Question on Deadly Stroke Feat.

[Jacob Saltband]

Am I reading Deadly Stroke right? It takes 3 rounds of actions to do a deadly stroke attack if you do it by your self?

If so for PFS its not that good a feat I think.

[James Priebnow]

That looks right. Unless you tag someone in the Surprise round where they start flat-footed of course. Hopefully you have a buddy helping you set this up. There are some rogue talents that synergize nicely.

Otherwise its round one - Dazzling Display to cause Shaken
Round two - Shatter defenses to add flat-footed
Round Three - Deadly Stroke

[Kryptik]

If you coordinate with your friends it's pretty good.

Get someone, such as a wizard or sorc, to cast Fear. Even if they fail the save, they're still Shaken.

Your turn comes up. You, by virtue of having Deadly Stroke, are at least BaB +6 or greater so you should have an iterative. Hit them with that, which makes them flat footed to you, then hit them with your iterative, which should hit because it's versus flatfooted AC.

Turn 2, hit them with Deadly Stroke.

[insaneogeddon]

You can do it yourself. Same round!

Performing Combat allows you to use performance feats in combat, Heroes Display gives a swift action intimidate all in 30ft.

So you can present/draw your sword with a flourish, debuff all in 30ft and con bleed one foe.

Works well with Samurai as gets bonus feats, Order of the Cockatrice gets free Dazzling Display and +2 hit vs intimidated foes, Sword Saint gives an additional shaken effect at 5th level and makes a single attack allot more effective.

Your to hit bonus will be hard to beat - weapon focus, greater weapon focus, +2 extra vs intimidated,no power attack, one attack at highest BAB only.

1 Weapon Focus (Katana), B2 Dazzling Display, 3 Performing Combat, 5 Heroes Display, 6B Specialization, 7 Shatter Defenses, 9 Greater Weapon Focus (Katana), 11 Deadly Stroke,

Dramatic Display and Masterful Display will add an extra +2 to hit.

A fighter could do much the same. However the samurai has the grab bag of specialization, challenge, quick draw + sneak attack with sword saint, resolve to re-roll saves and ignore conditions is a pretty good package probably more robust and flavorful then a fighter build that could milk some extra damage (no point if you want to bleed out a foe as you move on to others).