Combat actions before combat?

[Nytmare]

Wow, this response has been sitting, unsent, in this window for three days... Guess I should finish it and submit it.

That's certainly one scenario, but I don't think I'd allow anyone to do anything retroactively. And I'm not sure what you mean by "waiting to attack something the round before the encounter started." Actions must be declared before. I'm not trying to fight you here, I'm just trying to be clear.

Does pre-retroactive work better for you? I don't see any difference between the following:

"From now on, I am going to defend all the time."

"I am going to defend before something tries to attack me."

"When I walk down this hall, I am going to defend in case something tries to attack me."

"Wait, you just attacked me? I was defending against it."

If you're worried about your players doing this too frequently, make them make a will check. Honestly, really don't think players will abuse it, but your game may differ.

There's no need to introduce will checks and extra house rules because it is already covered by the existing "the DM decides if there is surprise, then everyone rolls for initiative." It's not that I'm trying to protect myself from my players, it's that there are already rules that cover it and that I don't believe in making house rules that don't stand on their own feet. If you are trying to make a good rule, it has to be able to be used by anyone, in any game, and not be abused.

So what happens if the person kicking the door open is at the receiving end of the readied attack above? What gets resolved first? If, however the decision is made, it's the shooting, does that mean that the guy opening the door doesn't get total defense? If that's the case, why did the shooter's preparation get rewarded, but not the door opener's preparation?

In writing this out I see that I wrongly assumed that you were only describing a "we open the door so that we can surprise whatever is inside" encounter, but that there's no reason why you'd need to do that. You can, by the existing rules, open/kick the door (minor action) and then take total defense (standard) but only if you're giving up surprise.

Mixing the two scenarios we end up with:

• Both groups want to go first. The door guy wants to defend before someone might shoot him, archer guy wants to be ready to shoot someone as soon as they come in the room.
• Only one group (outside) is in a position to initiate combat because they are opening the door, and that is what starts the whole process.
• Both groups are in a position to gain surprise. The group outside could burst in (minus the door opener) and each of them could get a single action. The guy inside could notice the door opening and take a single action to ready.

If door guy wants to surprise someone who might be in the room:

• Both groups make perception checks before combat starts. Both parties are attempting to be stealthy, so the perception checks are matched up against the other group's stealth check(s). I would use passive stealth and perception checks for the archer since he's just sitting around, waiting for something to happen, and I'd probably give him a +5 bonus to each cause he's quietly staring at a door.
• Combat starts and everyone rolls initiative!
• Everyone who can act in the surprise round acts. Let's pretend that both the door guy and archer can both act in the surprise round.
• If the door guy has the higher initiative, the door guy kicks the door down, his friends charge in whenever they can and bum rush the archer, the archer does whatever he wants on his initiative
• If the archer has the higher initiative, the archer readies an attack, the door guy kicks the door down and gets shot in the face, then his friends charge in and bum rush the archer.

If the door guy does NOT want to surprise someone who might be in the room because he wants to be defending when the door opens:

• Both groups make perception checks before combat starts. Both parties are attempting to be stealthy, so the perception checks are matched up against the other group's stealth check(s). I would use passive stealth and perception checks for the archer since he's just sitting around, waiting for something to happen, and I'd give him a +5 bonus to each cause he's quietly staring at a door.
• Combat starts and everyone rolls initiative.
• If the archer can act in the surprise round he readies an action to shoot the first person he sees.
• If the archer does NOT act in the surprise round, but has a higher initiative, he readies and shoots the defending door guy when he kicks in the door.
• If the archer does not act in the surprise round and has a lower initiative, the door gets kicked down, the door guy defends, and combat happens as per normal.

Let's picture something concrete. The players, expecting an ambush for in-game reasons, say that they prepare a bunch of ranged attacks and send one guy (the tank) down a corridor in total defense. I say that they can't because the encounter has not yet begun, and readied actions and total defense are actions that can only be taken once the combat begins. Since the characters clearly sniffed out the ambush and the ambushers knew of the characters, there is no surprise, and combat is done normally. One of the players, after the session is over so as not to interrupt the game, asks why couldn't they do those actions before combat if they could do them in combat. I can't find anything in the books that says why, so I come to enworld. Why?

Combat has to start for some reason, and it is the DM's job to figure out why it starts. Does it start because the fighter spotted a sniper? Does it start because the sniper shoots at the fighter?

Let's pretend that we have a situation where every possible bit of information regarding the ambush is known. The fighter has 100% complete omniscient knowledge of the situation. He knows how many people there are, exactly where they are positioned, when they're going to be able to see him, and what tactics they're going to use. When he gets there, he won't even need to make a spot check to see the snipers, because they will be effectively standing right out in the open.

In this instance, at what point does the fight start? The DM has effectively built a (what I'd consider really lame) encounter where both sides start facing each other across an empty field where they have as many rounds as they want before they get to within striking range.

The fight starts because the fighter becomes a target for the snipers. If everybody knows about everybody else, and nobody is nailed to one single spot, it is entirely a question of who goes first.

• Everybody rolls for initiative.
• If the fighter has the higher initiative, the fighter defends, moves into range of the snipers, then the snipers shoot him.
• If the snipers have the higher initiative, the snipers move up, shoot the fighter, and the fighter defends.

Q: "Why can't we do those actions before combat, if we're allowed to do them in combat."

A: "You can do those actions before combat. Combat however, translates before-combat activities into a series of abstract, round by round snippets instead of a realistic flow."

Actually not to veer off target, but I need to throw out a question for someone more rules-savvy than I. Can you can ready an attack for the start of someone's turn? Basically waiting for the break between one total defense action stopping, and the next one starting. If so, that's a perfect mechanical explanation of what's happening and where the combat round is starting.

Surprise doesn't mean 'you're aware there are monsters' it means 'you are aware specifically of -those- monsters.'

A surprise round occurs if any combatants are unaware of enemy combatants’ presence or hostile intentions.

Surprise means that you either know that something is there or you know that something is going to happen.

Crouching outside a door with your guns drawn, so that you can kick it open and arrest the perp is entirely what surprise is about.

 

[Ninja-to]

I don't think what you describe would be a reasonable player's request. Further, going by your description, all of a character's defenses should be lowered during a surprise round. This is not the case. Characters are normally ready to react and defend themselves from a broad variety of attacks.

Let's examine a more reasonable example. A fighter is opening a door, and he beleives that something is going to attack him from the other side. He doesn't know the exact location of the attacker, and he doesn't know exactly how the sniper is going to attack, but he's pretty sure something is going to attack him. So the player describes how the warrior crouches a little and positions his shield properly before opening the door, so that the character can more easily use the shield to block whatever might be coming at them. It's not failsafe, but it's better than not being prepared.

As a DM, you can certainly say that that's assumed in your normal defenses. That the characters are always reasonably wary and act carefully. So, the precautions described, therefore, afford no extra protection. That's a legitimate answer, in my opinion. But that seems to compare poorly with the ranger's player, who took the same opportunity to prepare a ranged twin strike against any attacker that became visible when the door opened. I see a bit of a problem there. Why is the readied action okay, but not the action that is the game-mechanic implementation of a cautious, defensive stance? Given the defender's role, that seems to be a somewhat unfair way to come down.

I was browsing around came across this, and just thought I'd add two cents.

First, just because your players are willing or able to describe what they're going to do, as you've mentioned, the PC's themselves are *always* doing this. It simply doesn't need to be stated that they're 'ready'. They *always* want to be ready.

It's like some players saying "I swing *REALLY HARD* this time." Should you give them a bonus to damage for saying something like this? Hardly. Why should you give them a game mechanic bonus for describing their characters combat actions? It's also like saying "I aim for his neck' and the attack roll hits with an axe. Does that mean the enemy is decapitated? No.

The system is built to be 'simple,' not explain everything in detail.

If your players are aware of the enemy, and the enemy is not aware of your players, then the players get a surprise round (one standard action). It's not complicated.

I think at best, if you really wanted to reward ingenuity or roleplaying or something else you like the players are doing, then give them a +2 to their roll, whether that be for initiative, their attack or whatever it is they're trying to accomplish (I think that's the DM's best friend or whatever it's called). But this should be a rare case. Like the other poster said, this type of thing could get out of hand. I"ve had players tell me in game "I aim for the head" and I remind them 'You're always aiming for the head... what's new?"

 

[Ferghis]

Does pre-retroactive work better for you? I don't see any difference between the following:

"From now on, I am going to defend all the time."

Well, I do see differences. This particular player's request strikes me as completely unreasonable. I would ask the player to reconsider, and if the player couldn't see that the request was unreasonable, I'd probably stop gaming with the particular player.

Does pre-retroactive work better for you? I don't see any difference between the following:
[...]
"I am going to defend before something tries to attack me."

Here the player is asking to act with hindsight. Also unreasonable.

Does pre-retroactive work better for you? I don't see any difference between the following:
[...]
"When I walk down this hall, I am going to defend in case something tries to attack me."

This is the case that I'm trying to examine in this thread. Again, I'm reluctant to allow the character a total defense bonus, but I'm not sure I have a good basis for it. That's why I started the thread.

Does pre-retroactive work better for you? I don't see any difference between the following:
[...]
"Wait, you just attacked me? I was defending against it."

If the player did not say so before, then he wasn't. That's easy to resolve, isn't it?

There's no need to introduce will checks and extra house rules because it is already covered by the existing "the DM decides if there is surprise, then everyone rolls for initiative." It's not that I'm trying to protect myself from my players, it's that there are already rules that cover it and that I don't believe in making house rules that don't stand on their own feet.

Well, I haven't found a rule that clearly says that you can't take total defense or ready an action before combat. And, just in case you're going to argue that combat actions can implicitly only be taken in combat, think of all the combat actions, such as moving, that can be clearly taken out of combat.

If you are trying to make a good rule, it has to be able to be used by anyone, in any game, and not be abused.

I sincerely beleive every rpg can be abused, so I don't think you need to fully idiot-proof your rules, but I agree with the spirit of what you are saying. I think.

Mixing the two scenarios we end up with:

• Both groups want to go first. The door guy wants to defend before someone might shoot him, archer guy wants to be ready to shoot someone as soon as they come in the room.
• Only one group (outside) is in a position to initiate combat because they are opening the door, and that is what starts the whole process.
• Both groups are in a position to gain surprise. The group outside could burst in (minus the door opener) and each of them could get a single action. The guy inside could notice the door opening and take a single action to ready.

[...]
If door guy wants to surprise someone who might be in the room:

If the door guy achieves surprise, he can use the surprise round, and any actions we have been discussing, whether readied or taken before, would have no further implication. If there is no surprise, it's the same as below.

If the door guy does NOT want to surprise someone who might be in the room because he wants to be defending when the door opens:

• Both groups make perception checks before combat starts. Both parties are attempting to be stealthy, so the perception checks are matched up against the other group's stealth check(s). I would use passive stealth and perception checks for the archer since he's just sitting around, waiting for something to happen, and I'd give him a +5 bonus to each cause he's quietly staring at a door.
• Combat starts and everyone rolls initiative.
• If the archer can act in the surprise round he readies an action to shoot the first person he sees.
• If the archer does NOT act in the surprise round, but has a higher initiative, he readies and shoots the defending door guy when he kicks in the door.
• If the archer does not act in the surprise round and has a lower initiative, the door gets kicked down, the door guy defends, and combat happens as per normal.

I'm not opposed to resolving it this way.

Let's pretend that we have a situation where every possible bit of information regarding the ambush is known.

I'm not sure how this advances the discussion.

Q: "Why can't we do those actions before combat, if we're allowed to do them in combat."

A: "You can do those actions before combat. Combat however, translates before-combat activities into a series of abstract, round by round snippets instead of a realistic flow."

That answer doesn't address the issue. I don't see how that addresses why a character can't effectilvely engage, for example, in total defense shortly before combat begins so as to enjoy a defense bonus on the first round of combat if s/he has not already acted.

Actually not to veer off target, but I need to throw out a question for someone more rules-savvy than I. Can you can ready an attack for the start of someone's turn? Basically waiting for the break between one total defense action stopping, and the next one starting.

I'm certainly not rules-savvy, but as far as I know you can ready an action for anything your character could see. Given the way combat is broken down into actions, you certainly could trigger a readied action to anything that happens at the beginning of a character's turn, which would be the same thing. Since you could trigger off such and such character taking or not taking ongoing damage, which sounds ridiculous, I'd let the character simply trigger off starting the character's turn.

When you ready an action, you prepare to react to a creature’s action or an event. Readying an action is a way of saying, “As soon as x happens, I’ll do y.” For instance, you could say, “As soon as the troll walks out from behind the corner, I’ll use my pinning strike and interrupt its movement” or something like, “If the goblin attacks, I’ll react with a crushing blow.”

READY AN ACTION: STANDARD ACTION
[...]
Choose Trigger: Choose the action that will trigger your readied action. When that action occurs, you can use your readied action. If the trigger doesn’t occur or you choose to ignore it, you can’t use your readied action, and you take your next turn as normal.

Immediate Reaction: A readied action is an immediate reaction. It takes place after your enemy completes the action that triggers it.

Interrupting an Enemy: If you want to use a readied action to attack before an enemy attacks, you should ready your action in response to the enemy’s movement. That way your attack will be triggered by a portion of the enemy’s move, and you will interrupt it and attack first. If you ready an action to be triggered by an enemy attack, your readied action will occur as a reaction to that attack, so you’ll attack after the enemy.
Note that an enemy might use a power that lets it move and then attack. If you readied an action to attack in response to that enemy’s movement, your readied action interrupts the movement, and you can attack before the enemy does.

If so, that's a perfect mechanical explanation of what's happening and where the combat round is starting.

I don't understand.

It's like some players saying "I swing *REALLY HARD* this time." Should you give them a bonus to damage for saying something like this? Hardly. Why should you give them a game mechanic bonus for describing their characters combat actions? It's also like saying "I aim for his neck' and the attack roll hits with an axe. Does that mean the enemy is decapitated? No.

True. Not all players' requests for their character's actions have an in-game impact. The appropriate response to that player's request would be that there is no game mechanic to reproduce what she or he is asking that her or his character attempt to do with that level of detail. However, some players' descriptions of their characters' actions DO have a game-mechanic equivalent. Would you dismiss a character's search for secret doors in the same way? How about when a character attempts to recall everything he or she knows about a particular monster? More relevant to this thread, there are game-mechanic equivalents for readied actions and total defense.

 

[Flipguarder]

This is my new rule.

When entering a new room in a dungeon, the first person can try for 1 of 2 things:

1. They surprise anyone inside, They must break the door down, and make an intimidate check vs. passive insight on those inside. Those he wins against don't act the first round of combat. But this IS his action for the first round.

... still thinking about it

2. Gird himself for attacks immediately upon opening the door. This grants him the Total defense action however it is impossible to surprise while doing this.

 

[Nytmare]

Let's pretend that we have a situation where every possible bit of information regarding the ambush is known.

I'm not sure how this advances the discussion.

I was building off of your example so that there was no question as to whether or not the fighter was going to need to make any kind of perception check at all. You can know where something is hidden and still not be able to find it. I was concreting your example more by removing any question of hidden knowledge.

Q: "Why can't we do those actions before combat, if we're allowed to do them in combat."

A: "You can do those actions before combat. Combat however, translates before-combat activities into a series of abstract, round by round snippets instead of a realistic flow."

That answer doesn't address the issue. I don't see how that addresses why a character can't effectilvely engage, for example, in total defense shortly before combat begins so as to enjoy a defense bonus on the first round of combat if s/he has not already acted.

We just keep missing each other here, I don't know what else to say.

You can defend whenever you want. You do defend whenever you want. It doesn't matter because all of the things you decide to do "before combat starts" have to change gears to interface with "as soon as combat starts."

Rounds do not start magically at midnight for every character in the world and march onward in a standardized set of 14,400, 6 second intervals over the course of a day. Rounds start when an encounter starts, and the encounter starts where the DM decides it starts.

If the DM determines, either by die roll, or decision that rounds starts in a place where the fighter can continue to defend, then the fighter can continue to defend. If rounds start at a place where the fighter's defenses are down, the player can not over rule the DM and insist that the rounds start somewhere else.

I'm certainly not rules-savvy, but as far as I know you can ready an action for anything your character could see.

If this is true, and you can interrupt the chain of Total Defense actions, then there's no problem with initiative starting at the moment the fighter's turn starts, or if that's too much of an abstract shortcut, having people ready to shoot him once his defense drops.

• Pre-combat, rounds do not yet exist
• Fighter is defending
• Initiative is rolled
• If the fighter wins initiative, real time stops and rounds begin with the fighter taking actions.
• If the archer wins initiative, real time stops and rounds begin at the break where the fighter drops his defense.

 

[DracoSuave]

This is my new rule.

When entering a new room in a dungeon, the first person can try for 1 of 2 things:

1. They surprise anyone inside, They must break the door down, and make an intimidate check vs. passive insight on those inside. Those he wins against don't act the first round of combat. But this IS his action for the first round.

... still thinking about it

2. Gird himself for attacks immediately upon opening the door. This grants him the Total defense action however it is impossible to surprise while doing this.

House rules that try to accomplish what the rules already say you can do:

If he is aware of enemies, and enemies are not aware of him (surprise rounds are based on awareness, not on how dramatic an entrance you make), then he gets his surprise round action.

That action can be 'Total Defense' if he likes. No surprise? No total defense. But you can console him and say 'At least you're not flat-footed like in 3rd edition!' No point -locking him into- Total Defense. Let him get his surprise round, let him be aware of the situation. The party'll just storm on in anyways, they always do.

That accomplishes everything the house rule here's trying to, but it keeps flexibility in the hands of the player, and doesn't allow them unrealistic expectations that 'walking around carefully' can equal 'Total Defense all the time durr durr durr'

 

[Kingreaper]

I have no problem with the occassional total defense outside of combat, but it's going to have consequences.

Kicking open a door while in total defense: Where the hell did you get the extra standard action? (I'd consider kicking the door down a standard)

Walking down a corridor while in total defense: A) you're slow. If enemies notice you coming, they have plenty of time to prepare stealthily.
B) you can't properly check for traps (sure, you can keep your eyes open for obvious signs, but if you actually want to search it requires at least a standard action)
C) you can't properly check for hidden enemies (see B, above) so you're more likely to be surprised.


So, walking around in total defense? Actually makes you more likely to get taken by surprise.

 

[Saagael]

Regarding the example of the fighter using total defense while kicking down a door, and a ranger readying an attack for when the door opens:

Give them a surprise round (if the monsters didn't know they were about to be intruded upon). When combat starts, you can think of it as if everyone's readied actions are going off at the same time. Initiative just determines whose readied actions get to go first. "You readied for when combat starts? Great, so did all your enemies. Roll initiative to see who gets to use their readied action first."

If, like in the given scenario, the players catch the monsters unaware, then opening the door starts combat with a surprise round. The ranger's readied attack is then resolved as his action in the surprise round, while the fighter's action is resolved as using a total defense.

I'm going to agree with others that have stated that to use total defense you have to know what you're fighting. Defense isn't all about hiding behind your shield. I would argue that hiding behind your shield is the bare minimum to get your shield bonus to AC/Reflex. Thus, walking around crouched behind your shield is hardly useful or productive at actually defending yourself from some unknown attacker.

Lastly, if the ranger still argues that he should get his immediate reaction shot as well as a surprise round action, remember that shooting requires time to aim, position yourself, etc. The surprise rounds lasts, I'd say, about 2-3 seconds, which is an awfully short amount of time to aim, fire, reload, aim and fire again.

 

[Flipguarder]

If he is aware of enemies, and enemies are not aware of him (surprise rounds are based on awareness, not on how dramatic an entrance you make), then he gets his surprise round action.

Monsters are guarding a room under the impression that at some point during their guarding shift there is an 80% chance an enemy of theirs will come in.

PCs are dungeon crawling, aware that every room could be full of danger.

So who is aware of who in this situation? My rule is to nullify the importance of this question. The current rules have little to no explanation of what defines "awareness".

 

[Kingreaper]

Monsters are guarding a room under the impression that at some point during their guarding shift there is an 80% chance an enemy of theirs will come in.

PCs are dungeon crawling, aware that every room could be full of danger.

So who is aware of who in this situation? My rule is to nullify the importance of this question. The current rules have little to no explanation of what defines "awareness".

Why not just use the common english meaning "If you are aware of something, you realize that it is present or is happening because you hear it, see it, smell it, or feel it."?