Substituting actions?

[danzibr]

Suppose I want to do two things in one round, something which takes a swift action and something which takes an immediate action. Can I do this?

And by that I mean... can you substitute, say, a move action for an immediate action? Or standard action for a swift action? It seems like it'd go something like:

full-round action > standard action > move action > swift action > immediate action > free action

It seems like you should be able to sub any action (on your turn) for a lesser action, but reading this (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/actionsInCombat.htm) I can't seem to verify this one way or the other.

[Dairuga]

Suppose I want to do two things in one round, something which takes a swift action and something which takes an immediate action. Can I do this?

Yes, yes you can. You can take one swift action on your turn, and then an immediate action as well, as far as I have understood. THis might only work if you use the immediate action on another person's turn, however, as an immediate action takes up the swift action for the next turn.




And by that I mean... can you substitute, say, a move action for an immediate action? Or standard action for a swift action? It seems like it'd go something like:

full-round action > standard action > move action > swift action > immediate action > free action

It seems like you should be able to sub any action (on your turn) for a lesser action, but reading this (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/actionsInCombat.htm) I can't seem to verify this one way or the other.

Shortly put, no; you cannot. Firstly, as per the rules "In a normal round, you can perform a standard action and a move action, or you can perform a full-round action". These are the basics. You get one Move, and one Standard action per turn. Then, we have: "You can always take a move action in place of a standard action", as an exception. This is the only substitution you are able to make. Likewise, you cannot sacrifice move actions to gain more standard actions.

Secondly, your hierarchy of actions (And deeming some "Lesser" than others.) is rather erroneous. On that side-note, an immediate action should be higher than a swift action, not lower, if you were going by your hierarchy of actions. An immediate action is exactly the same as a swift action, except you can do it whenever you want, even on your opponent's turn (And in turn, it takes away the next turn's swift action to compensate).

If you could have substituted standard / move actions into "Lesser" actions like swift actions, that would have opened up a whole new can of worm of abuse when casting spells. Arcane Spellsurge ahoy.

[Zombimode]

Suppose I want to do two things in one round, something which takes a swift action and something which takes an immediate action. Can I do this?

And by that I mean... can you substitute, say, a move action for an immediate action? Or standard action for a swift action? It seems like it'd go something like:

full-round action > standard action > move action > swift action > immediate action > free action

It seems like you should be able to sub any action (on your turn) for a lesser action, but reading this (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/actionsInCombat.htm) I can't seem to verify this one way or the other.

No, the rules do not provide this option. The only exception is that you can use your standart action to perform a move action.


full-round action > standard action
Doesnt make sense. If you take a full-round action, you dont have a standart action (or move action) any more. So when you "trade" a full-round action to a standart action, you would just lose your move action for no benefit.


standard action > move action
You can do that per RAW.


move action > swift action
That would be completely broken. Why? Because swift actions generally tend to do more than move actions. It would break the action economy even further, and mostly for the classes that are already incredible strong (casters).


swift action > immediate action
They already share the same slot and you can use immediate actions during your turn.


immediate action > free action
Normaly you wouldnt need to trade actions to get free actions, since they are, well, free. This trade however would allow you to take free actions outside your turn, which you normaly cant. Still, the side effects would make it broken or at least mess with the system. (Maybe 5-foot stepping out of harms way?).

Bottom line: with the exception of standard->move, the system is not build arround the idea of substituting action types. Any such rule would unbalance the system more than it would do good.

[DeltaEmil]

As Zombiemode wrote, you cannot substitute action in 3.5 like you can in D&D 4th edition. The only action type you can exchange for another is the standard action becoming a move action, and that's all.

[Squidfist]

Pretty sure RAW dictates that actions can't be substituted, because as said, that would lead to a whole array of issues, such as a caster getting 3 spells per round.

I solve this by allowing my players to substitute ONLY their standard action into a second swift action. That way they sacrifice their ability to attack/cast by casting a second swift.

For example:

Player falls into a pit, gets smacked down to 0 HP. Spends swift action using Divine Vigor, granting temporary HP as to not go unconscious, then needed to cast the swift spell Updraft to get out. Typical rules would say that NO, you can't do this even though logically you'd totally have time to do so... so screw that. User spends their standard casting updraft, and move action to move laterally, so they don't fall straight back in.

Makes perfect sense to me.

[Person_Man]

It's also worth mentioning that you do not "get" your Immediate/Swift Action until the first time you act in combat, and cannot take Immediate Actions or make attacks of opportunity while flat footed (although Combat Reflexes solves the latter issue).

At the start of your turn, you are allotted one Immediate/Swift Action, and one Full Round Action. The Full Round Action may be broken up into one Move Action and one Standard Action, or two Move Actions. That's pretty much it.

[danzibr]

At the start of your turn, you are allotted one Immediate/Swift Action, and one Full Round Action. The Full Round Action may be broken up into one Move Action and one Standard Action, or two Move Actions. That's pretty much it.
Yeah thanks. That's a good way to put it.

As for that little hierarchy thing I made, I was thinking of time it takes to do them.