Doorways and melee fighting

[El Hombre Fluo]

I have a doubt regarding doorways and melee fighting.

I know that, by the rules, the following situation means the defender has got +4 bonus to AC:

00A0
**/*
*D0*

A = attacker; D = defender; * = wall; / = opened door; 0 = empty square

What if the situation changes like the following example?

00A0
**/*
*DB*

A = attacker; D = defender; B= attacker's ally; * = wall; / = opened door; 0 = empty square

Is it still possible for the attacker A to hit the defender D, if he has his ally B blocking its only way? If so, what bonus/penalty applies?

[thorin001]

In the first example there is no cover.
In the second example you can make an attack, but the target has cover.

[shaventalz]

thorin001 wrote:

In the first example there is no cover.

In the second example you can make an attack, but the target has cover.

I disagree with the first answer.

There is cover, from the wall/doorframe. The rules for cover say:

Cover wrote:

To determine whether your target has cover from your ranged attack, choose a corner of your square. If any line from this corner to any corner of the target’s square passes through a square or border that blocks line of effect or provides cover, or through a square occupied by a creature, the target has cover (+4 to AC).

When making a melee attack against an adjacent target, your target has cover if any line from any corner of your square to the target’s square goes through a wall (including a low wall).

While the melee section doesn't specify what it means by drawing a line "to the target's square", it's right after the ranged section. The ranged section says you're drawing to "any corner of the target's square," so it seems most reasonable to use this as the default way to determine cover. Another fairly reasonable way would be drawing to the center of the target's square, which will give similar results.

In this case, a line drawn from the attacker's top-left corner to one of the defender's left corners passes through the wall. Therefore, the defender has cover.

Adding soft cover on top of this might doesn't stack, but the rules aren't super-clear on that. Personally, I would consider both to be "cover", and multiple bonuses (to AC) from the same source generally don't stack. However, I have had GMs apply multiple instances of soft cover to someone's AC, so there's definitely differences of opinion here.

[Brother Fen]

There's partial cover in both examples from what I can see. SO, yes, they will get the AC bonus.

[blahpers]

Some notes after plotting it on paper using an actual grid instead of using a proportional-width font:

(In these examinations, I assume that the door itself is sufficiently open that it has no bearing on cover lines or visibility.)

Assuming the asterisks indicate solid 5-foot cubes, this would mean D has cover (not partial) in both cases. There is no point in A's square from which one can see more than half of D.

Assuming the asterisks represent a wall of negligible thickness through the center of the second row of squares, this might represent partial cover:

In the first case, the combat chapter doesn't specify the perspective from which one determines the degree of visibility for the purposes of adjudicating partial cover vs. cover. From the bottom-right corner, one could see more than half of D; from the center of A's square, not so much. I'm not about to break out integrals or anything to get any fancier. I'd call it partial cover and keep things rolling.

In the second case, B blocks some of the lines from A, but partial cover references visibility, not, ah, "blockedness", so it may not matter. At worst, I'd call it "soft cover" for attacks and "partial cover" for Reflex saves. Another GM might make a different call, and I'd be fine with that.

[El Hombre Fluo]

Thanks all for the replies, I wanted to be sure I hadn't missed some well hidden rule.

It seems to me that the rules are a bit thin in the A-B-D scenario. If not totally unrealistic.

I think I'll houserule the A-B-D case, so that A can hit D only if he has reach, and even so with a +4 bonus to the defender's AC.

[blahpers]

Ack, was the wall intended to be between grid squares rather than occupying its own? I hadn't thought of that. X D

But like normal, you can draw lines as indicated in the combat chapter to determine cover. Reach shouldn't be necessary since distance is the same regardless of the presence of B. It's the GM's prerogative to rule otherwise, of course.