NJCommanderX's page

I had the pleasure to meet Rick late last spring and had the honor and privilege to be a regular at his table throughout last summer until the group had to move to another location. Rick was a person of great character and kindness. He immediately made all those at his table feel comfortable. I greatly enjoyed our sessions that Rick GM'ed throughout the summer. He exhibited all the positive qualities that define a stellar GM. He will be sorely missed around the gaming tables of Northern New Jersey, for sure. I hope that his spirit will live through the hearts of all those who had the chance to know him. My deepest condolences to his wife and family and to all his friends and fellow gamers.

I'd like to congratulate New Jersey Venture-Lieutenant Rick Lighthiser for earning his 5th star as a PFS GM.

Rick has dedicated much of his time running games for PFS Gamers in New Jersey and throughout the Northeast at regional game conventions such as Mepacon, The Seelie Court, Dreamation and Dexcon.

A tireless supporter of Pathfinder Society Organized Play, Rick is always willing to support gamers of all ages and experience.

Congrats Rick!

Congratulations Rick !!!

Looking forward to playing along in your games on a regular basis!

Cheers !!!

Hey Scott,

YES, the PDF's are searchable.

I haven't played the Jade Regent, but in the APs I have played they always provide a "bestiary" that covers the special monsters included in the AP as an appendix.I think this is for any creatures not covered in the core books. As Shadowfighter88 said, they shouldn't force you to run out and buy new bestiaries to be able to play the AP.

I want to thank everyone who took the time to post a response to my thread. My initial ruling on this at the table was "No F-ing Way!", although I did give the guy a chance to make his case and spent some time re-reading the appropriate sections of the SRD, to be fair. But as has been mentioned here over and over, it doesn't make sense. To be even MORE fair, and as a test of whether maybe I was not being reasonable, I posted it here to see what the PRPG Community thought, especially after my player continued to berate and bombard me with email arguments ... yes, and Covent characterized my player best. So I think it is safe to say, looking at the responses here that I am being fair and reasonable in my interpretation of the RAW, as they pertain to AoO, and have gone above and beyond to confirm this. You all basically confirmed the intent of the RAW.. but I like the way Kazaan summarized it, including the (strike with rule book) :) and have posted this in our campaign OneNote notebook along with a link to this thread for future reference. Game On!

If anyone is interested in continuing the discussion her is my player's response...
" This means that you are saying that the AoO melee attack is actually a special type of non-substitutable standard action. That's a clear rule but it has a significant additional implication. It also means that you are inactivating another part of the SRD that says you can substitute an AoO melee attack for Combat Maneuvers (which are mostly standard actions). This pretty much proves that an AoO melee attack is a standard action that is substitutable ... obviously. So your rule of non substitution means that we can't use Combat Maneuvers for an AoO either. You can't have your non-substitution rule for AoO melee attacks in play without negating the combat maneuver substitution for AoO rule. Which is a pity -- and is what I meant about taking us down the path of less colorful melee rounds. It means that an AoO can only be used for hitting -- and nothing else. Kind of boring. Unfortunately, you can't (reasonably) permit the standard rule that allows substitution of the AoO melee attack by combat maneuvers because this rule proves that the AoO melee attack is a standard action just like any other melee attack, and therefore can be substituted by move-equivalent actions. If you permit AoO melee attacks to be substitutable as the standard actions that they actually are, then you open the door to the interpretation you seem to fear. Instead of striking their opponents, pretty soon every player character will be taking things out of their pockets whenever their opponents are distracted, oh no! Worse than that, you can't do something in-between ruling wise because then you will have a rule bug. For example, to persist with the position that AoO melee attacks can't be substituted for move equivalent events but then also allow them to substituted by the more complex combat maneuvers would create weird circumstances where I can drag an opponent for half my movement, or pull their pants down, during an AoO but I wouldn't be allowed to pick up a single gold piece from the ground, or take something out of my pocket instead. It's nonsense. The middle ground is a strange place in this case. The strict interpretation (AoO is only for a strike) can be made to work and is internally logical but is boring. The only thing that anyone can ever do in combat when their opponent becomes distracted is to hit them. Really? The way the rules seems to be written are actually pretty balanced for great play. In the event of an AoO, there are many balanced non-attack kind of things that one can do. None of them really change the tide of the battle as much as an outright attack would and all of them add color. I'm not sure what the problem is... your only expressed fear is that somehow one could use an AoO substitution to run away but you wouldn't be able to do anything more than what the movement rules already allow... so what is the problem?

A player of mine suggested that an AoO, being a "single melee attack" is classified as a standard action, and as such can be replaced with any move action. So instead of taking the AoO he could instead move away for the opponent that was trying to grapple him, and effectively move out of range. Actually.. he was playing a game of "knivsies" and really wanted to pick up coins from the table before the opponent grappled him.

Here is his argument:

The rules on the pathfinder srd (http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/combat.html) pretty clearly state that:

1. “An attack of opportunity is a single melee attack” quoted from the Paizo URL listed above

2. A melee attack is a standard action (from Table: Actions in Combat at the same URL)

3. Under Action Types, the rules specifically state that “You can always take a move action in place of a standard action” (from the same URL)

Any thoughts on this ?