Confused Condition

[Gnomish Kart Bomb]

When attacking nearest creature due to being confused, would the simplest attack be made or the most aggressive/damaging?

as example Both Tanna and Darby are flying from a fly spell. Tanna (a caster with no equiped weapon) is hit with a spell that causes confusion. her confusion roll comes up to attack nearest creature, Darby is the nearest. would she: Attack Darby with the simplest attack (either pulling a weapon and swinging or unarmed, the choice here doesn't matter to this question) or Attack with the most benefit to her by taking a 5 foot step pulling a scroll and dispelling the fly spell?

[InsaneFox]

I would imagine that since the character is merely confused, than she'd simply attack. If a weapon is not drawn, I'd even wager that the character is so confused (at least enough to attack her friends) that she wouldn't have the presence of mind to draw a weapon and simply attack with what she has on hand.

I wouldn't let her preform any type of combat actions that require any kind of thought them. (For example, I'd allow/force the character to use power attack, but wouldn't allow her to fight defensively or use Combat Expertise.)

[Bonzai95]

InsaneFox wrote:

I would imagine that since the character is merely confused, than she'd simply attack. If a weapon is not drawn, I'd even wager that the character is so confused (at least enough to attack her friends) that she wouldn't have the presence of mind to draw a weapon and simply attack with what she has on hand.

I wouldn't let her preform any type of combat actions that require any kind of thought them. (For example, I'd allow/force the character to use power attack, but wouldn't allow her to fight defensively or use Combat Expertise.)

The spell is Confusion is a mind-affecting compulsion.

A player has one of four outcomes determined by die roll, act normal, do nothing, injure self, attack nearest creature.

My take on it is that the compelled character would do to the best of their ability any one of the four actions.

If they are compelled to attack the nearest creature, they would use whatever resources at their disposal to attack.

If they act normally, they are still under the Confusion spell, and would act normally to the best of their ability, not act normally in a confused way.

** edited the post to clear up the confused condition confusion.

[Quandary]

...Yeah, that´s one of the unfortunate wordings in Confusion.
It gives several qualities of being Confused itself, and then gives you a table which has several sub-variants of Confusion. One of which is ´act normally´ - but does that include the general effects of Confusion? Or ´normal´ means not-Confused? It doesn´t explicitly cancel the effects of Confused, and if you were to be targetted by a spell that only affected people with the Confused condition should you suffer it´s effects the round you rolled ´act normal´?
I play it as ´act un-Confused´, but the wording is vague enough to leave it up to your prejudices.

[Krail Stromquism]

this is just an ugly spell. It leaves too many open what ifs.
Better just to house rules it out.

[Gnomish Kart Bomb]

it was decided that the char is only confused as to who the enemy is but can function completely normal after that.....so it appears my cheetah mount and i will be slowly falling 60 feet or so next session...which wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the Zaug + i few high level enemies waiting at the bottom of the shaft....and fun was had by all....

[Treantmonk]

Krail Stromquism wrote:

this is just an ugly spell. It leaves too many open what ifs.

Better just to house rules it out.

Could be worse, could be "freedom of movement"

If I'm the GM, the player gets to choose. The spell doesn't say what kind of attack you make, so they can make a melee attack, an unarmed attack, or something more complex if they wish.

If it's not a PC, then I as the GM pick, probably whatever is the "standard" attack for the creature.

[Lvl 12 Procrastinator]

Krail Stromquism wrote:

this is just an ugly spell. It leaves too many open what ifs.

Better just to house rules it out.

This is the best spell, because it leaves so many what ifs. Nothing like a little chaos at the game table to liven up the action.

I felt constrained by having only four effects to choose from, so I made a custom table for a d20 roll to generate the specific effect. Just making the table is half the fun; having the fighter cling to the ground for dear life because he thinks he has become weightless and might slip away into space is the other half.

And I got rid of "act normally." That's just an open invitation to the players to rationalize taking the best possible course of action, the same action they would have taken if they weren't confused. What kind of condition is that?