Fireball pellet discussion brings up an interesting question

[kreynolds]

What roll would a character have to make to throw himself in front of the fireball pellet? A Dex check?

A readied action.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I just have a picture in my head of a high-level Paladin with a ton of hit points diving in front of a fireball yelling, "Noooooooooooo!" in slow motion, giving up the Reflex save and soaking the damage in order to save Innocent Bystanders.

Shhhhh!

It's a great image, but don't let anyone hear you mention it in the rules forum, or they will chide you since it will still explode and fill the full 20ft radius!

 

[AuraSeer]

It's a great image, but don't let anyone hear you mention it in the rules forum, or they will chide you since it will still explode and fill the full 20ft radius!

What's wrong with that?
If the wizard is aiming at a group of peasants 200' away, and the paladin manages to intercept it at the 100' mark, the peasants are still safely out of the blast radius.

 

[LokiDR]

A readied action.

Any person could do this? No chance of missing the mark? We are talking about a small pellet at high speeds, right? I would say a reflex save, DC of the fireball.

 

[kreynolds]

Any person could do this? No chance of missing the mark? We are talking about a small pellet at high speeds, right?

All you have to do is step in front of the thing. The bead travels at high speeds, yes, but it also must travel in a straight line. It would be no different than intercepting an arrow attack with your body because your buddy is low on hit points.

I would say a reflex save, DC of the fireball.

I wouldn't say that unless I was in the house rules forum, but hey, that's just me. Seriously though, I don't think adhoc rules are necessary here. You can already do this within the rules, and to top it off, it's fully supported. If you can get in front of the bead within a partial action, then it isn't a big deal at all, not for me anyway.

 

[da chicken]

All you have to do is step in front of the thing. The bead travels at high speeds, yes, but it also must travel in a straight line. It would be no different than intercepting an arrow attack with your body because your buddy is low on hit points.

Sounds about right. The major problem is figuring out exactly which way the pellet is going to go (it is small and probably emits no light). It is a bit easier with a bow (aiming and all). As long as you've readied an action (I ready an action to leap in front of whatever he throws at Bob!), I see no problem with it.

Of course, it might just happen the Wizard is casting lightning bolt, and then you're just not helping much at all.

 

[Pielorinho]

IIRC, you can choose the area of an area-affect spell at the end of casting.

If someone readies an action to intercept your fireball bead, they'll probably need to ready an action to go off when you cast fireball -- meaning that they act immediately before you do.

Which means that you can simply choose to send the fireball along a path unobstructed by their meddling self.

This isn't completely clear by the rules, but the rules for readying an action do say that it's the DM's judgement what constitutes a valid trigger. I know that I wouldn't allow someone to use "a fireball pellet appears" as a valid trigger.

If you could do that, then you oughtta also allow, "An arrow is fired" as a trigger in the following situation:

A------F
Y

where A=Archer, F=Friend, and Y=You. The archer fires an arrow. at your friend. You run up to your friend and stand in front of her, catching the arrow in your chest. You can do this, see, because you can run faster than a speeding arrow.

If you don't allow your players to run to intercept arrows like this, you probably shouldn't allow them to run to intercept fireballs like this.

Using a reflex save, OTOH, might be fine.

Daniel

 

[Plane Sailing]

What's wrong with that?
If the wizard is aiming at a group of peasants 200' away, and the paladin manages to intercept it at the 100' mark, the peasants are still safely out of the blast radius.

Well, since the person I was quoting said

a big battle in the middle of a crowded market

those kind of ranges are not really very likely, are they?

 

[BMF]

It's a great image, but don't let anyone hear you mention it in the rules forum, or they will chide you since it will still explode and fill the full 20ft radius!

If he is close to them when it goes off, he might provide them with some cover.

A------F
Y

where A=Archer, F=Friend, and Y=You. The archer fires an arrow. at your friend. You run up to your friend and stand in front of her, catching the arrow in your chest. You can do this, see, because you can run faster than a speeding arrow.

Why do you have to run all the way over to "F" to block the arrow?? It looks to me like a 5 foot step would put Y in the path of the arrow. Hell, Y can probably just reach his hand out and block the arrow as it leaves the bow, in this diagram anyway....

 

[Pielorinho]

Why do you have to run all the way over to "F" to block the arrow?? It looks to me like a 5 foot step would put Y in the path of the arrow. Hell, Y can probably just reach his hand out and block the arrow as it leaves the bow, in this diagram anyway....

Y doesn't HAVE to run over in front of F to block the arrow; my point is simply that he COULD, if you rule that an arrow's leaving a bow can be a trigger for a readied action.

Here's a diagram that illustrates that better; I was hoping you wouldn't make me do this :

F------A
--------
--------
--------
--------
Y-------

In this picture, A is (let's be mean and say ten feet) 10' away from F. A shoots F. Y is 30' away from F; Y uses his readied action to move in front of F, moving three times as fast as an arrow, in order to provide F with cover.

Problem?
Daniel