Net Maneuvering feat and AoO


Rules Questions


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I am looking at playing a character with the Net Adept and Net Maneuvering feats.

The first sentence of Net Maneuvering is "In melee, you can use a net to trip or disarm opponents instead of entangling them." What does that mean? This feat requires Net Adept, which makes the net a melee weapon with 10 ft reach. That means I could already use the trip and disarm combat maneuvers within 10 feet. I'm guessing that this sentence is supposed to have some effect. Does it mean that I follow the normal net attack procedure and substitute prone or disarmed for the entangled condition?


No, it cannot mean that you substitute prone or disarmed for entangled. Entangled is not a combat maneuver and using a net this way requires only a ranged touch attack to succeed. Your proposal would allow you to automatically trip or disarm an opponent with a ranged touch attack and no CMB roll. That would be amazingly overpowered.

Further, it says using the net this way gives you a +2 bonus on disarm checks. It doesn't state what that "check" is, but the only check used with Disarm is a Combat Maneuver Check. So clearly the intent is not to circumvent the CMB check.

I agree with you that the sentence should mean something, but it doesn't seem to. You're right, since it's a melee weapon, you could trip or disarm anyone you can reach without needing this feat to do it, and this sentence doesn't change that. It looks like it's just fluff; it's only there to set u the following sentence.


I would think that means that the net gains the Disarm and Trip special features. As far as the net being a melee weapon; it's a thrown ranged weapon normally. This changes it to a melee weapon. That would mean that it no longer grants an attack of opportunity when used. Whether that means it can be used against an adjacent melee target or not seems questionable, and as a GM I would say yes (if you're taking the feats, in this case, I'm inclined to be nicer since nets often aren't used). But the rules of a reach weapon state that you can't use it on an adjacent foe.

Disarm: When you use a disarm weapon, you get a +2
bonus on Combat Maneuver Checks to disarm an enemy.

Trip: You can use a trip weapon to make trip attacks. If
you are tripped during your own trip attempt, you can
drop the weapon to avoid being tripped.


2 people marked this as FAQ candidate.
Bradley Mickle wrote:

I would think that means that the net gains the Disarm and Trip special features. As far as the net being a melee weapon; it's a thrown ranged weapon normally. This changes it to a melee weapon. That would mean that it no longer grants an attack of opportunity when used. Whether that means it can be used against an adjacent melee target or not seems questionable, and as a GM I would say yes (if you're taking the feats, in this case, I'm inclined to be nicer since nets often aren't used). But the rules of a reach weapon state that you can't use it on an adjacent foe.

Disarm: When you use a disarm weapon, you get a +2
bonus on Combat Maneuver Checks to disarm an enemy.

Trip: You can use a trip weapon to make trip attacks. If
you are tripped during your own trip attempt, you can
drop the weapon to avoid being tripped.

Good point. I was thinking of how 4E reach weapons work. I don't think the net would gain the disarm and trip properties, though. That doesn't seem supported by the text (and doesn't actually do much).

To sum up these feats:

Net Adept actually only lets you use your net on nonadjacent creature A without provoking from adjacent creature B. (Plus the folding-related benefits.) Ranged mode would let you provoke and still target an adjacent creature. However! Making it into a melee weapon with reach means you threaten a large area!

Net Maneuvering gives you +2 to disarm checks when using your net. Sentence 2 makes an exception to a rule that doesn't seem to be written anywhere: what is the range of the drag and reposition maneuvers? Must be adjacent to you? Must be within your natural reach? For that matter, does the movement you make during a drag provoke an AoO from the drag target? Does Improved Drag remove this AoO as well as the AoO from the attempt itself?

Net Trickery hard-codes a use of dirty trick that a DM might or might not allow otherwise. Sentence 2 re-treads the implications of Net Adept and adds that you can trip an entangled opponent if you have control over the trailing rope (trailing rope length is not stated). Sentence 3 is straightforward (but would be meaningless without Net Maneuvering, since drag and reposition don't normally have weapons involved).

Note that drag, reposition, trip, and disarm attempts provoke AoOs only from the target of the maneuver, so try to target creatures that can't reach you.


Another note: Remember that once you attack a creature, your net is tangled up until they escape. Normally, you won't be able to do anything aside from control the trailing rope. Net Maneuvering and Net Trickery let you drag, reposition, and trip once your net is tangled.

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