[RPG] Would a non-attacking Barbarian’s rage end the same turn he started it

barbariandnd-5erage

QUESTION: If a Barbarian enters a Rage on their first turn, and does not attack, and furthermore has taken no damage yet in this fight, does the rage cease at the end of that same turn?

Reference: A player at our game wanted a multiclassed Moon Druid/Barbarian to combine Wild Shape and Rage. They stated that in a tough-looking fight they'd use their first turn's Action to Wild Shape and their Bonus Action to Rage, and start a frantic fight the next round. This led me to wonder about the mechanics:

The pertinent wording of Rage says (PHB, page 48):

Your rage lasts for 1 minute. It ends early if you are knocked unconscious or if your turn ends and you haven't attacked a hostile creature since your last turn or taken damage since then.

So, as I see it, strictly RAW:

If something happened in this battle prior to your turn and you took damage, that should let your rage continue after this first turn because the feature never states you had to be raging when the damage was taken.

If, however, you took no damage prior to your turn, and you didn't attack, then AT BEST there is only one other option to consider:

  1. If the last time you took damage was in your last fight, and that damage took place ON or BEFORE your turn (for example, you got the killing blow or just weren't harmed after your last turn), then you've neither attacked nor taken damage since your last turn, and Rage ends now.
  2. If the last damage you took was IN ANY WAY inflicted since your last turn, whether that means an enemy hit you after your last turn and a party member finished it off, or you got hit by a dart trap, or you just stubbed your toe really hard and took 1hp of damage while exploring, then the Rage SHOULD CONTINUE because you technically took damage since your last turn, even if that turn was yesterday.

Counter-argument for #2: "Turns" represent your actions in each 6-second window. Therefore looking at your previous "turn" only goes back 6 seconds, so unless that Dart Trap was REALLY fresh, your "last turn" probably just involved walking through a doorway or listening to the party Bard trying to talk his way out of the jam you're in. And if the Dart trap is that fresh, it was probably part of the same encounter anyway, and renders the thought exercise irrelevant.

Notes: In all reality, if I was DM here, I would probably allow this on the first turn, because the Barbarian is "revving up" for the fight, and then check this the next turn. But if it was later in the fight, I'd probably be looking more carefully at damage taken between turns, potentially. And I would almost certainly not count damage taken an hour ago from another group of enemies to count as damage "since your last turn." But in a purely RAW sense, is this interpretation accurate, or am I missing something?

Best Answer

You have it almost right

The only other thing to consider is the Barbarian's reaction, movement, and free object interaction. If they can attack a hostile creature with any of those or take damage as a result of any of those they can also ensure their rage doesn't end on the first turn.

Generally, the most common way that would happen is for the Barbarian to provoke an attack of opportunity and that attack to be made successfully and result in some damage, but many other options exist; for example, the barbarian could deliberately step on a caltrop or other hazard.

All of those ways, except perhaps getting to use your reaction to attack turning the same turn, are almost always bad and unnecessary-- the Barbarian should just wait until they take damage to super rage instead. Reaction based attacks currently at-best require you to be attacked and most require you to be hit, so those are kind of a bad idea, too, unless you have built around it. Commander's Strike is an exception, if an allied battle master fighter goes before you in the first round of combat and you are not surprised and you are in position to make an attack (it doesn't have to be a melee attack so that last part isn't unreasonable) and the GM rules you can take reactions before your first turn in combat, but it is bad for a battlemaster to use, generally, because it takes both a bonus action and an attack and your reaction and that is a lot of stuff so it's 1) unlikely your allied battlemaster fighter has this maneuver and 2) unlikely it's better for them to use it even if they do have it than to do two additional attack-equivalent thingies and leave you with your reaction available.

Pretty much the only scenarios I can come up with where you'd want to do this are where you are involved in a decent-sized melee and there's an AOE trap you can trigger to hit you and the enemies but not your party and you want to benefit from your resistance to damage and where you have an allied battlemaster fighter as a result of having used a Deck of Many Things and he or she stands in the back with a longbow and uses Commander's Strike instead of attacking.

So, in essence, yes, your reading is correct, but technically no, and the answer might change as better ways to use your reaction to attack during your turn are published.