Rogues flanking at range?

[Shellman]

Patryn,

I am LMFAO! I think you need to sit Zaebos down and school him about the rules again!

 

[Zaebos]

Patryn,

I am LMFAO! I think you need to sit Zaebos down and school him about the rules again!

School? I am sorry, but the logic is there... people just need to get their heads out of thier books long enough to understand the rules.

I absolutely hate the fact that people here tend to obscure the facts with reasoning that would make my 6 year old cringe.

Laff all you want, I don't mind. What I do mind are the blatant antagonistic antics that come up when people refuse to apply logic to a fairly simple system.

 

[Demoquin]

Actually i was planning on using a whip for my next character. And since i dobr threaten i can always use a gaunlet for the 5' reach with my 15' reach


Is there a 10' reach with the whip?

 

[Zaebos]

Actually i was planning on using a whip for my next character. And since i dobr threaten i can always use a gaunlet for the 5' reach with my 15' reach


Is there a 10' reach with the whip?

Well, with your guantlet, you are still considered unarmed, just that you deal leathal damage. You would not threaten with it (Since you can not threaten a square unarmed, barring Improved Unarmed Strike).

If your gauntlet was spiked, then you would be considered armed.

The whip is 15' reach, but if you talk it over with the DM, you might be able to use a 10' whip.

 

[atom crash]

The way I look at it is that that you need to threaten a target to gain your bonus.
Melee attack and threaten are interchangeable, with the noted exceptions... it's just an easier way to look at the situation, since that is the way threaten is written.

You're confusing the rules again. This is a generalization that doesn't hold true. We -- even you have pointed out a few -- have shown cases where you can make a melee attack without threatening. Melee attack and threaten are NOT interchangeable, BECAUSE of the noted exceptions. The exceptions negate the rule you're trying to establish. Take a look at this statement, which uses the same logic:

"All puppies are brown, with the noted exceptions."

See how ludicrous that statement is? If you can find one puppy which is NOT brown you've invalidated the first part of the statement, and the second part is completely superfluous and makes the whole thing nonsensical.

By strict definition, to gain a flank bonus you must be able to melee attack your target ...

I'm with you, assuming the other conditions are also met.

... and by default, you must threaten your target.

Why do you continue to cling to this? It's a generalization that is just plain wrong. And it's the source of a lot fo confusion.

These situations are fairly rare, and infact, since 3.0 and 3.5 have come out, to date, no one has used a whip in my games.

It's not rare to the character build that uses a whip. Or a non-improved unarmed strike with a gauntlet. Just because you've not seen it used in a game doesn't establish a statistical fact.

It is just easier to use the word threaten when explaining the game to novice players and DM's, since most of them wont face this situation very often.

Again, threaten and melee attack are 2 different things, but one and the same in most cases

This shorthand generalization you're using is wrong, and it's just going to confuse players later on. It is much more beneficial to tell them what the rules actually say. There's a lot of inconsistencies in your posts, and I think it's because you're confusing making a melee attack and threatening.

Edit: I get what you're trying to say, and I agree that in some cases it holds true. But it does not hold true in all cases -- as in the examples used previously -- so you can't claim it establishes a rule that you have to threaten in order to flank.

 

[ThirdWizard]

Edit: I get what you're trying to say, and I agree that in some cases it holds true. But it does not hold true in all cases -- as in the examples used previously -- so you can't claim it establishes a rule that you have to threaten in order to flank.

Especially when a very valid argument can be made for ranged flanking.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Especially when a very valid argument can be made for ranged flanking.

Note, however, that at no point can you actually get a "flanking bonus" - a +2 bonus on melee attacks - while making a ranged attack.

PrCs to the contrary notwithstanding.

 

[Philip]

Especially when a very valid argument can be made for ranged flanking.

Except for the problem that the very same argument makes flanking when in base-to-base contact almost a certainty, because fully 8,3% of all possible lines drawn go through the opposite sides of the square of your opponent when in base-to-base contact (assuming equal bases and a flat world...). And if you have randomly dispersed 'allies' in the universe, you need about 12 allies (on average) to make you always flank when in base-to-base contact.

While I like the idea of flanking in an unarmed bar fight, I don't like the idea of your sleeping buddy enabling you to flank. And that's what this way of interpreting flanking does as well.

 

[ThirdWizard]

And if you have randomly dispersed 'allies' in the universe, you need about 12 allies (on average) to make you always flank when in base-to-base contact.

Not if you require your ally to be threatening the enemy.

 

[Philip]

Not if you require your ally to be threatening the enemy.

True, that seems a very sensible rule to me. But it does invalidate Patryn's reading of the rules, since if you interpret it in the way he explained, you don't need your ally to threaten, you just need the line.

If you don't use Patryn's reading you're effectively making up a house rule by adding this condition. No problem of course, you just lose the position of arguing that you can flank from range by the RAW.

And you still can't flank in a bar fight unless someone draws a knife.