Suggested solution?
If you and I are fighting, I can take a 5' step back from you because you can run forward faster than I can run backwards.
At the very least, I think taking a 5' step back should require a combat maneuver check.
It is just like rolling initiative and letting the winning character do all of his movement while the other characters stand still -- letting the first guy walk all the way behind his enemies, getting to flank or grab something they were protecting. It isn't realistic -- ever watch football? Sometimes, you get by, sometimes not, but you never get more than a step or two before people are after you.
So what you're saying is you want more realism in your fantasy RPG, where a man can summon a giant spider to his side from an alternate plane, or a dragon can carry off a fair maiden from the top of a tower. I don't know about you, but if you and I are fighting and a wyvern drops out of the sky, whether or not I can move 5' back is the least of my worries.
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You don't have a facing so there is no backwards and forwards. You are a 5' box, adjacent to another 5' box. During the course of your action your box shifts slightly to another square away from the 5' box your fighting if you haven't taken any other movement with your box.
If your opponent's box has a reach weapon your box would still be in danger, if not then that box has to shift slightly forward after you on it's actions unless it has a feat similar to Step Up.
It's a game, not a real life simulator.
Look at Monopoly, you can't say that you don't have to pay for staying in a hotel on boardwalk just because you wouldn't waste that kind of money in real life and choose to just sleep in your wheelbarrow. (A bit over the top for an example but about the same concept.)
Adding extra things to it wouldn't make it more fun, it'd just add unnecessary complications onto it and screw over spell casters more then any other characters as they tend to need that 5' step much more often then a fighter or thief.
I know, but I don't lose any sleep over screwing spell casters. If they aren't hiding behind a spearman, invisible, or flying already, they deserve to take it from the barbarian.
Adding extra things to it wouldn't make it more fun, it'd just add unnecessary complications onto it and screw over spell casters more then any other characters as they tend to need that 5' step much more often then a fighter or thief.
If your really doing this just to screw over the spellcasters then why not just have guys with bows hiding to shoot arrows at him. Why bother with un necessary rules?
I want my fantasy rpg to be internally consistent. Dragons and magic work a certain way. Just because there is magic, doesn't mean people in that world move in jerky turns, nor does it mean that the regular flow of combat allows raging barbarians to simply stand there while people walk backwards away from them.So what you're saying is you want more realism in your fantasy RPG, where a man can summon a giant spider to his side from an alternate plane, or a dragon can carry off a fair maiden from the top of a tower. I don't know about you, but if you and I are fighting and a wyvern drops out of the sky, whether or not I can move 5' back is the least of my worries.If you and I are fighting, I can take a 5' step back from you because you can run forward faster than I can run backwards.
At the very least, I think taking a 5' step back should require a combat maneuver check.
It is just like rolling initiative and letting the winning character do all of his movement while the other characters stand still -- letting the first guy walk all the way behind his enemies, getting to flank or grab something they were protecting. It isn't realistic -- ever watch football? Sometimes, you get by, sometimes not, but you never get more than a step or two before people are after you.
Right, I understand what you're saying. What I'm saying is that you will always run into trouble when you try to ascribe realism to an RPG, in which all the supposed action takes place in the imaginations of the participants.
Also, the rules are set up in jerky turns to facilitate the easy adjudication of combat. No RPG in history has ever had a realistic approximation for imagined combat, because there are so many things that can and do happen in real life. It's an imaginary game, trying to get as close to equality of actions in combat as possible, I don't think at any point the creators of the games think it's going to replicate real life.
Specifically what you're talking about is this:
If you do something that requires a full round, you can only take a 5-foot step.
Which means that a character is actively engaged in some other type of action, and is trying to maneuver around while doing so. If I'm fighting a barbarian and I step back in reaction to the combat, of course he will immediately step forward, but the game is set up to take place in turns. On his turn he moves forward, and attacks, unless, as mentioned he has Step-Up.
If you want to try and confer more realism into combat get rid of the rules altogether, and just adjudicate combat as realistically as you can based off of what people are saying they want to do. That's what a lot of people refer to as 1st edition rules.
If your really doing this just to screw over the spellcasters then why not just have guys with bows hiding to shoot arrows at him. Why bother with un necessary rules?I know, but I don't lose any sleep over screwing spell casters. If they aren't hiding behind a spearman, invisible, or flying already, they deserve to take it from the barbarian.
Adding extra things to it wouldn't make it more fun, it'd just add unnecessary complications onto it and screw over spell casters more then any other characters as they tend to need that 5' step much more often then a fighter or thief.I don't see why you guys think it is so many extra rules.
Player 1 - "I'm taking a five foot step."
GM - "He tries to step up, give me a Combat Maneuver roll."
Player 2 - "Don't worry about it, I can cover him."
GM - "Ok, what now?"
Pathfinder is all about rules.
We are saying that the rules already work well enough to cover what your complaining about. Want the barbarian to wreck the casters day up give him step up, give them reach weapons, or use archers. Making it a combat maneuver roll is just making players waste feats just so they can stay competitive, whats the point in screwing your players?
EDIT- +1 to mended's post above.
Morgan, most of what's in the game is to help make a simulation. People should be able to intuitively make decisions based on real life, and the rules should back them up. You get a high ground bonus when above someone because everyone knows it is better to swing down on people than swing up at them. It is highly counter intuitive to act like people get to take their full movement, unobstructed by the fast soldiers around them, or that you can simply walk backwards from someone you are fighting.
Full movement is not what you think it is. The 30ft per round is a combat move, not a walk or a jog. An example would be on any FPS like call of duty or counterstrike. That's what you look like when you move 30ft per round.
But back to the original dilemma. A 5ft step is not walking backwards. It's more of a spring back or a shift of the feet. Watch Pirates of the Caribbean when Jack and Will are fighting in the smithy. Or watch Princess Bride when Inigo and Westley duel. Those are good examples of what 5ft steps look like.
Oh, and welcome to turn-based combat. You're always going to run into problems like this.
If you and I are fighting, I can take a 5' step back from you because you can run forward faster than I can run backwards.
At the very least, I think taking a 5' step back should require a combat maneuver check.
As someone pointed out earlier, there's no facing in Pathfinder. How fast you can run forward or backward is irrelevant, because there is no 'forward' or 'backward', just shifting one square in some direction or another. You can describe both combatants side-stepping or twirling round and round during their 5' step, it doesn't matter.
Is an ooze moving "backward" when it makes a 5' step away from a combatant? How do you know? Does it have to make a CMB check? What about xorn? Ettins?
Cranewings I agree with you, but I do not use grids. I have always felt that if you are engaged in melee combat you can not just back off without the enemy letting you. When you are engaged in melee combat you do not have the luxury of backing off whenever you want.
One simple fix is to remove the rule that a 5' step does not provoke an attack of opportunity. If they disengage the enemy gets a free swipe at them.
Fencing is not the baseline for tactical rpgs.
I also like the CMB roll also as an option.
I love the answer "if you don't like a rule get rid of all the rules", If I love cheeseburgers, but do not like pickles; I will take them off, not get a chicken sandwich.
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I've been GM'ing my group through a Star Wars Saga Edition game for the last year-and-a-half. There's no 5' (or 1.5m) step in SWSE and we miss it. We decided to stick with the movement rules as they are (no free step) and it forces combat to be even more stagnant than 3.5e/Pathfinder. I mean "stagnant" in the sense that combatants tend to be less mobile once they're engaged in melee (since a step in considered a normal move and provokes).
A maneuver check would probably be ok, but I generally don't like to add more rolls in the game where they don't already exist in the RAW.
-Skeld
Cranewings I agree with you, but I do not use grids. I have always felt that if you are engaged in melee combat you can not just back off without the enemy letting you. When you are engaged in melee combat you do not have the luxury of backing off whenever you want.
One simple fix is to remove the rule that a 5' step does not provoke an attack of opportunity. If they disengage the enemy gets a free swipe at them.
Fencing is not the baseline for tactical rpgs.
I also like the CMB roll also as an option.
I love the answer "if you don't like a rule get rid of all the rules", If I love cheeseburgers, but do not like pickles; I will take them off, not get a chicken sandwich.
Actually, I'd assume you'd just order your cheeseburger without the pickles... Crane already bought the cheeseburger and forgot to order it without the pickles, and now in order to fix it he's adding more ketchup.
Cranewings I agree with you, but I do not use grids. I have always felt that if you are engaged in melee combat you can not just back off without the enemy letting you. When you are engaged in melee combat you do not have the luxury of backing off whenever you want.
One simple fix is to remove the rule that a 5' step does not provoke an attack of opportunity. If they disengage the enemy gets a free swipe at them.
Fencing is not the baseline for tactical rpgs.
I also like the CMB roll also as an option.
I love the answer "if you don't like a rule get rid of all the rules", If I love cheeseburgers, but do not like pickles; I will take them off, not get a chicken sandwich.
Actually... I'd just assume that you'd order your cheeseburgers without pickles in the first place. Crane already ordered his cheeseburger, forgot to tell them to hold the pickles, and in order to fix it is adding more ketchup (or mustard, or mayonnaise, whatever you prefer).
But not every place is like "Burger King" sometimes you can't have it your way. So instead make the best of a sub-optimal situation and fix the problem yourself.
I've been GM'ing my group through a Star Wars Saga Edition game for the last year-and-a-half. There's no 5' (or 1.5m) step in SWSE and we miss it. We decided to stick with the movement rules as they are (no free step) and it forces combat to be even more stagnant than 3.5e/Pathfinder. I mean "stagnant" in the sense that combatants tend to be less mobile once they're engaged in melee (since a step in considered a normal move and provokes).
A maneuver check would probably be ok, but I generally don't like to add more rolls in the game where they don't already exist in the RAW.
-Skeld
Either you missed something in the rules or my group is imagining something as a collective hallucination with regards to sage... Its designed to be MORE mobile. You can withdraw(and thus not provoke from a specified target) as a move action. You dont need to 5ft step. I dont have my book in front of me at the moment to confirm, but I am pretty confident about this.
-1 to all suggestions. Anything that encourages people to just stand like a lump and hit things is just plain bad. I want MORE moving around on the map, not LESS.
-The Gneech, hater of iterative attacks
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Either you missed something in the rules or my group is imagining something as a collective hallucination with regards to sage... Its designed to be MORE mobile. You can withdraw(and thus not provoke from a specified target) as a move action. You dont need to 5ft step. I dont have my book in front of me at the moment to confirm, but I am pretty confident about this.
I don't think I missed anything. The situation where the lack of a free 1-square step comes into SWSE play is when you have a character, like a Jedi or other melee type, that likes to make multiple melee attacks/round. Those characters can't move at all before, between, or after their attacks without sacrificing the full-round attack action, which they need to make the multiple attacks.
You are right about Withdraw though. It pretty much works the same way in PF, except that in PF, it's a full-round action. In SWSE, you can make an attack, then move away, so that is definitely more mobile. But the lack of a 1-square step in Star Wars penalizes melee characters that take multiple attacks/round. Granted, it's kind of a niche use of the 1-square step, but it can be annoying. For a game that want's (and generally is) more mobile that 3.5e d20, I don't understand why the 1-square step was removed.
Unless I'm just mission something completely.
-Skeld
If you and I are fighting, I can take a 5' step back from you because you can run forward faster than I can run backwards.
At the very least, I think taking a 5' step back should require a combat maneuver check.
As someone pointed out earlier, there's no facing in Pathfinder. How fast you can run forward or backward is irrelevant, because there is no 'forward' or 'backward', just shifting one square in some direction or another. You can describe both combatants side-stepping or twirling round and round during their 5' step, it doesn't matter.
Is an ooze moving "backward" when it makes a 5' step away from a combatant? How do you know? Does it have to make a CMB check? What about xorn? Ettins?
+1
I don't think it's silly at all... for the reasons stated above.
Additionally, a lot of real life fighters (MMA, Boxers, Fencers, etc) are defensive and they are skilled at moving both forwards and backwards, left and right. You see it in boxing matches all the time. There is an exchange of blows then one of the fighters steps back. The other doesn't simply charge forward because tactically that is often a horrible idea. Shifting your momentum forward in a charge or run just adds to the speed and weight of any attack that your opponent has waiting.
Regardless of tactics I've seen people back peddle in fights often faster than their pursuers. I know when I fenced in college I could move backwards faster than most people could backwards.
Either you missed something in the rules or my group is imagining something as a collective hallucination with regards to sage... Its designed to be MORE mobile. You can withdraw(and thus not provoke from a specified target) as a move action. You dont need to 5ft step. I dont have my book in front of me at the moment to confirm, but I am pretty confident about this.I don't think I missed anything. The situation where the lack of a free 1-square step comes into SWSE play is when you have a character, like a Jedi or other melee type, that likes to make multiple melee attacks/round. Those characters can't move at all before, between, or after their attacks without sacrificing the full-round attack action, which they need to make the multiple attacks.
You are right about Withdraw though. It pretty much works the same way in PF, except that in PF, it's a full-round action. In SWSE, you can make an attack, then move away, so that is definitely more mobile. But the lack of a 1-square step in Star Wars penalizes melee characters that take multiple attacks/round. Granted, it's kind of a niche use of the 1-square step, but it can be annoying. For a game that want's (and generally is) more mobile that 3.5e d20, I don't understand why the 1-square step was removed.
Unless I'm just mission something completely.
-Skeld
I think the issue is the game deliberately moves away from more then one attack a round. Double/Triple attack come at huge penalties that you cant really afford in a system where to hit and defense rise at the same speed. It takes a large degree of specialization to make attacking more then once a round worth it. Where as there are lots of abilities/feats/rules that work off the idea of one big hit a round.
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I think the issue is the game deliberately moves away from more then one attack a round.
I think you're right. After 10 years of playing D&D 3e/3.5e, I think the lack of a 1-square step came as somewhat of an unwelcome revelation to my players. Of course, we were 5 or 6 levels into the game when it started to become an issue and we decided not to houserule it because we really don't like changing the rules after kick-off.
Like I said though, for a game that made improvements in the mobility aspect of combat, the lack of a free 1-square step is a little puzzling (it can also get you when you want to aim-aim-shoot).
-Skeld
If you and I are fighting, I can take a 5' step back from you because you can run forward faster than I can run backwards.
At the very least, I think taking a 5' step back should require a combat maneuver check.
As someone pointed out earlier, there's no facing in Pathfinder. How fast you can run forward or backward is irrelevant, because there is no 'forward' or 'backward', just shifting one square in some direction or another. You can describe both combatants side-stepping or twirling round and round during their 5' step, it doesn't matter.
Is an ooze moving "backward" when it makes a 5' step away from a combatant? How do you know? Does it have to make a CMB check? What about xorn? Ettins?
+1
I don't think it's silly at all... for the reasons stated above.
Additionally, a lot of real life fighters (MMA, Boxers, Fencers, etc) are defensive and they are skilled at moving both forwards and backwards, left and right. You see it in boxing matches all the time. There is an exchange of blows then one of the fighters steps back. The other doesn't simply charge forward because tactically that is often a horrible idea. Shifting your momentum forward in a charge or run just adds to the speed and weight of any attack that your opponent has waiting.
Regardless of tactics I've seen people back peddle in fights often faster than their pursuers. I know when I fenced in college I could move backwards faster than most people could backwards.In boxing and MMA, there is no reason to risk anything when someone backs up unless you are winning the mind game. If a feeble wizard was taking a five foot step back so he can turn your brain to jello, I'd bet you would find a way to run forwards faster.
The problem with your example is that I bet you were simply superior to the people you scrambled from, and / or they didn't think they would die if you got back a step.
I'm still allowing the 5' step when you have...
You know I'd have to half agree with you. While I don't think that I'd hesitate to rush at an empty handed wizard I might not be so fast to rush a barbarian who is waving his great sword in my face. While I think I will keep 5 ft steps in my game you might make it situational based on the weapon size and threat range.
The level to which D&D and now Pathfinder simulates combat in a realistic fashion is such an ancient and worn out argument. To me, it is relevant to ask if it is even constructive to argue the point, since it isn't going to change, and for the most part, we'd all be mad if it did.
I can't remember who said it, but long ago a game designer reminded us all that the game was mean to simulate combat, not replicate it. Or whatever.
I've tooled with more mechanisms than I can remember at this point, and I can say confidently that there was something wrong with all of them. And the main reason is always going to be that, because it is a game, everybody gets a turn. As long as their are turns, none of this is ever going to really be realistic. But then again, life isn't fair anyway, which is another way in which turn-based mechanics are unrealistic.
For my part, I can see what the 5-foot-step is meant to represent. It is part of your character being on his toes, thinking quickly, doing all the boxer-like things we do when we're trying to remain ready for incoming blows.
I have no problem with it. However, I will say this: I do think it best simulates a thinking combatant, so, like AoO, I often houserule it out in combat when it comes to skeletons, zombies, certain constructs, etc. Seems to me they lack the brains for using it tactically.
Cranewings:
Why not just make the Step Up feat a general rule of combat? That's how I've always felt it should be anyway. I'm not sure why it was ever introduced as a feat.
Then, when someone 5-foot steps, any opponent engaged may also decide if they want to "keep pace" and 5-foot step too.
So when a fighter is engaged with a barbarian and the barbarian 5-foot steps back, the fighter may not want to step up.
But when the wizard 5-foot steps back to gain some distance to cast a spell, the fighter steps up to threaten.
You might want to come up with a reasonable solution for reach weapons, but that isn't so hard. I'd personally just change reach weapons to threaten adjacent squares in addition to their normal reach (add in a penalty to attack rolls if you think that's too much of a benefit).
I can make your proposed rule more closely match your intent, with alot less fuss.
Casters can not 5ft step to avoid melee.
Period.
All your "CMB/CMD" stuff is just a way of saying "no casters" without saying "no casters". Just say they can't do it and be done with it.
-S
If you and I are fighting, I can take a 5' step back from you because you can run forward faster than I can run backwards.
I don't follow. If two people are fighting in melee they typically aren't running although there are rules for that. They are advancing and retreating(two steps forward and two steps back(we come together because opposites attract.))
The combatant who retreats usually does so to gain some benefit. I see no reason to deny them that. The other combatant can still advance and preform a full attack action. Without the 5' step combat wouldn't have this kind of interaction. In other words it would be less realistic.
This does not mean that a well trained combatant couldn't advance quick enough or lunge far enough to threaten the retreater. There are feats just for these situations. Feats that would be pointless to get if you didn't allow 5' steps.
5' steps for tactual advantage are also important. Taking a 5' step each turn until you get flanking is just important to your skirmishers.
My problem with the 5' step is the withdrawl from contact without repercussion. I can see a 5' step laterally or diagonally to adjust position but still maintain melee contact. To simple allow someone to withdraw from contact with no penalty seems absurd.
The reason a boxer allows a step back is to catch their own breathe. How many flurries have you seen pushed around the ring with a determined attacker preventing the defender from getting a break.
You are welcome Cranewings
Having actually fenced before, I can say that it is entirely reasonable to be able to make a 5 foot step without leaving yourself open. Even when things aren't simply back and forth it is quite reasonable if you are actually threatening them. If you aren't threatening then it might be a little bit trickier. Probably the most realistic would be to allow the attacker a CMB check to see if they can get an attack if the the stepper is not threatening them; although this is flawed when you bring into account reach weapons.
My problem with the 5' step is the withdrawl from contact without repercussion. I can see a 5' step laterally or diagonally to adjust position but still maintain melee contact. To simple allow someone to withdraw from contact with no penalty seems absurd.
The reason a boxer allows a step back is to catch their own breathe. How many flurries have you seen pushed around the ring with a determined attacker preventing the defender from getting a break.
You are welcome Cranewings
I think part of the problem a lot of people are having here is that we're looking at this differently. Crane, and Xyll you're looking at that 5' step as a combatant temporarily removing themselves from combat. Which is not really the case. The 5' step is there to allow combatants to "slide around." Even if two people were "locked up," as the expression goes, they still move their feet. Sometimes they stay "locked up" and move to a corner of the ring together. The 5' step is not meant to be a removal of one combatant from a melee, it is just an indication that they are sliding around. As the GM you would then have whichever combatant they were engaged with 5' step with them on your turn in the initiative. Yeah, it's jerky, and yeah, it "looks" like one combatant is stepping back, and is temporarily out of melee, but "in reality" whatever that means, they aren't.
The Combat Round
Each round represents 6 seconds in the game world; there are 10 rounds in a minute of combat. A round normally allows each character involved in a combat situation to act.
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.)
When the rules refer to a "full round", they usually mean a span of time from a particular initiative count in one round to the same initiative count in the next round. Effects that last a certain number of rounds end just before the same initiative count that they began on.
Bolding and italics are mine.
A round that takes place in combat is NOT any semblance of a real combat situation in real life. It is a sequence of events created by the rules to fairly adjudicate and simulate combat.
I get that you can house rule a lot of things that are broken, but I personally, and it looks like a few others agree, don't think this rule is broken.
If you ask a combatant to make a CMD check before they make a 5' step, you're essentially saying that their character is locked in place until the other combatant let's them leave. I've been in a couple of fights, and I certainly didn't ask the other guy's permission to take a couple of steps here and there to adjust my footing and stance.
Edit: +1 to Karlgamer, Skeld, and +2 to Erik542.
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I've got about 7 pages of house rules, and each one makes the game better than RAW.
Players/GMs always think their houserules make the game better than Raw. Otherwise, they wouldn't bother to make houserules.
-Skeld
Edit: My point is that you guys should play the game the way you want and the way you enjoy. Whether anyone here or on any other board agrees with you is immaterial.
I've got about 7 pages of house rules, and each one makes the game better than RAW.Players/GMs always think their houserules make the game better than Raw. Otherwise, they wouldn't bother to make houserules.
-Skeld
+1
I've got about 7 pages of house rules, and each one makes the game better than RAW.Players/GMs always think their houserules make the game better than Raw. Otherwise, they wouldn't bother to make houserules.
-Skeld
Edit: My point is that you guys should play the game the way you want and the way you enjoy. Whether anyone here or on any other board agrees with you is immaterial.
+2, the number of times I've had to pull house rules out of people asking for advice online, where those house rules ended up completely changing the game. And one got pissy with me for offering bad advice, LOL. She liked her 3rd party uber-fey book and made it RAW in her mind.
I don't see a problem with 5' steps.
They are trying to move out of the way... you can follow up with a 5' step of your own. If you want to keep an opponent in one place on the mat, be my guest and Grapple.
Just a minor point here in comparing a melee attack to a spell cast, both of which take a "standard action."
The melee attack is not intended to be visualized as a single swing of a sword. This used to be well explained in the old DMG and PHB. A single melee attack represents a discrete chunk of an ongoing battle between two melee combatants in an abstract way. The actual attack should be visualized as a series of combat maneuvers where swords and shields clash back and forth, at some point during which a single opening presents itself which the attacker takes advantage of to attempt to deal some damage.
In that sense it's quite reasonable to compare it to quickly mumbling a few words and tossing a bit of arcane flotsam into the air to get a spell off.
The actual attack should be visualized as a series of combat maneuvers where swords and shields clash back and forth, at some point during which a single opening presents itself which the attacker takes advantage of to attempt to deal some damage
Indeed, and hits were not necssarily an actual 'impact', just close enough to wear down the 'luck and vigour' of the target (drop his HP as an abstract number)
Just a minor point here in comparing a melee attack to a spell cast, both of which take a "standard action."
The melee attack is not intended to be visualized as a single swing of a sword. This used to be well explained in the old DMG and PHB. A single melee attack represents a discrete chunk of an ongoing battle between two melee combatants in an abstract way. The actual attack should be visualized as a series of combat maneuvers where swords and shields clash back and forth, at some point during which a single opening presents itself which the attacker takes advantage of to attempt to deal some damage.
In that sense it's quite reasonable to compare it to quickly mumbling a few words and tossing a bit of arcane flotsam into the air to get a spell off.
+1
I haven't brought it up to my players yet, but I'm pretty sure they will be happy. You wouldn't believe how stupid my whole table thought I was being when I explained that there wasn't anyway the light and agile rogue could stop my geezer npc from stepping back and blasting her. The rules are ignorant. I agree with my players.
Again, as I said before, if you have a problem with Pathfinder's rules maybe you should look at another system that doesn't have 5' step rules.
As Karlgamer said, what you're proposing actually makes the combat simulation less realistic.
In addition there's a perfectly legitimate way within the rules to let the agile rogue attack and interrupt the spell--take Step Up. If you engage enough casters that 5' step and fire off a standard action spell sooner or later wisdom will tell you to adjust to meet that tactic. Also, usually PCs aren't working alone. One of their companions should be filling in the gap there by shooting a ranged weapon at the caster while they're "temporarily disengaged."
You could have the 5ft step forward a readied action, changing to your opponents initiative. It could be your one free action that round. You could make it a skill trick, costing 2 skill points and equiring a certain amount of dexterity. I don't like your new rule but if you and some like minded gamers want it, fine, go ahead.