Author Topic: Threatening reach at 5' and 10' in Pathfinder+D&D  (Read 19960 times)

Offline Azoriel

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Re: Threatening reach at 5' and 10' in Pathfinder+D&D
« Reply #20 on: November 23, 2013, 06:53:49 AM »
IIRC, they had an FAQ a few months ago that disallowed this (or similar reach + non-reach combos), for incredibly stupid reasons.  Something about SKR claiming you can't kick and use a longspear at the same time.  I don't know, it was so stupid I tried my best to purge it from my head.

 :huh  Do you have a link for this?  The closest thing I've seen is no two-weapon fighting with armor spikes while using a two-handed weapon.  (Which is neither here nor there.)

Spiked gauntlets is a bad deal for 5' reach anyway, since it takes up a hand you'll probably need for your longspear.  (Of course, that's assuming you don't have more than two hands.)  Better to use armor spikes, or have the Humble Beginnings trait to put a (literal) boot in people's faces.  Or take Improved Unarmed Strike, though that's arguably a waste of a feat.
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Offline Azoriel

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Re: Threatening reach at 5' and 10' in Pathfinder+D&D
« Reply #21 on: November 23, 2013, 11:25:53 PM »
Addendum to the above:
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2pxa3&page=11?Is-this-TWF-combination-legal#541

http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2q0h7&page=3?Threatening-with-Reach-Weapons-Armor-Spikes

Nothing about invalidating armor spikes with longspear, with SKR saying it works so long as you aren't trying to claim two-weapon fighting bonuses for it.  He also says nothing about spiked gauntlet with longspear, though that's still an illegal combo anyway for the reasons I mentioned earlier: you can wield a two-handed weapon while wearing a spiked gauntlet, and you can wield a spiked gauntlet while holding (but not actively wielding) a two-handed weapon, but you can't wield both at the exact same time without having more than two arms.  Switching between the two is a free action (even switching off multiple times in the same round), but you can't take free actions when it's not your turn, so you'll need to settle on wielding one or the other for AoO's.
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Offline StreamOfTheSky

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Re: Threatening reach at 5' and 10' in Pathfinder+D&D
« Reply #22 on: November 24, 2013, 01:45:36 PM »
IIRC, they had an FAQ a few months ago that disallowed this (or similar reach + non-reach combos), for incredibly stupid reasons.  Something about SKR claiming you can't kick and use a longspear at the same time.  I don't know, it was so stupid I tried my best to purge it from my head.

 :huh  Do you have a link for this?  The closest thing I've seen is no two-weapon fighting with armor spikes while using a two-handed weapon.  (Which is neither here nor there.)

Spiked gauntlets is a bad deal for 5' reach anyway, since it takes up a hand you'll probably need for your longspear.  (Of course, that's assuming you don't have more than two hands.)  Better to use armor spikes, or have the Humble Beginnings trait to put a (literal) boot in people's faces.  Or take Improved Unarmed Strike, though that's arguably a waste of a feat.

Well, thanks to you for tracking down one of the threads in question, I found this:
Quote from: SKR
Nope. By putting two hands on your 1H or 2H weapon, you're giving up any extra attacks you'd get if you were using a 1H weapon and using two-weapon fighting. Doesn't matter if you're trying to make punches, kicks, headbutts, knees, or whatever, the game is giving you a choice:

• fully commit to one attack with two hands for extra damage, or
• make an extra attack with TWF at the cost of not getting the extra damage from using two hands on one attack.

There's probably more, but I've had my fill of stupid for one day.

Offline Azoriel

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Re: Threatening reach at 5' and 10' in Pathfinder+D&D
« Reply #23 on: November 24, 2013, 01:54:35 PM »
But that still has absolutely nothing to do with taking attacks of opportunity.

From the end of my first link-
Quote
Sangalor wrote:
Quote
Finally, does this have any effect on threatening and attacks of opportunity, e.g. when I used a longspear to attack in a round, can I still threaten with unarmed strikes and make attacks into adjacent fields?
I don't think this ruling has any effect on that; AOOs are outside the normal sequence of actions you can perform on your turn.

So, if you were talking about trying to two-weapon fight with a two-handed weapon, then of course that's invalid.  If you just want to threaten 5' away with improved unarmed strike or armor spikes while wielding a reach weapon, then that's still fair game.

(Edited to separate Sangalor's question from SKR's response.)
« Last Edit: November 25, 2013, 02:23:51 PM by Azoriel »
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Offline StreamOfTheSky

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Re: Threatening reach at 5' and 10' in Pathfinder+D&D
« Reply #24 on: November 24, 2013, 03:47:53 PM »
In his post, there is an implication that you now need a "free hand" to make unarmed attacks.  Despite unarmed specifically saying you can make them even with your hands full.  He was speaking about TWF, but his broad claims affect other forms of attack as well, potentially.  It didn't use to matter if you were using both hands for attacking with a weapon or not, now it does.

I suppose it doesn't specifically deny AoOs with each, but it throws a lot of uncertainty on attacking with a 2H weapon and unarmed or other "no hands" attacks in general.

Offline Azoriel

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Re: Threatening reach at 5' and 10' in Pathfinder+D&D
« Reply #25 on: November 25, 2013, 03:00:22 PM »
SKR's denial that his ruling on two-weapon fighting has anything to do with attacks of opportunity is pretty clear - the only way he could be more clear is if he said something like:

Quote
So long as you're physically able to act (not sleeping, stunned, etc), you can always make AoO's with armor spikes and unarmed strikes with the Improved Unarmed Strike feat regardless of what you're doing with your hands, no take-backsies!

Let's say I was visiting a friend and asked if I could have one of his Belgian beers.  If he responded, "I'm saving that for a party tomorrow but have no plans for the rest of my booze," the fact that he went to the trouble adding the exclusionary clause would imply that the said remainder is fair game.  There's no need to go into specifics about how I could have exactly X bottles of this brand and Y bottles of that brand instead, or that the exclusionary clause did not include permissions to burn down his house; these things should be understood by the context of the statement.

Were he writing a rulebook, perhaps he should've added an explicit exclusionary clause - but this was a response to a series of questions on a message board, and the primary topic had nothing to do with attacks of opportunity or even reach weapons, but rather getting extra off-hand attacks while using a two-hander.  As such, the answer he gave ("Not being able to two weapon fight with a two-handed weapon and armor spikes doesn't in any way restrict your ability to make attacks of opportunity with them.") was sufficient.  I don't really see how that muddies the waters, but to each their own.

[editted for clarity]
« Last Edit: November 26, 2013, 03:08:45 PM by Azoriel »
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Offline Azoriel

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Re: Threatening reach at 5' and 10' in Pathfinder+D&D
« Reply #26 on: November 26, 2013, 04:51:28 PM »
Ah, almost forgot - the dragoon archetype for fighter gives you the ability to threaten 5' and 10' away simultaneously with the same weapon at 7th level - though that weapon must always be a lance.

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/fighter/archetypes/paizo---fighter-archetypes/dragoon

The polearm master archetype for fighter also gets the ability to threaten near and far, but it's far more limited (requires an immediate action to shift from 10' to 5', implied that it can't to both at once, takes a -4 penalty to attacks which decreases as you level).

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/fighter/archetypes/paizo---fighter-archetypes/polearm-master

Also, you have the dwarven dorn dergar (chain flail) which can be shifted from 10' reach to 5' reach as a move equivalent action.  The feat Dorn Dergar Master lets you use it as a one-handed weapon, and the Darting Viper feat lets you shift from 10' reach to 5' reach (and vice versa) as a swift action rather than a move equivalent.  Since you can't threaten both areas simultaneously, it's not useful for threatening near and far like a 3.5 spiked chain or a lance on a Pathfinder dragoon, but it's still a viable one-handed reach weapon.
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