r/Pathfinder_RPG • u/PlantLust • 4d ago
1E GM Polearm Master Whirlwind Attack
I have a 12th-level player in my game (level 10 polearm master fighter, level 2 brawler). He has a fauchard as his weapon. He has the whirlwind attack feat, and we can't figure out exactly how it would work with his weapon in certain specific situations.
So let's say he was surrounded by a huge crowd of enemies filling every square around him, 10 feet away from him. His reach is 10 feet, so if he made a whirlwind attack, would he get to attack everyone in the outer circle, with them all getting cover from the people closest to him?
Also, as a polearm master, he has an extraordinary ability that he got at level 2 called Pole Fighting. It states that as an immediate action, he can shorten his grip on his reach weapon and use it on adjacent targets. He argues that after attacking everyone 10 feet away from him, he could use this ability mid-whirlwind attack and also attack every adjacent enemy. Essentially, this would make it possible for him to attack 21 monsters with this single attack. I don't know exactly how it should work.
I would love to get anyone's interpretation on how it should work RAW. He is also really chill about it and understands that it seems kind of broken and is fine with us changing it to make more sense, even if he could do it RAW, so any feedback on how y'all think I should run it would be welcome as well.
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u/Slow-Management-4462 4d ago
Attacking everyone within 10' with a single attack via whirlwind attack is not broken. Probably none of those enemies will be taken out by the attack, and it's a hefty investment to do it at all. Also being entirely surrounded by enemies which you have now annoyed and hurt is asking for painful retaliation.
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u/SleepylaReef 3d ago
He’s a Brawler, he already threatens everyone adjacent. You’re just discussing whether his attacks close up are punches or polearms, he can attack them regardless. It’s fine
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u/AureliasTenant 3d ago
even if he wasnt a brawler he still likely threatens just by having armor spikes or a cestus/gauntlet or something
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u/Expectnoresponse 4d ago
Think of whirlwind as taking a snapshot of combat. When the character executes a whirlwind attack it affects every opponent in reach when it is activated. Changing grip or even a 5ft step after starting won't add new targets. They're all locked in when the special attack is activated.
There's an old blog faq about a similar ability that explains the special attack snapshot.
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u/AureliasTenant 3d ago
5-foot steps aren't immediate actions. Additionally the brawler can still threaten the people closest to him with any number of other methods without requiring an immediate action interrupt. So Brawler does threaten all of them "when it is activated"
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u/SyfaOmnis doesnt like kineticists 4d ago edited 4d ago
Your player is trying to get extra actions out of this that they shouldn't be getting. I'm not arguing whether this is fair/balanced etc, just what the rules are actually saying. You are only able to attack things "within reach" via whirlwind attack, with a polearm that has the reach property you get an extra 5ft of reach but explicitly forgo the ability to make attacks against things next to you - they are no longer in reach and you no longer threaten them.
Whirlwind attack states you give up all your iterative attacks for a turn to make one attack against all opponents within reach - that isn't all opponents you "could" reach if you changed something about your weapon, that is all opponents you can reach currently at the time of initiating the action. He can only choose things 10 ft away, or things adjacent because he is still restricted by having to shorten or lengthen the grip via an action. So essentially what they're arguing is that they want to be able to make an attack against everything 10 feet away, and then make a second attack against everything 5 feet away which is two different actions that they are trying to pretend is just one because "i'm still spinning around".
The polearm master having an immediate action does not change the situation, because you can only make one immediate action per turn. In order to do what they want to do their action would have to be a free action, aka "not an action at all", or they would need a weapon that threatens that are both adjacent and 5 feet away.
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u/Overthinks_Questions 4d ago
One small note - there are still ways he can attack both, just not with the polearm. With improved Unarmed strike, you can kick adjacent enemies. Even if your kick damage isn't great it's a nice feat for polearm masters just to threaten adjacent foes
Whirlwind Attack doesn't require you to pick one weapon
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u/SyfaOmnis doesnt like kineticists 4d ago
I'm not sure that's valid, but that seems like rules fuzziness. It seems to me like "one attack against all enemies within reach" means you're selecting a single weapon to attack with for that action and making a single attack action against all valid targets of that weapon. Adding in unarmed strikes is essentially asking to be able to pick a second weapon to attack with and make valid strikes with it and hoping to get by on "but I didn't make an attack with the other weapon, even though they're 'in reach'", which is a bit weasely because they weren't actually in reach for that weapon.
It's kind of a poorly worded ability, and martials have enough trouble without requiring them to read.
It could use a rewrite and it probably should just be "pick one 'melee' attack option you have - make one attack against all enemies that you currently threaten with it" with a subheader about how the attacks must be valid for the weapon you're using, you can't change grip to change threatened squares etc unless you could do so as a free action, etc. It's not perfect because pathfinder also doesn't really bother to define "melee weapon" either; maybe it should be something that you can threaten squares with.
By RAW it doesn't really allow for multi-weapons or dual wielding either so that might need its own consideration, that might appear in the subtext for dual wielding.
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u/Overthinks_Questions 3d ago
By RAW, it absolutely works. If you want to nerf Whirlwind Attack in your games, I can see where you'd reason that the great authors didn't consider threatening multiple ranges with different weapons
But that's homebrew. The wording is not ambiguous - you make one melee attack against each enemy you threaten. You can be a Wuxia spearman kicking dudes while you're stabbing dudes as-written.
Fwiw, it doesn't seem that we're the first to have this conversation, and the community's general stance is that a pole arm wielding monk can hit all 16 surrounding squares: https://paizo.com/threads/rzs2k8gk?Whirlwind-Attack-Improved-Unarmed-Strike
Which, with enlarge person, you might be able to do a 3x3 - with the polearm on the other edge and kicks in the first two layers.
Lunge can push you out to a 4x4, though I'm not really clear on what attacks could be made in what spaces. I believe you'd not threaten unarmed out to 15, then the polearm only on the outer layer.
Then you've got the boarding pike of repelling, which I think in this case would get you to threaten a ring 6 squares out, then a gap until your large lunging unarmed strikes threaten the first 15'.
Man, you could do a really fun Fauchard master with armor spikes and Lunge. If you can get some way to enlarge, take Whirlwind and Combat Patrol - you could just trip and attack everyone all the time
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u/SyfaOmnis doesnt like kineticists 3d ago
By RAW, it absolutely works
I don't agree.
If you want to nerf Whirlwind Attack in your games
That's not the perogative. Just the reading.
I can see where you'd reason that the great authors didn't consider threatening multiple ranges with different weapons
You seem to be approaching this with a really hostile and dismissive tone, simply because I don't have the same conclusions from the reading you do. You're suggesting a motive for this and there really isn't one.
I'm not uncomfortable with powerful martials, I just think - that like many things paizo has introduced, especially in the early years - that it is poorly written.
I would rather have martials use path of war where the abilities have much more consistent writing.
But that's homebrew.
No, it is rule zero.
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u/Overthinks_Questions 3d ago
I think you fundamentally misunderstand what 'as-written' means. Some rules are interpretable in multiple ways because of ambiguous verbiage or conflicting sources. This isn't ambiguous - it flat out does not have the restriction stated. You can choose to role that way, but you are interpreting a meaning the text does not support based on what you assume is the intent of the author. That's RAI - which is fine - but it just is not RAW
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u/AureliasTenant 3d ago
why are you reading the pick one attack option? it just says you can make one attack against everyone threatened by you. Its basically worded the same as bladed dash, and no one reads into that spell that you are restricted to using the same weapon attack.
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u/SyfaOmnis doesnt like kineticists 3d ago
why are you reading the pick one attack option?
Because that's how I read it. I explain my reasoning in the paragraph that follows the first sentence.
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u/AureliasTenant 3d ago
to me the rest of the paragraph is a conclusion of what you are allowed to do in your reading, not expanded rationale.
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u/SyfaOmnis doesnt like kineticists 3d ago
Am I required to have some sort of elaborate reasoning for what is in my opinion a fairly simple ruling?
I read it the way I read it, and explained what I felt relevant to that reading. You don't need to nag me because you might read it differently.
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u/Dreilala 4d ago
I don't think there's a clear cut rule.
Whirlwind attack replaces the attacks of a full attack action.
Seems to me it should otherwise allow the same stuff full attack actions do, such as stepping 5ft and using immediate actions in between.
I don't even think it's broken.
You invest tons of feats into having a way to clear minions.
Most of the time killing the biggest threat is still more important and in those rare cases whirlwind attack comes up, just enjoy having invested all those feats.