New Revision Spotlight: Attacks of Opportunity

[Shalewind]

They obviously could, but that would be a MASSIVE redoing of the system.

Okay. Point taken. I see where our styles diverge. I see no reason for finishing off moves to be used on the PC, after all, the rule would be used far more often on enemies anyway as there are more of them.

AoO against helpless people is not a massive revision in the style of play that I am fond of. Like I said before, I hate hold spells as well. I'm a big fan of being able to finish off foes for good if you want to. My PCs get all to tired of those demons or bizzare monsters getting back up so they usually do take the extra time to stab them again. This AoO for helpless idea simply makes that aspect of my combat flow a little better.

So the primary divergence I see is that we disagree on a primary play style. Which is fine. I feel the majority of the community plays with your points, so I conceed.

 

[dcollins]

Anyone got an explanation for AoOs that does not involve lapses in defense?

The explanation that has always seemed obvious to me is that those who are threatening you in close melee draw your attention. If they are next to you, generally posing as a threat, and then present an opening while doing something new that is apparently a strategem against you (fire bow, cast spell, drink potion, pick up weapon, etc... in 3.5 parlance, a "distraction" both to them and you), then your attention drawn and an AOO results.

At the point when an opponent is dropped or paralyzed, you instinctively turn to defend against other relevant melee opponents, and are no longer focused on the non-threat. Hence no AOOs.

Added to the cinematic standard of a fighter taking extra time to carefully raise his sword prior to the death stroke of a helpless opponent (plus game balance), no AOOs vs. the helpless has always seemed perfectly reasonable to me. I do wish that WOTC would include language to this effect in the rules.

In short, a motionless body on the battlefield no longer draws the focused attention-to-threat which AOOs simulate.

 

[Rel]

So the primary divergence I see is that we disagree on a primary play style. Which is fine. I feel the majority of the community plays with your points, so I conceed.

I wish this degree of class had been shown in all the threads I've posted in for the past week.

 

[Petrosian]

In short, a motionless body on the battlefield no longer draws the focused attention-to-threat which AOOs simulate.

IMO that determination as to who you are paying tactical attention to and who you are not should not be determined by outside forces but by personal decision.

If my goal is to kill the spellcaster then the fact that he is held should not take him off my radar. It should give me big neon signs saying "gut him now that he is not defeneding" as opposed to gut him slowly later."

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a simple example... in case a i want to kill this archer fellow and have backed him into a corner. In case two i want to kill this coffe-table shaped altar and i have backed it into a corner.

I should NOT get more swings in a round at an active bowman who has full doidge and Ac against me (up to six **extra** swings in fact) than i do at a coffe table that is not actively defending at all.

***********

A less simple example...

A spellcaster throws a silent teleport within 5' of me. I get an aoo. His defense lapses and i get an opening and i swing. Note that I dont know that he is throwing a spell, i dont see him waving arms, his defense lapses because he is distracted... i see the opening, not the spell.


A held spellcaster stands right by me and i get no Aoo. Maybe i don't see his opening.

OK so far! Thems the rules.

A held sorcerer standing by me casts a silenced teleport and either...

I get an AoO (this is the by the rules.) Somehow his defense went from helpless to worse than helpless and even though he is according to you out-of-sight out-of-mind, i somehow get the AoO.

OR some might decide to house rule that his defense cannot drop below helpless and so he does not provoke AoOs by casting while helpless... raising the obvious "can i just decide to stand real still and be treated as helpless so i no longer provoke AoOs for spellcasting?" After all, if helpless prevents AoOs, then he goes helpless, casts silent teleport and gets away from the fighter, never allowing an aoo and never having to make his concentration check.

Sound like a trumped up example? We were 5' from it being the case monday night?

So, with your no attention paid rationale, wouldn't you be in favor of the latter.the fighter takes his eyes off the sorcerer ***no matter what*** even if the sorcerer had used the silent teleport trick before and thus cannot get an AoO for spellcasting... and so the sorcerer gets away BECAUSE he was held? (of course, given time, the warrior might be able to ready an action to watch for "the opening" the paralyzed mage presents when he casts...)

 

[dcollins]

A held sorcerer standing by me casts a silenced teleport and either... I get an AoO (this is the by the rules)... OR some might decide to house rule that his defense cannot drop below helpless and so he does not provoke AoOs... So, with your no attention paid rationale, wouldn't you be in favor of the latter?

No, I would not. The proper rationale would be that some outward effect (regardless of lack of spell components) drew the fighter's special attention to respond with an AOO. That rationale could be the caster's still-moving eyes, or some barely-suppressed twitch, or a crackling of energy, or hairs bristling on the back of the fighter's neck, or a number of other explanations.

 

[Dingleberry]

It seems to me like the "helpless" issue is largely dependent on whether you view each attack roll as a single swing. Personally, I view a combat round as including a number of swings/parries/etc. against all opponents you threaten (to me, that's what "threaten" means), and each combat roll represents a potential success against a single opponent amidst that chaos. Some combatants have more potential successes due to skill (BAB), multiple weapons (TWF), haste, or whatever else.

From that perspective, a provoked AoO doesn't mean an additional swing or attack - it simply affords another potential success from the swings/attacks you're already making. You don't get another such potential success against a helpless foe because the target's lack of movement/defense is already factored in through other mechanics (loss of Dex to AC, CDG availability, etc.).

(edit: typos)

 

[Shalewind]

From that perspective, a provoked AoO doesn't mean an additional swing or attack - it simply affords another potential success from the swings/attacks you're already making. You don't get another such potential success against a helpless foe because the target's lack of movement/defense is already factored in through other mechanics (loss of Dex to AC, CDG availability, etc.).

That's actually a solid argument. I tend to view combat as individual swings though, easier that way for visulaization IMHO.

I wish this degree of class had been shown in all the threads I've posted in for the past week.

Thanks.

 

[Hypersmurf]

That's actually a solid argument. I tend to view combat as individual swings though, easier that way for visulaization IMHO.

It states in the PHB under the definition of "Attack Roll" that a single roll does not represent a single blow of the sword, but rather a series of feints, attacks, and parries (exact wording differs, but that's the gist).

This view of AoOs also helps explain why you don't make an AoO with a ranged weapon. A man with a sword who gets one attack per round might swing his sword five times, but only one of them has a rules-mechanics finite chance of hitting a target. If someone provokes an AoO, however, the lapse in their defences allows another of those swings - which would normally have been dodged or deflected - to have a chance of hitting.

With a bow, however, a single roll represents a single arrow... otherwise you'd waste a whole lot of +2 arrows on "flavour shots" that could never, by rules-mechanics, hit a target. So when someone drops their defences, there are no "spare" attacks that might, in fact, get through.

(This view of AoOs is also key to the 'invisible creatures provoke AoOs' argument, but I won't go there )

-Hyp.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Petrosian's argument is very, very strong IMO.

Changing the effects of being at or below -10 is not actually a massive change to the rules. It is quite a small change IMO.

As for why you would not "always" take that AoO on the guy that just dropped, the reason is as simple as you are using up an AoO. Unless you have Combat Reflexes, you are now begging to be disarmed or flanked (and Sneak Attacked) or grappled or or surrounded or simply bypassed (and your Evil Overlord will be very grouchy about you letting the Paladin run right past you so easily, I promise).

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

That's actually a solid argument. I tend to view combat as individual swings though, easier that way for visulaization IMHO.

Another thing to consider is critical hits. While you can consider it one especially well aimed blow, it could also be view as a combination of swings where more than one happens to connect. That's why most weapons are x2 multipliers.

IMO, the whole point of the Threat Zone is it implicitly defines as area where the combatant is actively attacking enemies, even if we usually only bother to resolve a single attack per round for the sake of mechanics sanity.