The aggravating five foot move.

[Gromm]

The 5' step is really essential to combat in 3E, I would suggest you keep it.

If you have problems with the archer, just have someone step up and SUNDER that pretty bow of his. That would guarentee that next time he will be a bit further back .


TLG

This happened last time we played. The enemy kept getting hit with 2 arrows a round, so he decided he was tired of it and tried to sunder the archer's bow. The archer got lucky (kept rolling 20's on the opposed roll), but it still scared the crap out of him.

 

[BMF]

I like the 5 ft step too. It makes combat more interesting and mobile. I was always frustrated in 2e when I tried to have characters fight and maneuver. With 3e, that isn't a problem at all.

 

[Negative Zero]

this may come across as unneccessarily inflamatory, but imma say it anyway.

i think people who gripe about the 5' step, and AoOs for that matter, either don't understand the rules, or are too lazy to try. it's one of the biggest improvements/additions to 3E. it's made combat so much more tactical, and now actually requires players to keep track of their movement, try to anticipate their enemy's movement, and plan out theirs accordingly. any of this is bad, how exactly?

~NegZ

 

[mmadsen]

It is this "five foot step" rule that can be made by any character free of charge or responsibility. It leads to the invincible archer/crossbowman technique in close quarters. Not to mention the ease of penetrating a defensive line that is not three ranks in depth.

I don't think your problem is with the five-foot step; it's with the rule that a five-foot step doesn't subject you to an Attack of Opportunity.

Not only that it always leads to action described as "I make a five foot step and attack." Not really my idea of a heroic battle sequence. How often does Conan make a five foot move and attack? No, he leaps like a tiger into the fray.

"I make a five-foot step" is certainly no worse than "I attack him with my longsword."

 

[Oracular Vision]

Do what I did when it first came out - eliminate the 5-foot rule altogether. It eliminates many problems right away. There is less of the full attack or spellcasters and archers in the front line nonsense. It worked fine. But it is a different combat system than everyone else uses, and having to remember two sets of rules sucks if you play in tournaments, so I eventually gave up and used them. The 5-ft rule adds about half and hour to and hour to each evening, as people play chess figuring out just where they can go to draw no attacks and do their actions. Without it, play is faster, as you either move and attack, or stand in place and full attack...

 

[Xarlen]

I stopped using the 5ft rule too. It just got so annoying and repetative. To think you can move away from a raging barbarian, at all! He's just going to be ontop of you.

But, while I was at it, I changed some other things.

Instead of rolling for initiative, everyone says 'Me first!' outloud, and in the order that they say it, that's how they move. Certainly wakes up players.

Templates can stack with anything! So then I can throw Beholder Vampires and Half-Fiend golems, and half-dragon oozes at them. And let's not forget the Half-Celestial Fiendish Troll! Y'know, I think he could use the lich template, now that I think about it...

All bonuses stack. That way it makes everything a lot neater and easier, since we don't have to look up what overlaps and doesn't go with what.

Made my game So much faster.

 

[Negative Zero]

*amused chuckle*
well said Xarlen. don't you hate it when those darn rules get in the way of playing a game?

~NegZ

 

[Xarlen]

Rules? What rules? Why, Down here at Crazy DM's, we're slashing rules! That's right, All Rules Must Go!

You say I'm crazy, eh? Why, Let me just sunder this nice little Spells per day of a Sorceror. Toss a D20, that's how many spells you can cast a day!

And look at this handy dandy wand. Tired of only activating it Once a round? Well, don't fret! Just buy 50, string 'em together, and say the command word! All the command words are the same! Just don't say the command word in the warehouse...

That's right, All Rules Must Go!

 

[Oracular Vision]

The DMG actually says that rounds are an abstraction, that combat should be considered as simultaneous, with rounds and initiative as just ways to tell who goes first. This makes the 5-ft step, while locked in melee, even more problematic. No way in real combat will you ever be using a bow right next to me, taking a simple step to get out of my reach ...you will get creamed...but I guess some people think that all the rules are correct and work great, and they haven't put much thought into it on their own...sigh...Negative Zero and Xarlen, maybe you guys and KReynolds can get together and form a mutual lack-of-wit club, or at least argue about nothing together...

 

[IceBear]

The DMG actually says that rounds are an abstraction, that combat should be considered as simultaneous, with rounds and initiative as just ways to tell who goes first. This makes the 5-ft step, while locked in melee, even more problematic. No way in real combat will you ever be using a bow right next to me, taking a simple step to get out of my reach ...you will get creamed...but I guess some people think that all the rules are correct and work great, and they haven't put much thought into it on their own...sigh...Negative Zero and Xarlen, maybe you guys and KReynolds can get together and form a mutual lack-of-wit club, or at least argue about nothing together...

It's a GAME...not real life. Thus it has rules. I understand no rules are perfect, but I don't have time anymore to strive for perfection in my rules so I play with the rules pretty much as is. Does that mean I have to join a lack-of-wit club too?

You don't like 5-ft steps so you Rule 0ed it. That doesn't make you superior to those that haven't. It just means that this particular rule bothers you more than others, just like the way harm works bothers me more than others.

As you said yourself, you're using 5ft steps because it's just easier to keep using them. That's something that I use as a yardstick for any houserule I might think of, which was why I didn't get rid of AoO and 5ft step after our first game because I knew that it was too ingrained to be removed easily.

IceBear