Rules that never made sense to you?

[Egres]

Jump: you can run from east to west, and then make a jump from west to east.

Super Mario Bros anyone?

 

[JiffyPopTart]

My warmages intense desire to conjure fire at the bad guys instead of evoking it because for some reason it seems to always work against the big spell resistant bad guys.

DS

 

[Drawmack]

My two biggies are:
1) Diplomacy as it is written: you have just removed a huge role-playing aspect from a role-playing game and turned it into roll-playing. I house-rule this that a Displomacy check doesn't intrinsicly improve the opponents attitude, instead it can make the role-playing a bit easier or harder then it would have been otherwise. So it modifies the role-playing but it does not replace it.

2) The prereque rule on feats. You can take cleave and great cleave at the same time. Cool so I can get my 1st and 2nd degree black belt at the same time? This is just stupid. I house rule this also that taking prereques and coreques is taken on a case by case basis.

 

[KarinsDad]

If you bring in 100 pounds of crap and strew it across a 5-foot square, it's also not in the rules that the square is now difficult terrain ... but it is. Same with a (probably ex-sanguinating, possibly eviscerated) corpse. Or two. Or three. Of course that's difficult terrain.

Not everything needs to be specifically mentioned in the rules in order to have the rules apply.

Except in this case, it IS mentioned by the rules:

You can’t move through a square occupied by an opponent, unless the opponent is helpless. You can move through a square occupied by a helpless opponent without penalty. (Some creatures, particularly very large ones, may present an obstacle even when helpless. In such cases, each square you move through counts as 2 squares.)

 

[KarinsDad]

-1 to -9 you're bleeding out 1 hit point at a time: often times, if someone goes down, the other say "well, he's at -3, we got plenty of time to kill all the bad guys and come bind his wounds at -9." so I sit there for an hour going "ok, rolling for stabilization..crap, -5, next"

Don't allow this in your game.

We do not allow any players except the DM and the actual player of the PC to know a given PC's current total hit points.

 

[KarinsDad]

And for a real one, the ease of sundering worn items. A monk can have 50 touch AC, but you can sunder his belt by hitting AC 10+Dex+Size modifier for belt. Really? It's easier to cut off the monk's belt that it is to touch him?

This ones gets me too.

You can cut off the Wizard's Headband of Intellect easier than you can smack him in the head.

 

[KarinsDad]

I've used this interpretation for years. The rules say obstacles hinder movement. Since when is a 200 lb. half-orc not an obstacle? I occassionally waive it for smaller characters, like small or tiny.

In a 3x3 square, I would agree with you. In a 5x5 square, there actually is a LOT of room to get past someone without even touching them or interfering with them.

 

[RigaMortus2]

It bothers me that the penalty for firing a missile into melee is the same as firing past an ally.

.......C
X.....A....B

The penalty for firing at C is the same as at B if A is X's ally. If A is an enemy, there is no penalty for firing at C.


It also bothers me that you cannot just ignore that penalty, but with a chance to hit your ally.

But isn't that because, if C & A are allies, they aren't actively in combat with one another or trying to hit one another? If A & C are enemies, they are going to be constantly on the move from one another (al beit in their same 5' square). But still, if they are enemies, you have to assume at some point during the combat, A is reaching into C's square to hit and vice versa, which in my mind would be the reason why there is a penalty to hit, you don't want to hit your friend, do you?

You could always do an option where you do not get the -4 to hit, but you then have a chance to hit your ally instead.

 

[KarinsDad]

But isn't that because, if C & A are allies, they aren't actively in combat with one another or trying to hit one another?

Not necessarily.

A situation could occur where A, X, and C are all enemies, and A and C are attacking each other, but X attacking C does not result in a penalty. The penalty only exists for X attacking C if A is X's ally.

That is the discrepency.

 

[Elemental]

AoO for movement. For casting a spell or shooting a bow, sure, but for moving?

Once, I ran a game of Mage where the cabal fought an evil werewolf and his bodyguard of war-spirits, which I described as 8ft tall, encased in razor-edged chitin armour, with the stance and build of gorillas. Everyone ran past the spirits to get to the werewolf, because there was no reason not to. That's why I like the idea of AoO's for movement.


My own WTF-moment was finding out that water provided total cover. So, it's completely impossible to see someone underwater if you're standing on the bank.

My warmages intense desire to conjure fire at the bad guys instead of evoking it because for some reason it seems to always work against the big spell resistant bad guys.

DS

Ah, the good old "Conjurers can evoke better than the evokers" problem. For another example--I cast Black Tentacles, which creates magical tentacles that grapple the enemy. They don't get SR because it's conjuration. I cast Grasping Hand, which creates a magical hand that grapples the enemy. They get SR because it's evocation.

Can't argue with logic like that. :\ My guess is that one of the writers of Complete Arcane was sick of his mage always failing SR checks, or his conjurer not being able to do damage.