Design Manager
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You're reading it right. Note that the AC bonus only applies to the target of the Smite though. Look for baddies with minions, mobility, and possibly neutral followers to deal with these guys. A paladin can't Smite what he can't get to (unless he's one of those bow-wielding paladins, in which case, good luck, and maybe try non-evil bad guys).
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Yes. Smite Evil is basically the paladin's BFG and lasts the whole fight against a given opponent.
It's awesome, but it's their only to-hit/damage boosting class ability and (unlike that of most classes) it only works on *some* opponents. Admittedly a large group of them, but if you spend a day fighting oozes, animals, vermin and constructs then you spend a day where smite evil has approximately 0% usefulness.
Just switch up the enemies here and there. Most "good guy" campaigns will still have a decent mix of evil/neutral, and there's always room for constructs.
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Design Manager
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Don't attack the Paladins with one big dude. Attack them with a party of five to six evil dudes who aren't as powerful on their own, but work together against the Paladins' party. Smite Evil is a huge boost against a single target, but you should only rarely pit groups against a single target.
So much this. Single opponent encounters are a chump's game, with the eception of a few critters who are intended to be encountered solo.
Paladin's have extremely limited uses of Smite Evil, so the more evil enemies they encounter, the quicker they're going to burn their resources. Or they stockpile their Smites and aren't any more effective than anyone else.
Also If I recall correctly Detect evil takes three turns of concentrating to actually tell you if they are evil or not..... I better double check that, I may be thinking of osme old rules,
but yes, paladins dish out some crazy damage vs evil things, just cry if they get their hands on a sunblade as well
EDIT: Alrighty double checking detect evil, it only tells you if evil is within that 60 foot cone, if they are making the assumption that everything in there is evil , then that could lead to some interesting situations, poor fighter whose wife has been kidnapped and he has to take you out, with an evil familiar weasel in his backpack keeping an eye on him, oppsie mr paladin, thanks for slaying the poor guy on a hunch.
or say perhaps, taking out the thug to save the poor innocent hostage who is really the mastermind behind the plot, taking out the little lowbie hired goon only to get jumped by a challenging rogue encounter could prove troublesome if the paladin keeps operating on hunchs
And it all gets multipled on a crit or a charge as well!
I wonder if he's noticed SE can be used at range?
A paladin can, as a move action, concentrate on a single item or individual within 60 feet and determine if it is evil, learning the strength of its aura as if having studied it for 3 rounds.
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Played a PFS scenario recently. My paladin found that every single baddy was undead!
So, did Smite Evil make it a cakewalk?
Actually, since I only have a single Smite per day, and since all the undead we encountered (they were in groups) didn't seem that tough, then I saved my only Smite for the eventual BBEG.
Which didn't exist.
I went the entire scenario, which was filled with Smite-able undead, without using Smite Evil at all!
The damage of Smite Evil that scales with level (+2/pally level) is only applied to creatures that are Outsider (Evil), an evil Dragon or an Undead - and only on the first successful attack.
You're missing this line.
"...adds her paladin level to all damage rolls made against the target of her smite"
Which allows +1 damage/level on all attacks that round on any enemy, not just outsiders etc.
Just wait until they find Litany of Righteousness. ;)
Did another search and found a few posts already asking this question. That just seems so freaken crazy to me. I love how one of my other friends said "trick them into using smite on neutral targets" But I don't see how that possible with paladins having detect evil at will. I mean almost every fight starts with "I cast detect evil" after the surprise round.
Don't get my wrong I'll throw some neutral or good targets that smite won't work on them but it makes that "climatic fight vs some great evil mastermind" a lot harder to do without having to plan how I am going to deal specifically with the paladins (which I hate that mentality)
From the Paladin section of the SRD:
At will, a paladin can use detect evil, as the spell. A paladin can, as a move action, concentrate on a single item or individual within 60 feet and determine if it is evil, learning the strength of its aura as if having studied it for 3 rounds. While focusing on one individual or object, the paladin does not detect evil in any other object or individual within range.
You might also want to read up on the rules for Detect Evil; I threw that url into the quote block for your convenience.
The problem is if the target isn't high enough level to show an evil aura -- and a lot of opposition forces at low level are going to be within the 1-5 HD range. So when your paladins stand there and concentrate on the bad guy and don't detect him as evil, it's not necessarily because he isn't evil -- he just may not be high enough level to detect as evil.
Also keep in mind that smite evil can only be used once per day until the paladin hits 4th level -- and only twice per day until 7th. Your average day of adventuring should consist of between 3 to 5 fights. And it lasts until the specific target is defeated. Many is the time I've salivated at the thought of using my smite evil, and landing a solid blow on the enemy, only to have the enemy go down in one hit, because he was actually fairly wimpy compared to the real threat on the table.
If you are running your own campaign, and your NPCS are smart, favorite trick is half a dozen level 5 mooks and one level 13 BBEG wizard.
BBEG wizard dresses one of his mooks in a robe and makes him laugh manically and wave his arms around while wizard stands there with a sword looking dumb.
Watch the smites get burned.
Another favorite smite-trap is neutral cleric of an evil deity, as their aura ability makes them detect as evil.
Meaning if they are in the middle of a dungeon crawl they usually will secure a room, wall it off and sleep if they are out "things" (smites, lay on hands, spells, ect ect)
Imposing in-game time limits helps with this. Bad guy gets ritual off, princess dies instead of being saved, bad guys know there is a strong group in walled off area so they pack up and leave.... burning the building behind them (with the PCs in a walled off area).
Sometimes resting (or fleeing) is the right call, but you don't want every encounter to be a nova of class abilities.
You could also use spells with the "evil" descriptor on neutral NPCs to give them an evil aura, as detect evil doesn't tell you the source of the aura, just the strength and number of auras.
You can also use magic aura in the same way, making a weakling register as a BBEG while making said villain look meek (and immune to alignment-based effects) by using the spell imbue with aura cast by a weak good or neutral character.
So wait... Doesn't focusing on a target give them to location of the evil aura?
3rd Round: The power and location of each aura. If an aura is outside your line of sight, then you discern its direction but not its exact location.
Yes, detect evil gives a location, even if the source is invisible (such as your lich). However, while this might allow a character to distinguish between a neutral NPC & the evil artifact he is carrying, if an evil spell were cast directly on the NPC then the NPC would register as evil as he becomes the source for the spell's evil aura.
That said, a successful spellcraft check in conjunction with a detect magic or analyze dewomer spell might be able to suss out the two, but it certainly would add another layer of complexity that a paladin might not think to puzzle through before using up a smite evil on the apparent BBEG that's about to charge him.
Why use detect evil? Whenever our paladin is fighting a BBEG, he just assumes he's evil and smites. To date he's never had to detect evil to know to use smite.