Ignoble Death by Ray of Frost!?!

[hammymchamham]

hey... that's what the character is based on. Good for the Arcane Trickster! let him have his fun...

agreed

 

[Pielorinho]

BTW, Dragons have Blindsight. It ain't so easy to get a sneak attack on a dragon.

True -- which is why were so proud of achieving it. We were on a ruined castle wall, next to a ruined tower, attacking a gnoll army down in the ruined courtyard. The dragon had a secret passage into the ruined tower and planned to burst from this secret passage to ambush us from behind all sneaky-like.

What the dragon didn't know is that we knew about the secret passageway, and our rogue had readied an action to attack the dragon as soon as it popped out of the passage.

The dragon knew where we were standing, and knew that we were fighting the gnolls down below. But since the dragon was expecting us to be facing the gnolls, it expected to ambush us. The DM ruled that the faceful of alchemist's fire it got on bursting from its secret passage was enough of a surprise to it that it was denied its dex bonus.

It was a slightly questionable ruling - but since we'd put so much prep into our plan, and since it played so well on a dragon's weakness (its arrogance, its belief in the inferior intellect of lower creatures), the DM allowed it.

(Oh, and Hammy, thanks for the explanation -- I've got no idea whether this dragon had a dex bonus, though, since i never saw its stats).

Daniel

 

[Nail]

It was a slightly questionable ruling - but since we'd put so much prep into our plan, and since it played so well on a dragon's weakness (its arrogance, its belief in the inferior intellect of lower creatures), the DM allowed it.

Good "story" ruling, but maybe a bad "rulebook" ruling.

Since you are flat-footed (which is what you're really talking about, rather than surprise) until your action, and the dragon was taking it's action, it was no longer flat-footed.

So, no sneak attack.

Still, I like the surprise of "What! You knew I was coming? How is that possible?" That should probably be counted as surprise.

 

[Pielorinho]

Good "story" ruling, but maybe a bad "rulebook" ruling.

Since you are flat-footed (which is what you're really talking about, rather than surprise) until your action, and the dragon was taking it's action, it was no longer flat-footed.

So, no sneak attack.

Still, I like the surprise of "What! You knew I was coming? How is that possible?" That should probably be counted as surprise.

Yeah, as I said, it's a questionable ruling on technical grounds. However, you can argue that since it was a readied action, it occurred before the dragon's action (even though it was triggered by the dragon's action), and that the dragon was therefore flatfooted.

It's a screwy ruling, I know, and illustrates some of the wonkiness of readied-action timing -- but it brings the rules in line with the fun of the scene.

Daniel

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

I understand that my prob is mostly with Haste/Imp Invis/Fly. I just threw in the Ray of Frost as an eye-catcher.

Ok, rephrase - any good way to stime the AT who is a flying abuser?

There are lots of tools...

Obscuring Mist
Fog Cloud
Sleet Storm
Stinking Cloud
Ice Storm
Fairie Fire
See Invisibility
Glitterdust
Invisibility Purge
scent
blindsight
Blur
Displacement
Mirror Images
True Strike
grappling
nets
Fly
an exceptional jump skill

The reason the AT is so effective is you are allowing the party to fight on a predictable battleground. The AT is using tactics that are extremely efficient against opponents with little magic. Don't let him have it so easy.

The simplest countertactic is fog the area and have NPCs charge into melee. That will play havoc with ranged sneak attacks and many attack spells.

I have one DM who delights in cooking crazy battle scenarios: thick fog, places flying is impossible or suicidal, underwater, very tight windy corridors,... It is not about screwing over a particular character or tactics; it is about forcing all the PCs to adjust strategies to a new environment.

If you keep them guessing, straightforward combos won't be so deadly efficient all the time.

Your PCs are not low level anymore. You can take the gloves off and throw some weird magic back at them.

 

[Pielorinho]

I have one DM who delights in cooking crazy battle scenarios: thick fog, places flying is impossible or suicidal, underwater, very tight windy corridors,... It is not about screwing over a particular character or tactics; it is about forcing all the PCs to adjust strategies to a new environment.

I think this is great advice. Battles in which the terrain plays a significant part are tremendous fun, whether it's because there's an earthquake, or because there are fires burning all over the place, or because there's a pier next to water (in which enemies lurk), or because there are chains stretching from floor to ceiling, or because there's a storm buffeting the ship, or what have you. Characters will be endangered by the surroundings, of course, but if they're clever, they can use the terrain to their advantage.

And it keeps things interesting.

Daniel

 

[Nail]

It's a screwy ruling, I know, and illustrates some of the wonkiness of readied-action timing -- but it brings the rules in line with the fun of the scene.

Fun should be first, of course! ...And as long as we don't push too hard on th' rules interp., there shouldn't be too many complaining......

 

[Nail]

BTW, had the situation been reversed, people might be saying the ruling was a bad one.

That is, if the characters were going to burst out of a passage to attack a bad guy (let's neglect blind-sight and tremorsense for now), and they expected the bad guy would be surprised.....

...And then when they actually burst out of the door, they find the bad guy had readied an action to sneak-attack them.....

....Would you say the characters would be denied their Dex bonus to their AC? Could they have been sneak-attacked by that readied Bad Guy?

Funny thing about rulings: Complaints are usually reserved for bad rulings against you.

 

[Spatzimaus]

Easy. Since archers are too strong according to some guys here on the boards... build a smackdown archer with see invisible and nail him with 20 arrows or so.

Except that See Invisible is a cone, and not a very big one, so unless the mage is really close AND in front of you, you'd need True Seeing or something. In a 10x10 dungeon room, no problem, but out in the open is tougher.

Other countercombos I've heard of/seen/done:

> Control Air (Psion) is great. That whole "size XXX is blown away" refers to people on the ground, IMO, and assumes they're bracing themselves against the wind, grabbing onto trees, whatever. Any flying creature has to deal with the wind speed. If I can raise the wind by 60mph (that's 528 feet per round), there's no way a flyer can hold his position. Even if you allowed a "Run" (x4) equivalent for flyers AND you used the level 6 Improved Fly (120' move), you still couldn't hold position.

> Darkness on my own items plus Vigilance (psion power that lets you see in magical darkness). Can't target what you can't see, and I can see just fine. This only works if the other guy doesn't bring out the fireballs, but works great against melee opponents.

> Area dispels. Blade Barriers. Fireballs. Web. All the cloud/fog spells.

The biggest problem, in my opinion, is that all of the consistently effective countertactics require magic (other than, say, Scent), and so you have to be a caster, have an item that duplicates one of the spells needed, or use a wand.

 

[Pielorinho]

BTW, had the situation been reversed, people might be saying the ruling was a bad one.

Possibly, possibly. I think the ruling would be rock-solid, whether the ambusher is PC or NPC, if the ambushee (who knows about the ambush) made a bluff check versus the ambusher's sense motive.

But if you sat in on our game sessions, you'd see me pointing out rules that work against us almost as much as rules that work in our favor. I'm a bit of a bastard like that.

Daniel