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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Majoru Oakheart" data-source="post: 2138673" data-attributes="member: 5143">This is really the major point here.  Don't think of this in terms of "realism", think of it in terms of cinematics.  If you could see a powerful character in the middle of a throne room, surrounded entirely by guards suddenly reach into his belt and throw a dagger through the throat of the king seated there before the guards have time to even take the step towards him and attack him, then you can envision flat footedness in this situation.  Think Riddick.To me, flatfootedness is the difference between THINKING there might be combat and KNOWING there is.You can sit in a room with a dangerous person for hours, thinking that at any time he might try to kill you.  But you can never be certain at exactly WHICH moment it'll happen.  Maybe you'll look away for a split second as you think you hear a noise at the door, and in that split second, the person has a dagger in hand and at your throat.I also don't know what other people are talking about, my combat always starts with rolling init.  Atlso, combat starts at the exact moment both sides are aware of each other and aware that each other are threats.So, using this policy, if a group of adventures walks up to a door, listens at it, they hear Gnoll voices inside.  They inform each other that there are Gnolls in the room, they then open the door, and the Gnolls become aware of them.  Initiative is rolled.  The PCs get a surprise round because prior to rolling initiative, the Gnolls were unaware of the other side (assume they failed any listen checks to hear the PCs).  Since combat doesn't start until the Gnolls are aware of the PCs, no one can ready an action until then.Now, the Gnolls might THINK there are adventurers on the way to their room, but they don't know the exact moment that door is going to open.  That gives the PCs about 1 or 2 seconds as the Gnolls' brains register that a door has opened and there are PCs on the other side and that they should get ready to duck as they are about to get attacked.  They were prepared for a battle but didn't react fast enough to the battle actually starting.The same thing holds true for an assassin.  He is wandering through the crowd, disguised.  No one knows he is an assassin.  The guards know there must be an assassin out there somewhere and are ready for one to show up.  But WHO is the assassin?  Will he show up this second or 10 minutes from now?  Anyone in the crowd COULD be him, but there's lots of people who aren't him.  Suddenly, you catch a glimpse of steel as the assassin draws his dagger and rushes past you in a blur as your brain tries in vain to react to what you've just seen, but alas, you weren't fast enough (i.e. you lost init) and he managed to get past you before you could swing at him.And as for your problem about this not being able to happen in any round other than the 1st, you'd be wrong.  An assassin, in the middle of combat could become visible right beside the king and kill him, the king is flatfooted to him.  The only difference is in the amount of actions that he can take while everyone is flat footed to him.  The difference between the two situations is merely that the guards are already spinning around, swinging their swords around, dodging blows and acting on instinct.The best example in real life I can give of this is driving a car.  If you are driving around, you are always looking in your mirrors, being careful not to hit anyone.  However, if you see a car suddenly slam on it's breaks in front of you, it still takes a second to stop.  You may not have been paying enough attention to slam on the breaks in time not to hit him.  However, also in this second, time seems to slow down for you as adreneline is going through your system.  You put both your hands on the wheel, you sit up straight, you look around.  You may have been partially aware of the car to your left before, but now you are perfectly aware of the one behind you, the one to your right and back a bit and your brain has already calculated the distance needed to stop and possible routes other than stopping, like that hole to your right, if you swirve and speed up.  You weren't aware of the exact positions of all of these cars before it suddenly became important to know them all.  It still takes a second to react, and reaction times vary from person to person (i.e. initiative modifier).  If you don't react in time, you will hit the other car.  Just like if you don't react in time, the assassin will get past you.Flatfootedness represents someone making a quick action before people have time to react.  The feat Combat Reflexes represents training in acting in a split second to things that catch you surprised.</blockquote>

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