A couple of questions about readied actions

[Talakeal]

Ok, so a couple of questions about what happens if I interrupt another character with a readied action:

Can my opponent abandon his action if my readied action would make it dangerous to do so? For example casting a wall of fire in the path of a character who declares a charge on me.

Can my opponent change his action if my readied action made his initial reaction impossible? For example casting wall of stone in the path of a character who declares a charge on me.

Does a declared attack target ME or the space where I am standing?

Meaning, can I use a readied action to avoid damage entirely? For example, if someone cast a fireball at me simply move out of the spells area before it is cast, or if someone makes a melee attack against me take a five foot step out of their reach or put total cover between me and the attacker (for example closing a door or jumping behind a wall).

If no, does it matter whether the fireball is centered on me? For example if a fireball hits an ally can I simply move out of the radius. If a fireball is centered on me does the enemy move the fireball to center on my new location? If so can I intentionally move next to the caster or his allies to force him to fireball himself / his friends?


I checked in the PHB and all it states is "the opponent completes their action if able to do so", which is pretty damn vague about the above scenarios.

[Flickerdart]

Like the PHB says, your opponent completes their action if they can:
1) If they charge, and you cast wall of fire, they run through it.
2) If they charge, and you cast wall of stone, they run into the wall and stop moving (and might have a standard action left, since they didn't actually charge).
3) If they start casting, and you move, they can complete the casting and target the fireball on where you are now. You cannot ready a 5ft step, because it's not an action; if you ready a move action, you can move away from an attack, but would provoke an AoO for doing so.

[Talakeal]

Like the PHB says, your opponent completes their action if they can:
1) If they charge, and you cast wall of fire, they run through it.
2) If they charge, and you cast wall of stone, they run into the wall and stop moving (and might have a standard action left, since they didn't actually charge).
3) If they start casting, and you move, they can complete the casting and target the fireball on where you are now. You cannot ready a 5ft step, because it's not an action; if you ready a move action, you can move away from an attack, but would provoke an AoO for doing so.

1: Ok, so the sorcerer in my party has taken to readying an action to cast Prismatic Wall directly in front of the next enemy to move, inflicting 100+ damage and 7 save or die / lose spells with no chance to avoid it AND negating said enemy's turn entirely. This is a legitimate tactic? It seems really cheesy, any way to get around it?

2: So can they then use said standard action to do something else? Can they use any remaining movement to go in a different direction?

3: How do you determine the location of the new fireball? If the enemy just cast a fireball on top of you, who determines whether it moves with you or stays in place? Obviously you can substitute "fireball" in this example for any area effect.

Either way is open to abuse. If I rule it stays in an area the character just moves out of the way, like a better version of evasion. If I say it follows the character they use it to force people to nuke themselves or allies.

[Rhynn]

I'd say "This is what we have DMs for", but I seem to remember you're used to players who scream bloody murder over the DM making any interpretations/decisions (or at least ones that don't go their way 100%) ... :smalleek:

I'd just rule it on a case-by-case basis. Probably I'd mostly let a readied action be used to avoid damage - you're giving up your standard action that round, after all.

One note: combat is resolved sequentially, but happens simultaneously. So it's not like the enemy wizard casting fireball stops to wait for you to move out of the way - to my mind, what happens is that you were watching the enemy wizard, and when your readied action ("move out of the area of effect if that wizard throws an AoE spell this way") triggers, that's you reacting even as the wizard is casting the spell and the fireball is zooming your way... and that sounds fine and dandy to me, and I'd probably not let the caster "re-target" the AoE spell. It was already "fired" (or at least irrevokably aimed) at the target square when you noticed the character with the readied action was moving. (Spells that target creatures - like magic missile or rays - rather than have an area of effect are homing, though. Sorry! Cover helps if it's a ray, but magic missiles are only stopped by blocking the line of effect.)

I'd also let closing a door in the face of an attacker work, although I'd probably let them then attack the door with the action rather than forcing them to abort.

Using your standard action for the turn to ready a move action for the 5-foot step is so unoptimal that I don't have any problem letting someone do it. Besides, if the attacker is making a full attack, they can take a 5-foot step after the first (wasted) attack, and continue the full attack!

"The only movement you can take during a full attack is a 5-foot step. You may take the step before, after, or between your attacks."

I'd probably not let a charging opponent stop when an obstruction (wall of fire, a magically created pit, etc.) goes up in front of them as a readied action. That seems like a legit tactic to me. You risk your standard action betting on your opponent to take a specific action that will trigger your readied action, in order to maybe make them waste their action or take some damage... seems fair. (Also, you could just have used your action to cast wall of fire in front of the opponent before they charged!)


3) If they start casting, and you move, they can complete the casting and target the fireball on where you are now. You cannot ready a 5ft step, because it's not an action; if you ready a move action, you can move away from an attack, but would provoke an AoO for doing so.

SRD: "You can take a 5-foot step as part of your readied action, but only if you don’t otherwise move any distance during the round."

You can ready a free action. Talking is a free action. So ready an action to shout "whoah!" and take a 5-foot step as part of that readied free action.

But if you want to be difficult about it...

SRD: "You can take a move action in place of a standard action. If you move no actual distance in a round (commonly because you have swapped your move for one or more equivalent actions), you can take one 5-foot step either before, during, or after the action."

So ready a move action to pick up a pebble and take a 5-foot step as part of that move action.

[Talakeal]

So no one has any more ideas about this?

I am really trying to figure out how the rules are supposed to work, because as they exist it looks like a clever wizard can turn simple actions such as moving or attacking into certain death with no save for an enemy, or even force an enemy to kill their own allies.

If anyone has any good house rules or official clarification on how this is supposed to be handled I would really appreciate it.

[Phelix-Mu]

So no one has any more ideas about this?

I am really trying to figure out how the rules are supposed to work, because as they exist it looks like a clever wizard can turn simple actions such as moving or attacking into certain death with no save for an enemy, or even force an enemy to kill their own allies.

If anyone has any good house rules or official clarification on how this is supposed to be handled I would really appreciate it.

If someone's declared movement is suddenly obstructed by something they didn't know about when they started moving (pit trap, prismatic wall, tripwire) and the character can see it as they move, I'd allow a Reflex save for the character to stop their declared movement in time to avoid the threat. I think this is a house rule, but I'm honestly not clear on the issue.

Targeting a spell is part of the same action as casting the spell, I believe. When the caster declares the action, all variables are set. Then the action readied to do x in response to casting takes place. Regardless of the action, the spell will complete on schedule after the caster's turn resumes, with the same parameters initially specified (assuming the casting is still legal/targets still viable/LoE, LoS still in tact, otherwise it fizzles). I think this is how it actually works, but it's how I would rule it to work, regardless.

[Talakeal]

If someone's declared movement is suddenly obstructed by something they didn't know about when they started moving (pit trap, prismatic wall, tripwire) and the character can see it as they move, I'd allow a Reflex save for the character to stop their declared movement in time to avoid the threat. I think this is a house rule, but I'm honestly not clear on the issue.

Targeting a spell is part of the same action as casting the spell, I believe. When the caster declares the action, all variables are set. Then the action readied to do x in response to casting takes place. Regardless of the action, the spell will complete on schedule after the caster's turn resumes, with the same parameters initially specified (assuming the casting is still legal/targets still viable/LoE, LoS still in tact, otherwise it fizzles). I think this is how it actually works, but it's how I would rule it to work, regardless.

In the first case that is what I have been doing, allowing a reflex save to adjust movement, and I think that is the best solution. Still, it would be nice if there was same RAW answer to the problem.

As for targeting, I am still a little confused.

Say I center a fireball on a player and he readies an action to move thirty feet forward if attacked. Does my fireball now land in the place he was, hitting empty air, or does it center on his new location?

The second case seems more reasonable in a vacuum. But what if the thirty foot movement took him away from a close knit group of his allies? Meaning I am now wasting an area spell on a lone target.

Even worse, what if the thirty foot movement took the player into the middle of a bunch of my allies, or even right next to me, am I now forced to fireball myself?

[Phelix-Mu]

In the first case that is what I have been doing, allowing a reflex save to adjust movement, and I think that is the best solution. Still, it would be nice if there was same RAW answer to the problem.

As for targeting, I am still a little confused.

Say I center a fireball on a player and he readies an action to move thirty feet forward if attacked. Does my fireball now land in the place he was, hitting empty air, or does it center on his new location?

The second case seems more reasonable in a vacuum. But what if the thirty foot movement took him away from a close knit group of his allies? Meaning I am now wasting an area spell on a lone target.

Even worse, what if the thirty foot movement took the player into the middle of a bunch of my allies, or even right next to me, am I now forced to fireball myself?

Fireball is not a targeted spell. You don't attack anyone with it. You place the spell at some point in space within range of the spell. It goes off there once casting is complete, regardless of what happens. You can't place the fireball on a person, but you can "target" their current space as the origin of the fireball. If the person moves, the fireball still goes off at the designated point.

Other spells stand to be significantly more complicated on this point. Not sure I am qualified to address any of those other spells.

[Talakeal]

Fireball is not a targeted spell. You don't attack anyone with it. You place the spell at some point in space within range of the spell. It goes off there once casting is complete, regardless of what happens. You can't place the fireball on a person, but you can "target" their current space as the origin of the fireball. If the person moves, the fireball still goes off at the designated point.

Other spells stand to be significantly more complicated on this point. Not sure I am qualified to address any of those other spells.

So you are saying you look at this on a spell by spell basis? So fireball would hit the initial spot, while Meteor Swarm, which can target a specific creature before exploding, would hit the creature in their new location?

[Phelix-Mu]

If the creature is a legal target of the spell (requiring the spell to have a "Target" line) when it is cast, and is still a legal target after the readied action, then they still get hit by the spell, as far as I know. The actual attack roll doesn't happen until the casting is done, I believe, so that may be slightly distinct. Someone with more expertise should feel free to contradict me, and I can think of several abilities that contradict what I just implied about targeted spells.

As I said, I am fuzzy on the more complicated spells. Fireball is pretty straightforward.

[TuggyNE]

Targeting a spell is part of the same action as casting the spell, I believe. When the caster declares the action, all variables are set. Then the action readied to do x in response to casting takes place. Regardless of the action, the spell will complete on schedule after the caster's turn resumes, with the same parameters initially specified (assuming the casting is still legal/targets still viable/LoE, LoS still in tact, otherwise it fizzles). I think this is how it actually works, but it's how I would rule it to work, regardless.

Not exactly.
You make all pertinent decisions about a spell (range, target, area, effect, version, and so forth) when the spell comes into effect. I.e., once casting is finished.

[Talakeal]

Not exactly. I.e., once casting is finished.

Hmm, that makes it a lot more reasonable.

I wonder if this isn't the intent for everything. So, for example, you could intereupt someone mid move, or as soon as they declare a move action, but the path by which they do so is not pre determined, so you could, for example, throw a prismatic wall in their path, but nothing requires they continue following said path.

[Maginomicon]

How I handle ready actions is that the trigger and response of the readied action are written and put face-down on the table, dedicating the contents of the ready action for the round but not letting the GM see what the ready actions are, kinda like how trap cards work in games like Yu-Gi-Oh.

Once you do this, a lot of these concerns become trivial. If the GM can't know what the readied action is, he can't use out-of-game knowledge to have an enemy avoid it. Even if the GM has a good idea what your readied action's trigger and/or response is, he then has to determine if it would be out-of-character knowledge for the enemy and if it's OOC knowledge for him, he shouldn't have the enemy act on that knowledge. However, it's entirely reasonable for the same trick to not work twice (that is, for a 2nd enemy to not fall for it) because that particular enemy's seen it happen previously.

[yougi]

Hmm, that makes it a lot more reasonable.

I wonder if this isn't the intent for everything. So, for example, you could intereupt someone mid move, or as soon as they declare a move action, but the path by which they do so is not pre determined, so you could, for example, throw a prismatic wall in their path, but nothing requires they continue following said path.

Except for a charge, for which the path is predetermined.

[Maginomicon]

Except for a charge, for which the path is predetermined.
Charge is a full-round action, and readying is a standard action, so you can't ready a charge. If you allowed that you'd basically be getting extra actions out of the economy if you could do a full-round action in response.

EDIT: Oh, oops, you meant if the enemy charges? My bad.

On the other hand, this entry from the FAQ might provide some useful insight:
Suppose a fighter and an archer go at the same initiative. The archer is not in an adjacent square but only one square over. The fighter isnot using a reach weapon. Assuming the archer plans to use a full attack action (and doesn’t use a 5-foot step), and since they have the same initiative, could the fighter movehis 5-foot step (toward the archer) as the archer is firing and get an attack of opportunity?

The question is moot, because two characters never have the same initiative. If two characters tie with their initiative rolls, you must break the tie before starting the combat (see Initiative in Chapter 8 of the PH).

The fighter could use the ready or delay special initiative actions to act at about the same time as the archer. In the case of the ready action, the fighter could ready an attack against the archer when the archer shoots. When the archer shoots, the readied action is triggered. The fighter acts before the archer shoots (readied actions are resolved prior to the actions that trigger them, see the ready description in Chapter 8 of the PH). Assuming that the fighter has not previously moved this round, he could make a 5-foot step and then attack the archer. Since the fighter now threatens the archer, the fighter can make an attack of opportunity against the archer when the archer fires, provided the archer does not use a 5-foot step to get out of reach first.

If the fighter was delaying, the action would be resolved in the same way, provided the fighter chose to act before the archer. If the delaying fighter acts after the archer, the fighter won’t get any attack of opportunity against the archer (this turn, at least).