Threatening an area while casting

[shilsen]

IIRC, somewhere in the core books is a sentence along the lines of "You do not threaten an area in a round where you cast a spell." Unfortunately, I can't find said sentence anywhere. Am I mis-remembering things or is it actually in there? Or was it in an FAQ or some other such document? Thanks in advance.

 

[Henry]

I'm not saying you never saw the sentence, but casting a spell (standard action I'm talking about here, as with most spells) ONLY occurs on your initiative; your init is the only time you need to concentrate for any std. action spell. Any other time in the round, you could threaten an area.

Example #1: a caster with a sword in one hand, and the other hand is free. He plans to cast magic missile this round on init count 19.

init count 20: caster can take attack of opportunity on a fleeing attacker.
init count 19: he can cast his magicv missile.
init count 18: if another opponent does something stupid, and the caster has combat reflexes, he can take ANOTHER AoO!

As for whether concentration means whether you don't threaten an area for the duration you are concentrating, I'm still looking.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Look under "Cast a Spell" in the Full Round Actions section.

"You only provoke attacks of opportunity when you begin casting a spell, even though you might continue casting for at least one full round. While casting a spell, you don’t threaten any squares around you."

-Hyp.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Example #1: a caster with a sword in one hand, and the other hand is free. He plans to cast magic missile this round on init count 19.

init count 20: caster can take attack of opportunity on a fleeing attacker.
init count 19: he can cast his magicv missile.
init count 18: if another opponent does something stupid, and the caster has combat reflexes, he can take ANOTHER AoO!

He doesn't even need Combat Reflexes. The second opponent is provoking an AoO in a new round, as far as the caster is concerned.

-Hyp.

 

[shilsen]

Look under "Cast a Spell" in the Full Round Actions section.

"You only provoke attacks of opportunity when you begin casting a spell, even though you might continue casting for at least one full round. While casting a spell, you don’t threaten any squares around you."

-Hyp.

Bingo! Thanks a lot.

 

[MichaelH]

Note that that quote does not apply to spells that have a casting time of 1 standard action, but to spells with a casting time of 1 full round. Once you cast a spell as a standard action, and you have a weapon in hand, you certainly do threaten the area into which you can make a melee attack.

 

[Henry]

He doesn't even need Combat Reflexes. The second opponent is provoking an AoO in a new round, as far as the caster is concerned.

-Hyp.

You lost me there, Hyp. A character can take one Op-attack per round subjective to his action? We've always counted it from round to round, not from init to init. Though I see in the SRD where round is defined both ways, and it says it FAIAP doesn't make a difference.

 

[Hypersmurf]

You lost me there, Hyp. A character can take one Op-attack per round subjective to his action? We've always counted it from round to round, not from init to init.

Well, the whole point of removing the Refocus action and getting rid of the Dex-based limits on Delaying is that the 'round boundary' is completely arbitrary and doesn't mean anything.

If a spell lasts for two rounds, that's based on the initiative of the caster.

So an ability that functions 'once per round' is based on the initiative of the character as well... it fits with the increasingly-cyclical rules.

-Hyp.

 

[dcollins]

You lost me there, Hyp. A character can take one Op-attack per round subjective to his action? We've always counted it from round to round, not from init to init. Though I see in the SRD where round is defined both ways, and it says it FAIAP doesn't make a difference.

Agreeing with Hyp, here. Here's two key quotes from the 3.0 PHB (all I have, assume it's identical in 3.5):

p. 121: "The term 'round'... usually means a span of time from one round to the same initiative number (initiative count) in the next round."

p. 122: "If you have the Combat Reflexes feat (page 80), you can add your Dexterity modifier to the number of attacks of opportunity you can make between actions."

Note the wording at the end there, "between actions".

 

[Henry]

To quote Gomer Pyle: "Wuhll, gaaaaah-lee."

Learn something new every day.