Wakashi has a +4 to coup de Grace attempts, does that work for a ninja's assassate attempt?
By RAW, no. A coup de grace is a specific game mechanic. The ninja's assassinate, while similar, does not work the same and does not say it counts as a coup de grace.
(Both can instantly kill, but that is the only similarity. Both require different action types to perform. Coup de grace requires a melee weapon or for you to be adjacent to the target; Assassinate does not. The DCs are calculate differently.)
I believe you mean wakizashi, which has the deadly quality.
Deadly: When you use this weapon to deliver a coup de grace, it gains a +4 bonus to damage when calculating the DC of the Fortitude saving throw to see whether the target of the coup de grace dies from the attack. The bonus is not added to the actual damage of the coup de grace attack.
The assassinate trick is not a coup-de-grace attempt, and thus deadly will not apply.
A ninja with this master trick can kill foes that are unable to defend themselves. To attempt to assassinate a target, the ninja must first study her target for 1 round as a standard action. On the following round, if the ninja makes a sneak attack against the target and the target is denied its Dexterity bonus to AC, the sneak attack has the additional effect of possibly killing the target. This attempt automatically fails if the target recognizes the ninja as an enemy. If the sneak attack is successful and the target of this attack fails a Fortitude save, it dies. The DC of this save is equal to 10 + 1/2 the ninja’s level + the ninja’s Charisma modifier. If the save is successful, the target still takes the sneak attack damage as normal, but it is immune to that ninja’s assassinate ability for 1 day.
There's nothing here to remotely hint it should apply, sorry.
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Wakashi has a +4 to coup de Grace attempts, does that work for a ninja's assassate attempt?
As I understand it... it's the weapon a Samurai is supposed to use for sepuku. So I guess the idea is to make sure it works. :)
IFIRC the katana has the same property.
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Wakashi has a +4 to coup de Grace attempts, does that work for a ninja's assassate attempt?As I understand it... it's the weapon a Samurai is supposed to use for sepuku. So I guess the idea is to make sure it works. :)
IFIRC the katana has the same property.
Katanas were also used by the "second" in seppuku to behead the person, so again, make sure it works?
figured. :/
Good thing for house rules... :)
No offense, but this really shouldn't be house ruled that way.
While the effects might appear similar, this is a huge difference.
Coup-de-grace requires a creature be helpless. If a creature is helpless, it is already effectively dead (helpless creatures can't do anything). This is a huge difference compared to the assassinate ability, which has its own difficulties in pulling off since the target can't be aware of you (which means if they know your around even if they can't currently see/sense you). But is easier to pull off then actually making someone helpless.
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figured. :/
Good thing for house rules... :)No offense, but this really shouldn't be house ruled that way.
While the effects might appear similar, this is a huge difference.
Coup-de-grace requires a creature be helpless. If a creature is helpless, it is already effectively dead (helpless creatures can't do anything). This is a huge difference compared to the assassinate ability, which has its own difficulties in pulling off since the target can't be aware of you (which means if they know your around even if they can't currently see/sense you). But is easier to pull off then actually making someone helpless.
that, and the coup de grace thing was mostly a flavor thing having little to no in game effect.
Because that action is fairly much guaranteed. A level 1 character with 16 str and a katana (an 'acceptible' melee character level) would have an average base damage 4.5+4, or ~8.5. Now remember, coup de grace are auto crits, so the damage is typically doubled (average of 17). The DC for coup de grace are 10+damage dealt. So the DC of a LEVEL ONE character can reasonably be 27. Most casters at level 1 dish out things with DC 15 at best, and that is considered decent.
A 1 HD creature with generous stats (20 con=+5) and fort as a good save (+2) would have to roll a natural 20 in order to survive that blow (if it didn't auto kill him- it probably did). Heck- even a CR 20 balor might still die to that same coup de grace if the LEVEL ONE katana user added power attack on it (it would need a bad saving roll, of course, but it isn't a non-zero chance).
So a coup de grace is pretty much a guaranteed thing. There is little to add onto it. So the +4 is jsut flavor. It jsut takes it from 'guaranteed dead' to 'haha, I am just throwing arbitrary numbers at this point, I might as well say rocks fall'.
In comparison, a level 20 ninja with 20 CHA (a bit conservative) has a DC of 10+10+5= 25. So that +4 would actually be massive. It would actually almost match the entire part of DC from the ninja's level when you first get the talent (level 10, so in the 1/2 level system, that is 5... vs. the +4 from the weapon).
So this would be a MAJOR issue. For coup de grace, it is a miniscule addition, possibly less than 4%. But for assassination, that +4 might be over a 20% increase.