And I gave you a feat that shuts down other classes, without even needing to hit them in melee! Deflect Arrows.
1. Many archers start out with Rapid Shot, so Deflect Arrows does not shut them down, it just halves their damage output. Annoying, but manageable, since a level 1 archer can often kill on one shot anyway.
2. Unlike Flanking Foil, Deflect Arrows actually DOES have requirements. The most annoying of which not even being the actual pre-requisites (which again, unlike Flanking Foil, it has), it's that you need one hand free to use the feat. Being limited to at best a 1H weapon and a buckler or (gods help you) unarmed combat is a pretty severe cost of use.
And only archers w/ Point Blank Master dont care about 5 ft stepping. All other archers are quite definitely screwed by Step Up. Far more so than a caster ever is. They don't get some check to not provoke with their bowshots.
I don't see that shutting down an archer. Provoking an AoO, yes, taking damage, maybe, but definately not shut down.
I played an crossbowman in a long campaign, and on a regular basis took damage from provoking AoO from aiming a ranged weapon. I knew that I would likely take damage, but still went ahead.
I think the 5' step referral was to the fact that many archers stay in the background, at range, and don't have to worry if the caster takes a 5' step or not, nor do they need to take a 5" step to get in a full attack round.
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 8
|
And I gave you a feat that shuts down other classes, without even needing to hit them in melee! Deflect Arrows.1. Many archers start out with Rapid Shot, so Deflect Arrows does not shut them down, it just halves their damage output. Annoying, but manageable, since a level 1 archer can often kill on one shot anyway.
2. Unlike Flanking Foil, Deflect Arrows actually DOES have requirements. The most annoying of which not even being the actual pre-requisites (which again, unlike Flanking Foil, it has), it's that you need one hand free to use the feat. Being limited to at best a 1H weapon and a buckler or (gods help you) unarmed combat is a pretty severe cost of use.
1. And Flanking Foil doesn't shut rogues down either, it just reduces their damage output. At 1st level, probably by about half. Annoying, but manageable. :)
2. So go Missile Shield instead. Now instead of an empty hand, you've got a light, heavy, or tower shield. I admit, it's got a prereq (Shield Focus), but you also don't have to hit the archer with a melee attack to make it work.
Flanking Foil will halve the rogue's damage output...at level 1 and 2. It goes downhill from there pretty fast. Meanwhile, Deflect Arrows is gradually affecting less and less of the archer's damage as he gains more attacks.
Missile Shield is certainly less painful than Deflect Arrows to use, but it's still not crippling the archer as much as Flanking Foil is crippling the rogue.
And to go back to the "rogues were already weak" thing... Archers are a strong build in PF, so even if those feats were as bad for them as flanking foil was for a rogue (which I contest), it still wouldn't be as abhorrent. Just as massive nerfs to spellcasters would be more palatable. Why you gotta kick a class that's already down?
|
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 8
|
Flanking Foil will halve the rogue's damage output...at level 1 and 2. It goes downhill from there pretty fast. Meanwhile, Deflect Arrows is gradually affecting less and less of the archer's damage as he gains more attacks.
Missile Shield is certainly less painful than Deflect Arrows to use, but it's still not crippling the archer as much as Flanking Foil is crippling the rogue.
And to go back to the "rogues were already weak" thing... Archers are a strong build in PF, so even if those feats were as bad for them as flanking foil was for a rogue (which I contest), it still wouldn't be as abhorrent. Just as massive nerfs to spellcasters would be more palatable. Why you gotta kick a class that's already down?
And (as I've said) as the rogue gains levels, she gains more ways of negating Flanking Foil--just like archer gets better at bypassing Deflect Arrows--that's kind of my point :)
See, back here where I said that?
No, the reason the feat isn't broken is because it doesn't screw the rogue over that much at low levels, and at high levels they have a lot of ways of getting around it.
BTW, way to move the goalposts there. "Show me a feat that shuts down a class!" becomes "Well, that class is really powerful, so if there was a feat that shut them down, it wouldn't be so bad!"
Here's the problem with that. Nothing about that states that the effect stops if the target stops flanking and starts again.
In fact, the duration is "until the start of your next turn". So "while" it is flanking, whether or not it stopped at some point, it's still going to be under the effects of the ability.
Sorry MD, don't buy it. I see it as when you end the flanking situation, you end the restrictions of the FF. So when you create a new flanking situation its new and not restricted by any previous flanking situation.
IMO that's the RAI and the RAW.
Since the rogue has to move out-and-in to melee whenever hit with FF, it does allow the rogue to get some SA. And the FF becomes much less all-powerful unless he keeps hitting on AOOs with it.
|
What you say applies to rogues, too. Their HD is one size better than wizard or sorc, and he cannot afford as much in Con as those SAD classes can, so their hp ends up being about equal. Rogue has trouble just surviving in melee combat at low levels, too.And only archers w/ Point Blank Master dont care about 5 ft stepping. All other archers are quite definitely screwed by Step Up. Far more so than a caster ever is. They don't get some check to not provoke with their bowshots.
Nah, you misunderstood me. I wasn't saying that archers didn't care about attacks of opportunity. I was saying that archers didn't care if the wizard took a 5ft step or not before casting, because their range means they can use their readied action as long as the wizard is in sight.
But yeah, there are tons of ways to screw classes over. One more or less isn't game breaking.
Looking at it from the other end of the box, blindfight only allows you to retain your dex bonus if your opponent is invisible. If he's using stealth, well, that's not invisibility. If you're flatfooted, it won't help you either.
For flanking foil, the rogue will probably want offensive defense to stack up on dodge bonuses. It's not a given that his opponent is going to hit him, and if he misses then he doesn't get the benefits of flanking foil.
For many rogues, it wont more than halve the dpr to level 5 or so. Greatsword and longspear are common in my area at least, often with a str 16 or so to match.
Wow our rogues around here are all the typical TWF or Dervish dance rogues.
People rarely go twf here because its hard to set up full attacks without getting bashed into the ground. Dervish danc ies pretty common too, but the net effect is similar; at level 4 were looking at 1d6+6 or so with a 20 pt buy (1d6+5 for 15ptb) + 2d6 SA. Avg 16.5, drops to 9.5 due to feat. At 5th level about half damage is lost. This is ignoring the lost flank bonus.
For a greatsworder its more like 2d6+7 at the loss of 2 AB and some ac. Fighter or ranger dips are common here too, but didny include that.
Given that Flanking Foil requires the rogue to be adjacent to the target when the Foiler makes their melee attack, could the rogue pull out a reach weapon and go for broke? Harder to flank with, but I thought you could still flank even though you were using Reach. (Checked- you can!)
Or, heck, Enlarge Person and use the natural reach granted by that for both your weapons. It doesn't matter if the Foiler has Strike Back, as you need to be adjacent when you are struck or Foil doesn't work.
I will say that it is really really weird that the person struck by Flanking Foil doesn't actually have to be flanking at the moment they are Foiled, and that the effects are independent to the number of flanking situations they arrange themselves in that turn.
I would say that it wouldn't be unreasonable for someone to ask the feat be redesigned to either limit the number of Foil targets to one and/or require the person to actually be flanking when they are Foiled.