Combat actions before combat?

[Nytmare]

For pretty much any other normal action that a player would want to do all the time, we have an obvious abstraction to fill in the gap. Total defense is a binary state unfortunately, and not something that you can apply the passive skill rules to, because we don't have a measure of how well a character is able to "totally defend." We do however have the whole "start of an encounter" abstraction that we can work with.

My argument would be that of course someone wandering around a dangerous area is going to be doing so in total defense, and that that ends up being reflected in the abstraction of a character's passive perception allowing them to not be surprised at the start of an encounter; or in my eyes, even better yet, not starting an encounter surprised and wide out in the open begging to be taken down by snipers.

Not to muddy the waters with reality, but walking through the woods, I do with my hands in my pockets staring up at the birds in the trees. Walking through the woods playing paintball, I do creeping around with my weapon drawn and readied, scanning what I consider to be dangerous areas for bad guys, and always making sure that I keep some kind of cover between me, and where I'm afraid someone might be hiding.

 

[Squire James]

All this talk of Full Defense and Ready actions seems to be someone trying to gain a mechanical advantage from declaring reasonable and normal preparations for combat (or in some cases, like a superhero announcing all his special moves ahead of time). None of this seems to merit any kind of special advantage. More a statement of intent than an action, I think. The reality of the situation may be exactly as they think (i.e. they achieve surprise and/or win initiative), but then again maybe not.

 

[Amaroq]

I somehow feel the need to clarify

.. Apologies; I hadn't meant to get personal with you!

I simply meant that post as a reply to the part I quoted after "I still find it strange.."; I was trying to address the "fluff" more than the "crunch" in that last post.

This is a funny bit of reasoning, and in real life I've always made fun of people who employ it when negotiating. Your are stating that you find the benefit trivial. But you seem staunchly against granting it. Do you see the funny in that?

MMmmm?? .. I think you're putting words in my mouth. At no point have I stated that I felt the +2 benefit was trivial; in fact, I think that I've been arguing the opposite!

As you noted, it would be a pretty silly position for me to take!

I was actually trying to demonstrate that the "Hey, why can I 'parry' an attack I'm not aware of" was, while an understandable argument, one which might fall far enough down the list of edge cases that the game designers, in their quest for simplicity, would simply decide to allow it to slide rather than making "Total Defense" more complicated by trying for wording like "You only get the +2 against attacks which you can see coming".

Making that argument in more detail:

First, attacks you aren't aware of much less common than attacks you are aware of, especially at lower levels.

Second, being in Total Defense is much much rarer than being in "normal" mode.

Third, the odds of the +2 affecting any given attack are merely 10%.

Fourth, when you put #1, #2, and #3 together, you see that a 10% advantage is significant when you're looking at hundreds of rounds of normal vs normal combat .. but not so significant when you consider the rarity of the case meeting all three: "hidden" attack, Total Defense, and within the 10% range that made it matter.

Fifth, odds are that its the players in Total Defense, not the monsters, so we're "giving" the players the edge case, not taking it away from them.

Sixth, the players are most often going to be in Total Defense when we can't get to a creature: e.g., a ground-based melee fighter versus a flying creature which is out of his reach; that makes "Total Defense" a reasonable strategic choice.

(Though I suspect there are some Defender builds which could make good Strategic use of it, e.g., a Warden: close burst, mark eight guys, then be in Total Defense so that they're all less likely to hit him.)

That begs the question, why can't the player simply state that he is initiating combat? If it's because there are no visible enemies, the player is obviously preparing against enemies the character cannot see. Since you can, legally, fight invisible enemies, the character should be allowed to enter combat.

I'd say that falls under the sack of rats rule, myself. You can't initiate combat without a target any more than you can walk around with your best friend, each punching each other on the shoulder every round, and claim that you're "in combat" and therefore can't be surprised.

(Or even better, start, and stop, combat, until you both have initiative rolls of 18 or higher plus modifiers! Oh, and then we're both in Total Defense, of course...)

Likewise, I'd say you can't initiate combat against an invisible enemy unless you're actually aware that it is there, for some reason. Otherwise, your characters simply "Initiate Combat" at the end of each Short Rest, and stay in it until they meet something.

I'd actually be quite surprised if the PHB doesn't cover what counts as Combat and what doesn't; I don't have it available at the moment.

The other problematic point is that this prohibition gives characters in combat an advantage that doesn't make sense. They can use total defense, even to protect themselves from an unknown opponent, but those out of combat cannot. That's crazy. Why wouldn't an alert character be able to do whatever it is that a character who is in a fight be able to do? Or, better yet, why would an unknown attacker have better odds of hurting an alert and vigilant character who is not engaged in combat than one who is (and has used a total defense action)?

Again, I suspect this was an intentional "keep Total Defense simple" decision on the part of the developers. You could well argue for a House Rule applying the Total Defense benefit only to attacks which you can see coming ... but I don't think that's really necessary.

However, from a fluff perspective: the alert vigilant not-in-combat character is unlikely to be moving around as much as the in-combat character. No matter how "wary" he is, he's not shifting his feet and changing his orientation anywhere near as much as a fighter in combat is, his weapon is unlikely to be "up" and moving around as much as the fighter's is, etc .. there are many many ways you can imagine "Total Defense" being a bit different in combat than "I'm on alert" is out of combat.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

keeping in total defense for more than a few minutes is impossible. Also you are burning you standard action, and you are moving on half speed. Even though you may win initiative, your action in your surprise round is lost...? Why is it a balance problem? Why is it unrealistic?

I really believe the in combat out of combat thing is artificial. So declaring to be in combat mode all the time is nonsense as a DM disallowing "combat actions" out of combat.

Combat starts when one side is aware of the enemy side. And you can take as many surprise rounds until you alert the enemy. Just be careful to argument against full rounds after surprise rounds: "rounds are just split into shorter rounds (only one standard action) because the first standard action which is used to attack the enemy is alerting them, and now they can act in order of initiative...

 

[Doctor Proctor]

Just to toss in my .02 on the question of why using Total Defense all the time is impractical, I would say to chalk it up to a "heat of the moment" sort of thing. It's literally impossible to be 100% vigilant and alert for hours on end. Just ask anyone who has ever been a cop or in the military and they'll tell you the same thing.

Part of what "combat" and things like "total defense" are trying to abstract is the sudden surge of adrenaline accompanying danger, and the way that it speeds up your reflexes and increases your awareness of your surroundings. Fighter pilots used to talk about something called "situational awareness", which is basically knowing what's going on around even when you aren't directly looking at it and being able to predict what it will do in the near future. Basically, in combat they're able to achieve a heightened level of SA where they can manage the speed of combat and track threats much faster than normal. This is essentially "total defense". That's why it doesn't work well as an out of combat mechanic. Without the danger and adrenaline there won't be that heightened state of awareness needed to achieve that level of SA.

 

[DracoSuave]

Here's an abstraction for ya.

If you're walking about, keeping an eye for danger, that's called 'What you normally do.'

Congrats on describing your character as doing the baseline necessary to not fail to be heroic.

That's not a full defense bonus for you, that's 'You're doing what I assume everyone should be doing.'

 

[Ferghis]

Well, thanks to this thread I think I can concisely state the three issues I can see with not allowing players to have their characters enter total defense before combat.

1. It's incongruous that a character can use total defense in combat to be harder to hit than when s/he is not in combat.

2. It's incongruous that a character cannot initiate combat whenever s/he wants if there are actions that are restricted to "combat only."

3. Although I recognize the unpleasantness of allowing reasonable use of total defense or ready an action out of combat, I don't see any real consequences detrimental to game play.

keeping in total defense for more than a few minutes is impossible. Also you are burning you standard action, and you are moving on half speed. Even though you may win initiative, your action in your surprise round is lost...? Why is it a balance problem? Why is it unrealistic?

I couldn't tell you.

.. Apologies; I hadn't meant to get personal with you!

My turn to apologize for misunderstanding what you said.

First, attacks you aren't aware of much less common than attacks you are aware of, especially at lower levels.

Second, being in Total Defense is much much rarer than being in "normal" mode.

Third, the odds of the +2 affecting any given attack are merely 10%.

Fourth, when you put #1, #2, and #3 together, you see that a 10% advantage is significant when you're looking at hundreds of rounds of normal vs normal combat .. but not so significant when you consider the rarity of the case meeting all three: "hidden" attack, Total Defense, and within the 10% range that made it matter.

This is what I took to mean that you were minimizing the benefit of taking total defense out of combat. Since you are not saying that, I'm left a bit confused, because it really sounds like you are saying that the situation is not so significant. I'm trying not to be snarky here. Pre-emptive apologies if I come across that way.

Fifth, odds are that its the players in Total Defense, not the monsters, so we're "giving" the players the edge case, not taking it away from them.

Here I disagree: if this were allowed, I think it would much more often be monsters to use the action. But I could easily be wrong. It's already happened today.

Sixth, the players are most often going to be in Total Defense when we can't get to a creature: e.g., a ground-based melee fighter versus a flying creature which is out of his reach; that makes "Total Defense" a reasonable strategic choice.

Those PC actions seem reasonable to me. Otherwise, I'm not sure I could explain to myself (1) why we are not in combat if there is a hostile creature nearby (even if it's out of reach) and (2) why the characters wouldn't be in total defense if they were forced to wait for those attacks. Well, I would hope some of them would ready some attacks too, but that falls under the same parameter.

I'd say that falls under the sack of rats rule, myself. You can't initiate combat without a target any more than you can walk around with your best friend, each punching each other on the shoulder every round, and claim that you're "in combat" and therefore can't be surprised.

I have to disagree, and not only because I've been subjected to considerable bruising by so-called-friends who engage in the quite combative activity encompassed by the game of punch buggy. Seriously: the character enters total defense because the player suspects a genuine hostile presence. I expect players to play reasonably, otherwise the game ends rather quickly.

(Or even better, start, and stop, combat, until you both have initiative rolls of 18 or higher plus modifiers!

This is not reasonable, and would be prevented by the rule above.

Likewise, I'd say you can't initiate combat against an invisible enemy unless you're actually aware that it is there, for some reason.

Define "actually aware" in a way that no-one could reasonably disagree with. Must you have sensed the invisible creature with a (penalized) perception check? What if something is moving about the air and there is no likely source of telekinesis? What if the DM says "you think you saw something strange play with the light over there, but you can't see anything out of the ordinary when you focus on that area?"

Again, I suspect [giving characters in combat the option to have higher defenses than characters out of combat] was an intentional "keep Total Defense simple" decision on the part of the developers. You could well argue for a House Rule applying the Total Defense benefit only to attacks which you can see coming ... but I don't think that's really necessary.

Well, despite all my respect for the designers at WotC and their hard work, I would probably pin this on neglect rather than intentional design, but I don't know. As to the houserule that nerfs Total Defense, that's certainly reasonable. However, I have to admit that it would also be reasonable to simply allow the action in non-combat situations as well. Plus, it is arguably a less intrusive interpretation of the rules, since it does not contradict any of the RAW.

However, from a fluff perspective: the alert vigilant not-in-combat character is unlikely to be moving around as much as the in-combat character. No matter how "wary" he is, he's not shifting his feet and changing his orientation anywhere near as much as a fighter in combat is, his weapon is unlikely to be "up" and moving around as much as the fighter's is, etc .. there are many many ways you can imagine "Total Defense" being a bit different in combat than "I'm on alert" is out of combat.

I can't say that I buy that. I see no reason an alert, ready character cannot do the same "fluff" activity than one in combat.

Just to toss in my .02 on the question of why using Total Defense all the time is impractical, I would say to chalk it up to a "heat of the moment" sort of thing. It's literally impossible to be 100% vigilant and alert for hours on end.

I don't think anyone disputes that. I certainly do not. Any player who pretended their character could do otherwise should be laughed out of the game.

 

[Amaroq]

Mmm. We may have to agree to disagree, because I find myself disagreeing with your three issues.

1. It's incongruous that a character can use total defense in combat to be harder to hit than when s/he is not in combat.

I don't agree; I think there are plenty of reasons why that "works" for me: parrying a weapon, moving within my (much larger than me) 5x5 square... etc.

2. It's incongruous that a character cannot initiate combat whenever s/he wants if there are actions that are restricted to "combat only."

I don't agree. It takes two to tango. If you've only got one, you can do forms .. if you have two allies willing to cross swords, you can spar ... but its not "combat".

3. Although I recognize the unpleasantness of allowing reasonable use of total defense or ready an action out of combat, I don't see any real consequences detrimental to game play.

I disagree. I think that leads to an "I walk forward, staying in Total Defense" mechanic, with the players asserting that they're in Total Defense whenever they're in potentially hostile territory. That leads to starting every combat with all parties in Total Defense ass the only logical outcome; I think that badly negates the "power" of Surprise, as we're all at a -2 to hit all targets during a surprise round. To my mind, that's a consequence detrimental to game play: I like having Perception/Stealth be something that can work to the players' advantage or disadvantage.

Since we feel so opposite, and we've had a few goes at convincing each other, I think I'm willing to write this off as an agree-to-disagree case.

. . .

That said, I'll take my last shot at responding to your specific comments, because I feel like we're missing each other on one key point in the discussion.

It feels to me like most of the confusion is coming up where I'm trying to make a point about "how Total Defense works during combat", and I'm failing to state my argument clearly enough, so you are interpreting those comments to apply to the case "Allowing Total Defense out of combat."

Each of the six points I made about Total Defense referred to "In my experience, regarding Total Defense when it is action usable during combat only."

This is what I took to mean that you were minimizing the benefit of taking total defense out of combat. Since you are not saying that, I'm left a bit confused, because it really sounds like you are saying that the situation is not so significant. I'm trying not to be snarky here.

My intent there has always been to discuss the benefit of considering "total defense during combat", specifically against an "attack from a hidden enemy".

My comments there are not aimed at minimizing the benefit of "taking total defense out of combat"; in fact, I'm trying to argue that the benefit of taking total defense out of combat is TOO LARGE, not too small!

I've trying to indicate that I think that the number of cases which will be affected by allowing "taking total defenses out of combat" is much larger than the number of cases where "total defense in combat" affects an "attack from a hidden enemy".

Therefore, I conclude that the argument you advanced in post 27 and again in post 30, essentially, "{characters in combat} can use total defense, even to protect themselves from an unknown opponent, but those out of combat cannot. That's crazy," to be argument that does not argue persuasively for allowing Total Defense outside of combat.

Here I disagree: if this were allowed, I think it would much more often be monsters to use the action. But I could easily be wrong. It's already happened today.

I agree!

Again, I was trying to say, that, in my experience of the game, allowing Total Defense only in combat, I can't recall a time I've seen a monster take Total Defense; it is an action which I've certainly seen Player Characters take.

Therefore, if "Total defense during combat, versus an unseen attacker" does get left off as an edge case, its more likely to benefit the PC's than to hurt the PC's, so its not worth complicating the rules to cover.

(Assuming it was an intentional design decision, and not an oversight; you seem to prefer the interpretation that this was neglect, in which case - well, the same argument applies: if its an area of the rules that was neglected, but basically and only minimally to the PC's benefit, its hardly worth fixing.)

Yes, you're spot on, in that if we allow Total Defense as a regular action outside of combat, I think its reasonable to assume that most guard monsters, etc, are in Total Defense all the time .. which is an interpretation I personally dislike, and think winds up favoring the monsters more than the players.

Seriously: the character enters total defense because the player suspects a genuine hostile presence. I expect players to play reasonably, otherwise the game ends rather quickly.

That's a very optimistic view, and the amount of WotC errata fixing exploitable combinations of rules does sort of seem to argue against it ...

... but fair enough; I have the same expectation, and I don't want to invite players who don't play reasonably back to my game!

Most of my arguments stem from trying to pre-empt the munchkin rules-lawyer who would basically state "No, I'm in Total Defense all the time. Look, I even wrote it on my character sheet!"

If we're making the assumption "the players elect Total Defense outside of combat only when its a reasonable choice, and the DM awards the +2 bonus only if he agrees that its a reasonable choice," then I'm much less worried about the effects of allowing Total Defense outside of combat - and I think that caveat gets us back out of the "monsters are on Total Defense all the time" case.

Define "actually aware" in a way that no-one could reasonably disagree with. Must you have sensed the invisible creature with a (penalized) perception check? What if something is moving about the air and there is no likely source of telekinesis? What if the DM says "you think you saw something strange play with the light over there, but you can't see anything out of the ordinary when you focus on that area?"

Hmm. That I can do!

"A typical combat encounter is a clash between two sides." <- PHB 266.

"Determine surprise. The DM determines whether any combatants are surprised. If any combatants notice enemy combatants without being noticed in return, the aware combatants gain a surprise round," also PHB 266.

And PHB 267: "Some battles begin with a surprise round. A surprise round occurs if any combatants are unaware of enemy combatants’ presence or hostile intentions. For example, if you fail your Perception check to notice concealed enemies, you’re surprised. Or if supposed allies spring an attack and you failed your Insight check to notice the attackers’ traitorous intentions, you’re surprised. But if any of your allies made their Perception or Insight checks, they’re not surprised. When any combatants achieve surprise, they act in initiative order during the surprise round. Surprised combatants don’t act at all during the surprise round."

I'd define "Actually Aware" to mean what the PHB means by "aware", which the PHB gives an example of as made "a Perception check to notice concealed enemies."

So, yes, you must have sensed a hidden or invisible creature with a Perception check to initiate combat with it.

Otherwise, you can walk into a seemingly empty room with an invisible creature and declare, "I start combat in case there's anything in this room, haha!"

(Its not reasonable to, granted, but you can.)

Then, because combat is started, the invisible creature doesn't get its Surprise Round?

No.

For my money, the player can declare "I'm in combat!" all he wants - if his character doesn't perceive the enemy, the enemy gets a surprise round when it decides to reveal itself, and the surprised character doesn't participate until the first real round.

Plus, {allowing total defense outside of combat} is arguably a less intrusive interpretation of the rules, since it does not contradict any of the RAW.

Except for the bits where:
- the character takes an Standard action before the Surprise round begins
- the character gains a mechanical in-combat benefit with no associated in-combat penalty
(where the usual penalty is loss of said Standard action)

.. So I can't say I buy the "does not contradict the RAW" argument!

. . .

Okay, so you don't buy my fluff argument.

However, that got me wondering, what do you envision "Total Defense" as looking like?

What actions can a character be taking, outside of combat, that make him somehow more defensive than he normally is?

What does that look like, exactly?

What elements would a - to keep things simple - sword and board fighter take to be considered in a "Total Defense" state without an enemy combatant.

How would those elements be different in Total Defense than they are from precautions that we would expect any reasonable experienced warrior would be taking while slowly exploring potentially hostile territory?

I suspect this is where we're really talking across each other!

 

[Ferghis]

Mmm. We may have to agree to disagree...

NEVER!!! I will not stand for someone disagreeing with me on the internet! (insert smiley here)

I disagree. I think that leads to an "I walk forward, staying in Total Defense" mechanic, with the players asserting that they're in Total Defense whenever they're in potentially hostile territory. That leads to starting every combat with all parties in Total Defense ass the only logical outcome; I think that badly negates the "power" of Surprise, as we're all at a -2 to hit all targets during a surprise round. To my mind, that's a consequence detrimental to game play: I like having Perception/Stealth be something that can work to the players' advantage or disadvantage.

As a player, I've found other obstacles that prevent me from taking full advantage of surprise rounds. Sometimes the enemies have cover. Sometimes they are even hidden. Sometimes they are out of range. Sometimes they have really good defenses. I don't see another +2 to their defenses as dramatically problematic. I'm not particularly happy about it, but I wouldn't make a fuss about it. But my point is that the roles of Perception and Stealth remain untarnished, as does that of surprise. Further, as you correctly pointed out in the earlier post in this thread, characters that are being cautious are less likely to be surprised generally, so I think the cases in which characters will be surprised and have total defense set up would be very few. Usually, I imagine, it will be a straight to initiative situation.

It feels to me like most of the confusion is coming up where I'm trying to make a point about "how Total Defense works during combat", and I'm failing to state my argument clearly enough, so you are interpreting those comments to apply to the case "Allowing Total Defense out of combat."
[...]
My comments there are not aimed at minimizing the benefit of "taking total defense out of combat"; in fact, I'm trying to argue that the benefit of taking total defense out of combat is TOO LARGE, not too small!
[...]
Therefore, I conclude that the argument you advanced in post 27 and again in post 30, essentially, "{characters in combat} can use total defense, even to protect themselves from an unknown opponent, but those out of combat cannot. That's crazy," to be argument that does not argue persuasively for allowing Total Defense outside of combat.

Ah, okay, I get it. I agree that the in-combat situation where a character's use of total defense is what it takes to defeat the attack of an until-then unknown attacker is very rare, and probably not high on a list of things to be dealt with by a game designer. Your point is valid.

If we're making the assumption "the players elect Total Defense outside of combat only when its a reasonable choice, and the DM awards the +2 bonus only if he agrees that its a reasonable choice," then I'm much less worried about the effects of allowing Total Defense outside of combat - and I think that caveat gets us back out of the "monsters are on Total Defense all the time" case.

The fact that I expect players to act reasonably is why my issue #3 weighs in favor of allowing it IF (and only if) a player seriously wants to do this. The flip side of the coin applies. I expect the DM to act reasonably. I expect most monsters act like they should: I expect zombies to fight stupid, dragons to be tactical geniuses, and all the love-intersts to be good looking.

For my money, the player can declare "I'm in combat!" all he wants - if his character doesn't perceive the enemy, the enemy gets a surprise round when it decides to reveal itself, and the surprised character doesn't participate until the first real round.

How about an instance where the characters clearly know there is an enemy attacking them, but has no idea where that enemy is. Here's a scenario I'm planning on unleashing on my players (who, obviously, should neither highlight nor read the remainder of this paragraph).

Spoiler

Imagine a long-range sniper, attacking a bunch of minion-type allies the party is escorting at extreme range. I'm thinking of using a bellows-powered blow gun. It's going to take a bunch of perception checks to find the sniper. During that time, the PCs are aware of an attacker's attacks, and therefore are aware of the attacker, but have no idea where the attacker is. Do you see how, until they actually pinpoint and home in on the sniper, this encounter can be resolved both in combat time or in non-combat time?

Except for the bits where:
- the character takes an Standard action before the Surprise round begins

This implies that there is something wrong with taking a standard action before surprise rounds. I may be wrong, but I don't remember reading that. In-combat actions (other than the two types of actions we have isolated in this thread: total defense and readied actions) are pretty much the same thing folks do out of combat: perception checks, knowledge checks, movement, talking, and so on. There are powers that you can't use out of combat because you have no legal target, but that's really beside the point. You can't use them in-combat either, if you lack a legal target. So characters constantly take actions that, if they were done in-combat, would be termed standard actions, movement actions, and so on. I don't see how allowing a character to take a Standard Action of some kind before combat strains the rules. As to the impact Total Defense specifically has on surprise, I'll refer you to what I posted above on that matter.

Except for the bits where:
[...]
- the character gains a mechanical in-combat benefit with no associated in-combat penalty
(where the usual penalty is loss of said Standard action)

The usual penalty still applies. Instead of advancing (taking two move actions per round), or doing other things (casting rituals? intimidating the help? skydiving?) the character is wasting time preparing to defend from an attack. This may be perceived as less of a loss if there is no time constraint, but, in my experience, DMs become quite adept at punishing parties that waste time. I know that I would.

What elements would a - to keep things simple - sword and board fighter take to be considered in a "Total Defense" state without an enemy combatant.

How would those elements be different in Total Defense than they are from precautions that we would expect any reasonable experienced warrior would be taking while slowly exploring potentially hostile territory?

I can't say that I have sufficient personal expertise to address this realistically, so I will have to refer to the theatrical version of reality. In the movies, when a party is advancing, they do not have their weapons drawn, they are walking normally, but they are alert. They would make good travelling speed, and would not be caught off guard if someone approached them. They might, however, easily fail to note a concealed trap or ambush. A shield may be equipped, but is not held up. It hangs on the character's arm, equipped and ready to use, but not in active use. Even in combat, the character would not necessarily keep the shield in front of him or her. It might be off to the side somewhere while a sword is swung, or while the character scans and assesses the battlefield, providing some protection, but not all the protection it could provide.

When I think of total defense, weapons and shields are raised and actively interposed to prevent potential vectors of attack. Movement is done in quick short spurts. The character crouches a bit and stands sideways, keeping his or her knees bent, maybe to make themselves a slightly smaller target, maybe to have greater ease in dodging. The character's weapon is not wound back or up, but it is interposed to deflect potential attacks. The character does not appear ready to strike, but is doing what he or she can to avoid harm (short of fleeing to a desk job).

I have to admit that I don't really know what I'm talking about here, but I keep coming back to the fact that I can't imagine anything that the character could do in combat to prepare to defend against an attack, that the character could not do out of combat to achieve a similar state of readiness. That is the problem, fluffwise.

 

[Nytmare]

this encounter can be resolved both in combat time or in non-combat time

If you replace the word "combat" with "encounter" would you still consider this to be true?