A few rules questions (grappling and Con drain)

[Grog]

1. Attacking into a grapple. I couldn't find any special rules for this in the 3.5 PHB. Does this mean that you can just pick the combatant in a grapple who you want to attack, and do so with no penalty? How does this work?

2. If a monster has Improved Grab and a nasty special attack it can do to someone after a grapple (for example, swallowing), when does it get to use the special attack? Can it attack and, if it hits, use the Improved Grab, and then if the grapple check succeeds, swallow the target all in the same round? Or does it have to wait a round before swallowing, giving the target a chance to escape the grapple?

3. Am I correct in assuming that Constitution drain can't reduce a character's base HP below 1/level? For example, if a 3rd level sorceror with a 10 Con and 9 HP gets drained to a 2 Con, his base HP would be 3, not -3?

 

[thompgc]

1 -If you attack into a grapple w/a melee weapon you pick who to hit.
If you are using a ranged weapon you randomly determine who you hit

2 don't recall

3 - You are correct about HP and con drain

 

[Grog]

1 -If you attack into a grapple w/a melee weapon you pick who to hit.

That's what I was after. Thanks!

Apparentely D&D combatants stand remarkably still during a grapple....

 

[Gansk]

I think swallow whole has wording that delays it one round (something like "if the creature starts the round grappling, it can swallow whole"). Constriction damage is applied immediately if the grapple check succeeds with an improved grab.

 

[Infiniti2000]

1. thompgc answered.

2. If a monster has Improved Grab and a nasty special attack it can do to someone after a grapple (for example, swallowing), when does it get to use the special attack? Can it attack and, if it hits, use the Improved Grab, and then if the grapple check succeeds, swallow the target all in the same round? Or does it have to wait a round before swallowing, giving the target a chance to escape the grapple?

As the esteemed Mr. Gansk says, to use Swallow Whole, a creature must begin "its turn with an opponent held in its mouth...."

3. Am I correct in assuming that Constitution drain can't reduce a character's base HP below 1/level? For example, if a 3rd level sorceror with a 10 Con and 9 HP gets drained to a 2 Con, his base HP would be 3, not -3?

If you are undamaged, then you cannot be drained to negative hps. If in your example, the sorcerer was previously damaged to 5hp, then after being drained, he would drop to -1.

 

[Grog]

Thanks for the help, guys. Just for my own information, could someone point me to the section of the rules that deals with attacking into a grapple?

 

[Infiniti2000]

Thanks for the help, guys. Just for my own information, could someone point me to the section of the rules that deals with attacking into a grapple?

In the combat chapter under Combat Modifers (Hypertext SRD link), check out the table Armor Class Modifiers for when Defender is Grappling but attacker is not. For Melee, only Footnote 1 is referenced. For Ranged, Footnotes 1 and 3 are referenced. #3 is "Roll randomly to see which grappling combatant you strike. That defender loses any Dexterity bonus to AC. " Of course, #3 makes #1 superfluous.