Actions in Combat

***Your Turn***

During a round and on your turn, you can:

1. Take one action
2. Move a distance up to your speed.
3. Take one bonus action
4. Interact with the environment
5. Use a reaction

You decide whether to move first or take your action first. Your speed sometimes called your walking speed, is noted on your character sheet. See the “movement and position” section for the rules for your movement.

You can forgo movement, 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”.

#### ***Actions in Combat***

When you take your action on your turn, you can take one of the actions presented here, an action you gained from your ability origins or a feature, or an action that you improvise. Many monsters have action options of their own in their stat blocks. When you describe an action not detailed elsewhere in the rules, the GM tells you whether that action is possible and what kind of roll you need to make, if any, to determine success or failure.

##### ***Attack***

With this action, you make one melee or ranged attack. See the “Making an Attack” section for the rules that govern attacks. Certain abilities, such as the Extra Attack ability, allow you to make more than one attack with this action.

##### ***Cast a Spell***

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***

When you take the dash action, you gain extra movement for the current turn. The increase equals your speed, after applying any modifiers. With a speed of 6 m, for example, you can move up to 12 m on your turn if you dash.
Any increase or decrease to your speed changes this additional movement by the same amount. If your speed of 6 m is reduced to 3 m, for instance, you can move up to 6 m this turn if you 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***

When you take the help action, the creature you aid gains advantage on the next ability check it makes to perform the task you are helping with, provided that it makes the check before the start of your next turn.
Alternatively, you can aid a friendly creature in attacking a creature within 1 m of you. You feint, distract the target, or in some other way team up to make your ally’s attack more effective. If your ally attacks the target before your next turn, the first attack roll is made with advantage.

##### ***Hide***

When you take the hide action, you make a Stealth check in an attempt to hide, following the rules for hiding. If you succeed, you gain certain benefits, as described in the “Unseen Attackers and Targets” section later in this chapter.

##### ***Ready***

Sometimes you want to get the jump on a foe or wait for a particular circumstance before you act. To do so, you can take the ready action on your turn, which lets you act using your reaction before the start of your next turn.
First, you decide what perceivable circumstance will trigger your reaction. Then, you choose the action you will take in response to that trigger, or you choose to move up to your speed in response to it.
When the trigger occurs, you can either take your reaction right after the trigger finishes or ignore the trigger. Remember that you can take only one reaction per round. When you ready a spell, you cast it as normal but hold its energy, which you release with your reaction when the trigger occurs. To be readied a spell must have a casting time of 1 action or less, and holding onto the spell’s magic requires concentration. If your concentration is broken, the spell dissipates without taking effect.

##### ***Search***

When normally interacting 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.

#### ***Bonus Actions***

Various traits and abilities let you take an additional action on your turn called a bonus action. You can take a bonus action only when a trait or spell states that you can do something as a bonus action. 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 Activity on Your Turn***

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

* You can communicate however you’re 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 movement or your action. Examples include opening an unlocked door or drawing a weapon.
* 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 GM might require you to use an action for any of these activities when it needs special care or when it presents an unusual obstacle.
* More examples; withdraw a potion from your pack, pick up a dropped weapon, take a bauble from a table, remove a ring from your finger, stuff some food into your mouth, plant a banner into the ground, fish a few coins from your pouch, drink all the ale in a flagon, throw a lever or a switch, pull a torch from a sconce, take a book from a shelf you can reach, extinguish a small flame, don a mask, pull the hood of your cloak up and over your head, put your ear to a door, kick a small stone, turn a key in a lock, tap the floor with a 2 m pole and hand an item to another character.

#### ***Reactions***

Certain abilities or when you attack opportunity, described later in this chapter, is 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.

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.