Cleave, Reach, and Overhand Chop interaction

[Mystically Inclined]

I'm building a two handed fighter archetype that kind of stumbled into being a reach fighter. He took Cleave and Cleaving Finish, and (after some more important feats) I eventually intend to give him the improved versions of both. Yesterday I played a Season 1 scenario from PFS in higher tier (meaning there were mobs of low level mooks) and my reach fighter got to really stretch his legs. He was rediculously awesome in it. So awesome that I began to wonder if I was playing him wrong. I wanted to swing things by the forums to make sure I know what he can and can't do. I plan to take Lunge, so I've added that as well.

He's a level 3 two handed fighter. The reach questions assume he's using a Lucerne Hammer (his backup weapon). Question marks denote statements that I'm particularly shaky about.

-He cannot cleave and overhand chop.

-He can cleaving finish after killing with an overhand chop. He does not receive the overhand chop bonus on the cleaving finish. (?)

-He can use overhand chop on an attack of opportunity.

-He can cleaving finish after killing with an attack of opportunity, presuming he hasn't cleaving finished already in the round.

-He is allows to use cleaving finish in a round even if he hasn't used cleave.

-The Lunge feat adds 5 feet of 'natural' reach to a character. When using a reach weapon, this gives the Lucerne Hammer a reach of 10 to 20 feet. Meaning that in the following 'picture,' squares 1 and 2 are threatened by a spiked gauntlet and squared 3 and 4 are threatened by a reach weapon. x1234

-The 5 natural feet granted by Lunge is NOT doubled if under the effects of enlarge person. However, reach weapons double your character's natural reach. That means that the reach weapon of an enlarged creature using Lunge would be 15 to 30 feat, or squares 4 through 6 on the following 'picture' - x123456

-After using a (not englarged, non-lunged) reach weapon to kill a monster 10 feet away, he use cleaving finish to attack a creature 5 feet away using a separate weapon (spiked gauntlet, improved unarmed strike, etc). (?)

-Assuming he had a reach weapon, Improved Cleaving Finish, Combat Reflexes, and a high enough dex, he could attack and kill somebody on his turn, make an attack from cleaving finish, take attacks of opportunity as creatures provoked while moving through his range of threatened squares, and (presuming each AoO kills someone) make a Cleaving Finish attack after each AoO

(Writing that last made me realize how incredibly situational Improved Cleaving Finish is. By level 7-9 when I have time take the feats, it would take a rediculously fragile mook to go down in one hit.)

[DesolateHarmony]

cleave

great cleave

Cleaving Finish

Improved Cleaving Finish

Overhand Chop

Edit:
Lunge

[DesolateHarmony]

Mystically Inclined wrote:

-After using a (not englarged, non-lunged) reach weapon to kill a monster 10 feet away, he use cleaving finish to attack a creature 5 feet away using a separate weapon (spiked gauntlet, improved unarmed strike, etc). (?)

If you are wielding a weapon two handed, it is my understanding that you do not have the ability to attack of opportunity with another weapon. The exception to this being a monk and using unarmed strike, as monks are specifically called out as being able to use other body parts. However, there are many who will debate me on this point. Use caution.

[Talcrion]

Cleaving finish isn't an AoO however , it's just a bonus attack, I don't see why you would be unable to switch your weapon to one hand to punch

[DesolateHarmony]

Mystically Inclined wrote:

.

-He cannot cleave and overhand chop. correct

-He can cleaving finish after killing with an overhand chop. He does not receive the overhand chop bonus on the cleaving finish. (?) correct

-He can use overhand chop on an attack of opportunity. not correct. He can overhand chop when using an attack action or a charge.

-He can cleaving finish after killing with an attack of opportunity, presuming he hasn't cleaving finished already in the round. correct

-He is allows to use cleaving finish in a round even if he hasn't used cleave. correct

-The Lunge feat adds 5 feet of 'natural' reach to a character. When using a reach weapon, this gives the Lucerne Hammer a reach of 10 to 20 feet. Meaning that in the following 'picture,' squares 1 and 2 are threatened by a spiked gauntlet and squared 3 and 4 are threatened by a reach weapon. x1234

-The 5 natural feet granted by Lunge is NOT doubled if under the effects of enlarge person. However, reach weapons double your character's natural reach. That means that the reach weapon of an enlarged creature using Lunge would be 15 to 30 feat, or squares 4 through 6 on the following 'picture' - x123456

-After using a (not englarged, non-lunged) reach weapon to kill a monster 10 feet away, he use cleaving finish to attack a creature 5 feet away using a separate weapon...

Note that lunge only lasts during your action. It doesn't help when your turn is complete, and so will not affect many attacks of opportunity that you may get a chance to take. It doesn't increase your threatened reach except during your action that you use it.

[Mystically Inclined]

Sorry. I should have been more clear.

-After using a (not enlarged, non-lunged) reach weapon to kill a monster 10 feet away, he (free action- release a hand from weapon) use cleaving finish to attack a creature 5 feet away using a separate weapon (spiked gauntlet, improved unarmed strike, etc) (and free action- grab weapon). (?)

Also...

-He cannot use lunge with attacks of opportunity, as the reach benefit of lunge ends with his turn.

[Talcrion]

Ignore me lol replying to things not directed at me.

[bbangerter]

Cleave (and great cleave) along with overhand chop can only be made as part of an attack action. That invalidates using any of them as part of an AoO as an AoO is not the game specific term 'attack action'.

Cleaving finish can be used once per round after any attack you make that downs the foe, but does not get any of the bonus benefits from things like overhand chop. So it can be used after overhand chop, after an AoO, or any other attack you make that drops the foe (regardless of whether that attack was part of a cleave attack or not). Multiple AoO's taken by you in a round will not grant extra cleaving finishes. You get one per round (a round being all creatures get to take one turn each).

Also a note on cleaving finish, you don't have to take a foe from full health to <0 to use cleaving finish. If a powerful foe has been previously hurt, and your next attack drops it, cleaving finish kicks in.

[Mystically Inclined]

*Nods* Improved Cleaving finish removes the one-per-round limitation though.

[Kazaan]

Mystically Inclined wrote:

-He cannot cleave and overhand chop.

Correct. Cleave is a Standard Use Feat action while Overhand Chop is a modification to either the Standard Attack action or the normally Full-Round (can be Standard under certain circumstances) Charge action. Overhand Chop can, however, be used in conjunction with other feats that also modify the Attack/Charge actions (ie. Vital Strike + Overhand Chop both modify the Attack action and can be used together as can Spirited Charge + Overhand Chop).

-He can cleaving finish after killing with an overhand chop. He does not receive the overhand chop bonus on the cleaving finish. (?)
Presumably correct. Overhand Chop specifies a single attack which the actions it modifies normally limit you to anyway. The additional attack from Cleaving Finish is simply an extra melee attack granted via feat but not directly subject to the action that generates it.

-He can use overhand chop on an attack of opportunity.
Incorrect. AoOs are neither Attack actions nor are they Charges. They're "bare attacks" not encased in a particular action so you can't Overhand Chop on an AoO nor any other Use Feat or Use Special Ability action that just so happens to also grant a single melee attack. Only the Attack action and the Charge action qualify and only when used to make a single attack (ie. Pounce Charges are no longer single attacks so they no longer qualify).

-He can cleaving finish after killing with an attack of opportunity, presuming he hasn't cleaving finished already in the round.
Correct

-He is allows to use cleaving finish in a round even if he hasn't used cleave.
Correct. While Cleave is a Standard Use Feat action, Cleaving Finish is a "bare attack" that could trigger on any particular melee attack that meets the conditions including, but not limited to, Cleaves, Attack actions, Full-Attack actions, Charges, AoOs, a Magus's free melee attack to deliver a Spellstrike, etc.

-The Lunge feat adds 5 feet of 'natural' reach to a character. When using a reach weapon, this gives the Lucerne Hammer a reach of 10 to 20 feet. Meaning that in the following 'picture,' squares 1 and 2 are threatened by a spiked gauntlet and squared 3 and 4 are threatened by a reach weapon. x1234
Incorrect. Lunge adds 5' of reach on the back-end, not the front-end. So with a reach weapon (ie. Lucerne hammer), you go from a reach of 10 to a reach of 10-15. A non-reach weapon would threaten 5-10'.

-The 5 natural feet granted by Lunge is NOT doubled if under the effects of enlarge person. However, reach weapons double your character's natural reach. That means that the reach weapon of an enlarged creature using Lunge would be 15 to 30 feat, or squares 4 through 6 on the following 'picture' - x123456
Since it's not natural reach, a large creature wielding a Reach weapon would threaten 15-20' and, with Lunge, that becomes 15-25'.

-After using a (not englarged, non-lunged) reach weapon to kill a monster 10 feet away, he use cleaving finish to attack a creature 5 feet away using a separate weapon (spiked gauntlet, improved unarmed strike, etc). (?)
Presumably yes. While the flavor was probably that you're using a single swing to "cleave" through one enemy and hit the enemy adjacent to them, that's more of a guideline than a hard-fast rule. And, on the battlefield, only Paladins adhere that strongly to guidelines. It's pretty easy to visualize a two-weapon warrior cleaving with one sword and using his momentum to spin around and deliver a second attack with the other sword to an adjacent target. However there's a slight issue regarding the 2-h nature of the weapon "occupying" the hand "wielding" the spiked gauntlet and to whether you have the leeway to use a free action to release the reach weapon to use your Spiked Gauntlet between the triggering attack and the Cleaving Finish attack. It would probably work better with a weapon not hand-associated such as Unarmed Strike or Armor Spikes.

-Assuming he had a reach weapon, Improved Cleaving Finish, Combat Reflexes, and a high enough dex, he could attack and kill somebody on his turn, make an attack from cleaving finish, take attacks of opportunity as creatures provoked while moving through his range of threatened squares, and (presuming each AoO kills someone) make a Cleaving Finish attack after each AoO
Absolutely. Since ICF removes the "one per round" limitation, you'll basically be a big meat grinder. Moreover, you could kill the target that provoked the AoO, Cleaving Finish to a second target and replace the melee attack with a Trip. They go down and, with Greater Trip, they provoke an AoO on the way to the floor. Laugh maniacally while you're at it for bonus points.

DesolateHarmony wrote:

If you are wielding a weapon two handed, it is my understanding that you do not have the ability to attack of opportunity with another weapon.

That's incorrect. You can't Two-Weapon Fight while wielding a 2-h weapon*, even with weapons not hand-associated, because it uses both an actual hand as well as a "potential off-hand attack" to make an attack with the two-hander, but if you have, for example, a Lucerne hammer along with Armor Spikes, Improved Unarmed Strike, a Boot Blade, or some other weapon not hand-associated, you will still threaten with them even while wielding the 2-h reach weapon.

*: drastic over-simplification but good enough for general purposes.