Spiked Chains: Pure cheese or sometimes OK?

[NilesB]

Bendability doesn't make a flail any less a bludgeon, same applies to chains.

 

[Victim]

That's fine. There's still plenty to chew on.

Um, in my universe, AoOs happen. Forcing an AoO is a specific kind of tactic, one that has nothing to do with a build like this. This is so you can smack someone for each and every iterative trip attack, or to prevent 1d4+1 fiendish wolves from mobbing your spellcaster, etc.

In my experience, AoOs are usually easily avoided - getting a chance to take even your free AoO each round is unusual. Thus Combat Reflexes isn't very good without a method to force attacks or as a particular counter. My monk didn't like the blackguard with Close Quarters Fighting and Combat Reflexes. But fiendish wolves are generally going to fast enough to skirt around a defender without reach (or even with reach) and trip attacks usually don't provoke AoO anyway.

I don't have a problem with Improved Disarm, Improved Sunder, or Imp Bullrush. Each one adds a useful enough ability. I do have a problem with all of them. Imp Disarm works against weapon using opponents, and loses effectiveness as enemy size increases. Imp Sunder works against weapon using opponents, and loses effectiveness as enemy size increases. Imp Bullrush works best against smallish foes without unusual movement modes. Basically, each of these feats works best against humanoids with class levels, leaving the character with largely redundant feats. If you're going for a Shock Trooper/Combat Brute combo, then taking 2/3 of is good but even then the last one is pretty extraneous.

We are talking about a sword and shield fighter. The barbarian probably wants to go two-handed. The barbarian has some advantages, but he cannot begin to compete in the AC department with this guy. Full plate, baby.

Every time I've seen numbers or arena fights run on the wizards optimization board, the fighter wins over the barbarian in damage output. The barbarian is partially a skill character, and indeed, is less able at fighting than, yes, a fighter.

That's great. But I'm not talking about fighters versus barbarians. I'm talking about fighters vs fighter/barbarians (the best of both worlds). I'm using marginal benefits in the economic sense: the benefit per each additional unit. Fighters aren't marginal. Think about it this way; your character already has a bunch of fighter levels (let's say 12) and you need to decide where to allocate future levels. Each extra fighter level adds half a feat in special abilities. So to justify further fighter levels, every bonus fighter feat has to be at least equivalent to the first two levels of other fighting classes (or other classes, but the general similarity in HD, Bab, and saves makes comparison MUCH easier).

That cost comparison sets a pretty high standard for feats. It's not enough that having Disarm might occasionally be useful when you already have Sunder, it has to be more useful than the stuff the character could gain from multiclassing. Opportunity cost is the key. So you need to be able to bring lots feats to bear effectively in order for them to pay off enough to justify the investment in fighter levels.

 

[pawsplay]

Well, right. But "deep" feats aren't always the way to go. On its own, Combat Reflexes is a nice feat. It may not come up in every fight, but when it does, you're glad to have it.

Just as an example, my group last week fought a Death Knight. They were pretty peeved when he waltzed right through the group, taking one and only one AoO from each person, walked right up to the group's divine caster and sundered his staff of healing.

 

[Fat Daddy]

Divergence:
I don't buy "reach weapons" not being able to hit adjacent squares in most situations. Adjacent next to you? Perhaps not, Adjacent in front of you? You've got to be joking right? Baseball kids, Baseball! The rules lawyers forgot something fairly simple that most kids learn when they play their first game of baseball. Choke up on the bat! Hell even I had to play baseball.

Actually they have addressed this in ( I think??) PHBII, the feat Short Haft allows you to take a swift action to 'choke up' on your reach weapon and threaten adjacent squares. You can also take a swift action to resume your 'standard' grip and threaten the reach squares again.
As far as the facing rules go, well that's a whole 'nother can o' worms.

 

[Tetsubo]

Lets restate that a little more accurately :

Morningstar: a weighted Iron bludgeon with spikes attached.
Spiked chain : a weighted Iron bludgeon with spikes attached.

If the SC was Bludgeoning/Piercing like a Morningstar I'd have a lot less issue with it. You would also need to remove all of those idiotic spikes from the chain itself. It would allow a Sunder attack but wouldn't work underwater any longer. The underwater things is just absurd...

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Lets restate that a little more accurately :

Morningstar: a weighted Iron bludgeon with spikes attached.
Spiked chain : a weighted Iron bludgeon with spikes attached.

That's actually less accurate than my description.

With a Morningstar, the bulk of the weapon's mass is concentrated in the ball at the end of the haft.

With a Spiked Chain, the weapon's mass would be fairly evenly distributed over the weapon's entire length.

This makes a difference.

 

[Falkus]

Just as an example, my group last week fought a Death Knight. They were pretty peeved when he waltzed right through the group, taking one and only one AoO from each person, walked right up to the group's divine caster and sundered his staff of healing.

Combat reflexes wouldn't have helped there. Even with it, you can still only make one AOO for an enemy's movement through squares you threaten.

 

[NilesB]

That's actually less accurate than my description.

With a Morningstar, the bulk of the weapon's mass is concentrated in the ball at the end of the haft.

Less so than you'd think, there's a minimum weight for a suficientl sturdy shaft, a maximum weight before the weapon is too unwieldy for one hand.

With a Spiked Chain, the weapon's mass would be fairly evenly distributed over the weapon's entire length.

I've never seen or heard of a fighting chain without a weighted striking end, excepting certain improvised weapons.

And as Tetsubo pointed out being a pure piercing weapon in D&D implies a thrusting profile.

 

[bowbe]

Actually they have addressed this in ( I think??) PHBII, the feat Short Haft allows you to take a swift action to 'choke up' on your reach weapon and threaten adjacent squares. You can also take a swift action to resume your 'standard' grip and threaten the reach squares again.
As far as the facing rules go, well that's a whole 'nother can o' worms.

Groovy, now if they could just make PHB 2 OGL i'd shell out the bucks for it.

Case

 

[Merifluous]

well, I have a bias against a spiked chain since a Fire giant with one killed my namesake when he was 18th level. I tried to run within 20 ft of the giant to go save the world, and the next thing I knew I was on the ground (I got tripped on the AOO) and dead on the giants next turn.

I generally avoid using it for that reason - though I'm starting to wonder why I shouldn't pick one up in the new game that same DM is running