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From the swarm traits entry:
Swarm Traits: A swarm has no clear front or back and no discernable anatomy, so it is not subject to critical hits or flanking. A swarm made up of Tiny creatures takes half damage from slashing and piercing weapons. A swarm composed of Fine or Diminutive creatures is immune to all weapon damage. Reducing a swarm to 0 hit points or less causes it to break up, though damage taken until that point does not degrade its ability to attack or resist attack. Swarms are never staggered or reduced to a dying state by damage. Also, they cannot be tripped, grappled, or bull rushed, and they cannot grapple an opponent.
The entry doesn't specifically state precision-based damage or sneak attacks.
Assuming I had a rogue with swarmbane clasp (for example) and I beat the swarm in initiative, can I deal sneak attack damage?
Is the line "no clear front or back and no discernable[sic] anatomy" just fluff or is it actually saying no sneak attack?
I tried to find other examples of this, and it looks like in the bestiary 2 monster "Worm that walks" it has the same wording as swarm traits above (granted, this is a prime possibility for a copy-paste error as I am pretty sure the text is almost word-for-word from the swarm traits section).
Another creature I found that has explicit immunity to crits but not flaking is the Aeon creatures from Bestiary 2. These actually call out in their stat blocks "Immunities critical hits, poison..." which leads me to believe crit-ability =/= sneakattack-ability.
Thoughts?
Almost EVERYTHING in Pathifnder can be sneak attacked. In fact, creatures that can't be sneak attacked are so rare now that they'll either mention the fact that they're immune as a special defense or it's part of their type.
Incorporeal creatures, swarms, elementals, and oozes are both immune to sneak attacks, but that's pretty much it. Corporeal undead, all constructs, and pretty much everything else can be sneak attacked (or by extension critically hit).
Even though he contradicts himself there, I think it points towards the RAI being that swarms should be immune to sneak attack.
Almost EVERYTHING in Pathifnder can be sneak attacked. In fact, creatures that can't be sneak attacked are so rare now that they'll either mention the fact that they're immune as a special defense or it's part of their type.
Incorporeal creatures, swarms, elementals, and oozes are both immune to sneak attacks, but that's pretty much it. Corporeal undead, all constructs, and pretty much everything else can be sneak attacked (or by extension critically hit).
Even though he contradicts himself there, I think it points towards the RAI being that swarms should be immune to sneak attack.
Yah, I have seen JJ's post, and I personally do agree with him. But he himself has said he is not a rules guy himself, so wanted to see if anyone had a differing opinion.
"The rogue must be able to see the target well enough to pick out a vital spot and must be able to reach such a spot."
- Second to last line in the description of sneak attack.
Argue to me a "Vital spot" of the swarm and I'd let it happen, but, as it stands I do not believe swarms have said spots.
This is a copy of my post from the PFS thread that started this but it answers your request:
My swarm's can have vital spots example:
As the rat swarm approaches you notice that its forward motion puts a vast majority of the rats in in one section of the swarm. The rats don't see the vanish trick'd Ninja as they flow past. The Ninja strikes out at the obviously denser section of rats with his morning star. The ninja deals full damage due to bludgeoning and Sneak Attack for targeting the denser section of the swarm and smashing more rats with his attack.
I will also point out that "Vital Spot" is not longer the same as "Discernable Anatomy." Pathfinder specifically removed that sentence from the rogues sneak attack, thus broadening the definition of what what you can and cannot sneak attack (i.e. undead, contructs, etc).
3.5
A rogue can sneak attack only living creatures with discernible anatomies—undead, constructs, oozes, plants, and incorporeal creatures lack vital areas to attack. Any creature that is immune to critical hits is not vulnerable to sneak attacks. The rogue must be able to see the target well enough to pick out a vital spot and must be able to reach such a spot. A rogue cannot sneak attack while striking a creature with concealment or striking the limbs of a creature whose vitals are beyond reach.
Pathfinder
The rogue must be able to see the target well enough to pick out a vital spot and must be able to reach such a spot. A rogue cannot sneak attack while striking a creature with concealment.
Notice how much they cut out of the last paragraph. No mention of discernible anatomy and no such thing as immune to crit also meaning immune to sneak attack.
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Came to this message board thinking it was the same thing I need to know. It's close, but not exact. I'm playing iron gods, fire of creation. There are ratfolk scrappers, which say they can use their swarm ability to perform sneak attacks. So since two ratfolk can occupy the same square, does that constitute a swarm? And doing so, the target can't discern exactly where attacks are coming from? And in a swarm, does each creature take a turn attacking, unless otherwise specified? Thanks in advance!
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Swarms have there own mechanics. It doesn't matter how many ratfolk you squeeze into a square they will not inherently be a swarm. For a start they aren't fine, diminutive or tiny.
Even if you overcome that hurdle, a swarm is effectively it's own creature, with it's own attack - the individual creatures within it don't have their individual attacks.
In addition to not having a front, back or discernable anatomy swarms also have one other thing that may affect your ability to use sneak attack.
A swarm is immune to any spell or effect that targets a specific number of creatures (including single-target spells such as disintegrate), with the exception of mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, morale effects, patterns, and phantasms) if the swarm has an Intelligence score and a hive mind. A swarm takes half again as much damage (+50%) from spells or effects that affect an area, such as splash weapons and many evocation spells.
So if you are using a weapon to sneak attack it seems like this would not work. If you are somehow using an area of effect attack (Possibly with an arcane trickster) then you probably do get sneak attack.