Fixing Vital Strike and its Effectiveness


Homebrew and House Rules

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ThatEvilGuy wrote:
mplindustries wrote:
Evil Lincoln wrote:
As an example of how hard it is to write such a feat correctly, OP, your suggested feat text is a huge gift to ranged combat characters, who may now apply their strength bonus to attacks that didn't allow it previously. :)

Incorrect. The wording is "The character may now multiply their strength bonus to damage..."

When using, say, a Crossbow, you have no strength bonus to damage, so 0x2=0.

But thrown weapons, slings and mighty composite bows do.

Thrown Weapons and Slings are generally flavor weapons (or for characters who are in primitive materials games); they are otherwise quite sub-optimal, and chances are if they are using such garbage weapons the extra boost would actually make them pretty useful as secondary weapons.

In the terms of a Composite Bow, the feat is supposed to be intended for melee characters. Also, ranged characters get things like Rapid Shot and Manyshot, so using a Vital Strike in comparison is quite pointless, considering the bonuses for ranged attacks versus melee attacks is much superior (and thusly with Haste, the ~5-6 bow shots trumps the average 4 on a successful Greater Vital Strike).

With that said, we can sit there and be all like "It totally works with them," but the intent isn't for it to apply to ranged, and even if it does it's still not the most optimal choice for them, nor would it be game-breaking if we included them for those that were garbage in the first place.


It's a great feat for druids as is, honestly. Just add Strong Jaw and go to town!


Azten wrote:
It's a great feat for druids as is, honestly. Just add Strong Jaw and go to town!

It's better for Druids than for others, but I'd still generally prefer to get in a Pouncing form with 3-5 natural attacks (without spending any feats) than a form with just one big attack that costs me a feat to utilize.


I don't know...

- Stegosaurus has a 4d6 tail attack.
- With Imp Natural Attack, that is 6d6.
- Strong Jaw'ed that becomes 12d6.
- Vital Striked thats 24d6.

Two feats for 24d6 sounds pretty good.
Example Damage: 24d6 ⇒ (1, 2, 4, 5, 1, 1, 4, 3, 3, 3, 2, 6, 1, 4, 6, 5, 5, 2, 5, 1, 1, 5, 6, 2) = 78


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Azten wrote:

I don't know...

- Stegosaurus has a 4d6 tail attack.
- With Imp Natural Attack, that is 6d6.
- Strong Jaw'ed that becomes 12d6.
- Vital Striked thats 24d6.

Two feats for 24d6 sounds pretty good.
[Dice=Example Damage]24d6

24d6 averages 84 damage. 84 + static mods

And now you've spent two feats on this (Improved Natural Attack, and that you chose in tail slap, which is not exactly a common attack form).

Meanwhile, I could spend zero feats and turn into an Allosaurus. With Strong Jaw on, my bite does 4d6 and my claws each deal 2d8, so my damage dice are 4d6+4d8 (averages 32).

84 + mods
vs.
32 + 3xmods

84-32 is 52, so if my mods are 26 or more, the Allosaurus with zero feats actually outdamages the Stegosaurus with Vital Strike and Improved Natural Attack in a lousy weapon. The earliest you could take Vital Strike is 9th, but realistically, you won't have taken Improved Natural Attack before that since you need Power Attack at 3rd, Natural Spell at 5th, and Wild Speech at 7th, so we're look at 11th before this combo comes together.

At that point, Power Attack is adding +6 damage, you've got at least a +2, maybe even a +3 Amulet of Mighty Strikes and you have at least a 30 Strength (18 + 2 leveling + 4 item + 6 wild shape) for another +10. It's close with no investment. If I took Improved Natural attack for the far more versatile bite or claw, though, I'd be dealing 14 or 18 more damage respectively, reducing the threshhold for what I need to be worth it.

Under those circumstances, I'm looking at:

84 + ~20

50 + ~60

And you also get a bonus to hit from Charging. Yeah, no thanks, I'll still take the Pouncing form. Or crap, I'll become a Quickwood and get a 60' reach! I'm not impressed with Vital Strike, even for a Druid.


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Careful, mpl. All that math means that a lot of people will call you a "theorycrafter" and immediately assume that everything you've just demonstrated is 180 degrees wrong.


Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
ThatEvilGuy wrote:
mplindustries wrote:
Evil Lincoln wrote:
As an example of how hard it is to write such a feat correctly, OP, your suggested feat text is a huge gift to ranged combat characters, who may now apply their strength bonus to attacks that didn't allow it previously. :)

Incorrect. The wording is "The character may now multiply their strength bonus to damage..."

When using, say, a Crossbow, you have no strength bonus to damage, so 0x2=0.

But thrown weapons, slings and mighty composite bows do.

Thrown Weapons and Slings are generally flavor weapons (or for characters who are in primitive materials games); they are otherwise quite sub-optimal, and chances are if they are using such garbage weapons the extra boost would actually make them pretty useful as secondary weapons.

In the terms of a Composite Bow, the feat is supposed to be intended for melee characters. Also, ranged characters get things like Rapid Shot and Manyshot, so using a Vital Strike in comparison is quite pointless, considering the bonuses for ranged attacks versus melee attacks is much superior (and thusly with Haste, the ~5-6 bow shots trumps the average 4 on a successful Greater Vital Strike).

With that said, we can sit there and be all like "It totally works with them," but the intent isn't for it to apply to ranged, and even if it does it's still not the most optimal choice for them, nor would it be game-breaking if we included them for those that were garbage in the first place.

Whether it's 'meant for' melee or not, the way it's written does open up those options. I'm not saying it's overpowered or even optimal, I was just pointing out that while the crossbow doesn't get to add the Strength modifier to damage, the weapons I mentioned do.

As for the Rapid Shot/Manyshot feats, they are great, but they're expensive to get for a character that isn't either a fighter with feats to spare or a dedicated archer. Feats that boost multiple fighting styles are more versatile than ones that are limited to a single style.


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Personally, I think the problem with vital strike is that it attempts to fix the problem of full attacks and martial mobility by charging another feat.

If I had my druthers, I'd just have iterative attacks that you could take at any point along a standard move.

But we all know that would cause the fabric of the universe to split asunder.

Verdant Wheel

how about:

Vital Strike (alternate):
Prerequisites: BAB 6+ or Sneak Attack +3d6
Benefit: As a standard action, you may make a single attack that inflicts an additional +1d6 precision damage. This damage is increased by one dice (+1d6) for every two sneak attack dice you possess, and by one dice (+1d6) for every 4 BAB you posses.
Special: Precision damage stacks with other precision damage, but does not multiply on a critical hit.

this allows the rogue, master of precision damage, to be a few dice up on full BAB class all along the way, culminating at 15 BAB with 10 Sneak Attack dice for +9d6 (compared to 20 BAB for +6d6)

Improved Vital Strike (alternate)
Prerequisites: Vital Strike and either BAB 11+ or Sneak Attack +5d6
Benefit: When making a vital strike you may roll d8s for damage instead of d6s.

Greater Vital Strike (alternate)
Prerequisites: Improved Vital Strike and either BAB 16+ or Sneak Attack +7d6
Benefit: When making a vital strike you may roll d10s for damage instead of d8s.


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I still think it needs to scale with BAB, not be a chain of feats.
Yeah, I know TWF, ITWF, GTWF are a precedent, but honestly, those need to be fixed, too.


ThatEvilGuy wrote:
Darksol the Painbringer wrote:
ThatEvilGuy wrote:
mplindustries wrote:
Evil Lincoln wrote:
As an example of how hard it is to write such a feat correctly, OP, your suggested feat text is a huge gift to ranged combat characters, who may now apply their strength bonus to attacks that didn't allow it previously. :)

Incorrect. The wording is "The character may now multiply their strength bonus to damage..."

When using, say, a Crossbow, you have no strength bonus to damage, so 0x2=0.

But thrown weapons, slings and mighty composite bows do.

Thrown Weapons and Slings are generally flavor weapons (or for characters who are in primitive materials games); they are otherwise quite sub-optimal, and chances are if they are using such garbage weapons the extra boost would actually make them pretty useful as secondary weapons.

In the terms of a Composite Bow, the feat is supposed to be intended for melee characters. Also, ranged characters get things like Rapid Shot and Manyshot, so using a Vital Strike in comparison is quite pointless, considering the bonuses for ranged attacks versus melee attacks is much superior (and thusly with Haste, the ~5-6 bow shots trumps the average 4 on a successful Greater Vital Strike).

With that said, we can sit there and be all like "It totally works with them," but the intent isn't for it to apply to ranged, and even if it does it's still not the most optimal choice for them, nor would it be game-breaking if we included them for those that were garbage in the first place.

Whether it's 'meant for' melee or not, the way it's written does open up those options. I'm not saying it's overpowered or even optimal, I was just pointing out that while the crossbow doesn't get to add the Strength modifier to damage, the weapons I mentioned do.

As for the Rapid Shot/Manyshot feats, they are great, but they're expensive to get for a character that isn't either a fighter with feats to spare or a dedicated archer. Feats that boost...

I never said the RAW didn't apply, more that the intent of it that it isn't supposed to apply, and that even if it does it's not game-breaking.

And they're feats that people who specialize in bows take. Thrown weapons are completely useless and taking feats in those are a waste of time. Plus, the fix I implemented isn't supposed to make Vital Strike more flexible or anything like that; it's supposed to make the Vital Strike chain a more worthwhile set of feats to take.


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Kirth Gersen wrote:

I still think it needs to scale with BAB, not be a chain of feats.

Yeah, I know TWF, ITWF, GTWF are a precedent, but honestly, those need to be fixed, too.

I agree, I think these feats work much better and are far more worthwhile if they scale automatically.

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