Natural Reach

[DeadAggressor]

Would a medium creature who has 20' natural reach through feats, threaten 10' out to 40' while wielding a lance?

[Flickerdart]

A reach weapon doubles your reach and cannot be used within your normal reach, so he would threaten everything from 25ft to 40ft away.

[DeadAggressor]

Thank you, I forgot to ask in my OP, but would you be able to cite that in a book anywhere? I have a fellow player who built a battle controller who using Knight from PHBII to make everything within 40' difficult terrain, seeing as know it's only 25 out, this makes things much easier in dealing with him.

[torrasque666]

If he has armor spikes, those are weapons that can be used within his normal reach.

[DeadAggressor]

He doesn't, he has his 20' natural reach and wields a lance to double it so to control a massive area on the battlefield.

[Extra Anchovies]

He doesn't, he has his 20' natural reach and wields a lance to double it so to control a massive area on the battlefield.

If he's wearing Breastplate or heavier he automatically has normal gauntlets, which are a d3 but they still threaten.

[Flickerdart]

Thank you, I forgot to ask in my OP, but would you be able to cite that in a book anywhere?
It's explained in the rules for reach weapons, in the PHB's weapons chapter.

[Demorden]

Premise: medium-sized PCs with natural reach are definitely not standard, and thus confusing.
None expected us to create Monkey D. Rufy in D&D, after all, so who cared about proper wording?

TLDR version:
Basically, I rule the thing so that reach weapons give ADDITIVE reach, and size increases MULTIPLY it.
Which is debatable by RAW, but IMHO, is the only believable interpretation.

So if you're medium-sized, you have a 20-ft natural reach, and wield a reach weapon in my games, you'd add 5ft to your reach for the lance. (Not taking into account the fact that I can't imagine how you can fight effectively with a lance in that range... but that's another story.)

So I'd rule that you could reach any square in the 10-25 feet range.

If instead you feel like reading a little more...
You might find this old thread of mine interesting.
I was discussing reach and size increases, but the concept is similar.
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?361974-Natural-reach-and-size-increase-How-does-it-work-RAW-vs-RAI

From the discussion:

First, a myth needs to be debunked (well, not really, let's say that I'm pointing out something we always forget :P )

Quoting SRD on reach weapons


Reach Weapons:
Glaives, guisarmes, lances, longspears, ranseurs, spiked chains, and whips are reach weapons. A reach weapon is a melee weapon that allows its wielder to strike at targets that aren’t adjacent to him or her. Most reach weapons double the wielder’s natural reach, meaning that a typical Small or Medium wielder of such a weapon can attack a creature 10 feet away, but not a creature in an adjacent square. A typical Large character wielding a reach weapon of the appropriate size can attack a creature 15 or 20 feet away, but not adjacent creatures or creatures up to 10 feet away.

(emphasis mine)

The rules don't state that reach weapons double your natural reach.
They state that most reach weapons double your natural reach.

That opens the field to weapons that apply a different multiplier to your natural reach, and the same paragraph gives you the easiest kosher example: the infamous, ultra-hard-sucking whip!

The whip effectively triples your natural reach, that's commonly accepted, and in fact so obvious that it isn't even stated.

"But -I can almost hear you- you are not wielding reach weapons anyway!"

Let's see the definition of reach weapon, again...


Since unarmed strikes are in the melee weapons table, and "are always considered light weapons", making them longer turns them into reach weapons... and as such they can be treated.

Admittedly, by strict RAW there would be still some confusion...
See this: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?256373-What-is-natural-reach

But IMHO my point turns an "absurd claim" into a "debatable opinion"... And at the moment, that's enough for me. ;)


I thought about it further during this time, and came up with the interpretation I shared in the beginning of the post.
Reach weapons don't strictly double your reach. They effectively do it, but just incidentally.
They have longer reach, and that reach happens to equal your range x2, in standard conditions.

But we're not talking about standard conditions.... :smallbiggrin:
There's no math formula in the books saying that reach weapon = your reach x 2.
It says that most reach weapons double your reach (while for example the whip doesn't).

When the wording of the manual is even slightly ambiguous, common sense should rule.
If you rule it so that reach weapons systematically double your range, it would mean that the same lance would have different lenght based on who's using it. Nonsense.

All this reasoning comes, as you can see, from a very similar problem related to size increases, if you dig that thread, you'll find some more "bonus considerations" on the subject.

And be patient with my English, it's not my language.
But I suppose I made my point clear anyway.

:smallsmile:

[Curmudgeon]

If he's wearing Breastplate or heavier he automatically has normal gauntlets, which are a d3 but they still threaten.
Sorry, but they don't threaten unless you have Improved Unarmed Strike.
Gauntlet

This metal glove lets you deal lethal damage rather than nonlethal damage with unarmed strikes. A strike with a gauntlet is otherwise considered an unarmed attack.

Normal: Without this feat, you are considered unarmed when attacking with an unarmed strike, and you can deal only nonlethal damage with such an attack.
There's nothing in the gauntlet description which states that you also threaten while using it.

[Extra Anchovies]

Sorry, but they don't threaten unless you have Improved Unarmed Strike.

There's nothing in the gauntlet description which states that you also threaten while using it.

Ah. Nice catch. I guess they'll need to shell out for spiked gauntlets/armor.