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Isn't this the minion railgun? Or at least similar. I'm not that veteran on these forums, so my understanding of it is a bit vague.
Anyway...
1) No, nothing in Reposition says that you get a free pass on using the maneuver on an ally. The character doing the Reposition does still have to roll for their success.
2) A more common houserule is that you can improve the degree of success by one step above what you actually rolled because you are using an action on an ally that is designed to normally be used on an enemy.
3) Even critical success on Reposition doesn't let you move the target through an obstacle - and M3 would be an obstacle. M2 could use two Reposition actions, but they would have MAP on the second roll.
4) That is correct. Reposition is forced movement and the target being moved does not provoke reactions.
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1, since M2 was an ally of B, M2 didn't need to roll a check to reposition B
2, since no check was needed, M2 got the critical result of reposition
1 and 2 are clearly not the state of the rules. As for 1, there's no procedure for voluntarily allowing allies' maneuvers to automatically succeed, let alone automatically critically succeed.
There's an optional rule that allows one to voluntarily push an ally's check result up by one step or to voluntarily reduce your save result against an ally's effect by one step. That makes critical results fairly likely, though.
Your GM may just have a house rule that creatures can grant an ally a critical success on maneuvers. That'd presumably allow the PCs to do it, too.
3, M2 could chain two repositions together to move B 20 feet south
I don't know what "chain two repositions together means, so I don't understand exactly what you're asking.
That said, Reposition is one action, so any creature can make as many attempts in a round as they have actions, and with what appears to be your GM's houserule, two attempts would automatically result in 20 feet of movement.
Based on my understanding of the map, though, the first Reposition attempt would leave B stopped in an already-occupied space, and so it wouldn't work. Perhaps this is what you meant by "chain two attempts together" like move 20 feet at once, so that he moves through the ally's space and then "lands" in the unoccupied spaces beyond.
4, since M2 was moving B, B did not provoke a Reactive Strike from me
Technically this is correct, as forced movement doesn't trigger reactions.
But that's pretty busted if you're using a house rule that allows allies to automatically critically succeed as repositioning.
So I'd probably take one of three paths with this rules interactions:
1) If allies can freely maneuver allies, then only movement triggered by enemies' maneuvers would count as forced movement.
2) Make allies check normally for maneuvers "against" allies in all instances, and the results are truly forced movement, so i have no problem with that movement not provoking.
or 3) Allies always check for maneuvers "against" allies, and the target can decide (for free) whether to cooperate, which allows the ally to improve the degree of success by one, but does not result in forced movement, or not to cooperate, in which case ally uses the result as-is, but the result is forced movement.
Did that make any sense?
Finoan hit the nail on the head on this one. Your GM did everything wrong by RAW except the part about Reposition not triggering Reactive Strike from being forced movement.
A legal move here would be Minion 1 (M1) using Reposition twice on the Boss (B) to move them up and to the left so they end up above M1 in your diagram. But as Finoan points out, that would still require M1 to roll two Reposition checks, and the second one would be at -5 since Reposition has the Attack trait.
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Even critical success on Reposition doesn't let you move the target through an obstacle - and M3 would be an obstacle.
Since M3 is an ally or both M1 and B, I don't think M3 would count as an obstacle in the event that B would never stop moving in M3's square, but because of the creatures size and positioning involved, I think M3 is an obstacle in this particular situation.
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1, since M2 was an ally of B, M2 didn't need to roll a check to reposition B
"There's no rule explaining how this works" isn't the same as "you don't need to roll".
Obviously the GM can make a ruling about unclear situations, such as "what would happen if an ally wants to use an action on you that is only described in the rules as a hostile action used by enemies, but you're cool with it because it's your ally".
But when you're making those rulings, you don't get to say it's RAW, since there's no W(ritten).
2, since no check was needed, M2 got the critical result of reposition
This isn't a rule in the book.
3, M2 could chain two repositions together to move B 20 feet south
Well M2 could spend two actions on repositioning, so given points 1 and 2, yes.
4, since M2 was moving B, B did not provoke a Reactive Strike from me
Normally, "forced movement" doesn't provoke. But as pointed out by the others, how forced is this movement?
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I think the GM went a bit overboard here. It's absolutely reasonable to say "you should also be able to try repositioning non-enemies". But going from there to "it always automatically succeeds" and "it's still forced movement so doesn't provoke" is a bit much.
Consider also that if players did this, after a while you'd probably call shenanigans. Because it'd be more efficient to spend your last action moving an ally without provoking, than that enemy spending their first action on that move. So you get this weird "I move you you move me" kinda dance.
When your house rules result in the core play of the game shifting, you've probably overdone it.
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Well M2 could spend two actions on repositioning, so given points 1 and 2, yes.The issue was that the Boss would be occupying a minion square after the first reposition and thus that wouldn't be a valid Reposition, I think the GM was referencing this rule:
https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=2560
If I was arguing for this, I would instead use Moving through an Ally's space.
You can’t end your turn in a square occupied by another creature, though you can end a move action in its square provided that you immediately use another move action to leave that square.
It doesn't quite prove the point, because the rule is written for movement actions that the creature doing the moving is causing - not Forced Movement caused by a 3rd party.
I would still say that it doesn't work because the ally is still an obstacle to Reposition. Yes, you can stride through an ally's space. That doesn't mean that the ally isn't an obstacle to Forced Movement.
My 2 cents:
1, since M2 was an ally of B, M2 didn't need to roll a check to reposition B
2, since no check was needed, M2 got the critical result of reposition
Well the game rules doesn't expect an voluntary reposition so as many said before the most common workaround is to make a Reposition roll with a one step higher also because not only would be more realistic that in a middle of a combat a creature could slip and the reposition fails or just give a success. To use an auto-critical success looks like too good to be true.
3, M2 could chain two repositions together to move B 20 feet south
It wouldn't be a problem (considering 2 critical success) if wasn't the fact that are other creatures blocking the path. Unless you consider it as a voluntary movement...
4, since M2 was moving B, B did not provoke a Reactive Strike from me
And that is my main point here. RAW Reposition is a forced movement but your GM isn't ruling it as RAW it was houseruling. So once that it's a wiling creature that's doesn't making any check I have difficult to consider it a forced movement so IMO it would have to be considered like a voluntary movement and it will trigger movement reactions.
In general your GM forced too much the rules and open a big space for strange exploits. IMO it need to revise how to deal with this.
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I don't generally allow PCs or enemies to use hostile maneuvers on allies gaming the forced movement system or anything of the kind. If the ally was some cruel leader doing this in a hostile fashion, they would have to roll like an enemy with no bonus.
I wouldn't allow it myself.
In this case was a GM using it on its minions.
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I think it's worth asking the GM if he would feel it was okay if the players did this; use Reposition on their last action (who cares about MAP if you don't need to roll for an auto-crit) to do all their movement in ways that don't risk reactions. And to basically let mooks donate their actions to let the boss get free movement.
If he goes "that's shenanigans" then you ask "then what about what you just did?"
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I think it's worth asking the GM if he would feel it was okay if the players did this; use Reposition on their last action (who cares about MAP if you don't need to roll for an auto-crit) to do all their movement in ways that don't risk reactions. And to basically let mooks donate their actions to let the boss get free movement.
If he goes "that's shenanigans" then you ask "then what about what you just did?"
I use this test a lot as a GM when players ask if they can do some obviously silly thing: "Bear in mind that if that interaction works for you, it also works for everything I control." That tends to create some sober second thought in terms of if its a precedent we actually want at our table or not. Sometimes we end up deciding that its totally fine, but often it doesn't sound so good in the other direction. :)
PF2 is a game where there's some things NPCs can do that PCs simply can't, but in cases like this I make it a point to be consistent whenever possible and thus the PCs and NPCs abide by the same ruling, whatever it happens to be. That helps it feel fair and realistic for the players.
In this case as a GM I agree with the general consensus: there is no rule to allow auto-success (let alone auto-crit success on this). I use one degree better as moving someone rapidly in the middle of combat isn't a trivial thing to do even if they're willing without exposing yourself, but the ally being willing should count for something. Likewise you can't move them through an obstacle, doing it multiple times with multiple actions is fine, and it does not provoke.
If the character in question wants to instead simply lift and carry the person that way, then if they have the carrying capacity to do so I wouldn't require a check of any kind but it would take multiple actions and it would provoke as Manipulate. Likewise if they want to drag them: no check required but Manipulate.
Reposition is special in that you can do it as a single action in combat without risk to anyone involved, and that means a check should be required. It's not like it'll be a difficult check for someone good at Athletics, and even someone only trained has a pretty good chance at success against a willing creature with one degree of success better, but a failure risk keeps people honest and keeps some realism of "this is a risky thing to do in the middle of a fight."
There's also taking it to its silly extremes. I play a -1 STR Gnome Cosmos Oracle in Kingmaker who is untrained in Athletics. It's common for me to be Cursebound which gives Enfeebled. So should me and my -1 STR, -3 total Athletics modifier small size PC be automatically critically succeeding to move a Human 20' in a single action really automatically work every time? I don't think that makes much sense since. :)
My default rule for repositioning an ally is that, if you have both hands free and you could lift that ally without going beyond your maximum carry capacity (or one hand if they wouldn't even make you encumbered), you can pick up and move a willing ally to a position adjacent to you for two actions. This provokes attacks of opportunity against the mover and the movee.
If you couldn't carry them bodily, you have to start using Athletics, and it ends up working out similar to Reposition. You can't "chain repositions" and since it's willing movement, it provokes.
Works out pretty well for me.
This honestly just feels like a case of a GM abusing edge cases to get an effect.
1) While forced movement doesn't provoke, calling an ally repositioning an ally forced movement is kind of grey.
2) Someone could clearly use reposition twice on another character, but assuming it's a critical success both times is probably a bit far. It should be rolled. There is that optional rule about increasing level of success by 1 tier since it's an ally, which normally wouldn't be a problem, but when combo'd with everything else that's happening it feels unfair.
3) The GM pretty much ignored that the first reposition would end with two characters occupying the same space, so it shouldn't have been a legal move IMO. There's maybe an argument based on the chaining movement rules that you should treat it as one, but that rule is written assuming a character is moving themselves. Again, maybe reasonable in some circumstance, but again combined with everything else and it's going too far IMO.
Basically the GM engineered a situation and took a bunch of edge cases to put the Big Bad in front on their minions and presumably do something harmful to the players, and then used a bunch of edge case rulings combined to justify whipping the Big Bad around to a protected position behind all the minions.
Personally, it's the kind of thing that leaves a bad taste in my mouth, so to speak.
You can't say it's explicitly not legal, but combining all those edge cases creates an effect that's too far in my opinion.
To others points, I have generally ruled that being moved as an ally doesn't protect from reactions in the way that Forced Movement normally does. That ruling alone basically prevents this whole situation from happening typically. Although with so many minions, there's a chance the GM just wanted to use the minions actions instead of the Big Bad's to move out of the danger zone.
But overall it feels like a d*ck move that would leave me unhappy as a player.
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You can't "chain repositions" and since it's willing movement, it provokes.
So I actually really like this point.
I would extrapolate that to, if the target chooses not to resist and increases the success condition by one, then it is "willing movement" not "forced movement" and so provokes.
(I know that wasn't the main point of your post -- the house rule you presented looked totally reasonable and usable, just not something I would use.)
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Unless the enemy in question has a special ability that allows for that, that all seems really sus to me.
If it were my table, I'd let PCs do it to willing allies. They would get a Success rather than a Critical Success though. If they want the chance for a Critical Success, they'll need to roll and risk Failure.
They could not do this to unwilling PC allies, not even with a roll, as that treads on player autonomy and violates are table's gentleman's agreement against PvP.