For Discussion: Reactions.

[Water Bob]

The Ready action and attacks of opportunity pretty well cover any needed exceptions to resolving your own actions only on your turn.

The Ready Action works "pretty well", but it doesn't work as good as it should.

Case in point: You're a thief, burgling a house. The town watch is outside, banging on the door for you to come out. You grab the princess and stick your dagger to her throat and then walk out in front of the watch.

"If you make a move, I'll kill her."

In effect, what you're doing here is using a Move action then a Ready action, each round. If anybody moves, you'll stick the princess.




Now that the rules will let you do that is how they work "pretty well". In the old days, we use to have to wing that type of scenario and then go into combat rounds later. With 3E and the Ready Action, we can play out that scenario inside of a combat.

Where the rules fail, in my opinion, is that the thief has to be specific about when he will stick the princess. It should be "anytime the thief wants to". But, what it is, is "by whatever ever trigger the player comes up with."

What can a player say that will be the best trigger?

And, what about the constantly changing conditions of combat?

Maybe the thief initially thinks he'll stick her if the guards come close, but, a little later in the same turn, the thief sees an ally he didn't know was there. So, he decides to stick her and throw her at the guards, then take off for the ally he saw in hopes of getting away.

This is my point. The trigger for the Ready Action needs to be slippery--not specific.





This is why I think the game is better served if the player describes what will be triggered rather than what will trigger it. For example, the thief up above will stick the princess with his dagger. That's the action he's readying. He can't whip out his bow and fire at a guard because he's got his dagger out with the point to the princess.

And, if he's got the point to her neck, with only a standard action left, then he can't run this round, either. That will beging next round.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

So, basically, your house-rule could boil down to "I'll be more flexible in letting people delcare their triggers"?



I mean, I've found it's useful to be fairly lax in their requirements to begin with; I don't see the huge need to write a whole new rule when just thoughtfully applying the old one will work out.

"If you make a move, I'll kill her."

In effect, what you're doing here is using a Move action then a Ready action, each round. If anybody moves, you'll stick the princess.

In this case, the thief is allowed to attack the princess if one of the guards he sees gets too close, or if they attack. There's no need to be a stickler for precisely defining "move" as "If they get closer than 15'" or "If they draw a weapon" or ...

As for your archer at the door example, I allow people to decide not to take their readied action. When they declare, "I ready to attack the first enemy through the door", and then they decide not to shoot the goblin, well, they're allowed to decide to not shoot if they really don't want to.

As for:

What kind of a trigger would you give the bad guy, with his spear up to the commoner? You could Ready the action and say the character will run her through if the PC move past point X (maybe that the far-end of the wagon).

But, what if a PC throws a hand axe or a spear at the bad guy. I'd allow the attack, of course, but if the PC misses on his attack, doesn't it seem logical that the bad guy might run grandma through right there and then?

To do so, specify the action you will take and the conditions under which you will take it.

"If they come too close or attack me, I'll stab Grandma" is a perfectly acceptable ready action. It covers people advancing past the wagon and someone throwing an axe.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

What can a player say that will be the best trigger?

There is no best answer, no universally correct answer. It's for the PLAYER to figure out and for the DM to decide if it's allowable (see: Adjudicating the Ready Action, DMG p.25).

And, what about the constantly changing conditions of combat?

Another issue for the player to deal with round by round. Remember, however, that the Ready action is not an "I Win" button either. The mechanics should not be set up such that a player... gets to decide what he ALLOWS opponents to do to him. Allowing a character to act outside of his turn carries consequences - the possibility of having lost his action entirely or opponents finding ways to circumvent his preparations. In your example the character is moving and readying to kill his hostage. Simple enough except that he can't make the triggers for his kill action either too broad OR overly detailed. That leaves room for opponents to CATCH the character at the disadvantage in which he has voluntarily placed himself by shifting his action to later instead of now when he would be unopposed in resolving it.

Maybe the thief initially thinks he'll stick her if the guards come close, but, a little later in the same turn, the thief sees an ally he didn't know was there. So, he decides to stick her and throw her at the guards, then take off for the ally he saw in hopes of getting away.

This is my point. The trigger for the Ready Action needs to be slippery--not specific.

Exactly, that is the tradeoff the character accepts.

Also, as you, yourself note, in the round the character decides to just pull a bow and shoot instead, or to kill the hostage and take off running he's LOST his readied action for that round because the triggers for his action are not fulfilled. He has to wait until his NEXT turn to change what he wants to do and in that time his opponents could decide to do something different like rush him despite his threats (though again, see DMG p.26 for ways the DM may potentially allow the character to get around changing his mind about actually taking the action he declared). This is all well-handled by the Ready action.

This is why I think the game is better served if the player describes what will be triggered rather than what will trigger it.

The action to be triggered is almost always going to be VERY simple though: "I attack," "I cast my spell at Redshirt #4," "I take a move action," "I jump across the chasm." The events that have to take place that lead to the characters action are what have to be better defined.

I think this is all just a matter of better understanding and better adjudicating the Ready action and not of the game needing a new "Reaction" action. As far as I can tell, nothing your Reaction action will do does anything different or better than Ready already does.

Reaction action.
Ready already.
I sound like Dr. Seuss.

 

[Water Bob]

So, basically, your house-rule could boil down to "I'll be more flexible in letting people delcare their triggers"?

I think this is all just a matter of better understanding and better adjudicating the Ready action and not of the game needing a new "Reaction" action.

That's exactly what I meant with my previous post. Forget the "Reaction" and go with a looser call on Ready triggers.

I think specifying the weapon or the action is enough--we don't need specific tiggers.

A thief with a dagger up to the princesses head would say, "I Ready my dagger."

That's it. He doesn't need a trigger. And, if he wants to slice the princesses' throat because he's going to use that as a diversion, throwing her dying body to the guards, and running off in the other direction (probably work better as a Delay action), he can. He doesn't have to get stuck with the triggers "if the guards come too close", or "if they attack me".

I'm really leaning towards just naming the action or weapon (or spell) that will be readied, but allowing just about anything the character wants to do when he wants to do it with the Ready Action.

Thus, if he Readies his dagger, whatever action he takes, he's got to take it with the dagger. He could slice the princesses' throat. He could slice a guard as he walks by with the princess in tow. He could throw it at a guard--just about anything he wants to do with the dagger.



Spells would be even more restricted. A character would ready a magic missle, and his Readied action later in the round must use that spell--he's got to throw it at someone or not at all.