Applied Stealth Synergy

[Dessio]

Stealth Synergy:

Ultimate Combat wrote:
Stealth Synergy (Teamwork Feat)
Working closely with an ally, you are able to move like twin shadows.
Benefit:
While you can see one or more allies who also have this feat, whenever you and your allies make a Stealth check, you all take the highest roll and add all your modifiers to Stealth.

So, unless I'm mistaken, there's several ways to interpret that. Let's use an example.

Let's say Valeros has +2 Dex modifier, no ranks in stealth, and -6 armor check penalty. Merisiel has +4 Dex, 5 ranks in stealth, and -1 armor check penalty. Alain has +1 Dex, 1 rank in stealth (but it's not a class skill), and a -5 armor check penalty.

So let's say Alain uses tactician to give everyone Stealth Synergy to sneak past some orc sentries or something.

Valeros rolls a 20.
Merisiel rolls a 6.
Alain rolls a 10.

The first part is easy. We'll discard the 10 and 6 and keep the 20. The tricky part is what comes next. There's two ways to read "you all take the highest roll and add all your modifiers to Stealth".

Way #1
Valeros' stealth check is 16. (20 +2dex -6ac)
Merisiel's stealth check is 28. (20 +4dex +5ranks +3classskill -1ac)
Alain's stealth check is 17. (20 +1dex +1rank -5ac)

Way #2 (and naturally the way I want it to work)
All 3 PCs have a stealth check of 24. (20 +2valerosdex +4merisieldex +1alaindex +5merisielranks +1alainranks +3merisielclassskill -6valerosarmor -1merisielarmor -5alainarmor)

So which is it? If anyone is even using teamwork feats.. and it seems few are.. which way are you using it at your tables?

[StabbittyDoom]

It seems obvious to me that it would be way 1 since otherwise you'd get a pair of rogues with a cool +30 at high levels getting an effective +60.

I think this feat is more to prevent the situation where one guy gets a bad roll and screws over the whole group.

[Dessio]

The 2 rogues would each have to pay the feat tax... It's definately a matter of opinion as to whether obnoxious, nigh-undedectable stealth between 2 high-level rogues is priced unfairly at a feat for each PC.

It's only 'free' if someone uses the tactician ability.

OTOH, one might even argue that #1 is so UNDERpowered that noone would use it- doesn't help people who don't sneak well, and those who do sneak well won't need it.

[Talonhawke]

Its #1

If it was 2 then you get 2 guys good at stealh say a rogue and a inquisitor who is stealth heavy and suddenly your 5 dex pally in full plate with a tower shield with a daylight spell on him can walk right behind guards on a pitch dark moonless night and not be seen.(at least if the playtest on stealth holds.

[Shinigaze]

Talonhawke wrote:

Its #1

If it was 2 then you get 2 guys good at stealh say a rogue and a inquisitor who is stealth heavy and suddenly your 5 dex pally in full plate with a tower shield with a daylight spell on him can walk right behind guards on a pitch dark moonless night and not be seen.(at least if the playtest on stealth holds.

Except that as per Tactician, the cavalier in the croup would have to pick stealth synergy as a the ONE bonus feat that he can grant to his teammates. That would be wholly inefficient for the party as a whole unless you knew from the get go that the campaign you were running was going to be stealth heavy. And if you read the feat description it seems pretty self explanatory that it is option #2. Also i realize you are probably exaggerating but a 5 dex pally in full plate with a tower shield with a daylight spell on him walking right behind guards on a pitch dark moonless night would bring so many negatives to that stealth check that even with 4 stealth heavy characters your stealth check would probably be 5.

[Dessio]

Shinigaze wrote:

.. That would be wholly inefficient for the party as a whole unless you knew from the get go that the campaign you were running was going to be stealth heavy...

Bump for emphasis.

One can't say it's OP for rogues because rogues would never take it.

[cp]

its #1 - but even worse than that... continuing previous example...\

Soooo you're all humans sneaking into an orc encampment... the moon breaks from behind the clouds and suddenly.. instead of ocomplete darkness.. you have a moonlight clearing to pass.

The rogue, stealthy as ever..succeeds.

But - sadly.. your other two humans *can't see him*. And so get no benefit from that expensive teamwork feat.....

[Shinigaze]

cp wrote:

its #1 - but even worse than that... continuing previous example...\

Soooo you're all humans sneaking into an orc encampment... the moon breaks from behind the clouds and suddenly.. instead of ocomplete darkness.. you have a moonlight clearing to pass.

The rogue, stealthy as ever..succeeds.

But - sadly.. your other two humans *can't see him*. And so get no benefit from that expensive teamwork feat.....

"While you can see one or more allies who also have this feat, whenever you and your allies make a Stealth check, you all take the highest roll and add all your modifiers to Stealth."

I have a hard time believing it is #1 simply because if it was #1 then what is the point of the last part of that sentence. It could read

"While you can see one or more allies who also have this feat, whenever you and your allies make a Stealth check, you all take the highest roll."

The addition of the "and all your modifiers to stealth" makes a blanket statement that says you not only take the highest roll, but also add up every modifier of everyone who has this feat.

[BigNorseWolf]

Everyone rolls a d20.

You pick the highest roll of a die.

You calculate everyone's stealth from there using their own dex, ranks, etc.

I don't see how else to read it. I'll try again in the morning.

[Dessio]

BigNorseWolf wrote:

Everyone rolls a d20.

You pick the highest roll of a die.

You calculate everyone's stealth from there using their own dex, ranks, etc.

I don't see how else to read it. I'll try again in the morning.

...whenever you and your allies make a Stealth check, you all take the highest roll and add all your modifiers to Stealth...

The part in italics can be read in the two ways, as demonstrated in the 2 readings in my original post.

'all your modifiers' can mean all of your PC's or all of the players PCs involved, because 'your' means both the indefinate plural AND singular pronoun. You have to look at how it was used earlier in the sentance to tell which it is.

Unfortunately it was used to mean both, which makes for sloppy technical writing :( It was used to mean indefinite PLURAL closest to the usage in question, so I believe the most correct way to read it is way #2 because 'your' was most recently meant to mean plural, and it specifies 'roll' in the singular. Boiling it down.. the most accurate way to read it is 'multiple people apply all modifiers to one roll'. Most accurate, but unfortunately not the ONLY accurate way to read it.

Technical writing/English semantics aside, the 'that'd be too OP' argument against #2 is imo groundless. Invisibility or other spells can just as easily give obnoxious bonuses, and they're way more likely to be used. But what rogue is going to buy a teamwork feat for stealth- something he can do just fine on his own anyway, and useless unless someone else buys it too?

On the other hand, if it could be given out by tactician, it allows those that are good at stealth to help those not so good at successfully sneaking. #2 would actually be useful, whereas #1 is just redundant.

[Vehement1]

It's #1

Exact Text wrote:

While you can see one or more allies who

also have this feat, whenever you and your allies make a
Stealth check, you all take the highest roll and add all your
modifiers to Stealth.

It specifies that you only add your modifiers to the roll, not everyones, a good place to also look is the description in the table which reads

Table wrote:

Take the highest roll made by you and your allies on

Stealth checks

[BigNorseWolf]

There are much easier ways to say it if you were supposed to use the highest total out of the group

I can't think of an easier way to say you use the highest roll of the group.

It helps avoid the inevitable I GOT A FOUR if you try to routinely sneak with 3 people, I don't think its there to let Moonshadow the ninja carry Sir clanks-a-lot the paladin accross the crunchy leaves.

[Dessio]

Vehement1 wrote:

It specifies that you only add your modifiers to the roll, not everyones, a good place to also look is the description in the table which reads

Thank you for reposting the full text, but I had that in the original post :)

Anyway I think you're missing what I'm saying. I'm not saying 'all your modifiers' cannot mean 'all of the modifiers applying to you, only you'.

What I am saying is 'all your modifiers' can ALSO mean 'all of the mofifiers applying to all of you'.

[Vehement1]

The description of the feat in the table of teamwork feats in UC gives their intent with the wording of the feat imo

[Shinigaze]

Vehement1 wrote:

The description of the feat in the table of teamwork feats in UC gives their intent with the wording of the feat imo

The table does seem to indicate they intended #1. It abbreviates the feat to "Take the highest roll made by you and your allies on stealth checks"

That being said, there are instances where the abbreviation does not give an accurate description of the feat. For example, for Snake style it abbreviates it to "Gain +2 on Sense Motive checks, and deal piercing damage with unarmed attacks" it makes no mention of the fact that with the same feat you can use an immediate action to make a Sense Motive check and use the result as your AC or touch AC against an attack made against you. So while it "seems" to be intended as #1, there could be key factors of the feat omitted which would make it #2.

EDIT: Also, the last part of the stealth synergy feat says "you all take the highest roll and add all your modifiers to stealth" makes a blanket statement concerning the entire party i.e. "you all" which I would posit extends to the "add all your modifiers to stealth" portion. Or to be more clear, "you all" means the party, which makes the "your" also mean party.