Full round action

[Moriato]

Ok, this is something that's always bugged me and I could never quite get it sorted out.

Bascially it's about when a full round action happens. My understanding was that a full round action happens at the end of your turn. Then I ran into this:


Start/Complete Full-Round Action
The "start full-round action" standard action lets you start undertaking a full-round action, which you can complete in the following round by using another standard action. You can’t use this action to start or complete a full attack, charge, run, or withdraw.


So what gives? Let's say I want to coup de grace a helpless enemy. I start the coup de grace on my turn. Does it happen at the end of my turn, or do I really need to wait til the next round and spend another standard action on it?

[Jarian]

There are two different ways to make a full-round action. One, by consuming both your move and standard action for the turn. The effect resolves immediately. Two, by spending a standard action to start the action, after already having used your move action for something else, and then spending a second standard action on your following turn. The action then resolves as of the second standard action.

[Moriato]

Ahh, ok, that makes sense. I didn't realize you could split a full round action into two rounds like that.