Goodman Games

This is where I see a Mighty Deed come into play. Does the party need to flee a band of orcs they're in a fight with....and not want to get "free whacked" as they run? Do like the hero does in one of the Appendix N books....flip over a table, tear down a tapestry, slice the rope holding the chandelier, turn over the flaming brazier. Shield bash one of them into the others. Do something to give a momentary distraction and then run like hell. The trick is to stop thinking like this is a miniatures game with strict rules for movement and start think like it's an action movie.

The Hero doesn't just run away...he runs away with style.

Devil and AJ have the right of it.

As always, creative your way out of conundrums.

Apart from creative solutions, I'd probably just drop the "free whack" rule anyway. It sounds logical enough, but really, how easy do you think it is to simply take another effective swipe at someone in combat if they start running from you? My gut feeling is that in most cases it isn't, by the time you realize what they're doing and react, they've probably managed a few swift strides away from you. I've never had someone sprint away suddenly in a bout, but if anyone who actually has had some real experience has (especially with weapons) I'd be curious to know.

I had a question about whether the Rules As Written were meant to include a 'free whack' against spell-casters standing next to a melee threat. Somehow the dialog has taken a somewhat "4E is bad m'kay, and your questions are the reason...." tone.

I understand that the game is a simpler game and that not every contingency that can be dreamed of needs to be addressed in advance. I merely wanted to know what the intention of the designer was.

Exactly. And in fact, using the rule as written, it means the only way a fight can work is for everyone to stand there and slug it out toe to toe. Any movement entitles the enemy to a free attack.
Forwards, backwards, or even a sideways leap onto that table to do some heroic deed? All are "moving to a new position or attempting some action". Free whack.

And wanting to reposition isn't just a "war gamery" thing either - in my experience players in battle want to try something interesting/epic/stupid in about 96.2% of fights, rather than standing still and swapping hits with the bad guys until one side is down.
I must admit that I do like the simplicity of the rule as written - but it would be nice to have a touch more guidance than a two sentence paragraph, for something that must be an incredibly common occurrence in fight scenes.

*I'm not trying to be insulting or a jerk or anything other than to try and convey what I think the rule is all about.

You guys are too used to other more modern rule nutty games or are over thinking it.


The Free Wack rule is to stop every fight from turning into a chase. Think about it if you were in a sword fight and you were down to 4 hit points and your opponent was over 40 hit points still and you could run away without a major risk,why wouldn't you? If you don't you are dead! You can't do anything or help anyone or loot anything while dead. Running away you at least have a small chance of getting away.

Now the free wack rule gives a real reason why not to run away. Now that doesn't mean it could be done,many times you can still get away. It only adds a price to the attempt.

For those of you who think its unrealistic,pick up a stick and spar with a friend in your hallway and try to run away. It's almost impossible to get away with it unhit! Add a little training with that and anyone attempting to flee should have all there affairs in order! However,realism is a poor reason to use for a game.

Instead think about the way game play becomes effected. Try it out in game making sure you are fair and let the monsters and npc's use it as well. After all there is no reason that the monster would not simply run past the warrior out front and bit the wizards head off once hit by a spell. Once the cleric healed every intelligent for would focus all fire on the cleric IF they didn't do so from the get go.

Every foe would move about the battlefield at whim just the same as the players!

See I find most DM's who are against this rule, fail to change npc behavior to match the changed reality. For one because this puts the martially weaker players are a huge disadvantage.

Last but not least this doesn't mean that the battlefield can't be a place of movement! There is a huge difference from fleeing a battle and a swordman backing away from his enemy in a guarded position or lunging past his foe in a attack.

If you must have something codified in the rules to let this work for you think about a house rule that says this.

A combatant engaged in melee with a foe my move 10 feet in any direction during the round as long as he doesn't move through a occupied space and ends the round facing his foe.

Honestly I feel this isn't necessary and even adds more complexity (nearly always a bad thing) of combat.

I would rather use it than not use any free wack rules however.

Now if you try the game without withdraw rules and like it better then by all means do it that way. I'm by no means suggesting that the official way or my way is better for your game,simply that its better for my games.

Re-reading the rule, you could just strip out some verbiage and make the meaning of 'melee' cover the entire fight. As in, if you try to escape the fight, then there's a free whack, but if you're just switching targets, shifting to higher ground, etc., then you're still in melee and no free whack is called for.

Does that work?

This is a good discussion. I think it addresses a problem that many RPGs have attempted to address, with limited success.

3E introduced the attack of opportunity (already known by other names in wargames) and one result was that combat became very static. Creatures clumped up somewhere, and since no one could flee without getting hit, there was practically no movemenet on the battlefield. 4E changed this a bit by allowing more move actions that didn't provoke AoOs, and also forced movement. This worked well to address the problem IMO and made for much more dynamic battles, but it was a complex solution. D&D Next is tackling this very question in its beta-testing: it started out with no AoOs but the feedback was that monsters could charge the spellcaster too easily and that the fighter couldn't do anything to protect him (and the other way around for monsters); now they brought in essentially the same AoO rule that DCC uses, the free whack, but I feel that the designers have not said their last word on this topic.

I think there is no easy solution. The combat becoming static is a real problem of AoOs in my opinion. 3E battles really became stale mainly (IMO) because of that.

What I would hope for, for a battle to be cool, is that the opponents move about the room and jump on chairs, pick up a bottle to throw, move up on the balcony to fire a dagger, and generally be mobile to access different areas in the environment. However, no one is going to try that with the free whack rule.

I think perhaps one way to address that is to change the trigger of the free whack rule towards intent instead of action. What I mean is that, presently, the free whack rule trigger is based on action, namely: when a first creature moves away from a second creature, the second creature gets a free whack on the first. The judge should then watch for any "movement away", and award a free whack if there is one. If instead you use intent, then you could say that the rule is: if a first creature wishes to flee the battlefield and is engaged in combat with a second creature, the second creature gets a free whack. However, if the first creature moves away from the second creature but its intent is to continue to battle it, such as by jumping on the countertop, strategically moving back to lure the second creature into a trap, or the like, then no free whack. Perhaps the battle-movement, if I may call it that way, could then be limited according to circumstances, i.e. the first creature might not benefit from its usual full movement capacity. It then becomes a judgement call by the judge, who can adjudicate depending on the feel of a particular battle situation.

The way Skyscraper just described is pretty much how I've been running our game. As long as the PC isn't running away from combat completely, they can move at will. If they want to turn tail and run, and haven't done anything to prevent the their opponent from doing so (i.e turned over a table to get in the way, dumped over a flaming brazier), the opponent gets a free shot. i want to promote that swashbucking feeling in combat. Jump on tables, swing fromt he chandelier, kick sand in their face. I encourage my players to think out of the box, try crazy moves, but they also need to feel they can flee if needed...they just need to be smart about it.

We have ruled that certain activities, (anything taking a more than normal bit of concentration and focus, such as casting a spell or using a ranged weapon) doesn't give a free shot, but any attackers get a +d to their attack die, since the defenders attention is being spent on something other than melee.

Sometimes to decide this it takes a little discusion between myself and the players. They describe what they want to do, I try to assess its feasibility, give some pros and cons, and let the playeer decide it they want to try it. So much more freedom than having fixed rules that say "if the PC does this, then this will happen". You just got to get in the right mindset

I run it like Skyscraper is mentioning - a "free whack" only happens if you are attempting to exit a combat, rather than simply move that combat.

It's pretty easy to adjudicate too, you listen to the player for cues like "I wanna back this guy up to the rest of the group," or "I try to lead my opponent by that pool of water," instead of cues like "I've gotta get the [expletive deleted] out of here!"