Overrun Question

[666bender]

the feat clearly state that you provoke no AOO, how ever, is your movement free from provoking form the opponent as well ?
a human is trying to overun as pictured, passing through the ogre, the fact he is doing overrun deosnt provoke (feat)
what about the movemet ?
1. entering the reach of the ogre
2. passing through the other side - and away from the ogre.

the feat:
Improved Overrun (Combat)
You are skilled at running down your foes.
Prerequisite: Str 13, Power Attack, base attack bonus +1.
Benefit: You do not provoke an attack of opportunity when performing an overruncombat maneuver. In addition, you receive a +2 bonus on checks made to overrrun a foe. You also receive a +2 bonus to your Combat Maneuver Defense whenever an opponent tries to overrun you. Targets of your overrun attempt may not chose to avoid you.
Normal: You provoke an attack of opportunity when performing an overrun combat maneuver.

the manuver:
Overrun
As a standard action, taken during your move or as part of a charge, you can attempt to overrun your target, moving through its square. You can only overrun an opponent who is no more than one size category larger than you. If you do not have the Improved Overrun feat, or a similar ability, initiating an overrun provokes an attack of opportunity from the target of your maneuver. If your overrun attempt fails, you stop in the space directly in front of the opponent, or the nearest open space in front of the creature if there are other creatures occupying that space.

When you attempt to overrun a target, it can choose to avoid you, allowing you to pass through its square without requiring an attack. If your target does not avoid you, make a combat maneuver check as normal. If your maneuver is successful, you move through the target's space. If your attack exceeds your opponent's CMD by 5 or more, you move through the target's space and the target is knocked prone. If the target has more than two legs, add +2 to the DC of the combat maneuver attack roll for each additional leg it has.

[Quandary]

i have no idea... i always thought overrun had problems. i hit FAQ. (you should too, it's your question after all)

re: 1), i would say yes, and that is also true of approaching a superior-reach enemy to bullrush them, i don't think that is going to be avoided (except by Tumbling or some special ability). using Lunge or having Reach yourself can be important to when you actually threathen them/when you actualy initiate the maneuver.

of note, if the over-run is able to choose to avoid you, and does so, they are still free (per RAW) to take an AoO against you leaving threatened squares, which can be a Trip attack if they so choose. that doesn't even seem 'controversial' per RAW, but if in the scope of clarifying Over-Run and AoO's it could potentially be modified...???

re: 2) per RAW, i would say that passing thru them/leaving threatened squares DOES still provoke...
although this AoO will not increase the DC for the maneuver since that already succeeded,
it DOES obviously seem wierd to draw an AoO like this, but unless there's text saying otherwise I don't see why movement shouldn't provoke here, per RAW.

we can parse the sentence as 'as a standard action, taken during your move' OR 'as part of a charge',
but i don't see the supporting RAW to actually enable doing it as a charge...
unless we're supposed to read that overrun can be a FREE CMB on top of a normal attack at the end of a charge,
(a reading i believe is at odds with certain feats which let you overrun target A (+B,+C) on the way to charge target X)

we are left with the RAW of charge saying the attack happens at the end, and you move directly towards the target.
if we overrun 'the charge target' AS the charge attack, then once we do the maneuver,
we can't actually follow thru, because moving away from the target is outside the scope of charge... which overrun didn't change. even if you thought that wasn't meant to be enforced, once you diverge from the RAW it isn't clear what rules still apply... charge says you move directly TOWARDS the target (usually a straight line path), but if we think that doesn't apply to over-run, I don't see where to justify a requirement to move in a straight line AFTER the charge, right? i have no idea what is intended there.

[666bender]

getting even harder it seems ...

[ProfPotts]

You don't Overrun the target of your charge, you overrun the guy on the way to your target. Overrun is a standard action taken 'during your move or as part of a charge'. So you either move your normal distance, overrunning someone along the way, or charge a target, overrunning someone along the way. It's very much a move-based combat maneuver, one assumes designed by fans of rugby (or what Americans call 'football'... ;) ). A melee attack or a Bull Rush are generally your options at the end of a charge. Without an appropriate Feat (or similar) you can only attempt one Overrun per move or charge, of course.

And yes, the movement still provokes, the Improved maneuver Feats only prevent you from provoking for attempting the maneuver in the first place.

[Quandary]

it says "as part of a charge, you can attempt to overrun your target"
it says you are overrunning 'your target', singular... not 'some dude on the way to your target'.
since charge has a target already, i don't see how a reference to a singular 'your target' could reasonably be inferred to create a second target.
i guess i could see a reading saying you get a 'free' overrun against the charge target in addition to the normal charge attack (for damage), but that still runs into problems with moving after the charge attack.

the move action overrun uses a standard during that movement (specially interrupting it, essentially),
so you aren't going to be attacking anybody else.
given that, it seems pretty reasonable that the charge is only attacking (overrunning) one target as well,
since that's in line with the normal melee attack function of charge to begin with.

i just don't see how the current RAW is sufficient in any form, regardless of the specifics of intended function.

[OberonViking]

ProfPotts wrote:

You don't Overrun the target of your charge, you overrun the guy on the way to your target. Overrun is a standard action taken 'during your move or as part of a charge'. So you either move your normal distance, overrunning someone along the way, or charge a target, overrunning someone along the way. It's very much a move-based combat maneuver, one assumes designed by fans of rugby (or what Americans call 'football'... ;) ). A melee attack or a Bull Rush are generally your options at the end of a charge. Without an appropriate Feat (or similar) you can only attempt one Overrun per move or charge, of course.

And yes, the movement still provokes, the Improved maneuver Feats only prevent you from provoking for attempting the maneuver in the first place.

I think what you are referring to happens to be a feat called Charge Through.

[OberonViking]

I don't think a character with Improved Overrun should provoke any attacks from its target, but I see the confusion caused in this situation. I'm hitting FAQ as well.

[Quandary]

yup, Charge Through was the name of the Feat I was thinking of...
the thing is, the wording is just so bad, that anybody reading it is going to think there is SOME way you're supposed to use it, but whatever you choose just doesn't work by the RAW, at least for the Charge aspect, which is the really problematic one (the Move+Standard version just sucks 'cause you still draw an AoO for movement... unless you Tumble, that oh-so-appropriate to the imagery of brute force Over-Running...)

hit the fAQ on top people... :-)

[Quandary]

OberonViking wrote:

I don't think a character with Improved Overrun should provoke any attacks from its target

right.... i have no reason to think that Improved Over Run should let you evade AoOs from OTHER enemies also threatening the square of said enemy or the other squares you are moving thru, but it definitely seems like it should work vs. the Over Run target...

I mean, seriously, most NPCs/monsters only have 1 AoO in the first place, so you aren't reducing the AoO's you would take... Sure, it means the damage doesn't increase the DC/CMD, but really... Over Run is rather underwhelming to begin with.