To be honest I think I did my homework well enough, but I seem to not find anything, but everyone that I have asked said it does not matter what I had not found but common sense. I want to create the perfect steam punk style sniper.
I was going to create a rouge with sniper as the archetype sniper. Before that though I was going to go sniper, maybe pick the musket, trying to decide if I want 2 weapon fighting or not. Then I was like ya I will be a halfling with swift as shadows and just snipe people with a +13 stealth at first level it should be relevantly easy. Then I was like wait, can I even shoot a gun and snipe back into stealth? I have looked through both the new play test rules as well as the Chronicles campaign setting books, trying to find more with the fire arms. I have found no ule against steath shots with firearms, and maybe it is just me being stubborn but I think I should be able to do it, but I don't know.
I have asked my DM via e-mail, but he has not given me an answer yet. what does the message board think!?
1) Rogue.
2) Sniping with a gun is the art of shooting once and hiding. Even with arrows and sniping they know the general direction- just not where you are specifically. So yeah you can "snipe" with a gun and hide afterwards. The noise just tells them what they already know: the general direction of the shot. "sniping" doesn't make them blind to the fact that someone shot something or the general direction afterall- it just makes it where they don't see you standing up, shooting, and hunkering back down again.
-S
1) Rogue.
2) Sniping with a gun is the art of shooting once and hiding. Even with arrows and sniping they know the general direction- just not where you are specifically. So yeah you can "snipe" with a gun and hide afterwards. The noise just tells them what they already know: the general direction of the shot. "sniping" doesn't make them blind to the fact that someone shot something or the general direction afterall- it just makes it where they don't see you standing up, shooting, and hunkering back down again.
-S
True, even modern snipers have to deal with the noise of the gun and where the bullet strikes giving their direction away.
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Well, normal sniping with a ranged weapon via the CRB is:
"Sniping: If you’ve already successfully used Stealth at
least 10 feet from your target, you can make one ranged
attack and then immediately use Stealth again. You take
a –20 penalty on your Stealth check to maintain your
obscured location."
The benefits of the sniper archetype are to reduce your ranged penalties, which means you can fire from father away, and it increases the range from which you can apply sneak attack damage. Those are both pretty good.
Basically, what you'll be doing is hiding, then firing, then hiding again. Your stealth check is opposed by their perception check. Note that hiding after firing requires a move action, so you're not going to be unleashing a full round of attacks and then hiding.
Now, the reason you want distance is that perception has a modifier for it:
Distance to the source, object, or creature +1/10 feet
So the farther away you are, the better your chances of hiding again are. It's a tradeoff though, because you'll get out of sneak attack range, and you'll start applying penalties to hit, which will make it less likely that you'll succeed in hitting/killing your target.
To get rid of the "noise" and "flash" problem, get a wizard to put a silence spell on the gun, and a pin-pointed darkness or deeper darkness spell on the flash pan and end of the muzzle. Tada!! Silent musket sniper.
Why not try this. This is a gunslinger archetype I created.
Among the most dangerous gunslingers is the marksman, one who carefully watches and when the moment is right strikes quickly from a distance with deadly precision. Marksmen take tremendous pride in their abilities, which allow them to take life quickly and efficiently in the blink of an eye.
Stealth: At 1st level, a marksman gains Stealth as a class skill.
Accuracy (Ex): At 2nd level, a marksman halves all range increment penalties when making ranged attacks with a musket. This ability replaces Bravery +1.
Deadly Range (Ex): At 4th level, a marksman increases the range increment of her musket by 10 feet. This range increases by 10 feet for every 3 levels after 4th. This ability replaces the 4th level bonus feat.
Perfect Shot (Ex): At 6th level, a marksman gains Perfect Strike as a bonus feat, even if she does not meet the prerequisites. A sharpshooter can use Perfect Strike with any two-handed firearm. At 11th level, the marksman can roll her attack roll three times and take the highest result. If one of these rolls is a critical threat, the marksman must choose one of her other two rolls to use as her confirmation roll. This ability replaces Bravery +2.
Improved Dead Shot (Ex): At 7th level, whenever a marksman makes a dead shot, she can make one additional attack at her highest attack bonus. This ability is in addition to dead shot.
Safe Shot (Ex): At 8th level, a marksman does not provoke attacks of opportunity when making ranged attacks with a firearm. This ability replaces the 8th level bonus feat.
Improved Deadly Aim (Ex): At 10th level, when a marksman has at least 1 grit point and uses Deadly Aim with a two-handed firearm, the bonus damage from Deadly Aim increases from +2 to +3. This ability replaces Bravery +3.
Swift Marksman (Ex): At 12th level, a marksman gains a bonus to her initiative roll equal to ½ her gunslinger level, but only in the first round of the encounter. If her initiative score is 10 or more than the next highest initiative, she gains a surprise round and uses her normal initiative roll for the remainder of the encounter. When she is hit with a ranged attack, she can shoot her firearm at her attacker as an immediate action if it is loaded. This ability replaces menacing shot.
Greater Dead Shot (Ex): At 14th level, whenever a sharpshooter makes a dead shot, she can make two additional attacks at her highest attack bonus. This ability Bravery +4.
Piercing Shot (Ex): At 16th level, when a sharpshooter confirms a critical hit with a musket, the bullet pierces the target and can strike another creature in line behind it. The sharpshooter must be able to trace a line starting at his space and passing through both targets to make this additional attack. The secondary attack is made at a –4 penalty, in addition to any modifiers for added range. If this attack is also a critical hit, the bullet can continue to hit another target, but the penalties stack. This ability replaces the 16th level bonus feat.
Rapid Attack (Ex): At 18th level, a marksman can combine a full attack action with a single move. She must forgo the first attack at her highest bonus but may take the remaining attacks at any point during her movement. This movement provokes attacks of opportunity as normal. Rapid attack can be used with dead shot, but she must forgo her first attack at her highest bonus. This ability replaces Bravery +5.
Greater Deadly Aim (Ex): At 20th level, when a sharpshooter has at least 1 grit point and uses Deadly Aim with a two-handed firearm, the bonus damage from Deadly Aim increases from +3 to +4. This ability replaces the 20th level bonus feat.
To get rid of the "noise" and "flash" problem, get a wizard to put a silence spell on the gun, and a pin-pointed darkness or deeper darkness spell on the flash pan and end of the muzzle. Tada!! Silent musket sniper.
Oh you could build your gun so that when you pull the trigger it casts a darkness on the gun and then when you release the trigger, it casts dispel magic on the darkness. This would effectively eliminate any flash without having to worry about placement of the darkness so that it doesn't interfere with the sniper's sight at all.
To get rid of the "noise" and "flash" problem, get a wizard to put a silence spell on the gun, and a pin-pointed darkness or deeper darkness spell on the flash pan and end of the muzzle. Tada!! Silent musket sniper.
I was actually thinking about this though I might just get the wand of silence.
Well, normal sniping with a ranged weapon via the CRB is:
"Sniping: If you’ve already successfully used Stealth at
least 10 feet from your target, you can make one ranged
attack and then immediately use Stealth again. You take
a –20 penalty on your Stealth check to maintain your
obscured location."The benefits of the sniper archetype are to reduce your ranged penalties, which means you can fire from father away, and it increases the range from which you can apply sneak attack damage. Those are both pretty good.
Basically, what you'll be doing is hiding, then firing, then hiding again. Your stealth check is opposed by their perception check. Note that hiding after firing requires a move action, so you're not going to be unleashing a full round of attacks and then hiding.
Now, the reason you want distance is that perception has a modifier for it:
Distance to the source, object, or creature +1/10 feetSo the farther away you are, the better your chances of hiding again are. It's a tradeoff though, because you'll get out of sneak attack range, and you'll start applying penalties to hit, which will make it less likely that you'll succeed in hitting/killing your target.
So saying this does make me want to still have the rouge levels, though what if I made a strait gunslinger that stayed farther from the party using stealth as the advantage and just try to make it so I shoot one, very powerful musket shot to someone. Also I would like to mention I am a halfling taking the swift as shadows trait.
1) Rogue.
2) Sniping with a gun is the art of shooting once and hiding. Even with arrows and sniping they know the general direction- just not where you are specifically. So yeah you can "snipe" with a gun and hide afterwards. The noise just tells them what they already know: the general direction of the shot. "sniping" doesn't make them blind to the fact that someone shot something or the general direction afterall- it just makes it where they don't see you standing up, shooting, and hunkering back down again.
Thank you for the correction it might happen quite a few times though. Also how would you rule it then? Sniping I mean, would you make it so the monsters would walk toward the source until they just ran into some guy behind cover shooting them or just a minus to stealth when sniping with a firearm?
True Strike + Goggles of Sniping.
Shoot from 500-1000' away.
Force them to have a huge penalty to see or hear the fact that you shot anything, and still get your sneak attack damage in.
Not very good for group play though.. it fits for games that aren't as big on combat, or if your character can do this kind of thing to weaken the enemy before your group goes to engage the encounter, etc.
As long as you have something else you can bring to the table, then you can afford to have this little side benefit of killing from extreme range. ;)
I would note that they would perceive you hitting them, they could hear you hitting them and they might see the flash of the gun. Might be a large amount of circumstantial modifiers going on.
And If you decide to shoot someone that is 1000 feet away that's a few range increment penalties I'd think.
But, if you decide to snipe I thought I'd bring something up that I've never seen before...
Characters with darkvision (dwarves and half-orcs) can see lit areas normally as well as dark areas within 60 feet. A creature can't hide within 60 feet of a character with darkvision unless it is invisible or has cover.
Edit: Actually.. on further re-reading I'm over thinking this. Creatures with darkvision can see normally in the dark, so duh, you don't have concealment against them.
Disregard my last bit.
To get rid of the "noise" and "flash" problem, get a wizard to put a silence spell on the gun, and a pin-pointed darkness or deeper darkness spell on the flash pan and end of the muzzle. Tada!! Silent musket sniper.
Why not try this. This is a gunslinger archetype I created.
** spoiler omitted **...
We thought we were clever doing the silence thing. Problem is, the wielder of the gun and everyone immediately around him can't hear anything, either.
Means communication suffers, as does the sniper in any situation where he really needs to hear anything (such as when being chased, spotted, etc.).
And If you decide to shoot someone that is 1000 feet away that's a few range increment penalties I'd think.
There's fixes for that (far shot, and sniper rogues), but that's why I said "True Strike + Goggles of Sniping". +20 to hit takes away the entire detriment of a full 10 increment penalty. You are only pulling one shot a round with sniping anyways. It's mostly a "where'd that come from?" type of situation.
Guns have lower range though, so 1000' is mostly bow stuff.
Distance modifiers to a person's Perception attempt: DC +1/10'.
Even 200 feet away is a -20 to attempting to see you (or pinpoint your location with hearing), and 400 feet away is effectively a bonus similar to being invisible and not moving.
If you know where your enemy is, and you are set up for this, you can be pretty scary. Guerrilla tactics work for a reason. At best, their response is to find cover, and fan out to try and head in your general direction (at best a 90 degree arc from the person shot, which can cover a wiiiiide area once you get in the hundreds of feet away).
The Sniping Goggles is just to make the Sneak Attack damage kick in at that range. Better than the sniper rogue bonus (although a fairly expensive item, making it a mid-levels tactic at the earliest).
Edit:
This actually makes an amazing NPC encounter for a party. I'll have to remember this for later use.
We thought we were clever doing the silence thing. Problem is, the wielder of the gun and everyone immediately around him can't hear anything, either.
Means communication suffers, as does the sniper in any situation where he really needs to hear anything (such as when being chased, spotted, etc.).
Well, it's not like Silence lasts for a very long time. Silence from a wand would probably not last more than two rounds... it should be long over by the time communication becomes vitally important.
My DM e-mailed me telling me I will have heavy minuses, still unclear about how many, but should I just forget about the gunslinger and go for strait rouge sniper? The only real reason I wanted to do these class choices was because I liked the idea of a hiding gunner, thought that was really cool, but if it gets to be a pain I will go back to just sniper.
You would hide.
You would fire.
You'd make your attack roll and your sniper check to hide again.
Monsters would make a perception check to see you. If they see you, they come eat your face. If they don't see you, they still may discern the direction of fire.
Assuming they see what general direction (east, from that stand of trees!) then they can advance and try to find you.
really no different from
"i was shot on my left buttock with the arrow pointing -> that way, so the sniper is -> that way!". General direction? yes. Pin pointing you? no.
Next round you sneak away to a different spot and then try it again.
What you likely can't do is just snipe every round and hope no one ever notices. No matter what you do- folks just tend to notice getting shot at whether with guns or arrows. They will notice and they will start trying to find you. The "modern" idea of a sniper where its one shot/one kill is largely absent in D&D. (at low levels you are too low to make the checks and when you are high enough to make the checks HP has inflated too high to one shot them).
-S
To get rid of the "noise" and "flash" problem, get a wizard to put a silence spell on the gun, and a pin-pointed darkness or deeper darkness spell on the flash pan and end of the muzzle. Tada!! Silent musket sniper.
Why not try this. This is a gunslinger archetype I created.
** spoiler omitted **...
We thought we were clever doing the silence thing. Problem is, the wielder of the gun and everyone immediately around him can't hear anything, either.
Means communication suffers, as does the sniper in any situation where he really needs to hear anything (such as when being chased, spotted, etc.).
So have the silence and darkness effects required to be activated, like any other magic item that can have its effects activated or deactivated.
As for hiding from darkvision, Stynnk, use the darkhidden ring from one of the Forgotten Realms 3.5E books, maybe the Player's Guide, Races of Faerun or Underdark books. Can't remember which.
As much as a rogue makes completely perfect sense for a sniper, that 30ft sneak attack thing is going to hurt a lot, so unless you have a way to drastically increase your sneak attack range you'll need to work with your DM on a rule that lets your character work. The other major problem is that the traditional sniper role of striking from far away and taking down a target with one shot just doesn't work with D&D.
The best way to not be seen as a sniper is to be far away, which in the game gives penalties to spot checks to find your character. Normal sniping in game with a bow or crossbow already gives -20 to the check to fire and hide, and with black powder weapons the massive cloud of smoke could be seen by a DM as something that makes it even harder to snipe with a firearm than it already is to snipe with a bow or crossbow.
If I were to make a sniper I'd ask the DM for two things. Alchemical cartridges that work with no visible smoke, and the ability to get a permanent Silence spell cast that is localized to the weapon. With that, a way to get sneak attack at range, and vital strike you may be able to make a stealth focused rogue that works as a sniper.
Sorry for the threadnomancy, but a Gunslinger player in the group I DM has a more pedestrian approach and is requesting a DM judgment on it so thought I'd put it up for discussion...
He wants to create (or have created) a flash suppressor/silencer (take your pick) that is non-magical, just the same real-world physics.
I am thinking of allowing it as an "imperfect" creation that reduces range and damage; adn with him tinkering with it as he levels, reducing the negatives until he "perfects" it at around 8th level (he is 2nd level right now.)