Swift and Immediate Actions?

[Stegger]

I saw this as an option in the 4e poll and I do not know what they represent.
Could anyone enlighten me as to what they are, and if and how you use them?
Thanks in advance,
Stegger

 

[Thanee]

Swift Action = what a quickened Spell is
Immediate Action = what casting Featherfall is

They are explained in Miniature's Handbook, XPH and Complete Arcane.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Aaron L]

A Swift action is the same action as casting a quickened spell, a (nearly) free action that can only be performed once per round.

An Immediate action is a response action, such as feather fall, that can be made as a free action in response to an event.



[edit] gah, she beat me and used the same examples! [/edit]

 

[francisca]

A Swift action is the same action as casting a quickened spell, a (nearly) free action that can only be performed once per round.

An Immediate action is a response action, such as feather fall, that can be made as a free action in response to an event.



[edit] gah, she beat me and used the same examples! [/edit]

Anybody have a definitive list of SRD spells that can be cast as an Immediate action?

 

[Stegger]

Thanks!
Stegger

 

[Thanee]

Anybody have a definitive list of SRD spells that can be cast as an Immediate action?

Yes, see above.

Bye
Thanee

 

[ThoughtfulOwl]

A longer definition:

A Swift Action works like a free action, except that it has an hard limit of only one swift action per round. Casting a quickened spell is a swift action.

An Immediate Action works like a swift action, except that you can use it out of your turn, even in response to an event; it counts as your swift action for the round (or the next round, if used out of turn). Casting Feather Fall is an immediate action.

Note that they aren't anything new, as quickened spells and Feather Fall existed since the 3.0 Player's Handbook; it's just that now the designers slapped a formal name upon them.

 

[Quasqueton]

So they made a separate action mechanic to [re]explain how one feat works? Was the explaination in the feat description itself not good enough?

And they made a separate action mechanic to [re]explain how one spell works? Was the explaination in the spell description itself not good enough?

Isn't this just a little unnecessary? What's next? Will they come up with a name to describe the action of the extra attack you get from Cleave?

Quasqueton

 

[jodyjohnson]

They labelled the action and then added new spells/activities which also used the same mechanics as Quicken Spell and Featherfall.

The Miniatures Handbook, Complete Arcane, Complete Adventurer, and I presume XPH all have new spells which use the new Swift action label.

It also means that Feather Fall now uses up your Swift action for the round (before you could quicken a spell and featherfall in the same round).

 

[FireLance]

So they made a separate action mechanic to [re]explain how one feat works? Was the explaination in the feat description itself not good enough?

And they made a separate action mechanic to [re]explain how one spell works? Was the explaination in the spell description itself not good enough?

Isn't this just a little unnecessary? What's next? Will they come up with a name to describe the action of the extra attack you get from Cleave?

Quasqueton

When feather fall and quickened spells are the only immediate and swift actions around, it isn't necessary to use special terms. However, once people start getting creative and inventing other special abilities - the ability to put up a mental defence immediately when you are mentally attacked out of your turn, for example, or other spells that can be cast quickly or even out of turn - the terms become useful.

Effectively, "swift action" becomes shorthand for "using this ability is a free action, but you cannot use this ability in the same round as you use another ability which is also a free action, but has the same restriction." It's kind of like how "undead traits" becomes shorthand for "immune to critical hits, immune to poison, disease, stunning, death effects, etc."

Terminology happens. Terminology is also supposed to make things easier, and personally, I think that "swift action" and "immediate action" do. They aren't difficult concepts to grasp, and they help make it easier to define new rules and game effects.

As for the extra attack from Cleave, I personally would love it if WotC comes up with new terminology for it which makes it clearly impossible to Cleave off an AOO, but that's the subject of another long, hotly-debated thread.