Grappling alternatives or a really good chart that explains it all

[brienprime]

Grappling. I have a flowchart chart to help me through creatures grabbing my players. It seems like alot of work for nothing.

Does anyone have a better way to approach this process? I think my needing a flowchart and still not really understand the worth of using the process is an issue. It maybe the chart I'm looking at is ass, do any of you have your go to chart to assist you with grappling?

I really need some help with this.

Thanks
Brienprime

[Kasoh]

I used to use this one before I just memorized how grappling works.

This chart is not helpful for creatures with the grab ability, but it covers most cases.

As for why grapple? Well, a monster with constrict gets free damage every time they succeed at a grapple check, and its a free action to release a grapple, so constrict is essentially double damage for a lot of creatures.

A lot of times though, its not good for a 1 creature vs party fight, but if there's a couple of creatures and one of them can grapple, you can lock down party members.

It also shuts down the majority of spellcasting, which can be fun if you have a caster heavy party. Most casters can't escape easily as well. It has its uses.

[Diego Rossi]

Grappling:
1) Simulates reality, especially the attack routine of some creature.
2) Work better if you have equal or superior numbers. For adventurers 1 player grappling allows the others to attack at a bonus.

The downsides are:
1) PCs generally fight creatures that have higher CMB and CMD than theirs, so the one doing the grabbing normally is a full BAB character with good physical stats. Exactly the same guy that deals the maximum damage while fighting. He generally does less damage when grappling.
2) If you are grappling you are grappled, so the enemies have an advantage against the grappling character.

Essentially, it does its job but usually isn't so useful for a PC.

[Taja the Barbarian]

Combat Maneuvers like Grappling and Disarming have serious issues in actual gameplay:

1) There are a lot of foes these maneuvers just don't work against, which makes investing in them kinda problematic.
2) When they do work, they tend to work too well as they basically lock down the target and prevent them from acting as intended, which makes for a really boring BBEG encounter (I seem to recall 'PFS Monk grapples BBEG Wizard, Boss encounter drags on as he can't cast while other PCs beat him down', 'Evil swordsman disarmed by PFS PCs and has no backup weapon', and 'PFS PCs Sunder BBEG's spell component pouch to prevent spell casting' being fairly popular thread topics a few years ago).

In the interest of, well, interesting gameplay, these kinds of tactics are best avoided as they become 'I Win' buttons far too often...

[brienprime]

That's the flow chart I use too.

It just seems like we swap who's in control each turn and nothing gets resolved.

I'm running Ironfang Invasion and lots of critters have a Grapple ability and it's just monotonous that's why I'm looking for a better way to do this, instead of just ignoring the ability

I'll try again next Friday.

I appreciate all your input.

- Brienprime

[brienprime]

That's the chart I'm using.

It just seems like nothing happens while grappling. Monster grabs a PC, they do nothing but swap who's in control of the grapple.

The other PCs kill whatever else is in the encounter and then they kill the grappling critter.

I appreciate everyone's help.

Thank you
- Brienprime

[Ooze licker]

It's a good chart.