How do Readied Actions Affect Initiative

[Lord Ruby34]

I don't get how this (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/specialInitiativeActions.htm#ready) works, or a least I think that I'm missing something. I understand that taking a readied action changes your initiative count to right before the turn of the person you interrupted, but it also says you lose your action for that round. I don't think I understand how that works.

Example:

Joe the Fighter acts on Initiative count 17, he readies an action to attack anybody that charges him.

Grock the Orc acts on Initiative count 8, he charges Joe the Fighter. Joe's readied action goes off, he hits Grock and then Grock hits him. Grock's turn is over, there are no other combatants. Whose turn is it? Does anything change if Joe's initiative count had been 4?

[Malimar]

In both cases, Joe's initiative is now slightly higher than 8, because Joe reënters the initiative just before Grock when Grock triggers Joe's readied action. As there are only two combatants, Joe also goes next, after Grock.

[Piggy Knowles]

Note that the bit about your readied action causing you to lose your regular action only happens if your readied action goes if in the NEXT round. In this instance, it happened in THIS round. So it would proceed as follows:

ROUND 1:
Initiative 17: Joe moves and readies an action.
Initiative 8: Grock goes, triggering Joe's readied action. The readied action resolves, and Joe's initiative changes to just ahead of Grock (let's call it 9).
ROUND ENDS.

ROUND 2:
Initiative 9: Joe goes.
Initiative 8: Grock goes.

If Joe's initiative had been 4, it would instead look like this:

ROUND 1:
Initiative 8: Grock goes.
Initiative 4: Joe goes, and readies an action.
ROUND ENDS.

ROUND 2:
Initiative 8: Grock goes, triggering Joe's readied action. Joe's readied action resolves, and Joe's initiative resets to just before Grock's (again, let's call it 9).
ROUND ENDS. (Joe does not get an additional action on round 2, because his initiative is no longer 4.)

ROUND 3:
Initiative 9: Joe goes.
Initiative 8: Grock goes.

Make sense?

[Lord Ruby34]

Make sense?

Yes it does, thank you. It seems I need examples to actually understand things, which is probably my main source of rules confusion.

[StreamOfTheSky]

Note that if you have not moved at all, you can 5 ft step as part of the readied action.

I love in a duel vs. a dumb/aggressive foe, if I win init, to ready an action to strike him when he is about to melee attack me and THEN 5 ft step away.

Done right, you can strike him first, ruin his turn, then get your next turn before his and be able to 5 ft step back into melee to get a full attack off. All against his charging AC, if he charged.

On the opposite side, the 5 ft step w/ readied action is basically a necessity to actually strike back if the foe has higher reach than you. In fact, if the foe has a reach weapon and you ready to 5 ft and attack, you can often end up inside his "no-threat zone" before he can get his attack off, also screwing up his plans.