Say you have a situation where a given PC is the only one who can act in the suprise round. Instead of acting, can he delay until the start of the first full round and thereby make use of a move and standard action (or a full-attack action)?
It seems like he should be able to do this based on the wording of Delay in the SRD. Of course, the follow-up question would be: What if the party is setting up an ambush and all PCs (and no enemies) get to act in the suprise round? Can they all delay until the beginning of the first full round?
I don't see why not. They are simply giving up their ability to act in the surprise round in order to insure they go first in the next rounds. A smart move in some circumstances- but maybe not in others.
What if the party is setting up an ambush and all PCs (and no enemies) get to act in the suprise round? Can they all delay until the beginning of the first full round?
Well, the only people I can think of who would want to do that would be Archers with their bows already drawn, but sure...
What if the party is setting up an ambush and all PCs (and no enemies) get to act in the suprise round? Can they all delay until the beginning of the first full round?Well, the only people I can think of who would want to do that would be Archers with their bows already drawn, but sure...
Well - it works both ways of course and enemies could use the same tactic. Surely we could imagine a situation where an ambush is set up where the ambushers are undetected until the prey are within 10ft (using invisibility or some form of total concealment). Then, rather than taking their suprise round, they all delay then 5ft step and can get off a full attack (either multiple natural attacks or iterative attacks). A high level two-weapon fighting rogue could do this to get 4, 5 or more attacks all with sneak attack rather than risk taking only the one attack then losing initiative and have the target no longer be flat-footed.
Of course, as you say, archers are certainly the obvious ones who might benefit if the encounter is at range but I doubt that's quite as dangerous as the above situation.
an ambush is set up where the ambushers are undetected until the prey are within 10ft (using invisibility or some form of total concealment). Then, rather than taking their suprise round, they all delay then 5ft step and can get off a full attack (either multiple natural attacks or iterative attacks). (...Sneak Attack...)
True, I was assuming most ambushes need more movement than that to close, but that would be quite scary indeed :-)
an ambush is set up where the ambushers are undetected until the prey are within 10ft (using invisibility or some form of total concealment). Then, rather than taking their suprise round, they all delay then 5ft step and can get off a full attack (either multiple natural attacks or iterative attacks). (...Sneak Attack...)True, I was assuming most ambushes need more movement than that to close, but that would be quite scary indeed :-)
Well, even if you wanted to extend it to 35ft, you could do the same thing if the rogues in question have bows...
Of course, creatures with multiple natural attacks who are good at hiding could accomplish the same thing. Ropers, for instance, could make all 6 strand attacks if he gets a suprise round to himself and delays. At +10 vs touch (and flat-footed) he'll hit almost all the time and each attack does 1d6 strength damage (DC 25). That could be devastating.
At lower levels, it gives some creatures (animals, typically) greater range to attack prey. A leopard, for instance could get off its 3 attacks + rake from its hiding spot 60ft away.
It seems like he should be able to do this based on the wording of Delay in the SRD.
Hmmmm, are we both reading the same Pathfinder SRD? I am quoting it here, with pertinent parts bolded:
By choosing to delay, you take no action and then act normally on whatever initiative count you decide to act. When you delay, you voluntarily reduce your own initiative result for the rest of the combat. When your new, lower initiative count comes up later in the same round, you can act normally. You can specify this new initiative result or just wait until some time later in the round and act then, thus fixing your new initiative count at that point.
In 3.5, we had both Delay and Refocus.
Delay: Wait until a given initiative later in THIS round. It's pretty clear in the rulebook that you cannot "Delay" into the next round.
Refocus: This was the option the OP is asking about, whether he knew it or not. This let you reset your initiative to a natural 20 next round. You don't get to act this round, but on the next round (and for the rest of the fight) your initiative is set to whatever it would be if you rolled a 20 on your initiative die (add/subtract all your normal initiative modifiers).
That rule went away with Pathfinder (I have no idea why), but my group houseruled it back in. However, Refocus is a Full-round action (I don't remember if this is a houserule or not) so if you cannot take a full-round action (such as during a surprise round) then you cannot Refocus.
Really, if you think about it, everyone who gets a surprise action would just about always just delay until 20 next round in order to double their number of actions - which would almost completely eliminate the use of surprise rounds for any other purpose than that.
Delay: Wait until a given initiative later in THIS round. It's pretty clear in the rulebook that you cannot "Delay" into the next round.
Well, my Pathfinder SRD says:
If you take a delayed action in the next round, before your regular turn comes up, your initiative count rises to that new point in the order of battle, and you do not get your regular action that round.
It's clear that delaying can take you into the next round but my real question was dealing with what sort of action "delaying" entails. As you point out, if it was a full round action, then you couldn't do it in a surprise round but I don't see any wording to that effect.
EDIT: Actually, I think Refocus went away after 3.0 because it was rolled into how delay works with increasing your initiative count.
Really, if you think about it, everyone who gets a surprise action would just about always just delay until 20 next round in order to double their number of actions - which would almost completely eliminate the use of surprise rounds for any other purpose than that.
That's not necessarily true. I roll my encounter initiative before the surprise round starts. If I rolled well, have good initiative modifiers, or am up against slow opponents, why would I delay?
Really, if you think about it, everyone who gets a surprise action would just about always just delay until 20 next round in order to double their number of actions - which would almost completely eliminate the use of surprise rounds for any other purpose than that.That's not necessarily true. I roll my encounter initiative before the surprise round starts. If I rolled well, have good initiative modifiers, or am up against slow opponents, why would I delay?
Exactly. If you act on a surprise round, and then go again high on the initiative count the next round why WOULD you delay. You are only then giving up your free standard on the surprise round.
Really, if you think about it, everyone who gets a surprise action would just about always just delay until 20 next round in order to double their number of actions - which would almost completely eliminate the use of surprise rounds for any other purpose than that.That's not necessarily true. I roll my encounter initiative before the surprise round starts. If I rolled well, have good initiative modifiers, or am up against slow opponents, why would I delay?Exactly. If you act on a surprise round, and then go again high on the initiative count the next round why WOULD you delay. You are only then giving up your free standard on the surprise round.
But if you act in the suprize round and your prey doesn't, but your prey has higher initiative, this could let you get a full attack on them flat footed instead of just the standard action.
The question I have is the "act normally." One could argue the normal action for a suprize round is only a standard action, so your delayed round would only be a standard action. Personally I don't like this though, and would allow the suprizer to delay and get a full round action.
Really, if you think about it, everyone who gets a surprise action would just about always just delay until 20 next round in order to double their number of actions - which would almost completely eliminate the use of surprise rounds for any other purpose than that.That's not necessarily true. I roll my encounter initiative before the surprise round starts. If I rolled well, have good initiative modifiers, or am up against slow opponents, why would I delay?Exactly. If you act on a surprise round, and then go again high on the initiative count the next round why WOULD you delay. You are only then giving up your free standard on the surprise round.
But if you act in the suprize round and your prey doesn't, but your prey has higher initiative, this could let you get a full attack on them flat footed instead of just the standard action.
The question I have is the "act normally." One could argue the normal action for a suprize round is only a standard action, so your delayed round would only be a standard action. Personally I don't like this though, and would allow the suprizer to delay and get a full round action.
The problem with this is that if all the ambushers delay until the next round before acting to try to metagame and get a full round out...what happens is that NEXT round BECOMES the surprise round since action started on that round. No?
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6
|
Yes, they can delay, but they would not get their full-round action until their turn came up in the first full round. Until that point, they are restricted to the actions they had available when they started delaying.
So basically, if you want a full-round action as your first action, you have to skip your turn entirely.
I'm not seeing a whole lot of situations where you'd want to give up your free partial action, just to go first in the 1st round of combat. Basically, if you think you can one-shot your foe with a full attack, AND you roll low on initiative in the surprise round, then I can see someone thinking about it. There are a few others I can think of, but far more often than not, it's more advantageous to act in the surprise round than not. You're already a partial action ahead of the opposition, why give it up in most cases?
Meatrace has it right: if you get a surprise round AND you roll high initiative, why would you want to delay to go first in the 1st round of combat?
If you delay in the surprise round, all that's really happening is that you're forfeiting the ability to have a free action before combat formally begins, to potentially act first in the 1st round of combat.
EDIT: That in my eyes seems to go against the spirit of the game as a whole.
The problem with this is that if all the ambushers delay until the next round before acting to try to metagame and get a full round out...what happens is that NEXT round BECOMES the surprise round since action started on that round. No?
No, because with their l33+ metagame skillz, they realize that just one ambusher needs to "take it for the team" and act in the Surprise round, thereby allowing the rest of them to reap the benefit of exploiting the metagame loophole.
In fact, the ambushers broght along Pheerless Phred, the intern, who's only job is to fire off his puny intern arrow during the surprise round, thus guaranteeing the ambushers get maximum action on their delayed ambush.
I'm not seeing a whole lot of situations where you'd want to give up your free partial action, just to go first in the 1st round of combat. Basically, if you think you can one-shot your foe with a full attack, AND you roll low on initiative in the surprise round, then I can see someone thinking about it. There are a few others I can think of, but far more often than not, it's more advantageous to act in the surprise round than not. You're already a partial action ahead of the opposition, why give it up in most cases?
Meatrace has it right: if you get a surprise round AND you roll high initiative, why would you want to delay to go first in the second round?
I can see plenty of situations.
A dozen kobolds lie hidden in the tall grass, waiting to ambush the adeventurers who unwitting walked into the ambush killzone. The DM gives them the surprise round. The kobolds spring to their feet and hurl their small kobold javelins at the surprised adventurers, scoring a handuful of painful javelin hits. The DM then tells the players to roll initiave.
Then the rules-lawyer-player informs the DM that jumping to their feet was the only action the kobolds got during the surprise round - they cannot rise from prone AND throw their javelins.
So the damage is erased, initiative is rolled, and kobolds roll low. The PCs, seeing a bunch of kobolds spring to their feet with javelins in their hands, rush into battle, cast their sleep spells, and annihilate the kobolds before they even get to throw their javelins.
Had these (now deceased) kobolds simply delayed until the useless surprise round is over, they could have executed their ambush as planned.
Yeah, but couldn't the GM just have them crouching? Spring to their feet doesn't have to be literal. ;)
EDIT: And I know you personally don't roll initiative in the surprise round, but this is an instance where it would clear it up: The GM gives the surprise round to the kobolds. He rolls initiative for them. Based on the result, he could chooses whether or not to delay during the surprise round. If he rolls high, he takes the kobolds' partial actions, trusting that the high initiative will hold, they may get to go first in the 1st round too. If he rolls low for the kobolds, maybe he decides that it is better to get a full action before the PCs, so delays to initiative count 20 in the first round of combat and hopes none of the PCs do better.
I still think this is bad form and delaying should not be allowed in the surprise round. But that is just me.
Say you have a situation where a given PC is the only one who can act in the suprise round. Instead of acting, can he delay until the start of the first full round and thereby make use of a move and standard action (or a full-attack action)?
It seems like he should be able to do this based on the wording of Delay in the SRD. Of course, the follow-up question would be: What if the party is setting up an ambush and all PCs (and no enemies) get to act in the suprise round? Can they all delay until the beginning of the first full round?
Forgive the thread necro (strangely some people get unnerved by adding to previous conversations instead of starting the whole thing over again) but here is how I read the rules on this:
The surprise round includes very specific restrictions on what actions can be taken, including, and limited to: Standard, Move and Free actions: (bold italics mine)
The Surprise Round: If some but not all of the combatants are aware of their opponents, a surprise round happens before regular rounds begin. In initiative order (highest to lowest), combatants who started the battle aware of their opponents each take a standard or move action during the surprise round. You can also take free actions during the surprise round. If no one or everyone is surprised, no surprise round occurs.
Nowhere does it say you can delay in the surprise round. Delaying is explicitly stated as "waiting to see what happens" before you act. How can you act first if you're waiting to see what happens before you act?
So if you get to act during the surprise round, the rules do not allow you to delay. The rules say you can take a standard, move or free action, that's all. The rule is worded this way for very specific reasons, in my opinion.
If the PCs are the ambushers, they get to act once before the normal initiative order takes over - in which a particularly quick foe might outmaneuver them otherwise. If the PCs are the ones being ambushed, it allows a PC who notices the ambush to call out to his friends, move to block the enemy attack, or strike at the hidden ambusher first - if the PCs are being ambushed, "waiting to see what happens" should have quite obvious results! The PC simply does nothing during the Surprise round, and then the normal initiative order takes over.