why is grapple considered so hard to get?

[big teej]

I just read the grapple rules on the SRD and it seems.... much simpler than I often read about.

sure, if it came up I'd have to reference it (it's been 2 and a half years since someone has started a grapple)

but I don't feel it'd be too difficult.

so...

why do people consider grappling complicated?

same with AoOs.... (well, at least Roy finds them complicated.)

[kharmakazy]

Because I've played and DM'd for years and I still have to reference it too. Anything you have to reference the rules for every time you use it is too complicated.

I mean you have a touch attack, opposed grapples, Size modifiers, a specialized list of actions you can perform, escape artist...

Really once you make that first touch attack you have entered a subsection of combat with entirely different rules.

AoOs are simple. He moved. Can I whack him from where I'm standing? If yes I get to whack him before he moves. (once per round, barring combat reflexes)

[Person_Man]

Obligatory Tropes link (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GrapplingWithGrapplingRules).

Basically it just involves too many steps. Attack of Opportunity, Touch Attack, Opposed Check, unarmed or natural weapon damage, then a set of special conditions no one remembers, followed by a different set of opposed checks with special rules. I'm not a huge fan of 4E, but this is one of the things they did right. It's a game, not a wrestling simulator.

[Eldan]

Apparently, from what I've heard on these boards, they were much more complicated in AD&D, with tons of modifiers for body weight, armour, your last meal and how humid the air was. (Slight exaggeration)

[big teej]

Because I've played and DM'd for years and I still have to reference it too. Anything you have to reference the rules for every time you use it is too complicated.


fair point.


Obligatory Tropes link (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GrapplingWithGrapplingRules).


ooooh.....

yea I suppose that makes sense.

[Spiryt]

how humid the air was. (Slight exaggeration)

Well, when it's humid and you're really sweaty in result, grappling becomes much different. :smalltongue: :smallbiggrin:

[Person_Man]

Apparently, from what I've heard on these boards, they were much more complicated in AD&D, with tons of modifiers for body weight, armour, your last meal and how humid the air was. (Slight exaggeration)

Not that much of an exaggeration. Gygax was really into the simulation aspect of roleplaying games. In particular, he went out of his way to document every variable and incorporate it into the rules, usually via a lengthy chart. The Grapple rules are a good example, as are the weapon and armor rules (Do we really need different statistics for 8 different types of daggers?)

This part of the game holds a lot of appeal for some players. Some gamers really want their Fighter wearing half-plate armed with a dirk and a sai. The armor and each of their weapons will have it's own name, unique abilities, and back story of how it was made and acquired. They don't care if the rules are clunky, they want to play the main character in their own Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fafhrd_and_the_Gray_Mouser) story.

[Yora]

Because I've played and DM'd for years and I still have to reference it too. Anything you have to reference the rules for every time you use it is too complicated.
The reason we don't have it memorized is because we never use it. Because we don't have it memorized.
It's the same with turn undead and polymorph, still it gets used a lot.

[kharmakazy]

The reason we don't have it memorized is because we never use it. Because we don't have it memorized.
It's the same with turn undead and polymorph, still it gets used a lot.

That's a bit cyclical... Don't know it because we don't use it, and we don't use it because we don't know it. That would mean that if I memorized it I would use it. I have built grappling characters that used it extensively and had it memorized, but no longer. I knew it, but I don't know it. I've used it, but I don't use it. Green grass grows all around all around, green grass grows all around.

[Yora]

That's probably the reason why people bother to learn polymorph, because it's really good. The benefit of grapple just is not that great that many people ever bother about it.
Though I think it's an awesome caster lockdown at low and mid levels if you have a DM who does not put freedom of movement spells on every NPC ust because the PCs have found an effective tactic. It's also very useful in campaigns in which the game does not revolve exclusively around killing things.

[kharmakazy]

Yeah. DR/adamantine is a goldmine since every 2 bit thug now has adamantine weapons. I once had a DM make a whole damn door out of it just so I couldnt bust my way out. I did... then I took the whole damn door.

[Yora]

A door is always only as secure as the walls next to it. :smallbiggrin:

[hangedman1984]

yeah, i played in that game, wasn't just the door but the whole damn dungeon made of adamantine

[Coidzor]

I don't find grappling all that complicated, but I am one of the few ones who remembers the order of operations and even I can't remember all of the options once a grapple is started. Mostly just use it as a way to make subduing an enemy we want alive easier if we have no reliable source of nonlethal damage or status effects to neutralize them.
yeah, i played in that game, wasn't just the door but the whole damn dungeon made of adamantine

... $_$ *Ka-ching* ~<3

Was your response to get a team of hundreds of commoners in order to dig the dungeon up?

[kharmakazy]

I don't find grappling all that complicated, but I am one of the few ones who remembers the order of operations and even I can't remember all of the options once a grapple is started. Mostly just use it as a way to make subduing an enemy we want alive easier if we have no reliable source of nonlethal damage or status effects to neutralize them.

... $_$ *Ka-ching* ~<3

Was your response to get a team of hundreds of commoners in order to dig the dungeon up?

It was floating in the sky. Also, no matter where you went in that game, the doors always locked behind you. It was like playing some horrible zelda game. I still prop doors open to this day.

[Reltzik]

I've got it memorized. It's a wonderful way to nerf anything size M- or smaller that isn't built for it. ESPECIALLY casters or people in plate. (Why pound your way through the knight's armor when you can just sit on him and drown him in a puddle?)

My players hate it, and that means I'm doing my job.

[John Campbell]

Yeah. DR/adamantine is a goldmine since every 2 bit thug now has adamantine weapons. I once had a DM make a whole damn door out of it just so I couldnt bust my way out. I did... then I took the whole damn door.

My last caster could make the Craft check to produce dwarvencraft adamantine full plate on a nat 1. He routinely prepared fabricate. The DM made the mistake of putting an adamantine door where I could get line of effect on it exactly once.

[stainboy]

That's probably the reason why people bother to learn polymorph, because it's really good. The benefit of grapple just is not that great that many people ever bother about it.

What? Grappling is the one nonmagical thing that can reliably ruin a spellcaster's day. Pretty much any martial type should do it at least once per level, feat or no.

It really isn't hard once you get the hang of it, you just have to fumble through that one combat where nobody understands that if you grapple something it also grapples you. Grappling is complex but most of it's the good kind of complexity that lets you do new things. (There are a few unnecessary bits. I don't know why there are two separate ways to deal unarmed strike damage in a grapple. But most of it's worth learning.)

[sreservoir]

What? Grappling is the one nonmagical thing that can reliably ruin a spellcaster's day. Pretty much any martial type should do it at least once per level, feat or no.

It really isn't hard once you get the hang of it, you just have to fumble through that one combat where nobody understands that if you grapple something it also grapples you. Grappling is complex but most of it's the good kind of complexity that lets you do new things. (There are a few unnecessary bits. I don't know why there are two separate ways to deal unarmed strike damage in a grapple. But most of it's worth learning.)

which is why spellcasters have so many ways to ruin a grappler's day, yes?

[ericgrau]

It's pretty good until level 10ish and against arcane casters 14ish. That's a long time. Theoretically it could be stopped earlier but the money/action cost is crazy high or unreliable. Even at the stated levels it's a big investment at which point foes start readying actions to disrupt casting instead or whatever else and the caster needs to start dumping more rounds and money into other defenses. Even when facing big monsters a permanent enlarge person (at later levels) or some such can prolong the viable level range quite a bit. It's worth the rules hardship to put together a grappler build or to have grappling as a side option, and depending how long the campaign runs it might remain effective for the entire campaign.

[NNescio]

Obligatory Tropes link (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GrapplingWithGrapplingRules).

Basically it just involves too many steps. Attack of Opportunity, Touch Attack, Opposed Check, unarmed or natural weapon damage, then a set of special conditions no one remembers, followed by a different set of opposed checks with special rules. I'm not a huge fan of 4E, but this is one of the things they did right. It's a game, not a wrestling simulator.

Second obligatory link. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbbqMoEwDqc)


It's pretty good until level 10ish and against arcane casters 14ish. That's a long time. Theoretically it could be stopped earlier but the cost is crazy high. Even at the stated levels it's a big investment at which point foes start readying actions to disrupt casting instead or whatever else and the caster needs to start dumping more rounds and money into other defenses. It's worth the rules hardship to put together a grappler build or to have grappling as a side option, and depending how long the campaign runs it might remain effective for the entire campaign.

Abrupt Jaunt. Anklets of Translocation. Heart of Water. Babau Slime.

Core options? Dimension Door. Levitate. Fly. Polymorph. Alter Self. Fire Shield. Or summon a monstrous centipede to beat the grappler at his own game.

Or the Grapplemancer build (http://www.dnd-wiki.org/wiki/Grapplemancer_%283.5e_Optimized_Build%29) for lulz.

[ericgrau]

There's a hated phrase in Magic the Gathering called "dies to removal". The thing is most every good thing dies to removal and yet people still use good things. In fact pros tend to play with minimal removal. Offenses are so easy to switch up and defenses so resource intensive that defenses are about 1/10th as strong as their supporters claim.

Levitate, for example, is a fairly lousy spell. Spending an action to save yourself, and only yourself, from a specific threat that may or may not be what it seems to be tends to be a bad idea in general. As said things might start reading actions to shoot you and disrupt casting instead. Or another option. Or hit your allies. Or, heaven forbid, they could go first. The best options are actually offense, neutralizing or eliminating the foe, but people don't like to talk about these because they have a chance of failure (or getting hit first) and aren't as absolute on paper. The other listed core spells likewise aren't very reliable and eat up prepared slots and actions on things you might not even use.

[NecroRick]

You know that thing where one kid will grab another kids arm, and then force them to hit themselves in the face? All the while saying "why are you hitting yourself? Why are you hitting yourself?"...

... you can do that with a grapple ... :D

[DraconicPaladin]

Although we still need check up on it, the rules for grappling is much easier in Pathfinder thanks to Combat Maneuvers (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/combat#TOC-Combat-Maneuvers)

[OracleofWuffing]

Levitate, for example, is a fairly lousy spell. Spending an action to save yourself, and only yourself, from a specific threat that may or may not be what it seems to be tends to be a bad idea in general.
At the same level is Mirror Image, which, while it's not going to work so hot after being grappled, is likely to shut down any melee for a few turns as a prevention. But speaking slightly more offensively is Glitterdust, nobody likes a 50% miss to their initial attack to grapple or to their attempts to shoot you because their specific threat isn't what it seems to be. (Coincidentally, Protection From Arrows is the same level as Levitate, too... Hope your grappler invested in a magic bow.)

Great, now I have this hilarious situation in my head of a Wizard that has casted Mirror Image getting grappled, SOMEHOW wins the opposed grapple check, and uses movement to switch place with one of the mirror images, escaping the grapple. Yes, it's practically impossible with a competent grapple build, but it is hilarious nonetheless.

That said, isn't Grappling pretty much spending an action to save yourself from a specific threat, too? You're not actually going to do anything to take out the threat until next turn, anyways.


You know that thing where one kid will grab another kids arm, and then force them to hit themselves in the face? All the while saying "why are you hitting yourself? Why are you hitting yourself?"...

... you can do that with a grapple ... :D
Ehh... Okay, yes, you can do that, but the rules as written don't allow it. In order to attack someone with their own light weapon, they need to hold the weapon. Unarmed Strikes generally are not held in hands. :smallwink: It's for the best that way, though, because you'd be doing 1d3+str nonlethal damage with a -4 to hit. You can double the damage, make it lethal, and not have that penalty just by using a light mace.

[NNescio]

There's a hated phrase in Magic the Gathering called "dies to removal". The thing is most every good thing dies to removal and yet people still use good things. In fact pros tend to play with minimal removal. Offenses are so easy to switch up and defenses so resource intensive that defenses are about 1/10th as strong as their supporters claim.

Levitate, for example, is a fairly lousy spell. Spending an action to save yourself, and only yourself, from a specific threat that may or may not be what it seems to be tends to be a bad idea in general. As said things might start reading actions to shoot you and disrupt casting instead. Or another option. Or hit your allies. Or, heaven forbid, they could go first. The best options are actually offense, neutralizing or eliminating the foe, but people don't like to talk about these because they have a chance of failure (or getting hit first) and aren't as absolute on paper. The other listed core spells likewise aren't very reliable and eat up prepared slots and actions on things you might not even use.

Fly is universal. Polymorph is a swiss-army knife with various other uses. Alter Self is its lesser brother. Dimension Door is the mandatory "Oh Crap" emergency button for core-only casters. Monstrous centipede is a halfway decent grappling choice for a summoner, and Summon Monster Foo has a myriad of other uses.

Chances are you are hard pressed to find a competent arcane caster who doesn't have at least one of the above prepared at all times.

And since you insist on MTG terminology, "Dies to Removal" is a very relevant argument when the methods of removal are prevalent. It's like, say, running creatures of T3 or less when you know your opponent is running a heavily Red deck filled with lightning bolts and other burn effects. In which case they'll all readily "die to removal" with your opponent barely breaking a sweat. Or running a Red combo-deck with only a single combo, no AWCs, and no means to deal with your opponent's threats when you are up against a Mono-Blue Control deck. Then your combo "dies to removal again." Trivially.

The perfect solution fallacy does not work that way. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy) Consider the following analogy:

Robber 1: Let's rob that donut store over there.
Robber 2: No way. We'll get shot at by the cops and will probably get caught.
Robber 1: Hey! All good plans will fail if "they get caught by the cops." Just because my plan can fail when "we get caught by the cops" doesn't mean that it's a bad plan.
Robber 2: ...the store is filled with cops. 24/7. On their donut breaks. The place is swarming with them. We. Will. Get. Caught.

[stainboy]

I suppose "reliably ruin a spellcaster's day" probably states it too strongly, but at least it's often the best option. I don't think it's reasonable to expect that every NPC caster has Dimension Door or Freedom of Movement, and even if they do have Dimension Door you can waste their next standard while your allies act freely. (Because D&D is not fair, trading one of your side's fighter actions for one of their side's wizard actions is a good deal.)

[Eldan]

This part of the game holds a lot of appeal for some players. Some gamers really want their Fighter wearing half-plate armed with a dirk and a sai. The armor and each of their weapons will have it's own name, unique abilities, and back story of how it was made and acquired. They don't care if the rules are clunky, they want to play the main character in their own Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fafhrd_and_the_Gray_Mouser) story.

Funny thing being, of course, that the stories quite clearly say that Fafhrd and Mouser changed their weapons quite often and just always gave them the same names.

[stainboy]

Not that much of an exaggeration. Gygax was really into the simulation aspect of roleplaying games. In particular, he went out of his way to document every variable and incorporate it into the rules, usually via a lengthy chart. The Grapple rules are a good example, as are the weapon and armor rules (Do we really need different statistics for 8 different types of daggers?)

It wasn't just Gygax so much as the whole culture of early D&D. Gygax was actually resistant to some of the hard-to-remember subsystems in 1E. He didn't want to include the Weapon Type vs Armor Modifier table, for example.

Castles & Crusades grappling is actually really simple. Roll to hit AC 15 using whatever bonus the DM says, if you hit the target can't do anything. One paragraph, minimal rules, probably too much fiat if the DM isn't named Gary Gygax.

[danzibr]

but I am one of the few ones who remembers the order of operations

Are you talking about the steps of grappling or the math business?

[Coidzor]

Are you talking about the steps of grappling or the math business?

I find that outside of those who use them regularly enough to have committed them to memory it's both. :/