Dodging Fireballs and other Readied Action Sheneigans

[pemerton]

You *could perhaps* ready for "when a glowing red bead is shot by the opponent, and gets to within 30'" to "move perpendicular to the line of motion of the bead, to 30' from that line of motion", or something to that effect. That would require a ruling that the spell effect is not instantaneous.

The effect can't be literally instantaneous, can it - I mean, that glowing bead has to cover some distance and is doing so via ordinary motion through space, not via teleportation.

"Instantaneous" as a spell duration I have always taken to be a technical term that is borrowed from the ordinary English word but is then used to explain the spell's relationship to other mechanical factors (like dispelling, counterspelling, concentration etc). Wall of Stone is also instantaneous, for instance, but I assume that it is open to the player to describe the wall as "growing" out of the stone surfaces with which it must be merged, and therefore as taking some (brief) time to appear.

Similarly, I would assume that if a PC cast a range touch freeze liquid spell with an instantaneous duration, the player could narrate that in the classic super-hero movie fashion of the liquid solidifying at the point of physical contact and the ice then spreading out through the liquid to the extent of the spell's AoE.

There is a similar case of a caster shooting a fireball through a window, and a player readying to block the window with a shield as large as the window opening. Could you ready to block a window on the condition that "an arrow, ray, or projectile effect of any sort is shot at the window"?

I don't see why not.

I'm not seeing a problem with readying to attack an opponent who enters range of a reach weapon.

But this wouldn't work if the readied action must take place entirely prior to the other character commencing his/her action - because at the point before the charge commences, the would-be charger is out of reach of the longspear wielder.

So if we can mentally break down the charge into multiple episodes internal to the single game-mechanical action (eg a series of moves that culminate in an attack; the 4e PHB actually has a lengthy discussion of this in its presentation of the rules for readying and immediate reactions), then can't we do the same for the fireball? - though the casting is a single game-mechanical action it has constituent elements, like first conjuring the bead and then discharging it and then the bead travelling to its destination and exploding there.

To say, readied actions work on triggers, which break through the game grammar to the underlying description of what is happening. A readied action *can* trigger in the middle of an action. That action is "paused" with remaining parts incomplete until the readied action completes, then resumes and completes (if possible).

That is, a readied action can use a condition of "when an opponent attacks Ferdie", and if Ferdie is attacked second in a three attack full round attack action, the readied action goes off before Ferdie is attacked, interrupting the full round action.

A careful question does arise, which is to decide what parts of the trigger have completed when the readied action goes off. If my readied action is to cast a wall of stone between the attacker and Ferdie, then, is the attack lost, or, can it be given a new target?

I agree with this, and see it as consistent with what I've written just above. What you are calling the "game grammar", I have called the "single game-mechanical action".

And you are correct that the timing issues matter. In Rolemaster (and many other resolution-heavy systems) movement is not automatic, so the player of the dodging character could declare the dodge earlier (when the bead is conjured) for an easier movement check, or later (once the bead is thrown) for a harder movement check. The trade off for taking the easier check would be that the caster gets to choose another target.

But in D&D movement is generally automatic, so the player of the dodging PC has no reason not to declare the dodge late rather than early. Is this a feature or a bug? The general view, at least in relation to 3E, seems to be that casters are over- rather than under-powered, so it doesn't seem to me that it will break the game. But that's theorycraft, not experience.

Preparing against a charge is covered in a section below what I quoted.

As far as I'm reading it if you want to prepare against the charge, there is nothing stopping them from hitting you, you just get to hit them too.

But I don't see, on your account, how you think the person who readies actually gets an attack:

• The player of a PC declares a readied action - "If NPC charges, I'll stab her with my longspear as she enters my reach";
  
  
• NPC, who is 30' away from PC, commences to chage;
  
  
• PC's readied action triggers before NPC's action, and fails, because NPC is out of reach of a longspear;
  
  
• NPC then gets to resolve her charge.

The only way that readying against a charge works is if we assume that PC's attack can take place after NPC's action has commenced (ie once NPC has covered 20' of distance) but before NPC's action has been completed (ie before NPC covers the last 5' and stabs PC with her sword).

Furthermore, that this is possible seems to be contemplated by the phrase "If the triggered action is part of another character’s activities, you interrupt the other character", which - as I said upthread - is literally incoherent but appears intended to mean "if the triggering action/condition is part of another character's activities, you - the readying character - interrupt that other character". The whole idea of interrupting another character's activities is that you do something after they have commenced but before they complete. In the case of a fireball, this would be doings something after they have conjured the glowing bead, and perhaps after they have hurled it, but before it has got to you.

It is an instantaneous effect.

So are all martial standard actions, including charging - within the mechanical framework of the game they occur all at once. But that doesn't mean that a charging character is literally telepoting, taking no time to traverse the distance that s/he charges. Likewise nothing in the fireball spell suggests that it takes literally no time for the glowing bead to be conjured and discharged. The spell description itself refers to the bead 'streaking" from the caster's finger to it's destination - and streaking by definition is an event that occurs over a non-zero course of time.

Instantaneous is a technical term - part of the "game grammar" as tomBitonti puts it.

 

[Starfox]

By the time you see the glow on the squares, to know exactly where the wizard ends up lobbing the fireball, it has hit you. It is an instantaneous effect.

Since the readied action happens before the triggering condition, this is not the case. Repeating the same argument does not make it stronger. For the debate continue, the argument must be explained or expanded. Otherwise it's oratory, not debate. Sorry if my post became long and obtuse as a result.

Readying an Action from SRD 3.5

You can ready a standard action, a move action, or a free action. To do so, specify the action you will take and the conditions under which you will take it. Then, any time before your next action, you may take the readied action in response to that condition. The action occurs just before the action that triggers it. If the triggered action is part of another character’s activities, you interrupt the other character. Assuming he is still capable of doing so, he continues his actions once you complete your readied action. [snip]

My italics.

The trouble lies in "The action occurs just before the action that triggers it.". Up to that point, the rule is talking about "condition" - and being in an area effect is a condition in this sense. But if you trigger on a condition and the ready happens before the action that created this condition - can the original source of that condition change his action and do something else? How much of the sequence is rewound? "Assuming he is still capable of doing so, he continues his actions once you complete your readied action." tells me he must continue as he had planned - that is, the fireball hits the very same spot, regardless of if you are there or not. He cannot change his action.

But I can see where the reading comes from that he gets to decide where to place the fireball after casting the spell. The problem with this is that he would then nullify the triggering condition - and we have a time loop. No fireball, no triggering condition, no readied action - and so the fireball goes off, which triggers the condition, which triggers the move, which makes the caster not cast the fireball... Infinite recursion.

Another way to read this is that the only conditions you can ready actions for are the action's of others. Which would mean that you cannot trigger on such things as "rocks fall" or "the ship passes the pier" that are events, not actions. Not much support for that in the rules either.

(A strict RAW interpretation could even lead to time travel. I have a readied action as above, and a time bomb explodes. The last action which affected the time bomb happened an hour ago - when it was set. As my ready action happens before the action that created the condition, I travel an hour back in time to interrupt the character setting the bomb. Clearly an absurd reading.)

If the rule has said "The action occurs just before the condition that triggers it." things would have been much clearer in favor of my interpretation. Fireball is cast, explodes, victim triggers (before the explosion hits his space) and moves out of the way.

If the rules had said "To do so, specify the action you will take and the action another must take to trigger your readied action. Then, any time before your next action, you may take the readied action in response to another character taking the specified action." that would have been clearer in favor of your interpretation. The condition for the readied "run away" must suddenly be an action, such as [casting a fireball (not the fireball explosion itself), and thus the victim might be forced to make Spellcraft rolls and such. But if it takes a spellcraft roll to identify that it is a fireball being cast, what kind of roll would be required to notice if the archer was shooting an explosive arrow that releases a fireball instead of an ordinary arrow? What kind of roll would it take to notice who the archer is even shooting at? Notice how convoluted this interpretation becomes - Occam's razor seems to favor my interpretation.

The best way to get out of this hurdle is to be restrictive with the conditions allowed to ready actions on (without restricting them to only be actions). This is the easiest, most clear-cut way out. Simply disallow "I am in the area of a damaging area effect" as too generic to be a triggering condition. The rule does not limit what conditions you can use by RAW, but a DM is an arbiter, not a referee and can disallow too obtuse or open-ended triggering conditions. In fact, this kind of DM arbitration is usually the way out of RAW rules conundrums like this. This is not entirely trouble free either, as it reduces the utility of readied actions. But it is much better than any of the rules-wrangling above.

Now, the issue has become a lot more serious than it was intended to be. I was pointing with the original post that we get humorous effects our of the trigger action RAW. I don't really find this a fault with the rules - this is a corner case. It requires DM interpretation. As a part of a combat trick, I could see this kind of readied action working - "Hey dragon, here I am, hit me" - ready "run away". Very cinematic. But again per the original post, this would not be fun if used repeatedly. The thread was only intended to point out a funny quirk in the rules, but when my ability to read the rules was questioned, I become defensive and went into debate mode.

 

[Starfox]

The effect can't be literally instantaneous, can it - I mean, that glowing bead has to cover some distance and is doing so via ordinary motion through space, not via teleportation.

Very elegant. I was thinking of discussion instantaneous effects in this vein, but decided not to and argued around the point. Glad you did it instead.

(I couldn't say this as a simple Xp comment because I'd given you xp too recently).

 

[tomBitonti]

The effect can't be literally instantaneous, can it - I mean, that glowing bead has to cover some distance and is doing so via ordinary motion through space, not via teleportation.

"Instantaneous" as a spell duration I have always taken to be a technical term that is borrowed from the ordinary English word but is then used to explain the spell's relationship to other mechanical factors (like dispelling, counterspelling, concentration etc). Wall of Stone is also instantaneous, for instance, but I assume that it is open to the player to describe the wall as "growing" out of the stone surfaces with which it must be merged, and therefore as taking some (brief) time to appear.

I'm thinking "instantaneous" would be "effectively instantaneous". That's totally fuzzy but has meaning. A shot bullet, while not actually instantaneous, is too quick to ready against the details of its motion. The question is how fast does the glowing bead travel. That question becomes important for my example of blocking a window with a shield. Which of the following can be used as triggers: A lobbed boulder (presumably by a giant), an arrow, a scorching ray, a line-of-sight spell such as Black Tentacles, a magic missile, a bullet? If the shooter is in complete darkness, such that their intent cannot be read, is the ready against just the effect still possible?

Readying an Action from SRD 3.5

You can ready a standard action, a move action, or a free action. To do so, specify the action you will take and the conditions under which you will take it. Then, any time before your next action, you may take the readied action in response to that condition. The action occurs just before the action that triggers it. If the triggered action is part of another character’s activities, you interrupt the other character. Assuming he is still capable of doing so, he continues his actions once you complete your readied action. [snip]

That "action occurs just before the action that triggers it" statement is unfortunate. As written by Starfox, using that literally as written rather doesn't work. I take that to mean that the action occurs on initiative order immediately preceding the triggering action, leading to the update of the readying player's initiative to just before the initiative order of the triggering opponent. We are rescued by the additional text, "you interrupt" and "he continues his actions". Although, the language is imprecise, with "part of another player's activities being concluded with "he continues his actions", where "he continues his activities" seems warranted.

That SRD statement doesn't detail what may be specified as a "condition". That seems to be the center of the problem. Can a condition only be formed in terms of players declared actions, or, can a condition be placed in the details of the action resolution?

Thx!

TomB

 

[Starfox]

On what "instantaneous" means, to me it is a duration shorter than any other duration. It is simply the lowest rung on the duration ladder. It does not imply that it actually takes no narrative time - or the glowing sphere n the fireball would be entirely pointless and impossible to perceive - it just means it has no duration in game terms.

Duration is also the time during which an effect is dispellable, which is why Wall of Stone is instantaneous - it can be countered, but not dispelled.

 

[ImperatorK]

It's a cool idea. Not overpowered, and definitely more reasonable than standing in the middle of the fireball's explosion and not getting hurt at all.

 

[pemerton]

On what "instantaneous" means, to me it is a duration shorter than any other duration. It is simply the lowest rung on the duration ladder. It does not imply that it actually takes no narrative time - or the glowing sphere n the fireball would be entirely pointless and impossible to perceive - it just means it has no duration in game terms.

Duration is also the time during which an effect is dispellable, which is why Wall of Stone is instantaneous - it can be countered, but not dispelled.

I agree with this.

I'm thinking "instantaneous" would be "effectively instantaneous". That's totally fuzzy but has meaning. A shot bullet, while not actually instantaneous, is too quick to ready against the details of its motion. The question is how fast does the glowing bead travel. That question becomes important for my example of blocking a window with a shield.

<snip>

That SRD statement doesn't detail what may be specified as a "condition". That seems to be the center of the problem. Can a condition only be formed in terms of players declared actions, or, can a condition be placed in the details of the action resolution?

I agree that the key issue is "what can be a condition"? And, for instance, can Perception checks be required to notice, or DEX checks to respond in time?

This is what I had in mind upthread when I compared to Rolemaster, which has (reasonably) clear mechanics for imposing Perception, DEX etc checks to make the trade offs between different sorts of responses to different sorts of conditions easier to adjudicate.

 

[Luce]

Now then what do you think about shooting the glowing bead (fine object) out of the air? An arrow (or a thrown item) should probably count as an "solid obstacle or material body" if it hits. I would probably rule that it detonates halfway between you and the caster (if aimed in your direction).
How about resolving "if he starts casting a spell I shoot him with a poison arrow"? And if the poison causes con damage will it affect his Concentration to cast? What about INT damage which brings him below minimum INT to cast the intended spell? (I think they are INT damage spells [such as ray of stupidity] making the case)

 

[Starfox]

Now then what do you think about shooting the glowing bead (fine object) out of the air? An arrow (or a thrown item) should probably count as an "solid obstacle or material body" if it hits. I would probably rule that it detonates halfway between you and the caster (if aimed in your direction).

All you need is the AC of the bullet. Probably high, as it is both small and fast.

How about resolving "if he starts casting a spell I shoot him with a poison arrow"? And if the poison causes con damage will it affect his Concentration to cast? What about INT damage which brings him below minimum INT to cast the intended spell? (I think they are INT damage spells [such as ray of stupidity] making the case)

All these are fairly standard, and not hard at all. But that is because they trigger on the spellcasting, not the effect of the spell. The readied action goes first, and if it renders the caster unable to cast (or forces him to make a Concentration check and he fails it) the spell is lost. Nothing extraordinary.

 

[Vegepygmy]

My question to you, Vegepygmy, is this, would you let a character (any character) prepare against an attack using the condition: I prepare against his attack to move so he fails to hit me?

Yes. That is a perfectly legitimate use of the Ready action.

Ie. Would you let the fighter come up and take a swing then, after learning whether that is a hit or not allow the person who readied an action move and avoid the damage?

No, I would not allow that. As the DMG tells DMs (pages 25-26), "you're within your rights to make it a little harder on the character who readies an action and doesn't take that action when the opportunity presents itself. You have two options: (1) Allow the character to forgo the action at the expense of losing the readied action." (The second option presented doesn't matter for my answer.)

So the readied character must decide, when the attacking character declares he is attacking, if he is going to take his readied action to move or lose the readied action entirely. Likewise, a character who is readied to move when a caster throws a fireball at him can't wait to see if he makes his Reflex save before deciding whether he's going to move or not.

I never would and the rules never seem to say this is possible. If he wants to move BEFORE the fighter comes up and does this, or even after he moves up but before he attacks then that is fine. But moving WHILE THE EFFECT IS GOING ON (after the spell is cast - you can see the pea - but before you take the damage to somehow miraculously escape the effect) is not allowed anywhere that I can see.

Read the rules for counterspelling (PHB page 170). You ready an action to counterspell once your opponent begins to cast his spell, not before he does so.

If you see the fireball's pea or wait for the glow on your square - YOU GET HIT. If you move before that, but presumably after the spell is cast (somehow) then the wizard can redirect the spell.

That would make the Ready action even less useful than it already is. As it is, the Ready action allows you to possibly negate one particular event if it happens, at the cost of taking no action at all if the event you anticipate fails to materialize. It (potentially) rewards planning and forethought, but only sometimes.

I can't understand why someone would have a problem with that, but I've met many gamers who do, and try to nerf the Ready action. Fine for them, I guess, but I prefer it the other way.