How to effectively provoke AOO


Advice


I am a melee druid who has allies who have picked up Combat Reflexes as a feat. I am wondering what is the best way to provoke AOO from our enemies to get the most value out of that feat. I also have an AC who will be acquiring Combat Reflexes soon.


Broken wing gambit


There's a number of Teamwork Feats that can trigger/give AoO. Does have the requirement that everyone have these same feats to work together.

If you and your party are interested in these type of feats, they do require a bit of research and feat building around (I think, have just started creating a Hunterand doing some research on different builds. One was a AO build I read about.)


You want to provoke AoO from your enemies? Try running past them, or casting ranged touch spells at them while inside their reach.


some of the greater combat manuver featswill provoke AoO


Yeah, if you want the enemies to provoke AoO, Greater Trip works pretty well (they provoke once while falling, and again while standing up) - provided you have a character with high enough CMB to trip enemies, and enemies who are able to be tripped.


I think the original poster meant to get enemies to provoke AoOs from your allies. This includes successfully pulling off Greater Combat Maneuvers (some of them). Tricking them into moving past you is also workable -- if you are invisible, they may not realize you are there, go past you to try to get at an apparent squishy target (which could even be an Illusion), and provoke an AoO from you.

But some effective ways do exist to provoke AoOs from your enemies and turn this to your advantage. The Classic Barbarian (not Unchained Barbarian) Rage Power Come and Get Me is the most obvious example; it doesn't require Combat Reflexes to pick up and use at all, but does seem to require Combat Reflexes to make the best use of (otherwise you will run out of AoOs that you can make). When they make AoOs on you, you get to make AoOs on them, and dish out better than what you got. Note that Skald can also pick up this Rage Power and grant it to the rest of the party, but may not be personally very effective at using it (due to having 3/4 BAB) unless buffed to an extent that might be a challenge even with the Skald's spells and other abilities running (note that the Rage Power itself gives enemies +4 to hit and damage you, so that's a big penalty to overcome -- you really need full BAB and some DR as well as some AC and attack buffs to be effective with it). Similarly, Swashbuckler's Opportune Parry and Riposte Deed will let you use enemies' AoOs against them (they AoO you, which means that you can AoO them), although this doesn't get really good because you can't use Signature Deed to make it cost 0 Panache; on the other hand, at least your enemies don't get +4 to hit and damage you).

If you just want to make enemies waste AoOs on you so that allies that are squishier than you don't have to worry as much about them, if you push your Armor Class (and preferably Damage Reduction, such as Invulnerable Rager Barbarian) and CMD through the roof in a way that isn't visually obvious to your enemies, and then do things that provoke AoOs, this could work. Pay attention to CMD in case they try a Combat Maneuver instead of a normal attack, and watch out for Flanking in case they have Sneak Attack (in which case an AoO that does get through could be very bad news, and note that Invulnerable Rager Barbarian trades out Uncanny Dodge/Improved Uncanny Dodge). Lack of visual obviousness is so that enemies don't just forego their AoOs to save them for an easier target (especially if the enemies are smart enough to guess you might be trying to get them to waste AoOs).

Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder First Edition / Advice / How to effectively provoke AOO All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.