Can a PC back away with defensive movement and then fire a bow?

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Boggo
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Re: Can a PC back away with defensive movement and then fire a bow?

Post by Boggo »

it's not as confusing a misnomer as defensive movement, which is more of an attack of opportunity than defensive movement, but I honestly can't imagine I would ever let someone move away from a fight, without weapons ready to fight without allowing the foe a defensive movement on them

my favourite Dropped weapon to go to melee story, was a +1 shortbow dropped when an orc got into melee range, 2 rounds later the shortbow was stepped upon by another player and snapped, goodbye magic bow
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Solomoriah
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Re: Can a PC back away with defensive movement and then fire a bow?

Post by Solomoriah »

Boggo wrote: Sat Mar 11, 2023 12:24 am it's not as confusing a misnomer as defensive movement, which is more of an attack of opportunity than defensive movement,
AH.

No.

"Defensive Movement" is the overarching category... a Fighting Withdrawal is a kind of defensive movement, and a Parting Shot is what happens when you don't do that.

Hmm.

Maybe I need to revise that section.
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Boggo
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Re: Can a PC back away with defensive movement and then fire a bow?

Post by Boggo »

Solomoriah wrote: Sat Mar 11, 2023 10:43 am
Boggo wrote: Sat Mar 11, 2023 12:24 am it's not as confusing a misnomer as defensive movement, which is more of an attack of opportunity than defensive movement,
AH.

No.

"Defensive Movement" is the overarching category... a Fighting Withdrawal is a kind of defensive movement, and a Parting Shot is what happens when you don't do that.

Hmm.

Maybe I need to revise that section.
Maybe calling it something like Tactical positioning, or Tactial edge instead of defensive movement? the rules are pretty clear, the naming not so much
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Solomoriah
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Re: Can a PC back away with defensive movement and then fire a bow?

Post by Solomoriah »

No, I need to rewrite it so that nobody mistakes a "parting shot" as any kind of "defensive movement." You are conflating the subsection heading with the items within that subsection, a situation I never envisioned.
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Dimirag
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Re: Can a PC back away with defensive movement and then fire a bow?

Post by Dimirag »

Some games name such movement as Breaking Melee, or something similar, as its basically just moving away from a melee combatant.
If you turn away to move your full speed your opponent gets a free attack. (The free attack is a consequence of a specific defensive movement, not the defensive movement on itself.)
If you backpedal you move half your movement but there is no free attack and can attack if possible.

The fighting withdrawal is the more defensive movement of the 2, turning to run away is not very "defensive" in an engaged form.

Maybe it should be named something like "Moving while on melee combat" and name the movement possibilities.
-Retreat: Double movement, can't attack before doing it, gets a parting shot.
-Disengage: Normal movement, can attack before doing it, gets a parting shot.
-Withdrawal: Half backwards movement, can attack before or after doing it, does not gets a parting shot.
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Boggo
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Re: Can a PC back away with defensive movement and then fire a bow?

Post by Boggo »

Solomoriah wrote: Sat Mar 11, 2023 1:21 pm No, I need to rewrite it so that nobody mistakes a "parting shot" as any kind of "defensive movement." You are conflating the subsection heading with the items within that subsection, a situation I never envisioned.
I actually meant renaming the subsection, which doesn't actually describe defensive movement, defensive movement would be ways of moving to PREVENT an attack of opportunity, which is not covered in this subsection.
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Seven
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Re: Can a PC back away with defensive movement and then fire a bow?

Post by Seven »

In my view, it depend on what the opponent is doing.
Let say a thief is engaged with 2 orcs. If he back away, they will simply follow him, step for step. Now, if 2 thieves are engaged with one orc and one of the thief backs away, the orc can't follow and the thief can switch to his short bow, aim and fire away, possibly hitting the other thief.

In other terms, if a character turns and run, the opponent gets a party shot, but if the character backs up slowly, the opponent gets to follow him.

Also, if a character is facing 2 opponents and they suddenly turn and run away, the character only gets 1 parting shot at the opponent of his choice.
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