Crossbow Loading

[SuffocatedNYDM]

Has Adam totally forgot about loading I know for Wester does not have crossbow master those guards could have but I think not .

[Wodger]

Loading. Because of the time required to load this weapon, you can fire only one piece of ammunition from it when you use an action, bonus action, or reaction to fire it, regardless of the number of attacks you can make.

I don’t think anyone ever takes more than one shot per action?

[SuffocatedNYDM]

it still takes a full round action to load meaning you can only shoot every other round unless you have crossbow master

[LeStario]

The only thing the tag says in the 5e Player’s Handbook (p. 147) is the following:

Loading. Because of the time required to load this weapon, you can fire only one piece of ammunition
from it when you use an action, bonus action, or reaction to fire it, regardless of the number of attacks you can normally make.

I don’t see anything stating you must take an action to reload, only that you may only fire the weapon once within any given turn you take. This would make sense for things such as extra attack and the like further down the line.

[SuffocatedNYDM]

wow me and the DMs I play with have been totally fucking this up then, reading who would of ever thought its fundamental after all

[Peluche_]

Correct, Crossbow Master is only needed if you attack multiple times with the same crossbow in the same action.

[Typoko]

I think we all can take a good lesson from this one: use references.

[crowly_]

At least in 2e (and previous?) it took a round to reload, so I guess someone is mixing up editions.