Is disarm useless?

[Zaruthustran]

Character 1: Fighter with Improved Disarm
Character 2: Guy with a weapon.

Round 1
Character 1's turn: Disarms guy (attack action).
Character 2's turn: Picks up weapon (move equivalent action) and attacks (attack action).

Repeat this, and character 1 dies.

So.... why take Improved Disarm at first level? Is it only useful if you have a reach weapon?


--

EDIT: added "at first level"

 

[Crothian]

Give them multiple attacks. Character 1 disarms, then attacks 3 times. Character 2 picks up weapon and can only attack once.

 

[AuraSeer]

What he said.

Also, if the enemy's weapon is on the ground, he won't be making any attacks of opportunity. This can help protect weaker or less mobile characters. For instance:

Character 2 charges the PC wizard and attacks.
Wizard chooses to delay, because he's in a threatened area and has low hit points.
Character 1 strikes to disarm Character 2, and succeeds.
Wizard takes his delayed action. His square is no longer considered threatened, so he casts a spell and then moves, and draws no AoO.

 

[Crothian]

Also, you can cordinate with your other PCs and have one of them pickup or move the disarmed weapon.

 

[Pielorinho]

Or friends. Xander disarms Spike. Giles then bullrushes Spike who, unarmed, no longer gets an AoO. As he moves Spike past Xander, Xander gets an AoO on Spike. And now Spike is a good 5 or 10 feet away from his weapon, which Willow picks up and waves tauntingly at him. Or, if Giles is feeling foolish, he can grapple the (now unarmed) Spike.

Disarm is especially good for monks, who get to say, "Yoink!" as they grab the weapon for themselves.

Daniel

 

[0-hr]

Picking a weapon up off of the ground provokes an Attack of Opportunity.

 

[Crothian]

Or friends. Xander disarms Spike. Giles then bullrushes Spike who, unarmed, no longer gets an AoO. As he moves Spike past Xander, Xander gets an AoO on Spike. And now Spike is a good 5 or 10 feet away from his weapon, which Willow picks up and waves tauntingly at him. Or, if Giles is feeling foolish, he can grapple the (now unarmed) Spike.

Disarm is especially good for monks, who get to say, "Yoink!" as they grab the weapon for themselves.

Daniel

Someone's been watching Buffy

 

[Plane Sailing]

In our campaign we allow a free action for the disarmer to step on the weapon, preventing it from being picked up until he moves away.

Not terribly realistic, but we wanted to avoid the situation Zaruthustran describes.

 

[Pielorinho]

Picking a weapon up off of the ground provokes an Attack of Opportunity.

Hey, you're right! For some reason, I thought I'd read that it didn't provoke an AoO.

And Crothian, just finished watching seasons 1 and 2 of Buffy on DVD. 34 episodes of demonfighting chicks with stakes -- musta sunk in .

Daniel

 

[Bendrig]

Picking a weapon up off of the ground provokes an Attack of Opportunity.

Been meaning to ask this...

Since you can take any (single) attack option with an attack of opportunity, right?

Can you use the AoO to disarm the opponent who just picked up his weapon?