Great cleave, another good job.

[OnlyOffensive]

Another broken feat. Instead of getting great cleave, you get second cleave.

I have absolutely no idea how is it even possible to do such things...

[MeatPopsicle]

What's it supposed to do? Asking because I don't know.

[OnlyOffensive]

Cleave itself working, but you dont get GREAT cleave.

You are supposed to keep cleaving with great cleave on all attacks, instead of one time per use.

[Trip]

The cleave mechanic is very different from the cleave mechanic used in 3.5 from neverwinter nights then it is in pathfinder, it takes some getting used too.

That said my reach fighter/viv gets multiple hits all the time with the feat line, both with great cleave and finishing cleave. Its great for clearing trash mobs, not sure its worth all those feats but I have not played too deep yet so I'll have to see.

Maybe if you go into more detail we can find out what the full issue is.

[OnlyOffensive]

I had cleave with basic icon for cleave. Then i took GREAT cleave, which shows a different icon in window but in abilities you have 2nd basic cleave with same icon. Great cleave is supposed to cleave on all aditional attacks you do per round, but i dont see it working. Maybe im wrong in something? Why dont i have ability with name Great cleave anyway and have another cleave.

From what ive seen so far cleave is good anywhere you can cleave...surprise. There are alot of fights with couple tough enemies nearby, so its fine not only for cleaving trash. It should be super good as great cleave, but as i said i dont see it working.

[Trip]

It only gives an additional attack after each succesful hit on your first attack. It also limits you to a single attack that round, its kinda what whirlwind attack used to be in 3.5. If you miss even one attack it ends the chain right away.

[OnlyOffensive]

s a standard action, you can make a single attack at your full base attack bonus against a foe within reach. If you hit, you deal damage normally and can make an additional attack (using your full base attack bonus) against a foe that is adjacent to the previous foe and also within reach. If you hit, you can continue to make attacks against foes adjacent to the previous foe, so long as they are within your reach. You cannot attack an individual foe more than once during this attack action. When you use this feat, you take a –2 penalty to your Armor Class until your next turn.


description of great cleave

As a standard action, you can make a single attack at your full base attack bonus against a foe within reach. If you hit, you deal damage normally and can make an additional attack (using your full base attack bonus) against a foe that is adjacent to the first and also within reach. You can only make one additional attack per round with this feat. When you use this feat, you take a –2 penalty to your Armor Class until your next turn.

Normal cleave

As you can see with basic cleave you make one add attack per round with great you are not limited.

[Trip]

So you are saying you only are getting 2 attacks with great cleave at most? Thats even if you hit the second attack?

[OnlyOffensive]

yes, from what i've seen so far only 2 attacks.
The main issue with that is that i got 2nd cleave icon instead of great cleave upon picking feat.
I guess i could run more tests, but 2 same cleave icons further incline me to beilive it doesnt work.

[Trip]

The second cleave icon is something I got as well, so I don't think thats the problem. I had it work for me against the centipdes at the old sicamore, cleared out whole rooms of them.

Yeah, its pretty strange. It could be bugged on that save file. I've had feats work in some save files and not in others. I usually save before I level up and go do a quick fight after to make sure my feats work right before continuing on.

Then again I don't play much past the stag lord ATM due to the bugs.

[Sotanaht]

Originally posted by OnlyOffensive:

Cleave itself working, but you dont get GREAT cleave.

You are supposed to keep cleaving with great cleave on all attacks, instead of one time per use.

This is wrong though.

The difference between Cleave and Great Cleave in Pathfinder is that Cleave hits 1 additional enemy, and Great Cleave hits an unlimited number of additional enemies. Both stop working after the first "miss".

Neither Cleave nor Great Cleave is supposed to affect "all attacks", they are both standard actions separate from the full attack action, meaning you only get to attack once per target with both feats.

[Reaver79]

If your only getting 1 extra then theres a few options.
A: Your poorly positioned they need to be in range for you to attack the next target.. Makes sense no ?..
B: You miss and your not paying attention to the combatlog that tells you so..
C: Theres a bug that i have not seen myself on your game reinstall could possibly fix this ?..

Originally posted by OnlyOffensive:

You are supposed to keep cleaving with great cleave on all attacks, instead of one time per use.

On all attacks ? You wrote yourself the wording.. As a standard action, you can make a single attack at your full base attack bonus. This mean that you only make 1 attack no matter howmany you normally have, If you hit with that one you trigger the cleave effect wich in case of great cleave can keep chaining to next target if your well positioned and you keep hitting.

[Fendelphi]

The only benefit of Great Cleave is that all the chained attacks are at your full attack value(while multiple normal attacks during 1 round has a successive -5 to hit until the round ends).
You can also potentially hit more enemies during that 1 round than you would be able to with standard attacks.

It is a situational ability in Pathfinder, not a "must use in every fight" like it was in 3.5.
A fighter has a lot of feats, so can easily invest in it. Other classes, not so much.

[Rattenstein]

Cleave itself is only worthwhile in the first few levels; after that making two attacks is better than one that may or may not find a suitable other target. Plus -2 AC. Active cleave is a standard action, which precludes a full attack. If you're dual wielding it's even worse: you're only hitting with your main hand. I'm not sure that's the case in this game, but in PnP it also only works on targets who are adjacent to each other, which will only happen once in a blue moon. Buuuut it's a prerequ, so, okay, fine, whatever. Just consider it a dead weight tax.

Finishing Cleave on the other hand is quite OK for high str fighters who fight 2H - it's one free attack some of the time, and with a 2H a) you're going to be dealing a lot of killing blows and b) that free hit is going to hit for big damage++. It's even better with a high damage polearm wielded by an Enlarged character, because they'll have a ton of available targets - and in this case the pool of targets is "anyone you threaten"

I'm a lot less sold on Greater Cleave/Imp Finishing Cleave because those only work if you not only kill a guy, but then also one-shot another, and another... And honestly if you're fighting ♥♥♥♥ that you can hit reliably and kill in one hit, you're in zero danger anyway. Spending two feats to speed up mopping up chaff doesn't strike me as very productive. Mayyybe on a straight Fighter because you've got a million bonus feats and can blow some of them on situational stuff (and hey, it might trigger once in a while if you can't focus one monster with the whole team, or if you have wizards softening up people with fireballs...), but as a paladin you're a lot more feat-constrained and your big dmg boosts are single-target and won't apply to the cleave target(s). I'd pass.

[Balkoth]

Post a savegame or a video, it's really hard for us to help you out.

[Sotanaht]

Originally posted by Jerme Lenister:

Cleave itself is only worthwhile in the first few levels; after that making two attacks is better than one that may or may not find a suitable other target. Plus -2 AC. Active cleave is a standard action, which precludes a full attack. If you're dual wielding it's even worse: you're only hitting with your main hand. I'm not sure that's the case in this game, but in PnP it also only works on targets who are adjacent to each other, which will only happen once in a blue moon. Buuuut it's a prerequ, so, okay, fine, whatever. Just consider it a dead weight tax.

Finishing Cleave on the other hand is quite OK for high str fighters who fight 2H - it's one free attack some of the time, and with a 2H a) you're going to be dealing a lot of killing blows and b) that free hit is going to hit for big damage++. It's even better with a high damage polearm wielded by an Enlarged character, because they'll have a ton of available targets - and in this case the pool of targets is "anyone you threaten"

I'm a lot less sold on Greater Cleave/Imp Finishing Cleave because those only work if you not only kill a guy, but then also one-shot another, and another... And honestly if you're fighting ♥♥♥♥ that you can hit reliably and kill in one hit, you're in zero danger anyway. Spending two feats to speed up mopping up chaff doesn't strike me as very productive. Mayyybe on a straight Fighter because you've got a million bonus feats and can blow some of them on situational stuff (and hey, it might trigger once in a while if you can't focus one monster with the whole team, or if you have wizards softening up people with fireballs...), but as a paladin you're a lot more feat-constrained and your big dmg boosts are single-target and won't apply to the cleave target(s). I'd pass.

There is a benefit to Cleave that you can move+attack. When you have to close distance anyway, it's better to be able to hit 2+ targets with a single attack, than to only make a single attack against one target. It's less effective in RTWP because you would need to micromanage it too much, turning it on only when there are lots of enemies or you have to move+attack, then turning it back off again on the next round.