Combat Maneuvers and what to do with them?

[stack]

What are your experiences with the combat maneuver system and what would you like to see changed/improved?

In my view, the CMB/CMD system is somewhat problematic. Creating a more unified mechanic for maneuvers is a reasonable design goal in my opinion, but I am not certain that the comunity is generally pleased with the result. Complaints that maneuvers aren't worth using or the CMD scales in such a way that they stop being worthwhile without heavy investment seem common.

Are combat Maneuvers used regularly at your table?

If yes, are they thought to be effective/worthwhile?

If not, why not? Are they not effective enough compared to the investment? Do players prefer to deal damage and leave debuff and control to casters? Why?

In a theoretical homebrew, replacement system, PF2.0, how would you like to see combat maneuvers handled?

In my view, maneuvers can be effective at low levels or with heavy investment, but often that investment would be better spent elsewhere. With archetypes, feats, and items it is possible to make grappling, for example, nearly binary. It either ends an enemy or it is useless against them. Trip has similar issues, with flight-based or leg-less trip immunity making it a tactic that can often not be employed. Sunder and disarm face issues with simply not being worth investing heavily in when many foes cannot be effected by them.

I think that the system would be better served by allowing maneuvers to be employed in such a way that they are useful but do not require consuming your build to keep them effective. A THF doesn't need to spend all his feats and items boosting his attack bonus to stay relevant. In my ideal system, maneuvers would be something that any martial class would invest a bit in to be competent at a few of them fitting their theme and being both able to and wanting to work them into their attack routine.

I have seen three general types of maneuver systems:
3.5 had a somewhat fractured system, with different maneuvers having significantly differing mechanics. Some worked better than others, but the fractured mechanic is less player friendly than a more unified mechanic.

PF uses CMB/CMD. I think the move to a consistent system is good, but scaling and investment seem problematic. There are too many ways to get minor numerical bonuses and you need a lot of them to keep up.

Save based. I know Legend did this and I think I've heard 4e does as well. More unified than 3.5 and makes use of saves, which are already existing and the math of their scaling is pretty well established.

Another discussion point: size and how it effects maneuvers? Playablilty verses verisimilitude and how size does and should impact various maneuvers are important parts of the discussion.

So playground, thoughts?

[Gallowglass]

Personally, I -love- Combat Maneuvers and have made several builds around them and tend to utilize them even when I haven't built around them. I think they are fun, provide strong battlefield control and give me something to do other than hit-point reduction when I'm a beatstick.

Right now I have a Ninja using a number of dirty trick shenanigans, and a reach inquisitor that was using trip strings, but now has been forced into mace/shield which made me have to retrain a bunch of feats. Now I do more overrun, reposition and MORE dirty trick shenanigans.

But I do think that the pathfinder CMB/CMD system is overbuilt. The feat trains to be effective are too long, the exception handling is too dense and the very core mechanic of the CMD (AC) scales unfairly compared to CMB resulting in the lack of usefulness at higher levels you speak of.

I am, however, an anomaly at my common game tables. I'm the only one who really understands the system, and the only one that uses it most of the time. I often get groans from DMs when I enact a trip chain or pull out dirty tricks because now they have to go read the rules again and try to figure out the CMD for the enemy on the fly because they didn't include it when they prepped. When I am DM, my enemy troops make copious use of CMs to wreak havoc on the PCs, some of which have super optimized their AC to the point I can't realistically hit them with a common mook, but I can still make them sweat with CMs. (There is a particular Magus who, at 9th level, is routinely boasting a 40+ AC by the time combat begins, but I just spent a session using shadow cloakers to grapple her to hilarious effect)

Someone on this forum has a "feat redesign" that I like a lot because it combines all the CM feat chains into smaller and more focused (and achievable) feat chains that makes picking and choosing Manuevers more realistic instead of focusing on one particular maneuver like you see in most OP builds.

You ask what I would like to see in a rebuild system? I like the idea of defense being based on something other than AC (which is what CMD is) but I would want some number-crunching to make sure it stays somewhat lucid as you level. I would like to see the ability for a user to actually USE all the maneuvers when circumstances come up rather than being forced to focus all their effort on being good with one maneuver. I'd like to see teamwork feats become useful for people other than Inquisitors (and anyone else who gets Teamwork Feats that work without someone else in your party having the feat) and incorporated to encourage group strategy. That's what they do now, but they only work for the handful of classes who have the "use Teamwork feats even if no one else has it) rider.

[CockroachTeaParty]

My players rarely use them, but as a GM tool I find myself using combat maneuvers a lot.

At low levels, they are a nice non-lethal alternative for enemies, especially at high risk low levels where hp and healing ability is low.

For instance, I often have enemies like goblins use lots of combat maneuvers, even though they lack the necessary feats; they provoke more AoOs, which gives the players more opportunities to feel like a badass (and it ends the combats a bit quicker); it also helps emphasize the chaotic lack of self preservation and wacky tactics of the goblins.

Conversely, at higher levels combat maneuvers are a great way to give players a new challenge, especially those who have settled into a certain 'comfort zone' with their 'build.' For instance, one of my players dumped nearly all of their wealth into a single sword. So when I wanted to make them sweat, I'd mess with their sword. Sunder and disarm attempts made him more worried than actual hp damage. Big creatures like giants can make disarm attempts with staggering ease, challenging players to come up with contingencies or start investing in back up weapons and things like locked gauntlets.



I also believe varied fighting environments encourage stuff like bull rushes, overruns, and drags. It's very cinematic and fun to try to push enemies off bridges and cliffs, for instance; the more cinematic-minded players often take such bait, and it's great fodder for folks playing swashbucklers or gunslingers that ties in derring-do with mechanical benefits.

[AZGrowler]

I'd like to see scaling feats. Instead of 3+ feats to be able to do one thing competently, there should be one feat that gets better the longer you have it. This would also increase flexibility so, say, a mid-level fighter could adapt to whatever they face, rather than hoping that everything they go up against has only two legs, or is no larger than one size larger, or carry a weapon.

Also, all martials should get Combat Expertise for free. It's a feat tax, pure and simple.

[Captain Morgan]

One of the big issues with CMD is how it scales for bigger enemies, who get not only direct bonuses to their CMD for size but also size bonuses to strength for the same. This means that if you've investmed enough to have a chance of using combat maneuvers on these critters, they will be auto success against CR equivalent humanoids. The math definitely needs to be reworked. I'm also a fan of collapsing the feat trees into scaling forms or something.

[stack]

Do you think targeting saves would help with the math issue?

[Florian]

Do you think targeting saves would help with the math issue?

Looking at the actual maneuvers? No. Some of them are quite powerful and deal actual conditions. Comparing them to spells that are equally effective, then in this case, the CM variant coms out on top.

Problem rather is that there are so many maneuvers that are pretty useless.

[Gallowglass]

Looking at the actual maneuvers? No. Some of them are quite powerful and deal actual conditions. Comparing them to spells that are equally effective, then in this case, the CM variant coms out on top.

Problem rather is that there are so many maneuvers that are pretty useless.

I don't know about that, really.

First, yeah, no, I don't think targeting the saves is a great idea. Why? because CM are their own minigame at this point, and if you have them target saves then they get overcome with rings of resistance and headbands of wisdom and belts of constitution and all the other stuff people are already investing in to pump up their saves already for the normal game. Who has the best saves? Wizards. Who do you NOT want to be best at Combat Maneuver defense? Wizards.

But to Florian's point, I don't really thing any of the CMs are theoretically useless. Drag and Reposition should probably be combined into one. Bull Rush and Overrun should probably be combined into one. But in a tactical game where you have terrain and multiple hero and foe units, they are all usually useful in most combats.

Bull Rush
Dirty Trick
Disarm
Drag
Grapple
Overrun
Reposition
Steal
Sunder
Trip

The problem is, with the minigame as its currently written, its not worth the action to use them. Too little chance of success, its a bad trade off for the damage you are not going to be dealing in exchange. If the CMs with the least benefit (drag and reposition) had a reciprocally higher chance of success, then the cases where it makes tactical sense to spend an action to do them get revealed pretty easily. If the maneuvers dealt some damage along with the maneuver, then it would be more worth the exchange. Maybe you should get to do your str bonus of damage just without the weapon dice? Maybe you should be able to do precision damage if you use some of the maneuvers in place of an attack? I don't know, just spitballing.

Out of the 10 manuevers only 5 (Bull rush, Drag, Grapple, Overrun, and Reposition) really make sense to get the size bonus and penalty. The other five (Dirty trick, Disarm, Steal, Sunder and Trip) its really hard to understand why a small hero has such a huge penalty against a huge foe. In fact for some of them, smaller size could be a benefit.

So you should start by making groups.

Which maneuvers are fundamentally useless if you aren't using a tactical map of the combat? (Overrun, Reposition, Drag, Bullrush)
Which maneuvers are still useful even in the loosest from of Theatre of the Mind? (Sunder, Steal, Trip, Grapple, Dirty Trick, Disarm)
Which maneuvers should benefit from size differentials (Bull rush, Drag, Grapple, Overrun, and Reposition)
Which maneuvers shouldn't. (Dirty trick, Disarm, Steal, Sunder and Trip)
Which maneuvers are debuffs (Dirty trick, Steal)
Which maneuvers are meant to cost the opponent an action to recover (Trip, Disarm, Overrun?)

and so on. You will start discovering natural groupings, then you can say "If there are really 4 natural groups, can I turn these into 4 maneuver sets instead of 10 maneuvers? And if so, can I then change the feat trains or change the cmd/cmb minigame so that they make more sense? If I do does that make it less complicated or more complicated?

These are the kind of questions I would start with if you really wnat to revamp the system.

[Necromancy]

I played a grapple focused tetori monk as more of an experiment. Grappling turned out to be so strong as to be encounter breaking and the DM seriously hated it. I suspect most maneuvers have a lot more uses than any of us have dreamed up

The CMD/CMB numbers aren't really that bad if you try to pick up a couple magic item boosts

As for the feats, pathfinder has a very serious problem with feat bloat. Without counting 3rd party material, there's over a thousand feats. I personally allow 1 free "Improved" maneuver per 2 BAB among other changes

[Florian]

@Gallowglass:

Not useless. But we have two very distinctive tiers here.
One is stuff like overrun or disarm
The other is Trip and Dirty Trick.

The first one can be situationally powerful, the second is universally powerful.

[dascarletm]

I had a player focus on Bull Rush, and another focused on Dirty Tricks. They worked well. The bull rusher had an ability to sub his last attack for a bull rush, so full attack + knockback was good, and the Dirty Tricker had an ability to tack on a Dirty Trick as a rider to an attack. They seemed to enjoy it. Big monsters were a problem, but they fought plenty of large size and smaller opponents.

[Anlashok]

Well, Tetori is THE grappling archetype. It should be damn good at it.

That said I'm a bit skeptical of encounter breaking. The Tetori can partially shut down one single enemy, but that only really shines in encounters where you outnumber the enemy and then further than that requires an enemy that's unlikely to break the grapple and on that relies on tactics the grapple shuts down.

It's definitely a solid option, but I'm not really sure any of that trumps a spellcaster who can shut down multiple enemies without caveats, or a damage built martial who can just kill the enemy outright.

[Sayt]

Consolidate feats. At the very minimum merge Improved and greater [Maneuver] back together. Strongly consider striking Combat Expertise. Strongly consider grouping multiple CMs (Why do we need BUll Rush, Reposition and Drag? Just have one 'Move Enemy' CM)

Some enemies are designed to be immune to some Combat Maneuvers, and to a certain degree, tripping a centipede or a spider doesn't really make sense, but the problem at the moment is that combat maneuvers require so much investment that when you come up against an enemy that you can't use your investment is, you're second to useless.

Freedom of Movement's "Lol I'm just immune, get wrecked" is ****ing terrible.

The inability to stall flying creatures is incredibly restrictive.

And a lot of Combat maneuvers ask you to give up to much damage (The exceptions being Trip and Grapple, where you can actually break even or exceed damage expectations). IMO movement provoked by a Combat Maneuver should automatically provoke AoOs from others, and with a feat the maneuverer should be able to take the AoO as well.

But mostly, combat maneuvers should have less investment required for competency, so that it's worth picking them up in additonal to another schtick.

[Necromancy]

Well, Tetori is THE grappling archetype. It should be damn good at it.

That said I'm a bit skeptical of encounter breaking. The Tetori can partially shut down one single enemy, but that only really shines in encounters where you outnumber the enemy and then further than that requires an enemy that's unlikely to break the grapple and on that relies on tactics the grapple shuts down.

It's definitely a solid option, but I'm not really sure any of that trumps a spellcaster who can shut down multiple enemies without caveats, or a damage built martial who can just kill the enemy outright.

I could hogtie a gargantuan dragon in a single round per RAW

[Doc_Maynot]

As a person running mundane support/control (Using stuff like Seigebreaker Fighter, Combat Patrol + A trip weapon, Standstill, ANd the new Vanguard Style line and Cut from the Air line) they have been super useful.

[jjcrpntr]

I like the CMB/CMD set up a lot but there are a few things I change.

In general I'm not a fan of stagnant dc's especially in certain cases. So at my table we use CMB/CMD as normal except in things like grapple which is just an opposed check.

As a DM I find that I don't use them all that often, I really should start using them more but as of now my players have only gone against monsters except 1 fight (they are lost in a woods atm) so I don't think it makes a ton of sense for monsters to suddenly start disarming them.

[Azoth]

I have to agree with consolidating the feats again. No point in the increased feat gains of PF when feat chains were made that much longer.

I tend to use them fairly regularly as both a player and DM. Though it is limited mainly to bullrush, dirty trick, and trip as a player. As a DM I use all of them except reposition and drag.

No clue how to fix the issue of investment/reward. Against humanoids with levels it is fairly easy to be good/decent against then with minimum investment. It is usually monsters who have size/Str to spare that give the issue, but at the same time that is somewhat to be expected. One can more easily trip even a trained fighter than they can/should a storm giant.

[Novawurmson]

My players rarely use them, but as a GM tool I find myself using combat maneuvers a lot.

At low levels, they are a nice non-lethal alternative for enemies, especially at high risk low levels where hp and healing ability is low.

This is my experience as well.

Two changes I would make/like to make:

Prerequisites: Why do I need to be able to fight defensively to knock someone on their butt or swat a sword out of their hand?

Size bonuses: Thematic, but throws off the math hard. I'd like to see some easily-accessible way of negating an opponent's bonus in whole or in part.

[Kurald Galain]

I use maneuvers regularly, even on builds that don't specialize in them, and find they add an extra layer of tactics that can be very effective.

Don't focus on all the feats; you don't need three feats to be effective. Use them on flanked, prone, or flat footed targets to increase your accuracy. Use them with reach weapons or mirror image or on an enemy that already made an OA to avoid the OA.

Don't assume that you must have one maneuver that always works on everything; pathfinder doesn't work that way.

[Hogsy]

What would be a good substitute prerequisite for the Improved CM feats that need Combat Expertise? I feel like even a reworked version of it doesn't make it much sense and is a tax in general.

[Kurald Galain]

What would be a good substitute prerequisite for the Improved CM feats that need Combat Expertise? I feel like even a reworked version of it doesn't make it much sense and is a tax in general.

That's a fair point; I never take e.g.improved trip unless it's a bonus feat, simply because combat expertise is pretty useless on is own. I'd say drop the prereq.

[Florian]

That's a fair point; I never take e.g.improved trip unless it's a bonus feat, simply because combat expertise is pretty useless on is own. I'd say drop the prereq.

I´m actually a bit unconvinced at that. The very basic builds profit from having a good CMA. It´s only the overcomplicated builds that have problems with it.

[Doc_Maynot]

What would be a good substitute prerequisite for the Improved CM feats that need Combat Expertise? I feel like even a reworked version of it doesn't make it much sense and is a tax in general.

Dirty fighting, counts as having 13 int, 13 dex, expertise and improved unarmed for feat prerequisites, as well as making no maneuvers provoke if you areally flanking the target. From the Dirty Tactics Handbook.

[upho]

Are combat Maneuvers used regularly at your table?In past games using RAW for combat maneuvers, they were used only by a few PCs who invested heavily in related options in order to use one or (rarely) two maneuvers successfully in most situations during most levels, but naturally more often by eidolons or DM-controlled creatures having significant racial advantages (free action use abilities, great size, Str and melee reach etc).

With the house rules used in my current game (see below), yes, PCs as well as other creatures use them regularly.

1. Bonus Combat Feats All characters gain the following combat feats as bonus feats if/when they fulfill the prerequisites noted here (replacing the original prerequisites of the feats):
Combat Expertise no prerequisites
Deadly Aim Dex 13
Dirty Fighting BAB +1
Martial Power Con 13
Piranha Strike Dex 13
Point-Blank Shot no prerequisites
Power Attack Str 13
Weapon Finesse no prerequisites

2. Shortened Combat Feat Chains A creature who has the first feat in a chain consisting of "X -> Improved X -> Greater X" (such as the Two-Weapon Fighting feat chain) or "Improved X -> Greater X" (such as the Improved Trip chain) gains the following feat(s) in the chain, ie those named "Improved X" and/or "Greater X", as bonus feats as soon as the prerequisites are met.

3. No "Int 13" prerequisites No combat feat has this prerequisite.

4. Minimum Fighter level prerequisites replaced by minimum BAB All combat feats which originally have a minimum fighter level prerequisite replaces that prerequisite with a minimum base attack bonus of equal value (for example Base attack bonus +6 replacing 6th-level fighter in the case of Disruptive). (Note: This is primarily to make the "fighter-only" feats more accessible to the PCs in a game which has a T3 power target, making the fighter class a bit too weak to base a build on.)

5. Improved/Greater Slam Improved/Greater Bull Rush and Improved/Greater Overrun are replaced by the new feat "Improved/Greater Slam", which grants the benefits of both replaced feats and has the following prerequisites: Str 13, base attack bonus +1 / Str 13, Improved Slam, base attack bonus +6.

6. Improved/Greater Entangle Improved/Greater Drag, Improved/Greater Reposition and Improved/Greater Trip are replaced by the new feats "Improved/Greater Entangle", which grant the benefits of the replaced feats and has the following prerequisites: Base attack bonus +1 / Str 13, Improved Entangle, base attack bonus +6.

7. Improved/Greater Sunder merged with Improved/Greater Disarm The benefits (but not the prerequisites) of Improved/Greater Sunder are added to Improved/Greater Disarm.

8. Flying creatures can be tripped Flying creatures are not immune to the trip combat maneuver, but instead of being knocked prone by a successful trip attempt, a flying creature takes a -2 penalty to AC and attack rolls, and its speed is halved for all movement types. These effects remain until the target spends a move action to remove the them, which provokes attacks of opportunity (unless the creature has an ability which allows it to stand up from prone without provoking). This is treated as a trip combat maneuver in all other respects, and it triggers any actions which are normally triggered by a creature falling prone (and is thus compatible with for example the Greater Trip, Wolf Trip or Vicious Stomp feats).

9. Size and Combat Maneuvers A creature which is granted the benefits of a "Greater" combat maneuver feat may choose to disregard the normal size limit of the when using a related combat maneuver. When doing so, the creature takes a cumulative -5 penalty to the CMB check for each size category the target's size is above the normal size limit of the maneuver.

B]10. Freedom of movement and grappling[/B] Creatures affected by freedom of movement can be grappled normally by another creature also affected by freedom of movement, but the creature initiating the grapple takes a -5 penalty to its grapple checks.

Of the five PCs in my current game, three are primarily into melee - a half-giant warder, a tiefling wrathbood (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?442363-Wrathblood-The-Monster-Bloodrager-Archetype-New-and-Improved-Monstrous-Thread!) primalist bloodrager and a hexcrafter magus of a small-sized homebrew race. The warder and the bloodrager are played by very experienced players, while the magus player actually plays her first RPG character ever (she loves it despite not yet understanding her character's very strong mechanics, of course).

The warder's entire fighting style is based on maximized "hit-me" abilities, melee reach, defensive counters and control-boosting combat maneuvers, primarily using bull rush and trip plus a bit of reposition. He basically doesn't care about opting his damage output capacity beyond maybe having a good damaging strike readied for versatility purposes. The scary pouncing damage focused bloodrager has invested in Improved Slam and Charge Through, and finds uses for the free overrun, typically combined with Cornugon Smash, with increasing frequency. The player of the magus has actually been encouraged to not consider investing into combat maneuvers yet, primarily because she has far more than enough complex mechanics to learn already (and her very strong build can often successfully use spells for control or debuff purposes anyways).

The house rules have also enabled me to provide much more varied, difficult and tactically interesting combats, especially against more powerful BBEGs, while simultaneously often reducing the considerable risks of fluke PC kills powerful opponents otherwise often present.


If yes, are they thought to be effective/worthwhile?In past games using RAW, only a few of the combat maneuvers were considered effective/worthwhile outside of extreme niche builds, especially dirty trick and sometimes grapple and trip, but only for rather specialized builds with plenty of synergizing mechanics.

With current house rules, a large majority of them are considered effective/worthwhile, and the choice of using them has become quite a bit more of a situation-dependent decision rather than the almost entirely investment-dependent decision it was in past games. Most importantly, since less investments are required to boost the value of a combat maneuver, more creatures find such investments worthwhile (such as the aforementioned scary pouncing bloodrager using overrun to increase his charge frequency and related investments, the value of being scary and related investments, and his capacity to give some "love" to more than one target during his turn, without reducing his primary strength and combat "job" of dealing massive single target damage).


If not, why not? Are they not effective enough compared to the investment? Do players prefer to deal damage and leave debuff and control to casters? Why?In past games using RAW, there certainly existed builds frequently using combat maneuvers, but they tended to focus hard on one single maneuver (which they basically never used before having at the very least the improved feat) and often ended up binary, thus making the DM job difficult.


In a theoretical homebrew, replacement system, PF2.0, how would you like to see combat maneuvers handled?I've heard quite a few people play in games using these house rules (http://theworldissquare.com/feat-taxes-in-pathfinder/). These are similar to mine, but I would've used them instead of my own had I known about them when starting the game, not only because it would've spared me the extra work but also because I actually think they're a bit better, at least if complemented by the above mentioned rules for tripping flying opponents and using combat maneuvers against opponents above the normal size limit.

I would prefer something along those lines.


In my view, maneuvers can be effective at low levels or with heavy investment, but often that investment would be better spent elsewhere. With archetypes, feats, and items it is possible to make grappling, for example, nearly binary. It either ends an enemy or it is useless against them. Trip has similar issues, with flight-based or leg-less trip immunity making it a tactic that can often not be employed. Sunder and disarm face issues with simply not being worth investing heavily in when many foes cannot be effected by them.I totally agree.


PF uses CMB/CMD. I think the move to a consistent system is good, but scaling and investment seem problematic. There are too many ways to get minor numerical bonuses and you need a lot of them to keep up.I generally agree, but there's at least one noteworthy exception to this: the dueling weapon (http://www.archivesofnethys.com/MagicWeaponsDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Dueling%20(PSFG) ) from Pathfinder Society Field Guide. For the cost of a +1 enhancement, this provides a luck and enhancement bonus totalling three times the weapon's enhancement bonus to all maneuvers performed with the weapon (ie applicable dirty tricks plus disarm, reposition, sunder and trip). Most no-brainer combat maneuver related item in the game for a character who wants to use any or all of the applicable combat maneuvers, without question.


Save based. I know Legend did this and I think I've heard 4e does as well. More unified than 3.5 and makes use of saves, which are already existing and the math of their scaling is pretty well established.I don't think using saves would work well without including significant changes to tons of related options. 4e generally only requires you to hit with a power which has one or more related hit effect (such as "you knock the target prone and may slide the target up to 2 squares to a square adjacent to you"), usually in addition to dealing damage in the case of melee powers. Different powers may target different defense values (AC, Fort,Ref or Will), all of them static in the same manner as AC is in 3.5/PF. Very few monsters are immune to such effects, and being of a larger size doesn't provide a creature with any immunities or bonuses specifically against such effects. The main advantage of the 4e system is IMO the reduced number of die rolls and values to keep track of, plus the greater value of melee hit effects besides damage, enabling more melee build variation and more tactical melee game play. (It's entirely possible to build a very effective melee controller in 4e, and there are several strong synergizing options for melee focused "true tanks", known as "defenders" in 4e.) The downsides are very few and minor in this particular case IMO, though I can understand players having verisimilitude issues with the idea of a medium fighter potentially tripping a gargantuan gelatinous cube just as easily as an equal CR small biped.


Another discussion point: size and how it effects maneuvers? Playablilty verses verisimilitude and how size does and should impact various maneuvers are important parts of the discussion.In general, I prefer rules developed according to the following priority order of goals: 1 playability/fun, 2 variation and balance, and 3 verisimilitude.

[upho]

That's a fair point; I never take e.g.improved trip unless it's a bonus feat, simply because combat expertise is pretty useless on is own. I'd say drop the prereq.Huh? Do you never actually grab for example Greater Trip unless you get both Improved and Greater Trip as bonus feats without having to meet the prereqs? How many classes gives you that? I mean, grabbing Improved Trip but not Greater Trip is unfortunately a waste in most cases, since unless you're playing a magus or similar able to use for example true strike and a full attack in the same turn, you're still going to have to invest heavily in other options simply to make the trip attempt worth the melee attack it replaces in most situations. And I've seen and built plenty of PCs who make those two feats very worthwhile despite not being granted as bonus feats, though they generally do invest heavily in related options (items, melee reach, Vicious Stomp, Wolf Trip etc). Most of them do get Expertise as a bonus feat, usually via a dip into Lore Warden, or they go for Dirty Fighting or a brawler dip if they don't have the Int.

[Jeff the Green]

3.5 had a somewhat fractured system, with different maneuvers having significantly differing mechanics. Some worked better than others, but the fractured mechanic is less player friendly than a more unified mechanic.

I've got to question this. Is it really that problematic? In general a character will use one, maybe two of the maneuvers regularly. At low levels (where you're more likely to find yourself starting off), that's even more true since you lack the feats to do it.

[upho]

As a person running mundane support/control (Using stuff like Seigebreaker Fighter, Combat Patrol + A trip weapon, Standstill, ANd the new Vanguard Style line and Cut from the Air line) they have been super useful.I really like the Siegebreaker for dip purposes, since 2 levels may allow for some hilarious combat maneuver shenanigans otherwise simply impossible.

But I must say that, with the possible exception of Combat Patrol in higher levels (which may be great in some situations for highly control focused builds with great melee reach), Stand Still, the Vanguard Style line etc, are ranging from mediocre to poor investments for most builds in most parties/games IME, even for most fighters. This is primarily because a large majority of the many prereq feats are crap taxes you'd never take only for their listed benefits, but also because the total benefits granted aren't significant enough and the limitations are just too harsh to motivate the high costs.

For example, until you have Vanguard Hustle and the eight(!) prereq feats, all your ally protection mechanics are dependent on the ally being adjacent to you, disregarding not just your proximity to the attacking enemy, but even your natural reach. And when you finally do get Vanguard Hustle, you have to use an entire full-round action in order to add a bab-dependent 5-20 ft. increase to the maximum allowed distance between you and the ally you wish to protect, and only until the start of your next turn. So when enlarged, you won't even match the melee reach of a reach weapon wielding build (who spends his turns making full attacks) until 10th level! And to add insult to injury, these feats synergize rather poorly with investments made into increased melee control by for example stealing AoOs, disregarding your reach, forcing you to use a shield (thus making it impossible for you to wield a weapon increasing the reach of your AoOs if limited to Paizo options), and not gaining anything from your investments into combat maneuvers (such as your trip weapon).
:smallannoyed:

(For examples of defender options which I actually think are worth their costs and have mechanics done right, have a look the warder's Aegis (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder#TOC-Aegis-Ex-), Defensive Focus (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder#TOC-Defensive-Focus-Ex-), Armiger's Mark (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder#TOC-Armiger-s-Mark-Ex-) and Extended Defense (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/classes/warder#TOC-Extended-Defense-Ex-) features, for example the shield-based Iron Tortoise counters Defensive Shell (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/disciplines-and-maneuvers/iron-tortoise-maneuvers#TOC-Defensive-Shell), Burnished Shell (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/disciplines-and-maneuvers/iron-tortoise-maneuvers#TOC-Burnished-Shell) and Iron Defender's Riposte (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/disciplines-and-maneuvers/iron-tortoise-maneuvers#TOC-Iron-Defender-s-Riposte), and say the feats Defensive Expertise (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/feats#TOC-Defensive-Expertise-Combat-), Powerful Mark (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/feats#TOC-Powerful-Mark-Combat-) and maybe Take the Blow (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/path-of-war/feats#TOC-Take-the-Blow-Combat-). None of these options have crap prerequistes or useless bagage dragging them down, and except for Iron Defender's Riposte, all are available before 6th level.)

[upho]

I've got to question this. Is it really that problematic? In general a character will use one, maybe two of the maneuvers regularly. At low levels (where you're more likely to find yourself starting off), that's even more true since you lack the feats to do it.I doubt it changes that much in terms of player friendliness, mostly since any character who simply has a bonus applying to one or a few specific combat maneuvers will still have to keep track of different numbers. But I do think it often improves the DM friendliness of monsters! :smalltongue:

[Kurald Galain]

Huh? Do you never actually grab for example Greater Trip unless you get both Improved and Greater Trip as bonus feats without having to meet the prereqs? How many classes gives you that? I mean, grabbing Improved Trip but not Greater Trip is unfortunately a waste in most cases, since unless you're playing a magus or similar able to use for example true strike and a full attack in the same turn, you're still going to have to invest heavily in other options simply to make the trip attempt worth the melee attack it replaces in most situations.

If I make a build focused on tripping, then yes I would take GT and all its prereqs. However, my point is that even if you don't have a maneuver-focused build, maneuvers are still occasionally worth it. And for such a build, I would not take Combat Exp.

For example, I have a character that often opens combat by walking up to a flat-footed enemy and grabbing their weapon. This doesn't provoke (since they're flat-footed), has decent odds of success (again, flat-footed) and is a pretty good disabler as melee enemies tend not to have a backup weapon. Of course, the character has other options because this is not something you want to try in every combat, but it's hilarious when it works.

[Jeff the Green]

I doubt it changes that much in terms of player friendliness, mostly since any character who simply has a bonus applying to one or a few specific combat maneuvers will still have to keep track of different numbers. But I do think it often improves the DM friendliness of monsters! :smalltongue:

That's more of an argument for including combat maneuver modifiers in monster statblocks, I should think.

[stack]

Lots of good feedback. I have been a bit surprised it hasn't been more negative, given reactions I've seen other times combat maneuvers have come up.

So, are these thoughts generally accurate?
-Combat maneuvers would be more widely used with easier access (reducing feat chain lengths and prerequisites)
-Some maneuvers are of little use and would be better served by combing them
-Aside from size and strength scaling in monsters, CMB/CMD work decently well
-If it were easy to gain decent capability in several maneuvers that would improve the useful and interesting options for martial combatants
-Binary maneuver optimization is undesirable from a system design standpoint


I've got to question this. Is it really that problematic? In general a character will use one, maybe two of the maneuvers regularly. At low levels (where you're more likely to find yourself starting off), that's even more true since you lack the feats to do it. More mechanics are more load on the DM, as has been pointed out. Also simplifying stat blocks, more general feat/spell/item options (improve CMD instead of several bonuses to various checks, etc) is neater.

[Kurald Galain]

-Combat maneuvers would be more widely used with easier access (reducing feat chain lengths and prerequisites)
-Some maneuvers are of little use and would be better served by combing them
-Aside from size and strength scaling in monsters, CMB/CMD work decently well
-If it were easy to gain decent capability in several maneuvers that would improve the useful and interesting options for martial combatants
-Binary maneuver optimization is undesirable from a system design standpoint

Well,


Combat maneuvers would be more widely used if players were more aware of their existence. This can be done by having the GM use them, players will copy.
Some maneuvers are of little use, but they would be better served by improving them. In particular, for reposition/bullrush it should be easier to move an enemy multiple squares, and for sunder the "broken" condition should be more meaningful, and creatures that fly with wings should be affected by tripping.
Aside from size and strength scaling in monsters, CMB/CMD work decently well.
It is in fact easy to gain decent capability in several maneuvers, and most martial combatants can use them out of the box. "Decent" does not mean "optimized".
Binary maneuver optimization is not a term I've heard before.

[Florian]

@stack:

Keep the active/passive divide in mind. Problem with Maneuvers is, they must be equally damaging compared to just dealing raw damage, as this is what ultimately ends encounters.
Right now, the "best" way to use Maneuvers is to use an AoO for it, exemplified with the reach/trip builds for tanking, or certain advanced Dirty Trick builds.

[stack]

Sorry, I use binary to refer to optimizing to the point were you either succeed in the maneuver or the maneuver cannot function. Not a widely used term, my apologies.

The damage issue is a good point. Simply tacking maneuvers in to attacks wild make them flatly superior to just attacking, which would be potentially problematic, bough knock back was a feat in 3.5.

[Necromancy]

Also keep in mind that maneuvers are often made more useful by terrain details. Bull rushing an ogre 10 feet on a flat map isn't very exciting. Bull rushing ogre over the edge of a drop into difficult terrain of poisonous thorn bushes? Fun

Your PCs start fighting along mountain passes and odd terrain features, they'll wish the could take advantage of it

[upho]

Lots of good feedback. I have been a bit surprised it hasn't been more negative, given reactions I've seen other times combat maneuvers have come up.

So, are these thoughts generally accurate?
-Combat maneuvers would be more widely used with easier access (reducing feat chain lengths and prerequisites)
-Some maneuvers are of little use and would be better served by combing them
-Aside from size and strength scaling in monsters, CMB/CMD work decently well
-If it were easy to gain decent capability in several maneuvers that would improve the useful and interesting options for martial combatants
-Binary maneuver optimization is undesirable from a system design standpoint

More mechanics are more load on the DM, as has been pointed out. Also simplifying stat blocks, more general feat/spell/item options (improve CMD instead of several bonuses to various checks, etc) is neater.This fits rather well with my experiences, I think.

Though I don't really have a problem with higher level melee monsters increasingly often being bigger and stronger and therefore having CMD values high enough to make them virtually immune to combat maneuvers by PCs without full BAB and CMB investments, since those PCs have likely invested in other useful combat abilities instead. But I do have a problem with a monster whose size, physical shape or quality makes its CMD, along with any PC investments into an otherwise competitive CMB, completely irrelevant. A level 20 human fighter having made such significant investments into CMB to have trip CMB of +65 should be able to trip a great wyrm red dragon (CMD 64) as well as the freakin' Tarrasque (CMD 66), goddammit!


Combat maneuvers would be more widely used if players were more aware of their existence. This can be done by having the GM use them, players will copy.This seems to be the general case, judging by the many posts I've seen where players seem to ignore them simply because they don't see the tactical value (damage is easy), or believe CMB simply cannot be made competitive in higher levels regardless of size caps (sometimes to the point of even believing a balor's CMD of 54 to be beyond the reach of a 20th level PC).


Some maneuvers are of little use, but they would be better served by improving them. In particular, for reposition/bullrush it should be easier to move an enemy multiple squares, and for sunder the "broken" condition should be more meaningful, and creatures that fly with wings should be affected by tripping.So casters using magic flight (and who still rely on their Fly skill, mind you) should remain immune to trip? If so, why?


Keep the active/passive divide in mind. Problem with Maneuvers is, they must be equally damaging compared to just dealing raw damage, as this is what ultimately ends encounters.
Right now, the "best" way to use Maneuvers is to use an AoO for it, exemplified with the reach/trip builds for tanking, or certain advanced Dirty Trick builds.This. A very important comparison to keep in mind IMO, especially considering how damage oriented most good martial options are.

(If I build a martial that focuses on something other than raw damage, I try to compare the expected results of its combat style with the results of an equally optimized damage focused build. Which usually involves asking the question "Is this build's combat value at least equal to that of a build which typically removes a CR = level monster from the fight on its first turn and on each of its following turns?". With the current RAW, I think such a build can "sort of" be done using only Paizo options, but it's difficult to the point of being almost impossible IME. Changing how combat maneuvers work would do a lot to change this.)