Author Topic: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...  (Read 6815 times)

Offline ksbsnowowl

  • DnD Handbook Writer
  • ****
  • Posts: 4776
  • Warrior Skald, teller of tales.
    • View Profile
Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« on: April 02, 2013, 08:23:07 PM »
I've got a player w/ Robilar's Gambit.  Prior to him joining our group I had planned for several of my bad guys to have it as well.  So, how does this work?

War troll with RG and Dex 22 gets 7 AoO's.
Player with RG and Dex 22 gets 7 AoO's.

Player advances toward troll, provoking as he closes the last 5 feet, due to troll's reach. Troll uses AoO 1. Player can't retaliate w/ RG because he doesn't threaten the troll.
Player attacks troll, thus provoking AoO 2 from the troll, which provokes AoO 1 from the player.

Do we stop there? Or does the player's AoO provoke a third AoO from the troll, which triggers AoO 2 from the player... And onward until the troll runs out of AoO's?

Offline Maat Mons

  • DnD Handbook Writer
  • ****
  • Posts: 1203
  • What is a smile but a grimace of happiness?
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #1 on: April 02, 2013, 09:30:40 PM »
Both creatures wind up making a lot of attacks of opportunity.  See here, under “When an Attack of Opportunity Provokes an Attack of Opportunity.” 

The real question is, does your allotment of attacks of opportunity reset at the beginning or end of your turn?  The rules don't specify that I can find.  The writers seem to have mostly assumed creatures wouldn't be making attacks of opportunity on their own turns. 

Offline wotmaniac

  • Legendary Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 1586
  • Procrastinator in Chief
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #2 on: April 03, 2013, 04:16:16 AM »
The real question is, does your allotment of attacks of opportunity reset at the beginning or end of your turn?  The rules don't specify that I can find.  The writers seem to have mostly assumed creatures wouldn't be making attacks of opportunity on their own turns. 
My interpretation is that they reset at the beginning of your turn.
You're typically making AoOs out-of-turn (duh); also, when adjudicating effects round-by-round, round-to-round, "beginning of your turn" seems to be the go-to standard for action-economy resets (the only exception that I can think of is Immediate Actions).

Offline Nagukuk

  • Lurker
  • *
  • Posts: 42
  • I'm Baaack
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #3 on: April 03, 2013, 01:56:28 PM »
My group plays it out as stated, every attack activates RG. SO the Attack Opps activate the next Attack Opp.

So far we have not, that I can remember had an NPC with RG. But we have theorized that if the two players who have it in the group were to fight each other, the sequence would continue until one or the other ran out of hitpoints or AOO's  then it seems the rest of the attacks per round would commence.

If you feel like being particularly nasty towards your PCs ... give the trolls Double Hit  :D

Opp sequence - Claws - Attack Left + Attack Right if both hit then = REND

I know that they may be "dumb trolls" BUT since they may/do  have rolibars, you may consider EVASIVE REFLEXES, (instead of an attack opp you get a 5' step) it may help the trolls with their 10' reach become more of a force with out the "triple attack back" melee shredding.

Now that I have typed that i have a vision of the party chasing the trolls around the field of battle while they evade 5' stepping until the aggressor is out of movement, then they can strike on their turn.

heh Alas i believe the movement would only provoke once as it were, but it was an amusing thought. 
« Last Edit: April 03, 2013, 01:58:55 PM by Nagukuk »

Offline altpersona

  • Legendary Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 2000
  • #78
    • View Profile
    • You are here
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #4 on: April 03, 2013, 02:26:38 PM »
SRD
Quote
Making an Attack of Opportunity
An attack of opportunity is a single melee attack, and you can only make one per round. You don’t have to make an attack of opportunity if you don’t want to.

am i missing something that lifts the one per person per round barrier?

if 7 trolls attacked 7 same build pc's then things should get cray cray
The goal of power is power. - 1984
We are not descended from fearful men. - Murrow
The Final Countdown is now stuck in your head.

Anim-manga still sux.

Offline RedWarlock

  • Hero Member
  • ***
  • Posts: 628
  • Crimson-colored caster of calamity
    • View Profile
    • Red Blade Studios
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #5 on: April 03, 2013, 02:30:54 PM »
SRD
Quote
Making an Attack of Opportunity
An attack of opportunity is a single melee attack, and you can only make one per round. You don’t have to make an attack of opportunity if you don’t want to.

am i missing something that lifts the one per person per round barrier?

if 7 trolls attacked 7 same build pc's then things should get cray cray
Rob's Gambit requires Combat Reflexes, so yeah, the limit is gone.
WarCraft post-d20: A new take on the World of WarCraft for tabletop. I need your eyes and comments!

Offline ksbsnowowl

  • DnD Handbook Writer
  • ****
  • Posts: 4776
  • Warrior Skald, teller of tales.
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #6 on: April 03, 2013, 02:41:08 PM »
If you feel like being particularly nasty towards your PCs ... give the trolls Double Hit  :D
My PC already does have Double Hit... :P  So, it would even the stakes.

Evasive Reflexes... interesting option, but the War Troll is better off taking the attack anyway, as if he hits, there's a decent chance the PC will end up Dazed.

Offline altpersona

  • Legendary Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 2000
  • #78
    • View Profile
    • You are here
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #7 on: April 03, 2013, 02:47:17 PM »
iv never had a game that had combat reflexes let you AoO the same target more than once per round.

maybe we've always done it wrong...

The goal of power is power. - 1984
We are not descended from fearful men. - Murrow
The Final Countdown is now stuck in your head.

Anim-manga still sux.

Offline ariasderros

  • Epic Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 2507
  • PM me what you're giving Kudos for please.
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #8 on: April 03, 2013, 02:55:34 PM »
iv never had a game that had combat reflexes let you AoO the same target more than once per round.

maybe we've always done it wrong...

Yes, yes you have:

Quote from: SRD
Combat Reflexes and Additional Attacks of Opportunity
If you have the Combat Reflexes feat you can add your Dexterity modifier to the number of attacks of opportunity you can make in a round. This feat does not let you make more than one attack for a given opportunity, but if the same opponent provokes two attacks of opportunity from you, you could make two separate attacks of opportunity (since each one represents a different opportunity). Moving out of more than one square threatened by the same opponent in the same round doesn’t count as more than one opportunity for that opponent. All these attacks are at your full normal attack bonus.
My new Sig
Hi, Welcome

Offline altpersona

  • Legendary Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 2000
  • #78
    • View Profile
    • You are here
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #9 on: April 03, 2013, 03:04:49 PM »
ah, i see said the blind man
The goal of power is power. - 1984
We are not descended from fearful men. - Murrow
The Final Countdown is now stuck in your head.

Anim-manga still sux.

Offline ksbsnowowl

  • DnD Handbook Writer
  • ****
  • Posts: 4776
  • Warrior Skald, teller of tales.
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #10 on: April 03, 2013, 03:12:21 PM »
ah, i see said the blind man
... to his deaf wife on the phone.

Offline Nagukuk

  • Lurker
  • *
  • Posts: 42
  • I'm Baaack
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #11 on: April 03, 2013, 03:24:33 PM »
If you feel like being particularly nasty towards your PCs ... give the trolls Double Hit  :D
My PC already does have Double Hit... :P  So, it would even the stakes.

Evasive Reflexes... interesting option, but the War Troll is better off taking the attack anyway, as if he hits, there's a decent chance the PC will end up Dazed.

Ok, so War Troll is probably going to use a weapon(s), so the extra rend  is probably not going to be used.  Vrs the PC so generically equal it is.
You are probably right about Evasive reflexes, but it can also be used as a sneaky way to step closer to the yummy looking guy wearing paper for armor and trying to fling nasty acid at the nasty troll. But that comes with enough "ifs" to be much less reliable.

I like to have the evasive option for my character, the other enjoys full base attacking the enemies as they attack him.

Other shenanigans could be pulled with a feat (my DM allows almost any 3-3.5 source) ... I know you will all cringe ...from the Quint Bard book, there is a feat that allows your AOO to be calculated before the event that provoked it. allowing knock backs trips stuns damage etc to possibly interrupt your opponents attack.

We have yet to see a war troll in action, but a few players have been considering read-"threatening" to roll one. heh it should be fun!
 

Offline ariasderros

  • Epic Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 2507
  • PM me what you're giving Kudos for please.
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #12 on: April 03, 2013, 03:25:55 PM »
ah, i see said the blind man
... to his deaf wife on the phone.

I prefer the ending:

... to his deaf and dumb dog.

(Dumb used to mean the same thing as mute.)
My new Sig
Hi, Welcome

Offline ksbsnowowl

  • DnD Handbook Writer
  • ****
  • Posts: 4776
  • Warrior Skald, teller of tales.
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #13 on: April 03, 2013, 04:33:03 PM »
(Dumb used to mean the same thing as mute.)
Yes... (most of us are smart enough to know that, I would think)   :P

Side note, if I were blinded, my wife and I could act this out...

Offline Nanshork

  • Homebrew Reviewer
  • Administrator
  • *****
  • Posts: 13401
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #14 on: April 03, 2013, 05:40:09 PM »
(Dumb used to mean the same thing as mute.)
Yes... (most of us are smart enough to know that, I would think)   :P

Side note, if I were blinded, my wife and I could act this out...

Aha, my random knowledge of board members is growing!  Someday I will successfully stalk you all!   :evillaugh

Offline Maat Mons

  • DnD Handbook Writer
  • ****
  • Posts: 1203
  • What is a smile but a grimace of happiness?
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #15 on: April 03, 2013, 06:35:29 PM »
…there is a feat that allows your AOO to be calculated before the event that provoked it.

Attacks of opportunity are normally resolved before the actions that trigger them.  Robilar's gambit is the only exception I can think of.  Is this feat specifically aimed at Robilar's gambit users, or does the author just not know the rules? 

Offline ksbsnowowl

  • DnD Handbook Writer
  • ****
  • Posts: 4776
  • Warrior Skald, teller of tales.
    • View Profile
Re: Robilar's Gambit vs. Robilar's Gambit...
« Reply #16 on: April 03, 2013, 08:09:50 PM »

We have yet to see a war troll in action, but a few players have been considering read-"threatening" to roll one. heh it should be fun!
I've actually had floating in the back of my mind for a long time... the idea of playing a Shadow Creature War Troll as a 20th level character.  Yes, +8 LA hurts like hell, but you only take lethal damage from acid, and you can heal that with your fast healing 2 you got from Shadow Creature.

Add in Robilar's Gambit and Deft Opportunist, and you'd still be able to be a decently effective tank/bruiser, especially if you've got 20th level wealth that you put to good use.  Your total concealment most of the time wouldn't hurt, either.

I'm sure there are better ways to fill that roll by 20th level (Cleric 20, anyone?), but it would still be a hell of a lot of fun.

Edit:  Just to clarify, I don't use straight-up War Trolls in my game.  They are all Primordial Giant Half-Troll War Trolls (so they regain the Giant type, but still retain the Full BAB), and they are stronger, tougher, and smarter than normal War Trolls.  Effectively regenerating 14 points a round is nice, but my PC's still took one down after a few rounds of trying to figure out how best to hit him (he was gestalted with Scout 12, and there were role-play restrictions on the ways they could attack him).

Double Edit:
Aha, my random knowledge of board members is growing!  Someday I will successfully stalk you all!   :evillaugh
Yeah, yeah...  speaking of the off-topic topic-at-hand, my wife learned today that the chairman of another department at our university wants her help in recruiting a deaf Chinese researcher from USC.  Pretty cool, if you ask me.
« Last Edit: April 03, 2013, 08:17:26 PM by ksbsnowowl »