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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ilja" data-source="post: 4922806" data-attributes="member: 84300">Well, grabbing someone for the rogue to sneak attack isn't a coup de grace, it's a grapple. And as said before, slitting someone's throat when that person is wearing full plate, or even a helmet, or is moving to combat someone else, is definately not an auto-success. Sure, if he's lightly armored you CAN, but since he's moving it shouldn't be an automatic success. Also, he can still distract the character via the Aid action, so the rogue gets a higher attack bonus.You can do a coup de grace against a person who is adjacent to you with a bow, but you don't automatically hit an inanimate objects (you get a +5 to hit bonus, and can still roll natural one). It feels weird to give the ignoring fighter less chance than the wooden door of "avoiding" the attack.And grappling and all those examples still work. And how are you supposed to slit someones throat if he wears plate armor AND has his back to you?One simple fix could be to state that when you're flat-footed, you don't get your strength modifier to opposed rolls for the same reason you don't get your dex modifier; you don't have time to brace yourself/dodge. This would, game balance-wise, make someone in full plate ignoring a 1-st level commoner VERY vulnerable to what would probably be the most effective tactic IRL; Throwing yourself at the person, or attempting to hold him still. While a first level commoner can actually be seen as a no-threat-situation to the fighter in full plate, we could use a 1st level warrior with 13 strength as an example instead, as he's much more likely to actually be in the situation (as a town guard or whatever). He has a 35% chance of tripping the fighter on the first try. And, quite frankly, I would see it as slight rule abuse of a 19-th level rogue to carry along a first level fighter as flanker. If he's evil, I might accept it once or twice, but anyone non-evil wouldn't be allowed at all to bring a baby into the mouth of a dragon.While you can't reach a hundred percent realism, it's pretty good to favor the kind of action that would be the best IRL, at least not since it makes it easier for players to know how to combat a certain situation. And about monsters: Yes, it's a bigger problem there, because you can't grapple or trip a Gargantuan dragon. However, I don't really like it either that if the rogue faces of alone vs. the dragon, summoning a fiendish hawk on the other side is enough to give the rogue five times his regular damage.So, my suggestion is:When you're flat-footed, you loose your strength bonus to opposing rolls in cases like trip, grapple etc. This is always the case, not only when ignoring flankers.Ignoring a flanker makes you flat-footed, and of course the ignored combatant gains the flanking bonus as well.The ignored combatant gets an attack of opportunity each turn against the ignoring each turn.Once an ignoring combatant has suffered at least 1 point of damage or another negative effect from the ignored combatant, he can't ignore him anymore due to simple survival instinct.So yes, if you're in a full plate armor and a commoner is threatening you with a knife, you CAN ignore him for a turn or two and focus on the real threat. A dragon CAN ignore the hawk since it probably can't even get through it's scales. However, it can still be disruptive - via the Aid action. Also, once the commoner or hawk has done some harm, you can't ignore it anymore because of the pain.----------------If we look at what situations might actually come up that closely resembles this, what we have seen when actually playing and such, the closest I can think of is when our 9th level rogue faced off with a 10th level blackguard, and the rogues 7th level barbarian/fighter cohort flanked. And I can tell you, if the blackguard had ignored the cohort, he'd been on the ground in two seconds.On the other hand, more than once I've seen a rogue gain his sneak attack versus a huge or larger opponent due to the caster summoning a tiny animal on the other side of the demon/purple worm/whatever.</blockquote>

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