Stunning fist: what's the point of its improvements?


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion


I post this here in the rules section because I may have misunderstood the rules.

However, stunning fist STUNS the target if it fails a save.

Quote:
A stunned character drops everything held, can’t take actions, loses any Dexterity bonus to AC, and takes a –2 penalty to AC

Why on earth would you take disorienting blow ? It CONFUSES the target.

Quote:

Roll on the following table at the beginning of each confused subject's turn each round to see what the subject does in that round.

d% Behavior
01–25 Act normally.
26–50 Do nothing but babble incoherently.
51–75 Deal 1d8 points of damage + Str modifier to self with item in hand.
76–100 Attack nearest creature (for this purpose, a familiar counts as part of the subject's self).

25% chance of having no effect. 25% chance of attacking someone that very well might be you. 25% chance of hitting himself for little damage (unless you're huge and thus have a great fort save). 25% chance of losing your action BUT without losing dex or -2 penalty.

How is that better ? For the price of a feat, it just got WORSE.

Same question with the Ultime Mantis Style: Mantis Torment.

Quote:
While using Mantis Style, you make an unarmed attack that expends two daily attempts of your Stunning Fist. If you hit, your opponent must succeed at a saving throw against your Stunning Fist or become dazzled and staggered with crippling pain until the start of your next turn, and at that point the opponent becomes fatigued.

So now, you replace the stunned condition with dazzled and staggered. Which means your opponent can still fight you. And it costs TWO USES of stunning fist. Why again is that better ? At least, he's fatigued afterwards.

Did I miss something from those abilities, or from Stunning fist ?


There are creature types which are immune to stun, which are not immune to confusion, dazzle and/or stagger. It expands the amount of monsters that can be affected by your stunning fist uses.

By the way, I was not able to find Disorienting Blow in the PRD. Is it from a third party publisher?


Also, do these bonuses to DC stack ?
- +1 from Martial Artist
- +2 from Mantis Style
- +2 from Ability Focus


Mabven the OP healer wrote:

There are creature types which are immune to stun, which are not immune to confusion, dazzle and/or stagger. It expands the amount of monsters that can be affected by your stunning fist uses.

By the way, I was not able to find Disorienting Blow in the PRD. Is it from a third party publisher?

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/disorienting-blow-combat

Pathfinder Player Companion: Dragon Empires Primer


Disorienting Blow .

It is in the Dragon Empires Primer book.


Yes they stack.


I can see Mantis style as an opener. Fatigued is a nice little debuff to drop on someone when you're in melee with them, and it lasts. Follow up with normal stuns after that and you're golden.


wraithstrike wrote:
Yes they stack.

Sounds pretty powerful to me.

With 20 wis at level 10, we're looking at DC 25.


A CR 10 monster has a +13 to its good save on average, and if you are devoting 3 feats to it then you should have a decent chance at it working.

With a DC of 25 the monster still has close to a 50% chance of making the save.


wraithstrike wrote:

A CR 10 monster has a +13 to its good save on average, and if you are devoting 3 feats to it then you should have a decent chance at it working.

With a DC of 25 the monster still has close to a 50% chance of making the save.

Two feats actually (Mantis style and Ability focus).

It can also be used once every round - which means the mob will eventually fail its save.

But yeah, it's just a nice bonus when it procs ^^


Grenouillebleue wrote:


Why on earth would you take disorienting blow ? It CONFUSES the target.

For the same reason you'd take Stunning Fist Adept (from the same book).


Its better than vow of poverty. Other than that I got nothing


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proftobe wrote:

Its better than vow of poverty. Other than that I got nothing

besides Prone Shooter what isn't?


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Talonhawke wrote:
proftobe wrote:

Its better than vow of poverty. Other than that I got nothing

besides Prone Shooter what isn't?

I think Prone Shooter is probably better than vow of poverty.


I dont know at least Vow of poverty does something even if its bad for the most part.


Talonhawke wrote:
I dont know at least Vow of poverty does something even if its bad for the most part.

Yes, it does something. That something is make you much much weaker than you were previously. I'd much rather throw my resource (in the case of prone shooter, a feat) in the trash for something that literally does nothing than spend it on something that gimps me. Would you say a feat that gives the benefit, "You're gothy and edgy and like to hang out with vampires. As a result of your dealings with the undead, you are forevermore under the effects of -3 negative levels." is better than prone shooter because it's actually doing something?


You misunderstand even if it is horribly out weighed by the downside it does something I get an extra 10 Ki over the course of 20 levels. Sure I now have to find a way to get my GM to let me cheese all my magic items into one thing or multiclass spell caster but I did get more Ki.

Its a horrible option and one apparently we "need". Prone shooter does nothing in fact I have had players ask others if they had prone shooter before shooting from prone because "they weren't using lower numbers" Prone shooter actually tricks players into believing the rules are different than written.


Ok, I agree there. Prone Shooter obfuscates the rules and confuses new players. But in terms of being weak, it still doesn't even come close to vow of poverty. :p

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