What is the reach of a colossal sized long spear or whip?

[Mok]

"Double it!" is what you'd say, right? That isn't really the case...

First, the reach entry:

PRD wrote:

Reach Weapons: Glaives, guisarmes, lances, longspears, ranseurs, and whips are reach weapons. A reach weapon is a melee weapon that allows its wielder to strike at targets that aren't adjacent to him. Most reach weapons double the wielder's natural reach, meaning that a typical Small or Medium wielder of such a weapon can attack a creature 10 feet away, but not a creature in an adjacent square. A typical Large character wielding a reach weapon of the appropriate size can attack a creature 15 or 20 feet away, but not adjacent creatures or creatures up to 10 feet away.

The bold is plain as day... however it does say "most" which means that it isn't an axiom of reach.

Next we look at this thread I asked about awhile ago.

James Jacobs states:

James Jacobs wrote:

Game speak for "DOUBLE" doesn't really mean "twice as much." A creature that's Tiny and has a reach of 0 feet who uses a reach weapon would basically go up to the next stage of reach: 5 feet. Something smaller than Tiny would, at the most, go up to Tiny's level of reach—weapons smaller than those wielded by Tiny creatures, therefore, never have reach.

Now if you consult the size and reach chart, you'll see that reach is a series of "steps" rather than "doubling." It just so happens that the steps that we normally use end up doubling the reach, but the principle is steps.

So we have reach steps that go like this:

0 > 5 > 10 > 15 > 20 > 30

The problem is that the chart stops at 30, making an assumption that Colossal creatures aren't going to be big humanoids wielding weapons, but mostly just big beasts.

There are two steps missing here, one for normal reach weapons and one for extended reach weapons, such as the whip.

So I guess the two questions would be:

What is the reach of a colossal sized long spear?

What is the reach of a colossal sized whip?

Is it 40 and then 50? Is it 45 and 60? What should the scaling be?

It would be great to have a developer weigh in, I know it's one of these obscure questions about RAW, but with those two extra numbers the "tool kit" quality of size scaling would be further realized.

[JimmyNids]

Reach weapons double your base reach but you can attack or provoke within your base reach(the 2 main exceptions to this being Whip and Spiked Chain).

The Doubling pointed out by your quote of James Jacobs is wrong. Double = add refers to stacking multipliers, not reach weapons. A rule of reach weapons is that you increase from 0-5' with tiny creatures since you cannot physically double 0. This is the only case in which reach adds, everything else it does in fact double or triple(just look at your quote above from PRD - a lagre creature gains 15-20' reach but loses its 5-10' - thats double, not increasing to the next tier).

A colossal creature with a reach weapon would go from 5-30' reach, to 35-60' reach.. it would be unable to attack anything within 30' of it.

*With a Spiked Chain you threaten and can attack your entire range out from min to max, so a colossal with a Spiked Chain would have an effective reach of 5-60'.

**With a Whip, you TRIPLE your base reach! You may also attack the entire zone. So a colossal Whip would give you a reach of 5-90'. That said, Whips are terrible weapons for colossals - they basically say I can trip anyone within 90' of me but do nothing else. As noted in the weapons description, a Whip deals 0 damage to any creature with an Armor bonus to AC of +1 or more, or a Natural Armor bonus to AC of +3 or more. This means the entire party will take 0 damage from it(even super squishy caster guy). Secondly, you cannot make attacks of opportunity with a whip. This gives the entire party a 90' radius from the creature of "We dance around and you do nothing to us so lets all have a giant party with lots of beer as we laugh at Mr. Colossal I Can't Do Anything Man".

As stated the only reason for a colossal whip RAW would be to trip as your attack actions at up to 90'/18squares away.

EDIT:

Your reach table is as follows

Size: Tiny > Medium > Large > Huge > Gargantuan > Colossal

Base: 0' > 5' > 5-10' > 5-15' > 5-20' > 5-30'

Reach Weapon: 5' > 10' > 15-20' > 20-30' > 25-40' > 35-60'

Spiked Chain: 5' > 5-10' > 5-20' > 5-30' > 5-40' > 5-60'

Whip: 5' > 5-15' > 5-30' > 5-45' > 5-60' > 5-90'

Hope that helps.

[Name Violation]

JimmyNids wrote:

Reach weapons double your base reach but you can attack or provoke within your base reach(the 2 main exceptions to this being Whip and Spiked Chain).

The Doubling pointed out by your quote of James Jacobs is wrong. Double = add refers to stacking multipliers, not reach weapons. A rule of reach weapons is that you increase from 0-5' with tiny creatures since you cannot physically double 0. This is the only case in which reach adds, everything else it does in fact double or triple(just look at your quote above from PRD - a lagre creature gains 15-20' reach but loses its 5-10' - thats double, not increasing to the next tier).

A colossal creature with a reach weapon would go from 5-30' reach, to 35-60' reach.. it would be unable to attack anything within 30' of it.

*With a Spiked Chain you threaten and can attack your entire range out from min to max, so a colossal with a Spiked Chain would have an effective reach of 5-60'.

**With a Whip, you TRIPLE your base reach! You may also attack the entire zone. So a colossal Whip would give you a reach of 5-90'. That said, Whips are terrible weapons for colossals - they basically say I can trip anyone within 90' of me but do nothing else. As noted in the weapons description, a Whip deals 0 damage to any creature with an Armor bonus to AC of +1 or more, or a Natural Armor bonus to AC of +3 or more. This means the entire party will take 0 damage from it(even super squishy caster guy). Secondly, you cannot make attacks of opportunity with a whip. This gives the entire party a 90' radius from the creature of "We dance around and you do nothing to us so lets all have a giant party with lots of beer as we laugh at Mr. Colossal I Can't Do Anything Man".

As stated the only reason for a colossal whip RAW would be to trip as your attack actions at up to 90'/18squares away.

EDIT:

Your reach table is as follows

Size: Tiny > Medium > Large > Huge > Gargantuan > Colossal

Base: 0' > 5' > 5-10' > 5-15' > 5-20' > 5-30'

Reach Weapon: 5' >...

actually spiked chain doesnt have reach in PF

[HaraldKlak]

JimmyNids wrote:

EDIT:

Your reach table is as follows

Size: Tiny > Medium > Large > Huge > Gargantuan > Colossal

Base: 0' > 5' > 5-10' > 5-15' > 5-20' > 5-30'

Reach Weapon: 5' > 10' > 15-20' > 20-30' > 25-40' > 35-60'

Spiked Chain: 5' > 5-10' > 5-20' > 5-30' > 5-40' > 5-60'

Whip: 5' > 5-15' > 5-30' > 5-45' > 5-60' > 5-90'

Hope that helps.

While I fully agree on your elaborate breakdown of reach for different sizes, there is a slight ommission in your reach table: The reach for the tiny whip should be 0-5'.

[JimmyNids]

Was not aware of the change to spiked chain in paizo, thanks.

With regard to reach, every character has reach 0-5'. It makes the charts a little less confusing to omit the 0. 0' reach means you must enter an opponents space to strike at it. 5' reach is you can attack anything up to 5' away, since 0' is less than 5', a character with 5' reach may attack freely at 0-5'.

[Wraithcannon]

So a Huge Whip has a 45 ft reach?

Awesome!

[ChrisO]

JimmyNids wrote:

**With a Whip, you TRIPLE your base reach! You may also attack the entire zone. So a colossal Whip would give you a reach of 5-90'. That said, Whips are terrible weapons for colossals - they basically say I can trip anyone within 90' of me but do nothing else. As noted in the weapons description, a Whip deals 0 damage to any creature with an Armor bonus to AC of +1 or more, or a Natural Armor bonus to AC of +3 or more. This means the entire party will take 0 damage from it(even super squishy caster guy). Secondly, you cannot make attacks of opportunity with a whip.

Hey, now. Not unless that colossal creature is using a Scorpion Whip in one hand and a sword in the other!

Scorpion whips in the hand of a giant humanoid. I think I like that idea...;)