I've been thinking of a way on how to cast a touch spell while grappling someone, as it would feel like a right combat-style for my (tomboyish) sorceress, and it would seem natural to be able to cast a touch spell while you're holding someone in place.
The only option I've come up with so far is casting a touch-spell with both Quicken Spell and Still Spell. But would you personally house-rule that you could on one turn: 1) Keep ahold of someone (Standard action) 2) cast a Still Spell touch-spell (Full-round action). Because if only the verbal component is left, shouldn't I be able to keep ahold of someone at the same time (if I'd succeed in a high DC concentration roll)?
Your opinions please.
HyuGarona wrote: I've been thinking of a way on how to cast a touch spell while grappling someone, as it would feel like a right combat-style for my (tomboyish) sorceress, and it would seem natural to be able to cast a touch spell while you're holding someone in place.
The only option I've come up with so far is casting a touch-spell with both Quicken Spell and Still Spell. But would you personally house-rule that you could on one turn: 1) Keep ahold of someone (Standard action) 2) cast a Still Spell touch-spell (Full-round action). Because if only the verbal component is left, shouldn't I be able to keep ahold of someone at the same time (if I'd succeed in a high DC concentration roll)?
Your opinions please.
"Touch Spells and Holding the Charge: In most cases, if you don't discharge a touch spell on the round you cast it, you can hold the charge (postpone the discharge of the spell) indefinitely. You can make touch attacks round after round until the spell is discharged. If you cast another spell, the touch spell dissipates.
Some touch spells allow you to touch multiple targets as part of the spell. You can't hold the charge of such a spell; you must touch all targets of the spell in the same round that you finish casting the spell.
Discharge: Occasionally a spells lasts for a set duration or until triggered or discharged."
Taken from http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/magic.html
If I was DMing that, I would say that you could charge at the enemy, grapple them, and discharge the spell as you grapple them, but I would raise the DC of the grapple by 1 or 2 points just because now you are multi-tasking. This only applies if the charge is able to be held and discharged later, as the first paragraph says.
Somehow I understood that part so, that it would trigger immediately when I touch someone, but it was probably just my imagination. So I could hold on to the charge, grapple and release. But you'd rule out the possibility of casting touch spells while -in- a grapple situation?
HyuGarona wrote: Somehow I understood that part so, that it would trigger immediately when I touch someone, but it was probably just my imagination. So I could hold on to the charge, grapple and release. But you'd rule out the possibility of casting touch spells while -in- a grapple situation? I suppose you could, but the concentration check would have to be passed, yes. And I would probably make my players take two turns to do it. One to subdue target, and one to cast the spell.
HyuGarona wrote: I've been thinking of a way on how to cast a touch spell while grappling someone, as it would feel like a right combat-style for my (tomboyish) sorceress, and it would seem natural to be able to cast a touch spell while you're holding someone in place.
The only option I've come up with so far is casting a touch-spell with both Quicken Spell and Still Spell. But would you personally house-rule that you could on one turn: 1) Keep ahold of someone (Standard action) 2) cast a Still Spell touch-spell (Full-round action). Because if only the verbal component is left, shouldn't I be able to keep ahold of someone at the same time (if I'd succeed in a high DC concentration roll)?
Your opinions please.
Unfortunately, doesn't work. Action Economy is a b!@ch. I'd say just quicken it.
Now the feat greater grapple makes the "keep a hold" a move action and you could cast a non-stilled spell. 3.5 had a touch attack to grapple, which would work at the initiation of a grapple...
Would I let it work? No. That's a great example of "doing too much". Like a kid with a 5 dollar bill who says "I want that, and that, and this, and that, and this..." And everything is 4.99
Name Violation wrote: Unfortunately, doesn't work. Action Economy is a b!@ch. I'd say just quicken it.
Now the feat greater grapple makes the "keep a hold" a move action and you could cast a non-stilled spell. 3.5 had a touch attack to grapple, which would work at the initiation of a grapple...
Would I let it work? No. That's a great example of "doing too much". Like a kid with a 5 dollar bill who says "I want that, and that, and this, and that, and this..." And everything is 4.99
The greater grapple feat is then pretty much what I'd be looking for, however the somatic component is the stumbling block in this then.
What I was looking for was basically to grapple someone, then while grappling, charge electricity through my body to the target with shocking grasp.
But thanks to both of you!
Create an item that is use-activated or command word activated. (There are arguments that the latter doesn't require a Concentration check.) Then use that while grappled. A good item might be brass knuckles for use-activated...
d20pfsrd.com wrote:
If you touch anything or anyone while holding a charge, even unintentionally, the spell discharges.
No separate action is required. Cast your touch spell, move to grapple.
It's gonna cost you an AoO though. You can get this off in 2 rounds, without AoO, by casting, moving all but 5' to the creature, (next round) 5' step (if they haven't approached), grapple (with Improved Grapple).
Confirming the grapple will be difficult, with the stats usually given to sorcer(ers/esses), but Improved Grapple would help.
Near as i can see the grapple would set it off automatically. The problem is that casting the spell doesn't give you a free opportunity to grapple, so its quicken spell or bust.
Strangely, Pathfinder defines that it is entirely possible to cast spells when grappled (legal so long as one hand is free, DC 10+Opponents CMB+Spell Level concentration check) in lieu of "attempting to break or reverse the grapple" while it does not define how to cast as the grappler. So you could cast in the grapple if someone grapples you. Or you could initiate the grapple and cast on a subsequent round IF the grappled target chooses to become the grappler after succeeding on a grapple check on its turn. The DC would vary a great deal with an opponents CMB, making this either very effective or unlikely.
It would seem to be better to cast the touch spell on a previous round before initiating the grapple. Alternatively, one could houserule that grapplers could follow the same rules as those followed by those grappled.
Would this mean forgoing a grapple check and making the required caster level check with the above listed DC? Or would there have to be a grapple check involved (at the usual -4 for not having two free hands) before casting the spell? The former allows for the grappled to disrupt the casting by factoring their CMB, but i am not sure it explains why the grappled doesn't simply wiggle free. The latter would seem to exceed the action economy (grappling and casting are both standard actions in most cases).
i agree that contact from grappling would discharge the spell, based on the passage Gruuu found. i also agree that quickened, still spells would get around the problem.
In any case it seems that the rules give guidance without clear procedure so some house rules might be in order.
Edit: Greater Grapple allows one to maintain a grapple as a move action, opening up a standard action, as some have pointed out already. i would think that Greater Grapple therefore allows for the normal rules for casting in a grapple as one's standard action, following the move action of maintaining the grapple, as a house rule. The only downside is that even with Greater Grapple, initiating a grapple is a standard action, so casting would happen only on the second round. Does that make any sense?
If you really want to spend the feats then Greater Grapple should let you maintain the grapple as a move action and cast your spell as a standard action. As far as I know the rules say that you'd still need to make a touch attack to harm the enemy with the spell though. You get a touch attack for free as part of casting the spell, so you could potentially hit the enemy with Shocking Grasp every round, just as if you weren't grappling. This could get pretty nasty if you pin the enemy.
Of course you'd be paying a heavy feat tax, and you'd probably be a poor to mediocre grappler, but the image does seem kind of amusing. If you're going to pursue this be sure to get the feat to Intensify your Shocking Grasp up to 10d6.
Another idea if the DM is flexible is to design a spell specifically for causing damage in a grapple. The 3.5 Spell Compendium had a 2nd level spell called Balor's Nimbus which did 6d6 fire damage per round to anybody grappling with you. Changing it to "Electric Nimbus" instead seems simple enough.
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