Taunt

From HGWiki

Ability

Taunt is used to provoke an enemy into dropping his guard for a short time.

• Ability: Charisma

• Classes: Barbarian, Bard, Blackguard, Paladin

• Cross-Class: Yes

• Requires Training: No

• Check: The difficulty class is a concentration check made by the target against the character's Taunt skill roll. It is considered an attack. If the taunt is successful, the opponent suffers an armor class penalty equal to the difference between the Taunt roll and the defender's roll (to a max of a -6 penalty) for 5 rounds. The target will also suffer a 30% chance of spell failure, if they don't resist the taunt.

• Special: Taunt penalties are not cumulative.

• Use: Select skill and then target creature.

HG Enhanced

• No longer requires an action to use, but may only be used once per round.

Notes

• This is an excellent way to reduce an opponent's AC -- in a sense giving a character up to +6 AB that does not count towards the +20 attack bonus cap.
• Taunt counts as an offensive action but is not an attack per se.
• When using taunt, you are flat-footed.
• If a character makes an attack of opportunity while taunting, the taunt is interrupted. However, unless the character exits combat mode, the next taunt is instant, allowing the character to continue attacking without interruption.