How does overrun work?


Rules Questions

Grand Lodge

2 people marked this as FAQ candidate. 1 person marked this as a favorite.
Quote:

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.

How can I take a standard action in the middle of a full-round action?


1 person marked this as a favorite.

You are not taking a standard action as part of a charge. You have two options:

Option 1: As a standard action taken during your move. (1 standard & 1 move action). Benefit: You don't have to move in a straight line.

Option 2: As part of a charge. (1 full round action). Benefit: You can move double your movement, but has to be a straight line.


Given that you can attack on a charge, and attacking is usually a standard action, I would say that you treat an overrun like an attack for the purposes of doing it on a charge.


conan_the_barbarian, attacking is not always a standard action. It can be an Attack of Opportunity, free action, swift action, immediate action, move action, standard action, or full-round action depending on the type of attack and the rules involved.

Associating it as only a standard action leads people to errors.

Peachbottom is correct, it is either a Standard action and a Move action OR it is a Full-Round Action (charge).

The problem is that claudekennilol is parsing the sentence incorrectly.
The correct parsing is: "As a standard action, taken during your move or as part of a charge,"


Let us say you are standing in a narrow hallway. Mr. Evil is standing 50 feet away while Henchman A is directly between you and Mr Evil at 20 feet distance.

Since A is in the way, you cannot normally charge Mr. Evil. What you can do is charge Mr. Evil and make an overrun attempt at henchman A. This gets you to Mr. Evil and lets you attack him while also either getting A to move or running him over. You may take an AOO, and henchman A may even use trip to ruin your plans, but it'll still get you where you are going.

Option two - You are in a hallway with a 90 degree turn in it. Henchman A is right before the turn, but Mr. Evil is another 20 feet past it (total - 50 feet). So you can't charge Mr. Evil and the hallway is too narrow to walk past henchman A. However, you may take your standard action to overrun henchman A and get to the bend in the hall, then use your move to walk up to Mr. Evil. Sure, you aren't able to attack this round, but you got past the Henchman and are threatening Mr. Evil.

Grand Lodge

Gauss wrote:

conan_the_barbarian, attacking is not always a standard action. It can be an Attack of Opportunity, free action, swift action, immediate action, move action, standard action, or full-round action depending on the type of attack and the rules involved.

Associating it as only a standard action leads people to errors.

Peachbottom is correct, it is either a Standard action and a Move action OR it is a Full-Round Action (charge).

The problem is that claudekennilol is parsing the sentence incorrectly.
The correct parsing is: "As a standard action, taken during your move or as part of a charge,"

I don't believe so--that's a pretty non-standard way of writing plain English.

To me it reads 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.

If it were supposed to be parsed as you suggest then there should be a comma between 'move' and 'or'.


claudekennilol, I think you will find you are parsing it in a way that most people do not and in a way that is not the intent of the rule.

Our way of parsing it makes sense in the context of the rules. Your way of parsing it does not make sense in the context of the rules and will not work.

As for 'plain English' if English were so plain it would be much easier for everyone. But it isn't. English is one of the most complicated languages in existence because of its rules and how it has fractured.

So, lets look for intent and meaning in the context of the rules.

BTW, regarding commas, a lot of people drop the comma before "AND" or "OR" because they were taught it was unnecessary. The problem is dropping the comma can create the problem you just ran into.
link


You can do it because it expressly say you can. It specifically and unambiguously changes when you can perform this specific standard action. Not unlike spring attack that expressly allows an attack when you otherwise couldn't. Or any one of a dozen other rules that break existing rules.

Scarab Sages

MurphysParadox wrote:

Let us say you are standing in a narrow hallway. Mr. Evil is standing 50 feet away while Henchman A is directly between you and Mr Evil at 20 feet distance.

Since A is in the way, you cannot normally charge Mr. Evil. What you can do is charge Mr. Evil and make an overrun attempt at henchman A. This gets you to Mr. Evil and lets you attack him while also either getting A to move or running him over. You may take an AOO, and henchman A may even use trip to ruin your plans, but it'll still get you where you are going.

Option two - You are in a hallway with a 90 degree turn in it. Henchman A is right before the turn, but Mr. Evil is another 20 feet past it (total - 50 feet). So you can't charge Mr. Evil and the hallway is too narrow to walk past henchman A. However, you may take your standard action to overrun henchman A and get to the bend in the hall, then use your move to walk up to Mr. Evil. Sure, you aren't able to attack this round, but you got past the Henchman and are threatening Mr. Evil.

Incorrect for both options.

Option 1: You cannot charge Mr. Evil even with overrun. The only thing you can do is as part of a charge or as a standard action while taking a move action, can you overrun Henchman A. You MUST have the feat Charge Through to be able to overrun Henchman A while charging Mr. Evil as long as it is within your allowed movement.

-Without Charge Through, only the target of your charge can be the subject of your overrun.

Option 2. Overrun can be done as a standard action that takes place during your movement. You cannot overrun someone and then take your move action. Overrun requires movement, typically 10 feet for medium creatures to move through their square and end up on the other side.

Overrun RAW "As a standard action, taken during your move or as part of a charge"

Charge Through "Benefit: When making a charge, you can attempt to overrun one creature in the path of the charge as a free action. If you successfully overrun that creature, you can complete the charge. If the overrun is unsuccessful, the charge ends in the space directly in front of that creature.

Normal: You must have a clear path toward the target of your charge."

Liberty's Edge

So..
You decide to charge
Henchman A is in the way: you make an Overrun attempt.
If successful, you move through, and can continue moving as per a charge, but cannot attack Mr. Evil at the end of your action. But you can be next to him and threaten him.
If failed, you stop in front of Henchman A

But...
If Henchman A, for some reason, decides to let you through, then you could charge Mr. Evil and get an attack on him at the end of your move. Right?

Scarab Sages

Lord Magus wrote:

So..

You decide to charge
Henchman A is in the way: you make an Overrun attempt.
If successful, you move through, and can continue moving as per a charge, but cannot attack Mr. Evil at the end of your action. But you can be next to him and threaten him.
If failed, you stop in front of Henchman A

But...
If Henchman A, for some reason, decides to let you through, then you could charge Mr. Evil and get an attack on him at the end of your move. Right?

Yes to the first part, but you will only threaten if you have enough movement to reach Mr. Evil

Without the Charge Through feat, you cannot charge Mr. Evil, so you cannot attack him if Henchman A moves out of the way. Here's why, Charge RAW "If any line from your starting space to the ending space passes through a square that blocks movement, slows movement, or contains a creature (even an ally), you can't charge." Because Henchman A is in the way, you can ONLY charge Henchman A. Charging Mr. Evil is not a legal option due to this.

Liberty's Edge

If your intention is to Charge, but instead of making an attack at the end, you plan to make an Overrun of Henchman A as part of the charge, and he lets you pass...

Then: "When you attempt to overrun a target, it can choose to avoid you, allowing you to pass through its square without requiring an attack." Wouldn't you still have available the attack you get as part of the charge (and thus be able to smack Mr. Evil if you have enough move left to get to him?)

Scarab Sages

Lord Magus wrote:

If your intention is to Charge, but instead of making an attack at the end, you plan to make an Overrun of Henchman A as part of the charge, and he lets you pass...

Then: "When you attempt to overrun a target, it can choose to avoid you, allowing you to pass through its square without requiring an attack." Wouldn't you still have available the attack you get as part of the charge (and thus be able to smack Mr. Evil if you have enough move left to get to him?)

You do not, that attack goes to the target of your charge. The target of your charge is Henchman A. If he moves out of the way and you end up next to Mr. Evil, you lose that attack because Mr. Evil was not the target of your charge and cannot be the target of your charge without Charge Through.

Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder First Edition / Rules Questions / How does overrun work? All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.