|
People use the term "broken" a lot, but I think this might be a bona-fide case of the real thing.
The APG feat Dastardly Finish allows anyone with five dice of sneak attack to coup de grace any stunned or cowering target. My first thought when reading this was "...what?", and my opinions haven't changed much since. This feat just seems better than almost any other feat that a qualifying character could take, especially if the party has a way to stun enemies.
There really isn't any way to survive a coup de grace backed by 5d6 sneak attack dice, so if you fail a save against a stunning fist, an antipaladin's stun cruelty, a critical from some critical builds (or a druid's ankylosaur), or just the wrong spell - you're dead. The only caveat is that the rogue has to set himself up next to the enemy to be targeted, because coup de grace is a full-round action. With that condition in place, a stunning fist is a no-doubt-about-it save-or-die.
For reference, the coup de grace rules are pasted below.
Coup de Grace: As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target.
You automatically hit and score a critical hit. If the defender survives the damage, he must make a Fortitude save (DC 10 + damage dealt) or die. A rogue also gets her extra sneak attack damage against a helpless opponent when delivering a coup de grace.
Thoughts?
|
If you stun/cower them and they were alone, the yes this could be a problem. Otherwise you trigger an AoO from every adjacent opponent to do one attack as a full-round. This coming from the (generally somewhat squishy) rogue is not usually a good idea. I think that most of the time, IF you pull this off, it'll be against an opponent that wasn't that big of a deal anyway.
Also, since the rogue generally isn't in melee (he might be, but most don't melee with the antipaladin or the monk) he would have to spend post-stun-turn-1 to approach, then the next to coup-de-grace. He could probably have just sneak-attacked and killed the guy without approaching. Also, by the time he approaches any allies would have moved up to fill the area (especially if the vulnerable one was a PC).
To me, this is only overpowered for an NPC, and only because they *might* not care about their own life. But let's face it, an NPC can make up rules to be unfair anyway. The only time an NPC has ever tried to coup-de-grace a PC in any game I played, they got creamed by the AoOs, and they were the boss.
Random notes that aren't really meant to have much consequence: Undead and Constructs are immune to death effects (which IIRC the fort save portion of this is), and there are ways for (N)PCs to be immune or resistant as well. Oh, and you can always nat 20. The save isn't that hard if the rogue hits someone with fortification.
Dangerous but really only of someone has the Improved Coup De Grace letting them do it as a standard action.
Now it could be interpreted that the Fortitude save is DC 10 + damage dealt... and then seperately the rogue adds hsi sneak attack damage. I can see it being interpreted either way.
Rogue Hits opponent with Coup De Gras. Rogues does (1d6 +3)x2 +5d6. Rogue rolls a 3 for the damage and 15 for the sneak attack ding 12 damage +15 damage for 27 points of damage.
Now is that a 37 or a 22 Fortitde save that is required. I can see an argument by the way it is written that he adds his sneak attack damage AFTER the DC is calculated (since it is in a seperate sentence).
I don't think it is too bad recently, the target needs to already be adjacent to the rogue and in the case of stunnig fist has to fail that saving throw. Fairly common at low level, not so much at high level (for strong fort save people).
You've done a couple things wrong here.
First, rogue sneak attack simply adds to the damage of the attack. If needed, I'll search for the official word on this, but it was given by Jason in another thread about Sneak Attack vs. DR. So, a rogue that deals 12 damage with 15 sneak attack simply does 27 damage, and the Coup de Grace save would be a DC of 37. Officially.
In fact, here is that thread.
Second, when you roll a x2 crit with a weapon, you don't just roll the damage one time then multiply it by two. You actually roll two dice. So in your example, the rogue doesn't "roll a 3 for damage...doing 12 damage". Instead, he rolls two dice and adds his STR modifier, magical weapon bonus, etc., to each die, then adds that together to determine his damage. And, as you correctly noted, if it's a sneak attack then the sneak attack dice are rolled just one time since they don't multiply on a critical hit, and the sneak attack damage is added on at the end.
If you have someone setting you up for it (e.g. a monk with Stunning Fist, or a melee fighter with Stunning Assault, or an arcane caster with Color Spray), it could be handy. But the fact that a coup de grace takes a full round makes it non-trivial to be in the right place at the right time, I think.
As Name Violation pointed out, it would be much more useful with the ability to coup-de-grace as a standard action.
|
|
I must have been mistaken. I can't find the thread about this that I thought I saw. Meh. Either way...
I don't have a problem with this feat. If a PC takes it, then the GM should prepare for it. If an NPC has it, then hope that you have a fair GM (even though a [cruel] GM could just fiat it). I just don't really see it as a big deal.
I must have been mistaken. I can't find the thread about this that I thought I saw. Meh. Either way...
Nope. You weren't mistaken. There was a little discussion about it in the APG – Broken Feats thread. I'd link it if I knew how.
If anything, I think it's a sub-par feat overall. Being stunned or cowering is pretty much being in the proverbial "save-or-suck" state anyway. All this feat does is allow a rogue to finish the job quicker. Personally, I'd rather choose a more versatile feat.