I decided to give a Trip specialist a shot. They are indeed brutal. Almost nothing is immune to being knocked prone. Prone only provides a bonus against ranged attacks if you take cover while prone. Reflex saves are usually the lowest on many creatures.
I want to make sure I'm running this right in regards to flying creatures because knocking them out of the air seems pretty powerful.
The questions:
If you trip a flying creature, they are knocked to the ground prone if they are less than 500 feet up?
They can use the Arrest a Fall reaction to prevent themselves from taking any damage when falling, but are still knocked prone? Or they land without going prone because they don't take damage? Tripping doesn't require damage, but going prone when falling does. What rule applies? Trip or not taking damage when falling?
Even flying creatures must take an action to right themselves before taking other actions after being knocked prone? They can't fly off from the prone position?
Is anything immune to being knocked prone? From what I'm seeing everything can be tripped. Is that true? It trip the most powerful maneuver in PF2? The God Maneuver?
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I believe you only land prone from a fall if you take damage. If the flier successfully arrests their fall they will land gently, taking no damage, and not be prone. However they will be on the ground.
I vaguely remember something about swimming creatures not being able to be knocked prone, but I can't find it currently.
Also, I think the interpretation that you only get a bonus to defense while prone if you take an action might be incorrect.
Prone says:
You're lying on the ground. You are flat-footed and take a –2 circumstance penalty to attack rolls. The only move actions you can use while you're prone are Crawl and Stand. Standing up ends the prone condition. You can Take Cover while prone to hunker down and gain greater cover against ranged attacks, even if you don't have an object to get behind, gaining a +4 circumstance bonus to AC against ranged attacks (but you remain flat-footed).
If you would be knocked prone while you're Climbing or Flying, you fall (see Falling for the rules on falling). You can't be knocked prone when Swimming.
Take cover says:
You press yourself against a wall or duck behind an obstacle to take better advantage of cover. If you would have standard cover, you instead gain greater cover, which provides a +4 circumstance bonus to AC; to Reflex saves against area effects; and to Stealth checks to Hide, Sneak, or otherwise avoid detection. Otherwise, you gain the benefits of standard cover (a +2 circumstance bonus instead). This lasts until you move from your current space, use an attack action, become unconscious, or end this effect as a free action.
Cover says a lot, including light cover (like a creature) still provides a benefit, albeit lesser.
It's a bit obtuse, but I think there is potentially a case that being prone grants you some sort of bonus (or at least should) but it's not explicitly spelled out.
However, I would find it odd that you can take an action to take cover and get greater cover while prone with no object protecting you, but you wouldn't have at least light cover from being prone with no object protecting you. Not impossible (mechanically), just very odd.
Oh, and it appears that cover doesn't only apply to ranged attacks. It's simply a circumstance bonus to AC. I see no stipulation that it's only to ranged attacks the way prone worked in PF1.
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Being prone makes you flat-footed, which gives a -2 penalty to AC against both melee and ranged attacks.
If you are prone out in the middle of an empty room, then you don't have cover. Being prone does not by itself give you cover against ranged attacks. Or melee attacks.
If you are prone, you can spend an action on Take Cover to get the +4 bonus against ranged attacks even if you don't have cover. You are still flat-footed and take the -2 penalty from that though. So that means that for ranged attacks you will have a net +2 bonus to AC if the only things affecting you are being flat-footed and taking cover. You will still be at -2 AC for melee attacks.
So Trip is still better than say [i]Earthbind[/b] at bringing something to the ground, even if it arrests it's fall preventing damage.
It is a lot more powerful than it was in PF1 from what I recall and a lot easier to do. Monks with Flurry of Maneuvers are nasty trippers.
I did find incorporeal creatures can't be tripped unless you have maybe a ghost touch rune to physically interact with an incorporeal creature.
As I understand it Take Cover requires an action even if you are prone to gain the cover bonus.
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So Trip is still better than say [i]Earthbind[/b] at bringing something to the ground, even if it arrests it's fall preventing damage.
Well, maybe. Though I am not sure how most characters are going to reach far enough to trip something flying overhead. Earthbind has a 120 foot range.
So Trip is still better than say [i]Earthbind[/b] at bringing something to the ground, even if it arrests it's fall preventing damage.Well, maybe. Though I am not sure how most characters are going to reach far enough to trip something flying overhead. Earthbind has a 120 foot range.
Ranged Trip comes to mind. Bounty Hunter gets access to bolas and inventor can attach it to any simple/martial ranged weapon [up to 180'].
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I did find incorporeal creatures can't be tripped unless you have maybe a ghost touch rune to physically interact with an incorporeal creature.
The rule states that "An incorporeal creature can’t attempt Strength-based checks against physical creatures or objects—only against incorporeal ones—unless those objects have the ghost touch property rune. Likewise, a corporeal creature can’t attempt Strength-based checks against incorporeal creatures or objects."
The way I've been running it is that as long as the weapon or specific unarmed attack has the rune and the action's trait, it can work. So in AV my monk that has Ghost Touch hand wraps and an attack with the Grapple trait can Grapple a ghost, but he can't Trip a ghost since he has no attacks with the Trip trait.
However, tripping a ghost brings up other questions, since most ghosts only have a fly speed...
Ranged Trip comes to mind. Bounty Hunter gets access to bolas and inventor can attach it to any simple/martial ranged weapon [up to 180'].So Trip is still better than say [i]Earthbind[/b] at bringing something to the ground, even if it arrests it's fall preventing damage.Well, maybe. Though I am not sure how most characters are going to reach far enough to trip something flying overhead. Earthbind has a 120 foot range.
Sure. But now you have to actually plan and build for that. It isn't just a standard Trip action that anybody has available.
There may also be the Extending rune. I think that RAW that only works for Strike, not Trip attacks with a flail for example. But I could see that being a reasonable houserule to allow.
Sure. But now you have to actually plan and build for that. It isn't just a standard Trip action that anybody has available.
It's not a great deal of planning though: and if someone is asking about tripping flying creatures, it already sounds like they are trying to plan for it.
You can also be human and go the Unconventional Weaponry route [Shoanti use bolas, derro use aklys].
I did find incorporeal creatures can't be tripped unless you have maybe a ghost touch rune to physically interact with an incorporeal creature.The rule states that "An incorporeal creature can’t attempt Strength-based checks against physical creatures or objects—only against incorporeal ones—unless those objects have the ghost touch property rune. Likewise, a corporeal creature can’t attempt Strength-based checks against incorporeal creatures or objects."
The way I've been running it is that as long as the weapon or specific unarmed attack has the rune and the action's trait, it can work. So in AV my monk that has Ghost Touch hand wraps and an attack with the Grapple trait can Grapple a ghost, but he can't Trip a ghost since he has no attacks with the Trip trait.
However, tripping a ghost brings up other questions, since most ghosts only have a fly speed...
The way I understand it a flying creature still has to stand before flying. I wasn't playing it this way initially, but I understand it. A flying creature using wings would probably have to right itself before flying. But a ghost could just sink through the ground or float up and shouldn't care about being tripped. Anything that flies as its natural movement without wings should be able to move in three dimensions and shouldn't have to worry about prone, but the game rules don't seem to account for this.
Trip does indeed seem like a God Maneuver in PF2. It's super effective against almost anything and fairly easy to build up. Not sure I love Trip being this powerful myself, but we'll see how it goes.
So Trip is still better than say [i]Earthbind[/b] at bringing something to the ground, even if it arrests it's fall preventing damage.Well, maybe. Though I am not sure how most characters are going to reach far enough to trip something flying overhead. Earthbind has a 120 foot range.
Monks move real fast. As far as I know the bonus to movement for ground movement translates to flying which uses their ground movement to set the speed. It says add the movement bonus to your speed. Not sure the specifics of how that interacts with a variety of rules. With the base fly spell, they can cruise up to a flying creature and crush it to the ground fairly easy.
My group is well aware of the effectiveness of tripping enemies, but yet still prefers most of the time to just do a damaging attack. Most trips are done via using assurance as a third action when done. I have not seen in my personal experience with any group I have played trip being abused or feeling too powerful.
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Monks move real fast. As far as I know the bonus to movement for ground movement translates to flying which uses their ground movement to set the speed. It says add the movement bonus to your speed. Not sure the specifics of how that interacts with a variety of rules. With the base fly spell, they can cruise up to a flying creature and crush it to the ground fairly easy.
Well if you specify that as your comparison point in the beginning that would lead to a lot less debate about it.
But when all you say is:
So Trip is still better than say [i]Earthbind[/b] at bringing something to the ground, even if it arrests it's fall preventing damage.
I'm thinking just a plain old level 1 generic character version of Trip. Not a character with a fly speed or someone who brought a ranged trip weapon.
No, Earthbind is not the only, or arguably even the best possible option for bringing a flying creature down to the ground.
But for a level 5 party that finds out that they are going to be going up against a flying enemy tomorrow, having the Druid prepare Earthbind in the morning could be a lot easier and faster than running back to town to get a bola or six.
Monks move real fast. As far as I know the bonus to movement for ground movement translates to flying which uses their ground movement to set the speed. It says add the movement bonus to your speed. Not sure the specifics of how that interacts with a variety of rules. With the base fly spell, they can cruise up to a flying creature and crush it to the ground fairly easy.Well if you specify that as your comparison point in the beginning that would lead to a lot less debate about it.
But when all you say is:
So Trip is still better than say [i]Earthbind[/b] at bringing something to the ground, even if it arrests it's fall preventing damage.I'm thinking just a plain old level 1 generic character version of Trip. Not a character with a fly speed or someone who brought a ranged trip weapon.
No, Earthbind is not the only, or arguably even the best possible option for bringing a flying creature down to the ground.
But for a level 5 party that finds out that they are going to be going up against a flying enemy tomorrow, having the Druid prepare Earthbind in the morning could be a lot easier and faster than running back to town to get a bola or six.
I'm almost always talking about higher level play with access to higher level options like fly.
Earthbind could still be useful for a lower level party.
Trip wasn't this powerful in PF1. It was a decent option, but it's a god maneuver in PF2 if you build for it. It slants battles toward the PCs in nearly every single fight, especially boss encounters where you destroy them. It's better than slow for much lower resource cost. Force the enemy to use an action to stand up while flat-footing them at the same time and stacks with slow for a completely useless enemy built of a skill you can build up to legendary. It's far more brutal than I recall in PF1. Sort of like the PF2 version of grappling, which was super harsh in PF1.
Sort of like the PF2 version of grappling, which was super harsh in PF1.
Well, PF2 grappling is pretty good too. Even if it is a bit harder to land since it targets Fortitude.
If they Escape, they have not only wasted an action, they have progressed MAP.
If they don't Escape, they have a 20% chance of losing any manipulate action they make. I don't think that affects Strike though. But it certainly affects a lot of ranged weapons being reloaded and most spellcasting.
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Remember, monsters should be tripping too. :-)
It's one of the overlooked flaws of ignoring Dex in heavy armor. IMO heavily armored PCs should be landing on their backs more often, especially if minions have trouble hitting you (or have AoOs) & if they have good Athletics of course (which most do).
PF1 did have some brutal trip builds, and standing up robbed enemies of their full attack while provoking to everybody. Or stay down and die. And that penalty stacked well while in PF2 it's on a list of sources for flat-footed which would be redundant together. The main hurdle was the investment needed, though there were shortcuts around that. I GMed an early PF1 Monk who'd had to invest normally (need decent Int & several feats) and he'd open by tripping everyone around him, which was often a death sentence as his Combat Reflexes hit at full BAB. I breathed a sigh of relief whenever a PFS boss couldn't be tripped! He could solo tank for a whole party of backrow PCs by tying up the enemies w/ tripping. In PF2, enemies can stand and still have movement to deliver their main attack against a backrow PC.
Though yeah, PF2 backrow PCs might be surprisingly good at Trip too!
ETA: The fact Trip now works vs. flyers and enemies w/o legs (or w/ tons of legs) does make it more universally applicable in PF2, so that's an upgrade too.
Is this the part where we restart the argument about if trip being capable of inflicting damage on a critical success makes it a "damaging effect" and therefore subject to bulwark?Remember, monsters should be tripping too. :-)
It's one of the overlooked flaws of ignoring Dex in heavy armor. IMO heavily armored PCs should be landing on their backs more often, especially if minions have trouble hitting you (or have AoOs) & if they have good Athletics of course (which most do).
Bulwark is on reflex saves, not reflex DC.
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Bulwark is on reflex saves, not reflex DC.Is this the part where we restart the argument about if trip being capable of inflicting damage on a critical success makes it a "damaging effect" and therefore subject to bulwark?Remember, monsters should be tripping too. :-)
It's one of the overlooked flaws of ignoring Dex in heavy armor. IMO heavily armored PCs should be landing on their backs more often, especially if minions have trouble hitting you (or have AoOs) & if they have good Athletics of course (which most do).
No. Bonuses to saves affect DCs. Arguing to try to make bulwark apply to trip isn't worth spending time on, but you've got the general rule mistaken, if you aren't applying save bonuses when calculating DCs.
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Bulwark is on reflex saves, not reflex DC.No. Bonuses to saves affect DCs. Arguing to try to make bulwark apply to trip isn't worth spending time on, but you've got the general rule mistaken, if you aren't applying save bonuses when calculating DCs.
Seconded. DCs are always calculated as 10 +bonus value. Changing the bonus value changes the DC also.
And at best Bulwark would apply to the critical success DC where trip causes damage, but not the regular success DC that only causes a non-damaging condition. And since having the standard DC and critical success DC be more than 10 points apart is a houserule, that probably doesn't work by RAW either.
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I believe you only land prone from a fall if you take damage. If the flier successfully arrests their fall they will land gently, taking no damage, and not be prone. However they will be on the ground.
If you are given Prone condition and are flying, you fall. You aren't falling "instead," you are knocked prone and falling now.
Arrest a Fall says you take no damage on a success. It doesn't say anything about changing whether you would become prone or not. Falling Damage does it for sure, but a creature falling from a Trip is falling and receiving the prone condition from the Trip.
I'd argue that a flier knocked prone using Trip falls prone no matter what, but might mitigate their damage from the fall itself.
I believe you only land prone from a fall if you take damage. If the flier successfully arrests their fall they will land gently, taking no damage, and not be prone. However they will be on the ground.If you are given Prone condition and are flying, you fall. You aren't falling "instead," you are knocked prone and falling now.
Arrest a Fall says you take no damage on a success. It doesn't say anything about changing whether you would become prone or not. Falling Damage does it for sure, but a creature falling from a Trip is falling and receiving the prone condition from the Trip.
I'd argue that a flier knocked prone using Trip falls prone no matter what, but might mitigate their damage from the fall itself.
I definitely don't agree with your take. The rules for prone tell you that if you were knocked prone while flying you need to look at the rules for falling. Falling says you only land prone if you take damage from the fall.
If a flier successfully arrest their fall (easy check, but maybe you get lucky and they've already used their reaction) then they wont take any damage and will land on their feat.
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I believe you only land prone from a fall if you take damage. If the flier successfully arrests their fall they will land gently, taking no damage, and not be prone. However they will be on the ground.If you are given Prone condition and are flying, you fall. You aren't falling "instead," you are knocked prone and falling now.
Arrest a Fall says you take no damage on a success. It doesn't say anything about changing whether you would become prone or not. Falling Damage does it for sure, but a creature falling from a Trip is falling and receiving the prone condition from the Trip.
I'd argue that a flier knocked prone using Trip falls prone no matter what, but might mitigate their damage from the fall itself.
I definitely don't agree with your take. The rules for prone tell you that if you were knocked prone while flying you need to look at the rules for falling. Falling says you only land prone if you take damage from the fall.
If a flier successfully arrest their fall (easy check, but maybe you get lucky and they've already used their reaction) then they wont take any damage and will land on their feat.
Again, my assertion is that receiving the Prone condition while flying adds that "you fall" but doesn't replace "being knocked prone" with "falling instead of being knocked Prone." You are knocked Prone, and additionally you are Falling.
Hence why arresting the fall doesn't make you no longer knocked prone, it just prevents fall damage.
If you would be knocked prone while you're Climbing or Flying, you fall (see Falling for the rules on falling).
Success You fall gently, taking no damage from the fall.
Can you arrest a fall to avoid damage? Yes.
If you were falling and you avoided the damage, do you avoid the Prone condition from falling? Yes.
If you received the Prone condition from an effect such as Trip, can you arrest a fall to avoid that Prone condition from that condition? No, not even if you were falling.
The Prone condition from the Trip should stand, since Arrest a Fall doesn't address Prone conditions; it only addresses falling damage (which can cause Prone itself).
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The replacement part comes from these first three words.
If you would be knocked prone while you're Climbing or Flying, you fall (see Falling for the rules on falling).
That is a pretty standard phrase in rules text that I see a lot in at least Paizo stuff. It means that you get the following effect instead of the normal effect for the event.
So it is: if you would be knocked prone while flying, you fall instead of actually getting the prone condition.
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Also, if you get tripped while high enough that you don't hit the ground, you certainly wouldn't be prone then.
The natural reading is they fall and can arrest the fall if knocked prone while flying. It's still very powerful to be able to knock creatures to the ground in melee range without expending a spell slot.
I looked over Earthbind. It isn't a bad spell. Even on a success the creature ends up 120 feet lower to the ground, which can be enough for your party to close and hammer for a round depending on initiative order.
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The natural reading is they fall and can arrest the fall if knocked prone while flying. It's still very powerful to be able to knock creatures to the ground in melee range without expending a spell slot.
I looked over Earthbind. It isn't a bad spell. Even on a success the creature ends up 120 feet lower to the ground, which can be enough for your party to close and hammer for a round depending on initiative order.
My group got attacked by 3 young black dragons while we were on an airship. My character used Earthbind on one of the dragons dropping it 120’ down. It wasn’t enough by any means to damage it, but it did cause the dragon a full round of actions to fly back up to the fight since flying up acts as difficult terrain.
I’m a big fan of the spell.
I did find incorporeal creatures can't be tripped unless you have maybe a ghost touch rune to physically interact with an incorporeal creature.The rule states that "An incorporeal creature can’t attempt Strength-based checks against physical creatures or objects—only against incorporeal ones—unless those objects have the ghost touch property rune. Likewise, a corporeal creature can’t attempt Strength-based checks against incorporeal creatures or objects."
The way I've been running it is that as long as the weapon or specific unarmed attack has the rune and the action's trait, it can work. So in AV my monk that has Ghost Touch hand wraps and an attack with the Grapple trait can Grapple a ghost, but he can't Trip a ghost since he has no attacks with the Trip trait.
However, tripping a ghost brings up other questions, since most ghosts only have a fly speed...
The way I understand it a flying creature still has to stand before flying. I wasn't playing it this way initially, but I understand it. A flying creature using wings would probably have to right itself before flying. But a ghost could just sink through the ground or float up and shouldn't care about being tripped. Anything that flies as its natural movement without wings should be able to move in three dimensions and shouldn't have to worry about prone, but the game rules don't seem to account for this.
Trip does indeed seem like a God Maneuver in PF2. It's super effective against almost anything and fairly easy to build up. Not sure I love Trip being this powerful myself, but we'll see how it goes.
This is a bit confusing to me compared to where you were back in October.
https://paizo.com/threads/rzs43oz4?Pathfinder-2e-lament#47
I think breithauptclan's reading is correct. Additionally supported by the first line of Prone, "You're lying on the ground.", which you can't possibly be doing while midair.
The only weird interaction with that is that flying 5 feet or less in the air now gives you trip protection, because if you get tripped, you don't fall far enough to take damage and actually go prone. I don't mind it though, gives at least a minor boon to fly over airwalk.
If they're flying 5' above the ground, they're losing the major defensive advantage of flying. While that may or may not be relevant depending on timing & their attack options, they're still beholden to moving each round to maintain that. So a fine tactic for flying skirmishers (i.e. most Air Elementals or the Vrock & Gargoyle which seem built tactically to hover above their enemies), but that seems fitting it'd be difficult to pin them down.
And you or an ally could try to trip them once grounded.So yeah, perhaps not the best use of flying for most enemies, and I doubt any PCs or parties are "trip-dependent".
You can also do it with Cat Fall and now you get the cake and eat it, too.