| EvilVegan |
Kylien wrote:Joana wrote:Here is Jason Bulmahn on tripping someone while they're prone.Wrong question, already said that I know about that. That is about using the AoO from standing up to knock them prone again, which you can't. This is about tripping someone who is still prone.No, it's the right question. Look at the reason for which you can't trip someone using the AoO from standing up:
The AoO would resolve when they were still prone, and that would have no effect.
It doesn't matter why you're tripping them while they're still prone; what matters for your question is that tripping someone who's already prone would have no effect. Doesn't matter whether it's an AoO from standing up or something else; tripping someone who's already prone has no effect.
I'm going to resurrect this thread to say this: "Specific over general."
A) You can trip someone who is prone, it has no effect because they are already prone; meaning it does not make them more prone and they can then stand up.
B) If you invest multiple feats into the trip line to get Greater Trip and spend an action tripping someone, and you "successfully trip someone" (i.e.: exceed their CMD on a trip attack) then you trigger the specific benefit of Greater Trip, meanwhile the trip attack itself does not cause its own general effect (i.e.: "does not further cause a redundant prone condition").
There is no rule that states you cannot trip a prone target and the creator of the game clearly says you can. Meanwhile, the feat specifies that if you succeed on a trip attack, you trigger attacks of opportunity by succeeding; where "successfully tripping" is defined as exceeding CMD, not "successfully knocking someone prone"; even in a normal trip the attack of opportunity from Greater Trip is triggered after the success of the check, but necessarily before the target gains the prone condition because AoO resolve prior to the triggering action resolution. The fact that vicious stomp is explicitly based on "falling prone" (and would NOT happen in a double-trip situation) supports the fact that the AoO from greater trip is explicitly from the trip success itself, not the prone condition.
Additionally, since "causing the prone condition" is also dependent upon success of the trip check, it cannot be a determining variable of whether a given trip check is considered a success (else it would say "if your trip check exceeds their CMD and they're knocked prone, then they are considered tripped"). Any other effect that might trigger off of a "successful attack" or "successful trip" would occur regardless of whether the prone condition was actually added to the target after the check. For example, an ability that negates or re-rolls a successful attack would clearly trigger before they gain the prone condition. Just as it would also trigger if you "successfully tripped" someone who was prone, unless it specifically says "when someone falls prone". For comparison, if you cast blindness on someone who already has the blind condition and they fail their save, they are treated as having "failed a save", "being targeted by a spell" and whatever else could trigger on this event; except for "gaining the blind condition" or "successfully blinding someone" (distinct from "successfully tripping" in that the condition to compare it to is "successfully knocking someone prone", which are distinct triggers); regardless of whether adding blind to blind "has an effect" in and of itself.
This isn't even that cheese. The attacker just gets to use the underwhelming feat he invested heavily into at the cost of an action that might fail and relies on perfect conditions to be useful. The target can still stand up immediately after getting attacked maybe once or twice by everyone around them who happens to have combat reflexes (another feat investment by multiple players).
There are far better ways to grant bonus attacks that don't require everyone to be perfectly surrounding someone that can reasonably be tripped with every one of them investing in Dex and combat reflexes. Just let the trippers twirl people on their feet (feat?) and give their friends more attacks, because honestly they probably suck otherwise.
Bulman explicitly details this is the way it works if you parse his sentence correctly and put the conditional clauses back in and don't just reduce it to "tripping a prone person has no effect".
"You can use your AoO to trip a creature that is standing up from prone, but it has no effect, since the AoO is resolved before the action is completed, meaning that the creature is still prone. Once the AoO resolves, the creature would stand up normally."
* You can use your AoO to trip.
* "Standing from prone" triggers an AoO.
* As per normal, the AoO is resolved prior to the triggering action.
* A successful trip, in general, only causes prone condition.
* This action occurs before they stand from prone.
* Gaining the prone condition while prone does not do anything, just as gaining the blind condition while blind does not do anything.
* They may now stand from prone normally.
* Therefore, the trip attack has "no effect" even if it succeeds.
At no point does he actually say that "Tripping a prone creature has no effect." as it its own distinct clause; nor does he say "You cannot trip a prone creature." He says that while you can trip a prone creature, they'll just stand up anyway and "since" the trip happens before they actually stand up, the trip has no effect on their ability to do so.
He's not specifying anything new, he's just clarifying the existing rules for attacks of opportunity as written and saying that it sounds to him like it would be a waste of time in general circumstances. He very clearly is putting a lot of conditional terms ("but", "since", "meaning", "once") in this quote to indicate his intent and rationale is based on the fact that it won't really do anything simply because of the order of operations; not because he's changing/clarifying any rules for trip attacks and explicitly detailing a restriction on the effects they might have.