How often does Grappling happen in your game?

[Voadam]

Lots, hate it.

Even though I normally don't like "We're all immune all the time" stuff I was glad the spontaneous caster cleric in my high level group I DM chose freedom of movement as one of his spells and kept the party normally immune so I did not have to resolve it all the time anymore.

Single thing I'm most looking forward to in 4e is how they handle grapple.

 

[blargney the second]

There are?

Oodles of them.

When my players go somewhere I don't expect, I sometimes make semi-random areas for them to explore. I rifle through my large collection of minis for monsters that I haven't used before, then grab the stat cards to go with them. So I've been exposed to a fair number of differeent monsters now...

Between snatch, improved grab, engulf, and other abilities, there are loads of monsters that are built around grappling. The worst part is I often don't end up using the ability because grappling is a stupid tactic if you're outnumbered. It's like trying to snog before you've properly separated the girl from her entourage - some things are just better done alone.

 

[boolean]

There are?

I guess I have somehow managed to avoid all of them but uh otyughs. . . and uh . . . do owlbears have improved grab? I can't think of any, I guess. And I am not one to pick monsters based on their abilities, but rather on how well they fit in an adventure's environment regardless of what those abilities are. . . So I would have thought I would have run into more. . .

The following SRD (MM1) monsters have Improved Grab:
[sblock]Animal Brown Bear
Animal Constrictor Snake
Animal Giant Constrictor Snake
Animal Crocodile
Animal Giant Crocodile
Animal Dire Bear
Animal Dire Lion
Animal Dire Shark
Animal Dire Tiger
Animal Leopard
Animal Lion
Animal Octopus
Animal Giant Octopus
Animal Polar Bear
Animal Squid
Animal Giant Squid
Animal Tiger
Animal Tyrannosaurus
Ankheg
Assassin Vine
Behir
Choker
Chuul
Couatl
Darkmantle
Demon Glabrezu
Demon Hezrou
Demon Marilith
Demon Retreiver
Devil Barbed
Devil Hellcat
Devil Pit Fiend
Gibbering Mouther
Grey Render
Hag Annis
Kraken
Leonal
Lilend
Lycanthrope Any Animal form with Improved Grab
Mohrg
Nightshade Nightcrawler
Ooze Black Pudding
Ooze Grey Ooze
Ooze Ochre Jelly
Otyugh
Owlbear
Purple Worm
Rast
Remorhaz
Salamander (Any Size)
Shambling Mound
Tarrasque
Tendriculous
Tojanida (Any Size)
Vermin Giant Ant (Any Size)
Vermin Giant Praying Mantis
Vermin Monstrous Scorpion (Any Size)
Wyvern
Xill[/sblock]

Illithids and Yuan-Ti Abominations also have Improved Grab. I'm not sure about any of the other non-SRD monsters.

Looking at the list, they're mostly big and dumb (Animals, Oozes, Vermin, low-Int magical beasts). There's also a notable subset of Outsiders. If you tend to favour an urban style of campaign then they wouldn't turn up as much.

 

[el-remmen]

Yeah, I have only ever used 4 of those in 3.xE.

I guess that's why I didn't think there were that many. But yeah, that does seem like a lot.

 

[chriton227]

Usually multiple times per combat encounter. One of the players in my current RHoD campaign is playing a half-giant Psi Warrior/Monk grapple specialist. Improved Grapple, Powerful Build, Expansion, and Grip of Iron combine to give him an absolutely ludicris grapple bonus (north of +20 at ECL7). He uses trip and grapple to completely shut down any caster they encounter, and grapples most tougher targets to set them up for the rogue in the party (and to force the -4 to attacks for prone and -4 to attacks for being grappled). Most of the time he gets pretty torn up in the process, but all in all it is effective and makes things easier for the party.

 

[blargney the second]

Sounds like a human tanglefoot bag.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Grappling. Just about every session. Every now and then I go a game or two without using the rules, but when it does come up, it tends to come up more than once.

In the last session, after being mauled by a sporebat, the party retreated, rested, prepped daylight, death ward, and fly and cast both on the party's tank who is closest to light infantry. He followed the sporebat into its lair, cornered it near the ceiling, grappled it, and killed it.

The session before that when I remember it coming up, there was a shadow dire tiger who charged my halfling paladin mutt and was shocked to discover that close quarters fighting means little halflings with sharp pointy swords are NOT grappleable, then there were a pair of axiomatic dire tigers who snacked on our party's clerics, and finally a giant who, frustrated with the dwarf tank's dodginess decided to put him in a headlock and squeeze until he had dwarf-jelly. (It would have worked much better if my halfling had not gotten healed after nearly scorching herself to death on the evil wizard's fire shield, returned to the fight, and put an end to him). In between, we returned the favor to the monsters by trapping a foul derro and his gorgon mount in Evard's Black Tentacles.

 

[Jhulae]

And, there are enough of the big critters with Swallow, too. I don't think many people realize just *how screwed* the average PC is once they get swallowed.

 

[blargney the second]

I gave one of my rogue PCs the draconic template just so he'd have claws and darkvision to sneak attack his way out of gullets. At one point I voluntarily failed a grapple check to get swallowed whole by a purple worm.

 

[Jhulae]

I gave one of my rogue PCs the draconic template just so he'd have claws and darkvision to sneak attack his way out of gullets. At one point I voluntarily failed a grapple check to get swallowed whole by a purple worm.

Yeah, but you were specifically set up for being swallowed.

I'm interested to know how many Players and DMs realize just how screwed PCs who don't have P/S natural weapons or P/S light weapons in hand are when they're swallowed.