| Colette Brunel |
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I am running the Pathfinder 2e Pathfinder Society playtest scenario The Frozen Oath at this very moment, and the game has come to a grinding halt for the past 45 minutes, because one character's life or death at the hands of two elite rocs all boils down to this: "Can a creature be grabbed by two or more other creatures? Can a creature be restrained by two or more other creatures? Can a creature be grabbed by one other creature, and restrained by one other creature?"
What is happening here is that the two elite rocs are tag-teaming against a single PC. They are trying to restrain that PC and lift that PC up together at 1/4th speed, such that if the PC breaks free from one roc (the PC can do so only on a natural 20), the PC is still restrained by the other roc.
However, the rules on conditions are completely unclear on how being grabbed/restrained by multiple creatures work, or if it is even possible in the first place. So then, how does this actually work? It seems as though we might have to skip this battle altogether, because one PC's life hangs in the balance depending on how this finicky rule works.
Once again, grappling rules are a complete headache.
| tmncx0 |
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I think the problem here isn't the grappling rules, but rather the interaction between the Roc's Snatch ability and the normal grappling rules.
By RAW, you may be grappled and restrained by more than one creature at once, and the rules work perfectly fine in that case. Where it gets screwy is when you try to use the Snatch ability by two Rocs at once - each Roc cannot move during the other Roc's turn, which means that a creature grappled by by both Rocs will move with the first Roc to use Snatch. Nothing in the rules say that the second Roc moves as a reaction when the first Roc moves, so clearly, that Roc exits the grapple.
Additionally, it's not clear if the Snatch ability overrides the following clause for the Immobile condition:
If an external force would move you out of your space, it must succeed at a check against either the DC of the effect rooting you or the relevant defense (usually Fortitude DC) of a monster rooting you, as appropriate.
This clause has some holes in it, for sure - namely, what kind of check is the external force supposed to make? Athletics makes the most sense, but it would be nice for the clause to explicitly call this out.
Wording issues aside, I think it's pretty clear that RAI, Snatch is meant to override that clause for a Roc attempting to Snatch a creature it has grabbed or restrained with its talons. Therefore, a Roc does not need to make a check against it's own Fortitude DC to initiate a Snatch.
However, by RAW, the two grappling Rocs must succeed on the checks against each other's Fortitude DCs in order to successfully Snatch a creature when both of them have a creature restrained or grappled. I think that the confusion here could be easily cleared up by adding another clause to Restrained, Immobile, and Grabbed: "If an external force moves you from the affected square, you remove the Restrained, Immobile, and Grabbed conditions."
Then, the situation would play out like so: Both Rocs may attempt to grab and restrain a creature simultaneously. When either Roc attempts to Snatch a creature, they must succeed against the other's Fortitude DC, and if successful, the creature is Snatched and is no longer grabbed or restrained by the other Roc.
Still, by RAW it is impossible for both Rocs to simultaneously Snatch a single creature - neither Roc may move as a Reaction when the other one uses Snatch and flies, therefore, they cannot both be Snatching a single creature at once. Additionally, by RAW, in order to Snatch a creature out of a dual grapple, the Snatching Roc must succeed on some kind of check against the other Roc's Fortitude DC. Those two facts are undeniable. There should be some more clarification around the other gaps in the situation.
| tmncx0 |
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I was rereading my post, and I should clarify my revision to the Immoble condition clause - it should read: “If an external force moves you from the affected square, you are removed from the restrained or grappled condition from that source.” My first wording would introduce confusion as to if the grappled condition is removed entirely, which it should not be, from the Roc initiating the movement.
Another possible solution is to apply a grappled condition to all participants of a grapple, and whenever any participant of a grapple moves, all other participants move as well. This would require adding a new condition that is very similar to Grabbed but I think additional clarification is required.
Pretty much, we need specific grapple rules that outline these interactions with movement and multiple participants, because they are not clear by RAW.
| Colette Brunel |
During my first playthrough of The Frozen Oath, I ultimately had to skip the first fight against the rocs after one PC got grabbed twice, and we could not resolve how it would work, because it would greatly influence the rocs' tactics.
Unsurprisingly, in my second playthrough, a PC likewise would have gotten grabbed twice, which would have greatly influenced the rocs' tactics. Again, we could not figure out how it would actually work, so we had to skip that battle.
It did not help that this corner case also came up, wherein a PC grabbed by a roc was placed under a resilient sphere, and we could not figure out how to resolve it either.
I do not like having to skip over battles because of ambiguous grab rules that smash head-first into relatively simple situations like "What happens when a creature is grabbed by two other creatures?" or "What happens when a resilient sphere goes around a grabbed creature, or the grabber?"
| tmncx0 |
So are you just going to completely ignore my responses? Because I answered your first question. The grapple rules are not ambiguous. The only ambiguous interaction is with the corner case of the Roc’s Snatch ability.
I also see that you ignore the response to your question about resilient sphere in the linked thread. Hmm.
| Colette Brunel |
I am afraid I do not quite parse your explanation here. There is, in fact, an ambiguity that remains unaddressed by your interpretation, found in page 319:
You can have a given condition only once at a time (conditions with different values are considered different conditions for this purpose; see Condition Values). If an effect would impose a condition you’re already being affected by, you now have that condition for the longer of the two durations. The shorter-duration condition effectively ends, though other conditions caused by the original, shorter-duration effect might continue.
As for the separate matter of the resilient sphere, what happened in my playthrough was that a roc was grabbing a PC, and a different PC used a resilient sphere on the other PC. We had no idea how to resolve the grab then; we did not know where the flavor text of resilient sphere started or ended, or indeed, what would happen if the sphere was created in such a way that it would have to cross something (like a grabbing creature's appendages).
| tmncx0 |
The text on page 319 does not cause an ambiguity. It reads "The shorter-duration condition effectively ends" but this does not mean that the effect giving the condition ends, it just means that you cannot suffer the effects of any given condition twice, i.e. they don't stack. This reading is unambiguous and easy to understand. What don't you parse about it?