Deranger's page

This might be summed up under the condition of flatfooted, but I believe when a character is using the acrobatics skill to maneuver over a difficult surface (such as a narrow plank) the character loses its dexterity bonus to AC. This is potentially meaningful because the grease spell creates a slippery surface which requires acrobatics checks to move across at a certain speed. So depending on how you read it, I believe the grease spell can create a situation where a creature loses its dex to AC.

Using the Run action also loses dex to AC, but if something is running (unless it triggers an AOO in the process) it's probably too far away for the rogue to capitalize on such a condition.

I also tend to look at the lifting maxes as a way of gauging what the simulated real world strength would be. I tend not to look only at move speeds, because it seems too deceptive and involves factoring in too many abstractions.

That is, how can I really determine where the breaking point is where I begin to suffer max dex penalties, or penalties to my dex and strength based skills, or when my speed has suddenly reached a threshold where it drops by 10 feet per round. And so on.

Saying "Can I lift X over my head?" and "Can I lift 2X off the ground?" is a lot simpler. So far I'm somewhere between a 13 and a 14 based on that, and I've reached a similar conclusion to the OP.

It is also interesting, as Daenar points out, how a lot of young folks that keep to athletics are able to lift a lot of weight, though. Maybe we're more of a split between 7s and 13s, which averages out to 10s even if the average dude's strength isn't a 10.

Seems a bit like a Paladin trap to me. My view of pathfinder goblins is that they're all conniving evil creatures, even the 'children'. Definitely should have been covered early on that the campaign would include creatures that don't follow typical alignment (if it wasn't mentioned). Paladin should have received significant cues that he was committing evil throughout the attack and probably fallen before the village was entirely slaughtered.

That said, evil is evil and paladins fall regardless of whether they intend it. Atonement should not be very onerous in my opinion. It can be difficult reading cues like this from the players' perspective when they're just excited to play.

As DM I had to pull some punches by having a couple low level sorcerers protected by mirror image stop casting magic missile. They were focusing down the partys primary damage dealer from a distance while he was dealing with a few mooks. Group of bad guy sorcerers can do a lot of damage target firing with this in the low to middling levels.

I think there's a rule under damaging objects that mentions something like this:

Certain weapons just can't effectively deal damage to certain objects. For example, a bludgeoning weapon cannot be used to damage a rope. Likewise, most melee weapons have little effect on stone walls and doors, unless they are designed for breaking up stone, such as a pick or hammer.

I find monks excel at running. Whether you run in circles or directly away from danger, you'll likely outlive your friends.

He who monks and runs away, lives to monk another day!

I'd have permanent scorching rays beaming out of my eyeballs. Then I'd craft some special goggles to block out the harmful light rays that I could flip up whenever needing to burninate something.

...

Aaaand maybe wear some tight blue clothing.

Just to throw some of what I've experienced in, I've got a player running a strength based magus wielding a greatsword and he's doing fine. He does not use spell combat at all, instead using his spells as standard actions for self buffing or for support type spells to overcome non-combat obstacles.

Otherwise, he uses his weapon enhancing abilities and picked up the pool strike arcana to boost his damage some while swinging the two hander in combat. I believe his intelligence is a 15 including the bonus from his headband of intelligence +2.

He's only up to level 6 so far, but I suspect it will continue to be viable for a good little ways. That said, it's very likely not nearly as "powerful" of a build as a higher intelligence one-handed weapon wielding magus would be, but it works well enough for what it is.

As far as the ranged, this is from the fighter he posted:

Longbow Attack Routine:
Attack: +20 (bab) +5 (dex) + 3(training) +2(weap focus+ greater) +1 (masterwork)-6 DA-2 RS = +23/23/18/13/8
Damage: 1d8 + 3(training) + 5 (strength) + 2(spec) + 12 (PA) = 1d8 +22

With Defeclt arrows, the two 23's get deflected the 18 will hit on a 10 the 13 will hit on a 15 and the 8 will hit on a 20. A monk with a 10 CON has 103 HP. All 5 of those attacks would have had to hit to take out a monk with a 10 CON who didn't take toughness. I don't see that happening all that often.

I just want to get this straight, because I might have missed it:

1) The fighter's attack routine is counting the +23/+23 as a Manyshot, not as a Rapid Shot? Because I would have expected the fighter to do both. Meaning it'd be a +23 (x2 damage)/+23 (regular damage). If it's Rapid Shot, then you only block the first (double damage) arrow with Deflect Arrows, right? Manyshot doesn't penalize an attack roll, so I was assuming both would be used.

2) If (hypothetical here) the fighter wins initiative, doesn't that make the monk flat footed when attacked by the fighter? That won't affect the monk's special armor bonuses, but it should prevent the monk from using deflect arrows and lower his defenses a little by dropping the dex bonus.

If those two conditions are accurate, then failing to win initiative is going to put an enormous hurt on the monk.

If the 1st is accurate, then any time the monk is open to a full attack then he's only going to block that first +23 from hitting.

Sylvanite wrote:

The rerolls are there to protect against poor natural rolls, as I see it. You don't need to know the DC ahead to time to know if you're gonna use a re-roll power. You rolled a 2 on a Will save after seeing a wizard flap his arms and mutter gibberish? Probably time for the re-roll.

But only if they have a save mod of at least +8, right?

Since you've disallowed anyone with a lesser bonus of ever being able to use the re-roll on a roll of natural 2.

Using the strictest interpretation mentioned in this thread, that is what happens.
A natural 1 can never be rerolled by anyone ever, ever.

Similarly, a roll of natural 3 can only ever be rerolled by a PC with a mod of +7 or more.
A roll of natural 4 can only be rerolled by a PC with a mod of +6 or more, etc....

Can you see the pattern?
Do you understand why that's the case?

Okay, I'll admit it. I don't understand what you're saying here. Why would the natural roll + the bonus have to equate to a value of 10 to allow a reroll? Are you suggesting that a character ALWAYS takes the lesser result of the two rolls? That doesn't make sense... Most rerolls say that you have to take the SECOND roll, even if it is lower.

If your char has a will save bonus of +4, and you roll a 3 against a will save spell, you know quite well that a end roll 7 isn't going to cut it. So you reroll hoping to roll higher than a 3. How does having a low saving bonus prevent someone from rerolling?

I playing a magus at the moment, level 3, and I have 4 spell slots.
A Sorcerer at the same level has 6 spell slots. Any reason why?

You're comparing a magus's spells per day to a sorcerer's? I thought a magus was NOT a full caster.

Comparing a full caster such as a wizard to a sorcerer's spells per day, you'll find the wizard will probably have MORE spells per day at level 3. A magus should have fewer than either...

It frustrates me that I can't seem to make any difficult encounters without having to "overdo" it according to the progression tables.

For "normal" encounters involving a CR close to APL, try to have your bad dudes setup in beneficial terrain or tactically beneficial locations. Terrain can make a big difference. Even just having a bunch of ranged guys in a position of cover can make an encounter tougher. Adding a couple simple traps that add further havoc is also fun.

Aim to have more than one encounter per day. When a party can "go nova" and blow all of their resources in a single encounter, it will trivialize the encounter. Throw a couple weak encounters at the party to force them to use some resources, then have something more challenging up ahead so they aren't completely fresh when they reach it.

You may also consider giving a few of your bad dudes some kind of means of buffing. Whether that's with the occasional bad guy sorcerer/cleric casting some spells, or whether a few of the more "brutish" types carry around a potion of bulls strength or invisibility, it can add some to the challenge.

Throw creatures at the party that have different strengths and weaknesses. Incorpreal undead, for instance, are a real headache. They take half damage from most sources, can move through terrain, and often attack touch ACs. Likewise, creatures that cause status effects or ability damage can be fun and weaken the party up so a later encounter will feel more challenging.

Something to avoid: A single high CR creature. Action economy goes to the party. If you want to have a single powerful creature, try to also include a handful of weak little minions to absorb damage, get into flanking positions, and generally cause havoc.

Also, be sure not to over saturate your players with wealth/items. Gear will increase the power level of the party significantly.

As someone else suggested, I would expect an exact mirror party to have a 50% chance of outright killing the entire party, or perhaps even higher chance as you can move the group as a very tactical group and perhaps give them environmental advantages. It's kind of up to the dice on that one. Be careful.

Deranger wrote:

Also bear in mind that a group of CR appropriate foes can do aid another attacks, attacking an AC of 10, to effectively lower a target's AC into a hittable range. This could potentially raise the bar for what is a "disruptive" AC (which, as has been mentioned, can be difficult to quantify because there are so many other defenses than AC that can be targeted).

Those aid another attacks aren't always the best tactic, but if you have a lot of lower CR henchmen and one big bad, it makes perfect sense for the henchmen to try to setup the big bad for a powerful swing.

How much of a Big Bad is he if he needs his henchmen to be able to effectively hit the tank?

Is this a serious question? I'll assume so...

Well, for starters, I apologize if I caused any confusion with my terminology of big bad. I should have used "bigger" bad. Or just "more powerful opponent." But I was going for brevity. I wasn't *intending* to reference the BBEG of a campaign.

HOWEVER. Even if I was talking about the BBEG, increasing the BBEG's chance to splatter a PC is always a worthwhile exercise, especially if his minions have little to no other effective method of damaging the high AC fighter. Seriously. BBEGs need not be able to hit on a 2 to be a BBEG -- and I don't mean to indicate you are suggesting such a thing, so much as using hyperbole to express my opinion that there is always room to improve the chance of a powerful enemy making meaningful contact with a PC.

The discussion had turned towards determining what was an unreasonably high AC for a PC. I simply wanted to toss out a simple reminder that when calculating that, it isn't really enough to just say "well, a CR8 critter swings at X, so X+20 is too high" because, well, a CR7 critter could swing at +14 (hill giant) but between flanking and a couple dire wolves aiding him, he could swing at the equivalent of +20 (or +18 with power attack). So that x+20 suddenly becomes (more) hittable.

Obviously throwing in a mix of encounters that target different defenses is desirable. But if an encounter DOES target AC (and you SHOULD have encounters that target AC so the AC builder can actually feel like his build paid off) it doesn't mean you have to put creatures in there that have gigantic attack bonuses just to hit the high AC character (which introduces the issue of those creatures never failing to miss the regular AC PCs).

That's it.

Also bear in mind that a group of CR appropriate foes can do aid another attacks, attacking an AC of 10, to effectively lower a target's AC into a hittable range. This could potentially raise the bar for what is a "disruptive" AC (which, as has been mentioned, can be difficult to quantify because there are so many other defenses than AC that can be targeted).

Those aid another attacks aren't always the best tactic, but if you have a lot of lower CR henchmen and one big bad, it makes perfect sense for the henchmen to try to setup the big bad for a powerful swing.

I'm pretty sure swapping things around in your hands or swapping your grip back and forth are free actions. Which would suggest, per RAW, releasing one hand (free action), casting (standard, or whatever), and regripping (free action) should all be fine and should not prevent you from threatening/taking an AoO.

There is something that feels a little more... I don't know, heroic, maybe? About wading into melee. Iconic imagery of adventurers and heroes usually includes more dudes with swords than dudes with bows (yes, yes, legolas and all that, but generally we're talking about dudes with swords). I find myself generally inclined to choose close combat options, and I also tend to notice that among those I play with.

One part of it could be because ranged combat comes into its own much later in play, and it requires a lot of feats invested to be really powerful. There's less room for fun and whacky things when you're focusing on picking up your point blank shot, precise shot, deadly aim, maybe weapon focus, rapid shot, and many shot.

Once you've got all those feats and a good composite longbow - yeah, you can stand in the backrow and machine gun everything down with devastating effectiveness. But I think a lot of players may like to be in the thick of things. That might be what you're noticing.

Ranged combat definitely has love. It is (in my opinion) the most effective means of fighting. But it's not everybody's bag.

Manyshot, rapid shot, sanp shot and combat reflexes. 5 regular attacks, and with dex 22) 6 attacks of oportunity

To be clear, there are enough things in this game that don't make sense for this to not phase me in the least. But if it really bothers you, note that both many shot and snap shot require a BAB of 6, so I don't think you can do this at level 6.

Likewise, I don't really see a realistic scenario where 6 guys are dancing around an archer generating AoOs instead of attacking him.

If a player did this with me, I'd happily allow it, because it is a monumental feat investment (7 feats, by my count, they'd want to have at level 7 dealing with nothing but archery) that will never pay off the way you're describing it - definitely not at level 6/7. But hey - this is what houserules are for. As for me, I don't often experience groups of enemies running circles around archers.

Deranger wrote:

I think the usual responses to these kinds of queries involve lightning bolts underwater...

It's a game mechanic. They won't always be reasonable.

Magic is magic, my questions only involve mundane things

There's really not much mundane about 20th level fighters, but the lbolt is just an example. Seriously. How about a bleed over from the "can you charge over readied spiked growth" thread? It is impossible in pathfinder for a group to charge in unison. How can this be?!?!

Game mechanic. Not always reasonable.

Edit: Or if you need more, that 20th level fighter can likely fall 100 meters, face plant, stand up, dust himself off, and walk away.

Or take facing. During combat, all characters can always see 360 degrees around them at all times.

Some mechanics don't necessarily make sense. Throw houserules where you want them to make things feel better, but otherwise just roll with it. It's a game.

That is less than a second to take the arrow, to put it in the bow, to pintpoint the target and to shot. and a level 20 figther can do it.

So, how fast his hands have to move?

And let suppose his targets are spread out, let say 6 targets in 360 arc degree, how fast he have to rotate to do that?

and let he provoke atacks of opportunity, and all hit, how is that the attacks do not interrupt the shooting?

And let suppose his attackers also provoke, and the archer have, snap shot, impproved snap shot and combat reflexes, so he can strike back at all of they, that will be 7 arrows from regular attacks, and 6 arrows form attacks of opportunity, and all in 6 seconds!!

how can it be?

I think the usual responses to these kinds of queries involve lightning bolts underwater...

It's a game mechanic. They won't always be reasonable.

Thanks! That's about what I figured, but just wanted to make sure.

Not sure if this is possible per RAW. Can a rogue blow a feat on Extra Rogue Talent at level 1, or does the rogue need to actually have a rogue talent before being able to select that feat?

And the companion question to this: if a rogue can choose Extra Rogue Talent and if the rogue chooses the Rogue Talent: Weapon Training, does the rogue gain Weapon Focus as an (unusable) bonus feat that just lies dormant until they become level 2, at which point their BAB rises to 1 and their weapon focus become active?

Thanks for any input.

I don't have any problem with allowing jumps to be made from within difficult terrain. But I would probably only permit an acrobatics check per action taken. That is, a single acrobatics check per move action, or whatever.

The thing about the rogue looking up spells in game is that the players have agreed that the GM is never allowed to prevent players from looking up rules. They feel that to allow the GM to do this would facilitate GM cheating.

This is how I feel right now. I know I should be mature about this. I know I should act like an adult and shut the RP down. I just might. You guys probably are right about it being the best course of action.

That doesn't make me want to slaughter them any less, though.

And just as general advice to the overarching problem, I'd agree with most of what the other posters have recommended. Let them know that there are certain compromises everyone is going to have to make if they want you to continue as the GM. If they want to overrule you every time you say "No, let's just do it this way," that's fine - just let them know that you won't continue to serve as the GM under those conditions. Not to strong arm them, but just to say "The game slows down too much when we check the rules for every situation. Unless a rules decision will throw a character into life-or-death peril, let's just use my ruling and go with it. We have to work together for everything to move smoothly, and it's simply too burdensome to double check the rules every time a spell is cast." -- or whatever.

If they refuse, they really aren't operating under the cooperative spirit required for this game to function in a manner that is entertaining to all participating individuals.

Maxximilius wrote:

Kelsey MacAilbert wrote:

I ruled that the monk is automatically proficient with unarmed strikes, and the rogue and sorcerer WILL NOT let it go.

You do know that the monk gains Improved Unarmed Strike as a free feat at level 1, do you ?

Yes. The party rule lawyers say that that doesn't mean they are proficient with them. I think their idiots, but the argument persists.

Just to clarify this issue, I'm pretty sure all characters are proficient with unarmed strikes. Check the weapons section of the core book.

Simple, Martial, and Exotic Weapons

Anybody but a druid, monk, or wizard is proficient with all simple weapons. Barbarians, fighters, paladins, and rangers are proficient with all simple and all martial weapons. Characters of other classes are proficient with an assortment of simple weapons and possibly some martial or even exotic weapons. All characters are proficient with unarmed strikes and any natural weapons possessed by their race. A character who uses a weapon with which he is not proficient takes a –4 penalty on attack rolls.

Pulled from here: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/weapons

Quick question spawned by this discussion... So figment creatures can't cause damage. But could, say, a high level illusion of a dragon (or something similar) make an intimidate check against folks to demoralize them? If it's one of the movable illusions created through the concentration of a caster, I could easily see it roaring and trying to look intimidating. But could it actually make a skill check to cause the shaken condition if it's not real?

I think it's basically because the monk is a role play option. Fighting without armor or significant weaponry in melee combat sucks in real life when facing armored foes and giant monsters, so they decided it shouldn't be as good of an option as fighting with magical armor and weaponry in the game. It's there just in case you want the option for the aesthetic, but there's NO WAY you should be as powerful without armor while fighting with your fists as other characters fighting with both of those elements.

Ok, ok, I'm obviously joking. I don't really think that's part of paizo's design philosophy for the monk. It's an OK class, and I think it survives OK. But playing one from level one when other martial characters are in the party is disappointing. Some of the archetypes are nice - zen archer and qinggong monks for instance - but if you're looking for the traditional legendary kung fu master, you'll have to settle for being sub par when compared to other martial characters.

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More seriously though, instead of making general statements such as "my x does y better than your z," can folks post up at least a brief outline of a stat block?

A few pages back there's arsenic and old lace, a scouting druid and animal companion i made for Comparison to zephyr, a rogue. Old Lace's damage output is insane at level 10, the druid could stealth at a movement rate of 35, had a better perception score and a comparable disable device check.

Right - that wasn't directed at you. I don't think your velociraptor had the 24 stealth at level 4, but I could be wrong. Essentially, I don't think it's appropriate to suggest that an animal companion alone replaces a rogue. An animal companion + a druid? Sure, and then some. Having a rogue in the party lets the druid be a druid, though.

To summarize my position, I think the rogue is underwhelming, other classes can more or less take care of what he does without him, and the things they can't take care of are not generally of vital importance, but the rogue itself is not a useless class and it can contribute to the performance of a party.

I'm actually running a game with a 3 player party of a Cleric, a Ranger, and a Rogue multiclassed with one level of cleric. They're doing just fine, and the rogue (somehow) keeps surviving and doing his part. Are they optimized? Not at all. But they're overcoming CR appropriate challenges and having fun. Things are getting tougher for them as the mod draws to a close, so we'll see if they survive through the rest of it. It'll be tough.

Deranger wrote:

What, you send your eidolon ahead as a scout? What's it's stealth like?

A level 4 druid companion has +24 stealth and human intelligence (int = 3) so it can be told to stealth and scout. It also does almost rogue dps and the druid can heal.

To be clear, we were talking specifically about your eidolon. But ok, the level 4 druid companion stealths as well as a level 4 rogue, but doesn't auto spot or disable traps, pick locks, sabotage equipment, deal as much damage, or have as much staying power as the rogue? So clearly, the druid's animal companion replaces the rogue.

More seriously though, instead of making general statements such as "my x does y better than your z," can folks post up at least a brief outline of a stat block? I'm asking for my own edification. Usually when x does y better than someone else's z, that x has some kind of deficiency or limitation elsewhere. And dealing with abstractions can be meaningless - having a specific build for comparison is more worthwhile.

But yeah, the druid is a beastly class. I don't think the rogue can hold up to it in many situations. For instance, I'm pretty sure the big cats with pouncing can do a lot more damage than a typical rogue. On the other hand, archers can pelt a tiger companion into the negatives faster than they'll poke holes in a rogue. And tigers get caught up in the middle of the action, while a rogue can keep to a safer distance. But again... abstractions...

Deranger wrote:

Well, technically, if that level 5 rogue charges into an attack, he does 1d8+3d6+7, which is a little better. But I won't contest that a rogue does the same kind of consistent damage that a fighter or barbarian does. They don't.

For some perspective, that sneak attack damage is less than one of the 4 attacks from my same level eidolon and that doesn't count the summoner casting haste or some other enormously beneficial spell.

What, you send your eidolon ahead as a scout? What's it's stealth like?

I'm not going to contest the damage output comparisons. Rogues plink. They're great 5th party member characters. They're scouts and trap spotters. They auto-spot traps. Whether that's significant or not in your games will determine whether a rogue has any place. The sniper rogue I posted, for instance, can cruise around through a forest with a +43 to its stealth checks at 80 feet per round. Like a ghost, yo.

The spear toter is not quite that much of a ghost, but he has much better damage output. He dances around behind the fighter/barbarian/eidolon, let's them tank the damage, and stabs folks in the face with reach and spring attack and consistent sneak attack damage. As much damage as a martial character? Nope! Only around 40/round. Plus some strength damage. But none of the martial characters have to sacrifice any of their combat efficacy to be able to scout around. Your eidolon wouldn't have to waste any skill points on disable device. Etc. etc.

Right, but at that point you're out of talents that make the rogue any better at stealthing or finding traps than another class with maxed out ranks. Most parties only move at 20, so if you can walk at 40 you can easily keep ahead of them stealthing

Yeah, I can agree with that. Rogues need some lovin. But I still hold that they're not a complete waste of space. They just play differently than the martial types that stand up front swinging.

BigNorseWolf wrote:

The rogue NEEDS to sneak attack every time, consistently, just to keep up with the fighters damage. Every round he spends flitting around in the dark playing cat and mouse is a round he's not contributing to dropping the monster.

I disagree. If he kept up with fighter damage he still would suck because he has bad HP and can't tank. Also a rogue with 100% sneak attack still does horrible dps. The guy above me posted an unoptimized level 5 rogue whose longspear does +9, d8+7. That's less attack and damage than a level 1 Barbarian and they don't even top the DPR charts.

Well, technically, if that level 5 rogue charges into an attack, he does 1d8+3d6+7, which is a little better. But I won't contest that a rogue does the same kind of consistent damage that a fighter or barbarian does. They don't.

The rogue just happens to be a trap spotter and disabler and scout that can ALSO contribute a little bit to the damaging of the baddies.

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But the sniping penalty can be reduced with a rogue talent to -10 which, if you're plinking at something from 50-60 feet away, means the rogue is still getting a +34 or +35 to its re-hide attempt. Most things are not going to perceive that at CR10. Barring blindsight etc. etc. If you're in an environment with foliage, the rogue can get another +4 to its hiding attempts. Really - pretty invisible.

Foliage that's granting concealment is a REQUIREMENT to hide. It doesn't provide a bonus. If the foliage is that thick its probably providing your target as well as you concealment and the miss chance, which negates the sneak attack ability entirely.

So at 60 feet you're effectively at +12 to stealth, - 10 for the sniping is back to +2. You had a 26 so that puts you at a 28.

bebilith has a +16, you can probably get off 2-3 plinks.

brachiosaurus +27 , even contest.

Clay golem: +o yay The dr will take a lot of bite out of the arrows though.

couatl +23, which is close. Can Detect chaos, good, and evil at will, and will probably find you with one.

Fire giant: +14 plunk away

Giant flytrap: tremmor sense . No dice.

Guardian naga +23 . Can go invisible to stop the sneak attacks, cast detect magic and look for you.

Rakasha: +14 but see naga.

Red/silver dragon 15 and 17, but blindsense

White dragon +22 and blindsense....

Sorry for the confusion. You don't require foliage to hide - you just require concealment or cover. What I was specifically referring to is the Camouflage rogue talent. If your concealment happens to be due to foliage, you can make camo which gives an addition +4 bonus.

Yeah, if he's shooting into concealment he won't get sneak attack - well, there's ANOTHER rogue talent that allows sneak attack into concealment, but only within 30 feet I think. The numbers I stated were for a more ideal situation - that is, where you're in hiding shooting into an area without cover/concealment, such as from the forest into a war camp or clearing. Something like that.

So for reference, the level 10 sniper's stealth skill is +39. If he's got camo, it's +43. If he shoots at something 50 feet away and re-hides, he takes a -10 penalty due to sniping and a +5 bonus due to distance, and his hide check is at +38. Assuming he's rolling around a 10 on the d20, critters need to hit a DC 48 to spot him. That's tough.

He could swap out some talents to be able to shoot into concealment, but then he'd lose a couple more points to his stealth check. He wouldn't have to rely on ideal situations in that case, though, so it's probably a good idea to work that in.

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Yeah, the druid is certainly more powerful. But the APG made it a lot easier for rogues to get sneak attack damage. If a scout rogue moves at least 10 feet in the round, he gets sneak attack damage. So although it is not guaranteed, it can definitely be relied upon with a spring attacking build.

thats pretty nice. Does it apply to attacks of opportunity or just the regular attacks?

Unfortunately, only the regular attacks. The AoOs would be without the sneak attack.

The sniper rogue gets increased ranges for sneak attack damage. Which, with crazy stealth bonuses, can also be pretty reliable.

Not really. By the raw, after the first time you sneak attack them they're not flat footed (or second, if you win initiative). you can try to hide with the sniping penalty, but eventually most things at that level are going to find you.

Hmm - I had understood that, if something did not see you, that they were denied their dex bonus against you. Comparable to if something were blind or if you were invisible. If that's not supported by RAW, that kind of sucks.

But the sniping penalty can be reduced with a rogue talent to -10 which, if you're plinking at something from 50-60 feet away, means the rogue is still getting a +34 or +35 to its re-hide attempt. Most things are not going to perceive that at CR10. Barring blindsight etc. etc. If you're in an environment with foliage, the rogue can get another +4 to its hiding attempts. Really - pretty invisible.

The druid still has special abilities more powerful than the rogues entire class.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0346.html

The damage is only useful if you can sneak attack, which isn't guaranteed.

Yeah, the druid is certainly more powerful. But the APG made it a lot easier for rogues to get sneak attack damage. If a scout rogue moves at least 10 feet in the round, he gets sneak attack damage. So although it is not guaranteed, it can definitely be relied upon with a spring attacking build. The sniper rogue gets increased ranges for sneak attack damage. Which, with crazy stealth bonuses, can also be pretty reliable.

Interesting discussion for the most part. After reading most of this, I think I'd agree that a rogue is mechanically disadvantaged compared to many other classes. I hadn't really considered it before. But I still think they can contribute to a party. I had some (a lot of) spare time so I drafted up a couple of builds. Pulling from APG and Core. I'm sure there are problems with them, but these tend to be the types of rogue builds I lean towards.

First up is a strength based melee rogue. He can scout, but he's not really focused on it. He's primarily a skirmisher that rushes in, stabs things in the face, then flees like a pansy. At 10th level, he can spring attack with reach to dish out 1d8+5d6+17 damage + 2 strength damage. Nothing amazing, but useful.

Next up would be how I would envision a scouting rogue. I took the sniper archetype from the APG. This guy is not nearly as effective in combat, but his stealth is pretty good considering he can remain in half elven form for it. Anyway - this guy snipes. At level 10 he can hit things for 1d6+5d6+8 from ranges of up to 60 feet away. With a base +39 to his stealth and with only a -10 penalty to sniping, he'll have a decent chance of re-stealthing after the attack. Not much damage, really - he's a plinker.

Either of these builds can serve as a trap finder/disabler. They can also move pretty quickly while stealthing to serve as an advanced scout of sorts. And while neither of them are truly dangerous in combat, they can at least contribute to some killing with consistent sneak attack damage.

Standard point buy seems to be what the APL and CR considerations are based off of. It requires some degree of sacrifice to boost important stats. I like this, because some characters can really shoot themselves in the foot when they try to min/max their stats. It maintains a degree of balance.

20 point buy doesn't really change things much, and seems to mostly round out the characters so they have fewer dump stats.

25 point buy gets things a little bit ridiculous and, in my experience, screws up some of the expected APL to CR comparisons. I usually bump up the APL by 1 if they're operating on a 25 point buy.

At least, in my (very limited) experience.

I wouldn't exactly build either of those characters that way myself, but just a few brief comments:

1) I wouldn't dip the wizard's Dex below 10. Wisdom is a better stat to dump of the two.

2) You can make a relatively playable two-handed-weapon power-fighterish fighter on a low point buy; the thing is, that's about it. (My opinion, I know others will disagree.) For example, a fighter who wants the Expertise line of feats or wants the Two-Weapon Fighting feats is straight out unless he dumps CON relative to your Mr. Fighter.

3) Keep in mind that while people hone in on combat during comparisons, it's not the whole game; Mr. Wizard, for all his faults, is still probably in the top tier of non-combat-usefulness characters. Fighter with 7 Int? Not so much.

Yeah, I agree. I wouldn't build them that way for my games, either. Thank you for some input as to how you might build them, though, because I'm sure it's different than how I play. We tend to use suboptimal, relatively balanced characters at 15 pt buys (usually) and they get along alright. But as for a few brief thoughts on your comments:

1) Dumping the wisdom instead of the dexterity brings the wizard's initiative back up, which is cool beans. At the same time, it doesn't really do anything to alleviate his defensive vulnerabilities while, instead, introducing a new vulnerability in low will saves. In fact, he'll be neck and neck with a fighter for a while, as the fighter will likely pick up some iron will feats. The cleric and druid in the party can probably handle the will-based skills (such as perception), so no big loss there.

Because the dexterity increase bumps the initiative score up a couple of points, would it be appropriate to change the school from Divination to Illusion, perhaps? Though it would slow down initiative growth, it would provide better access to color spray/mirror image/displacement, etc. Which I'm assuming are relied upon for survival.

2) I was kind of putting the fighter together as the traditional "optimal" combat build which emphasizes strength and constitution above all else. Obviously, if you want a different build it won't be as optimized for combat. In fact, the two weapon fighter is inherently sub optimal, even in high point buy games, because he's introducing another ability score dependency in order to swing more times with less of a chance to hit on each swing to do less damage on each actual hit. It puts a greater emphasis on full attacking to do damage. And it's feat intensive. And more expensive to have multiple magic weapons. Even in a higher point buy, if I were going for "optimal," I'd continue to emphasize strength and constitution above all other stats. It's the only way to get the most bang for your buck. A ranger can get around these issues through their bonus feats... and a rogue can maybe get around them by taking finesse. But an optimized fighter will tend towards Two Handers or Ranged Combat.

Bear in mind, a two weapon fighter is plenty *viable* depending on player skill and party composition. That's not the issue. But he'll always be lagging behind in melee effectiveness compared to the two hander.

3) I agree with this. But I also kind of see that as the wizard's role. He's a wellspring of knowledge and his focus on intelligence gives him access to all sorts of skills.

On the flip side, his low-ish dexterity, wisdom, and charisma will make sure he's never at the top of his game comparable to other skillbots. And any out-of-combat situation that requires strength will shut the wizard down hard. He is ridiculously easy to encumber. Ugh.

I might throw up a couple of my (extremely suboptimal) builds later on, just as a comparison of viewpoints. I'm sure they'll get some laughs from the hardcore optimizers. (And note: I don't use the term "optimizer" in any sort of a derogatory manner.)

I'm also curious about the claim that a 15 pt buy hurts a meleer more than a caster. I'm digging this up from a few pages ago but... is that really accurate? Drafting up a quick and dirty fighter and a quick and dirty wizard, the fighter seems like he has a lot more staying power than the wizard at early levels with the 15 point buy:

I mean... Mr. Wizard has an AC of 8. Really? And he's 2 pounds of equipment (or gold!) away from being encumbered. This works? Would the wizards in an all caster party just pile all their gear on the druid's animal companion or something until they have a haversack?

Mr. Wizard would certainly be dangerous with a DC 17 color spray at level 1 and, against a handful of Mr. Fighters, whoever got the first attack off wins. But Mr. Wizard isn't fighting Mr. Fighter, he's fighting a bunch of these:

Or something similar. And as weak and pathetic as those are, a half dozen of them could pepper Mr. Wizard with arrows (they have to roll a 4 to hit) after beating his initiative and drop his measly 10 hps into unconscious before he gets a chance to exploderize the world with color. Not to mention that distance and a scattered position would make that particular spell difficult to use... And of course, I'm not taking into account defensive positioning such as dropping prone and hiding behind other characters that the wizard could use to boost that AC...

But to the point, I'm not convinced the 15 point buy really disadvantages the fighter more than the wizard early on. The 15 point buy doesn't seem to unduly affect Mr. Fighter at all. He can do what he's designed to do. Mr. Wizard looks really, really gimped at level 1 with a 15 point buy, though. If this is the kind of wizard that an optimized party looks at, I can see why it would want to start with a 25 point buy and at level 3. And I can understand why a player in those types of games would think levels 1-2 are a bunch of dudes running around with rocket launchers.

I'd be happy to agree that the casters seem to pull ahead at levels 12+, but that doesn't seem to be due to point buy problems.

And I don't mean to knock this play style or anything, but I don't think any level 1 wizards like this would survive in the games I tend to play or, if they survived, it would be due to the fighter types dragging them along.

I'm just pulling this off of the SRD, but the Scout archetype for Rogues has an ability that enables sneak attacks if the attacker moves more than 10 feet in a round.

At 8th level, whenever a scout moves more than 10 feet in a round and makes an attack action, the attack deals sneak attack damage as if the target was flat-footed. If the scout makes more than one attack this turn, this ability only applies to the first attack. Foes with uncanny dodge are immune to this ability.

This ability replaces improved uncanny dodge.

The scout's other ability involves charge attacks, so it seems like the intent is for the scout to be using melee attacks. But the way it's written, this should apply to ranged attacks as well, right? I'm assuming the rogue would still have to be within 30 feet to get sneak attack damage unless it also takes the Sniper archetype, in which case the sneak attack range increases.

I'm sure it's not in any way optimal, just considering what I can do for a character concept. Out of curiosity, would this also work if the Scout was mounted?

Thanks for any feedback.

The spell states pretty explicitly that it grants a flat shield bonus to AC. It doesn't provide any particular details describing when that bonus is not applicable. To infer otherwise is to ignore what is explicitly stated.

I have seen nothing in PFCR that says there are no facing rules. Ok they do not have any, but that does not mean that common sense and words can not dictate other wise.

Yeah - here we like to discuss the rules according to how they are written. I don't believe that there are any rules that state a character is facing any particular direction at any given time during combat. The assumption is that a character is at all times capable of turning to face whatever threat there is and, during combat, they are continuously in motion. This is also why someone is immediately visible to everyone within line of sight as soon as he or she steps out of hiding - there is no sneaking up "behind" someone during combat without cover/concealment.

Now, you can make an appeal to "common sense" and say that there SHOULD be facing - but at that time you are invoking house rules. And if you want to make a house rule about facing, make sure it applies reasonably to all situations. This means ANY character that carries a shield should only receive shield bonuses to AC if they are facing the threat. Likewise, any character not facing an enemy is essentially blind when attacked by that creature - which creates a litany of penalties that would need to be applied to the character being attacked. You'll also need to create house rules to describe under what conditions turning is possible, etc. etc.

It would make a really complicated mess - and that's one of the reason why facing rules were abandoned to begin with.

Now last time I checked the direction that a miniature was facing was front.

The miniature is only a representation to assist with the visualization of tactical combat. You can use quarters or other various tokens to represent characters and enemies. The miniature doesn't have to accurately reflect the way a creature looks at all.