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<blockquote data-quote="El Mahdi" data-source="post: 6607798" data-attributes="member: 59506">I disagree...that is unless you consider all mechanics to be Meta.Once one is engaged in combat, one cannot simply choose to arbitrarily end it.&nbsp; The other participant in the engagement still has a say in it.&nbsp; If one just simply attempts to walk away, you're shish kebab.Instead, you have to DO something to gain some separation, to gain a momentary break in the engagement.&nbsp; If not, your attacker is going to press that sudden opening; an Attack of Opportunity.So, Disengage is an action; an action that takes a mental choice, a physical action, and an expenditure of time and focus.That physical action could be a misdirect in order to disengage (rather than a misdirect to create an opening for an attack), or passing up an opportunity at a riposte from a parry in order to use an opponents attack to instead gain separation, etc.Much like an attack roll, it's an abstract representation of a multitude of possible actions that all functionally result in the same thing.So, no more Meta than any other game mechanic.As to Attacks of Opportunity, IMO those are no more meta than any other mechanic either.&nbsp; However, I do feel that they were overused in past iterations of the game.&nbsp; For instance, a character engaged in combat with another is far too busy to suddenly take an Attack of Opportunity on a third party.&nbsp; That is unless they don't mind taking their focus off of the enemy in front of them, if they don't mind giving their currently engaged opponent an opening for them to take an Attack of Opportunity also.&nbsp; In most situations, the answer would likely be it's not worth opening oneself up to an Attack of Opportunity themselves, unless they had a good reason for it; like keeping somebody from bypassing them to get to a weaker target, or keeping them from the McGuffin in the room, trying to keep them from escaping, etc.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="El Mahdi, post: 6607798, member: 59506"] I disagree...that is unless you consider all mechanics to be [I]Meta[/I]. Once one is engaged in combat, one cannot simply choose to arbitrarily end it. The other participant in the engagement still has a say in it. If one just simply attempts to walk away, you're shish kebab. Instead, you have to [B][I]DO[/I][/B] something to gain some separation, to gain a momentary break in the engagement. If not, your attacker is going to press that sudden opening; an [I]Attack of Opportunity[/I]. So, Disengage is an action; an action that takes a mental choice, a physical action, and an expenditure of time and focus. That physical action could be a misdirect in order to disengage (rather than a misdirect to create an opening for an attack), or passing up an opportunity at a riposte from a parry in order to use an opponents attack to instead gain separation, etc. Much like an attack roll, it's an abstract representation of a multitude of possible actions that all functionally result in the same thing. So, no more [I]Meta[/I] than any other game mechanic. As to Attacks of Opportunity, IMO those are no more meta than any other mechanic either. However, I do feel that they were overused in past iterations of the game. For instance, a character engaged in combat with another is far too busy to suddenly take an Attack of Opportunity on a third party. That is unless they don't mind taking their focus off of the enemy in front of them, if they don't mind giving their currently engaged opponent an opening for them to take an Attack of Opportunity also. In most situations, the answer would likely be it's not worth opening oneself up to an Attack of Opportunity themselves, unless they had a good reason for it; like keeping somebody from bypassing them to get to a weaker target, or keeping them from the McGuffin in the room, trying to keep them from escaping, etc. [/QUOTE]

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