Combat

The clatter of a sword striking against a shield. The terrible rending sound as monstrous claws tear through armor. A brilliant flash of light as a ball of flame blossoms from a wizard's spell. The sharp tang of blood in the air, cutting through the stench of vile monsters.

Roars of fury, shouts of triumph, cries of pain. Combat in 5e: Adept can be chaotic, deadly, and thrilling.

This note provides the rules you need for your characters and monsters to engage in combat, whether it is a brief skirmish or an extended conflict in a dungeon or on a field of battle. Throughout this note, the rules address you, the player or Dungeon Master.

The Dungeon Master controls all the monsters and nonplayer characters involved in combat, and each other player controls an adventurer. "You" can also mean the character or monster that you control.

The Order of Combat

A typical combat encounter is a clash between two sides, a flurry of weapon swings, feints, parries, footwork, and spellcasting. The game organizes the chaos of combat into a cycle of rounds and turns. A round represents about 6 seconds in the game world. During a round, each participant in a battle takes a turn. The order of turns is determined at the beginning of a combat encounter, when everyone rolls initiative. Once everyone has taken a turn, the fight continues to the next round if neither side has defeated the other.

Surprise

A band of adventurers sneaks up on a bandit camp, springing from the trees to attack them. A gelatinous cube glides down a dungeon passage, unnoticed by the adventurers until the cube engulfs one of them. In these situations, one side of the battle gains surprise over the other.

The DM determines who might be surprised. If neither side tries to be stealthy, they automatically notice each other. Otherwise, the DM compares the Dexterity (Stealth) checks of anyone hiding with the passive Wisdom (Perception) score of each creature on the opposing side. Any character or monster that doesn't notice a threat is surprised at the start of the encounter.

If you're surprised, you can't move or take an action on your first turn of the combat, and you can't take a reaction until that turn ends. A member of a group can be surprised even if the other members aren't.

Initiative

Initiative determines the order of turns during combat. When combat starts, every participant makes a Dexterity check to determine their place in the initiative order. The DM makes one roll for an entire group of identical creatures, so each member of the group acts at the same time.

The DM ranks the combatants in order from the one with the highest Dexterity check total to the one with the lowest. This is the order (called the initiative order) in which they act during each round.

If a tie occurs, the DM decides the order among tied DM-controlled creatures, and the players decide the order among their tied characters. A tie between a monster and a player character has the player character win the tie.

When everyone has taken their turn in combat, everyone then rolls initiative once more. This cycle continues until combat is over.

Your Turn

On your turn, you can move a distance up to your speed and take one action. You decide whether to move first or take your action first. Your speed—sometimes called your walking speed—is noted on your character sheet.

The most common actions you can take are described in the "Actions in Combat" section later in this note. Many class features and other abilities provide additional options for your action.

The "Movement and Position" section later in this note gives the rules for your move.

You can forgo moving, taking an action, or doing anything at all on your turn. If you can't decide what to do on your turn, consider taking the Dodge or Ready action, as described in "Actions in Combat."

Bonus Actions

Various class features, spells, and other abilities let you take an additional action on your turn called a bonus action. The Cunning Action feature, for example, allows a rogue to take a bonus action. You can take a bonus action only when a special ability, spell, or other feature of the game states that you can do something as a bonus action. You otherwise don't have a bonus action to take.

You can take only one bonus action on your turn, so you must choose which bonus action to use when you have more than one available.

You choose when to take a bonus action during your turn, unless the bonus action's timing is specified, and anything that deprives you of your ability to take actions also prevents you from taking a bonus action.

Other Activities on Your Turn

Your turn can include a variety of flourishes that require neither your action nor your move.

You can communicate however you are able, through brief utterances and gestures, as you take your turn.

You can also interact with one object or feature of the environment for free, during either your move or your action. For example, you could open a door during your move as you stride toward a foe, or you could draw your weapon as part of the same action you use to attack.

If you want to interact with a second object, you need to use your action. Some magic items and other special objects always require an action to use, as stated in their descriptions.

The DM might require you to use an action for any of these activities when it needs special care or when it presents an unusual obstacle. For instance, the DM could reasonably expect you to use an action to open a stuck door or turn a crank to lower a drawbridge.

Reactions

Certain special abilities, spells, and situations allow you to take a special action called a reaction. A reaction is an instant response to a trigger of some kind, which can occur on your turn or on someone else's. The opportunity attack, described later in this note, is the most common type of reaction.

When you take a reaction, you can't take another one until the start of your next turn. If the reaction interrupts another creature's turn, that creature can continue its turn right after the reaction.

Movement and Position

In combat, characters and monsters are in constant motion, often using movement and position to gain the upper hand.

On your turn, you can move a distance up to your speed. You can use as much or as little of your speed as you like on your turn, following the rules here.

Your movement can include jumping, climbing, and swimming. These different modes of movement can be combined with walking, or they can constitute your entire move. However you're moving, you deduct the distance of each part of your move from your speed until it is used up or until you are done moving.

Breaking up Your Move

Moving Between Attacks

If you take an action that includes more than one weapon attack, you can break up your movement even further by moving between those attacks. For example, a fighter who can make two attacks with the Extra Attack feature and who has a speed of 12 meters could move 8 meters, make an attack, move 4 meters, and then attack again.

Using Different Speeds

If you have more than one speed, such as your walking speed and a flying speed, you can switch back and forth between your speeds during your move. Whenever you switch, subtract the distance you've already moved from the new speed. The result determines how much farther you can move. If the result is 0 or less, you can't use the new speed during the current move.

For example, if you have a speed of 10 and a flying speed of 20 because a wizard cast the fly spell on you, you could fly 8 meters, then walk 2 meters, and then leap into the air to fly 10 meters more.

Difficult Terrain

Combat rarely takes place in bare rooms or on featureless plains.

Boulder-strewn caverns, briar-choked forests, treacherous staircases—the setting of a typical fight contains difficult terrain.

Every foot of movement in difficult terrain costs 1 extra meter. This rule is true even if multiple things in a space count as difficult terrain.

Low furniture, rubble, undergrowth, steep stairs, snow, and shallow bogs are examples of difficult terrain. The space of another creature, whether hostile or not, also counts as difficult terrain.

Being Prone

Combatants often find themselves lying on the ground, either because they are knocked down or because they throw themselves down. In the game, they are prone, a condition described in conditions.

You can drop prone without using any of your speed. Standing up takes more effort; doing so costs an amount of movement equal to half your speed. For example, if your speed is 10 meters, you must spend 5 meters of movement to stand up. You can't stand up if you don't have enough movement left or if your speed is 0.

To move while prone, you must crawl or use magic such as teleportation. Every foot of movement while crawling costs 1 extra meter. Crawling 1 meter in difficult terrain, therefore, costs 3 meters of movement.

Moving around Other Creatures

You can move through a nonhostile creature's space. In contrast, you can move through a hostile creature's space only if the creature is at least three sizes larger or smaller than you, or you use the Overrun combat maneuver. Remember that another creature's space is difficult terrain for you.

Whether a creature is a friend or an enemy, you can't willingly end your move in its space.

If you leave a hostile creature's reach during your move, you provoke an opportunity attack, as explained later in the note.

Flying Movement

Flying creatures enjoy many benefits of mobility, but they must also deal with the danger of falling. If a flying creature is knocked prone, has its speed reduced to 0, or is otherwise deprived of the ability to move, the creature falls, unless it has the ability to hover or it is being held aloft by magic, such as by the fly spell.

Creature Size

Each creature takes up a different amount of space.

The Size Categories table shows how much space a creature of a particular size controls in combat. Objects sometimes use the same size categories.

Creatures do not always take up a square of space. When specified, they take up a rectangular space instead. Their size category is the length of the largest side of the rectangle. A creature may rotate their body by using a number of meters of movement equal to their longest side.

Space

A creature's space is the area in meters that it effectively controls in combat, not an expression of its physical dimensions. A typical Medium creature isn't 1 meter wide, for example, but it does control a space that wide. If a Medium hobgoblin stands in a 1-meter-wide doorway, other creatures can't get through unless the hobgoblin lets them.

A creature's space also reflects the area it needs to fight effectively. For that reason, there's a limit to the number of creatures that can surround another creature in combat. Assuming Medium combatants, eight creatures can fit in a 1-meter radius around another one.

Because larger creatures take up more space, fewer of them can surround a creature.

If four Large creatures crowd around a Medium or smaller one, there's little room for anyone else. In contrast, as many as twenty Medium creatures can surround a Gargantuan (4) one.

Squeezing into Smaller Space

A creature can squeeze through a space that is large enough for a creature one size smaller than it. Thus, a Large creature can squeeze through a passage that's only 1 meter wide. While squeezing through a space, a creature must spend 1 extra meter for every meter it moves there, and it has disadvantage on attack rolls and Dexterity saving throws. Attack rolls against the creature have advantage while it's in the smaller space.

Actions in Combat

Attack

Cast a Spell

Spellcasters such as wizards and clerics, as well as many monsters, have access to spells and can use them to great effect in combat. Each spell has a casting time, which specifies whether the caster must use an action, a reaction, minutes, or even hours to cast the spell. Casting a spell is, therefore, not necessarily an action. Most spells do have a casting time of 1 action, so a spellcaster often uses his or her action in combat to cast such a spell.

Dash

Disengage

If you take the Disengage action, your movement doesn't provoke opportunity attacks for the rest of the turn.

Dodge

When you take the Dodge action, you focus entirely on avoiding attacks. Until the start of your next turn, any attack roll made against you has disadvantage if you can see the attacker, and you make Dexterity saving throws with advantage. You lose this benefit if you are incapacitated  or if your speed drops to 0.

Help

Hide

When you take the Hide action, you make a Dexterity (Stealth) check in an attempt to hide. If you succeed, you gain certain benefits, as described in the "Unseen Attackers and Targets" section in the Player's Handbook.

Ready

Search

When you take the Search action, you devote your attention to finding something. Depending on the nature of your search, the DM might have you make a Wisdom (Perception) check or an Intelligence (Investigation) check.

Use an Object

You normally interact with an object while doing something else, such as when you draw a sword as part of an attack. When an object requires your action for its use, you take the Use an Object action. This action is also useful when you want to interact with more than one object on your turn.

Improvising an Action

Your character can do things not covered by the actions in this note, such as breaking down doors, intimidating enemies, sensing weaknesses in magical defenses, or calling for a parley with a foe. The only limits to the actions you can attempt are your imagination and your character's ability scores.

When you describe an action not detailed elsewhere in the rules, the DM tells you whether that action is possible and what kind of roll you need to make, if any, to determine success or failure.

Combat Maneuvers

As an action on your turn, you may perform a combat maneuver. When you perform a maneuver check, you roll 1d20 + your proficiency bonus. "Contested" combat maneuvers have both you and the target of the maneuver roll a maneuver check. Whoever rolls the highest number wins, the target winning on ties. The following are combat maneuvers you may perform on your turn:

Charge

As an action, you may dash in a straight line toward a creature you can see. You may then make a single melee weapon attack against that creature, as a maneuver check adding your Strength modifier. If you miss, you provoke an attack of opportunity from the target.

Disarm

As an action, you can attempt to knock a single weapon out of an opponent's hands within one meter of you. You both must make opposed maneuver checks, adding either Strength or Dexterity modifiers. On a success, you disarm the opponent and knock their weapon out of their hands, which lands on a spot you choose 1 meter adjacent to the target. On a failure, this provokes an attack of opportunity against you.

Grapple

As an action, you use at least one of your free hands to attempt to grapple a creature within one meter of you. You can only grapple creatures who are no more than one size category larger than you. Initiating this maneuver provokes an attack of opportunity from the target of your maneuver. You both must make opposed maneuver checks, you adding your Strength modifier, and the target adding either their Strength or Dexterity modifier. On a success, the target is under the grappled condition. They can make another opposed maneuver check as an action on their turn to attempt to break free. You can let the target free of the grapple at any time, no action required. You may drag or carry the grappled creature with you, but your speed is halved unless the creature is two or more size categories smaller than you.

Lunge

As an action, you can make a melee weapon attack against a creature. You may then make a single melee weapon attack against that creature, as a maneuver check adding your Dexterity modifier. Your reach with your weapon during this maneuver is increased by 1 meter. If you miss, the target provokes an attack of opportunity against you.

Overrun

As an action, you can attempt to overrun an enemy, moving through its square. You can only overrun a creature who is no more than one size category larger than you. Initiating this maneuver provokes an attack of opportunity from the target of your maneuver. If your overrun attempt fails, you you stop in the space directly in front of your target, or the nearest open space if that space is occupied. When you attempt to overrun a target, it can choose to avoid you, allowing you to pass through its space without requiring a check. If your target does not avoid you, you both must make opposed maneuver checks, adding Strength modifiers. If the target has more than two legs, it gains a +2 bonus to its check for each additional leg it has. If your maneuver is successful, you move through the target's space.

Shove

As an action, you attempt to shove an enemy within one meter of you. You can only shove a creature who is no more than one size category larger than you. You both must make opposed maneuver checks, you adding your Strength modifier, and the target adding either their Strength or Dexterity modifier. On a success, the creature is moved 1 meter away from you plus a number of meters equal to how far you surpassed the target's check, divided by 3 (rounded up). On a fail, the target provokes an attack of opportunity against you.

Sunder

As an action, you attempt to break an object a target within reach of a melee weapon you are wielding. Initiating this maneuver provokes an attack of opportunity from the target of this maneuver. Make an opposed maneuver check against the target, you adding your Strength modifier, and the target adding their Dexterity modifier. On a success, you deal damage to the object normally. If this reduces an object to below half of its durability maximum, it gains the broken condition. If this reduces the object below 0 durability, you can choose to destroy it, or leave it at 1 durability with the broken condition.

Trip

As an action, you attempt to knock a creature prone. You can only trip a creature who is no more than one size category larger than you. Initiating this maneuver provokes an attack of opportunity from the target of this maneuver. You both must make opposed maneuver checks, adding either Strength or Dexterity modifiers. On a success, the target falls prone.

Making an Attack

Whether you're striking with a melee weapon, firing a weapon at range, or making an attack roll as part of a spell, an attack has a simple structure.

• 1. Choose a target. Pick a target within your attack's range: a creature, an object, or a location.

• 2. Determine modifiers. The DM determines whether the target has cover and whether you have advantage or disadvantage against the target. In addition, spells, special abilities, and other effects can apply penalties or bonuses to your attack roll.

• 3. Resolve the attack. You make the attack roll. On a hit, you roll damage, unless the particular attack has rules that specify otherwise. Some attacks cause special effects in addition to or instead of damage.

If there's ever any question whether something you're doing counts as an attack, the rule is simple: if you're making an attack roll, you're making an attack.

Attack Rolls

When you make an attack, your attack roll determines whether the attack hits or misses. To make an attack roll, roll a d20 and add the appropriate modifiers. If the total of the roll plus modifiers equals or exceeds the target's Armor Class (AC), the attack hits. The AC of a character is determined at character creation, whereas the AC of a monster is in its stat block.

Modifiers to the Roll

When a character makes an attack roll, the two most common modifiers to the roll are an ability modifier and the character's proficiency bonus. When a monster makes an attack roll, it uses whatever modifier is provided in its stat block.

Opportunity Attacks

In a fight, everyone is constantly watching for enemies to drop their guard. You can rarely move heedlessly past your foes without putting yourself in danger; doing so provokes an opportunity attack.

You can make an opportunity attack when a hostile creature that you can see moves out of your reach. To make the opportunity attack, you use your reaction to make one melee attack against the provoking creature. The attack interrupts the provoking creature's movement, occurring right before the creature leaves your reach.

You can avoid provoking an opportunity attack by taking the Disengage action. You also don't provoke an opportunity attack when you teleport or when someone or something moves you without using your movement, action, or reaction. For example, you don't provoke an opportunity attack if an explosion hurls you out of a foe's reach or if gravity causes you to fall past an enemy.

Two-Weapon Fighting

When you take the Attack action and attack with a light melee weapon that you're holding in one hand, you can use a bonus action to attack with a different light melee weapon that you're holding in the other hand. You don't add your ability modifier to the attack roll or damage of the bonus attack, unless that modifier is negative.

If either weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon, instead of making a melee attack with it.

Cover

Walls, trees, creatures, and other obstacles can provide cover during combat, making a target more difficult to harm. A target can benefit from cover only when an attack or other effect originates on the opposite side of the cover.

There are three degrees of cover. If a target is behind multiple sources of cover, only the most protective degree of cover applies; the degrees aren't added together. For example, if a target is behind a creature that gives half cover and a tree trunk that gives three-quarters cover, the target has three-quarters cover.

A target with half cover has a +2 bonus to AC and Dexterity saving throws. A target has half cover if an obstacle blocks at least half of its body. The obstacle might be a low wall, a large piece of furniture, a narrow tree trunk, or a creature, whether that creature is an enemy or a friend.

A target with three-quarters cover has a +5 bonus to AC and Dexterity saving throws. A target has three-quarters cover if about three-quarters of it is covered by an obstacle. The obstacle might be a portcullis, an arrow slit, or a thick tree trunk.

A target with total cover can't be targeted directly by an attack or a spell, although some spells can reach such a target by including it in an area of effect. A target has total cover if it is completely concealed by an obstacle.

Damage and Healing

Injury and the risk of death are constant companions of those who explore the worlds of D&D. The thrust of a sword, a well-placed arrow, or a blast of flame from a fireball spell all have the potential to damage, or even kill, the hardiest of creatures.

Hit Points

Hit points represent a combination of physical and mental durability, the will to live, and luck. Creatures with more hit points are more difficult to kill. Those with fewer hit points are more fragile.

A creature's current hit points (usually just called hit points) can be any number from the creature's hit point maximum down to 0. This number changes frequently as a creature takes damage or receives healing. Whenever a creature takes damage, that damage is subtracted from its hit points. The loss of hit points has no effect on a creature's capabilities until the creature drops to 0 hit points.

Damage Rolls

Each weapon, spell, and harmful monster ability specifies the damage it deals. You roll the damage die or dice, add any modifiers, and apply the damage to your target. Magic weapons, special abilities, and other factors can grant a bonus to damage.

When attacking with a weapon, you add your ability modifier—the same modifier used for the attack roll to the damage. A spell tells you which dice to roll for damage and whether to add any modifiers.

If a spell or other effect deals damage to more than one target at the same time, roll the damage once for all of them. For example, when a wizard casts fireball or a cleric casts flame strike, the spell's damage is rolled once for all creatures caught in the blast.

Critical Hits

When you score a critical hit, you get to roll extra dice for the attack's damage against the target. Roll all of the attack's damage dice twice and add them together. Then add any relevant modifiers as normal. To speed up play, you can roll all the damage dice at once.

For example, if you score a critical hit with a dagger, roll 2d4 for the damage, rather than 1d4, and then add your relevant ability modifier. If the attack involves other damage dice, such as from the rogue's Sneak Attack feature, you roll those dice twice as well.

Damage Types

Different attacks, damaging spells, and other harmful effects deal different types of damage. Damage types have no rules of their own, but other rules, such as damage resistance, rely on the types.

The damage types follow, with examples to help a DM assign a damage type to a new effect.

Acid: The corrosive spray of a black dragon's breath and the dissolving enzymes secreted by a black pudding deal acid damage.

Bludgeoning: Blunt force attacks—hammers, falling, constriction, and the like—deal bludgeoning damage.

Cold: The infernal chill radiating from an ice devil's spear and the frigid blast of a white dragon's breath deal cold damage.

Fire: Red dragons breathe fire, and many spells conjure flames to deal fire damage.

Force: Force is pure magical energy focused into a damaging form. Most effects that deal force damage are spells, including magic missile and spiritual weapon.

Lightning: A lightning bolt spell and a blue dragon's breath deal lightning damage.

Necrotic: Necrotic damage, dealt by certain undead and some spells, withers matter and even the soul.

Piercing: Puncturing and impaling attacks, including spears and monsters' bites, deal piercing damage.

Poison: Venomous stings and the toxic gas of a green dragon's breath deal poison damage.

Psychic: Mental abilities such as a mind flayer's psionic blast deal psychic damage.

Radiant: Radiant damage, dealt by a cleric's flame strike spell or an angel's smiting weapon, sears the flesh like fire and overloads the spirit with power.

Slashing: Swords, axes, and monsters' claws deal slashing damage.

Thunder: A concussive burst of sound, such as the effect of the thunderwave spell, deals thunder damage.

Damage Resistance and Vulnerability

Some creatures and objects are exceedingly difficult or unusually easy to hurt with certain types of damage.

If a creature or an object has resistance to a damage type, damage of that type is halved against it. If a creature or an object has vulnerability to a damage type, damage of that type is doubled against it.

Resistance and then vulnerability are applied after all other modifiers to damage. For example, a creature has resistance to bludgeoning damage and is hit by an attack that deals 25 bludgeoning damage. The creature is also within a magical aura that reduces all damage by 5. The 25 damage is first reduced by 5 and then halved, so the creature takes 10 damage.

Multiple instances of resistance or vulnerability that affect the same damage type count as only one instance. For example, if a creature has resistance to fire damage as well as resistance to all nonmagical damage, the damage of a nonmagical fire is reduced by half against the creature, not reduced by three-quarters.

Healing

Unless it results in death, damage isn't permanent. Even death is reversible through powerful magic. Rest can restore a creature's hit points, and magical methods such as a cure wounds spell or a potion of healing can remove damage in an instant.

When a creature receives healing of any kind, hit points regained are added to its current hit points. A creature's hit points can't exceed its hit point maximum, so any hit points regained in excess of this number are lost. For example, a druid grants a ranger 8 hit points of healing. If the ranger has 14 current hit points and has a hit point maximum of 20, the ranger regains 6 hit points from the druid, not 8.

A creature that has died can't regain hit points until magic such as the revivify spell has restored it to life.

Dropping to 0 Hit Points

When you drop to 0 hit points, you gain a level of exhaustion and fall unconscious. This unconsciousness ends if you regain any hit points.

Death Saving Throws

Whenever you start your turn with 0 hit points, you must make a special saving throw, called a death saving throw, to determine whether you creep closer to death or hang onto life. Unlike other saving throws, this one isn't tied to any ability score. You are in the hands of fate now, aided only by spells and features that improve your chances of succeeding on a saving throw.

Roll a d20. If the roll is 10 or higher, you succeed. Otherwise, you fail. On a success, nothing happens. On a failure, you gain one level of exhaustion.

Rolling 1 or 20: When you make a death saving throw and roll a 1 on the d20, it counts as two failures. If you roll a 20 on the d20, you regain 1 hit point.

Damage at 0 Hit Points: If you take any damage while you have 0 hit points, you suffer a death saving throw failure. If the damage is from a critical hit, you suffer two failures instead. If the damage equals or exceeds your hit point maximum, you suffer instant death.

Stabilizing a Creature

The best way to save a creature with 0 hit points is to heal it. If healing is unavailable, the creature can at least be stabilized so that it isn't killed by a failed death saving throw.

You can use your action to administer first aid to an unconscious creature and attempt to stabilize it. You must make a DC 10 Medicine (Knowledge) check. On a success, the creature has advantage on its next death saving throw.

A stable creature doesn't make death saving throws, even though it has 0 hit points, but it does remain unconscious. The creature stops being stable, and must start making death saving throws again, if it takes any damage. A stable creature that isn't healed regains 1 hit point after 1d4 hours.

Monsters and Death

Monsters make death saving throws as well on their turn, although you may not see them. If a monster has no outside aid to help them, they may die upon reaching 0 hit points for the sake of brevity.

Knocking a Creature Out

Sometimes an attacker wants to incapacitate a foe, rather than deal a killing blow. When an attacker reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack, the attacker can knock the creature out. The attacker can make this choice the instant the damage is dealt. The creature falls unconscious and is stable.

Temporary Hit Points

Some spells and special abilities confer temporary hit points to a creature. Temporary hit points aren't actual hit points; they are a buffer against damage, a pool of hit points that protect you from injury.

When you have temporary hit points and take damage, the temporary hit points are lost first, and any leftover damage carries over to your normal hit points. For example, if you have 5 temporary hit points and take 7 damage, you lose the temporary hit points and then take 2 damage.

Because temporary hit points are separate from your actual hit points, they can exceed your hit point maximum. A character can, therefore, be at full hit points and receive temporary hit points.

Healing can't restore temporary hit points, and they can't be added together. If you have temporary hit points and receive more of them, you decide whether to keep the ones you have or to gain the new ones. For example, if a spell grants you 12 temporary hit points when you already have 10, you can have 12 or 10, not 22.

If you have 0 hit points, receiving temporary hit points doesn't restore you to consciousness or stabilize you.

They can still absorb damage directed at you while you're in that state, but only true healing can save you.

Unless a feature that grants you temporary hit points has a duration, they last until they're depleted or you finish a long rest.

Mounted Combat

A knight charging into battle on a warhorse, a wizard casting spells from the back of a griffon, or a cleric soaring through the sky on a pegasus all enjoy the benefits of speed and mobility that a mount can provide.

A willing creature that is at least one size larger than you and that has an appropriate anatomy can serve as a mount, using the following rules.

Mounting and Dismounting

Once during your move, you can mount a creature that is within 1 meter of you or dismount. Doing so costs an amount of movement equal to half your speed. For example, if your speed is 10 meters, you must spend 5 meters of movement to mount a horse. Therefore, you can't mount it if you don't have 5 meters of movement left or if your speed is 0.

If an effect moves your mount against its will while you're on it, you must succeed on a DC 10 Dexterity saving throw or fall off the mount, landing prone in a space within 1 meter  of it. If you're knocked prone while mounted, you must make the same saving throw.

If your mount is knocked prone, you can use your reaction to dismount it as it falls and land on your feet. Otherwise, you are dismounted and fall prone in a space within 1 meter of it.

Controlling a Mount

While you're mounted, you have two options. You can either control the mount or allow it to act independently. Intelligent creatures, such as dragons, act independently.

You can control a mount only if it has been trained to accept a rider. Domesticated horses, donkeys, and similar creatures are assumed to have such training.

The initiative of a controlled mount changes to match yours when you mount it. It moves as you direct it, and it has only three action options: Dash, Disengage, and Dodge. A controlled mount can move and act even on the turn that you mount it.

An independent mount retains its place in the initiative order. Bearing a rider puts no restrictions on the actions the mount can take, and it moves and acts as it wishes. It might flee from combat, rush to attack and devour a badly injured foe, or otherwise act against your wishes.

In either case, if the mount provokes an opportunity attack while you're on it, the attacker can target you or the mount.

Underwater Combat

When adventurers pursue great sea beasts back to their undersea lairs, fight off sharks in an ancient shipwreck, or find themselves in a flooded dungeon room, they must fight in a challenging environment. Underwater the following rules apply.

When making a melee weapon attack, a creature that doesn't have a swimming speed (either natural or granted by magic) has disadvantage on the attack roll unless the weapon is a dagger, javelin, shortsword, spear, or trident.

A ranged weapon attack automatically misses a target beyond the weapon's normal range. Even against a target within normal range, the attack roll has disadvantage unless the weapon is a crossbow, a net, or a weapon that is thrown like a javelin (including a spear, trident, or dart).

Creatures and objects that are fully immersed in water have resistance to fire damage.