"Step Back" feat?

[StreamOfTheSky]

I was looking at the Step up feat while thinking up an archer character. It's great they made feats like that for Fighters to maintain some lockdown on mages and such. But..it also kind of screws over archers. At least casters can still use concentration, and possibly have teleporting magic. I would even be willing to take the feat myself -- just so as to negate someone with Step Up from pwning me in melee. But as written, you can only use it to move into melee with a creature. I don't see why it's unbalanced, at the cost of a feat, to negate another feat, especially one available to any full BAB class at level 1.

Thoughts?

 

[pawsplay]

In Adventuring Classes: A Fistful of Denarii, there's a couple of feats to take an attack action and then any attacks with a bow without drawing an AoO.

 

[Haffrung Helleyes]

well

I can see why you would want that, but to be honest I think it's party of the balance of archery that it can get screwed in some situations. You get a full attack every round, while the melee fighter has to be right up next to his opponent.

Ken

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

It's not just some situations, though. In D&D, once the Fighter is within melee range (typically charge range), with an option like this, he can basically keep sticking it to the archer round after round. Move into reach, and now the archer has the lovely choice of take a move action and suffer an AoO, just to take a single attack action safely (all of an archer's power comes from full attacking, especially in a system where Manyshot is simply a means to full attack better) before being charged or melee'd again, rinse repeat; OR...5 ft step back, inevitably get followed, eat an AoO anyway, proceed to full attack (hopefully no combat reflexes), and then he gets to full attack you next round and can look forward to yet another AoO or multiple on your turn.

That's not situational at all. Most fights take place at a range where reaching melee isn't hard. And for all the "realism" arguments about using a bow in melee should be hard...you could argue that realisticly, once the Fighter's shot the first time from range, he should be dead or so incapacitated that he's easy pickings for the archer anyway. So bs on that, it's heroic fantasy. The Fighter can take volleys of ranged fire and not even flinch, and the archer should be able to fight up close without getting bounced around like a hacky sack.

Even without Step Up, once a Fighter is in melee with the archer, the 5 ft step back on the archer's part would still mean they're both getting full attacks at that point. Except the Fighter's either doing much more damage with a 2H weapon or has more AC with his shield. And all I asked for is why there is not a single freaking counter-feat to this one game-breaking(?) feat that any character can get by level 2, many by level 1?

Even if there was a counter feat, Step Up is useful beyond screwing over archers and mages. It's also useful when dealing with a creature with different reach than you. Say he has a longspear, you have a longsword. You get adjacent to him and attack. He tries to step back 5 ft so he can actually even attack you. You Step Up. Sucks to be him. I'm sure there's even more uses for this feat.

And yet the closest thing to a counter for it is Acrobatics, which in PF is never going to be automatic, and a skill that Fighters and Rangers (most likely archers other than rogues) both don't get.

 

[ruemere]

Given my experiences with ranged vs melee fighting in d20, I'm against nerfing of Step-Up.

Fighters are supposed to be bad news once they get into melee range - there is a reason (or there should be, anyway), why one does not use ranged weapons in such circumstances.

StreamOfTheSky complained about "sticky" Fighters:

That's not situational at all. Most fights take place at a range where reaching melee isn't hard.

Ask you GM to allow adventuring outside of dungeons. Once you get to open spaces, you should have the advantage of range. On the other hand, if you keep fighting indoors, being dominated by melee characters is only natural.

As an example, we've had during 3.0 days, an Order of the Bow Initiate. The guy pumped over 100 points of damage per round at 600' ranges. Airborne opponents or anything moving beyond 100' was a target practice for him.
However, once we got into dungeon, he had to switch to a sword - most intelligent opponents tried to disable him (Sunder), as he was the biggest threat, and so within narrow confines of Underdark, he ceased being such a pushover (and the rest of the party got a chance to shine).

Regards,
Ruemere

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Given my experiences with ranged vs melee fighting in d20, I'm against nerfing of Step-Up.

I never said to nerf Step Up. I merely wanted to know why there was no option for others to take to negate or counter it. Not a freebie. Melee spends a feat to use Step Up, my archer has the option to spend a feat to protect himself from it. Seems fair to me. It's not some high level unique class feature, it's a level 1 feat.

Fighters are supposed to be bad news once they get into melee range - there is a reason (or there should be, anyway), why one does not use ranged weapons in such circumstances.

The reason is by a strictly numbers comparison, melee does more damage on a full attack. Once melee characters reach an archer, they automatically have the advantage, even with 5 ft steps to avoid AoOs.

As an example, we've had during 3.0 days, an Order of the Bow Initiate. The guy pumped over 100 points of damage per round at 600' ranges. Airborne opponents or anything moving beyond 100' was a target practice for him.

Singling this out for a side rant, because 3.0 was more friendly to archers than 3.5. The weapon size rules, for one. More notably, the prestige classes. The 3.5 OotBI sucks. The only decent 3.5 archer PrC was Cragtop Archer, which as only 5 levels and helped with range, not damage. Peerless Archer, Deepwood Sniper, the "good" OotBI...all 3.0 classes.

StreamOfTheSky complained about "sticky" Fighters:

Ask you GM to allow adventuring outside of dungeons. Once you get to open spaces, you should have the advantage of range. On the other hand, if you keep fighting indoors, being dominated by melee characters is only natural.
......
However, once we got into dungeon, he had to switch to a sword - most intelligent opponents tried to disable him (Sunder), as he was the biggest threat, and so within narrow confines of Underdark, he ceased being such a pushover (and the rest of the party got a chance to shine).

Chance to "shine"?! Combat in confined quarters, which in your game forced the archer to pick up a sword, is far more common than aerial enemies that force a melee character to pick up a bow IME. And if he really was the primary damage dealer in the group, I can only conclude he was just a lot better at optimizing than the melee people. In 3.0 I had monks that could do triple digit damage. And monks were even crappier in 3.0 than they are in 3.5!

And as for it being natural for melee to dominate up close... Again, maybe in your games archers downing Fighters and Barbs from afar before coming into danger is the norm. In my groups, you're lucky to get 2 rounds of free range shooting, most often you might get 1 round, if the melee character isn't already close enough to charge. It's extremely uncommon IME for combats to not reach a melee stage if at least one side wants there to be one. And with Step Up, once melee has begun, the archer can't break out of it. Best case scenario might be Withdraw action to regroup. Of course, charge is double movement just as withdraw is (the 5 ft speed loss might prevent that if they have the same base speed, granted) and barring AoOs from nearby enemies, the melee character has no real reason to not just take a Run action and move back adjacent to the archer on his turn anyway.

 

[Drathir]

... Stream is somewhat correct just as... i forgot the other guy... IMO. Once melee can happen the archer is screwed, but at the same time its supposed to be that way. but the thing is PF is 'balanced' theres usually something that takes away every advantage and something that can give it back, concentration for example. sure its hard if the fighter has disruptive and step up but you get the concentration option. so logically following the fact that mages can, can being the key word, defend their spells from a fighter means there should be some way for an archer to do the same and acrobatics just dont cut it, after all it removes your ability to full attack.

So step back does not sound too ridiculous, say it doesnt negate step up but rather makes five foot step ten and has an increased requirement, possibly involving step up for those of you who still complain, something like BAB +3 and Step-up and if you the archer think thats unfair well as Stream said youre either a fighter ranger or rouge (in all likely hood) and the first two at least can spare an extra feat or two especially if youre making an ARCHER yea as a rogue it might suck to have to take two feats to be effective once melee occurs but youre supposed to "be sneaky, and devious" think of some way to not get a sword in your face, there are options.

 

[Stormonu]

A Rock-Paper-Scissors situation would be best, but counters would probably work as well.

I see no reason why there couldn't be a house-ruled feat to allow ranged attackers to make (at least one) attack while in melee without provoking an AoO. Possibly with some sort of follow-up on it that at higher levels you could make additional attacks - probably one attack less than normal.*

Same for polearms - Short Haft or some other feat (if it doesn't already exist). Give up the reach to attack within normal reach (perhaps at a small minus?).

* Heck, I had experimented with a feat that gave ranged attackers a threaten area of 10 ft. to allow them to make AoO's, among other things.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Same for polearms - Short Haft or some other feat (if it doesn't already exist). Give up the reach to attack within normal reach (perhaps at a small minus?).

PF has the Lunge feat, so I don't see why Short Haft couldn't work. Short Haft was so ridiculously tame I basically turned it into a weapon property in my 3.5 houserules -- "variable grip" weapons can be switched between reach and regular melee range with a swift action. We had our own create-a-weapon system with values for everthing, but it was basically worth the same as a tripping property or +2 disarm. That is, on top of the "cost" of having reach to begin with, the ability to switch to non-reach was worth about a much as that, maybe slightly less.

* Heck, I had experimented with a feat that gave ranged attackers a threaten area of 10 ft. to allow them to make AoO's, among other things.

And of course, there was the Arrow Mind spell. I loved that spell, PF should have it.
In the gestalt game i was DMing, I made one of the enemy NPCs a gestalt Ranger / (Fighter or Warblade, I forget). He pre-buffed with Arrow Mind and could use the Wall of Blades counter maneuver with his bow while so buffed. Wall of Blades, if you don't know, is an immediate reaction ability to parry an attack with a melee attack, replacing your AC with your attack roll. Except he was using point blank arrow shots to deflect or hinder enemy strikes. It was pretty cool thematically.

 

[coyote6]

One of the d20 books had a feat that let you attack with a bow without provoking AoOs, if you took a penalty to your attack roll (-2 IIRC). I want to say it was from one of Fantasy Flight's Legends & Lairs books, but I really don't remember for sure.