Talk:Cleave
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[edit] Cause of Cleave
Since this statement was added, I think the nature of the cause of cleave ought be addressed.
- In certain situations, a kill does not have to occur in order to trigger a cleave. For example, a character dealt enough damage to kill a badly wounded target. Before the blow is landed, the target heals itself such that the blow will no longer kill it - a cleave will occur nonetheless.
There is not anything false about the above, but it just doesn't go far enough. Even on creatures with no DR whatsoever that do not heal themselves, cleave can become a final blow instead of blow resulting from a final blow (this seems especially the case when the target has a lot of hit points). For this express reason I do not think that the circumstance taken into consideration by cleave is the same as the damage roll versus hit points (or maybe cleave performs a different damage roll), but have been unable to track down any formulaic breakdown of what causes a cleave versus what does not. If others wish to shed some light on this. WhiZard 10:08, 20 May 2009 (UTC)
I've found out the following.
- A cleave can only happen if the killing blow is the first attack, critical or otherwise, of a flurry.
- If you have multiple attacks in a flurry and one of the non-first attacks scores a critical hit, a cleave occurs, even if such critical hits are made on an already dead target.
- Successful defensive rolls also cause cleaves to occur.
While it doesn't explain why the killing cleave occurs in the example provided by WhiZard, hopefully it provides some insight. 220.255.7.242 03:28, 21 May 2009 (UTC)
