Is a Push meta a potential concern? - Unearthed Arcana - Dungeons & Dragons Discussion - D&D Beyond Forums (2024)

My friends and I were chatting about the OneD&D playtests, and we had a thought about Weapon Mastery and the Push property.

Most effects in 5e that push enemies only do so on a failed save. With a feature that gives a guaranteed 10-foot push on hit, willmartials end up pressured into Push-focused builds to exploit damaging-terrain spells?

Take for instance, Spike Growth and Cloud of Daggers. Two 2nd-level spells, so they're available very early and for little cost. Spike Growth deals 2d4 damage for every five feet a creature moves within the area, so one hit of Push deals an extra 4d4 damage. Cloud of Daggers deals 4d4 damage once a turn, and the 10-foot push range conveniently pushes the enemy into and then through the affected area so that another party member can push them from the other side. And higher-level spells give even more potential for damage and debilitating effects.

It seems like such a strategy would quickly become a dominant one, and one other players are expected to play along with, as doing sowould greatly increase the damage output of the party against tough foes. Is this something that's been discussed in regards to OneD&D, or perhaps an overblown concern?

(Also, isn't it strange that a guaranteed effect on attack pushes an enemy 10 feet, but a shove attempt that requires a saving throwonly pushes them back5feet? Unless that was also changed and I missed that in the UAs.)

Quote from kenclary >>

Anything martial that competes with DPS in the meta would be supremely welcome.

DPS builds are already dominated by half-casters, or martial x caster multiclasses. The balance problem is in battlefield control with a lot of spells being very unbalanced.

Quote from Quar1on >>

It's the same as Repelling Blast, except arguably worse because Repelling Blast is ranged so you don't really have to worry about your enemy getting further away. Repelling Blast doesn't break the game, so I don't think Push would.

Repelling Blast is way overpowered and we had to house rule to limit it, largely because of damaging spell terrains.

A high level RAW game with repelling blast, could via quicken or Illusionists bracers do 8 blasts per round, pushing a Gargantuan creature 8x10 = 80 ft. Easily enough to go through a prismatic wall (sphere mode) twice.

Quote from The_Ace_of_Rogues >>

I mean, if the issue is a high-tier magic item enabling the combo, just don’t give them the item. The bracers are kinda broken on Warlocks in any case, or at least with EB.

This is the perpetual problem of EB being a cantrip rather than a class feature. Make EB a class feature that scales exclusively with Warlock levels and all these problems go away.

Quote from Agilemind >>

Quote from kenclary >>

Anything martial that competes with DPS in the meta would be supremely welcome.

DPS builds are already dominated by half-casters, or martial x caster multiclasses. The balance problem is in battlefield control with a lot of spells being very unbalanced.

Well, my point is that, for a PC who has already chosen to go "pure" martial, DPS tends to already be a dominant strategy in combat. I think it would be welcome for something like the "the push meta" to compete with that.

Quote from Pantagruel666 >>

Spirit Guardians should probably have a duration of 1 minute instead of 10, but there's no good answer to pull/push meta without either changing how push/pull works or changing how damaging zones work (as far as I know it first became a meta back in 4th edition), because the core feature that causes a problem is the ability to double-dip on a damaging zone without of turn movement. Easiest fix is probably something like "If you have taken damage from a zone, you cannot take damage again until the end of your next turn".

The problem isn't with damaging zones. Spells like Wall of Fire, Moonbeam, Sleetstorm (ok not damaging but still a persistent area), or Sickening Radiance aren't problematic. There are two key features of Spirit Guardians that make it OP:

1. You can move it essentially for free
2. It only affects enemies

No other damaging area has both of these properties. Prismatic Wall only affects enemies but you can't move it, same for Guardian of Faith. Moonbeam requires a full Action to move and affect allies as well as enemies. Wall of Fire and Sickening Radiance can't be moved and affect allies as well as enemies.

These are the various ways one could nerf Spirit Guardians to bring it inline with other damage areas:

A) Spirit Guardians lasts for 10 minutes, and affects a 15 ft radius sphere centered at a point within 30 ft of you, it damages everyone that enters it / starts within it and you can move it up to 30 ft as an action on your turn.

B) Spirit Guardians lasts 10 minutes, and affects a 10 ft radius around yourself and moves with you. It creates difficult terrain in the area that only hampers your enemies. As bonus action on your turn, you can cause it to deal damage to one creature of your choice within the radius.

C) Spirit Guardians affects a 20ft radius sphere centered at a point within 120 ft of you, it damages everyone that enters it / starts within it. It lasts for 1 minute and cannot be moved.

D) Spirit Guardians affects a 10ft radius sphere centered at a point within 60 ft of you, it only affects enemies and lasts for 1 minute. You can move it up to 60 ft as an action, and it no longer creates difficult terrain.

Personally, I like B&D the most as the "only hurting allies" idea seems very thematic with cleric.