Rules for being knocked down in Combat?

[Dubbert]

Can anyone point me in the direction of where I can find rules for being knock down / off you feet in combat? Or possible provide you house rules for the situation?

[ShadowLogan]

The basic rule based on examples is that being knocked down means you lose one action to get back up. It can also be found under the "Wind Rush" Spell in PF2E (pg203). PF2E main book doesn't have this bit, but the RUE (more recent) version of the Combat Terms (pg346) has knockdown described. in terms of Penalties RUE has this to say (~1/3 of page column is devoted to the term "knockdown"): "In ALL cases, when a character is knocked down or off his feet he automatically loses initiative and one melee attack/action. If he is knocked several or dozens of yards/meters, the character loses two melee attacks. This is true even if the character is knocked down right where he was standing or only a few feet/meters"

[Veknironth]

Well, there is also a bit about it under Wrestling for the body block/tackle. It's on page 56 of the main book.

-Vek
"Losing one attack seems not very useful. I use one of my attacks to make you lose an attack. Whoopee!"

[Dubbert]

Are there any penalties for continuing to fight from the ground. Do you have to spend your next Attack/Action standing back up?

[Kraynic]

"Losing one attack seems not very useful. I use one of my attacks to make you lose an attack. Whoopee!"

Depending on what the initiative order was before the attack, being dropped to the end of the initiative order can be a pretty nasty penalty. If they were already last anyway, then it isn't all that great. Of course, that is assuming one on one combat. If there is anyone else around to gang up on them, then the victim will be taking attacks without being able to return any.

[The Beast]

Rifter 3 has optional rules for ground fighting in it. Perhaps they can fill your need.

[Soldier of Od]

Yeah, it is the losing an attack/action AND the initiative that can make the most difference.

e.g. Gina and Tommy are fighting. Gina rolls a 14 for initiative and Tommy rolls a 7.
Action 1: Gina does a successful knockdown attack, knocking Tommy down. Tommy loses his action 1, but he is already at the bottom of the initiative.
Action 2: Gina goes first, but she would have done anyway.

But if Gina rolls a 14 for initiative and Tommy rolls a 16:
Action 1: Tommy hits Gina, who tries to defend with an automatic parry. Gina does a successful knockdown attack, knocking Tommy down. Tommy loses his next action, and drops to last place in the initiative.
Action 2: Gina gets to go again. Tommy doesn’t get to act this phase.
Action 3: Gina gets to go again. Afterwards, Tommy finally gets to take an action. In the meantime, Gina has had three actions in a row (including the initial knockdown attack). I find this is especially useful if one wants to make a two-action move (such as casting a spell) without any fear of one’s opponent interrupting it.

And as others have said, if this is a group fight, that can make even more difference. If Gina has a 14 for initiative and Tommy has a 7, but Gina’s friends Jim and Billie-Jean rolled a 4 and a 3, they now both get to go twice before Tommy gets to act. And if Tommy has friends, Gina gets to take him out of the fight and concentrate her next two actions on them while he is floundering around on the floor.

Also, it is important to recognise that if someone really doesn’t want to be knocked down, the victim may lose multiple actions defending the attack as well as from (or instead of) the knockdown. Some knockdown attacks cannot be parried, but can be dodged, which (usually) requires an action. Tripping/leg hooks and backwards sweeps both require a dodge to avoid them. That would take an action. If you fail, you lose another action through being knocked down. After you are hit by a knockdown attack, you can attempt to maintain balance by rolling over their strike roll, but this also takes an action to do. So, the victim could end up losing up to three actions from a single knockdown attack! Initiative order could make this even more debilitating.

Body block/Tackle as a hand-to-hand combat move appears to be a slightly special case, the main differences being that it takes two actions to do, and as a result doesn’t just knock the victim down, but backwards another 1D6 feet (which is awesome when you are on the edge of a cliff!). This attack also indicates that it cannot be parried (“a successful strike always inflicts damage unless his opponent dodges, but the victim who is hit can avoid being knocked down only by trying to maintain his balance”), so although it takes two attacks to do, the victim may lose three attacks: an action to dodge, action to maintain balance, and (if they fail) an action from the knockdown. Even if they succeed, the victim will lose one or two actions from defending, which would even-out with the attacker – in some ways better than an ordinary attack that can be defended with an automatic parry and has no need for a maintain balance roll.

I personally consider the body block/tackle ability conferred by the wrestling skill to be slightly different than that conferred by the hand-to-hand. As it doesn’t say anything in the skill description about requiring two attacks or being knocked backwards 1D6 feet, I have used this as a different, one attack move that just knocks the victim down. It does call it a special wrestling move rather than just referring to the combat section, and the other special moves are unique and different to their related moves in the combat section. And besides, every hand-to-hand skill automatically gets the standard body block move anyway, which would very often make the wrestling ability redundant. But that is just my interpretation.

And the point is at the end of all this that the victim is on the floor. What are the penalties for fighting while lying on the ground? I wish I knew. Thanks again Palladium. But even if there are no direct penalties to combat rolls, there are actions the victim simply can’t do without getting back up, such as running away.
I hope all of that helps!

[Library Ogre]

Yeah, it is the losing an attack/action AND the initiative that can make the most difference.

e.g. Gina and Tommy are fighting.

The strike really did a number on their relationship, huh?

[Soldier of Od]

Yeah, it is the losing an attack/action AND the initiative that can make the most difference.

e.g. Gina and Tommy are fighting.

The strike really did a number on their relationship, huh?

[ShadowLogan]

Well, there is also a bit about it under Wrestling for the body block/tackle. It's on page 56 of the main book.

-Vek
"Losing one attack seems not very useful. I use one of my attacks to make you lose an attack. Whoopee!"

Depending on how the "knockdown" (or knocking one off one's feet) is performed, there could be damage inflicted to the opponent, so you get the benefit of doing damage to your opponent AND making them lose an attack. I'd call that a positive.

Another thing to consider is the situation, a "knockdown" might be required if you are trying to subdue someone with minimal damage inflicted (ex. your Psychic goes Astral Projecting and their body gets possessed, the party probably doesn't want to kill the Psychic's body when battling it under the control of the possessing entity, or in a rescue mission the princess needs to be subdued because she doesn't realize you are her rescuers, etc).

[Hotrod]

If you're repeatedly knocking down an opponent, you're effectively removing that opponent's ability to do anything. That can actually be a terrific, team-player tactic. Think of it like an offensive lineman in football; you're keeping the other person busy. This frees up other members of your party to act without having to worry about your opponent. This be especially useful if your opponent is effectively immune to damage or too tough for you to take down by doing damage, or if your opponent has some attacks that are so dangerous that you want to add an extra layer of protection above standard dodges and parries.

If your knockdown attacks do damage (flip/throw), there's a pretty good case for using those attacks exclusively; you're both doing damage and pre-empting your opponent from even trying to hurt you. The question then: Will you prevent more harm to yourself by using weapons with normal attacks and killing/subduing your attacker sooner, or by using knockdown attacks to reduce the number of attacks your opponent can launch at you during a longer fight?

If P.S. bonuses apply to flip/throw attacks (and I think they do), then, for a high P.S. character, there's not a big difference in damage between using one weapon and going unarmed. Thus, a "Hotrod Smash" character without paired weapons would do well to use the heck out of flip/throw attacks, wading into a melee and tossing foes around. With paired weapons, it's more situational.

Ideally, a "Hotrod Smash" character would be paired with another character who could spam a lot of knockdown/disabling attacks, enabling high P.S. dual strikes on an opponent who's too busy getting tripped up to mount any kind of attack. A "you hold 'em, I hit 'em" approach could be highly effective against single opponents who might otherwise easily defeat either player character.