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<blockquote data-quote="sev" data-source="post: 5151428" data-attributes="member: 77780">Ah. This may be where a misunderstanding occurs -- I do not support the idea of *entering* Total Defense before a combat starts.&nbsp;&nbsp; There's nothing to defend against, before combat starts.&nbsp; I would allow a readying of total defense based on a specific trigger -- say, if the group with the volley of arrows had party-members with no ranged attack, who wanted to enter total defense at the same time as all their friends shot the arrows.&nbsp; Without the ready, it's not a volley of arrows; it's some arrows that plunk down spread out across the whole round.&nbsp; If the arrow-firers get to ready all their arrows to fire on a trigger, shouldn't someone be able to ready a different action against the same trigger?Having an action readied to trigger at a specific thing that you believe will cause combat to begin meets the criteria of &quot;not surprised&quot; if that trigger does occur, which is why I think surprise is a separate issue.&nbsp; If they're surprised, then whatever it was they were readying for wasn't what happened, and no amount of attempting to ready a combat action before combat begins will help them.It's not that I think surprise is a not-useful mechanic; it's that I think that surprise-or-not should be considered *as a separate question* from&nbsp; whether you can take combat actions outside of combat.&nbsp; My answer to the latter is &quot;the combat action I allow outside of combat is the ready action.&quot;&nbsp; I think that answer keeps the original question (&quot;can you take combat actions outside of combat?&quot;) from muddling up the discussion of whether or not someone is surprised.&nbsp; They're separate things to be separately determined.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="sev, post: 5151428, member: 77780"] Ah. This may be where a misunderstanding occurs -- I do not support the idea of *entering* Total Defense before a combat starts. There's nothing to defend against, before combat starts. I would allow a readying of total defense based on a specific trigger -- say, if the group with the volley of arrows had party-members with no ranged attack, who wanted to enter total defense at the same time as all their friends shot the arrows. Without the ready, it's not a volley of arrows; it's some arrows that plunk down spread out across the whole round. If the arrow-firers get to ready all their arrows to fire on a trigger, shouldn't someone be able to ready a different action against the same trigger? Having an action readied to trigger at a specific thing that you believe will cause combat to begin meets the criteria of "not surprised" if that trigger does occur, which is why I think surprise is a separate issue. If they're surprised, then whatever it was they were readying for wasn't what happened, and no amount of attempting to ready a combat action before combat begins will help them. It's not that I think surprise is a not-useful mechanic; it's that I think that surprise-or-not should be considered *as a separate question* from whether you can take combat actions outside of combat. My answer to the latter is "the combat action I allow outside of combat is the ready action." I think that answer keeps the original question ("can you take combat actions outside of combat?") from muddling up the discussion of whether or not someone is surprised. They're separate things to be separately determined. [/QUOTE]

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