The situation:

Four orcs, sitting around a campfire, are spotted by the party. Two more orcs are in a tent a couple meters away. The orcs do not notice the party.

A Wizard casts invisibility on himself and goes very close to them them while the rest of the party waits close by, hidden behind a bush.

The wizard casts Thunderwave and as soon as he appears the rest of the party charge in.

Wich is the correct way to determine turn order in this situation?

This sounds like a textbook case of Surprise

In general:

1. Determine Surprise. The GM determines whether anyone involved in the combat encounter is surprised.


2. Establish positions: The GM decides where all the characters and Monsters are located. Given the adventurers’ Marching Order or their stated positions in the room or other location, the GM figures out where the adversaries are̶how far away and in what direction.


3. Roll Initiative: Everyone involved in the combat encounter rolls Initiative, determining the order of combatants’ turns.


4. Take turns. Each participant in the battle takes a turn in Initiative order.
   Begin the next round. When everyone involved in the combat has had a turn, the round ends.

Note that during Surprise,

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.

In this case, the order of events is...

1. Combat positions are set up / drawn up / etc (or have already been done)




2. Everyone rolls initiative




3. Players each take a single turn. There are a couple of ways to DM this - I couldn't find a RAW interpretation on exactly what order this occurs, since the Wizard may not have the highest initiative but is taking the first action. RAW says initiative, but the DM may want to consider manipulating this so the wizard doesn't get an extra round




4. Combat enters the normal initiative, proceeds accordingly. Orcs are slain, treasure is looted and celebratory debauchery ensues

A non-RAW house rule that works far better

I'm going to give an answer based not off the rules, but off my experience. I've started handling this kind of situation differently in the last year or so and it's made play much easier (and more fun) without any real downsides. Here's my system for handling surprise rounds:

Roll initiative as normal. Roll initiative as normal, record it as normal. This will be helpful after the first round, and may come into play this round.

Place characters in groups. Usually the players are in one group, and the NPCs are in another. Occasionally you might split NPCs into multiple groups (e.g. orcs around the fire and orcs in the tent). Characters who are surprised must be in a separate group from characters who are not surprised.

Identify the triggering group. The triggering group is the one starting the combat - they're the one doing the "surprising". In this case, the triggering group is the party (because the Wizard is starting out the combat).

The triggering group acts first. All characters in the triggering group may act in whatever order they desire. So the wizard gets to act first, followed by the other members of the party charging in. Any surprised enemies are surprised for this entire duration.

Remaining non-surprised groups act next. This is rare in a "surprise round" situation, but some characters may have abilities that prevent them from being surprised (e.g. the Alert feat) or let them break out of surprise early (e.g. Feral Instinct). Group members can take turns in whatever order they want. If there are multiple groups in this category, decide who goes first by looking at the highest initiative roll for each group (or just pick based on what makes sense).

Start taking turns as usual, following initiative order. All characters recover from surprise and can act normally, turn order starts from the top.

Why I use this method

The RAW method for handling surprise rounds leaves a lot to be desired. For example, let's say you're an Assassin rogue - one of your most important features depends on attacking a surprised enemy. Let's imagine a situation where you successfully sneak into a position where you can surprise and attack the enemy, but then they roll higher initiative than you. According to the rules, they lose the "surprised" condition at the end of their first turn, which means that by the time you attack they're (somehow) no longer surprised.

Likewise, I've seen so many reasonable plans created by the party that make sense in-universe but don't work because of initiative rules. For example, let's say that the Wizard is going to cast silence and the moment he finishes casting it, the Ranger and the Rogue are going to loose arrows at the targets within the silence. If the Ranger and Rogue roll higher than the wizard, according to RAW they would have to ready attacks (which forfeits their reaction and Extra Attack) or skip that turn. Additionally, if one of the enemies has a feature like Alert, it's entirely possible (based on initiative rolls) that an enemy could get up and run behind cover between the moment that the wizard finishes casting and the moment that the archers loose their arrows (which makes objectively no sense in-universe).

The method I use now is a lot simpler - if you plan and execute the ambush, and you pull it off successfully, for the first turn you all get to act in whatever order makes sense for the first round before any enemies go (after all, they're surprised). Likewise, if you get surprised, all the enemies get a free turn to go after you. This way your players are free to come up with fun and exciting plans for what to do when they surprise bad guys, and they don't get hampered by rules that make no sense whatsoever in-universe. Likewise, your Assassin Rogues will have their Assassinate critical depend on their skill in setting up a surprise attack, not their luck in rolling initiative.

As normal

The orcs are surprised.

Everyone rolls initiative. Everyone acts as normal on their turn.

PCs who act before the wizard can use their action to Ready something in response to the wizard becoming visible. This limits their options, for example they miss out on Extra Attack and their Bonus Action by acting on the wizard’s turn but that’s the price you pay for tying your action to someone else. Or they can act normally - think of this of them hearing the wizard and moving just too quick.

The orcs, being surprised, can’t move, take actions or reactions until after their turn. All the PCs will get at least 1 ‘free shot’, quicker PCs will get 2.

It's complicated and some of it is up to the DM

Let's start with the Surprise rules:

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.

A lot of this initial work is determined by the DM, and only they can ultimately decide who is surprised, who isn't, and when it's time to roll initiative. But ultimately, if you're all in actionable points, then it's time to roll initiative and figure out surprise.

But let's look at your scenario.

You've got several groups of players:

• The Party


• The Orcs sitting around a campfire


• The orcs in a tent

At this point, the Wizard wants to cast invisibility and move to the Orcs. This is also the first point the DM has to determine whether or not we're talking about combat and the need to track initiative.

First contact?

If the party is far enough away from the Orcs and never got close enough to be noticed, then they can rule that the spell can be cast, and that they are far enough away that the Verbal component isn't an issue for being noticed.

But a DM could also rule that if they're close enough to have found the Orcs and scoped out the situation, then they are also close enough to be noticed and that it's time to roll initiative.

But let's say the DM wants to allow the casting and have the wizard approach invisibile

The wizard approaches

Being invisible doesn't make you undetectable. The Wizard will still need to roll stealth and then the Orcs will have their passive perception scores determine if they notice the Wizard approaching (sound, ground disturbance, etc.)

Again, the DM could ask for initiative so that the time and actions can be better tracked, but it's also reasonable to let this play out. It's the DM's call.

If the players attempting to be within range of attacking (whatever their movement speed is), then the DM again could ask for initiative rolls or simply ask for the party to roll their stealth to see if they can get that close. Otherwise, the DM determines how far off they can be without fear of being noticed and has the party at that distance.

Wizard wants to get close enough for a thunderwave

Here is the moment the DM really must roll initiative and make the determination of who is surprised and which creatures are currently involved in combat.

It is possible that the Orcs are ahead in initiative and end up losing their Surprised state before the Wizard has a chance to cast thunderwave.

It is important to note that once thunderwave is cast, the Wizard will also lose their invisibility. If the Wizard's initiative is after any of the Orc's they are currently in melee range, then those Orcs would have an opportunity attack if the Wizard leaves because their turn has ended and they can again take reactions.

Any creatures not directly in combat than roll in initiative

At this point, the DM can also determine when any remaining creatures (the Orcs in the tent, the party if they were far enough away, etc.) roll initiative and join the combat.

Let's dissect this piece by piece

First you mentioned that the orcs do not notice them. This means when the Wizard attacks, the orcs are surprised when combat starts.

Next the Wizard, still out of combat casts Invisibility which has a verbal component and may alert the orcs. If they still don't then continue but if they do then it becomes a normal case of "roll initiative".

Assuming they don't then the rest of your party takes the Ready action. "We ready an action to charge in when the wizard attacks" or something similar.

The wizard says he wants to cast Thunderwave and everyone, including the orcs, rolls initiative. No matter the order in this case the wizard will cast the spell first. The orcs are surprised and thus can't act and the rest of the party is using their action for Ready. So the wizard casts his spell, the orcs can't act or react, then the party charges in on initiative order.