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To use combat expertise/fight defensively you need to make an attack. To parry (as the Duelist PrC feature) you need to make a full attack and choose not to take one of your iterative attacks.
Say you're beset by a spring attacking shadow, but you've managed to get your touch AC high enough that it needs a 20 to hit you (assuming you can fight defensively and use combat expertise), but after every attack it simply moves through a wall.
You've got nothing else to target for a full attack for these bonuses. Nor can you parry.
It is possible to swing at a square in hopes that an invisible creature is there to hit.
1) Can you make a full-round attack at a likely empty square to gain these defensive bonuses.
If 1 is yes, you give up your largest attack to parry the shadow if he hits. Say you have a ghost touch weapon. Parry has you compare attack rolls to see which is greater (before the target rolls his). He had to roll a 20 to hit and does. You roll a 19. Your attack bonus+19 is greater than his+20. But these are attack rolls...
2) Can you parry a natural 20 on an attack roll with anything less than a natural 20 of your own?
My instincts say yes to both. For 1, I can't see people being allowed to randomly attack squares hunting an invisible creature and not letting them attack squares. For 2, you compare the results of attack rolls, not to AC, but to each other. I'm not sure, though. Any thoughts?
For reference:
For 1, I see no reason you can't take full attack actions randomly for no reason. declare that your attempting to break the ground (then proceed to use parry with all of your attacks).
natural 20 is an auto hit but this is just comparing attack rolls so whether or not it hits isn't relevant, as long as your total is higher. (your DM may vary on what a nat 20 can do for you and your opponent).
A natural 20 (the d20 comes up 20) is always a hit.
I'm pretty sure the natural 20 rule is literal - a natural 20 hits ragardless of anything. The intent being that as a game design choice they don't want effective invulnerability to attack, so they cap the miss chance at 95%, in that something always has that 1 in 20 chance to land a shot. Implicitly, parrying is ineffective against a 20 on the die.
The 50% miss chance for total consealment should apply, since it's an attack roll. Which makes sense, since a parry is basically attacking that invisible attack, same as if you were attacking the invisible creature in a general sense. In the same way you're guessing where the creature is, you're guessing where the blow is coming from, as you can't previeve it.
I think doing attacks on a square I'n an attempt to hit an invisible creature is fine. doing so at squares you know absolutely have no invisible creature isn't, the ground does not threaten you nor does empty air.
you could however just ready an action and trigger combat expertise at that point. it just won't work for the duelist parry.
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doing so at squares you know absolutely have no invisible creature isn't, the ground does not threaten you nor does empty air.
I agree with your readied action idea. That could work. I'm just not clear that anything in the RAW says I have to be threatened. I recall something (maybe 3.0 or 3.5) that required it. I cannot find it, though. As far as I can tell, if I'm making attack rolls on my turn and applying the penalty, I get the AC boost.
If you can find it in the rules, I'd really like to know, as I do plan on taking an Aldori Swordlord/Duelist through Kingmaker. If this works by RAW our GM will likely allow it.
Honestly, you're giving up the chance to even ready an action by committing to a full attack. I don't see it as being that terrible.
1) Can you make a full-round attack at a likely empty square to gain these defensive bonuses.
I'd say that you could make a full-round attack and pick your nose and gain the bonuses. It just means that you waste your attacks (and thus a full-round action) doing basically nothing (except getting ready to parry).
What that means is that even if you don't have anything to attack, you can use this, but it also means that you use up your full-round action. That means no more than a five-foot-step, and you can't cast spells, draw another weapon (except with Quick Draw) or do anything else that takes up an action.
2) Can you parry a natural 20 on an attack roll with anything less than a natural 20 of your own?
Nope. A natural 20 on the attack roll is basically a result of infinity. Even if your attack bonus is -10 and the target's AC is OVER NINE THOUSAND (sorry, failed my will save against Meme ;-)), you hit. A weak, crippled peasant's son (the son is weak and crippled, not the peasant) could hit a god with a natural 20.
So I'd say that you would need a natural 20 of your own. In that case, I'd treat it both as if the whole natural 20 thing didn't exist and compare the check results.
For 2, you compare the results of attack rolls, not to AC, but to each other.
It's still an attack roll.
So I'd say that you would need a natural 20 of your own. In that case, I'd treat it both as if the whole natural 20 thing didn't exist and compare the check results.
Irrestistable force, meet immovable object
Irresistible force, meet immovable objectSo I'd say that you would need a natural 20 of your own. In that case, I'd treat it both as if the whole natural 20 thing didn't exist and compare the check results.
It's always fun when that happens!
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1) Why are you wasting your actions to up your AC? You should be holding your Full Round attack action for the Shadow enter an adjcent square before attaching you, then you can fight defensively to gain the AC bonus and claim your Combat Expertise bonus. By holding your full attack, you can then not take one of your attacks to use your parry ability.
Can't do that. The shadow is using flyby attack. Delay puts me after him in initiative. And going after him has him inside a wall. Only a readied action can hit him, and only once (because it's a ready and I'm a swordlord/duelist, not a TWFer).
Also this is a theoretical exercise to deal with a situation where a standard full attack is not available.
Irrestistable force, meet immovable objectWe've divided by zero!! Oh no!!
Oh no I haven't... believe me -- you will know when I do that...
If the wife ever lets me...
Oh no I haven't... believe me -- you will know when I do that...If the wife ever lets me...
*Shudder*
Hopefully she keeps everything in line then. No one needs that.
I like my universe just the way it is, thank-you-very-much!
Are you sure? It might be more fun all melty...
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Personally, I'd just ignore the Parry ability and ready an attack to hit it when it gets within melee range, using Combat Expertise and Fighting Defensively. It moves up to strike you, not provoke an attack of opportunity, but you still get your readied attack because it 'interrupts' its turn. There's your attack, your reason to get the higher AC from CE and FD, and you can hit it.
Yay readied actions.
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Personally, I'd just ignore the Parry ability and ready an attack to hit it when it gets within melee range, using Combat Expertise and Fighting Defensively. It moves up to strike you, not provoke an attack of opportunity, but you still get your readied attack because it 'interrupts' its turn. There's your attack, your reason to get the higher AC from CE and FD, and you can hit it.
Yay readied actions.
Fair, but I was merely seeing if I could, not should. Also I wanted to see what people's views were on parrying a nat 20. Readied Action wouldn't get me that, hehe
I hate parry, but RAW, I see no reason it wouldn't work. A 20 is always a hit, but so it a 10 if your AC is 10. Parry negates hits, it doesn't raise your AC or otherwise prevent them from occurring in the first place.
An in-between solution is what many groups did (a 3.5 DMG option I believe) who considered auto hits and misses too extreme, and make a 20 = 30 (and a 1 = -10). This would probably result in the same as 20 = auto hit, unpreventable.
Another way would be to at least allow the Parry against the confirmation roll (which wouldn't matter in the above example of "only a 20 hits").
As usual, I agree with Karui Kage.
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On a more serious note, looking at the wording of parry, you could parry a natural 20 (which is an automatic hit) with the parry, since it is an attack roll. This causes an automatic miss, no matter what the attack roll is, and whether or not the attack is successful. It does not convert your attack roll to your AC, it's simply a matter of "is B > A?" If the answer is "Yes", where B is your attack roll including modifiers, and A is the opponent's attack roll including modifiers, then you parry the attack.
RAW, I can't see why you couldn't parry a critical hit. The duelist needs to get a bone thrown to it anyways :P
Parry negates hits, it doesn't raise your AC or otherwise prevent them from occurring in the first place.
That's semantics. Parry lets you pit your roll against the attacker's attack roll. Normally, the attacker rolls against your AC. That means the parry roll basically becomes your AC.
Parry negates hits, it doesn't raise your AC or otherwise prevent them from occurring in the first place.That's semantics. Parry lets you pit your roll against the attacker's attack roll. Normally, the attacker rolls against your AC. That means the parry roll basically becomes your AC.
Um... no. The AC was hit -- that's why you are parrying, and why it's an immediate action. So it would hit, but you parry it.
Just like miss chance can cause a crit to miss.
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Rules are semantics. Calling them thus doesn't invalidate the interpretation.
Semantics definition one: The study of meanings. merriam-webster dictionary.
This.
In order to be considered RAW, you have to look at exactly the way something is written without any inference or simplification (see the Intensify Magic Missile thread for an example of people butting heads over this).
So yes, your attack roll basically replaces your AC, and logically that seems correct. However, as written, your attack roll is compared to the opposing attack roll to see if the attack hits. AC doesn't play any part of the equation. Thanks to the wording of Parry, it can, RAW, block critical threats and natural 20s.
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1) Can you make a full-round attack at a likely empty square to gain these defensive bonuses.
A Full Attack is listed as one of the Full-Round actions, with all the limits KaeYoss listed. But there is nothing in its description that explicitely states that you have to attack something.
If 1 is yes, you give up your largest attack to parry the shadow if he hits. Say you have a ghost touch weapon. Parry has you compare attack rolls to see which is greater (before the target rolls his). He had to roll a 20 to hit and does. You roll a 19. Your attack bonus+19 is greater than his+20. But these are attack rolls...
2) Can you parry a natural 20 on an attack roll with anything less than a natural 20 of your own?
Yes.
He gets a natural 20, thus it is a hit ("A natural 20 (the d20 comes up 20) is always a hit", page 178 of the core rulebook). You roll higher than his attack roll on your parry roll, thus he automatically misses ("If her attack roll is greater than the roll of the attacking creature, the attack automatically misses.", page 383 of the core rulebook).
It is a hit that automatically misses :-)
Since the Parry ability is described after the natural 20 rule, I take it as an exception to this general rule.