Plane Sailing
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The only time when I'd consider a spiked chain to be cheesy is in the Enlarge Person (or other Large user) issue - where basically it allows them to fully control a 20ft area with their reach.
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Is the Spiked Chain Fighter really that Cheesy?
- Thread starter Herremann the Wise
- Start date
Plane Sailing
Astral Admin - Mwahahaha!
An interesting idea I heard someone mention once and which I think bears consideration, is that the spiked chain rules could actually be used quite well for a (real) quarterstaff or Bo staff, which is essentially a weapon that excels at being used both at reach and close up, and is jolly good for tripping and disarming.
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Moon-Lancer
First Post
I dig that. 
Nazhkandrias
First Post
Sorry, but for Trip builds, Str, not Dex, is paramount. With point buy, you can be much more effective as a Str-based Spiked Chain user, and you free up a feat. The finesse quality only makes the Spiked Chain more versatile for smaller users, and then, it's more of the AoO chain rather than the trip chain.
(Psi)SeveredHead
Adventurer
It's powerful, depending on the campaign. If your opponents are frequently (demi)humans, you'll often walk all over them. You will not have an easy time tripping giants, though. There is nothing wrong with a campaign that uses lots of (demi)humans - any "Against the Drow" adventure, for instance, will be full of them.
The trip sequence is a big deal, too. You trip your opponent, they fall, and then you get a free attack (to do damage, at +4 to hit while you're at it). If it weren't for the likelihood of failing your opposed stat check, you would always use trip when possible. With the +4* bonus from Improved Trip, the chance of succeeding at the stat check is quite high, even if your enemy has equal stats to you.
So you've knocked your opponent down and got to hit him. Your opponent starts getting up. You get an AoO. The AoO resolves before the action that triggered it, so your opponent is still treated as prone as they get up. As a result, you don't get to knock them right back down (no serial tripping), and your opponent does get to get up (but takes damage). This had to be explained in the FAQ because the rules around this were poorly explained.
The biggest thing that makes tripping really good? Classed (demi)human oponents have to be specifically built to avoid being tripped, otherwise they have little chance of resisting being tripped. Even a high Strength fighter or high Dex rogue has little chance to avoid being tripped if the attacker has a (nearly) matching stat. A raging barbarian has a decent advantage, though.
Spiked chains give lots of extra attacks (very good threatened area, hit 'em on the way down, hit 'em on the way up) but do lower base damage compared to other two-handed martial or exotic weapons. On the whole I think they get the advantage over the other weapons, but not a huge one ... depending on the campaign.
* Your opponent's stat needs to be 8 points higher just to match yours, assuming they're the same size as you. That's ... a lot.
The trip sequence is a big deal, too. You trip your opponent, they fall, and then you get a free attack (to do damage, at +4 to hit while you're at it). If it weren't for the likelihood of failing your opposed stat check, you would always use trip when possible. With the +4* bonus from Improved Trip, the chance of succeeding at the stat check is quite high, even if your enemy has equal stats to you.
So you've knocked your opponent down and got to hit him. Your opponent starts getting up. You get an AoO. The AoO resolves before the action that triggered it, so your opponent is still treated as prone as they get up. As a result, you don't get to knock them right back down (no serial tripping), and your opponent does get to get up (but takes damage). This had to be explained in the FAQ because the rules around this were poorly explained.
The biggest thing that makes tripping really good? Classed (demi)human oponents have to be specifically built to avoid being tripped, otherwise they have little chance of resisting being tripped. Even a high Strength fighter or high Dex rogue has little chance to avoid being tripped if the attacker has a (nearly) matching stat. A raging barbarian has a decent advantage, though.
Spiked chains give lots of extra attacks (very good threatened area, hit 'em on the way down, hit 'em on the way up) but do lower base damage compared to other two-handed martial or exotic weapons. On the whole I think they get the advantage over the other weapons, but not a huge one ... depending on the campaign.
* Your opponent's stat needs to be 8 points higher just to match yours, assuming they're the same size as you. That's ... a lot.
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IMHO, its not so much the spiked chain fighter that is cheesy, its the art...oh yeah, and the spiked chain itself.
AFAIK, the only weapons that actually resemble the dimensions of the weapon from the PHB have no spikes on them, only chains and a weight at the end (like the OA version).
Though I suppose you could have one with the weights having spikes...but if you've ever seen someone work with a chain weapon, you'd know that would still be a problem.
Actually, you can if you're wearing the gauntlets typical of a fully-armored warrior. In fact, there is something called the "Mortschlag" (Murder Blow) in which the sword is grasped by the blade and the foe is struck in the head by the sword's crosspiece- effectively working like a blunt pick.
It may not penetrate the armor, but it probably will cause a concussion good enough to stop or drop your foe, allowing you to finish him off.
But the point was that you can't fight with a spiked chain if it really were as it was illustrated. You don't have enough places to grab it and get damage-dealing leverage with it.
AFAIK, the only weapons that actually resemble the dimensions of the weapon from the PHB have no spikes on them, only chains and a weight at the end (like the OA version).
Though I suppose you could have one with the weights having spikes...but if you've ever seen someone work with a chain weapon, you'd know that would still be a problem.
Actually, you can if you're wearing the gauntlets typical of a fully-armored warrior. In fact, there is something called the "Mortschlag" (Murder Blow) in which the sword is grasped by the blade and the foe is struck in the head by the sword's crosspiece- effectively working like a blunt pick.
It may not penetrate the armor, but it probably will cause a concussion good enough to stop or drop your foe, allowing you to finish him off.
But the point was that you can't fight with a spiked chain if it really were as it was illustrated. You don't have enough places to grab it and get damage-dealing leverage with it.
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The Blow Leprechaun
First Post
Again, though, only if they're stupid enough to consistently put themselves in a position to be tripped. Classed demihumans are often way too smart to fall for this trick more than once, and any DM who keeps mindlessly walking them towards the spiked chain fighter should have their DM-card revoked. Even a creature with animal intelligence shouldn't fall for this more than once.(Psi)SeveredHead said:
This is a powerful tactic, but it's not that powerful. PCs have to constantly respond and adjust their tactics based on what the monster they're facing is doing - why should monsters be any different? If a PC had DR 2/whatever, wouldn't an intelligent creature be smart enough to realize its weapon isn't working as well as it thought and change up tactics? In that case, the monster may not have another weapon - against a spiked chain, it could always choose not to be an idiot and stick its hand in front of the lawn mower.
wildstarsreach
First Post
JRR_Talking said:
A spiked chain is limited and problematic. To have real cheese, you have to go with the Kusari-gama out of OA. It can do everything a spiked chain can and be used as a double weapon without the short haft feat, be used at standard combat and weapon finesse can be used with it. It has 1d6 slashing or 1d4 blunt as opposed to piercing only. I have a ninja that uses this to trip opponents and then to strike at range while being out of range of the opponents.
The thing about a spiked chain is even if you don't or can't go for the whole tripping thing, it's still extra attacks. Especially nice at lower levels. So your 4th lvl greatsword fighter could either move to the badguys and get 1 attack. While spiked chian guy could ready an action to attack something that closes with him, and get his one attack, plus one per target up to his max number of AOOs. This can often be 2-3 extra attacks. What other pair of feats(exotic weapon and combat reflexes) can give you that many extra attacks. With pretty much any melee type build I have to resist the urge to use a spiked chain just cause I've all ready done a couple and I don't want to annoy my DM too much.
