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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gantros" data-source="post: 2111849" data-attributes="member: 15836">I for one agree with KarinsDad - this has always seemed to me like an obvious problem.    Perhaps a better example is in order.  Let's say 2 PCs are working their way through a bandit lair that's been alerted to their presence.  They enter a large room 60' across with a door on the opposite side.  Unbeknownst to them, the bandit leader waits quietly behind the door.  He hears the PCs coming, but decides to wait and ambush whoever comes through.    Scenario 1:    The room is empty.  Suspecting danger beyond the other door, PC #1 decides to stand beside the door and push it open, while PC #2 stands 30' away with his crossbow trained at the door.  #1 approaches the door and makes a Listen check, hearing breathing on the other side.  Now both sides are aware of each other, but cannot immediately engage.  #1 decides to act first by signalling to his partner and pushing open the door.  Everyone rolls for initiative.  If the bandit wins, he can dash through the door, past #1 who cannot attack, charge 60', and catch #2 flat-footed before he even has a chance to release the trigger.    Scenario 2:  Same as above, except a second bandit happened to be walking through the room as the PCs enter.  Combat starts with both sides are surprised, so there is no surprise round and initiative is resolved normally.  #1 moves off to attack the bandit.  He doesn't look too tough, so #2 decides to let #1 handle him, and uses his turn to cover the suspicious-looking door by readying his crossbow to fire at anyone that comes through.  Round 1 ends.  Hearing the sound of combat, the bandit leader decides to open the door and rush through, hopefully catching the enemy unawares.  Since he counts as a new, aware combatant, he enters combat between rounds 1 & 2 and everyone re-rolls initiative (as per the DMG).  However, #2 was waiting for exactly something like this to happen, so his readied action happens before anyone else can act.  Thus, he automatically gets a shot at the leader.    Now compare these two scenarios.  In the first one, all initiative modifiers being equal, the bandit leader has a 1 in 3 chance of winning initiative and attacking #2 before he can react - this despite the fact that #2 was supposedly prepared for this action and was not being distracted in any way.    In the second one, since combat has started, it becomes impossible for the bandit leader to attack #2 before he gets a shot off, even though if anything you'd expect #2 to be a little more distracted by the fighting happening a few squares away from him.    How can you rationalize something like this?  It seems obvious to me that #2 should be every bit as prepared to fire in scenario 1 as in scenario 2, if not more so.  And this is far from a contrived scenario.    The DMG is pretty explicit about not allowing ready actions outside of combat, but it's much less explicit about when combat should start.  I think it's perfectly fair to say that once two opponents become aware of each other, either side can choose to initiate combat by taking any combat action, including readying an action.  This state should persist until both sides cease to be aware of the other, or both sides stand down.    In fact the DMG gives an example much like this, where two parties become aware of each other but cannot immediately interact (pg23).  In this case, actions start tracking by rounds, and each side can do whatever they want to prepare until they come into contact, at which point initiative is rolled.  The question is, does combat begin when initiative is rolled, or when the parties become aware?  I'm not aware of anything explicit in the RAW that says it can't be the latter.</blockquote>

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