Gaming W/Jemal: Planar Quest! (Closed)

[Jemal]

just for the official ruling from on high : all forms of teleportation effects can pass through force effects unless either the teleportation or force effect specifically states otherwise.
Also I know its been dealt with, but benign transposition must be cast on a WILLING target, so by definition if Mei doesn't want to go he cant make her.

And finally, things like this are exactly why I (And wade) wanted this fight.

I'll also have to check how big - exactly - the force bubble is, b/c while a creature CAN fit/fight in a smaller space, there is still a limit.
*EDIT: OK so the bubble is 10' high and 10' across, it's just barely big enough for Wade to function, the Elemental would have to squeeze, gaining massive penalties, however it would not be able to do so with Wade already in there.

 

[Jemal]

Also, regarding my post IC about tripping someone who's standing up, I have seen many people argue over this, but in the end there is an official ruling (Or at least as official as you can get with the hundreds of authors involved in D&D)
From the Wizards of the Coast Rules of the Game article on their main website. Near the bottom it states:

t's possible to attempt a trip attack as an attack of opportunity. Fortunately, you can't be tripped while getting up from prone, at least not through the attack of opportunity you provoke. That because attacks of opportunity are resolved before the actions that provoke them (there are a few exceptions, see Rules of the Game: All About Attacks of Opportunity for details). When you try to stand up from a prone position, the attack of opportunity comes before you get back on your feet. Since you're still prone when the attack comes, the attack of opportunity can't trip you.

 

[Binder Fred]

Also a note: Wade is standing after the teleport. I've always ruled that if it can transport you across a world and change which way you're facing, it should allow sitting/changing/laying down alterations.

Makes sense. It was this bit that sort of got me confused: ".. and still laying on the ground!" By the by, do we have a better idea of Wade's touch AC, now that Ur has both hit and missed him with touch attacks?

ALSO, quick rules FYI: You cant trip someone with the AoO provoked by them standing up, b/c the AoO happens *BEFORE* the action that causes it, hence your target would still be prone when you trip them, and then their 'stand up' action would go off and they'd be standing.

I, of course, happen not to agree with Skip's reasoning (are you surprised? ). From my point of view it rests wholly on an arbitrary binary prone/not prone view of things which has no basis in reality as we know it. 1. You get an attack of opportunity because your opponent has opened up his defenses. i.e. in this case Ur would get an (hypotethical) AoO, not because Wade just lies there, but because he's made himself stationary/dropped his guard by *starting to get up*. The attack of opportunity, by its very nature, therefore occurs not before the triggering action, but before the triggering action is completed, when Wade is neither down, nor fully up -- it's in fact this attempt to change his state that triggers the attack, and *that's* what the trip attempt, in this case, is against: not a prone foe, but a foe *attempting to get up*. 2. Anybody who has watched or experienced any fighting at all (be it TV or real life) knows that it's very possible indeed to trip someone as they are trying to get up IRL (by kicking out a suporting arm or leg, pushing at an unbraced moment, smashing the guy down, etc). Skip's reasoning is therefore based on a word for word interpretation of the rules without bothering to look at the underlying reality those rules are trying to model. Poor form in my book.

Frankly, I have no idea why the whole of D&D history seems geared at making any manoeuver other than the straight damage-dealing attack so difficult. The rules for tripping, bull-rushing, disarming, etc are already so skewed againts their users that it takes a pile of Feats to make them halfway workeable. There's really no need to pile on any more on top, IMHO.

 

[Shayuri]

I think it's because it's pretty easy to make a 'trip build' who can render an enemy completely unable to regain his feet once down, if that's allowed. The rules of the game aren't really meant to strictly model reality...they're also to make the game at least semi-protected against that kind of abuse.

There may be better ways to do it, I grant you, but this is how they chose to.

There's a fair amount of actions that are resolved as straight rolls against a DC when they should probably be resolved as contested actions. But even then, it's not hard to stack bonuses to make the outcomes of contests foregone, thus removing the randomness from the results.

 

[Jemal]

AH, I see. The 'still laying on the ground" comment was meant to indicate that he appeared to be in both places At the same time - Standing in the bubble AND laying on the ground where he was tripped. (The ability he used - 'flee the scene' invocation - simultaneously teleports you AND Creates an illusion of you where you were for one round that reacts as though you were still there.) Apologies for not making that clearer.

As to the ruling, I can understand your reasoning, but as Shayuri already pointed out, it's a big balance issue. A trip character (Like, say for completely random example...you ) Could easily keep many opponents out of a fight otherwise.
Even without the ability to just keep someone prone as long as you want, you can still force them every round to to either expend a move action (Or have some other way of getting up) or remain prone and suffer the consequences.

I've always found Trip, Disarm and Grapple to be fairly powerful, so much so that I dislike using them against PC's. The only time they AREN'T highly effective is when they're completely useless because the target is immune (Or virtually immune, such as by dint of having an even better check than the attacker)

 

[Binder Fred]

(The ability he used - 'flee the scene' invocation - simultaneously teleports you AND Creates an illusion of you where you were for one round that reacts as though you were still there.)

Oh. Didn't get that at all, obviously. Might have acted differently if I knew... Then again, maybe not, considering Ur was the only fighter able to get inside the bubble that round... Eh, it's done now.

As to the ruling, I can understand your reasoning, but as Shayuri already pointed out, it's a big balance issue. A trip character (Like, say for completely random example...you ) Could easily keep many opponents out of a fight otherwise.
Even without the ability to just keep someone prone as long as you want, you can still force them every round to to either expend a move action (Or have some other way of getting up) or remain prone and suffer the consequences.

You mean somewhat like, say, the Daze cantrip at low levels? Confusion/charm/slow spells? Trip attemps *are* fairly nice when they work (that being, you know, the point), but contrarely to most things, they are resisted *twice* (once from the touch, once from the Str), allow the defender an opportunity to turn the tables if the trip attack should fail and, in the non-Feated version, even give out an AoO for your trouble(!), all of which balances things some I would think... Would it be better accepted if the target did not suffer from the Prone disadvantages when under an AoO Trip? (For no RL reason that I can see, but much better to loose a hard won advantage than not being able to use it at all, right?). What say yee?

(While on the subject, I don't generally consider Ur to be a "trip character". He's far from optimized to be one anyways. I think of him more as a General Support character. He's much more polyvalent than, say, Tutek, and, if he ever manages to lay his hands on a Divine Might item he can use, he might even manage to be at least competitive in the straight damage-dealing arena as well.)

 

[D'Raven]

I hide! I consider Darrian to be a hide character.

 

[Binder Fred]

Not sure where you get the >4, >4, 16, 5.
Urs rolls last turn against TOUCH AC were 1 (Failed hit), 18(Hit, but then failed trip), 16(followed by successful trip), and then non-trip attacks. His Trip attack this turn was a 5.
Thats 1, 18, 16, 5 for his last for touch AC/trip attacks.

Oh, right. Forgot that second "miss" was on the str check and not the Touch. Not that unlucky then.

By the by, do I guess that your silence means you're thinking about my counter-proposal above very hard indeed. Quoted below for convenience:

Would it be better accepted if the target did not suffer from the Prone disadvantages when under an AoO Trip? (For no RL reason that I can see, but much better to loose a hard won advantage than not being able to use it at all, right?). What say yee?

 

[Binder Fred]

Calling [MENTION=51271]Voda Vosa[/MENTION], [MENTION=24234]kinem[/MENTION], [MENTION=6699311]D'Raven[/MENTION] and [MENTION=4936]Shayuri[/MENTION] (for that move action if you want) to the IC thread? You guys are up!

 

[Shayuri]

Meep, my bad. Thanks!