Throwing teammates (as a tactic vs flying enemies)

[gamerprinter]

So I should just forget all her backstory and give her a bow because that's the smartest move to make and the rules allow it? Pass.

Not at all. It's just a tool not a character commitment. You want to climb down a steep cliff own some rope to help you out. You want to shoot at an aerial target, get a bow. Its not out of character to possess the best weapon for whatever you might encounter over the course of your adventuring career. Its just a tool.

It's not based on BAB alone. He's already started specializing with his bow, and it's his main weapon. I however am not specialized towards ranged.

Don't get upset, these are only suggestions.

Look at it this way, you already have a +2 to ranged attacks based on your BAB alone. Your Bard probably has Weapon Focus just to keep up with your natural ranged weapon ability and you don't even have to spend a feat slot.

Thanks for the advice, but I'm not going to go that route unless something in-game changes my mind. We're already winning this combat anyways

It was just a recommendation, as stated without spending feat slots you're already as good as the Bard who is spending feat slots.

I'm glad you're winning your encounter. I hope the majority of your opponents are ground-pounders so your character can shine! I only want the best for you, and merely offerred suggestions, not changes in character.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Are there rocks around? Picking up and throwing an improvised ranged weapon for d3 + str damage with a 10 ft range increment is a better use of your time than trying to throw an ally, will let you full attack (even TWF if you can find enough rocks!), and can travel a heck of a lot farther and more accurately than a 117 pound or whatever creature.

If you insist on the completely unneeded tactic of hurling an ally and the DM is up for YOU designing the houserule...

I would do it as a combat maneuver check. Treat it like bull rush in terms of 5 ft of distance + 5 ft per 5 points you win by. The ally to be thrown should be able to drop his or her CMD significantly. How significantly I have no idea, I started a thread on this forum about two weeks ago to figure out exactly that. Allowing the throwee to leap up as the thrower hurls him/her also seems reasonable, so you could add your vertical jump check height to the thrown height (remember you need a running start or the check gets halved). On landing, you would take falling damage for the height you fell, with a DC 15 Acrobatics check as part of your jump reducing the damage by 10 ft / 1d6, as per the rules. Finally, since non-perfect flight has movement cost double to ascend since you're going against gravity, I would rule the same for this maneuver. A bull rush result of "move 20 ft" would be cut to 10 ft. Vertical jump already factors this in by dropping the height you reach to 1/4 your check result, so that portion of your distance remains the same.

Together, it would look like this:
Thrower reeadies an action to hurl you.
You move forward towards the ally for your running start
You leap up in an adjacent square to the Thrower, Thrower grabbing you as you take off
Thrower makes his readied combat maneuver check and gives a "boost" to your jump height.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

Don't get upset, these are only suggestions.

Look at it this way, you already have a +2 to ranged attacks based on your BAB alone. Your Bard probably has Weapon Focus just to keep up with your natural ranged weapon ability and you don't even have to spend a feat slot.

It was just a recommendation, as stated without spending feat slots you're already as good as the Bard who is spending feat slots.

No problem ^_^

He actually has his weapon proficiency coming from a racial trait though. His first feat went towards Point-Blank Shot.

If you insist on the completely unneeded tactic of hurling an ally and the DM is up for YOU designing the houserule...

Meh, I don't insist. It just seemed like a fun idea is all. Our bard is doing fine shooting... Whatever it is (just realized that we haven't actually figured that part out yet) on his own. He got a bad roll and still managed to hit with it, so I think whatever this is, it's not that tough. He hit it with 10, so it's got an AC of 9 at the most. I think we're likely going to be fine.

 

[DumbPaladin]

I'm not really getting the impression you want to hear anything except a specific answer to your question; your defensiveness in responding to some perfectly acceptable suggestions is rather telling.

So instead, I have only one flaw in your original post's logic to point out:

A moment ago the idea came to me of asking our barbarian to throw my character at the enemy. His strength is high enough the even the weight of me and my weapons and armour is still just a light load for him, so I think in theory this tactic could work.

Just to be clear, the weight of my character and her weapons and armour (I would drop off my bag with non-weapon equipment beside the barbarian before being thrown) is 137 lbs. His maximum light load is 153 lbs.

Unless the barbarian is completely naked, or carrying and wearing no more than 16 pounds of armor, clothing, and items ... picking up what he is currently carrying PLUS the entire weight of you should put him into the medium load category.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

I'm not really getting the impression you want to hear anything except a specific answer to your question; your defensiveness in responding to some perfectly acceptable suggestions is rather telling.

I was happy to receive answers to my actual question, even if they said it's really not feasible, but as that was the case I wanted to make sure there really was no way. I asked why (for example) it would hurt more if the barbarian missed his throw because I really couldn't see why. Gamerprinter then explained that, and it made sense, thus solving one problem.

What I'm less happy about is when I'm trying to come up with alternate solutions to a problem and I repeatedly get told "buy a bow" or whatever the simplest thing to do in any given situation would be.

And... Then the question kind of faded into the background and the topic turned into a "should all rangers carry ranged weapons" debate for a while...

Unless the barbarian is completely naked, or carrying and wearing no more than 16 pounds of armor, clothing, and items ... picking up what he is currently carrying PLUS the entire weight of you should put him into the medium load category.

Actually all he has to do is put down his backpack (contains the majority of his items) and falchion. His armour + clothing weight is 15 lbs.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Unless PF changed the rule from 3.5, your starting set of clothing doesn't affect your carrying capacity anyway. Those who'd prefer not to see naked Barbarians, rejoice!

 

[gamerprinter]

No one is trying to 'force you to buy a bow', our suggestions were only the most obvious solution. The simplist answer is most often the correct one. You choosing not to use a bow seemed counter to finding a solution to your problem - as if to say you didn't want the obvious answer you'd rather get a solution to a rather insane proposition, "can a PC be thrown by another as a combat tactic."

In the end, no matter what your 'background' story is, you are a ranger and rangers have many built in solutions to your problem. Why reach out to bizarre combat tactics, when playing a ranger as a ranger fixes it automatically.

However, its your character, play her the way you want to.

 

[SnowleopardVK]

I didn't say anyone was trying to force me. I said that I was a bit upset that suggestion came in so quickly and took over so much of the conversation.

...as if to say you didn't want the obvious answer you'd rather get a solution to a rather insane proposition

I didn't want the obvious answer. Obvious answers are obvious enough that I could have thought of them myself if I wanted to go with something obvious.

Why reach out to bizarre combat tactics?

More fun.

In conversations about past games, "Remember when you threw me at that wizard?" (it turned out to be a disguised wizard we were fighting by the way, his miserable AC now makes sense) brings back fond memories that you can say "Yeah, that was cool" to, or even "Yeah, that was a stupid idea but it was fun". On the other hand "Remember when I shot the wizard with my bow?" is (in most cases) a memory not even worth remembering. And what's the point of playing if the game is too dull for me to even remember it afterwards? I'd rather have a memorable victory, or even a memorable death.

 

[gamerprinter]

Creative problem solving is at the heart of an RPG experience, but creative problem solving becomes necessary when there are no obvious solutions. If there is an obvious solution like 'bring a bow to shoot at an aerial target', then getting creative, while still fun, is more a waste of time and possibly a threat to the rest of the party, because you aren't solving problems rather are creating problems (as in "Heal me, I missed when you threw me, so use up your healing magic instead of the injured fighter because my idea was silly and now I'm hurt...)

You are unnecessarily using up party resources.

When solutions become problems, they are not solutions.

There are many situations when there are no obvious solutions, so that's when getting creative is useful, fun and memorable - and sometimes risky, but since their were no obvious solutions, you had no other choice.

Creative solutions should be a measured response - look at all options before taking a big risk.

 

[SkredlitheOgre]

But what if it WORKS? That would be insanely awesome.

Why look at all the options before taking a big risk? I have my Elven monk sprint across the room trying to dropkick giant bat things, outrunning the rest of my party to do it. Why? Because it's FUN! Yes, I have an emotional investment in my character, but unless someone wants to make a plan, there's no point in waiting.

And the whole "get a bow" argument seems rather pointless at the moment because they are already in combat. It's not like she can call a timeout, wander over to the Weapons Depot and buy a bow. She has no bow, the barbarian obviously isn't using a ranged weapon, so that calls for a creative solution. I totally agree that this is a good use of resources.

The way I would DM this is that the Ranger (it sounds like you are small sized) are about the same size (length-wise) as a club, but heavier. I would make the range increment 5 ft, but the missle (you) do no damage, but could cause falling damage if you succeed in grappling the flying whatever. A successful Acrobatics or Dexterity check means you get whatever it is underneath you when you fall, reducing your falling damage to 1d4 per 10 ft. of falling. Due to your extra weight, I might increase the falling damage of the other thing to d8 per 10 ft.