Knocking someone off to the side

[Fifo]

Say I have a party crossing a bridge with a large ogre, ettin, or cyclops type on the other side. I'd like the enemy to ran into the party and knocking some of them off the bridge to the creek below. however bull rush only pushes someone directly back and overrun says knocks them prone, not necessarily off to the side. Is there some maneuver to push them off the bridge?

[Kayerloth]

Both Grapple and Bull Rush could do it. With Bull Rush you would need to use some of your movement to get in position to use a Standard Action to push them off the bridge, nothing says the movement leading up to the Bull Rush needs to be in a straight line (i.e. it can be but does not have to be part of a Charge). A successful Grapple allows you to move yourself and the target up to half your speed and then place the target in any square adjacent to you. That said placing them in the square of open space off the bridge almost certainly triggers the clause of 'hazardous' location allowing them a free grapple attempt to break the grapple.

Or since you mentioned creatures such as Ettins give the creature the Awesome Blow feat and have them knock the PC off the bridge

[Fifo]

i was thinking of a 10' wide bridge. the party would be side by side going down it. the ettin would be large and take up that 10' space, it moves down the bridge and runs into them. if it overran them i'd think they'd be pushed off the bridge on both sides or he'd be walking on them when they went prone.

[Kayerloth]

By the rules they can simply let the Ettin go through their square(s) if he attempts to Overrun them and he can't end his movement in a square they occupy whether they are prone or not. Technically he can only actually use Overrun vs a single target so he can't Overrun both of them even though his facing is 2 spaces wide. The simplest way is for him to successfully start a grapple then use another grapple check to 'move' one of them over the side of the bridge. I also don't think it unreasonable to use Bull Rush along the diagonal in which case a 'straight' line would be off the bridge. But none of these rule solutions would allow the Ettin to effect more than one PC at a time. He'd need other/additional special abilities or rules to do so (as far as I know). On the otherhand this is a perfect opportunity to design/homebrew the encounter around a grappling(or other method)/toss off the bridge opponent complete with any special rules you want to come up with.

For example maybe he just suddenly grabs the hand rails and gives the rope bridge a good twist sending one or more PCs over the side. (Reflex save DC=10+1/2HD+Str mod)