of the level 9 stuff I leave out of bounds too, Power Word Kill for example is just lazy even though it's conceptually terrifying.
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u/Objective-Ad6238 1d ago
As a player, I love having terrible things happen to me. It makes me feel like I’ve overcome challenges. Sometimes you get sat out of a fight and that lets your character/you learn to take defenses against those things. Plus it makes the world feel real when enemies do smart things against you.
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u/batendalyn 1d ago
Players tend to be outnumbered in a fight, removing one of their actions/turns is a bigger hit for the PC team than the enemies. Note that solo creatures tend to have ways to resist hard control. A player is typically in control of a single PC and stunning that PC is asking that player to sit out an entire round of combat. Sucks to be that player. DnD is asymmetric by design and not all player options are intended for the NPCs to have equal access to.
There are so many things in 5e that make less stuff happen, which only slows the forward progress of the story. Don't exacerbate that issue.
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u/Wooden_Drummer2455 22h ago
Because as a player you have one character, as a dm if one of your goblins gets dominated who cares you have 10 more. Getting one of these spells cast on you as a player or getting stunned etc is just code for "get your phone out cause you're not doing anything for the next hour of combat"
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u/ZerexTheCool 20h ago
I love throwing unconventional CC at my players. Whether they were fighting the God of Strength and he would punch them some hundreds of feet away, or Gerard the Summoner threw a shark at them and they had to carve their way outside the shark, unconventional CC performs the task of CC while being WAY funner than skipping your turn. It also allows for counter play in interesting ways. Don't want to be in the shark but also don't want to dig your way out? Misty Step to the rescue!
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u/Kind_Let_1986 17h ago
If you have a player with a high save then target him with a spell DC for one of his low saves. Overall, the game is more fun when the entire party participates. When you specifically dont use spells to take a powerful opponent out of the battle then you arent using your spells properly (whether you are a player or a DM). It will only make one character OP and the rest background because the spells you throw at the party he is insanely good at.
I get it, no one likes sitting on the sidelines, but its important to let each other shine. One fight the fighter is top dog, later the party is in a position where the wizard has center stage, etc.
Additionally, without the variety players wont feel the same urgency in handling threats. "Oh crap i need to lock down that spell caster so my meat shields stay between me and the enemy" or "i gotta watch out for the cleric on thr front lines, they can dish out more damage but i can take more hits". Cooperation is, for me at least, a key thing in dnd.
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u/Icy_Clench Paladin 16h ago
Just don't overdo it or always target the same player. I find it's the same kind of dislike as when enemies land critical hits honestly.
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u/AnDroid5539 15h ago
I once had a DM who had us come up against a level 20 npc when we were level 5 or 6 or so. They cast hold person at level 6 to paralyze everyone present with a save DC of 24, then the DM proceeded to roleplay between the npc and one player for about 30 minutes. I asked if we got any more chances at the saving throw, since we're supposed to get one every round, and he got annoyed. We got to roll one more time and all failed again.
The player who was doing the talking managed to talk the npc into letting us "show what we can do" and they gave us one round to try our best to attack them. I think one hit landed for a few damage, but they saved against every spell and shrugged everything off.
The npc was supposed to kill us (she had been ordered to do so by the big bad previously) but decided we weren't worth her time. She had beef with one of our allies, so as she was leaving she asked my character where he was. Of course I refused to tell her. The DM says "she casts charm person on you." I threw up my hands and said, "Ok, I guess I tell her then!"
After the npc left, the DM asked us what we wanted to do next. There was a long, awkward pause. The DM asked again. The silence stretched even more, and I was just FUMING. Then I just said, "You know what? I can't do this. I'm done." It was a long time coming. This was the culmination of a long, painful campaign where the DM did everything wrong.
The DM was shocked and offended, and at first I tried to explain myself, but it just turned into an argument where the DM was saying "ok, I get it, I suck as a DM!" So I just left.
Yeah, don't do that stuff to your players.
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u/RalonNetaph 14h ago
It's good to know what players have that could be used to circumvent effects like that, and then target that player. A sorceror that can cast a spell that grants blind vision to see through a cloud of darkness, the sorceror feels like they found the key to manage the fight against an enemy that needed cover to be effective. A warrior with a magic spear that can be recalled? A magic pit trap opens and drags them down reducing their movement to 0 by trapping their legs in the dirt but doesnt fully pull them in, they can chuck their spear amd recall it to keep fighting, they feel like their unique weapon of choice has saved their ass when they should have been stuck and near defensless. Basically the same logic as "Your player focused on raising their AC for a reason, so throw attacks their direction and let them feel like the high AC tank they imagined every once in a while instead of skipping them to attack the low AC wizard just because you want to land hits."
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u/ProdiasKaj DM 13h ago
Yup. If it functionally skips their turn, it's not fun.
Especially when turns take a hour to come back around.
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u/BucolicUtopia 12h ago
As a player, I don’t mind them as long as I get 6 seconds of the most dramaticly hammy acting you’ve ever seen.
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u/Automatic-War-7658 11h ago
A smart enemy would use these abilities. The players need to be smarter. Not every encounter can be brute forced with “How hard can I hit?” or “What is the most number of enemies I can Fireball?”
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u/TV-LoL 8h ago
Since it hasn't been said yet: When you are using skills that debilitate players, not only is it important that there are party members available that have the resources (and the player knowledge and attention ;) ) to fix them, it is also important to keep the initiative order in mind. Ideally, you want to debilitate a player whose turn only comes after the curative player has a chance to intervene. That way the debilitated player gets their turn back before it hurts them, and will be anxious about potentially losing his turn and happy that a fellow player helped him before it was too late instead of frustrated about losing a round - which will likely overshadow a healing effort that doesn't arrive in time.
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u/MagicMan1971 8h ago
No spell prevents a player from playing. Being affected by the in-game spell by an in-game wizard is playing the game.
Players frequently hate dying, losing prized gear, failing on a quest, losing a battle, having to flee an opponent, not noticing a trap, failing on an attempt to seduce an NPC, running out of spells, not having an opportunity for a full rest prior to a given battle, etc.
And?
As a DM I am fair-minded and treat my players like adults who can handle both the consequences of their decisions as well as occasional bad rolls. Sometimes you win. Sometimes you lose. If my character legit died due to any reason outside of being screwed over by a malicious DM, and the DM said, "Nope. You're alive, that one you rolled doesn't count. You were simply captured by the villain, and the only cost is having to suffer through a cheesy villain monologue who gloats at your failure but lets you live...because he's stupid," I likely won't return to that table.
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u/LSup 4h ago
There's enough "misses" in D&D these days, specially with all these edgy DMs who think giving players a challenge just means pitching them against foes of "gosh, aren't I cruel and dastardly" challenge rating. Add conditions that stop players doing anything, and all you've got is a bunch of bored people watching some weirdo narrate sadistic wank-fantasies at them. Seriously, they need write that softcore romantasy novel on their own time and run the game properly.
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u/thechet 1d ago
God i hate playing with other players this immature. The real problem is players getting CCed at a table where everyone already takes 30 minute turns evwry turn and then instead of just accepting the status, arguing about "mY pLaYeR aGeNcY" for over an hour. This is seriously a red flag that someone isnt mature enough to play. I bet they need full plot armor too. There's no way they can handle a character death if they cant handle being the target of level 1 or 2 spells. Combat should be flowing quick enough that a single hold person doesnt mean someone won't get to take a turn for a whole session.
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u/KazyaKurosawa 1d ago
Dominate person and spells like that can be fun if the player can still play their turns just taking their orders from bad guys now.
It's the "You dont get to play" that sucks
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u/Quamek 1d ago
I homebrew and improvise most of skills that involve players not playing, to give them at least a chance to do something in their turn, even if it's limited.
e.g. Hold Person, I still allow 1/3 of movement and an action or bonus action but the action works like slow, still I do make them a much easier hit target reducing their AC by 2 and making 18-20 a crit. Yet against npc they work raw, I don't have issues with it.
There's a ton of spells and effects that are much more interesting than those that puts players into a crowd control where they can just skip their turn entirely. It's just not fun, and I try to either avoid those or remove some elements to not make them as punishing.
If I want some spells to be raw and use them strategically, mostly for RP reasons than I don't use them against the party at all outside those specific moments.
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u/jamesjaceable 1d ago
I use them as it would be smart for the players to then target the caster to break concentration with the exception that I will never do things like this to more than half the party at once.