I find it utterly ridiculous when I see so many threads about how the coup de gras was used in combat either by the GM or by players. I admit it could realistically be used in certain situations, but for a general combat involving 5 pcs vs more than 2 enemies there is no way.
Most combats in Pathfinder wouldn't play out like a movie where there is time to watch the foe fall, make a comment and search for the secret key before someone else rises to take his play, but rather like a real life street fight. If someone goes down for the count the attacker almost always looks for danger around him or finds another target. I think the CdG mechanic is clearly abused as a power gaming tactic.
Now if one fight were happening away from the rest of the action, on a balcony, around a cave corner etc, I could see it happening, but in a real fight? Pshhh...
Some people on here make it sound like they use it all the time. Not only is it anti climactic, but it also feels a little sleazy to me.
So I avoid it in almost every situation as an option.
This is just my opinion.
Thanks for reading.
If you don't like coup de grace you could try house ruling that it is just a free crit or perhaps a crit with a x1 higher crit modifier (x3 for swords, x4 for axes, etc). That said, if you knew that enemies could be healed from dying back up to dangerous by their Cleric buddy I'd imagine that you might take a moment to slice a throat or two if you weren't being otherwise threatened at the time (no AoO). Some GMs will go the extra mile to CdG PCs even when it is a bad tactical decision, but unless you're dealing with summoned demons and other bloodthirsty psychopaths that's probably going a little overboard (of course some folks like going overboard)
If/when you want to make sure someone doesn't get back up.
Coup de Grace is a prime option. If I'm not going to provoke an AoO, and I can make sure that the opponent won't be healed/wake up/return to the fight in some other way, I'll make sure to do so.
And I would expect any DM to do the same thing to a fallen PC (and if not Coup De Grace, at least an attack on my unconscious corpse)
Very Respectfully,
--Bacon
To me, it largely depends on the situation and who would be performing a CdG.
It's not even whether or not it is a tactically optimal choice; most combatants I run will make decisions based on their personality and what they perceive as a threat.
A typical brigand, throne room guard or the like is unlikely to waste time killing an already helpless opponent if combat is still going on.
A hungry animal that has downed its prey is likely to be going for a CdG, even if its packmates could use some help.
If faced by other immediate threats or distractions, it is probably going to react to those instead.
And a demon who happens to have someone's life at its mercy... might just casually 5-ft-step out of your reach, give you a sh!t-eating grin and CdG the one it knows you care for before your very eyes.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
And a demon who happens to have someone's life at its mercy... might just casually 5-ft-step out of your reach, give you a sh!t-eating grin and CdG the one it knows you care for before your very eyes.
One of the best villains ever was a Half-Ogre/Half Orc that managed to drop one of our party members. Everybody else was one-on-one with the wizard in the back...
The guy just squitched the fallen ranger's head with his club (a regular hit would have killed the ranger anyway) and then sauntered over to join the fight with the survivors.
Very Respectfully,
--Bacon
One of the best villains ever was a Half-Ogre/Half Orc that managed to drop one of our party members. Everybody else was one-on-one with the wizard in the back...
The guy just squitched the fallen ranger's head with his club (a regular hit would have killed the ranger anyway) and then sauntered over to join the fight with the survivors.
*laughs* Like i said, I have no problems with CdG if it fits the situation.
However, if the GM starts using CdG right and left, because 'it's the optimal choice', or (even better) 'Hell, I don't care about drawing an AoO, this monster won't be needed after this encounter anyway'... we have entered a style of play that is incompatible to mine.
Full round action that provokes attacks of opportunity vs an already helpless opponent, or keep on fighting until all threats are dealt with.. I can't believe anyone'd choose the coup de grace in the middle of combat.
Because that opponent won't be helpless next round because of Clerics... or Colorspray.
In short, the threat is not yet 'dealt with,' so why wait until the opponent is not helpless to deal with him?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Didn't any of you watch Zombieland?
Rule #2: always remember to double tap.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
It actually did, and still does, occur in real fights. The idea of pulling it in the middle of battle isn't just to kill; it's to shock and demoralize. That's why it was, in history, typically done on leaders who fell in combat. And in real life, typically done on someone who appears to be important to the group you're trying to demoralize. Though, these days, the real life use of it tends to be limited to gang warfare.
|
I think it was the first or second book of the Legacy of Fire Adventure path.
There was a Djinn-possessed ex-paladin who was in a group with a badass Gnoll bruiser, and a harpy. According to my GM he can fly and did so quite liberally, (it's of note that before this fight he buffed the last fight to basically force us to nova before an Ogre punched the Dwarf's helmet through his skull.
Once he no longer cared, he had to Harpy friend sing, and against a group of level 3 characters this went poorly. Everyone but myself (1MusketMaster 2 Spellslinger) and a Halfling blindness Healing Oracle failed. The book then told him to go around and CdG the helpless while a swarm of Gnolls forced us to divert our attention. So after 2 people died from full in that single fight we sort of found a new GM.
A CdG is a really nice way to give players a middle finger. Practicality in normal combat is less-than-useful.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm of the opinion that any time someone uses the idea that something in a game would never happen in a "real street fight" there's really little point to listen to anything else they have to say. Thanks for reading.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
^ It's possible that a difference did exist between be heavy armor for cavalry and heavy armor for infantry. In fact, that distinction would have made sense in much the same way it still does: heavier armor is only practical for vehicles (mounts). That said, I'm not a historian, nor so I play one on TV.
CDG is a tactic I'd argue should be used only when appropriate. CDG is tactical, requiring intelligence to understand its benefits and uses. Killing a hapless opponent (who, by definition, could also be disarmed, bound and taken prisoner, or made to surrender, etc.) is South of Neutral and should not be used lightly by Good-aligned beings. That's hows I sees it, anyways.
CDG is actually used on battlefields pretty often. The CDG is simply peforming a telling, lethal blow. For instance, in the age of swords, it would not be uncommon to land one more, usually fatal, blow by stabbing them while they are on the ground, thus ensuring that the enemy was dead. In modern era warfare, the CDG would be the extra shot that is taken on a guy on the ground to make sure he is dead. When your clearing a space, you will often shot one round into the hostile on the ground to ensure he is dead (nothing sucks worse when you move by a guy you think is dead and he actually isn't full dead yet).
^ Good point; my observations are really limited to in-combat CDG. Plus, modern & historical soldiers are both (a) intelligent and trained to use some tactics, and (b) not necessarily Good-aligned (most are probably neutral)... so it may actually be pretty common, IRL, according to my criteria. In a fantasy setting, though, you get a lot of animals, dumb brutes, etc. fighting, and these things lacking human levels of intelligence makes employing tactics like CDG harder to reconcile (of course, in some instances, it's appropriate the , but for other reasons: the example earlier of the troll/ogre/whatever squishing a skull, for instance).
Oh! Of that sure! Something that does not have a certain level of intellectual thinking I would not thing would make a CDG in combat while also maintaining combat awareness. I could see some animals makes a CDG, but that would be like wolf jumping on a helpless target and tearing out their throat and starting eating away at the poor chump. What I would not see is a wolf doing a single bite to CDG then moving on to another target.
Knights had to be winched onto their horses when full plate was a thing. When they were unhorsed (say, by pikemen, or by another charging knight with a lance), it was a bad day for them, which is why footmen were there as well (and wearing lighter armor).Uhhh, I can see why you'd have trouble with "verisimilitude", when your "reality" actually never happened. Combat plate armor (as opposed to ceremonial) weighed somewhere between 35 and 55 pounds, with the weight distributed across the shoulders and body. Henry V of England was documented to leap into his horse's saddle from behind in full plate armor. The French knights at Agincourt drowned in the mud, not because they could not stand up in their armor, but because of the press of the many men behind them struggling to move forward.
Just trying to debunk all of the myths in one post. Common sense would tell you that armor too heavy to stand in would be worse than useless on the battlefield. No one would wear something so heavy... And they didn't!
I blame the English of days past for inventing all this stuff and managing to insert it into the mainstream historical narrative. It's not really Silentman's fault. I too was taught in school about French knights who couldn't get up if they fell down, and it's not like my teachers set out to lie to me. They just had bad material to work with due to the very long half-life propaganda sometimes has.
As for the origins of this particular contamination of the historical record - over the course of research I've come to hold the opinion that much of what constitutes popular knowledge of the Hundred Years War is actually British religion- and class-inspired propaganda invented long after the fact, and it has a lot more to do with considerations of "Protestant work ethic and sturdy lower classes" as opposed to aristocratic arrogant French papists. The later English story of the Hundred Years' War is a story about the Protestant Reformation and about the English class system, not about the actual Hundred Years' War.
Aristocratic French knights who got so wrapped up in expensive armor that they got trapped in the shell and couldn't engage good simple English yeoman soldiers? Sounds a lot like the Protestant attacks on a Catholic Church they regarded as choked in excessive pomp and ritual, aristocratic and out of touch with ordinary people, wrapped up and translated into military metaphors, actually.
Then, as far as I can tell those stories about the Hundred Years' War did indeed start appearing in England after the Reformation. Which makes me think that the whole thing is indeed allegory that was successfully disguised as military history.
Those winch knights flopping around like a bug on its back may have fought in precisely zero historical battles, but you can't let history get in the way of a good piece of propaganda!
Or at least, that's my layman's opinion.
I think the CdG mechanic is clearly abused as a power gaming tactic.
Wait...seriously?
You spend your entire turn, draw AoOs, can only do it conditionally, and it still might not kill the guy, and it's power gaming?
It's a full-round action, and it's cruel (sometimes a necessity of war, but nonetheless cruel). Let players use up their actions if that's what they want. I don't think I've ever played in a game where an enemy NPC runs over to help another enemy NPC with a potion or a Healing check.
Still, this is a good reason to fudge letting players survive: the enemy is more concerned with dropping the PC's than "finishing them off" (usually). It doesn't stop some ghouls in the back of the room from helping themselves to a fresh meal if their cohorts are busy with the rest of the PC's.
Our current group's pretty infamous for the one-two punch of Witch slumber and Inquisitor cdg on big nasty things.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Knights had to be winched onto their horses when full plate was a thing. When they were unhorsed (say, by pikemen, or by another charging knight with a lance), it was a bad day for them, which is why footmen were there as well (and wearing lighter armor).Uhhh, I can see why you'd have trouble with "verisimilitude", when your "reality" actually never happened. Combat plate armor (as opposed to ceremonial) weighed somewhere between 35 and 55 pounds, with the weight distributed across the shoulders and body. Henry V of England was documented to leap into his horse's saddle from behind in full plate armor. The French knights at Agincourt drowned in the mud, not because they could not stand up in their armor, but because of the press of the many men behind them struggling to move forward.
Just trying to debunk all of the myths in one post. Common sense would tell you that armor too heavy to stand in would be worse than useless on the battlefield. No one would wear something so heavy... And they didn't!
Just to chime in, his little bit about "swinging a massive 2-handed weapon" is also off the mark as well. The idea that most two handed weapons were huge 20-60lb monsters is another incorrect generalization with little basis in fact. Swords rarely went over 5lb, and even hammers and maces were almost never the sledges we associate with them now. Which makes a sort of sense when you think about it rationally. No one wants to be the guy on the battlefield with the slow heavy weapon they can't swing or are too slow on the swing with.
Just to chime in, his little bit about "swinging a massive 2-handed weapon" is also off the mark as well. The idea that most two handed weapons were huge 20-60lb monsters is another incorrect generalization with little basis in fact. Swords rarely went over 5lb, and even hammers and maces were almost never the sledges we associate with them now. Which makes a sort of sense when you think about it rationally. No one wants to be the guy on the battlefield with the slow heavy weapon they can't swing or are too slow on the swing with.Knights had to be winched onto their horses when full plate was a thing. When they were unhorsed (say, by pikemen, or by another charging knight with a lance), it was a bad day for them, which is why footmen were there as well (and wearing lighter armor).Uhhh, I can see why you'd have trouble with "verisimilitude", when your "reality" actually never happened. Combat plate armor (as opposed to ceremonial) weighed somewhere between 35 and 55 pounds, with the weight distributed across the shoulders and body. Henry V of England was documented to leap into his horse's saddle from behind in full plate armor. The French knights at Agincourt drowned in the mud, not because they could not stand up in their armor, but because of the press of the many men behind them struggling to move forward.
Just trying to debunk all of the myths in one post. Common sense would tell you that armor too heavy to stand in would be worse than useless on the battlefield. No one would wear something so heavy... And they didn't!
The swords that typically did were ones like the claymore... a sword so friggin' big it made the person wielding it look small and which weighed in at a hefty 5.5 pounds.
I actually run into the sword mistake more often than I do the armor these days. I had six guys all standing around at my FLGS telling me that I was wrong and how William Wallace's sword weighed 60lbs until I dug up some evidence on my laptop.
Yeah. With 60 pounds of material, he could have made a full suit of plate armor...
|
First, a "real-life fight" would not encompass the possibility of a combatant being healed or raised to keep fighting. And "real-life street fights" don't often end with death; otherwise, the killing blow could indeed be considered a Coup.
Second, Coup is a tactic often used if outnumbered, *especially* when the enemy has healing abilities or allies.
Third, Coup is exceedingly dangerous as it provokes and takes a full round. If you're in melee, you turn is more useful focused elsewhere in most circumstances.
Fourth, unless the creature knows the previous blow or spell didn't already kill, a Coup could be considered meta-gaming.
Just think of a Coup as the final blow...
Knights had to be winched onto their horses when full plate was a thing. When they were unhorsed (say, by pikemen, or by another charging knight with a lance), it was a bad day for them, which is why footmen were there as well (and wearing lighter armor).Uhhh, I can see why you'd have trouble with "verisimilitude", when your "reality" actually never happened. Combat plate armor (as opposed to ceremonial) weighed somewhere between 35 and 55 pounds, with the weight distributed across the shoulders and body. Henry V of England was documented to leap into his horse's saddle from behind in full plate armor. The French knights at Agincourt drowned in the mud, not because they could not stand up in their armor, but because of the press of the many men behind them struggling to move forward.
Just trying to debunk all of the myths in one post. Common sense would tell you that armor too heavy to stand in would be worse than useless on the battlefield. No one would wear something so heavy... And they didn't!
I blame the English of days past for inventing all this stuff and managing to insert it into the mainstream historical narrative. It's not really Silentman's fault. I too was taught in school about French knights who couldn't get up if they fell down, and it's not like my teachers set out to lie to me. They just had bad material to work with due to the very long half-life propaganda sometimes has.
As for the origins of this particular contamination of the historical record - over the course of research I've come to hold the opinion that much of what constitutes popular knowledge of the Hundred Years War is actually British religion- and class-inspired propaganda invented long after the fact, and it has a lot more to do with considerations of "Protestant work ethic and sturdy lower classes" as opposed to aristocratic arrogant French papists. The later English story of the Hundred Years' War is a story about the Protestant Reformation and about...
A fact is that the first full harnesses (full plate) were quite cumbersome as the iron they were made from was not that good a quality and you needed thicker plates. That's why knights mainly fought on horseback. Later as armorsmiths learned to make better iron the armors got lighter. And for tournament purposes a jousting tournament harness was created that only featured protection for blows from the front, which is the only location where the knight will get hit in the joust. This was useless in war but for tournaments it rocked, because it was considerably lighter. Full harnesses made from the better iron/steel were much less cumbersome and will allow a knight to litteraly make headroll and get up without too much difficulty.
Agincourt is another nice example as the french knight fought uncoordinated in three (the holy number) seperate batallions attacking seperately after each other (not even bothering to clear the battlefield in between). On top of that was the fact that the english troops were entrenched and made use of bowmen and even though a harness is excellent protection, it is not impervious and horses are easyer to hit.The sword was a weapon used against unarmed adversaries as a sword will not likely penetrate a full harness. Knights used hammers, morningstars and flails against each other. Getting hit by a warhammer several times is not fun even in a full harness, the spikes on a morningstar had a serious chance of piercing the armor and the flail allow you to bypass the shield as the ball at the end of the chain could curve around the side of a shield and hit something behind the shield.
The knights and cavalry units were finally made obsolete by the introduction of the pikemen and the muskets. Dense rows of pikemen would decimate any charge that would be made against them, unless the enemy would be able to flank them (unlikely but possible). And the musket would seriously reduce the effectiveness of armor. Soldiers continued to wear amor, but this was mainly against melee weapons and the occasional arrow.
Oh and about using coup-de-grass during combat situations? Did you ever try to defeat trolls without coup-de-grass or a firebrand weapon, because that's pretty difficult.
Combat plate armor (as opposed to ceremonial) weighed somewhere between 35 and 55 pounds, with the weight distributed across the shoulders and body. Henry V of England was documented to leap into his horse's saddle from behind in full plate armor. The French knights at Agincourt drowned in the mud, not because they could not stand up in their armor, but because of the press of the many men behind them struggling to move forward.
Yes. The idea of knights being unable to get on their horse is just as exaggerated as the effectiveness of the longbow . Recent rain had softened the ground, and the French had a narrow avenue of attack, up hill (not only eliminating the advantage of numbers, but turning it into a disadvantage), so the ground along the attack route was torn up very badly by hundreds of people and horses, and turned into a thick mud that sucked at the legs of the French knights traveling uphill. It was slow, plodding movement, and if you slipped, you likely fell in the mud and suffocated or were trampled by your allies. The real reason for the English victory was the proper use of terrain and tactics by the English, NOT the longbow. The arrowheads on the English arrows were made of a softer, thinner metal than the French breastplates.
Anyway, what he said. Military armor was heavy, but not so heavy that a knight needed a crane to get mounted. Think about it... Where did they keep the cranes when they were hundreds of miles from home, invading enemy territory? Even if they had them (they didn't), what use is an army that can only get ready for war 1 or 2 knights at a time because they had to wait their turn to get mounted?
-I am going to add, that how often do limbs get cut off in game? One of the reasons there is CDG...is that the game is an abstraction. If you cut off a man's legs, he might be screaming on the ground but he isn't going to jump up and keep fighting you...and undead don't really have wounds like normal people anyway.
-CGD is not a good act however, I can see a Paladin never using it.
I see the thread got derailed... I'm partly to blame.
I'm ok with cdg. It is unwise to leave a potential threat behind you as you move forward in combat. It's quicker to cdg than search them to see if they have a potion of healing. Also, helpless doesn't always mean negative hit points. A sleep spell can render someone helpless.
If you are talking about real life: Even a dying person can pull a trigger on a crossbow...