A whip says it has 15-foot reach, but you don't threaten. Yet, a medium creature can attack with it into an adjacent square 10 feet away, or 15 feet away. Ok, this is clear enough I think.
prd:
Whip: A whip deals no damage to any creature with an armor bonus of +1 or higher or a natural armor bonus of +3 or higher. The whip is treated as a melee weapon with 15-foot reach, though you don't threaten the area into which you can make an attack. In addition, unlike most other weapons with reach, you can use it against foes anywhere within your reach (including adjacent foes).
Using a whip provokes an attack of opportunity, just as if you had used a ranged weapon.
You can use the Weapon Finesse feat to apply your Dexterity modifier instead of your Strength modifier to attack rolls with a whip sized for you, even though it isn't a light weapon.
Now, the question comes in with Improved Whip Mastery. This feat says you "threaten the area of your natural reach plus 5 feet." This wording confuses me. Does this mean that, based on the normal whip rules, you can still attack 5, 10, or 15 feet away, but you can only THREATEN 10 feet away and therefore only get AOOs from 10 feet away but not 5? Or does it mean that you now can attack 5, 10, and 15 feet away, but that you threaten both 5 and 10 feet away (but not 15)?
prd:
Improved Whip Mastery (Combat)
You are able to entangle opponents with the coils of your whip.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus (whip), Whip Mastery, base attack bonus +5.
Benefit: While wielding a whip, you threaten the area of your natural reach plus 5 feet. You can also use a whip to grasp an unattended Small or Tiny object within your whip's reach and pull that object into your square. To do so, you must hit AC 10 with a melee touch attack.
Further, you can use the whip to grasp onto an object within your whip's reach, using 5 feet of your whip as if it were a grappling hook, allowing you to use the rest of your whip to swing on like a rope. As a free action, you can release the object your whip is grasping, but you cannot use the whip to attack while the whip is grasping an object.
Also, the feat says "you can use 5 feet of your whip as if a grappling hook" etc... I'm also unsure on this wording... does that mean you can grab something 10 feet away and swing/climb from there, but if it were 15ft or 5ft away you could not do so? The 15ft part of this question seems obvious, that you can't, but if you can "grappling whip" 5ft away or not is less clear.
This is a good question. I can think of 2 possible meanings here. First, it could be that, since Whip Mastery says you can now do damage against armored/natural armored creatures, it is making the assumption that we understand that the whip now threatens all the area of its reach (15'), and now with Improved Whip Mastery you threaten all the space within 20' of you. I think this interpretation is less likely.
The second possible meaning is that "natural reach" means whatever amount of space you would threaten with a natural attack or if you had improved unarmed strike, thus as a medium creature you would threaten 5' away and 10' away. A large creature would threaten all the space 5', 10' and 15' away. I think this is the more likely interpretation.
As far as the grappling hook effect, I think you are limited to grabbing something 10' away.
Now, the question comes in with Improved Whip Mastery. This feat says you "threaten the area of your natural reach plus 5 feet." This wording confuses me. Does this mean that, based on the normal whip rules, you can still attack 5, 10, or 15 feet away, but you can only THREATEN 10 feet away and therefore only get AOOs from 10 feet away but not 5? Or does it mean that you now can attack 5, 10, and 15 feet away, but that you threaten both 5 and 10 feet away (but not 15)?
If we assume you're a medium sized creature, you can use the whip to make an attack at 5, 10 or 15 feet - as normal. In addition, you threaten with the whip in area "of your natural reach plus 5 feet". This is a benefit of your new feat. So this would mean both at 5 feet and at 10 feet for a medium creature.
You are confusing the whip's specific rules with the "reach" property rule that states you can attack at 10ft but not at 5ft. This rule specifically does not apply to whips as they can make attacks at 5ft, 10ft & 15 ft. This usually comes into play for things like polearms because these weapons are too long and cumbersome to wield at close ranges. Yes, I realize Paizo ammended this with the introduction of their fighter archetypes.
setzer9999 wrote:
Further, you can use the whip to grasp onto an object within your whip's reach, using 5 feet of your whip as if it were a grappling hook, allowing you to use the rest of your whip to swing on like a rope. As a free action, you can release the object your whip is grasping, but you cannot use the whip to attack while the whip is grasping an object.
As there is no numeric limiter here except "whip's reach" you should assume that your whip can be used as a grappling hook with a range of 15 feet. I think the "using 5 feet of your whip as a grappling hook" is a description of how you'd employ your whip in this way.
i disagree - the idea is the end of your whip is wrapping around whatever you are using to swing on, and it needs 5 feet of length to do so securely. hence your whip is now at best ten feet long.
if you whipped something 15 feet away, only the very tip of the whip would be able to touch the object in question.
