Gaping "Ready Action" hole

[Nebulous]

Would the easiest solution be to say you can't Ready in a turn you use an Action Point.

After all Action Point implies "Action!" not thinking about an a little action later.

I think that would fix a bunch of abuse right there, simply enough. An AP is action NOW, immediately, not delayed for later. As far as action points are concerned. I realize there are other potential loopholes being discussed here.

Please, continue.

 

[WalterKovacs]

Correct me if I'm wrong, I want to make sure I'm on the same page.

Let's go with drow for an example, since it won't need an Action Point as part of the equation. We'll go with darkfire since it's more useful than darkness in this equation. It only takes a minor action and lasts until the end of the drow's next turn. The initiative is:

Fighter Warlock Wizard Warlord Monster Rogue (the Drow).

The Drow Rogue hits with darkfire, and then readies an action (deft strike) for when the Warlord shifts, since the rogue can't otherwise get into position to hit the monster. After readying this action, the drow's first turn since firing darkfire is over.

The next round starts and everyone (including the rogue when the readied action is triggered) make their attacks with combat advantage. The initiative becomes:

Fighter Warlock Wizard Rogue (the Drow) Warlord Monster

Since the Warlord is the one that triggered the readied action. The drow did not actually have a second turn yet, so the fighter, warlock wizard and rogue each get another attack with combat advantage. This extended the effect for most of the group an extra turn. (For the rogue it was a wash, as the drow would still have had two turns of attacking it if it wanted since it used a readied action to not attack it on one turn, but three other party members benefitted from the delay).

Now, when it's an effect that applies on the monster's turn (like slow, dazed, stunned, blinded) it would last a turn longer.

One note on Action Points: Someone could spend an action point to take an action now, and use their normal standard action to ready an effect.

One other note about readying ... I've seen some players use delaying and/or readying as a means of getting around certain other problems. For example, an enemy drops an effect on them like blindness or immobilization that lasts until the end of that monsters next turn. So they either delay, or ready an action such that at some point after they lose their disabling condition they can still get an attack off (or an entire turn in the case of delaying). Presumably, monsters could do the same in the case of these exploits. It doesn't help the delayed/stunned monsters, but it could help monsters that are slowed/immobilized/weakened until end of next turn.

 

[Eric Finley]

Draco - reread the OP. At this point I think we're all agreed on what it should be. But your invocation of RAW is incorrect, and/or your interpretation of the problem scenario is.

Readying an action based on a legitimate trigger (movement, say) that occurs during the turn of someone who falls before you in the initiative order will always trigger the problem, by RAW, with certain exceptions (like if you're last and they're first, or if others also juggle the order in the meanwhile). The whole problem is that when you take the triggered action it resets your initiative from a spot in the initiative order that's yet to come (your old spot in the order) to one that's already gone by (by definition), and does so (by clear and unambiguous RAW) without any of the compensating factors covered under Delay Turn.

Nebulous - you're right that this would fix many of the issues right there. But since it's not a comprehensive fix, my personal preference is to address the underlying issue (which I've done), and then not add additional constraints for players to have to remember regarding Action Points... which, in my experience, are being used much more often than Ready Action.

(Edit: Walter, yes. Correct on every count. Including your additional note at the end. I'm going to wait and see if this becomes an issue, though. There are fixes which could be possible to it, but they're not as intuitive, so I think I may just discourage this behaviour OOC if it comes up, and trust my players and DM to be reasonable about it. It's not one that'll happen by accident much, I think.)

As for anyone who wants to contend that we're seeing more loopholes crop up as a result of the fix, I can only assume that they're just not paying attention. The current fix, which was proposed in the OP and has not changed a whit, remains airtight. I'm quite honestly puzzled by why people keep suggesting alternate fixes which, frankly, aren't.

It's just a clarification to the "your initiative moves to spot X" part of the Ready Action rule. How do you move your initiative token - do you just slide it without doing anything else? The answer is no. You do it by using Delay Turn on it, when it comes up, to slide it into the new position. That way you get all the rule precautions built into Delay and everything happens when it should. This is NOT complicated. It's just also not in there, right now, and thus is indeed a fix.

(And, as I think we've shown here, it's also not 100% intuitive, despite any assertions to the contrary. Once I showed people where the problem lay, at least half of the proposed fixes have been either incomplete or far more loophole-ridden than RAW. And these are the fixes which these people would have applied at the gaming table, if a player brought it up. Even among those proposing versions of the "just use the same rules that are under delay turn", there's confusion on when to insert these effects from Delay, and an overall lack of clarity which I know would fubar many of my players if it came up.)

My solution appears to be airtight. It also appears to be equivalent to, if more precisely stated than, the proposals offered by chaotix42, DracoSuave, and (sarcasm tantamount to hostility aside) ricardo440. If some of these people want to suggest that the fix is completely obvious, I have no stomach to argue that; all I can do is point to this thread and shrug.

As far as I'm concerned, this thread is closed. That's not hostile or defensive, that's just an old forum habit - I asked a question and raised a point, and my question has been answered to my satisfaction and the point brought to folks' attention. If, by now, people still either (a) disagree that there's a problem, or (b) think that some other fix would be sufficient, well, power to you. I will still keep half an eye on this thread, though, and will happily answer anyone who either (c) is still confused about the problem and its fix and honestly just wants clarification, or (d) spots a loophole which is not caught (or is caused) by the fix.

The bit about sustained effects I will fork to another thread for clarity.

 

[mneme]

How do you move your initiative token - do you just slide it without doing anything else? The answer is no. You do it by using Delay Turn on it, when it comes up, to slide it into the new position.

Yes. This is good, and covers the issue nicely.

Re Sustain -- the problem is that you do want a restriction on Sustain such that you can't get 1 sustain in 1.5 turns. Frankly, I'm fine with the rule being that you lose sustain if you haven't done so in a full initiative cycle (eg, if you delay normally) -- this would allow wizards to reorder if they have the actions via sustain minor, ready a sustain after Foo, (or action point sustain, sustain after Foo) but would still mean that a normal delay would break sustain.

 

[WalterKovacs]

Just to make sure I'm looking at this right, the idea for the fix is:

When you take your readied action you also resolve any 'start of turn' effects, and end any positive until the end of your turn effects (i.e. end positive effects like buffs on you or your allies, debuffs on your enemies), and when you reach what would have been your previous turn on the initiative order you resolve the rest of the end of your turn (stuff like saving throws and the like)?

It just seems this could create other issues, such as with a regeneration type positive effect that, by readying an action, you may double dip on some positive effect that occurs on each of your turns before the opponent's next turn. Similarly an ally could have an effect that does something for their allies at the start of each of their turns, and by all their allies readying actions they could double dip in that effect. [One example would be consecrated grounds, the level 5 cleric daily ...]. Mostly this would probably equate to a bit of extra healing before an enemy gets to act.

Also, presumably if you got another 'start of turn' you'd get back your immediate action which let's you "ready to ready to ready ...". If you don't have a proper start of turn, you'd get some benefits (like the invisibility of eyebite) a second time not to mention avoiding ongoing damage, etc.

Of course I might be misinterpreting what is meant by using the Delay Turn on the initiative token ...

 

[mneme]

Just to make sure I'm looking at this right

Don't think you are, but I'll explain.

When you take your readied action you also resolve any 'start of turn' effects, and end any positive until the end of your turn effects (i.e. end positive effects like buffs on you or your allies, debuffs on your enemies), and when you reach what would have been your previous turn on the initiative order you resolve the rest of the end of your turn (stuff like saving throws and the like)?

Don't think so.

I think it's:

Start of turn
Minor: whatever
Move: Whatever
Standard: Ready an action
End of turn

Trigger
Take readied action
Put post-it on initiatve: move to right before trigger.

Original initiatve: automatic forced delay
Start of turn effects (bad stuff).
delay effects (end goodstuff)
delay
delay

New initiative start of turn. No bad stuff (already happened)
turn
End of new turn

Basically, instead of just moving your initiative, you mark "forced delay" on your initiatve, and the normal delay rules make things work.

 

[Jhaelen]

Threads like this make me glad I don't care about RAW

 

[Otterscrubber]

I know DMs sometimes have a hard time deciding when to just lay the books aside and slap their players, but here's a good rule of thumb: "When the player invents a rules abuse that is so convoluted that it requires, roughly, a recursive function call to explain, slap that player."

Seriously. Slap them twice in fact.

To be honest though when the plan is so convoluted that I don't even want to read the 2nd paragraph something is wrong. Although I did see what part of the concept here was to ready an action for when the creature loses it's action. Can that even be done? When you ready an action something has to happen to trigger it, and effectively nothing is really happening there to trigger it, something is failing to happen and I would never allow such a readied action to take place.

 

[Stalker0]

Thanks to the OP for bringing this to the community's attention.

Like most of the comments here, I agree that rule 0 is the cure for any potential brokenness.

That said, let us all remember that its much nicer in most people's games for the DM to become aware of an issue and then let everyone know how he's going to handle it, as opposed to a player finding this, gleefully spending hours trying to create the ultimate combo, and then getting instantly knocked back by the DM.

An ounce of prevention prevents a pound of cure (or something like that)

 

[Grazzt]

I know DMs sometimes have a hard time deciding when to just lay the books aside and slap their players, but here's a good rule of thumb: "When the player invents a rules abuse that is so convoluted that it requires, roughly, a recursive function call to explain, slap that player."

Actually in such a situation, I wouldnt lay my books aside. I'd likely slap the player with the book just to make sure the point is clear.