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Title says it all -- how long can you hold your action in combat?
Thanks!
The 3.0 PHB also had rules for when everyone is delaying. It was something like the person with the worst initiative mod had to stop delaying first.
It's unlikely to come up in practice. The example they gave was a single PC encountering a single elf, in a situation where it wasn't clear if the elf was a friend or an enemy. Both of them delayed to see how the other would act.
Thanks!
Further on this, now that I've had a moment to think about it:
Let's say there are 3 players and we are in combat with an NPC. The initiative order is:
Player A
Me
Player B
NPC
Player C
If I choose to hold my action until Player A is up, can I 'stack' my initiative and effectively go twice, or as near to twice as possible?
Just trying to wrap my head around this concept; sorry if my question is ill worded!
Further on this, now that I've had a moment to think about it:
Let's say there are 3 players and we are in combat with an NPC. The initiative order is:
Player A
Me
Player B
NPC
Player CIf I choose to hold my action until Player A is up, can I 'stack' my initiative and effectively go twice, or as near to twice as possible?
No, because when you ready an action, you reset your initiative to whenever you end up acting. Since your place in the initiative order changes, you don't get to go again right away.
^ Thanks for the clarification!
On a related note, ready action. On your initiative, can you take part of your and ready part? For example, On my turn, I take a move action so I have a clear shot on the spellcaster. Can I then ready my standard action to get a shot if he tries to cast? Suppose you attack as a standard action, could you declare a readied action to trigger a move later in the round? I assume the answer to these questions is no, but It came up last session and i told them I would look it up. When I did, it still seemed vague.
Readying an Action: You can ready a standard action,
a move action, a swift action, or a free action. To do so,
specify the action you will take and the conditions under
which you will take it. Then, anytime before your next
action, you may take the readied action in response to
that condition.
On a related note, ready action. On your initiative, can you take part of your and ready part? For example, On my turn, I take a move action so I have a clear shot on the spellcaster. Can I then ready my standard action to get a shot if he tries to cast? Suppose you attack as a standard action, could you declare a readied action to trigger a move later in the round? I assume the answer to these questions is no, but It came up last session and i told them I would look it up. When I did, it still seemed vague.
Readying an Action: You can ready a standard action,
a move action, a swift action, or a free action. To do so,
specify the action you will take and the conditions under
which you will take it. Then, anytime before your next
action, you may take the readied action in response to
that condition.
Yes to the first, and no the second. You can move and ready an action to attack if a spellcaster starts casting a spell. However, you cannot attack and ready a move action, because readying an action is a standard action. You could however, ready a move action if someone approaches within 5' for example, if you didn't attack or use any other standard action.
Farmerbob posted:
Yes to the first, and no the second. You can move and ready an action to attack if a spellcaster starts casting a spell. However, you cannot attack and ready a move action, because readying an action is a standard action. You could however, ready a move action if someone approaches within 5' for example, if you didn't attack or use any other standard action.
Then this seems confusing to me. Readying is a standard action. If you take a move action, then use a standard action to ready an action, How can you take another one as an attack? Or is it because, regardless of the actual action, it counts as a standard action?
Farmerbob posted:
Yes to the first, and no the second. You can move and ready an action to attack if a spellcaster starts casting a spell. However, you cannot attack and ready a move action, because readying an action is a standard action. You could however, ready a move action if someone approaches within 5' for example, if you didn't attack or use any other standard action.Then this seems confusing to me. Readying is a standard action. If you take a move action, then use a standard action to ready an action, How can you take another one as an attack? Or is it because, regardless of the actual action, it counts as a standard action?
You are 'readying' that standard action. You don't have to have a standard action left to take the action, you just have to expend the standard action to ready the action. Notice you can't ready a full round action, you can only ready an action that takes one standard action or less. So you can't ready to do a full attack, you can only ready to attack.
Basically, you are expending the standard action before you actually take it, but you are keeping the option of not performing the action. So, I do a move action, then ready an attack action as I cry out 'Surrender' to the rogue breaking into my house. If he drops to the ground and surrenders, I retain the right to not execute my attack action. If he moves, I retain the right to shove my sword through his gizzard.
Then this seems confusing to me. Readying is a standard action. If you take a move action, then use a standard action to ready an action, How can you take another one as an attack? Or is it because, regardless of the actual action, it counts as a standard action?
Readying is a standard action, but it is a special type of action. When the readied action is triggered, it allows you to perform the standard, move, swift, or free action that you had readied. You can still take your normal move action before declaring your readied action if you wish. It's like a limited form of delay (you only get one action), except it is triggered by something and can interrupt others.
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Title says it all -- how long can you hold your action in combat?By RAW 1 round maximum. At which point you would have lost your action for the previous round and be back to your original init in the new round.
That depends on if he is delaying or readying. If he is delaying an action when it rolls around to his initiative again he would be able to choose to continue delaying as long as he desires. Technically I guess that counts as delaying one round and then doing so again, but since there's literally nothing stoping him from just redoing the same over again its effectively the same as holding his action indefinitely.