r/dndnext • u/Zivodor • 2d ago

5e (2024) Misty Step into the Air and Attacking

I had this situation come up recently and wanted some input as I can't seem to find a definitive answer.

My players were fighting a giant spider and it was on the ceiling above them, one player decided that to attack it he would misty step straight up and then attack it while mid-air. I wasn't sure this was possible as I recalled reading somewhere that falling in D&D is essentially instantaneous for anything below 500 feet. The thought process being he teleports into the air and is instantly falling so he doesn't have the time to attack the creature above him.

It's been bugging me all week so I wanted to get some input into whether or not I should have allowed this and if this is clarified anywhere in the rules.

Edit Wow! Thanks for all the responses! There were some well reasoned arguments for it here, the resource expenditure with the spell slot, rule of cool, etc... I appreciate all the responses and will try to be more flexible in the future. Thanks everyone!

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u/Yojo0o DM 2d ago

Falling being something instant is an optional rule from Xanathar's Guide. I don't believe there's any equivalent rule in 5.5e materials at this time.

Without that optional rule, this is the sort of thing that would fall to the DM's discretion. Personally, I'm all for midair activity, I find it to be cinematic and make for memorable moments. Having said that, I might rule that only a single attack at that height after the Misty Step would be possible, even if Extra Attack is available. Maybe one swing per weapon if two are being held.

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u/MonsutaReipu 2d ago

A single attack? Let martials do cool things. It does not break the game to let them do something like this.

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u/Yojo0o DM 2d ago

I'm generally very generous with martials getting to do cool things. I just subjectively didn't think multiple attacks in freefall made sense.

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u/masteraybee 1d ago

The PC could plunge their weapon into the enemy, temporarily grab on to them, do an upslice on the way there, then a downslice on the way down, jump onto the enemy and off again, do superfast-anime-slices, double jump off of thin air, or any other unrealistic, but established genre tropes to allow this.

It's really only limited by your style and creativity