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Why is the new rogue talent Confounding Blades from Ultimate Combat not as good as the rogue talent Slow Reactions from the Core Rulebook ???
Advanced Rogue Talent from Ultimate Combat
Confounding Blades*(Ex)
When a rogue with this talent hits a creature with a melee weapon that deals sneak attack damage, her target cannot make attacks of opportunity until the begining of her next turn.
Basic Rogue Talent from Core Rulebook
Slow Reactions*(Ex)
Opponents damaged by the rogue's sneak attack can't make attacks of opportunity for one round.
Pretty much identical, but Slow Reactions also works on ranged sneak attacks.
Do we need to get the black sharpies out and redact this useless talent?
I read it as follows
Slow Reactions:
Initiative 15 - Bad Guy attacks
Initiative 12 - Rouge causes damage with Slow Reactions
Bad Guy Cannot make attacks of Oppotunity until Init 15 of next turn
Confounding Blades:
Initiative 15 - Bad Guy attacks
Initiative 12 - Rouge strikes with Confounding Blades
Bad Guy Cannot make attacks of Oppotunity until (Start of) Initiative 12 of next turn
From a purely pedantic standpoint, Confounding Blades actually can never activate because it requires "a melee weapon that deals sneak attack damage" and no weapons have this property.
Both require that the rogue hit and damage the target with a sneak attack, and deny the target any AOO until it's next turn in the initiative order.
Every weapon used in a sneak attack deals sneak attack damage.
Both require that the rogue hit and damage the target with a sneak attack, and deny the target any AOO until it's next turn in the initiative order.
Every weapon used in a sneak attack deals sneak attack damage.
True, and untrue.
Successful attacks from a rogue that qualify for sneak attack damage deal sneak attack damage. Weapons do not. Unless the weapon is an intelligent magical item with levels in rogue. Then, well, it does.
Confounding Blades is one of those things where I would turn the "one round" to "one additional round" and require Slow Reactions and it is suddenly fixed?
Changing it to "one additional round" would make it "fixed", but then it would just be the lamest talent of them all.
Maybe changing it to "one additional round plus one round per five levels of rogue".
This is after all supposed to be an Advanced Talent.
Changing it to "one additional round" would make it "fixed", but then it would just be the lamest talent of them all.
Maybe changing it to "one additional round plus one round per five levels of rogue".
This is after all supposed to be an Advanced Talent.
A tenth level rogue can then sneak attack someone and make them unable to take opportunity attacks for 4 rounds... I dunno. That seems very powerful-- it's equivalent to "you can't take opportunity attacks for the rest of your life." The rogue that has this talent basically gains every Improved talent for every combat maneuver since they can now disarm, trip, grapple, bull rush, steal, dirty trick, etc. to their heart's content-- doubly so if they have the feat to let them dirty trick/steal as an attack (which then again, requires the feat, but screw it).
But, on the topic of doing those feats as attacks... I do suppose that it is really funny to imagine a 20th level rogue sucker punching a guy in the back of the head (1) before ripping off his cloak (2), tearing away his spell component pouch (3), disarming him of his weapon (4), sundering his armor (5&6) before tripping him (7). The next round, the rogue sunders his shield (1&2), steals his helmet (3), spits in his eye (4), pulls down his opponent's pants (5) and then sickens him by giving him a wet willy (6) or something equally absurd. Lastly, he shines his watch at his eyes, dazzling him (7).