Revised Action Economy and Vital strike

[Zautos']

So I think by RAW vital strike is a 1 act action. But i'm thinking that it should be 2 acts.

Then you could do one powerful attack and a normal attack 0/-5
instead of 0/-5/-10. So it would be useful some times but not always i think.

So what do you think is it a good whey to run things?

[KainPen]

it is up to you to decided. the whole new action Economy a lot rulings have falling to be GM choice. Due to page limit in the book. they where working with. I would have loved to see more and maybe we will one day. I am surprised they covered as much as they did in the number of pages they had to work with.

I ruled it as 1 act, that can only be used on 1st attack subtype. I honestly don't think it that bad if you allowed it on every strike. Considering the main point of the new action economy is to help martial be more mobile. Most martils I see making is 1 or 2 attacks in around anyway. I don't see a lot of 3 more more attacks. I find my players doing other things they could not do before or would not because full attacks was to important. Also making it 1 act allow you use it with a charge.

The reason I ruled it 1 act limited to 1st attack subtype of the round was the txt in the feat about being at the highest attack bonus. I feel it was also within the spirit of the original feat and the spirit of how the new action Economy is supposed to work, by granting more mobility to martial.

[SheepishEidolon]

Don't be too nice when it comes to action economy. When using (a modified version of) revised action economy, I allowed two Cleaves per round - little change in the rules, big change on the battlefield.

Vital Strike is (in average) +7 damage with a greatsword for medium creatures. That's more than thrice the reference value of +2 from Weapon Specialization. Keep in mind the bonus can be even higher, with shapeshifting or enlarge.

Another point: Revised action economy tried to make martials more mobile. But if you allow Vital Strike on any attack, you again encourage full-attacks. A combination of move + Vital Strike + normal attack in the same round is already more powerful than the usual move + Vital Strike.

[Derrick Winters]

Don't compare Vital strike with Weapon specialization in the context of RAE, but rather, compare it with TWF/ITWF/GTWF in the context of RAE.

With TWF, you can move, attack twice(at -2), then attack once(at -5) at level 1.
If you have bonus damage (from inspire courage, sneak attack, rage, etc), you can deal quite impressive damage thanks to TWF.

With ITWF, you can move, attack twice(at -2), then attack twice again(at -7) at level 6.

[SheepishEidolon]

I like TWF myself, but it's difficult to compare to Vital Strike. TWF has several drawbacks (AB penalty, smaller weapons, feat requirements, Dex requirements) which effectively reduce damage output. Depending on the character choices you might be better off than a Vital Striker, but that's not a given. Working like intended...