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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 4970401" data-attributes="member: 4937">Oh, get real.  We are talking about cocking a crossbow for 30 seconds or 3 minutes or something.  Have you ever actually been hunting with a crossbow?This is really simple.  By everyone's description (so far) but mine every combat is an ambush.  Sure, you don't always get a surprise round, but you do 'surprise' the other side enough to catch them off their gaurd and flatfooted.Does that make the slightest bit of sense either under the rules or in real life???There are four basic situations:1) Both sides are caught unaware.   Neither side can act immediately, the side that acts first catches the other one briefly off gaurd.2) Side A is surprised but side B is not.  Side A prepares an attack (the surprise round) or 'ambushes' side B, and then if it can act first catches side B possibly off gaurd.3) Side B is surprised but side A is not.  Side B prepares an attack (the surprise round) or 'ambushes' side A, and then if it can act first catches side A possibly off gaurd.4) Neither side is surprised or caught unaware, so neither side can catch the other off gaurd.Why is everyone here claiming #4 is impossible, when the rules plainly state that you stop being flatfooted whenever you are aware of the threat and take your first action?  Why is everyone here claiming that #4 is impossible when it was clearly possible under every prior edition of the game?  Why is everyone claiming #4 is impossible when it reflects experience and common sense about how things 'really work'? He can't be surprised, but if he can be caught flatfooted that is a huge advantage.   Initiative is supposed to resolve 'who goes first'.  It isn't supposed to turn every fight against an alert opponent into an ambush/counter ambush situation.  Winning initiative is a huge enough advantage as is  - 9 times in 10, whoever wins initiative is going to win the fight because of the fact that D&D fights are usually over in 1-4 rounds, going an 'extra round' is already huge.  If winning initiative turns every fight into an ambush, even if the opponent has been aware of you for several rounds, then its just ridiculous.I have no problem with interrupting a villains monologue.  My villains generally don't monologue more than, "Kill them.", anyway.  The issue I have is that a player interrupting like that is IME metagaming.  They are interrupting because they seem to think there is or are angling for a 'ruthlessness' bonus that they think the side that announces the most ruthless and most sudden attack earns.  I personally think that arguing that its impossible to begin 'a battle' (by which I mean, the point in combat where someone takes an attack action, not the point where we start tracking rounds) with neither side flatfooted is precisely that sort of argument in favor of 'ruthlessness.  It leads IMO to pure 'hack n slash', because why bother talking to an NPC if it risks getting you caught flatfooted?  Attack first and always attack is then the surest way to ensure survival.  I know that as a PC first time I tried to initiate parley with a strange group, and the DM had me take sneak attack damage because I was supposedly 'flatfooted' despite being aware of the threat it would never happen again.</blockquote>

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