Proposed Wager with DracoSuave - Blurred Step

[DracoSuave]

I think the arguments with Blurred Step really devolve down to interpretation of the rules.

1) Do you know what square an enemy is shifting into before he shifts?

2) Does shifting into that target square abort the enemy's shift?

3) If not 2 then does it at least cost the enemy one square of his shift?

1 and 2 are both a Yes according to the FAQ.

 

[keterys]

The FAQ says:
1. I'm playing a battlemind. If an adjacent enemy that I have marked attempts to shift to another square adjacent to me, can I use blurred step to shift to that square and prevent the enemy from entering it?

Yes, blurred step is an opportunity action, which interrupts its trigger.
​

So, you do know where they're shifting and that shift is blocked. If they're doing a 'shift 5' type maneuver, then they still have another 4 squares worth of shift they can do something else with. If you choose to use Blurred Step instead of an opportunity attack to follow someone who is making a move action to just move 5 squares, it is similarly limited. If you don't have a power or melee training to make your opportunity attack notable, this might very much come up.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Which is of course why Twisted Eye (admittedly with 1 augment) is there. If you can't/don't want to follow the enemy and you're more than 2 squares distant from the character you're defending then you drop a Twisted Eye on the enemy. If you ARE within 2 squares you can just use Blurred Step to get within one square, at which point you can Mind Spike the enemy when he attacks (and remember, he's STILL marked by you, this is a bad deal all around for the enemy).

I see the Battlemind's defending as a lot like the way the Paladin defends. Mind Spike is a sort of inverse of Lay on Hands. Instead of patching up the damage after the fact, you hurt the enemy after the fact or just degrade its to-hit so much the attack is futile. I really don't think I'll have much trouble running with this concept in a game. Its going to play a good bit different than a fighter and maybe more like a warden (as someone else noted) but it should work fine.

The only aspect of the Battlemind I'm really at all unsure about right now is just that it seems like you are tied fairly closely to the people you defend in most situations. It sounds like that may change as you level up, but it is a bit different than most of the other defenders.

 

[Samir]

The FAQ says:
1. I'm playing a battlemind. If an adjacent enemy that I have marked attempts to shift to another square adjacent to me, can I use blurred step to shift to that square and prevent the enemy from entering it?

Yes, blurred step is an opportunity action, which interrupts its trigger.
​

So, you do know where they're shifting and that shift is blocked. If they're doing a 'shift 5' type maneuver, then they still have another 4 squares worth of shift they can do something else with. If you choose to use Blurred Step instead of an opportunity attack to follow someone who is making a move action to just move 5 squares, it is similarly limited. If you don't have a power or melee training to make your opportunity attack notable, this might very much come up.

So what happens when you use an immediate interrupt that pulls the target away from the square they are trying to shift into? Do they lose 1 square of shifting?

 

[keterys]

Sure, if you pull them far enough they can't shift into that square they lose that movement, just like if someone did a melee strike targeting an adjacent enemy and it interrupted to shift away. No longer a valid target, so that melee attack is invalidated and still expended. Ditto for movement, it's just that movement gets broken down by square so it's harder to invalidate an entire action that way.

Though prone, slow, and daze do wonders

 

[Colmarr]

The FAQ says:
1. I'm playing a battlemind. If an adjacent enemy that I have marked attempts to shift to another square adjacent to me, can I use blurred step to shift to that square and prevent the enemy from entering it?

Yes, blurred step is an opportunity action, which interrupts its trigger.
​

So, you do know where they're shifting

The FAQ answer doesn't actually support your conclusion. In fact, it's completely neutral on the issue.

All the answer says is that if you shift into the end square, you get there first. Although knowledge of the destination square is implied in the question, there's absolutely no reference to it in the answer.

 

[DracoSuave]

The FAQ answer doesn't actually support your conclusion. In fact, it's completely neutral on the issue.

All the answer says is that if you shift into the end square, you get there first. Although knowledge of the destination square is implied in the question, there's absolutely no reference to it in the answer.

Except they haven't actually declared their shift until they choose the square. At that point, the shift's interruptable, before then, it's not happening.

And stuff like that isn't exactly secret knowledge.

I don't see how the square they are shifting to can be unknown, seeing as you don't know they are shifting until they go 'I'm shifting here.'

 

[Colmarr]

I agree that I would play it that way too.

I was simply being Mr Lucifer's representative and pointing out that your supporting evidence wasn't actually all that supportive.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

DS is right though. There is no such thing as a shift that doesn't have a destination and the shift action has to be declared BEFORE triggers can go off. Once an OA goes off it happens at interrupt speed.

The main thing the BM has to watch is monsters that can do long shifts and get by them that way. Fighters will probably be better off in this situation BUT even they can only stop the movement entirely once per round. All that can really be said is every defender has its nemesis and there are STILL ways to usually set things up to give you a shot at Mind Spiking the creature when it attacks your ally.

 

[Mr. Teapot]

If they're doing a 'shift 5' type maneuver, then they still have another 4 squares worth of shift they can do something else with.

Do you actually have any rules support for this interpretation? That FAQ answer doesn't say anything of the sort.

All I can see is the rules on interrupts saying that an invalidated action is lost. The text there says "If an interrupt invalidates a triggering action, that action is lost", which may or may not mean the standard/move/minor/whatever action is lost (the example doesn't clarify this).

I see no reason to assume that the shift loses a square of movement but can keep moving rather than the entire shift being lost. If anything, I'd say "the entire shift is lost" is an interpretation more grounded in the rules.