The first thing that came to mind: You need to be within 30 ft to perform a ranged sneak attack, and you may want to be outside 30 ft when the opponent's turn comes about again.
Edit: It also allows you to move out from behind a wall, shoot, and then move back behind the wall (keeping total concealment from your targets).
Edit2: Edit ninja'd by Sniggevert :)
How about moving out from total cover, shoot, move back behind cover with the rest of your movement? Limiting your attacks, but makes a bow defender dangerous and hard to get to with a proper setup.
I could see it for a sniper Rogue build. Combine it with stealth to begin and end your turn behind cover so you can do sneak attack damage with your rnaged attack.
Nope, you hit it on the head. You use shot on the run to move from a point where shooting is not advantageous, to a point where it is advantageous, and then to another point where you are presumably safe.
Two examples come to mind: Shooting from behind allies gives the enemy cover so you move out from behind allies, shoot, and them move back behind allies.
Shooting from cover would also work similarly.
It should be combined with the Vital Strike tree IF they ever got VS to work right. Many people houserule that Vital Strike can be combined with Spring Attack (and thus Shot on the Run).
- Gauss
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Normally you can only:
1, shoot, move.
2, move, shoot.
Shot on the Run allows you to:
move, shoot, move.
More options = good. You never know when you need it. This is assuming you can afford the feat. Sometimes it's just not possible because the character needs other feats to do other things or to shore up weakness.
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Wow, I'm amazed that people are paying 3 feats for this! It's not worth it.
Get and ride a mount. Do the same thing but full attack instead of a single attack.
Really it needs to have dodge & mobility removed from the prereqs. It still won't shatter anything.
Btw, why are those people spending 3 feats for this?
-James
There's a few hurdles with taking a mount to move while arching. First, you need a class that will give you a mount. Any class can buy a horse and take ranks in Handle Animal and Ride, but if you want to keep that mount alive, you'll want the class ability.
(Once nice thing about having a mount as an archer, is that your mount won't be exposed to nearly as much high high-damage melee combat. But if a wizard takes aim, there could be issues...)
Here's the big one though - there's still a feat cost! One that's worse than Dodge and Mobility, IMO. See, if your mount is taking a double move, you'll take -4 to your ranged attack (-8 if running!). The Mounted Archery feat halves these penalties and you'll need Mounted Combat for that. Unlike Dodge and Mobility, you've now spent two feats that only have any use if you're on a mount.
(A samurai can halve that penalty again, and is great for this build - they get the archery, the mount, and some sweet abilities that make them useful on or off the horse.)
I see why the feat is there, and agree with the above. It's for the sneaky sniper or tactical shooter, not the mounted tank. Note that typing this out has made me think that the samurai, or similarly built ranger or paladin could be a lot of fun (and would be VERY good at surviving).
If you're also pulling double duty as a ranged tank you step back fire your bow to avoid OA's, and then step forward again.
Shot on the run is good for dex based melee skirmishers who already have the pre-reqs, to give them a little more versatility in combat. Melee doesn't always cut it, so having a ranged sniping alternative (move out of total cover, shoot, move back to total cover) is a good thing to have in the toolbox. Certainly not an optimal use of a feat though, I agree.
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If you're also pulling double duty as a ranged tank you step back fire your bow to avoid OA's, and then step forward again.
Say what?
If you are ranged, you aren't going to be much of a tank.
If you are a tank, you are going to be wielding a melee weapon, where your nominally high Strength gives a lot of damage, and you can full attack with it.
Dodge: Okay, but not terribly impressive for a melee build, very little use for a properly played ranged build.
Mobility: Terrific for a Rogue who needs to move around his opponent to get flanking, if he doesn't have a good Dex and/or isn't trained in Acrobatics.
Shot on the Run: Ummmm. Why? For less overall cost, at least if you are a Fighter (Weapon Focus, Weapon Specialization, Point Blank Master), Ranger (Weapon Focus, Point Blank Master) or Zen Archer (archetype feature), you can get your full attack in, with your bow, while being based.
And, honestly, unless your party is of an odd composition (I have experienced this in PFS play), your archer will, instead be staying back behind your real tanks. 30' for PBS, or 110' for first range increment for a composite longbow.
We won't even count the effects of a trait like Hunter's Eye (ignore the penalty from the second range increment) or a feat like Far Shot (range penalty goes down to -1 per increment) or the enchancement Distance (double the range increment) on the bow on how far you can stand back. Add those together, and you might be talking no penalty to shooting at an opponent from outside Fireball range.
Composite longbow: 110'
Distance: 220'
Hunter's Eye: 440'
Fighter Archer archetype: 115' base at 2nd level, 120' base at 6th level, etc.
So, at 6th level, Fighter Archer with the Hunter's Eye trait, +1 distance, seeking composite longbow has an effective first range increment of 480'. Fireball from a 6th level Wizard has a range of 640', but is the Wizard going to waste one of the few 3rd level spells he has at that level on a single target? Heck, when will you even see an encounter with that large an area defined?
Hell, I'd be HAPPY if they targeted the mount on my mounted archer. I'm rolling lvl + DEX + 3 against your attack roll with mounted combat to avoid the first hit, and the second means you're focusing fire on a charge from my wand. Congrats, I make DC 15 ride check to soft fall and am on my feet, still fighting fine, albeit with less mobility. Good use of actions, champ.
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The feat exists because there are games where the GM does sneaky things like kill that pony so the machine gun gets shut down or summons a monster at the feet of the that archer that's so far away or gods forbid places a combat in a tight space or other environment that doesn't allow for you to just sit there and plink away or ride your pony. There are a LOT of games where this happens that is why you need the feat. If this doesn't happen in your games then you're absolutely right you don't need it.
Kill the pony? Okay, shoot from long range on your feet.
Monster adjacent? Covered above, but there is also the ability to withdraw, up to double your movement distance, without provoking AoOs.
Tight space? Makes that tank in front of you even better as a wall than the wide, open spaces do.
And the feat tax is too high for what it is worth.
3 mediocre feats so you can move your normal distance with an attack made sometime during your movement?
It doesn't prevent that big monster at your feet from getting an AoO as you move away from him, unlike Spring Attack, so how is that better than just withdrawing for a round?
Nah, I just have never seen enough value in it to be worth paying 3-5 levels worth of feats for it.
As I mentioned, Point-Blank Master doesn't have any "true" feat tax in its prerequisites, since it is either one or two feats your dedicated archer is going to be taking anyhow, or a class feature. And that negates, ayt least in part, that big monster dropped at your feet. Full attack, with Point Blank SHot, no AoOs, and, if it survives (and summoned monsters are usually going to be a bit hit point light for the level), you can still 5' step away from it, or put later arrows in your full attack at a different target. Something you cannot do with Shot on the Run.