Ranged flank?

[Deaxsa]

Does anyone else play with this? Where if a creature is being flanked, everything attacking it gets the appropriate bonuses. The logic being that if it's distracted, it's distracted.

Edit: thanks for all the advice folks (didn't actually know about the bloodstone blade one), but I simply meant to foster discussion and acquire opinions. My group plays with this rule and I was wondering what other people thought of it, no need for me to find a way to do this, it's already being done.

[Venger]

Do you also obviate the penalty for firing into melee?

It's not a bad idea as far as verisimilitude goes, but as far as game balance is concerned, like with fumble houserules, it will disproportionately slam PCs

[Gruftzwerg]

Does anyone else play with this? Where if a creature is being flanked, everything attacking it gets the appropriate bonuses. The logic being that if it's distracted, it's distracted.

the logic behind: imho
The distraction is caused by the assumption that you have a field of view of 180° and thus you have problems when both are at the end of your field of view. It's not a real distraction, more a sensory problem, which worsens your AC against those 2 (or more) who flank you. This explains, why another person, who is standing in your regular field of view (not at the edges), doesn't get the flanking bonus (cause always in your field of view).
A real distraction imho is when you "Aid Another", where you try to look like a threat (while not really attacking) just to distract the enemy a bit to help your ally to hit.

edit:
btw, Bloodstorm Blade can get ranged flank on their own turn (can't give others flank bonus himself). They have the ability to let their ranged attack count as melee (with reach) which opens a lot of more cheese too.
And I think there was another way to get real ranged flank, but can't seem to remember it..

[Dante Daylight]

There is an ACF for the Rangers animal companion (PHB2) that grant exactly this for others for the next attack this round - Distracting Attack.

It would make perfectly sense to gain that flanking bonus when shooting someone in the back, but when you are not playing with the facing rules from Unearthed arcana, per RAW you can't flank aside from melee.

[Deaxsa]

Interesting that more people don't seem to play with this rule. I see what you mean about disproportionately slamming PC's, but I think the comparison to fumble rules is unfair, as it's something you can plan for (and plan around). I dont think we obviate the melee firing penalty, but I think in practice we do, DM hasn't asked about it in forever for the ray mages. I don't think I'm opposed to losing that though, not entirely sure though.

Sensory issue vs distraction seems like rationalisation to me. I'm not denying that there might be an argument there, but i think you should try a different tack, this just seems like the fine art of applied pedantry.

And yeah, I'm aware this isn't raw.

[The_Jette]

We really dug into the rules and figured a kind of loophole that our extreme RAW DM had to concede to. The ranged attacker has flanking, but the melee character doesn't. Because the ranged characted doesn't actually threaten the enemy, his ally doesn't have someone opposite him who threatens the enemy. But, the ranged character absolutely does. We used this to allow the rogue to maneuver into position and get ranged sneak attacks consistently. Our DM hated that...

[Deaxsa]

We really dug into the rules and figured a kind of loophole that our extreme RAW DM had to concede to. The ranged attacker has flanking, but the melee character doesn't. Because the ranged characted doesn't actually threaten the enemy, his ally doesn't have someone opposite him who threatens the enemy. But, the ranged character absolutely does. We used this to allow the rogue to maneuver into position and get ranged sneak attacks consistently. Our DM hated that...

I'm lost, are you saying that he can get sa for free all the time? Or he needs to have a friend near the enemy? Or he needs to be opposite someone else?

[Venger]

We really dug into the rules and figured a kind of loophole that our extreme RAW DM had to concede to. The ranged attacker has flanking, but the melee character doesn't. Because the ranged characted doesn't actually threaten the enemy, his ally doesn't have someone opposite him who threatens the enemy. But, the ranged character absolutely does. We used this to allow the rogue to maneuver into position and get ranged sneak attacks consistently. Our DM hated that...

That's not how the rules work. Unless you're a bloodstorm blade, you can't flank at range. Even if you are, you can't confer that advantage to your friends.

[Gruftzwerg]

That's not how the rules work. Unless you're a bloodstorm blade, you can't flank at range. Even if you are, you can't confer that advantage to your friends.

Agree. Flanking specifies that you need to make a melee attack to profit from it.

[Zanos]

I would think having more people in a melee tarpit would make hitting one of them accurately harder, not easier.

Can't say I've ever used this rule.

[The_Jette]

I'm lost, are you saying that he can get sa for free all the time? Or he needs to have a friend near the enemy? Or he needs to be opposite someone else?

He needed to be opposite somebody. We found a spot in the rules that left out the melee attack and focused on that. Considering that this guy almost ended up banning my non-optimized monk for being too powerful because I got three attacks when I used Flurry of Blows, when we were going up against an enemy that got a base land speed of 90' and 6 natural attacks per round, I felt justified in getting the Rogue a few extra Sneak Attacks.

[Psyren]

the logic behind: imho
The distraction is caused by the assumption that you have a field of view of 180° and thus you have problems when both are at the end of your field of view. It's not a real distraction, more a sensory problem, which worsens your AC against those 2 (or more) who flank you. This explains, why another person, who is standing in your regular field of view (not at the edges), doesn't get the flanking bonus (cause always in your field of view).
A real distraction imho is when you "Aid Another", where you try to look like a threat (while not really attacking) just to distract the enemy a bit to help your ally to hit.

This is correct, and is supported by the fact that All-Around Vision disables flanking. So it's more a sight/blindspot thing than a distraction thing.

[eldskald]

He needed to be opposite somebody. We found a spot in the rules that left out the melee attack and focused on that. Considering that this guy almost ended up banning my non-optimized monk for being too powerful because I got three attacks when I used Flurry of Blows, when we were going up against an enemy that got a base land speed of 90' and 6 natural attacks per round, I felt justified in getting the Rogue a few extra Sneak Attacks.

Me and my playgroup used to do that in our very first game of D&D, but that was because we simply misread flanking rules. We simply didn't saw the rules saying that only melee attackers could benefit from it. So I, as the rogue, tried to get as much advantage from it as I could. The thing is that we also didn't notice that the melee attacker should get the advantage too. If you simply allow ranged attackers to threaten people in their range so that they can benefit from flanking bonuses, melee attackers can simply do a 5ft step to get the enemy between the ranged attacker and them, so they also get flanking bonus. Just the presence of a ranged attacker would allow everyone to get a flanking bonus. The day I notice this, I went to read the rules again and found out ranged attackers cannot get flanking bonuses. I talked to my DM and I had to get into melee to deal my sneak attack damage after that.

Now, what was my experience? I still got outdamaged by the martial classes. Rogues are really bad, and if you want to let them get flanking bonuses with ranged weapons while not giving flanking bonuses to other melee attacks, it's totally fine in my opinion. Only unchained rogue saved the rogues, and they must go melee anyway if they want to deal damage, so it's not a big deal.