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<blockquote data-quote="Sword of Spirit" data-source="post: 6684951" data-attributes="member: 6677017">The problem is that initiative doesn't measure how alert to potential foes you are--that's what Perception measures. If you beat their Perception, they don't know you are there until you are given away. Now, we could assume that a high initiative means they are fast enough on the reflexes (for that particular fight) that they can react to the twang of the bow,&nbsp; but that's really pushing it. First, as was mentioned, Perception is its own thing, and secondly there a plenty of situations where noticing anything prior to an arrow blooming out of your chest would be highly unlikely (some where it would be impossible, but we are looking at a general rule here, not such exceptions).The surprise rules are metagame rules that work kinda okay most of the time (assuming your party is willing to use the Ready action and lose moves or attacks to let a specific PC go first in an ambush), but interact very poorly with the rogue's Assassinate feature.The simplest fix is really just to let the individual who initiates an ambush take his initial attack outside outside of the initiative sequence, before combat has begun, but that is difficult to justify by the rules and lets him potentially act three times before his opponents.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Sword of Spirit, post: 6684951, member: 6677017"] The problem is that initiative doesn't measure how alert to potential foes you are--that's what Perception measures. If you beat their Perception, they don't know you are there until you are given away. Now, we could assume that a high initiative means they are fast enough on the reflexes (for that particular fight) that they can react to the twang of the bow, but that's [I]really[/I] pushing it. First, as was mentioned, Perception is its own thing, and secondly there a plenty of situations where noticing anything prior to an arrow blooming out of your chest would be highly unlikely (some where it would be impossible, but we are looking at a general rule here, not such exceptions). The surprise rules are metagame rules that work kinda okay most of the time (assuming your party is willing to use the Ready action and lose moves or attacks to let a specific PC go first in an ambush), but interact very poorly with the rogue's Assassinate feature. The simplest fix is really just to let the individual who initiates an ambush take his initial attack outside outside of the initiative sequence, before combat has begun, but that is difficult to justify by the rules and lets him potentially act three times before his opponents. [/QUOTE]

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