I have a player who can do a quickened Dispel magic. He intends to fight a magic user and would like to counterspell her spells (using his quickened Dispel) and still be able to attack. Is that possible?
PFRPG Core:
The ready action lets you prepare to take an action later,
after your turn is over but before your next one has begun.
Readying is a standard action. It does not provoke an attack of
opportunity (though the action that you ready might do so).
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. The action occurs just before the action
that triggers it. If the triggered action is part of another
character’s activities, you interrupt the other character.
Assuming he is still capable of doing so, he continues
his actions once you complete your readied action. Your
initiative result changes. For the rest of the encounter, your
initiative result is the count on which you took the readied
action, and you act immediately ahead of the character
whose action triggered your readied action.
You can take a 5-foot step as part of your readied action,
but only if you don’t otherwise move any distance during
the round.
Since according to the above Readying is a standard action can he still dispel with his quickened dispel and attack?
What about in the rounds following when he's already set up to go immediately ahead of the caster?
Thank you
no you can not do that, readying in itself takes at least a standard actions, though it is possible to ready a quickened dispel magic, it wont be any better than a normal dispel magic, except that a quickeded spell helps you avoid attacks of oppurtunity.
the round after do not actually change anything, if he wants to counterspell he still has to ready an action to do so.
what he could do is take a move action, cast quickened dispel magic and ready an action to counterspell using a standard action, if quickened dispel magic is all he has I'd allow him to use it as a standard action in that instance.
no you can not do that, readying in itself takes at least a standard actions, though it is possible to ready a quickened dispel magic, it wont be any better than a normal dispel magic, except that a quickeded spell helps you avoid attacks of oppurtunity.
the round after do not actually change anything, if he wants to counterspell he still has to ready an action to do so.
what he could do is take a move action, cast quickened dispel magic and ready an action to counterspell using a standard action, if quickened dispel magic is all he has I'd allow him to use it as a standard action in that instance.
He asks: Could he ready an attack to hit when she casts and cast the dispel magic as a quickened spell at the same time since the attack readied is a standard action and the dispel is quickened ... would it dispel the spell she was casting?
He asks: Could he ready an attack to hit when she casts and cast the dispel magic as a quickened spell at the same time since the attack readied is a standard action and the dispel is quickened ... would it dispel the spell she was casting?
No. You can ready AN action from the list of actions provided. The readied action resets your initiative, but it does not give you carte blanche for actions after performing the (singular) readied action. The readied dispel magic could indeed be used to counterspell the spell being cast, or an attack could cause enough of a distraction to disrupt the casting. You can ready to do one or the other, not both.
It might be possible, however, to dispel and attack in the same 'readied' action if the attack spell were quickened, i.e. nonquickened dispel plus quickened other spell.
Does anyone know if there has been any discussion of using a swift action in conjunction with the triggered 'ready' action?
yea, I wouldn't allow for it.
You can move and quicken before you ready an action, readying an action is just the one action though.
you can cast a quickened spell as a swift action, a swift action can be taken any time you can take a free action.
I would say it depends on what people think about talking while someone is casting a spell. If you can do that then you can cast a quickened dispel while they are casting and not have to even ready it.
I would say it depends on what people think about talking while someone is casting a spell.
Well, my mother always said that was rude.
you can cast a quickened spell as a swift action, a swift action can be taken any time you can take a free action.
I would say it depends on what people think about talking while someone is casting a spell. If you can do that then you can cast a quickened dispel while they are casting and not have to even ready it.
you can't do a swift (quickened) action outside your turn, you need an immediate action for that.
I see your point after reading what an immediate action is but the rules for swift action is
" You can take a swift action anytime you would normally be allowed to take a free action."
I could be wrong, but i thought you could essentially take free actions any time as long as your DM allowed it and you didn't try to do anything ridiculous.
Unless specifically noted however you can not take action when it isn't your turn, not even free actions, unless the are so minor the dm allows it.
I agree it isn't quite clear in the description, it only becomes obvious after reading what a 'free action' and an 'immediate action' is.
It's probably the curse of 3.5 some rules are taken a bit too matter-of-factly by both the paizo staff and gamers, I've missed a few small changes to the way things work till I get slapped on my nose with them.
(also I encounter a rule or two I never realized already existed in 3.5)