[PF] Come and get me and AoO chains

[Bearserker]

Hi,

I've got a question about attacks of opportunity...
Assume a barbarian duels a warrior :

Round 1 - the barbarian gets initiative.

Barbarian : I rage, use "Come and get me" rage power, then I move next to you and try a sunder maneuver.
Fighter : Do you have "Improved Sunder" ?
Barbarian : No.
Fighter : So attack of opportunity !
Barbarian : okay, so because of "Come and get me", I get an attack of opportunity too, and I resolve mine before yours... I use it to try another sunder maneuver.
Fighter : So attack of opportunity !
Barbarian : Hmmm, do you have "Combat Reflexes" ?
Fighter : No.
Barbarian : So, you can only perform one attack of opportunity a round.
Fighter : Indeed, but I still haven't resolved mine, so I'm still able to perform it !


My question is : Can the fighter indeed declare a second AoO because the first AoO hasn't begun ? :smallsmile:
(Be carefull there is a non-euclidean multidimensional trap behind this **** :smallwink:)

[Acanous]

No, the fighter is declaring his AoO on your first Sunder attempt, which is resolving after your second attempt.
Think of it like two people with very fast reflexes, taking advantage of the opponent Beginning a swing.
That swing has already begun, it can't be stopped prior to resolving, but the opponent can make a lightning-fast attack under the swing.

[Bearserker]

I agree with this interpretation of the rules which is the most logical.

But, if we follow the RAW, I don't see anything preventing the warrior to claim his AoO after the second sunder maneuver is declared... :smallconfused:

Is there some rules I missed ?

[Hand_of_Vecna]

Not to my knowledge, but I think this is a case of "RAW doesn't say I can't" that falls into the same territory as attacking while dead. Even hard RAW followers have to use logic sometimes and RAW also doesn't say that you can.

[Deophaun]

If the fighter could re-declare his AoO, then so can the barbarian. Now we get into infinite loop territory, which tells you something broke.

[Iamtheend]

I play melee, and do the AoO's too, so this is something I put thought into. It's silly and I compare it to like magic the gathering with instants resolving before another, like in a burn/counterspell war. There are things you can make sense of with messed up rules to take advantage, then there is trying to be honest for what was intended.

So if you guys wants to play a game where you're all about the RAW, like you're playing some competitive game, then take advantage of the nonsense. You're essentially stopping your swing to swing the same swing again, but somehow before the reaction of the other person, who was reacting to you. THEN you're going to immediately go back to that original swing somehow and continue it rather than just swinging again.

I can also see it like you are about to attempt to sunder, and then someone attempts to take their AoO, and then you react because you're faster somehow. Then from your reaction resolving, they follow through on their AoO while you just reset to what you were doing.

These views are conditional on two people swinging on one another, and as written before, you can get never ending loops potentially. Like consider applying someone moving out of a space, and while they're traveling, they have time for a million reactions to reactions to finally continue a 6 second round to finish that fraction of it making a movement of 5 feet. That's insane!

You need to choose how you want to play the game is what it comes down to, or rather how your DM wants to play it. RAW I believe would let you do your AoO fest.

[StreamOfTheSky]

I would not allow the Barbarian to attempt to Sunder on his AoO drawn from the Fighter's AoO of him attempting to Sunder in the first place.

Of course, this means the barbarian can instead do other attacks to intentionally provoke AoOs, but those options will at least be somewhat finite (trip and disarm are the only other maneuvers that can replace iterative attacks in PF; then I guess he could opt for unarmed strikes....). And the Fighter is not obligated to take a provoked AoO once it becomes obvious it is a trap to do so. And he may not have Combat Reflexes and even if he does, one of the 2 will run out eventually.

So it's a little silly but it's not going to result in infinite loops or other crap. And can be shut down quickly by the fighter just opting not to play along. And it causes the Barbarian to use all these AoO-provoking attacks on things that will likely suck / have low success chance / do low damage anyway -- unarmed strikes w/o IUS feat or a gauntlet; trip/disarm/sunder without any feats related to them.... and with some of them carrying consequences for failing by a large amount.

So I don't think it's that problematic in play, only as a thought exercise intentionally trying to take it to the extreme.

[Bearserker]

Actually the fight is a duel between a fighter with a vorpal blade and the barbarian who was trying to sunder the enchantment of the vorpal blade. :smallwink:

Barbarian : Sunder enchantment ! You can do an AoO.
Fighter : Yeahhh natural 20 on my AoO ! I behead you !
Barbarian : Wait a minute, I've "combat reflexes", so because of your AoO, I've got another AoO. I try to sunder the enchantment once again !
Fighter : Doesn't matter, my AoO goes first anyway ! If you do another AoO before mine, I haven't done mine so I'm still able to do it.

So it does make a sense the barbarian insists to sunder whereas he hasn't "Improved Sunder" and it does make a sense the fighter insists to hit before the sundering attempt (with "strength surge" the vorpal effect will surely be disabled). :smalltongue:

Actually, if the fighter hits before the second AoO of the barbarian, there is a paradox because the first AoO he declared disappears, so does the second "Come and get me" attack of the barbarian and so does the AoO the fighter resolved.
To my mind, the barbarian is obviously right, but players don't like to loose, that's why I'm asking for some rules to show them... :smallamused:


(...)
that falls into the same territory as attacking while dead.
(...)

What does this refer to ?
It seems sadly fun to read... :smallbiggrin:

[StreamOfTheSky]

Quite simply, "the rules don't state that you can't attack while dead, ergo I say you can."

It's an analogy people often use to counter what they see as absurd readings of RAW. Sometimes it's a warranted comparison, sometimes it's overused.

[Fouredged Sword]

In this case the fighter would still be able to make his AOOs due to the fact that he can still attack after his sword has been broken.

It just becomes not a sword, but an unenchanted improvised weapon, so the barbarian gets an AOO for each time he swings it, allowing the barbarian to make ANOTHER AOO for each swing the fighter uses.

Ever played disgaia? One attack on the main character ends in a long halt to combat at the two combatants countering each others counters until one dies.

[Xervous]

Judging by the similarities of many actions, events, etc. in the game, I believe that the act of declaring "I am making an attack of opportunity" uses up one of your AoOs for the turn, just like casting a spell would, or activating a free action effect.

Each event has conditions that must be met before it may be attempted, and now we wander into a MTG comparison...

The fighter and the barbarian are, in essence, throwing limited use abilities at one another which all go on the stack. once they have put the maximum of their allowed uses on the stack, they're done (assuming they hadn't used any before). The conditions for the event to occur must be met before resolution of the chain happens, costs must be paid in order to place each individual action on the stack. In this case, declaring the attack of opportunity costs 1 AoO for the round, so once they fighter hit his limit, he can't add more on because each are already a dedicated event set in a specific time on the chain.

[TopCheese]

Actually the fighter is flat footed and can't make AoO in the first place assuming this is the first round of combat and the barbarian goes first.

You can't make AoO while flat footed.... So even if you went to sunder without improved sunder you wouldn't draw the AoO because the fighter "isn't ready".

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/conditions#TOC-Flat-Footed

[Xervous]

Wonderful find TopCheese, :D

shows how much of the rules we actually remember :P

[TopCheese]

Wonderful find TopCheese, :D

shows how much of the rules we actually remember :P

Well when you get your butt handed to you because the group didn't know this rule (or believed you) you tend to look it up and be prepared for it :p

First time Pathfinder Society and I get droped by a few goblins...Sad (I went before them on the first round).

Edit: Oh and thanks :p