Cover, line of effect, fireball ??

[Camarath]

ConspiracyAngel what were you trying to point out?

 

[Al'Kelhar]

Now, I could be completely wrong, but I'm going to venture out on a limb and assume that the fighter in your group is NOT a 10x10 square of flesh (or it would be pretty hard for him to wear armor or wield weapons). Therefore, it's quite possible for a Fireball to be launched past him, especially considering that the world IS in fact 3-dimensional. The Wizard could have very easily just shot the fireball above the fighter to the back of the hall.

Unless the wizard happens to be Fine sized, but again, I could be wrong.

In short, your DM's full of crap.

Oh yeah, the air burst fireball is a favourite of my wizard. Bad guys hiding behind that low wall or comrades blocking my view of the battlefield are no problem provided the ceiling is high enough to put one above them. I'm surprised you didn't point out to your DM that the world's 3-dimensional.

Cheers, Al'Kelhar

 

[Ninja-to]

Gee... thanks.

Now, I could be completely wrong, but I'm going to venture out on a limb and assume that the fighter in your group is NOT a 10x10 square of flesh (or it would be pretty hard for him to wear armor or wield weapons). Therefore, it's quite possible for a Fireball to be launched past him, especially considering that the world IS in fact 3-dimensional. The Wizard could have very easily just shot the fireball above the fighter to the back of the hall.

Unless the wizard happens to be Fine sized, but again, I could be wrong.

In short, your DM's full of crap.

Well thanks a lot. I'm the 'crap' DM who posed this question to my group and gave them the benefit of the doubt and still allowed them to cast the fireball through the other creatures. I wasn't sure about the ruling because I rememberd the '1 foot by 1 foot' square required for a line of effect. I had one of the PC's stand directly behind another PC and try to cast his fireball straight ahead. I couldn't 'see' a 1 foot square through the other PC so I said "I don't think you can do that, but go ahed".

Thanks Tatsu!

 

[Ninja-to]

Hi all, we were happily pounding through bad guys in our game today and our DM laid a big ruling on us. He says that a Fire Ball needs a clear line of effect, so no cover.

In the game, this took the form of the mage not being able to put a fireball on the other side of our fighter, as he provided cover. Here’s the layout…

It’s a 10’ wide hallway, with the fighter and against the south wall. To the east of the fighter are three (also medium size) monsters.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
..................................................(Monster 1)...(Monster 2)...[A]
(Mage).............................(Fighter)...............(Monster 3)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
The big plan was to put the fireball just behind monster 2 (in the location marked as ‘A’) and thus cook all the monsters but not the fighter, but the DM ruled that that area was out of sight (total cover).

Our fighter is tough, so he agreed to ‘take one for the team’ and have the FB placed directly east of him (location ‘B’).

The DM ruled that any cover, including the fighter in this situation meant that the mage couldn’t put the FB there.

This has dire repercussions for putting fireballs in the second, third, or even middle rank of large groups of monsters.

So, to make a long story short, is he right?

-Tatsu

Actually the real fireball that was in question was when the mage was in the square directly behind the other character and wanted to cast his fireball straight through his square up ahead to the monsters. Anyway I now realize that 'soft cover' doesn't block line of effect, even though I still can't imagine where that 1 foot square is... :\

 

[Camarath]

Anyway I now realize that 'soft cover' doesn't block line of effect, even though I still can't imagine where that 1 foot square is... :\

This is my metagame rationalization for why soft cover works as it does. Most charaters are not wide enough to take up their whole space. Thus Medium characters are not 5ft wide even though their space is. This means that a significant portion of a character's space is not physically occupied by the character thus allowing for "gaps" many of which should be at least 1 foot square.

 

[Scion]

Maybe I am just not understanding, but I cant fathom there not being 'several' 1 foot squares abounding all over. One character is in a 5' square, and another character is in a different 5' square adjacent. For two human sized characters there is just a 'huge' amount of extra room all over the place. Even taking into account armor, and cloaks, and other sorts of strangeness the mage could simply raise his hand and fire over the head of the character in front of him, or just give a little hop and that is a worst case scenario.

 

[Tatsukun]

Oops, now the DM is cranky.
Oh well, back to the game!

Thanks for the help all!
-T

 

[Ninja-to]

Maybe I am just not understanding, but I cant fathom there not being 'several' 1 foot squares abounding all over. One character is in a 5' square, and another character is in a different 5' square adjacent. For two human sized characters there is just a 'huge' amount of extra room all over the place. Even taking into account armor, and cloaks, and other sorts of strangeness the mage could simply raise his hand and fire over the head of the character in front of him, or just give a little hop and that is a worst case scenario.

The way I was thinking was like this. If you're standing behind someone, even five feet behind them, and you're aiming your sniper rifle at someone (who is about the same size as the character right in front of you, but 30 feet away) then wouldn't that affect your aim? Isn't there still a 'chance' that you could hit that person, especially considering they're not metal miniatures standing there but they're moving and jumping around in front of you dodging arrows and other strangeness. I just thought there would be a 'chance' that you'd hit them before reaching the target. Yes I know characters don't occupy 5 foot squares no matter how large their armour is, but I was considering the 'chance' of hitting someone in front of you as part of cover and that's all.

Again maybe I didn't make this clear in my first TWO posts, but I was simply RAISING THE QUESTION during my session, not making a hard ruling about it. Thanks.

And you're not supposed to be able to give 'a little hop' while you're spellcasting or you'll lose the spell

Please don't reply telling me firing a rifle is different from aiming a fireball. It's just an analogy my friends.

 

[Scion]

All you need is a tiny, 1 foot hole for a roughly instantaneous amount of time. With that, try standing with a friend in front of you, and then freeze frame. Is there any place you can move, even ever so slightly, and be able to have a clear line through which an incredibly tiny pea could fly? Sure there is, all over.

It isnt that I am saying you made the wrong call, I just dont understand how there is even a question to the circumstance. People just dont tend to take up a full 5' x 5' section. If your friend is the same height then raising your hand above your head provides a clear shot.

Remember, since this spell doesnt generally require any sort of attack roll then its chance of hitting the buddy is incredibly slim. Especially if they have some sort of code worked out such as, 'hey, move left 1 foot'.

 

[UltimaGabe]

The way I was thinking was like this. If you're standing behind someone, even five feet behind them, and you're aiming your sniper rifle at someone (who is about the same size as the character right in front of you, but 30 feet away) then wouldn't that affect your aim? Isn't there still a 'chance' that you could hit that person?

When casting a Fireball, you're not trying to hit someone, you're just tossing the pea-sized ball of magic towards a general area. If you were aiming a Sniper Rifle, you'd have to have a clear shot exactly where you want to hit (down to the exact inch or two), but with a Fireball, not much is going to change if you toss it half a foot or two to the right of your target than if you hit it directly.

You're not really aiming at a person, just a very general area. Spellcasters are assumed to have practiced their own spells enough to not have to worry about too much aiming- plus, it's quite possible that the spellcaster could simply step to the side (after all, a 5-foot square is much bigger than you think) and then cast it.