Attacking a grappled target

[dunbruha]

Hi. I have lookead at the rules for grappling, but I didn't see anything about this:

Is there a penalty for attacking a target that is in a grapple? Is there a chance of hitting the other person? For example, if a monster is grappling a character, and a second character (not in the grapple) wants to attack the monster, is there a "to hit" (or some other) penalty?

 

[Ltheb Silverfrond]

It isn't listed in the grappling section; its under Combat Modifiers. Attacking into a grapple takes no penalty, but you determine randomly which combatant you strike at. He or she loses his dex bonus to AC. This implies that you must roll who you strike at before rolling to hit; IE You can't have Bob grapple Stan, roll to hit Bob's AC of 10, but end up randomly hitting Stan, who's AC is 42. It doesn't call out this order of operations, but I accidentally ran a combat like this, and it was really bad.

Also, if you attack at a Pinned grappler, he takes some heavy penalties: His or her Dexterity Score is treated as 0 (so a minus 5 modifier) AND he or she takes a -4 to AC on top of that. Plus rogues get their sneak-attack damage.

 

[Hypersmurf]

It isn't listed in the grappling section; its under Combat Modifiers. Attacking into a grapple takes no penalty, but you determine randomly which combatant you strike at.

Note that this is only true for ranged attacks. With a melee attack, you've no chance of striking the wrong target in a grapple.

(Contrast this with Bull Rush, where an AoO has a 25% chance of striking the wrong target.)

-Hyp.

 

[Whimsical]

Also, if your target is pinned, there is no "roll randomly" chance to hit other grapplers. It's only when you are attacking a grappled opponent with a ranged attack.

 

[dunbruha]

It isn't listed in the grappling section; its under Combat Modifiers.

OK, thanks. That's just what I needed. I appreciate the help.