Attacks of Opportunity and New Rounds

The way I've always played D&D 3.5 and subsequently Pathfinder, a new round starts at the after all of characters have acted in the previous round. If a character made an AoO without combat reflexes at any time in the round, they couldn't make another one until the next round started.

This week, one of the other players told me that wasn't quite correct. They said that in a given round, if a character took an AoO before their turn, they could take another AoO after their turn within the current round because subjectively for that character, the next round had begun.

Is this correct, and does any one know of a page in the Core Rulebook or SRD that clarifies this?

I think it is the later method as there is no magic buzzer that resets things when the initiative counter reaches zero. I can't find anything in the rules to support this, but it makes more sense to me.

The way I've always played D&D 3.5 and subsequently Pathfinder, a new round starts at the after all of characters have acted in the previous round. If a character made an AoO without combat reflexes at any time in the round, they couldn't make another one until the next round started.

This week, one of the other players told me that wasn't quite correct. They said that in a given round, if a character took an AoO before their turn, they could take another AoO after their turn within the current round because subjectively for that character, the next round had begun.

Is this correct, and does any one know of a page in the Core Rulebook or SRD that clarifies this?

Actually you are right. Your player is mixing rounds with turns. The number of AoOs a character may perform are tied to a round, unlike for example swift actions, which are tied to a character's turn. This is most likely based on the logic that AoOs are reactions to what others make during their actions. This is somewhat uncommon, as most things are tied to a characters turn in a given round, not the round itself.

A round begins when the character with the highest initiaive count takes her actions and ends when the character with the lowest initiative count takes his. This is different from a character's turn. AoOs are "refreshed" at the begining of a new round and not on a characters turn. See page 180 of the Core rulebook to see that AoOs are tied to rounds, not turns. Also, check the description of the feat Combat Reflexes on page 119 for further evidence.

Is this correct, and does any one know of a page in the Core Rulebook or SRD that clarifies this?

I run everything based on the player/ creatures turn as your player suggests but I think you and Gray have the more correct reading of the rules.

Ultimately the difference is trivial. If you are playing with a regular group choose one method and run with it. If you are in organized play I suggest you go with the way you've been playing it as it's the way outlined in the rules.

This week, one of the other players told me that wasn't quite correct. They said that in a given round, if a character took an AoO before their turn, they could take another AoO after their turn within the current round because subjectively for that character, the next round had begun.

Is this correct, and does any one know of a page in the Core Rulebook or SRD that clarifies this?

I believe if you look at immediate actions it assumes the player's reading of the rules, which is also how I've always played it as well as everyone I've come across in playing 3e.

I don't really have time to search for a reference now however.

-James

I believe the player is right. While there is no official reference, I think it is one of those things that is "understood". Obviously not, as this has come up in my game as well.

The best way I can explain it is spells with duration of 1 round.

Example:

Fighter Initiative: 20
Wizard Initiative: 19
A whole bunch of other combatants after.

Fighter takes his actions
Wizard casts daze on the fighter, the fighter is dazed for one round.
Everyone else takes shots at the fighter for the rest of the round.

What your saying is the next round when it is the fighters turn, he isn't dazed anymore. And if you think about it, he wasn't dazed for one round, it was less.

Point is the daze effect would end on the wizards turn, so the fighter would be dazed on his turn in the next round. I think would all agree that is the intended use of the spell.

Once the combat gets going (after the first round), I think of it as a continuous loop. Just like an old boardgame where you lose your next turn. It doesn't matter if you were first to go or last in that "round". The next time it's your turn, you don't get to go.

I am pretty sure Combat Reflexes is meant to be per round on the character's TURN.

Example:

INITIATIVE
Enemy A 22
Enemy B 20
Enemy C 15
Fighter 10
Cleric 9
Enemy D 7
Enemy E 6
Rogue 5
Enemy F 2

The Fighter takes his turn for the round. He has Combat Reflexes, he can make 3 AoO (his Dex is 14). Enemy D, E, and F provoke AoO from the Fighter in the round. He uses up all 3 AoO.

Then, a new round begins, and Enemy A, B, C provoke AoO from the Fighter. He makes another 3 AoO? That doesn't sound right. He just made 6 AoO in a round.

The way we play Combat Reflexes is it resets per turn, otherwise you end up with twice as many AoO.

I am pretty sure Combat Reflexes is meant to be per round on the character's TURN.

Wouldn't your result be the same? You received 3 AoO's in the first round of the example combat and 3 in the second. When the third round comes up you'll get 3 more.

If A,B,C provoke from the fighter he has no attacks for D,E,F. It's still going to be 3 AoO's for the round.

I believe the player is right. While there is no official reference, I think it is one of those things that is "understood". Obviously not, as this has come up in my game as well.

The best way I can explain it is spells with duration of 1 round.

Example:

Fighter Initiative: 20
Wizard Initiative: 19
A whole bunch of other combatants after.

Fighter takes his actions
Wizard casts daze on the fighter, the fighter is dazed for one round.
Everyone else takes shots at the fighter for the rest of the round.

What your saying is the next round when it is the fighters turn, he isn't dazed anymore. And if you think about it, he wasn't dazed for one round, it was less.

Point is the daze effect would end on the wizards turn, so the fighter would be dazed on his turn in the next round. I think would all agree that is the intended use of the spell.

Once the combat gets going (after the first round), I think of it as a continuous loop. Just like an old boardgame where you lose your next turn. It doesn't matter if you were first to go or last in that "round". The next time it's your turn, you don't get to go.

Your example is wrong. If you read carefully the entry on the combat round on page 178 of the Core Rulebook, you will see that you are mixing the term "round" with the term "duration of one round". They are not the same.

AOOs reset on the acting character's turn. Otherwise it would be possible for a character to make 2 AOOs between two of his turns, simply because of where he falls in the initiative order.

It's generally also easier to remember "I've taken an AOO since my last turn" compared to "I've taken an AOO since the last arbitrary reset point in the initiative where we stopped counting low and started counting high again." Especially when you take into account actions like Ready and Delay that change your location in the initiative.

AOOs reset on the acting character's turn. Otherwise it would be possible for a character to make 2 AOOs between two of his turns, simply because of where he falls in the initiative order.

It's generally also easier to remember "I've taken an AOO since my last turn" compared to "I've taken an AOO since the last arbitrary reset point in the initiative where we stopped counting low and started counting high again." Especially when you take into account actions like Ready and Delay that change your location in the initiative.

Thanks. This actually came up for me recently while running. It occurred to me that I never questioned that your take was the way to do things. Someone else was saying "but I already took an AoO this round" and I argued with him that his turn had come and gone so he gets a fresh one. Glad I was right. Chalk one up for the DM!

Cralius the Dark wrote:

I believe the player is right. While there is no official reference, I think it is one of those things that is "understood". Obviously not, as this has come up in my game as well.

The best way I can explain it is spells with duration of 1 round.

Example:

Fighter Initiative: 20
Wizard Initiative: 19
A whole bunch of other combatants after.

Fighter takes his actions
Wizard casts daze on the fighter, the fighter is dazed for one round.
Everyone else takes shots at the fighter for the rest of the round.

What your saying is the next round when it is the fighters turn, he isn't dazed anymore. And if you think about it, he wasn't dazed for one round, it was less.

Point is the daze effect would end on the wizards turn, so the fighter would be dazed on his turn in the next round. I think would all agree that is the intended use of the spell.

Once the combat gets going (after the first round), I think of it as a continuous loop. Just like an old boardgame where you lose your next turn. It doesn't matter if you were first to go or last in that "round". The next time it's your turn, you don't get to go.

Your example is wrong. If you read carefully the entry on the combat round on page 178 of the Core Rulebook, you will see that you are mixing the term "round" with the term "duration of one round". They are not the same.

Huh? That very reference proves what I just said. The last sentence in particular. "Effects that last a certain number of rounds end just before the same initiative count that they began on."

The wizards daze would end on his initiative before he takes his actions. If it didn't work like that, then every spell with a duration is useless unless the wizard goes first in intiative.

If a fighter wants to unlock his weapon and give it to his buddy, it is a full round action. The fighter goes last in initiative (2).

round 1: he starts unlocking it on init 2
round 2: his buddy cant run up to him on init 20 and take the sword. He has to wait until init 2 to get it. For the fighter a round is rnd 1 (init 2) to rnd 2 (init 2).

AOOs reset on the acting character's turn. Otherwise it would be possible for a character to make 2 AOOs between two of his turns, simply because of where he falls in the initiative order.

It's generally also easier to remember "I've taken an AOO since my last turn" compared to "I've taken an AOO since the last arbitrary reset point in the initiative where we stopped counting low and started counting high again." Especially when you take into account actions like Ready and Delay that change your location in the initiative.

Well, I was wrong then. Sorry for my previous posts.

Razz wrote:

I am pretty sure Combat Reflexes is meant to be per round on the character's TURN.

Wouldn't your result be the same? You received 3 AoO's in the first round of the example combat and 3 in the second. When the third round comes up you'll get 3 more.

If A,B,C provoke from the fighter he has no attacks for D,E,F. It's still going to be 3 AoO's for the round.

If A, B, C provokes, yeah, he will have no AoO.

But if D, E, F, provokes, he uses all 3...new round and he has, before his new turn came, another 3 for A, B, and C? That's 6 AoO in one round (there's a difference between a Round of Combat and 1 Round, which has always been defined as from your turn all the way to the point right before your next turn begins).

Same situation but two differing results? Something's wrong.

But, as Sean just stated, it resets on your turn anyway. :P

This is me, pointing at a spoon. No. There is no spoon.

Similarly, there is not "round". Just because you pop to the top of the numerical initiative stack doesn't make it "the next round". Round is a relative term.

Witness a wizard casting a spell with a one round casting time, such a summon spell. If they're at the bottom of your initiative stack they don't get their summon right away (because you shift to the top of the stack and declare a "new round"). Instead, they continue casting throughout everyone else' actions, presenting plenty of time for someone to come up and damage them, forcing a Concentration check. Finally, when one round - relative to the wizard - expires, a.k.a. when it's the wizard's turn again, the spell completes.

Again, when a round ends is entirely relative to the person to whom it matters.

Similarly, there is not "round". Just because you pop to the top of the numerical initiative stack doesn't make it "the next round". Round is a relative term.

Again, when a round ends is entirely relative to the person to whom it matters.

Exactly.

Exactly.

For the sake of my pride, I'm not nearly as illiterate as that post would lead you to believe. While I was typing that I was also on the phone transacting a house purchase. There are obviously words missing and extra letters included as a bonus. My apologies.

This:

Similarly, there is not "round". Just because you pop to the top of the numerical initiative stack doesn't make it "the next round". Round is a relative term.

Doesn't mesh well with this:

5. When everyone has had a turn, the next round begins with the combatant with the highest initiative, and steps 3 and 4 repeat until combat ends.

or this:

Each round's activity begins with the character with the highest initiative result and then proceeds in order. When a character's turn comes up in the initiative sequence, that character performs his entire round's worth of actions. (For exceptions, see Attacks of Opportunity and Special Initiative Actions.)

The rules quite explicitly define what round is and that it has a beginning and an end. This is what Gray was talking about.

My feeling is the game system has evolved over the years contrary to what is expressly defined in the rules.

In the end... pick whichever way works best for your group and run with it.

This:

Doesn't mesh well with this:

Combat Chapter wrote:

5. When everyone has had a turn, the next round begins with the combatant with the highest initiative, and steps 3 and 4 repeat until combat ends.

or this:

Quote:

Each round's activity begins with the character with the highest initiative result and then proceeds in order. When a character's turn comes up in the initiative sequence, that character performs his entire round's worth of actions. (For exceptions, see Attacks of Opportunity and Special Initiative Actions.)

Yeah, passages like those Ogre quoted above were what originally had me thinking my interpretation was more accurate. However, it seems the consensus on the forums favors AoO resetting after a character's action, although it doesn't appear to be explicitly stated as such in the Core rulebook or SRD.

I'm fine playing it this way, I was just curious what others had to say on the matter.

Thanks for all the feedback!

This probly isnt a RAW thing but i always got the impressiont hat Rounds really had no start and end. theres a start of the fight but after that stuff just cycles through in turn order.

Everything with 1 round duration starts and ends on the turn of the person who did the action.

Otherwise the guy who rolled last in turn order would never affect the guy who went irst because it would just end when the 'round' started.

Part of how I handle this from a DM point of view involves index cards. Each card has one of the combatant's info on it. The initial die roll just gives me the order of the deck. From then on I pull the next card in the stack, run that combatants turn, and then put it on bottom. This keeps the combat flowing smoothly, gives you a place to keep notes on effects and such in combat, and even helps for when the initiative may be re-ordered (aka a readied action), where I can just move the card to the new location.

The cards that I use have the following:

Character name (player name)
AC: Hit Points:
Will Save:
Fort save:
Reflex Save:

And for my NPC's I add the skills that may come into effect in combat for that character. It is a little more prep ahead of time, but once you have it, it makes combat move much faster. Also helps to cut down on people being missed in an exciting combat.