Let's the turn order is:
20, Player A
15, Player B
10, Player C
Can Player C delay until after Player A's next turn? This is a point of contention in a current game.
Argument Against
Delay By choosing to delay, you take no action and then act normally on whatever initiative count you decide to act. When you delay, you voluntarily reduce your own initiative result for the rest of the combat. When your new, lower initiative count comes up later in the same round, you can act normally. You can specify this new initiative result or just wait until some time later in the round and act then, thus fixing your new initiative count at that point.
The argument against is that since you're last, reducing your initiative result any lower will never put you after the person with the highest initiative result.
Argument For
Initiative Consequences of Delaying Your initiative result becomes the count on which you took the delayed action. If you come to your next action and have not yet performed an action, you don’t get to take a delayed action (though you can delay again).
If you take a delayed action in the next round, before your regular turn comes up, your initiative count rises to that new point in the order of battle, and you do not get your regular action that round.
This argument hinges on the fact that you should be able to delay into the next round and then take your turn, otherwise this entry is meaningless. It interprets the previous entry as intending to allow the player to delay until a later point in the combat, being after any future turn, not just ones with lower initiative values.
Is there someone with a better understanding of the delay mechanic who can weigh in on this?