Are Expertise and Fighting Defensively Stackable?

[CuriousBard]

I have a PC in my group that has the Expertise Feat, but also wants to Fight Defensively. He was under the impression that he could do this (effectively giving him a +7 to the AC in exchange for a -9 on his attack) and I hadn't given it any thought. But as I think about it, I wasn't really sure if that was allowable or not.

Your thoughts?

 

[IceBear]

It was clarified by either Sean or the Sage that they are.

IceBear

 

[Artoomis]

Yep - legal.

Fighting Defensively:

A combatant can choose to fight defensively when taking the attack action. If a combatant does so, the combatant takes a -4 penalty on all attacks in a round to gain a +2 dodge bonus to AC for the same round.

Expertise:

When the character uses the attack action or full attack action in melee...

The question is: Is the character using attack action?

Answer: Yes. When fighting defensively you are indeed using the attack action, so you can combine the two together.

There is a part of me that wants to say it's not allowed, but the rules pretty clearly allow it. You won't hit much, but you'll have a great AC. So be it - maybe it will but some time while you move away - heck, with mobililty you could get ANOTHER +4 AC while you moved out of the threatened area - for a total of +11 AC and -9 attack while still getting one move action. Perhaps a better option than just moving away if your move might take you through other threatened squares.

 

[Antikinesis]

Yep - legal.

Fighting Defensively:

The question is: Is the character using attack action?

Answer: Yes. When fighting defensively you are indeed using the attack action, so you can combine the two together.

There is a part of me that wants to say it's not allowed, but the rules pretty clearly allow it. You won't hit much, but you'll have a great AC. So be it - maybe it will but some time while you move away - heck, with mobililty you could get ANOTHER +4 AC while you moved out of the threatened area - for a total of +11 AC and -9 attack while still getting one move action. Perhaps a better option than just moving away if your move might take you through other threatened squares.

Give him 5 or more ranks of tumble, and you can bump those AC's up another point...

AC +12 (+5 (expertise) +3 (fight def.) + 4 (mobility) ),
Att -9 (-5 (expertise) -4(fight def.) )

Does full-defense (edit: make that "total defense". Thanks, Art.) (as opposed to fight def.) count as an attack action? Combined with 5 or more tumble ranks, that would add another +3 AC, I think. I don't think I'd allow that one, but I was wondering what the "official" ruling on that was.

AK

 

[Artoomis]

Give him 5 or more ranks of tumble, and you can bump those AC's up another point...

AC +12 (+5 (expertise) +3 (fight def.) + 4 (mobility) ),
Att -9 (-5 (expertise) -4(fight def.) )

Does full-defense (as opposed to fight def.) count as an attack action? Combined with 5 or more tumble ranks, that would add another +3 AC, I think. I don't think I'd allow that one, but I was wondering what the "official" ruling on that was.

AK

Full-defense, by which I presume you mean "Total Defense" is an action:

: A combatant doesn't attack or perform any other activity other than moving at base speed, but the combatant gets a +4 dodge bonus to AC for 1 round. The combatant's AC improves at the start of this action, so it helps against any attacks of opportunity provoked while moving.

It can't be combined with anything needing the attack or full-attack actions.

 

[IceBear]

That's what I have to check my notes for when I get home. I think Sean allowed the synergy bonus from Tumbling to stack. My memory is hazy right now so I'll have to check my notes.

IceBear

 

[Artoomis]

Just to finish this up.

Assuming the SRD is accurate:

From the tumble skill:

Special: A character with 5 or more ranks in Tumble gains a +3 dodge AC bonus when executing the fight defensively standard or full-round action instead of a +2 dodge AC bonus.
A character with 5 or more ranks in Tumble gains a +6 dodge AC bonus when executing the total defense standard action instead of a +4 dodge AC bonus.

I don't see any question. You get +3 instead of +2 for Fighting Defensively and +6 instead of +4 when using Total Defense.

So you could, indeed, have +12 AC and -9 Attack when moving out of combat with a single move, assuming you have 5 ranks in Tumble, the Expertise feat with at least +5 BAB and the Mobility feat.

 

[IceBear]

I currently have no opinion because I want to refer to my notes first. Sean made some clarifications on this - about what stacked with what - and I want to review that first (you are most likely correct, but I still want to review before I commit to anything).

IceBear

 

[Ristamar]

From the old d20 combat pages:

Expertise, Tumbling, and Fight Defensively: WotC's Sean Reynolds has the latest word on whether one can combine the Expertise feat and the Fight Defensively combat action and how the Tumbling skill works into the mix: OK, apparently Skip [Williams] got out of a meeting this afternoon where they discussed this, and they have reversed their decision. So:

1. Expertise is *not* a better version of Fight Defensively
2. The two *can* be used together.
3. A character with 5 ranks in Tumble increases their dodge bonus by 1 when using Fight Defensively.
4. A character with 5 ranks in Tumble does *not* get an additional bonus when using Expertise.[/list=1]

 

[IceBear]

Thanks - that's what I have at home in my notes.

IceBear