I agree with Oake and Kyoru. You should not let the rules ruin your game (a tendancy thet seem quite common among D20 players) but rather use them as a guiding tool. Try to be descriptive in combat situations, be as much objective as possible and use your judgement and use the rules when they fit, not just because "it's in the book".
Great Cleave vs the laws of Physics
- Thread starter Maximo
- Start date
Yeah, I agree with all of the above posts of course. It's refreshing to see so many people on this forum who seem to feel that way about the game.
After I typed my post, I realized that instead of a single rule addressing each situation (like a rule against cleave on aoo in this case), there's already a sweeping rule covering many of these situations. That rule is GM discretion, and I guess that's simply an optional rule in many cases
I'm sure that in any games I run, there will be house rules dictating the effects of some of these feat combos that have the capability of ruining suspension of disbelief or realism.
Sorry for maybe hijacking the OPs thread, this subject just came up in a game i played in this weekend, and I was curious how other gamers felt about it. Thanks for the responses. I also agree with the idea that the realistic approach to using large weapons be that they are limited in effectiveness when in areas of limited space.
All in all, great posts guys.
After I typed my post, I realized that instead of a single rule addressing each situation (like a rule against cleave on aoo in this case), there's already a sweeping rule covering many of these situations. That rule is GM discretion, and I guess that's simply an optional rule in many cases
I'm sure that in any games I run, there will be house rules dictating the effects of some of these feat combos that have the capability of ruining suspension of disbelief or realism.
Sorry for maybe hijacking the OPs thread, this subject just came up in a game i played in this weekend, and I was curious how other gamers felt about it. Thanks for the responses. I also agree with the idea that the realistic approach to using large weapons be that they are limited in effectiveness when in areas of limited space.
All in all, great posts guys.
slaughterj
Mongoose
Hurbold said:
That example seemed suspect to me. From my experience, when a character takes his action, PC or NPC, he does his action, and then the next one does his. Therefore, if Mr. Pike is waiting for a bunch of people to rush him, the GM moves the first NPC to him and the first NPC gets hit by the AOO at that point. The rest of the NPCs have not yet moved, so they are not in reach to be Cleaved with the AOO, so there isn't some massive Great Cleave occurring in the previous pike example.
Perhaps my example should have been more clear.
Mr. Pike (that's what we'll call him), has moved to within 15' of a line of say, 10 guys. Mr. Pike attacks one guy, kills him, great cleaves a few of the other enemies, then takes the 5' backwards, leaving the remaining enemies 15' to 20' away, within reach of his pike. One of the enemies closes, leaving the 20' threat square into the 15' threat square, and provokes an aoo doing so. Mr. Pike then takes the aoo on the closing opponent, then proceeds to great cleave those enemies still within his range, enemies who did nothing themselves to provoke any such attack, other than to be friends with a stupid npc.
I agree that the example sounds pretty ridiculous, but it was even more ridiculous at the table. I wish I had a picture of the battle, as my description may be a bit difficult to follow. Unfortunately, I was only a player in this game, and my opinion that such a maneuver was ludicrous, was vetoed at the table.
I know this wasn't what the OP probably had in mind specifically, but it illustrates the point that there are feats within the game, cleave/great cleave among them, that can be abused in certain circumstances.
Mr. Pike (that's what we'll call him), has moved to within 15' of a line of say, 10 guys. Mr. Pike attacks one guy, kills him, great cleaves a few of the other enemies, then takes the 5' backwards, leaving the remaining enemies 15' to 20' away, within reach of his pike. One of the enemies closes, leaving the 20' threat square into the 15' threat square, and provokes an aoo doing so. Mr. Pike then takes the aoo on the closing opponent, then proceeds to great cleave those enemies still within his range, enemies who did nothing themselves to provoke any such attack, other than to be friends with a stupid npc.
I agree that the example sounds pretty ridiculous, but it was even more ridiculous at the table. I wish I had a picture of the battle, as my description may be a bit difficult to follow. Unfortunately, I was only a player in this game, and my opinion that such a maneuver was ludicrous, was vetoed at the table.
I know this wasn't what the OP probably had in mind specifically, but it illustrates the point that there are feats within the game, cleave/great cleave among them, that can be abused in certain circumstances.
schedule2 said:
Ok, this is quite a ridiculous situation i just cant imagine how this could actually happend.
It basically means that the combat starts when pikeman is completly surrounded by those 24 (or even 8 if wielding a non-reach weapon) enemies... Did he drop directly from the sky at the middle of this mook-horde?
Also, if he is completly surrounded by opponents from all the sides, can he make that 5' step without provokin AOO's himself (If those opponents are really packed like that it would mean at least 3 AOO's).
If he takes his 5' step at the end of his turn and first of his opponents moves closer to threat area he does get his one (unless he also has high dex and combat expertice) AOO but after that 5' step are there any other opponents close enough for his cleave?
Basically my point is i don't belive there could be lots of situations where mr Great Cleave is able to make that theoretical 7-extra-attacks-from cleave combination unless his opponents are dirt dumb and basically line up to be executed.
Sutek
Mongoose
Here's my Great Cleave mods to tame it way down:
A) Slashing weapons only. It's called "Cleave"because it slices through baddies like buttah, so hammers and pikes don't work that way.
B) You have to have "clear" space to do your work. This is based off of the area you threaten. Since you need ya some swinging room, there can be no obstacles anywhere within your area of threat, meaning normal weapons need 5' clear of obstacles (walls, mainly) all around you, and reach weapons need whatever thier reach distance is. This assumes that freinds know that you are a Cleave monster and obligingly duck as you swing your slasher around hacking off heads; they and other people do not count as obstacles.
C) You can only do so much; you aren't Superman, you know. You are limited in the number of cleave attempts that you can string (yes, even though GC normally is unlimited). You are limited to DEX mod or STR mod number of cleave attempts per opportunity. That's still WAYYY lots of Cleaving. If you get 4 attacks per round, that's four possibilities already that could lead to a Cleave, not to mention AoOs. But, if you get the opportunity to Cleave, you roll them right then until you run out of momentum, and if you have a +5 STR mod using that stat to attack with (meaning that you aren't Finessing) then you get 5 chances to dish out Cleaving nastiness. But it's still going to allow loads of attacks to go off of you deal major damage per blow.
Now, these things stack to mitigate GC. For instance, the room to swing thing can mean that you can't Great Cleave so you have to be satisfied with just a simple Cleave.
You can limit it more by saying that the ability mod value is your TOTAL number of cleave attempts PERIOD. Meaning, if you hav that +5 STR mod, you only get 5 opportunities even if you drop 6 dudes without GC that round.
:wink:
A) Slashing weapons only. It's called "Cleave"because it slices through baddies like buttah, so hammers and pikes don't work that way.
B) You have to have "clear" space to do your work. This is based off of the area you threaten. Since you need ya some swinging room, there can be no obstacles anywhere within your area of threat, meaning normal weapons need 5' clear of obstacles (walls, mainly) all around you, and reach weapons need whatever thier reach distance is. This assumes that freinds know that you are a Cleave monster and obligingly duck as you swing your slasher around hacking off heads; they and other people do not count as obstacles.
C) You can only do so much; you aren't Superman, you know. You are limited in the number of cleave attempts that you can string (yes, even though GC normally is unlimited). You are limited to DEX mod or STR mod number of cleave attempts per opportunity. That's still WAYYY lots of Cleaving. If you get 4 attacks per round, that's four possibilities already that could lead to a Cleave, not to mention AoOs. But, if you get the opportunity to Cleave, you roll them right then until you run out of momentum, and if you have a +5 STR mod using that stat to attack with (meaning that you aren't Finessing) then you get 5 chances to dish out Cleaving nastiness. But it's still going to allow loads of attacks to go off of you deal major damage per blow.
Now, these things stack to mitigate GC. For instance, the room to swing thing can mean that you can't Great Cleave so you have to be satisfied with just a simple Cleave.
You can limit it more by saying that the ability mod value is your TOTAL number of cleave attempts PERIOD. Meaning, if you hav that +5 STR mod, you only get 5 opportunities even if you drop 6 dudes without GC that round.
:wink:
slaughterj
Mongoose
Few characters have great cleave, and none of my PCs have it for the significant reason that the reality of game play doesn't result in its use coming up that much, and consequently all these proposed limitations to it are a waste of time because it's just that many more rules for you to have to worry with, and there's more than enough of those already to keep in mind.
Face it, to continue cleaving, you need to be able to take down the cleaved target. That means they need to be pretty damned weak. But even when my PCs have been surrounded by low level thugs, they take them down plenty quickly without great cleave and suffer little in the way of hits because their defense scores are plenty high, even when taking into account multiple attacker bonuses, and so there's little need to take down all surrounding foes in a single round (and frequently there's little opportunity to do it anyway).
But hey, you guys feel free to complain and create multiple rules to address a highly infrequent situation
Face it, to continue cleaving, you need to be able to take down the cleaved target. That means they need to be pretty damned weak. But even when my PCs have been surrounded by low level thugs, they take them down plenty quickly without great cleave and suffer little in the way of hits because their defense scores are plenty high, even when taking into account multiple attacker bonuses, and so there's little need to take down all surrounding foes in a single round (and frequently there's little opportunity to do it anyway).
But hey, you guys feel free to complain and create multiple rules to address a highly infrequent situation
rgrove0172
Mongoose
GM runs the game, GM thinks 4 mooks slaughtered is enough for this round, GM says "no more mook targets till next round", Player says "ok, your the GM", play continues.
slaughterj
Mongoose
rgrove0172 said:
The problem with that is the lack of predictability for the PC - he may have moved into a position with the intent to attempt to slay X number of foes, but ends up getting cut off by an arbitrary decision by the GM, leaving the PC in a lurch. Whatever you do, be clear how the rules will work in advance to avoid that sort of situation.
This is a perfect reason why I don't use attacks of opportunity in my game. It slows down combat a lot, and limits your ability to do special manouevers like trips, unarmed attacks, and disarms.
So all I do is remove any feats that rely on attacks of opportunity or prevent them, like improved unarmed strike, improved trip, combat reflexes, etc. and my players like the flow a lot better. The miniatures you use on the table then become more of a estimation on range and postion, than such a concrete rule.
Reach weapons are still useful as you can still ready attacks against enemies from further away, and can strike enemies through ranks of soldiers, as well as take out mounted chargers before they strike.
The True20 RPG removed AoO and its one of the best rules sets around IMO.
So all I do is remove any feats that rely on attacks of opportunity or prevent them, like improved unarmed strike, improved trip, combat reflexes, etc. and my players like the flow a lot better. The miniatures you use on the table then become more of a estimation on range and postion, than such a concrete rule.
Reach weapons are still useful as you can still ready attacks against enemies from further away, and can strike enemies through ranks of soldiers, as well as take out mounted chargers before they strike.
The True20 RPG removed AoO and its one of the best rules sets around IMO.
slaughterj
Mongoose
quigs said:
I can understand, but it seems that most PCs know what triggers AOOs and avoid doing those things usually, so they don't arise much. I agree that it is annoying that special maneuvers are limited because of the AOO trigger without the requisite Improved feat. But when I used to run Fantasy Hero, I found it annoying that people could just flee whenever, run by you without a care in the world, etc., so I tried out an "AOO" system of sorts way back (before DnD had it). Plus I like it that bowmen can't just stand in your face and shoot without a concern (and that Conan got rid of the DnD dancing archer issue). So I think there might be some sort of middle ground. I think that an alternative that might work is to give a -4 penalty to various special maneuvers based on lack of training rather than triggering an AOO, and the Improved feat cancels those penalties (and maybe provides some other bonus, e.g., to the trip check itself). Then you just leave AOOs for things like fumbling through the backpack or shooting arrows while adjacent, or attempting to run by someone.
