Does Soft Cover stack with Improved Cover?


Rules Questions

Liberty's Edge

I was running a combat where a merrow engaged the characters from the water. The merrow was submerged in the water enough to be granted improved cover (+8 AC, +4 Reflex, +10 Stealth, improved evasion).

Several of the characters engaged the merrow in melee in the more shallow water near the shore; however, the gunslinger sat back and fired from 30' away.

With the other characters standing between the Gunslinger and the merrow, I decided that it made sense that the merrow would be even harder to hit due to soft cover (+4 AC).

Unfortunately, the Gunslinger also did not have Precise Shot so he was penalized with a -4 to hit.

I was not able to find a definitive answer in the rules or in the forums as to whether bonuses from cover are typed or untyped (though opinions seams to lean towards untyped). My decision feels right based on the situation, but I am not sure if it is supported by the rules. Did I adjudicate this correctly?


Stacking: Stacking refers to the act of adding together bonuses or penalties that apply to one particular check or statistic. Generally speaking, most bonuses of the same type do not stack. Instead, only the highest bonus applies. Most penalties do stack, meaning that their values are added together. Penalties and bonuses generally stack with one another, meaning that the penalties might negate or exceed part or all of the bonuses, and vice versa.

Cover, being a bonus to the target's AC, should not stack.

Shadow Lodge

nidho wrote:

Generally speaking, most bonuses of the same type do not stack. Instead, only the highest bonus applies...

Cover, being a bonus to the target's AC, should not stack.

Not quite. "Bonus to AC" isn't a bonus type - "armour bonus" and "deflection bonus" are. If bonuses to AC didn't stack your Ring of Protection or Amulet of Natural Armour would be useless on top of your Full Plate. Cover is an untyped bonus to AC* and there's a rule for that:

Bonus Rules wrote:
Bonuses without a type always stack, unless they are from the same source.

Source

At this point the question comes down to: is the source "cover" or is the source "improved cover" and "soft cover"? If it's the former, no bonuses from cover would stack. If it's the latter, then you have two untyped bonuses from different sources and they should stack. I think there's room for interpretation in the rules here, so you didn't adjudicate it wrong.

From a common sense POV it is going to be harder to hit someone who is standing behind both a tree and another person - the movements of the other person might block potential openings when your target moves out from the other side of the tree. On the other hand, the second piece of cover probably isn't going to make as big a difference since it's partly covering the first piece of cover as well. I'd probably split the difference and grant a +2 soft cover bonus to a target who is already benefiting from a superior form of cover.

* There is no "cover bonus" type and the cover rules don't specify a bonus type, so I'm not sure why someone would argue that cover grants a typed bonus. If anything it could be described as a circumstance bonus, in which case like all circumstance bonuses cover would stack.


Weirdo wrote:
There is no "cover bonus" type and the cover rules don't specify a bonus type

Partial Cover says "its cover bonus is reduced to a +2 to AC..."

Covering Defense (feat) grants a cover bonus to AC.

Touch Attacks says that Incorporeal touch attacks work similarly to normal touch attacks except that they also ignore cover bonuses.

So while the section on Cover doesn't explicitly say it's a cover bonus to AC, it's implied in many other places.


Weirdo wrote:
nidho wrote:

Generally speaking, most bonuses of the same type do not stack. Instead, only the highest bonus applies...

Cover, being a bonus to the target's AC, should not stack.

Not quite. "Bonus to AC" isn't a bonus type - "armour bonus" and "deflection bonus" are.

Just to clarify, blame my english as a third language, I am using the word bonus as opposed to penalty in the context of the text I quoted, where one stacks and the other doesn't.

I never wrote "Bonus to AC" is a type of bonus to AC which is absurd, but I meant "cover" is, or should be. Thanks Grick for pointing out the possibility.
Then rules for bonuses from the same type should apply.

To the OP, I'd like to point something out. The gunslinger character was shooting with a modified roll of -12 due to the improved cover bonus and the shooting into melee penalty.
That is a hefty penalty that would shut down any non dedicated archer if not a dedicated one depending on the level. -4 on top of this is overkill in my opinion.
Would you have ruled the same if that precise class did not target touch AC? I could understand you unconsciously trying to stop this kind of character from always hitting.

Honestly I've not seen a gunslinger in play yet. Not as a player nor as a GM so take what I say with a grain of salt.

Shadow Lodge

nidho's right, +12 to the target's AC and a -4 to hit is brutal. The gunslinger probably should have taken Precise Shot because ranged combat is rough without it, but an effective -16 to attack is a good reason on its own to cut him some slack.

Grick wrote:
Weirdo wrote:
There is no "cover bonus" type and the cover rules don't specify a bonus type

Partial Cover says "its cover bonus is reduced to a +2 to AC..."

Covering Defense (feat) grants a cover bonus to AC.

Touch Attacks says that Incorporeal touch attacks work similarly to normal touch attacks except that they also ignore cover bonuses.

So while the section on Cover doesn't explicitly say it's a cover bonus to AC, it's implied in many other places.

I was not aware of those particular statements on cover. I can now see why there is an argument for "cover" being a bonus type, and I'm certainly not disappointed for it to work that way (my group never stacks cover anyway, it simplifies things). It's a little annoying though that the usage isn't consistent and that it isn't listed in the glossary of bonus types. Something as simple as "is this a typed bonus" should be crystal-clear and explicit in the main description of cover, not spread out in fine print and other parts of the rules...

Thanks for the clarification, though.


So you are suggesting the GM should ignore penalties because the PC did not take precise shot? It seems there are a lot of situations where a Gunslinger can shine. Is it so bad when there are other situations, where he is ineffective?
Sure, archers and gunslingers have to be treated equally and using penalties against one but not against the other is bad. But ignoring ranged PC drawbacks but not melee drawbacks is the same.

Liberty's Edge

nidho wrote:

To the OP, I'd like to point something out. The gunslinger character was shooting with a modified roll of -12 due to the improved cover bonus and the shooting into melee penalty.

That is a hefty penalty that would shut down any non dedicated archer if not a dedicated one depending on the level. -4 on top of this is overkill in my opinion.
Would you have ruled the same if that precise class did not target touch AC? I could understand you unconsciously trying to stop this kind of character from always hitting.

Nope. I have no malice against the player or gunslinger class. I was trying to adjudicate it fairly. When the player had his gunslinger make his first shot, I described the shot as being difficult with the water making the creature hard to hit (+8 AC for improved cover), his allies being between him and his target (+4 AC soft cover), and him having to take care in aiming (-4 To Hit for lack of Precise Shot).

While the situation made the gunslinger's chance of hitting much more difficult, I would not let that affect my decision process. Playing favorites with one player means that you are being unfair with the other players. My goal is to adjudicate all situations fairly.

Grick cited some good examples that make me think that the game designers may have considered 'cover' to be a type, so I may go with that.

The only change I may have made is to go with what Weirdo said, which was to apply the full AC bonus for the Improved Cover and half of the Soft Cover. That sounds like a reasonable assessment.


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since cover is a named bonus (based upon the various places in the rules grick cites) improved cover and soft cover shouldn't stack.

Silver Crusade

So a gunslinger (or archer) with precise shot is trying to shoot someone who has cover, but there is a teammate in between them. Are you saying that cover and soft cover would not stack? Or would it then be considered improved cover?

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