Movement and Partial Actions...

[RigaMortus]

Curious how this works out...

Lets say you are in a battle in a dungeon hallway. The hallway turns around a corner several feet away from you. Can you do the following...

On your turn you declare a Standard Action and move 30 feet so that you are now just past the corner and can see further down the hall. Then for the rest of your standard action you "Ready a charge if an enemy comes around the other end of the hallway" (which happens to be another 30' away from you).

Sure enough an enemy comes barrelling around the corner and your ready action goes off. You do a partial charge (30 feet) and attack the enemy.

Is this "legal" by the rules? I can see two ways of ruling this. Since you already moved, you shouldn't be allowed to charge again. This kinda circumvents charging around corners in a way. On the other hand, a partial charge is a legal action you can take for a Readied Action.

Thoughts?

 

[Artoomis]

Yes, you can do this, though it depends on how you interpret the charging rule.

...All movement must be in a straight line, with no backing up allowed....

Now, I think this means all movement during the charge action, though others think it means all movement for the round (including the Sage). It does not make a difference normally, since Charge is a full-round action (or a special standard action - it's effectively the same thing), and so all your movment in a round is totally used up in the charge anyway.

For a Partial Charge (readied actions or hasted rounds), however, it makes a big difference.

If you must make all your movement for the round in a straight line, then of course what you propose will not work. This also means you could not charge twice in a hasted round, unless you have opponents lined up nicely for you (and, of course, you have Ride-by Attack or Spring Attack if unmounted and you allow charges with Spring Attack - another questionable Sage ruling).

If you must make all your movement during the charge action only in a straight line, then what you propose is legal.

I take the latter view, though I seem to be in the minority.

 

[dcollins]

This is an entry in the Official D&D FAQ (p. 30 of v.06132002):

Is it possible to prepare a partial charge, move, turn, and
then execute the charge? Do I get a 5-foot step in between
my move and my charge? Can I squeeze an extra 5 feet of
movement out of each round by moving as a partial action,
then taking a 5-foot step and attacking as a partial action?

No in all cases. When you charge, all your movement must
be in a straight line (and in the same direction); any movement
you make before a partial charge counts against you.

It's true that this is not directly explicated in the Core Rules themselves.

 

[fett527]

YES

What you are presenting is possible. From the PHB: A partial action is like a standard action, except that you can’t do as much. As a general rule, you can do as much with a partial action as you could with a standard action minus a move. Thus, you can attack once as a partial action or move your speed, but you can’t both move and attack unless you are performing a partial charge action.

 

[fett527]

Sorry

Didn't see the errata, that would be the final word!

 

[RigaMortus]

Ok, well that would take care of the "charging around corners" part of the question. But lets say you move 30' north in a straight line, you Ready for a partial charge on any opponent that turns the corner in front of you (another 30 feet away). Sure enough an opponent comes around the corner and your Ready goes off. You move another 30 feet north in a straight line and charge the opponent.

Now in this case, all movement was in a straight line and in the same direction. The movement you made before the charge does count against you, but since it was only 30 feet, you should be entitled to another 30 foot move (because a normal charge would be comprised of a double move and an attack. 30 ft + 30 ft would equal that double move).

Is this legit?

 

[Artoomis]

Ok, well that would take care of the "charging around corners" part of the question. But lets say you move 30' north in a straight line, you Ready for a partial charge on any opponent that turns the corner in front of you (another 30 feet away). Sure enough an opponent comes around the corner and your Ready goes off. You move another 30 feet north in a straight line and charge the opponent.

Now in this case, all movement was in a straight line and in the same direction. The movement you made before the charge does count against you, but since it was only 30 feet, you should be entitled to another 30 foot move (because a normal charge would be comprised of a double move and an attack. 30 ft + 30 ft would equal that double move).

Is this legit?

Legit - without question.

 

[Pielorinho]

I'll just point out that if you could do the partial charge as described in the original post, then charge's requirement of moving in a straight line would pretty much be tossed out the window.

I could zigzag my way toward the enemy over the course of 30', ready an action to partial-charge as soon as I heard any noise whatsoever, and then charge as soon as (for example) I heard someone near me grunt from exertion.

Daniel

 

[KarinsDad]

I'll just point out that if you could do the partial charge as described in the original post, then charge's requirement of moving in a straight line would pretty much be tossed out the window.

I could zigzag my way toward the enemy over the course of 30', ready an action to partial-charge as soon as I heard any noise whatsoever, and then charge as soon as (for example) I heard someone near me grunt from exertion.

Well, not according to the "all movement must be in a straight line for the entire round with a charge" ruling.

Personally, although the Sage often annoys me with his rulings, I find this one to be appropriate.

The reason is that we played it the other way for a while and the party Monk was able to weave in and out of combat, avoiding AoOs, and still charging away into new opponents all of the time.

When a character can still get a double move and attack in, and basically sidestep the must move in a straight line rules of charging (especially a high speed character like a Monk), it just gives that character too much combat potential.

This got annoying for everyone, including the other players (with the exception of the Monk player ).

 

[Artoomis]

I'll just point out that if you could do the partial charge as described in the original post, then charge's requirement of moving in a straight line would pretty much be tossed out the window.

I could zigzag my way toward the enemy over the course of 30', ready an action to partial-charge as soon as I heard any noise whatsoever, and then charge as soon as (for example) I heard someone near me grunt from exertion.

Daniel

Yes, but that's controlled with only the tiniest bit of discretion and abuse-avoidance in readied actions. You need that even without my view on Charge.

Also, it's pretty easy to get caught in over-general readied action and lose your action. And, finally, readied actions can only be used in combat, so most of teh "I'll go around the corner and ready a charge" things go away as most of them are out-of-combat actions. Not all - only most.

Really - this is nowhere near as bad as some folks think. I'll grant you, though, that using a readied action to avoid the charge movement restriction may be unjustied and outside the intention of "charge."

But you really should be able to charge one direction and then take a hasted action to partial charge in another direction. This is certainly no more powerful than casting two spells, and can readily be viewed as within the rules - in fact, it's a small stretch to view this as NOT witin the rules..