Simply put, I've seen tons of threads like this, but due to all the arguing I can't find an answer. This must have been answered by a Paizo rep right?
Two groups in same vicinity, one group undetected, a PC from the undetected group fires his bow at an "enemy" from the other group. Allow the shot, then roll initiative? If so, where does the original shooter go? He could get two straight shots if he rolls highest.
Thanks!
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No free extra action. The GM Core says this:
When do you ask players to roll initiative? In most
cases, it’s pretty simple: you call for the roll as soon as
one participant intends to attack (or issue a challenge,
draw a weapon, cast a preparatory spell, start a social
encounter such as a debate, or otherwise begin to use an
action that their foes can’t help but notice). A player will
tell you if their character intends to start a conflict, and
you’ll determine when the actions of NPCs and other
creatures initiate combat.
The next page has a long and somewhat rambling paragraph about hidden enemies, but that doesn't change this.
Let's dissect why the rule is like it is, because it's a good rule.
The first attack you do each round has no MAP. For enemies, it's likely to be at a high attack bonus, because enemies tend to have high attack bonus to begin with and if there's some kind of ambush, the one making the first attack is probably not the junior enemy. So getting two attacks in a row would be really brutal, potentially two crits in a row.
How could you imagine this happening? Well, someone who's got the element of the surprise should probably be going first. Unless of course their ambush is kinda clumsy and they're so deep in the bushes that they actually waste some time getting loose enough that they can take a shot. That uncertainty is what you simulate by having everyone roll initiative. Maybe the people being ambushed react faster than their ambushers!
So are there no mechanical benefits at all to laying an ambush? Actually, there are a couple of significant ones:
1. The rogue Surprise Assault ability. If a rogue is using Avoid Notice and beats someone's initiative, that enemy is off-guard to the rogue. So you can do ranged sneak attacks, or sneak attacks when your allies haven't set up flanks yet.
2. If you're ambushed, you might not get to use reactions before you've had your turn:
The GM determines whether you
can use reactions before your first turn begins, depending
on the situation in which the encounter happens.
Some people still think that it's a standard rule that you never have reactions before your first turn in combat. That's wrong. The rule is that the GM decides based on the circumstances. Getting surprised is a reasonable circumstance not to get reactions in.
3. Time to prepare buff effects. Like spells that last a minute or 10 minutes, or drinking some mutagens.
4. Positioning. You can start the fight when enemies are in a weak position. Maybe even with some traps around.
So altogether, ambushes and surprise attacks are still pretty nice. But no free attacks/surprise rounds.
There is no such thing as a surprise round
Probably I whould be it mechanically like this. I'd assume that the ambushing group was waiting for the players to reach a certain point. At that point I'd resolve a reaction then call for initiative.
If that action/reaction was a trap triggers then the trap resolves and initative is normal.
That action/reaction could easily be a bandit leader calls out attack. So normal roll for initiative. So you could get a situation where the players being ambushed act before the bandits who are ambushing them.
But you could imagine that one bandit uses a reaction (readied action) to attack, so you would resolve that attack action first and then roll for initiative. Yes this does seem to be within the rules. It is up to the GM to decide which is appropriate. It is clear that whole surprise rounds are not parts of PF2. But a surprise reaction or held action is possible.
I'd like to note that the GM can add circumstance modiifers to his hearts content. So a players really high initiative modifier may not always protect them.
PF2's initiative procedures aren't terribly satisfying in the rare occasion where one party launches an attack from a position that you would imagine they could not possibly be noticed from, but I have to say I still don't miss surprise rounds and the endless jockeying for an ambush, or simply to be the first to announce their attack in hopes the other is caught off-guard.
Oh nice, and Ascalaphus rides in with the appropriate citations and explanations. That's gonna save me some time.
This is definitely one of those "Good for players, good for monsters" kinds of things, because frankly players are rarely going to be in a situation where they can meaningfully ambush a foe, while monsters very often are set up for precisely this purpose. In fact, some monsters make such efficient ambush predators that even in 2e some of them still have a way to lash out in situations where Initiative may not have been rolled yet, such as the mimic's Object Lesson reaction or the Aquatic Ambush ability.
On the other hand, I there there is a case for allowing a rare break from operating procedure. Simply being the first to attack from hiding isn't enough--it has to be truly special circumstances that would be difficult to reproduce (certainly more difficult than setting up a standard ambush). For example, in an adventure I was running, the party were descending underwater in a cramped bathysphere with a single window for visibility. Even if the surrounding water weren't turning dark with the depth, it would have been all but impossible for them to see a black dragon out in those waters, lurking some 100' away casting Darkness on their location.
Because the darkness was not a direct attack, and because it would have strained credulity for any party member to possibly have detected the dragon before the next turn where it swam up and tried knocking around the bathysphere as some atmospheric harassment to set up for the fight, I ruled that it could cast the whole spell as a way to announce its presence to the party.
It's worth adding, for the regular ambush situation, even in the (relatively rare) situation that your ambush is successful (i.e. you rolled Stealth high enough to remain undetected) but your enemies reacted more quickly, they still have to spend Seek actions to detect your location, and may not correctly guess where they should be looking in the first place!
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One interesting thing I've noticed a lot in ambushes, is that tradition 1E surprise rounds actually didn't always work well for ambushers.
Imagine you have a tiger. To make a good attack it needs to close in to melee, then do a bunch of attacks. With 1E surprise rules, it would only get a standard action, so that's not gonna work just like that. Okay, but tigers are ambush predators, so they get Pounce, which allows them to do a charge plus full attack as a standard action. But the problem is that charge can only be done in a straight line. But to be hidden from people you need some cover or concealment to hide behind, so that straight line is not so easy to achieve.
If you tried to build surprise rounds in 2E by giving people one free action at the start of combat, you'd end up more or less with the same problem. One action isn't enough to get to melee AND do some good attacks.
But it also starts to show a better solution: make it so that the ambushing side does better in melee. That means they get to move first and attack first and try to gain some advantage. Meanwhile, the surprised people might not have their weapons ready which also costs an action. (And can provoke reactive strikes, since Interacting to draw weapons has the manipulate trait.)
Now I don't think it's a good idea to make it so the entire ambushing side automatically wins initiative. Because then you get all the enemies, and then all the PCs. You often get focus-fire situations one way or the other that are too extreme.
A more balanced approach is to give enemies a bonus to initiative rolls, so on average more of them will be earlier in initiative than the PCs, but not all of them.
So then we get to where it's actually pretty simple to run ambushes:
- If enemies have excellent preparation, give them a bonus (say, +2 circumstance) to their Stealth rolls that they use for Initiative. Also, their Stealth score might be their strongest skill to begin with.
- Ambushing enemies tend to have weapons already drawn. If the PCs are completely unsuspecting they're in danger, they probably don't have weapons ready yet.
- People who like to ambush often have abilities like Pounce (lots of big cats) or Surprise Assault (rogues) that work better if you win initiative. And remember, winning initiative is actually the same thing as successfully surprising people.
Add that if the ambush begins from behind standard or greater cover, technically they do already bring +2 to +4 circumstance bonus to the table--although I don't know if it was ever intended for this bonus to apply to initiative rolls and not just the Hide/Sneak portion of the Stealth roll. That said, this sounds like a good argument in favour of an initiative bonus for a well-placed ambush. Should you fail that roll and your opponents still outdraw you at that point, I suppose it's only appropriate to say they had the quicker reaction time. I think I like this.
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1. The rogue Surprise Assault ability. If a rogue is using Avoid Notice and beats someone's initiative, that enemy is off-guard to the rogue. So you can do ranged sneak attacks, or sneak attacks when your allies haven't set up flanks yet.
2. If you're ambushed, you might not get to use reactions before you've had your turn:
PC1 p. 436 wrote:The GM determines whether you
can use reactions before your first turn begins, depending
on the situation in which the encounter happens.Some people still think that it's a standard rule that you never have reactions before your first turn in combat. That's wrong. The rule is that the GM decides based on the circumstances. Getting surprised is a reasonable circumstance not to get reactions in.
3. Time to prepare buff effects. Like spells that last a minute or 10 minutes, or drinking some mutagens.
4. Positioning. You can start the fight when enemies are in a weak position. Maybe even with some traps around.
More than just this. I'd go as far as to say you didn't include the most three most widely applicable advantages.
5. Using stealth to initiative, including cover. GM Core explicitly calls out cover bonuses apply to initiative, and if you're literally waiting to ambush someone that is a +4 circumstance bonus. Also, anyone can upgrade their stealth proficiency but your perception proficiency is basically limited by your class. Even in a situation where you have concealment but not cover (which is quite rare) you can get a juicy circumstance bonus from Follow the Expert.
6. You almost always start combat at least hidden, and potentially unobserved or even unnoticed. You compare your stealth initiative roll to the Perception DC of the enemy (not their perception roll for initiative) and even if you failed (but not critically failed) the enemy starts combat only knowing your square. If they go first and try to target you without Seeking or moving so cover isn't in the way, they have a 50% miss chance. If you go before them they will be off guard against your first ranged strike. Very nice for gunslingers in particular.
7. If the enemy rolls higher than everyone else for initiative, but if no one on your side rolls below that enemy's perception DC then the enemy gets a feeling that there's someone watching but doesn't know where. The enemy might use actions to Seek (unreliably since Seek covers a very small area on a big outdoor map), draw weapons, or cast a preparatory spell... But it can't actually attack with its high initiative most of the time, and those prepatory actions are much more likely to benefit PCs than they will an owl bear.
One last note: if you are observing a creature before initiative is rolled, this is an excellent time to use concentration based activities like Recall Knowledge, Hunt Prey, or Pursue a Lead. Investigators in particular have this fun interaction where if their entire side rolls high enough for stealth in an ambush scenario (or Deception in a social ambush) you can sit there Devising a Strategem repeatedly until you get nat 20, then open the fight with a crit as your first action. It won't come up often but feels great when it does.
5. Using stealth to initiative, including cover. GM Core explicitly calls out cover bonuses apply to initiative...
Oh my, and I was just in that section last night. I might have seen it myself if not for my eyes!
Now the only situation I can imagine where you would not start an encounter with +2 to +4 initiative is if you were relying on Convealment to sneak, or else your last implied movement before the roll is made would have taken you out if cover for that action (since you need to remain behind cover for the whole duration of a Sneak to gain it's benefit to the Stealth roll--something normally trivial to achieve when you haven't even entered a room yet!)
Also how would you even remove this bonus? They roll stealth for initiative, they have a bonus for stealth, and you would remove it why? *puzzled look*
I would not remove it, of course, nor dud I say I would. Why would you imagine my speculation motivated by mean-spirited desires to tear every small bonus from my players? This seems hardly in common with the actual content of my post.
I don't imagine that. I was just confused how this could even work, that's all. I also tried to be as amicable as I could, but seems failed at it. Well, the post was a quibble...Also how would you even remove this bonus? They roll stealth for initiative, they have a bonus for stealth, and you would remove it why? *puzzled look*I would not remove it, of course, nor dud I say I would. Why would you imagine my speculation motivated by mean-spirited desires to tear every small bonus from my players? This seems hardly in common with the actual content of my post.
No, yeah, that's fair. I read too deep into the tone I read in my head.
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As for the preceding discussion, I think I miscommunicated. The scenario I outlined is not Cover (Stealth Init) vs No Cover (Perception Init) but rather
<Plausibly Had Cover for Entire Time Up to Initiative Roll> (Stealth+2) which I now imagine to be the default especially any time you start in the hall when the battle is joined, and
<Broke Cover But Still Finished Movement Behind Cover Before Initiative> (Stealth+0) which may be a plausible explanation for how a character ended up starting in a position already inside the room but is still hidden from the enemy
Either way, knowing that cover is explicitly intended to buff your initiative when rolling Stealth, I kind of wish the Avoid Notice section called out this common use case benefit with an in-text reminder of the effects of cover on Stealth rolls. Seems like it would be a useful place to have such information to help as a reference in play.