| 2 people marked this as FAQ candidate. |
The whip mastery feat says "You no longer provoke attacks of opportunity when attacking with a whip. "
The situation came up where my character, who has whip mastery, was 15' away from an enemy with a 15' reach weapon. I interpret the statement above to allow my character to attempt to disarm the enemy without the enemy getting an AOO. My GM thought not.
My argument is simple. In the section on Combat Maneuvers, it says "Combat maneuvers are attack rolls, so you must roll for concealment and take any other penalties that would normally apply to an attack roll." I would suggest that if you have to take the penalties that apply to attack rolls you also get any benefits that apply to attack rolls.
Making a disarm or trip combat maneuver with a whip is an attack with a whip. Whip mastery says you don't provoke attacks of opportunity when attacking with a whip. Therefore, no attack of opportunity when using the whip to disarm or trip.
I would argue that this overrides the normal rule that making a combat maneuver provokes an AOO from the target. You can get around it with the combat expertise and improved disarm or improved trip feat, but when using a whip, you can get around it with whip mastery feat.
A secondary argument is more game balance one. Since one generally needs three feats to get whip mastery [Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Whip), Weapon Focus (Whip), and whip mastery] it should do more than just allow attacks for damage with the whip without provoking AOOs. The whip only does 1d3. If all you want is a reach weapon that does damage, there are less feat intensive ways to get that. The only time the question even comes up is the rare event such as described above, attempting to trip or disarm someone with a reach weapon. I don't think it's game breaking to allow someone with a whip mastery to do that without provoking an AOO, particularly considering how weak the whip is otherwise.
Am I in the minority in my interpretation?
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
You don't invoke the normal AoO from using a whip, but you still incure an AoO for a disarm attempt without having the improved disarm feat.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Whip Mastery (Combat)
Your superior expertise with this weapon does not provoke attacks of opportunity from your enemies.Prerequisites: Weapon Focus (whip), base attack bonus +2.
Benefit: You no longer provoke attacks of opportunity when attacking with a whip. You can deal lethal damage with a whip, although you can still deal nonlethal damage when you want. Further, you can deal damage with a whip despite a creature's armor bonus or natural armor bonus.
Normal: Attacking with a whip provokes attacks of opportunity as if you used a ranged weapon. A whip deals no damage to a creature that has an armor bonus of +1 or natural armor bonus of +3.
It is important to look at the entire feat description rather than an isolated sentence. The part about no longer provoking is contrasted with the normal usage. Normally you provoke just for using a whip. With this feat, you no longer provoke for that particular reason. The feat doesn't prevent you from provoking for any other reason. So if you choose to trip or disarm with your whip you will provoke an attack, not because you are using a whip, but because those maneuvers provoke. Of course, since a whip has 15' reach, you usually can be far enough away that provocation doesn't matter. In this situation your GM was correct.
Hmm. Just noticed a second implication of this line of thinking*. A creature with neither Whip Mastery nor Improved Disarm that attempts a disarm against a foe with 15' reach, will provoke twice. Once for attacking with a whip and once for attempting a Combat Maneuver.
Similar to certain ranged attack spells.
* Not to imply I disagree with it, just observing another consequence.
Hmm. Just noticed a second implication of this line of thinking*. A creature with neither Whip Mastery nor Improved Disarm that attempts a disarm against a foe with 15' reach, will provoke twice. Once for attacking with a whip and once for attempting a Combat Maneuver.
Similar to certain ranged attack spells.
* Not to imply I disagree with it, just observing another consequence.
That is correct. The AoO are triggered by two different aspects of the same, compound action. The ranged attack spell is a nice analogy.
I see the logic, but I don't think the author of the feat intended it to just enhance using the whip for damage. Whips only do 1d3 and attack as a ranged weapon (limited to 15 feet). If you exclude the benefit of using the whip for combat maneuvers without suffering an attack of opportunity, the feat is roughly equivalent to getting the ability to throw a dagger at up to 15 feet away without suffering attacks of opportunity. That's hardly a feat worth considering.
People don't use whips to do damage. People use whips to make disarm and trip combat maneuvers at a safe distance. The only drawback to doing that is you still have to watch out for attacks of opportunity when you try a combat maneuver on someone with a reach weapon. So avoiding those attacks of opportunity is the real benefit that I'm sure the feat is intended to provide.
It is essentially like getting a limited use improved disarm and improved trip. It only works when using a whip. That seems a reasonable and very useful and desirable feat, well balanced and just the sort of thing I would want for my character.
Would anyone seriously consider taking Whip Mastery if he or she knew it would only grant him or her whip attacks for damage without provoking attacks of opportunity? Keep in mind that as a weapon for doing damage, the whip, in addition to doing a measly 1d3 damage, attacks as a ranged weapon, which means no attacks of opportunities with the whip, no flanking, and no precision or sneak attack damage. If you want to do damage with a reach weapon or a ranged weapon, there are much more effective ways to achieve that than a whip.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I see the logic, but I don't think the author of the feat intended it to just enhance using the whip for damage. Whips only do 1d3 and attack as a ranged weapon (limited to 15 feet). If you exclude the benefit of using the whip for combat maneuvers without suffering an attack of opportunity, the feat is roughly equivalent to getting the ability to throw a dagger at up to 15 feet away without suffering attacks of opportunity. That's hardly a feat worth considering.
People don't use whips to do damage. People use whips to make disarm and trip combat maneuvers at a safe distance. The only drawback to doing that is you still have to watch out for attacks of opportunity when you try a combat maneuver on someone with a reach weapon. So avoiding those attacks of opportunity is the real benefit that I'm sure the feat is intended to provide.
It is essentially like getting a limited use improved disarm and improved trip. It only works when using a whip. That seems a reasonable and very useful and desirable feat, well balanced and just the sort of thing I would want for my character.
Would anyone seriously consider taking Whip Mastery if he or she knew it would only grant him or her whip attacks for damage without provoking attacks of opportunity? Keep in mind that as a weapon for doing damage, the whip, in addition to doing a measly 1d3 damage, attacks as a ranged weapon, which means no attacks of opportunities with the whip, no flanking, and no precision or sneak attack damage. If you want to do damage with a reach weapon or a ranged weapon, there are much more effective ways to achieve that than a whip.
First, where are you getting the idea that it attacks as a ranged weapon? It provokes as if attacking with a ranged weapon, but other than that it is a normal melee reach attack. It benefits from flanking, sneak attack, precision, etc. as normal.
Second, besides damage, it has multiple benefits: it negates the AoO from attacking, so for example, with Improved Trip you can make a trip attack without provoking at all, or without Improved Trip you can make a trip attack only provoking once instead of twice. Also, it qualified you to take Improved Trip Mastery which is a pretty great feat.
I see the logic, but I don't think the author of the feat intended it to just enhance using the whip for damage. Whips only do 1d3 and attack as a ranged weapon (limited to 15 feet). If you exclude the benefit of using the whip for combat maneuvers without suffering an attack of opportunity, the feat is roughly equivalent to getting the ability to throw a dagger at up to 15 feet away without suffering attacks of opportunity. That's hardly a feat worth considering.
People don't use whips to do damage. People use whips to make disarm and trip combat maneuvers at a safe distance. The only drawback to doing that is you still have to watch out for attacks of opportunity when you try a combat maneuver on someone with a reach weapon. So avoiding those attacks of opportunity is the real benefit that I'm sure the feat is intended to provide.
It is essentially like getting a limited use improved disarm and improved trip. It only works when using a whip. That seems a reasonable and very useful and desirable feat, well balanced and just the sort of thing I would want for my character.
Would anyone seriously consider taking Whip Mastery if he or she knew it would only grant him or her whip attacks for damage without provoking attacks of opportunity? Keep in mind that as a weapon for doing damage, the whip, in addition to doing a measly 1d3 damage, attacks as a ranged weapon, which means no attacks of opportunities with the whip, no flanking, and no precision or sneak attack damage. If you want to do damage with a reach weapon or a ranged weapon, there are much more effective ways to achieve that than a whip.
If you're focusing on the dX part of damage done by your weapon, you're not focusing on the right part. Whip Mastery also opens up access to subsequent feats in the line, which have some nice benefits. Is it a bit of a feat tax? Sure. But whips make really nice weapons once you remove the provoking part (and especially when you add the threat range). So yes, taking Whip Mastery is pretty much a must if you're going to use a whip.
Beyond that, you don't provoke AoO unless the target threatens you. So this is only an issue against creatures with reach. So a whip user without improved maneuver feats is sitting squarely where a reach weapon user without the same feats is when attacking a target with reach - seems appropriate.
I highly doubt the Developers ignored the combat maneuver implications when drafting the feat. It is pretty clearly intended to remove two of the primary weaknesses of using a whip (provoking and not being able to harm most enemies). Both of those are substantial benefits. Since the feat never mentions combat maneuvers (and provoking from combat maneuvers is a wholly different idea than provoking by using a range-equivalent weapon), there's no reason to think they would be impacted by this feat.
|
Remember that one of the benefits of the whip is that you can, easily, make your trip and disarm attacks from a distance of 15', which leaves you out of the threat range of anything that is not Huge or bigger.
And, as mentioned, being able to, at will, and with no attack penalty, choose to do either lethal or nonlethal damage is a fairly big boon. That, and you can now ignore what kind of armor, or how thick that animal's skin is, when attacking.
Also, as mentioned, 1d3 is pathetic, but, in general, that is not only the smallest component of your damage with most weapons past a certain point, it is also fairly close to moot for a whip wielder, since one of the strengths of the whip, especially once you get to Improved Whip Mastery, is local battlefield control. Trip, disarm, drag, reposition.
And, for some classes, that additional reach negates some of the class's most serious drawbacks, like Magus, since you can use Spell Combat without provoking, while using Spellstrike to deliver that touch spell against a target 10' or even 15' away from you...
First, where are you getting the idea that it attacks as a ranged weapon? It provokes as if attacking with a ranged weapon, but other than that it is a normal melee reach attack. It benefits from flanking, sneak attack, precision, etc. as normal.
It is a normal melee weapon except that it does not threaten squares into which it can reach. If it doesn't threaten then that means it cannot make attacks of opportunity nor can it provide a flanking advantage.
I was wrong in thinking it could not do sneak attack damage. I assumed that since ranged weapons did not get sneak attack damage, neither would the whip.
Hmm. Just noticed a second implication of this line of thinking*. A creature with neither Whip Mastery nor Improved Disarm that attempts a disarm against a foe with 15' reach, will provoke twice. Once for attacking with a whip and once for attempting a Combat Maneuver.
Similar to certain ranged attack spells.
* Not to imply I disagree with it, just observing another consequence.
I disagree with this.
This feat does not let you make more than one attack for a given opportunity, but if the same opponent provokes two attacks of opportunity from you, you could make two separate attacks of opportunity (since each one represents a different opportunity). Moving out of more than one square threatened by the same opponent in the same round doesn't count as more than one opportunity for that opponent.
The attempt to disarm is a single opportunity. It may provoke because of two different rules about what can provoke the attack, but one attack cannot provoke two AOOs. This was hashed out elsewhere.
It is true that if something provokes for two different rules and someone has a feat that prevents an AOO for one of those rules, the other still kicks in. That is actually what is at issue here, whether Whip Mastery covers both rules or only one.
The writing or rules is usually very concise. For example, in the section on making an attack of opportunity, it just says "An attack of opportunity is a single melee attack." You have to read the section on combat maneuvers to notice that some combat maneuvers can be used "in place of a melee attack". This makes these combat maneuvers attacks. The combat maneuvers don't specifically state you can use them for attacks of opportunity. But put the rules together and they state unambiguously that one can make a disarm or trip CM as an attack of opportunity.
So in this case, I don't see why there is a challenge when the same logic holds. The feat says, "You no longer provoke attacks of opportunity when attacking with a whip." It doesn't matter that there are two rules that cover why a person doing a combat maneuver attack like trip with a whip provokes an attack of opportunity, they are both connected to the attack action. So both are prevented when attempting to trip with a whip.
If this were ambiguous, I could see the reason for adding a restriction based on the wording of the Normal rules, but since there's no ambiguity, there is no reason. I think the only reason the normal section only mentions the property of whips normally provoking AOOs when used in an attack is lack of space. The "Normal" section is not a necessary part of the statement of a feat, only a way to help the reader avoid having to look something up elsewhere.
In any case, before I'll be satisfied I am wrong, I'd like someone with authority at Paizo to weigh in, preferably with an entry in the FAQ.
Don't forget the trip AOO only applies to the target of the trip. So at range with whip mastery you would provoke no AOO.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Hmm. Just noticed a second implication of this line of thinking*. A creature with neither Whip Mastery nor Improved Disarm that attempts a disarm against a foe with 15' reach, will provoke twice. Once for attacking with a whip and once for attempting a Combat Maneuver.
Similar to certain ranged attack spells.
* Not to imply I disagree with it, just observing another consequence.
I disagree with this.
This feat does not let you make more than one attack for a given opportunity, but if the same opponent provokes two attacks of opportunity from you, you could make two separate attacks of opportunity (since each one represents a different opportunity). Moving out of more than one square threatened by the same opponent in the same round doesn't count as more than one opportunity for that opponent.The attempt to disarm is a single opportunity. It may provoke because of two different rules about what can provoke the attack, but one attack cannot provoke two AOOs. This was hashed out elsewhere.
It is true that if something provokes for two different rules and someone has a feat that prevents an AOO for one of those rules, the other still kicks in. That is actually what is at issue here, whether Whip Mastery covers both rules or only one.
The writing or rules is usually very concise. For example, in the section on making an attack of opportunity, it just says "An attack of opportunity is a single melee attack." You have to read the section on combat maneuvers to notice that some combat maneuvers can be used "in place of a melee attack". This makes these combat maneuvers attacks. The combat maneuvers don't specifically state you can use them for attacks of opportunity. But put the rules together and they state unambiguously that one can make a disarm or trip CM as an attack of opportunity.
So in this case, I don't see why there is a challenge when the same logic holds. The feat says, "You no longer provoke attacks of opportunity when...
Actually one attack can provoke 2 AoOs if it gives 2 different opportunities.
Tripping with a whip does so. As does casting a ranged attack spell.
And the feat only changes what is explicitly mentioned in the "normal" section. Here the AoO incurred because of attacking with a whip. It says nothing about AoOs due to making a combat maneuver, and thus does not change it.
Actually one attack can provoke 2 AoOs if it gives 2 different opportunities.
That'll get messy real fast, if the enemy's AoOs also provoke multiple AoOs.
Actually one attack can provoke 2 AoOs if it gives 2 different opportunities.That'll get messy real fast, if the enemy's AoOs also provoke multiple AoOs.
Madness!
This is why nobody likes combat-reflex style builds :P
In any case, before I'll be satisfied I am wrong, I'd like someone with authority at Paizo to weigh in, preferably with an entry in the FAQ.
I hope you don't mind waiting, then. First, that's not how this process typically works. Second, they don't usually release new FAQs when they've already answered a nearly identical question (this is pretty much the ranged attack spell question they already responded to).
|
|
First, where are you getting the idea that it attacks as a ranged weapon? It provokes as if attacking with a ranged weapon, but other than that it is a normal melee reach attack. It benefits from flanking, sneak attack, precision, etc. as normal.It is a normal melee weapon except that it does not threaten squares into which it can reach. If it doesn't threaten then that means it cannot make attacks of opportunity nor can it provide a flanking advantage.
I was wrong in thinking it could not do sneak attack damage. I assumed that since ranged weapons did not get sneak attack damage, neither would the whip.
Where do you get the idea that ranged attacks cannot get sneak attack damage?
Ranged weapons cannot get sneak attack from flanking, but they can get sneak attack in other ways. During the first round or surprise round, before their target has acted, and are flatfooted, the ranged attacker, if within 30' (archetype/feat/talent can adjust this distance), they get sneak damage. If, somehow, they can deny their target their Dex bonus to AC, they get sneak damage if within the legal distance.
Sniping is a thing. So are the various forms of invisibility. Heck, this is why Ninjas get the Vanishing Trick talent. Greater Invisibility is something anyone with sneak attack values highly.