Clarification on Unarmed attacks, lethal damage and threatening.


General Discussion


Since this applies to multiple sections of the playtest document as well as things from the GM and player side I decided to post it in the general discussion rather than in any of the specific sections

I was trying to figure out how nonlethal and lethal unarmed attacks worked as well as how easy it is to threaten with your feet when your hands are occupied. I'll quote some of the rules in spoilers to make them easily available.

Lets start with what unarmed attacks are

Unarmed attacks pag 178:

You can Strike with your fist or another body part, calculating your attack and damage rolls in the same way you would with a weapon. This counts as a simple weapon, so almost all characters start out trained in unarmed attacks. Use the statistics for a fist even if you’re kicking, kneeing, or attacking with another part of your body. Some ancestry feats, class features, class feats, and spells give access to special, more powerful unarmed attacks.

Now keep in mind that the default fist is 1d4, brawling group, Agile, finessable, nonlethal and unarmed. And you use this for all your unarmed strikes (headbut, kicks, elbow, ect)

All the Barbarian animal totem weapons do NOT have the nonlethal trait and specify natural weapons. (claws, antelers, ect)

All the Monk's special unarmed attacks DO carry the nonlethal trait, and generally do not specify limbs.
What does the nonlethal tag mean?

Nonlethal Attacks Pag 295:
You can make a nonlethal attack in an effort to knock
someone out instead of killing them (see Getting Knocked Out on page 295). Weapons with the nonlethal trait
(including fists) do this automatically. If you’re making a nonlethal attack with a weapon that doesn’t have the nonlethal trait, calculate your attack roll’s result as if you were untrained with the weapon. Likewise, you can attempt lethal attacks with a weapon that has the nonlethal feature, also calculating your attack roll’s result as though you were untrained.

Monks get Powerful fist to allow them to hit lethally with non lethal unarmed attacks.

powerful fist pag 97:
When striking with your fist, you deal 1d6 damage instead of 1d4. You use your normal proficiency when making a lethal attack with a nonlethal unarmed attack.

But fighters and other classes get no such thing. Since there is no feat to pick, does that mean that any character that wants to fight with his body is expected to get monk and multiclass into something else or get stuck taking a -2 to -5 penalty on their unarmed lethal attacks?

And if you need to treat them as untrained does that mean you cannot use the brawling critical weapon effect if you fight lethally with the penalty?

Then there is the question of flanking with your mere existence

flanking pag 313-314:

When you and an ally are on opposite sides of an enemy, you’re flanking that enemy. While the enemy is flanked, it is flat-footed (taking a –2 circumstance penalty to AC) to the creatures who are flanking it. To flank a foe, you and your ally must be on opposites sides or opposite corners of the creature. A line drawn between the center of your space to the center of your ally’s space must pass through either opposite sides or opposite corners of the enemy’s space. Both you and the ally have to be threatening that enemy: this means you both must be wielding weapons or ready to make unarmed attacks and not under any effects that prevent you from making attacks. If you have reach, you determine whether you are flanking creatures out to the distance of your reach because you threaten all of those squares.

Since you always have your feet with you, and they are treated as simple weapons. Does that mean that you are always threatening? (even with occupied hands)
And if not, that exactly does this mean?

Quote:
or ready to make unarmed attacks

mean?

I have seen people raise some of these issues on the forum, but not the multiclassing requirement for unarmed combatants or the always flanking.


What I think you may be missing is that there's not much reason to be worried if damage is non-lethal. The only time it matters is if you reduce a target to zero hp. If the damage that knocks them below zero is lethal the target is unconscious and gains Dying 1 (Dying 2 if the attack was a crit), but if the damage was non-lethal the target is only unconscious. That's it. So, there's very little reason to take the penalty to do lethal damage with an unarmed attack.


Quote:
What I think you may be missing is that there's not much reason to be worried if damage is non-lethal.

The same reason i was worried about it in PF 1. What about if you are fighting undead, constructs or other creatures that are immune to non-lethal?

You either need to pick up a gauntlet weapon or start make a multiclass monks

A general feat could easily solve this, just like it did in PF1.


Actually, undead are no longer immune to non-lethal. Looks like only constructs are, at least of stuff in the playtest bestiary. That's sufficient for your point to stand, of course.


The new errata might appear to resolve some issues but left a major oversight in. Using lethal weapons to attack non lethally, but doing lethal damage with non-lethal hasn't been changed.

Non lethal pag 295 wrote:


You can make a nonlethal attack in an effort to knock someone out instead of killing them (see Getting Knocked Out on page 295). Weapons with the nonlethal trait(including fists) do this automatically. If you’re making a nonlethal attack with a weapon that doesn’t have the nonlethal trait, you take a –2 circumstance penalty to the attack roll . Likewise, you can attempt lethal attacks with a weapon that has the nonlethal feature, also calculating your attack roll’s result as though you were untrained.

This is strange as they have changed the monks powerful fist to read:

powerful fist pag 97 wrote:
When striking with your fist, you deal 1d6 damage instead of 1d4. You don’t take the –2 circumstance penalty when making a lethal attack with a nonlethal unarmed attack.

So is that an oversight not changing the second paragraphs second sentence, or are monkes still the only way to use fist lethally without penalties?

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