|
12d8+28 is 124 every time with Furious Finish, which bloodragers qualify for.Which ends your rage and leaves you fatigued and therefore unable to rage again even if you wouldn't normally be fatigued. A single CR11 opponent has on average 145hp so you have failed to kill your target and are pretty weak for the rest of the encounter which may well be against multiple opponents.
Unless you use one of the many ways to rage cycle.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Yeah, yeah, the Bloodrager example I gave isn't 100% optimal. But it's fine, and the player is having a blast with it. Vital Strike is an option that works well enough in some circumstances, and never outright penalizes you. Therefor, IMO, not a trap.
Shall we move on to other options?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
As I said, it's worth it with two-handed weapons. Without them and without a way to offset the accuracy hit, it becomes a trap against high AC opponents.This is demonstrably false.
I don't care what weapon style you are fighting with. And I don't care how high the AC is. A 5% reduction in accuracy for +2 damage is always beneficial to DPR.
Apologies to all for continuing the derail, but it is not 'demonstrably false'.
Let's say I'm currently hitting only on a 19. My normal damage is 2d4+5 for an average of 10. That's a 10% chance of hitting, so average damage is 1 per attack.
If I throw in -1 to hit and +2 damage, I have a 5% chance hitting for damage of 2d4+7. That's an average damage of 0.6. So in this case using power attack would reduce my damage output by 40%.
In my experience it varies from game to game, setting to setting, table to table.
Example: If I run a campaign that is extremely heavy on intrigue and extremely light on combat, then Power Attack becomes a trap option in comparison to Skill Focus(Sense Motive).
Example: If I run a game set in Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover then all missile weapons become trap options in comparison to thrown weapons because possession or use of a missile weapon of any type carries a Death Penalty in every civilized region of the planet.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Monkey Lunge: spend a standard action to remove the penalties from the lunge feat. The lunge feat has not actions. You just spent your standard action and can no longer attack.
Elephant Stomp: This feat gives you the ability to move and make single attack if you pass a CMB check by 5 or more by eating your swift action in addition to your move and standard action.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Actual Traps:
Building traps. They're expensive and feeble. Even a Trapper Ranger can't make it worthwhile, and it's certainly not worth the loss of spellcasting.
On which note, anything to do with using poison.
Exotic Weapon Proficiency (some are borderline OK, most are just v weak).
Heavy Armour Proficiency unless it comes as a class feature.
Kukri unless you do a lot of bonus damage or are a dedicated critfisher.
Cockatrice Strike. It's not going to work and you can CdG him anyway so why bother?
TWF unless you do phat bonus damage like sneak, FE or Smite, AND use identical/double weapons. And even then it's poor.
Unless you use one of the many ways to rage cycle.I am fairly sure you cannot rage cycle with Furious Finish. It specifies that you become fatigued even if you wouldn't normally be so you get fatigued even if for example you are otherwise immune. The best you can hope for then is something like potions of lesser restoration which then cost actions.
Agreed. The unusual wording is certainly to specifically exclude Furious Finish from the rage cycling game.
Actual Traps: Kukri unless you do a lot of bonus damage or are a dedicated critfisher.
The kukri is the optimal choice for a TWF'er, I'd hardly call it a trap.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
James Jacobs disagrees, although I've heard he doesn't like to be quoted about rules issues.
But that's good enough for me.
I would love if the feat was written that way.
It is not. It clearly even makes undead barbarians fatigued. The devs need to write better. People don't buy their product to scrounge through the someone's post history of someone to figure out what words like "normally" mean.
|
Great thread! Thanks, Bret!
I'll weigh in on the Power Attack to mention that the people arguing against Power Attack mostly don't do rigorous math. It's only a bad option if you choose to play e.g. a TWF Smiting Paladin or a TWF Rogue, or some other option that gets the worst version of Power Attack and has lots of bonus damage. Even then, it's not a Trap option, it's just a poor choice.
I'll call out DEX-based melee combat as a trap. Some builds use it semi-effectively, but it's still a trap. At the end of the day it costs more feats and does less damage. Also, this approach eschews reach tactics, so it loses doubly. Sure, there are exceptions so there's no need to go offering counter-examples, but it's still largely true.
I'll call out DEX-based melee combat as a trap. Some builds use it semi-effectively, but it's still a trap. At the end of the day it costs more feats and does less damage. Also, this approach eschews reach tactics, so it loses doubly. Sure, there are exceptions so there's no need to go offering counter-examples, but it's still largely true.
I'll come out and say that DEX-based magi is also a trap.
Strength/INT is just better.
skill focus sounds great and actually has a nice effect on said skill. With out some trick to make said skill useful in combat it hurts your combat ability more then you would think.
Many new players will think that skill focus acrobatics is great choice for their nimble character but hit does not add much at all.
I am sure there are worse.
I actually had the eidolon of a 19th level summoner take Skill Focus (Perception) as her 19th level (15 HD) feat. She had a very high Perception bonus but could still want to boost it since our DM has super hard to detect foes and traps. It would be her last feat ever, so she could not start a new feat chain and had nowhere to go with the previous ones. I don't regret picking up that +6 bonus for the climax of our campaign.
How about Favored Enemy for a humanoid creature sub-type that you completely wipe out at 1st level and then never encounter again?
I'll call out DEX-based melee combat as a trap. Some builds use it semi-effectively, but it's still a trap. At the end of the day it costs more feats and does less damage. Also, this approach eschews reach tactics, so it loses doubly. Sure, there are exceptions so there's no need to go offering counter-examples, but it's still largely true.I'll come out and say that DEX-based magi is also a trap.
Strength/INT is just better.
I'm having difficulty seeing this, unless you are going for a debuff build.
I'm having difficulty seeing this, unless you are going for a debuff build.I'll call out DEX-based melee combat as a trap. Some builds use it semi-effectively, but it's still a trap. At the end of the day it costs more feats and does less damage. Also, this approach eschews reach tactics, so it loses doubly. Sure, there are exceptions so there's no need to go offering counter-examples, but it's still largely true.I'll come out and say that DEX-based magi is also a trap.
Strength/INT is just better.
Get 18 strength, pump int, pump arcane pool as much as possible.
Spam arcane accuracy, use polymorph spells, buff, make use of your spont casting.
It works out really well. My magus keeps up with tier 2 mythic character, even though he doesn't have mythic tiers. The arcane pool is really really useful. I'm level 13 and have taken extra arcane pool like 7 times.
Char: Point buy is 26 for this game. If it was lower I would decrease con and cha.
I'll call out DEX-based melee combat as a trap. Some builds use it semi-effectively, but it's still a trap. At the end of the day it costs more feats and does less damage. Also, this approach eschews reach tactics, so it loses doubly. Sure, there are exceptions so there's no need to go offering counter-examples, but it's still largely true
Dex-based combat can be very effective. (Ok, I know you said "no need to go offering counter-examples" but I couldn't resist.)
Situations in which you cannot charge or full attack make Vital Strike quite powerful.
For example, my reach Bloodrager used Vital Strike whenever I could not charge my foes. People do not often set themselves up in a straight line.
My party was nearly permanently hasted thanks to our cleric and summoner, so I was able to walk around for 70ft of movement and then smack people with 6d6+Bonuses damage from my Enlarged Vital Striking Lucerne Hammer.
It worked well especially since I was a reach character so I was often setting myself into a new position on my round to force out more AoOs.
I'll call out DEX-based melee combat as a trap. Some builds use it semi-effectively, but it's still a trap. At the end of the day it costs more feats and does less damage. Also, this approach eschews reach tactics, so it loses doubly. Sure, there are exceptions so there's no need to go offering counter-examples, but it's still largely true.I'll come out and say that DEX-based magi is also a trap.
Strength/INT is just better.
Justify that one please?
It's rather game-specific. Dex shines in the lower levels (1-6) because you're more survivable. But if you're starting at level 7, or even a level or two below that, or you have some other way to ensure survivability (Tiefling Armor of the Pits-- between Tiefling's +2 Dex and Armor's +2 AC, you're netting +3 AC over an equivalent-build Human at the cost of a feat), then I'd agree.
You have access to the shield spell. You can spam it at level 4. You are also using the polymorph spells that dex builds avoid, further increasing your AC through nat armor.
Crossbows and thrown weapons, two weapon fighting, and finally grappling/other combat maneuvers.
Thrown weapons are fun and not completely useless, though they do drop off in effectiveness pretty quickly as you level up in most situations.
At least a light crossbow is better than a sling and I've been in more than one situation where melee characters are forced to fight at range.
I will admit that I agree that heavy crossbows are pretty terrible in most cases though.
Grappling isn't bad for giving casters a hard time.
Fun trick with thrown weapons. If you have a two-handed weapon and quickdraw, you can throw weapons with any extra attacks you have after full-attacking someone.
To be honest, looking at that it seems like you have the trap options backwards. To writ:
-None of your buffs besides Monstrous Physique are actually affecting Str vs. Dex.
-You have plenty of room for improving your feat selection, so the 2-3 feat tax is not significant
-You have room to improve your weapon; replacing the longsword with a scimitar or rapier would be a straight upgrade even on a strength build, in addition to being Dex-oriented.
-You have a huge number of freely available skill points to devote to Dervish Dance (pull 2 from Ride to Perform)
-Monstrous Physique's Str additions are replaceable by picking a Diminutive form instead. This does cost you reach, but the AC boost is significant enough that getting close is a non-issue and the Magus has awesome mobility by that level anyway. Or, my preferred opinion, just cast a more useful spell.
-Net change for simply flipping Dex and Str directly and going to an appropriate armor would be either a -1 or net-zero change in AC (depending on whether or not one considers a Mithril Chain as appropriate, since you'd be close to bumping the Dex cap on it and would with Monstrous Physique active), net zero change in to-hit and damage, -4 pool points, -2 points in Ride, +4 points in assorted skills, reduced ACP preventing losses in various skills (notably, you'd come out ahead in Ride), and -4 points in assorted much-less-useful skills.Thus: Dex is not a clear trap option based on this character.
Don't get me wrong. You're free to run your character however you like, and certainly I don't always go for a Dex-Magus. But it's not good evidence that going Dex-based is a trap option for a Magus.
-Not exactly but we'll get to why with your other points
-Uh doesn't matter 6 arcane pool is more useful than doing less damage and having less AC by being dex based.-You are forgetting that weapon dice increase with size. I personally rarely roll in the crit range so the jump from 1d8 to 2d6 is worth more than some additional crit chance. I rarely do spell combat either, so criting shocking grasp is rarely a factor.
-Why waste skill points for a worse option?
-Did you forget about reach? Enjoy eating an AOO every attack. For dex-magi it is a bad spell. For strength Magi it is just tons of benefits.
-Forgot that dex builds can't two hand their weapon, so far less damage. AC is less because no one wants to eat AOOs from a dex polymorph.
Thus: You burn some feats and skill points to be worse. No thank you.
The biggest trap is to set the campaign on a world where the star goes supernova. Sort that our Rogue!
-AC is, as noted, equivalent. Better with MP once size bonuses kick in.
-Didn't forget, but it's a relatively negligible part of damage. Incidentally, switching to one of those weapons would upgrade raw damage if you broke out Precise Strike.
-Why waste skill points on Ride? I mean, they're being wasted anyway. You've also yet to actually indicate that it's worse.
-Reach was mentioned. As was "or just cast a more useful spell". Please read the post you're quoting?
-Why is a Magus two-handing anything?And finally: Not using Spell Combat kind of kills your ability to use that character as any kind of argument in terms of options. At this point you're so incredibly far outside Magus norm as to be an outlier by default, and thus not suitable for discussing the sort of standard options that revolve around trap/not trap. This is akin to the Vital Strike discussion earlier in the same thread: Vital Strike is generally bad, and outliers can make it good. Your character can indicate, at best, that outliers (polymorphs, in particular) can make Dex-based bad, not that Dex-based is a trap in the general sense. To do anything more would require a more standardized comparison.
Spell combat isn't a damage booster, it is an action economy booster. I use it for casting extra buffs or casting battlefield control spells.
Generating an AOO on every attack is non-trivial. Actually you realize that. That is why you don't think polymorph spells are best buff ever. Strength magi get longer reach 10ft+, better AC since the spell is good for them, higher weapon dice, random side benefits from the various forms.
Two-handing is what you do when you need to do lots of damage. That is just a truth about the game and is no less true for the magus. Dex builds in general are a trap because they are damage focused but cannot two-hand for benefit.
Spell combat isn't a damage booster, it is an action economy booster. I use it for casting extra buffs or casting battlefield control spells.
Generating an AOO on every attack is non-trivial. Actually you realize that. That is why you don't think polymorph spells are best buff ever. Strength magi get longer reach 10ft+, better AC since the spell is good for them, higher weapon dice, random side benefits from the various forms.
Two-handing is what you do when you need to do lots of damage. That is just a truth about the game and is no less true for the magus. Dex builds in general are a trap because they are damage focused but cannot two-hand for benefit.
I am no expert in Magus, but somehow this seems a bit off.
First of all: what is so beneficial for a magus to 2-hand anyway? unless you have a strenght stat in the 20s i'd imagne this is mostly a mid-game scenario.
Just where do two-handers gain their damage from anyway?... its just the damage die on the weapon isnt it? Wouldnt a dex/crit magus do better in general due to crit-range and that all spellstrike spells actually do get 2x in addition to the weapon crit and the elemental brust enchantments?
It just sounds like the same issue some cleric builds have that it rely on having time to buff up first.
Also, i dont think you can use spell combat with a 2-hander anyway as you need to have a hand free anyway so how you can use it to use spells.
One thing I've noticed is that some of the alleged "trap" options become pretty great if you're in a Mythic game. I probably wouldn't have thought much about combining TWF and Power Attack, but with Mythic Power Attack it is great. I'll also probably be taking Mythic Vital Strike to use when throwing my Viking's 1d4 light hammer, turning the "trap options" of Vital Strike and thrown weapons into a decent attack I can make when I can't reach a foe for melee and or feel like spending a mythic point to make an extra attack.
Just where do two-handers gain their damage from anyway?... its just the damage die on the weapon isnt it?
I'm not going to go into the rest of your post, but I can answer this specifically:
two-hander builds gain their damage from 1.5x strength mod and the extra 0.5x bonus on power attack. As most damage comes from the damage mod, not the damage die (which is also in two-handers favour anyway), these multipliers add up quite quickly.
Spell combat isn't a damage booster, it is an action economy booster. I use it for casting extra buffs or casting battlefield control spells.
Generating an AOO on every attack is non-trivial. Actually you realize that. That is why you don't think polymorph spells are best buff ever. Strength magi get longer reach 10ft+, better AC since the spell is good for them, higher weapon dice, random side benefits from the various forms.
Two-handing is what you do when you need to do lots of damage. That is just a truth about the game and is no less true for the magus. Dex builds in general are a trap because they are damage focused but cannot two-hand for benefit.
I am no expert in Magus, but somehow this seems a bit off.
First of all: what is so beneficial for a magus to 2-hand anyway? unless you have a strenght stat in the 20s i'd imagne this is mostly a mid-game scenario.
Just where do two-handers gain their damage from anyway?... its just the damage die on the weapon isnt it? Wouldnt a dex/crit magus do better in general due to crit-range and that all spellstrike spells actually do get 2x in addition to the weapon crit and the elemental brust enchantments?
It just sounds like the same issue some cleric builds have that it rely on having time to buff up first.
Also, i dont think you can use spell combat with a 2-hander anyway as you need to have a hand free anyway so how you can use it to use spells.
1. You can wield a longsword in two hands.
2. You cannot spell combat while swinging a weapon two-handed.3. If you have base strength of 18, items increase it and polymorph increases it. You have strength well over 20.
4. Power attack also does more damage while two-handing
Thanks for the answers.
RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
|
Powerful Sneak and Deadly Sneak are two of the trappiest trap options. They look good but actually reduce your average damage in nearly every circumstance.
Sharp Senses gives a character who already has keen senses an additional +2 Perception. So I guess you could take it if you already have both Skill Focus and Alertness, both of which are strictly superior choices.
Fast Learner is almost strictly inferior to Toughness. It lets you take both the hp and skill point when leveling your favored class, but just taking Toughness already gives you a hp every level, so just choose skill point and get the same effect, or choose hp and get even more hp. Fast Learner doesn't allow you to combine other FCB with a hp or skill point, which would make it actually worth taking.
Fast Learner is almost strictly inferior to Toughness. It lets you take both the hp and skill point when leveling your favored class, but just taking Toughness already gives you a hp every level, so just choose skill point and get the same effect, or choose hp and get even more hp. Fast Learner doesn't allow you to combine other FCB with a hp or skill point, which would make it actually worth taking.
There is nothing preventing you from taking both Toughness and Fast Learner.
I think Fast Learner can be nice if it is the skill points you are wanting (probably because you want a 2 + Int skill ranks class) and planned to take your FCB as skill ranks at a few levels. The required 13 Int can cause a character to be too spread out for attributes, especially at 15 point buy, so I wouldn't recommend it in all instances. I would definitely look at it for any Fighter going for Disarm feat.
|
RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
|
Fast Learner is almost strictly inferior to Toughness. It lets you take both the hp and skill point when leveling your favored class, but just taking Toughness already gives you a hp every level, so just choose skill point and get the same effect, or choose hp and get even more hp. Fast Learner doesn't allow you to combine other FCB with a hp or skill point, which would make it actually worth taking.There is nothing preventing you from taking both Toughness and Fast Learner.
I think Fast Learner can be nice if it is the skill points you are wanting (probably because you want a 2 + Int skill ranks class) and planned to take your FCB as skill ranks at a few levels. The required 13 Int can cause a character to be too spread out for attributes, especially at 15 point buy, so I wouldn't recommend it in all instances. I would definitely look at it for any Fighter going for Disarm feat.
It's true that you can take both, but it's always a superior option to take Toughness first unless you want the feat chain that comes after Fast Learner.
If your plan is to take a skill point every level, then the two feats are equivalent. If you ever want to take hp or a class-specific FCB instead, Toughness is better because it lets you retain those options while still getting an extra hp.
|
|
On the subject of trap options and the Magus: Trying to go Dex with a katana. It makes Kestrals sad, don't do it.
Speaking of the katana, I'll go one further and say any exotic weapon is a trap. If you can get proficiency via race on a race you were already picking, or via deity favored weapon/Kensai ok, but actually spending a feat to use one is a waste.