defensive fighting and special attacks

[kjenks]

The only time a grappler gains a benefit from CE or fighting defensively is when his opponent is attacking with a weapon and not actually grappling. This, of course, obviates the need for this discussion because then we are no longer talking about grapple checks. You don't mean to imply that you add the dodge bonus from CE or fighting defensively to your grapple check, do you? And, such bonuses do not apply outside the grapple because you lose your Dex bonus (and thus all dodge bonuses).

Those are AC bonuses, not attack bonuses, so they don't affect a grapple check. See the difference?

Combat Expertise definitely helps the AC of a grappler who is being attacked by his dance partner using the Attack Your Opponent option (attack with a light weapon at -4). It does not help against attacks by another opponent outside the grapple because the grapplers lose their Dex bonus to AC against such opponents, and that also negates Dodge bonus to AC like that granted by Combat Expertise.

 

[Infiniti2000]

Those are AC bonuses, not attack bonuses, so they don't affect a grapple check. See the difference?

Combat Expertise definitely helps the AC of a grappler who is being attacked by his dance partner using the Attack Your Opponent option (attack with a light weapon at -4). It does not help against attacks by another opponent outside the grapple because the grapplers lose their Dex bonus to AC against such opponents, and that also negates Dodge bonus to AC like that granted by Combat Expertise.

Yeah, that's what I said. That's not what you said earlier, though. You're changing your mind on this, kjenks.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Combat Expertise definitely helps the AC of a grappler who is being attacked by his dance partner using the Attack Your Opponent option (attack with a light weapon at -4).

Except that you can't use CE while grappling. CE requires the Attack or Full Attack action.

When grappling, you have access to the following actions:

Activate a Magic Item
Attack Your Opponent
Cast a Spell
Damage Your Opponent
Draw a Light Weapon
Escape from Grapple
Move
Retrieve a Spell Component
Break Another’s Pin
Use Opponent’s Weapon

 

[Infiniti2000]

Except that you can't use CE while grappling. CE requires the Attack or Full Attack action.

So, attacking your opponent isn't an Attack action? What kind of action is it, then?

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

So, attacking your opponent isn't an Attack action?

If I'm standing around, I can take the Attack action - a standard action - and make a single melee or ranged attack against an opponent.

If I'm in a grapple, I must use the "Attack Your Opponent" action.

When you are grappling (regardless of who started the grapple), you can perform any of the following actions. Some of these actions take the place of an attack (rather than being a standard action or a move action). If your base attack bonus allows you multiple attacks, you can attempt one of these actions in place of each of your attacks, but at successively lower base attack bonuses.

...

Attack Your Opponent: You can make an attack with an unarmed strike, natural weapon, or light weapon against another character you are grappling. You take a –4 penalty on such attacks.

 

[Infiniti2000]

If I'm in a grapple, I must use the "Attack Your Opponent" action.

Yeah, but that "takes the place" of an attack in an Attack (or Full Attack) action. It's still an attack action. Really, you're attempting to be too pedantic in reading the grapple rules.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Yeah, but that "takes the place" of an attack in an Attack (or Full Attack) action. It's still an attack action.

And it says that where, exactly?

 

[kjenks]

I disagree. [A grapple attack] is clearly not a melee attack which inflicts damage. A grapple attempt is a melee attack (the touch attack) which allows you to enter another subsystem of rules. The grapple check itself is not a second melee attack.

It looks like you're thinking that the multi-step grapple attack does no damage because it has multiple steps. Is that what you're trying to say?

Grapple attacks clearly do inflict damage (usually nonlethal, as if with an unarmed strike, per step 3). One can even take Weapon Specialization in grapple to inflict a little more damage. If a rogue grappler catches someone flat-footed, he could even get sneak attack damage while grappling.

As for grapple checks begin like a melee attack, check out the similarity between the attack bonus for a grapple check and the two other types of attack bonuses:

A grapple check is like a melee attack roll. Your attack bonus on a grapple check is: Base attack bonus + Strength modifier + special size modifier

Contrast that with...

ATTACK BONUS
Your attack bonus with a melee weapon is:
Base attack bonus + Strength modifier + size modifier
With a ranged weapon, your attack bonus is:
Base attack bonus + Dexterity modifier + size modifier + range penalty

You see, all three are attack bonuses. All three get other bonuses and penalties from conditions, spells, feats and circumstances. Some bonuses and penalties apply only to melee attacks, some only to ranged attacks, some to both. Since a grapple check is like a melee attack (with exactly one difference stated in the rules), it gets the bonuses and penalties that apply to melee attacks.

Sorry, Patryn. You have not proven your two points (which seem to be (1) grapple attacks are not melee attacks that inflict damage and (2) grapple checks are not really like melee attacks) to any reasonable degree. I'm willing to change my mind on this issue. I have in the past. But your arguments so far have been less than convincing.

 

[Infiniti2000]

And it says that where, exactly?

In your quote.

 

[mostholy2]

I seem to think the issue of contention is if the opposed grapple check is the same as a melee attack. Even though both are similar in the factors affected the bonus (as pointed out by kjenks) the grapple check is only stated to be "like" a melee attack roll (except that it is opposed vs. a set number).

WotC seems pretty specific when it comes to descriptions of bonuses and names for things. Take armor bonuses for example, WotC makes it clear that shield bonus is different from armor bonus from deflection bonus, etc. They do this to make sure that there is no stacking among similar bonuses.

The fact that WotC does not say that grapple check IS a melee attack and only mention that it is LIKE a melee attack would lead me to conclude that it is not a melee attack.

kjenk: for your example of weapon focus/specialization (grapple), I would just point out that this could be interpreted as giving a +1 to hit on the initial touch attack (for the focus) and +2 for any damage incurred (for specialization), since each specifically states what the bonus applies to (attack/damage), neither of which gives a bonus for the grapple check (as the grapple check could be considered as belonging to neither category).

After listening to both sides of this argument, I'm just going to houserule that attack bonuses/penalties cannot applied for non-attack rolls (ie. grapple checks), but can be used when choosing the "attack opponent" grapple option (as this is an attack roll/not a grapple check) w/ the caveat that CE/def fighting used in this context is useless b/c of lack of Dex bonus due to grappling circumstances.