What's the advantage of a Disengaging Feint - which needs a successfull Bluff chek [standard action] to succeed and permits the rogue to disengage himself from an opponent [one move action] without provoking an attack of opportunity - over a Withdraw action : full round action where you can move double your speed without provoking an AoO from the opponent you were engaged with ?
Maybe I'm missing something, because I don't see the benefit here.
It is a feat tax to the rest of the chain. Also, it is not a rogue talent, but a feat.
At first I thought perhaps Disengaging Feint would deny all AoO attempts (whereas Withdraw only denies for the first square) - but the two appear to operate in the same way.
It also seems sort of silly that it has Improved Feint (feint as a move action) as a prerequisite but requires a standard action in itself.
As far as I can tell, the only real mechanical differences are that DF is a standard action (leaving you your move action to move, or take any other action you can take as a move equivalent), while Withdraw is a full-round action(which doesn't leave you time to do anything but move, swift, free).
Well, technically, with the withdraw action I don't have the option to move one move's worth of distance (eg: 30 ft) and then take a different move action like getting something out of my backpack. With the disengaging feint I could. (The wording of disengaging feint says it takes a standard action and allows you to move up to your speed away, it does not say that this movement requires a separate move action.) But honestly, I can't think why I would WANT to do this. It could also be used to disengage from an opponent you can't see (perhaps you are blinded or they are invisible). One other thing it allows is disengaging from an opponent with a really wide range of reach: withdraw only protects you from attacks in the square you are leaving (from any opponents), while disengaging feint protects you from one opponent in ALL squares they can reach.
All that being said, it is still not much of a feat. Now, if disengaging feint were a MOVE action, then I would have the option of disengaging one foe and engaging another on my turn (if my bluff were good enough). That would be worthwhile, but as written it sounds like it adds almost no benefit over the withdraw action.
I always took that to mean that your standard action includes the feint and the movement, leaving you with another move action to do whatever you want, like draw a weapon or ready a potion or something. You could also move up to an opponent, then use Disengaging Feint to move again without provoking.
But these are such small corner cases that I don't think anyone would ever take this feat. Ever. If Paizo wanted people to be able to do this, they should have just errata'd Improved Feint or simply added this as an option to the Bluff skill.
Side note: Anyone taking this feat already knows how to make a feint as a move action. This feat might be marginally useful (but probably still nearly worthless) if it allowed you to feint and move as a move action instead of standard. At least then you could cast a spell, or make a ranged attack, or activate a command word, etc.
I would fully support pushing for an errata like that.
Well, technically, with the withdraw action I don't have the option to move one move's worth of distance (eg: 30 ft) and then take a different move action like getting something out of my backpack. With the disengaging feint I could. (The wording of disengaging feint says it takes a standard action and allows you to move up to your speed away, it does not say that this movement requires a separate move action.) But honestly, I can't think why I would WANT to do this. It could also be used to disengage from an opponent you can't see (perhaps you are blinded or they are invisible). One other thing it allows is disengaging from an opponent with a really wide range of reach: withdraw only protects you from attacks in the square you are leaving (from any opponents), while disengaging feint protects you from one opponent in ALL squares they can reach.
All that being said, it is still not much of a feat. Now, if disengaging feint were a MOVE action, then I would have the option of disengaging one foe and engaging another on my turn (if my bluff were good enough). That would be worthwhile, but as written it sounds like it adds almost no benefit over the withdraw action.
This is wrong. The full quote of the feat is:
Benefit: As a standard action, use Bluff to feint against an opponent. Instead of denying that opponent his Dexterity bonus to AC, a successful feint allows you to move up to your speed without provoking an attack of opportunity from the opponent you feinted for leaving the square you start in.So, reach creatures still screw you.
If Disengaging Feint negated all potential AoOs from the feinted target, then it could actually be worth something. As it stands, I think Tarantula is right - it's a feat tax (and a really crappy one at that, unless there are some really awesome Rogue actions that can be taken as a move equivalent that I'm overlooking).