Surprise or no surprise?

[William_2]

Yeah, I think the spectre gets surprise, as would the golems if the spectre tips them to the party's presence.

My analogy: the mousetrap. You see a mousetrap, you understand how it works and where all the important parts are. Irregardless of that fact, if you trip the trigger...snap! surprise.

So what if the party knows where the baddies are in the room? They can not see them or see what they are doing or are ready to do until that door is open. The bads are waiting (3 rounds min?) for the party to open the door so they can snap their trap.

I still favor initiative, but this is a pretty sound counter argument.

 

[William_2]

Hmmmmm, well, my reasoning is that the party did not *know* that the enemies were there. They were going on 5 week old knowledge and *assuming* such. It just so happens that they were correct.

With the reasoning of the previous posters, players can just "assume" that there are enemies behind every door and "prepare" for a fight, negating ambushes 100% of the time. A player can just say, "I assume that there will be enemies behind this door and prepare for a fight." prior to opening any door. ??????

That IS what initiative is for: those situations where you suspect trouble, are as ready as possible- but reflexes still tell. That is why most encounters start that way- surprise is an extreme situation.

Nobody is implying that the characters go first in this case- all anyone is saying is that they should get to ROLL initiative, like in most other encounters, in this case. Their chance of going first does not become 100%- only higher than 0%. Also, I don’t believe an ambush is negated merely because there is no surprise round- an ambush is still good as long as you end up going first. In most situations, one opponent jumping another should not expect 100% success, but incur some risk that the ambushed is still faster than they are.
I stand by my rule that if you want to ambush, you’d better be fast. Or stack the deck better than in this example. If you have to wait for the ambushed to open a door, there is the risk that they will do it too fast. If the Golem was simply standing out in that hall, hidden, with his mouth already pointed at oblivious approaching characters...hello surprise round...

 

[dcollins]

I would actually fall on the side of a surprise round myself, due to the special monster detection ability.

If the PCs had announced specific anti-golem plans as they opened the door (attempting to surprise them...) then I would boil it down to raw initiative. In fact, that's exactly what I've done in the past, mid-combat, when a door got closed and the parties on either side readied attacks the moment it opened back up: then I called for a new initiative roll.

 

[Thanee]

Hmmmmm, well, my reasoning is that the party did not *know* that the enemies were there. They were going on 5 week old knowledge and *assuming* such. It just so happens that they were correct.

Well, that "assumption" wasn't just taken out of the blue sky, tho.

With the reasoning of the previous posters, players can just "assume" that there are enemies behind every door and "prepare" for a fight, negating ambushes 100% of the time. A player can just say, "I assume that there will be enemies behind this door and prepare for a fight." prior to opening any door. ??????

That's right.

Unless the enemies are hidden (and not spotted), there is no surprise in that situation.

For an ambush, you hide. You don't just stand in the room waiting for someone to get in.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Space Coyote]

With the input from fellow players (which is why we are here, right? ), I think this is how it should have gone:

1) Spectre knows the party is outside the door about to come in.
2) The Spectre can do something for at least a round or 2 before the party barges in.
3) Spectre commands the golems to ready an action to breathe their gas cloud.
4) Party options the door and everyone rolls initiative.
5) Golems readies action foes off which puts them at the "highest" iniative.
6) The rest of the combat plays out as per initiative.

The spectre could even had readied an action also.

 

[Pielorinho]

With the input from fellow players (which is why we are here, right? ), I think this is how it should have gone:

I would be fine with that as a player, as long as I could use a similar technique to my advantage in the future: namely, if I had good reason to suspect monsters were behind a door, we could "begin combat" a round or two early, and ready actions. If critters on the other side were also aware of us, they could do the same thing, and everyone with readied actions could go before everyone else.

Of course, the easier thing to do in such a case would be to have a surprise round in which both sides could act.

Daniel

 

[Thanee]

You cannot ready actions outside combat. Otherwise the party will have readied actions all the time while moving through a dungeon. Move, Ready, Move, Ready, Move, Ready.

And if you start the surprise round with the door still closed, then after the surprise round the party outside gets to roll initiative for the 1st round and get to act normally, too.

Bye
Thanee

 

[William_2]

With the input from fellow players (which is why we are here, right? ), I think this is how it should have gone:

1) Spectre knows the party is outside the door about to come in.
2) The Spectre can do something for at least a round or 2 before the party barges in.
3) Spectre commands the golems to ready an action to breathe their gas cloud.
4) Party options the door and everyone rolls initiative.
5) Golems readies action foes off which puts them at the "highest" iniative.
6) The rest of the combat plays out as per initiative.

The spectre could even had readied an action also.

Thanee is, once again, both succinct and correct, I think. About the correct part, that is.

The above description falls apart at 2, really. The Spectre can do many things before the characters arrive- except have an encounter with them. As a result, 3 is not a given- if there is no encounter and no initiative yet, then there is no readying either. It is just waiting. As I said before, and Thanee seems to be saying as well, if you rule that the Spectre is aware before the characters at the beginning of the encounter (which does seem possible in this case, certainly), then there is a surprise round. That round starts and ends completely while the characters are still outside- the Spectre has NOT opted to attack during the surprise round (or even open the door), but to wait. You can not act to preserve a surprise round until you think you need it- it arrives, and then it is gone.

Characters enter, initiative rolled. If the Golem wins initiative, it can ready whatever it wants. This scenario is just not a very good effort at jumping the characters, basically. Golem in the corridor, Spectre using surprise to pop out of the floor, etc.- could very well make good use of a surprise round. Staying hidden behind a door, while fine, does not take advantage of your earlier awareness that an encounter is taking place.
Just imagine it without the door. You get a surprise round- you don’t move. What happens next? Your opponent moves, sees you, and you still strike first? I don’t think so- they at least get a chance to act first at that point.

 

[Pielorinho]

One thing that may work for you--and this is definitely a house-rule--is to give folks with Superior Awareness an initiative bonus. In this situation, where both sides believe an encounter is going to happen as soon as the door opens, but where one side takes discrete measures to prepare for the encounter and the other side doesn't really do so, you can give a bonus of +1 to +5 or greater on the prepared side's initiative rolls.

We've done this in the past, to good effect: it's sort of halfway between getting a surprise round and not getting a surprise round.

Daniel

 

[Thanee]

That's not even really a house rule... DM's friend rule could be used for a +2.

If the spectre wants to surprise the party, let the spectre attack them outside, and the Golems open the doors and assault them.

Bye
Thanee