Because AO threads never go out of style.

[ourchair]

I'm sure there is another thread discussing AOs, but I can't be buggered to find it right now, hence the tongue in cheek thread title.

Anyway, as far as I can tell, the RAW declares that attacks of opportunity are made when:

a) an opponent leaves your threatened square (but NOT when he enters your threatened square)
b) when an opponent within range uses a ranged or area attack power including close bursts.

In our first game of 4e last year, we played with the assumption that forced movement leaving the threatened square provokes AOs, which is exciting for everyone because slamming a guy 3 squares parallel to a row of allies causes a big old AO party.

Unfortunately, the RAW says forced movement doesn't cause AOs. Which doesn't make sense to me fluff-wise, but I've accepted because I don't want to use fluff interpretations to determine rules intent.

What are your takes on that subject? Do you count AOs during forced movement?

Or have I actually gotten it right, and by right, I mean I'm getting it wrong and AOs ARE provoked during forced movement making my interpretation of the RAW wrong? (/mojojojo)

 

[DracoSuave]

The difference between forced movement and regular movement, is the former is being pushed, pulled, tossed, something is making you move away, and it does not involve you dropping your guard.

The latter case tho, you're dropping your guard to move more than a small amount. So that's why it provokes.


Also, in before the first Combat Agility thread.

 

[ourchair]

I understand that yeah, you're not letting your guard down, but I also believe that it's possible that forced movement causes a bit of surprise on the part of the opponent that leaves him open to attack.

If I push you "two squares" in a bar fight, why can't the guy adjacent to you try to kick you in the shins? It's not necessarily an automatic success, because when the pushee (!) doesn't take a penalty to his defense. It's just a cheap shot, nothing more.

 

[DracoSuave]

I understand that yeah, you're not letting your guard down, but I also believe that it's possible that forced movement causes a bit of surprise on the part of the opponent that leaves him open to attack.

If I push you "two squares" in a bar fight, why can't the guy adjacent to you try to kick you in the shins? It's not necessarily an automatic success, because when the pushee (!) doesn't take a penalty to his defense. It's just a cheap shot, nothing more.

For the same reason you don't provoke OAs by being attacked by someone else. Just because someone does something negative to you, doesn't mean that everyone and their dog gets automatic cheap shots against you.

 

[OakwoodDM]

Anyway, as far as I can tell, the RAW declares that attacks of opportunity are made when:

a) an opponent leaves your threatened square (but NOT when he enters your threatened square)
b) when an opponent within range uses a ranged or area attack power including close bursts.

Actually, Close Bursts (and close blasts for that matter. Basically, anything Close) don't provoke Opportunity Attacks. Just Ranged and Area.

 

[ourchair]

For the same reason you don't provoke OAs by being attacked by someone else. Just because someone does something negative to you, doesn't mean that everyone and their dog gets automatic cheap shots against you.

Fair enough.

 

[KarinsDad]

The difference between forced movement and regular movement, is the former is being pushed, pulled, tossed, something is making you move away, and it does not involve you dropping your guard.

The latter case tho, you're dropping your guard to move more than a small amount. So that's why it provokes.

There is no "why it provokes" other than "that's the rules". It actually has nothing to do with this type of in character rationalization.

The reason you do not provoke in the former case is not because you "don't lower your guard". You do not provoke in the former case because the rules state that you don't.

You do provoke in the latter case because the rules state that you do, not because it actually makes sense (for example, in martial arts, people are taught how to retreat while keeping up their guard, it's actually pretty darn simple).

In this type of example, the creature being tossed aside by the Giant is doing uncontrolled movement. From a logical perspective, he should drop his guard a lot more than the creature just moving away, but that's not what the rules state.

This is no different than the prone unconscious PC on the ground should drop his guard a lot more than the prone conscious PC doing an action which provokes, but the rules do not work that way.


Fluff-wise, a lot of this stuff doesn't make a lot of sense. Crunch-wise, it's balanced and hence the reason for the rules the way they are written. But OAs in general don't make a whole heck of a lot of sense. Casting this type of spell provokes, but casting this other type doesn't. Moving past a foe provokes, even if that foe is busy with another target. Being distracted by two foes doesn't provoke. Lots of stuff which should doesn't and some stuff which shouldn't does. Meh.

 

[FrozenChrono]

I've always thought of it as when being pushed you are flying by an enemy at high speed. It makes sense for some but not all push/pull/slide effects. For example with Forceful Dismissal I envision characters are being launched back a long distance and land prone. That's not something someone's going to be expecting enough to take a whack at the character, you'd need to be prepared (like a batter for a pitch).

For lower impact powers the power itself could be in the way. Lightning Lure snares the opponent in electricity. This effect could very easily make an easy OA impossible even though the affected enemy is stumbling by because there's a bunch of electric whips flying around cutting off your path of attack to the target.

 

[DracoSuave]

Stuff

Interesting.

I mean, the OA rules are obstensibly the same for movement as they were since 2nd Edition's Combat and Tactics first introduced them, and the reasoning I gave was good enough then to describe this very situation.

If you don't understand the fluff behind the mechanics, that's okay. But don't pretend they don't exist... they're one of the few things that -has not- changed.

 

[MarkB]

In our first game of 4e last year, we played with the assumption that forced movement leaving the threatened square provokes AOs, which is exciting for everyone because slamming a guy 3 squares parallel to a row of allies causes a big old AO party.

You've pretty much answered your own question there. Forced movement provoking is unbalanced, because it's too easy to set up large chains of triggered attacks as a result.

There are two ways around that: Make forced movement powers far rarer and less powerful, or don't let forced movement provoke Opportunity Attacks. Given how much fun the extra tactical dimension of forced movement brings to the game even without provoking OAs, I'd say the designers went with the right option.