When you can push an opponent on hit because of 2 reasons

[Shin Okada]

This question popped up in the last day's session.

A PC has Forceful Opportunist, Longhand Student & Heavy Blade Opportunity feats. And used her glaive (two-handed polearm/heavy blade) to make an opportunity attack and used Cleave power instead of melee basic attack (Heavy Blade Opportunity).

Forceful Opportunist says,

Whenever you hit a target with an opportunity attack, you can push the target 1 square and shift into the square the target vacated.

Longhand Student [Lesser Style] says,

If you are attacking with a two-handed polearm or a two-handed spear and you have proficiency with that weapon, you also gain the following benefit.
When you hit an enemy with a power associated with this feat, you can push that enemy 1 square.

Associated Powers: Cleave, Viper’s Strike

Now, will she

1) Push an enemy 1 square, twice.
2) Push an enemy 1 square, once (must choose either of the one benefit).
3) Push an enemy 2 squares (distance combined), once.

We guessed the 1 was the answer, but not 100% sure about it.

It matters as she also has Draconic Arrogance feat

Benefit: Whenever you push an enemy or knock an enemy prone, you deal damage to that enemy equal to your Strength modifier.

If she indeed can push an opponent twice with this attack, she can inflict this damage twice.

Well, actually, thrice, as she is a polearm master, the distance of push increases buy 1 for each occasion. And as she has polearm momentum, she can knock an enemy prone when she pushes it 2 or more squares. Thus, push 2 squeas (str mod damage), phsh 2 squares (str mod damage) & knock down (str mod damage).

 

[eamon]

Hmm, I think I'd do exactly that - be in doubt between those three options and choose the 1st, albeit uncertainly .

I don't see the motivation to disallow having both effects matter (which would be option two), and in general there's no rule concerning the stacking of pushes or similar.

I'm generally not thrilled by scenario's whereby the "packeting" of effects matters, but there's no reason to assume said packaging would be altered merely because it's part of one attack. After all, that attack could be interrupted half-way (as could be any attack involving movement or multiple sub-attacks). The attack doesn't represent an atomic, singular, unsplittable event, merely an action expenditure.

So - I doubt it's a scenario the designers thought about much, but nevertheless option 1 sounds most reasonable. On the other hand, since it doesn't seem particularly intentional or necessary, if it significantly disrupts gameplay, it's a prime candidate for a house rule. It doesn't look like slightly more powerful OA's would be that problematic, however.

Is it problematic?

 

[jbear]

Sounds like she has a very cool build.

I really don't know what the offical answer would be on this one.

What would my ruling be?

If I wanted to restrict her abilities then I'd rule that the Push effects combine into one Push. So Push 3. Knock Prone. Apply damage once. Shift into any of the squares the enemy left along the path of the Push.

If I wanted fights to go faster, have my monsters die quicker, then I'd probably let the player Push 2, Knock Prone, Apply damage, Shift into a square enemy left ... and then Push 2, Apply damage again.

If I wanted a balance between the two, I'd let her choose whichever option f the two above that she preferred, but say that the second option required her to forgo the extra damage to an adjacent enemy in order to Push twice and get the extra damage.

It's definitely a tricky one to rule. Someone with a firmer grasp of the fiddly bits of the rules might be able to nut this one out, but otherwise this seems like it falls into the DMs ruling of what is most fun for everybody category.

 

[cdrcjsn]

The condition is landing a hit, so both would trigger I think.

But I think this is one of those gray areas where the DM just has to make a ruling.

Personally, I view push/pull effects similar to damage. So if one feat says deal 2 extra damage on a hit and a second says deal 3 extra damage on a hit, I would apply 5 extra damage.

So in this case, I would apply the hit effect twice as well.

Is this crazy broken? Not necessarily. For one thing, it's Paragon level. For another, it requires the use of an at-will power (not really optimal at Paragon levels when you could be spending an encounter or daily power for every round of a 5 round fight). Also, once bad guys see how effective that character's OAs are, they will be unlikely to provoke any more OAs for the rest of the fight.

 

[NMcCoy]

This is one of those situations where it really is up to interpretation more than anything. So: does counting it as separate effects (thus triggering multiple Draconic Arrogance damage hits) increase the total amount of fun at the table? If so, you already know the answer to your question.

 

[DracoSuave]

It's two pushes, they both work, and Draconic Arrogance triggers twice.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

It is definitely a gray area. There's no doubt the character gets the benefits of each feat. There is simply no rule on the order of resolving riders or how to combine them.

 

[Styracosaurus]

I think that it would be one push because it was one attack, so Draconic Arrogance applies once and it should not stack with itself on the same attack.

Has there been an official ruling on stacking the push effects?
I don't think that we should just stack push powers willy nilly.

The feats open up different opportunities to apply a push, but they do specify one square. So if both powers can push you one square, then you only push the opponent one square. If they were intended to stack, then it would be stated as such in the feat description.

The Spear Push feat and the Polearm Master Paragon class both clearly state that they stack distance on top of pushes.

It seems to me that you have abilities to apply a push (with a stated distance) and you have different abilities that would extend the push.

 

[Spatula]

I would say the result would be push 1 (Forceful Opportunist) + push 1 (Longhand Student) + push 1 (polearm master) + prone (polearm momentum) + str damage (Draconic Arrogance) = Str mod damage + push 3 + prone. I wouldn't apply Draconic Arrogance more than once on the same attack, myself - It's all basically one push IMO. Although I could see applying it twice, once for the push and once for the prone.

 

[Larrin]

I would say its a push one, you just have it from two sources. Sort of like flanking a blind man. You have Combat advantage two ways, but it only amounts to one combat advantange, no +4 double sneak attacks. Thus she will push the guy once, despite having two ways of doing so, using both of them at once still only pushes 1. If Each of those pushes had different riders, i'd say she could apply each but the push 1 is not an additive effect.

But say you a push 1 effect and a pull 1 effect, then i WOULD let her push then pull, or vice versa...I'm not claiming I'd be being consistant, thats just how i'd rule it.