It's kinda situational, honestly. I'd say if you're expecting to go into areas with tighter quarters, where you're more likely to be sniping enemies that are engaged with your party's melee fighters, Precise would be the better choice. Also keep in mind that Precise is a prerequisite to a number of other feats you may plan on taking, and if you're not having any issues handling enemies with just the one shot per turn, you might be able to push some of those feats that require Precise Shot forward. If you're really feeling like your damage isn't competitive, though, Rapid Shot is still a great option, giving you three attacks by 5th before taking haste into consideration. It also might work better than Precise if your GM tends to send large groups of low-HP enemies rather than a smaller number of beefier enemies.
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precise shot. PFS groups are herds of cats and they will be in your shooting gallery. -8 from shooting into melee + parties overly large keister cover bonus is about the only thing that can make you miss.
well if you dont mind killing allies rapid shot but if you dont want to kill allies precise shot(with out precise shot if you miss by 4 or more your attack has a chance of hitting an ally in melee)
Not true.
Sounds more like a 3.X rule than a Pathfinder rule.
Either way, I'd go with Precise Shot over Rapid Shot. Sure, Rapid Shot gives you an extra full BAB attack, but that gives you even more penalties, and having -4 penalties for firing into melee is brutal in the early levels, and continues to be a pain later to come.
If Improved Precise Shot didn't have such hefty requirements, I'd even go so far as to suggest taking that before taking Rapid Shot, but I guess you can't win them all, can you...
hmmm then its a house rule literally every dm ive played with implements
It's realistic and offers an aspect of risk (as well as a nerf) to ranged characters, so it makes sense that a lot of GMs would want to implement it as a rule (either because they want to bring life into their world, or because they just hate OP ranged builds).
I personally would enforce it as a GM, but when you apply its logic linearly (such as by having 2 or more creatures providing cover for a given attack), it begins to fall apart.
But the rules don't say anything about, if you miss your target by 4 or less, that the attack instead goes onto the target that provided the cover bonus to the creature you originally intended to attack, and I acknowledge that how I'd run it is incorrect.
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hmmm then its a house rule literally every dm ive played with implementsIt's realistic and offers an aspect of risk (as well as a nerf) to ranged characters, so it makes sense that a lot of GMs would want to implement it as a rule (either because they want to bring life into their world, or because they just hate OP ranged builds).
I personally would enforce it as a GM, but when you apply its logic linearly (such as by having 2 or more creatures providing cover for a given attack), it begins to fall apart.
But the rules don't say anything about, if you miss your target by 4 or less, that the attack instead goes onto the target that provided the cover bonus to the creature you originally intended to attack, and I acknowledge that how I'd run it is incorrect.
No, it is a terrible house rule. The -4 is to indicate you are taking less-than-optimal aim at your opponent to purposefully avoid hitting your teammate.
If you want to have a houserule where you risk friendly fire then you should eliminate the -4 penalty altogether. The make precise shot remove the friendly fire chance.
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http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/reckless-aim-combat?tmpl=%2Fsyst em%2Fapp%2Ftemplates%2Fprint%2F
hmmm then its a house rule literally every dm ive played with implementsIt's realistic and offers an aspect of risk (as well as a nerf) to ranged characters, so it makes sense that a lot of GMs would want to implement it as a rule (either because they want to bring life into their world, or because they just hate OP ranged builds).
I personally would enforce it as a GM, but when you apply its logic linearly (such as by having 2 or more creatures providing cover for a given attack), it begins to fall apart.
But the rules don't say anything about, if you miss your target by 4 or less, that the attack instead goes onto the target that provided the cover bonus to the creature you originally intended to attack, and I acknowledge that how I'd run it is incorrect.
No, it is a terrible house rule. The -4 is to indicate you are taking less-than-optimal aim at your opponent to purposefully avoid hitting your teammate.
If you want to have a houserule where you risk friendly fire then you should eliminate the -4 penalty altogether. The make precise shot remove the friendly fire chance.
No, that is a houserule. You take a -4 penalty because the target has soft cover in relation to the square you're attacking from, and has nothing to do with trying to avoid hitting your teammate. I'm not saying that PCs want to shoot their teammates, merely that the penalty doesn't apply for the reason you're saying. It applies because the teammate in question is in your line of fire, and therefore is making it more difficult to accurately shoot your target.
Realistically speaking, it's quite plausible to shoot him in the back by accident instead of shooting the intended target (the creature adjacent to him), but I only go that far at my table; by the rules, all it does is make the desired target more difficult to hit, which is likewise fine and dandy.
@ _Ozy_: The houserule suggests that there should be consequences for shooting an enemy who is (partially) covered by an ally beyond "You miss the enemy," as would normally be the case in the real world. Of course, the rules don't actually say that, because the rules are abstract of realism, but something like this shouldn't be too difficult to implement as an actual rule, whether for a home game or otherwise.
Also, consider that if, for example, an enemy creature was standing in front of another enemy creature, that if an ally attempted to hit the latter enemy creature, but missed by an amount equal to or less than the cover granted by the former creature, that the attack would instead affect the former enemy creature. It creates an interesting "fail-safe" option for ranged characters in said situations, so it's not like the houserule is all that bad.
@ BigNorseWolf: Linkified for the lazy people. Also, that feat has unique ramifications beyond what the original houserule is (i.e. if you attack misses the intended target by an amount equal to or less than the cover bonus granted by the relevant creature or object, the attack applies to that creature or object), as it may instead let you hit another adjacent enemy creature (as I've demonstrated above).
{. . .}
Also, consider that if, for example, an enemy creature was standing in front of another enemy creature, that if an ally attempted to hit the latter enemy creature, but missed by an amount equal to or less than the cover granted by the former creature, that the attack would instead affect the former enemy creature. It creates an interesting "fail-safe" option for ranged characters in said situations, so it's not like the houserule is all that bad.
{. . .}
Actually sounds like a pretty good house rule to me. Flesh this out a little bit by recombining with the original rule for what happens with no archery feats or traits, so that you have the option to take a penalty of up to some amount that depends upon your base attack bonus to shave an equal amount off the chance of hitting the wrong creature. Precise Shot and Improved Precise Shot would work normally.
Darksol, you seem to be conflating two different things.
There is the -4 AC due to soft cover.
Then there is the -4 for firing into melee combat without precise shot.
An ally that is to the right or left of your arrow's trajectory is not 'in the way' in any sense, and yet you still get a -4 to hit your target if they are in melee with your ally.
The house rule referred to above said that if you didn't have precise shot, you risk hitting your ally, even if they aren't in the path of your arrow. Note, there is no soft cover involved in this scenario.
...Well damn.
Of course, I do know they're separate penalties, and that Precise Shot removes the -4 melee penalty, but I thought we were talking about hitting allies because they were providing Soft Cover to enemies you wanted to shoot.
If not, then I don't know what we're so uppity about.
hmmm then its a house rule literally every dm ive played with implementsIt's realistic and offers an aspect of risk (as well as a nerf) to ranged characters, so it makes sense that a lot of GMs would want to implement it as a rule (either because they want to bring life into their world, or because they just hate OP ranged builds).
I personally would enforce it as a GM, but when you apply its logic linearly (such as by having 2 or more creatures providing cover for a given attack), it begins to fall apart.
But the rules don't say anything about, if you miss your target by 4 or less, that the attack instead goes onto the target that provided the cover bonus to the creature you originally intended to attack, and I acknowledge that how I'd run it is incorrect.
No, it is a terrible house rule. The -4 is to indicate you are taking less-than-optimal aim at your opponent to purposefully avoid hitting your teammate.
If you want to have a houserule where you risk friendly fire then you should eliminate the -4 penalty altogether. The make precise shot remove the friendly fire chance.
No, that is a houserule. You take a -4 penalty because the target has soft cover in relation to the square you're attacking from, and has nothing to do with trying to avoid hitting your teammate. I'm not saying that PCs want to shoot their teammates, merely that the penalty doesn't apply for the reason you're saying. It applies because the teammate in question is in your line of fire, and therefore is making it more difficult to accurately shoot your target.
Realistically speaking, it's quite plausible to shoot him in the back by accident instead of shooting the intended target (the creature adjacent to him), but I only go that far at my table; by the rules, all it does is make the desired target more difficult to hit, which is likewise fine and dandy.
@ _Ozy_: The houserule suggests that there should be...
Yes, the -4 penalty for soft cover is because you are trying to hit the thing instead of the cover.
Ie, a big chunk of the middle of the thing you want to shoot is obscured. So you try to shoot around it.
But in any event, suggesting that missing by 4 or more should cause you to hit the thing you were trying to shoot around and already caused you to take a -4 to your attack roll is crazy.
For that matter, it doesn't at all weaken archers when they are strongest. It just makes anyone who isn't a dedicated archer worse at using ranged options, which doesn't help AT ALL. Most ranged characters get Precise Shot within their first two feats. This rule does literally nothing to curb ranged characters.
Now, here is an interesting question or two. Is the attack automatically dealing damage to the ally? Why? Do they not get a chance to avoid the damage? Few rules work with the presumption that you cannot avoid an effect, and attacks are definitely one of those. So is this attack being remade against the ally?
Also, what if you elected to hit a different creature engaged in melee (like an ally), then also then elected to miss. You can choose to fail any D20 roll you make. So does that mean you can hit a creature without possibly missing, so long as they are the only other creature engaged with your false target?
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Precise Shot. Not as sexy as Rapid Shot but it gets rid of an annoying penalty.
The houserule we implement is that, if you miss the intended target by 4 or less (AKA, if the Cover Bonus improved its AC enough to cause an attack tomiss), then you hit the thing that is providing the cover bonus to your target (which can be a creature, or a barricade, or whatever), certainly not if you miss by 4 or more, or an automatic hit to whatever created the cover.
Of course, the attack roll still needs to beat the AC of the unintended target (so if a 20 AC character is providing cover to a 16 AC creature, there's no way you can hit the character without hitting the creature). And no, you can't choose to automatically miss your attack to affect a creature that doesn't have cover.
That's it. Precise Shot or firing into melee has nothing to do with that houserule (outside of modifying your attack roll as normal, though Improved Precise Shot, on the other hand, has more direct impact).
I've also already demonstrated how that can likewise be a good thing via my reply to _Ozy_, by using line-stacked enemies as fail-safes for wasting action economy (i.e. even if you miss a creature that has cover, as it's a more valuable target to take down early, i.e. a wizard, perhaps you didn't miss the enemy creature that was in front of him, as they may have the same or even less AC than the intended target).
I mean, that seems much better. Sorry, I got the impression somewhere up thread that it was just the firing into melee penalty that was causing your ally to be hit.
Striking your ally was in 3rd edition, not 3.5 (I think? Can someone confirm that?). From personal experience, I will tell you that this can lead to conflict between or hurt feelings for some players. Maturity, group chemistry, and/or player's assumptions should be considered before bringing it in as a house rule. It warrants a discussion at the very least.
Striking your ally was in 3rd edition, not 3.5 (I think? Can someone confirm that?). From personal experience, I will tell you that this can lead to conflict between or hurt feelings for some players. Maturity, group chemistry, and/or player's assumptions should be considered before bringing it in as a house rule. It warrants a discussion at the very least.
Of course it does. But when our group made the rule, it was during the game, when our players were complaining about how ridiculously hard it was to be effective at ranged combat, and were all like "Well, even though I missed X creature because of cover, Y creature, which provided that cover, would've been hit by that attack, so it should hit that creature because I missed due to Y creature providing the cover."
It's been a few campaigns, and we still talk about our one ranged character who took the Reckless Aim feat and dealt with cover all the time, and shot at least one ally in every combat we've participated in, either because cover, or rolling 1's. It's more for laughs at this point than anything else. (Heck, I'm playing one right now, and the fellow PCs are sitting there trying to be all like "Don't shoot me man, don't be like X character!")
But when our fellow players try to finagle the rules to benefit themselves (such as by saying "It's a realm of fantasy, anything can happen!" when the rules are unclear and the GM has to make a judgement call, or even when a couple players try to be realistic about a situation that's likewise unclear and doesn't revolve around magic), stuff like this becomes created.
So the way I see it? The PCs at our table sewn their own seeds of destruction. They were the ones who got the ball rolling in the result of houserules like these being made, and when they complain about it because of the bad stuff that happened, all we can say is "You brought it upon yourself when you argued X houserule in Y scenario, deal with it."
And then they stop talking about. (At least until they get shot again.)
Reckless Aim only works on enemies who are engaged in melee, meaning if you attempt to fire against someone who isn't engaged in melee, you can't use Reckless Aim. (That's actually a mistake that I completely overlooked from the past, which could've saved a few shots landing on allies. Whoops...)
Furthermore, Reckless Aim is a specific result that overrides the general "You automatically miss" rule.
I'm not going so far as to say that you won't misfire (it'd still count as a misfire for your firearm functioning and stuff), but more that instead of being an automatic miss, you'd instead hit a random adjacent creature, as that's the part that Reckless Aim overrides.
In short: You'd still misfire (and suffer the consequences of a misfire in relation to your firearm), but instead of automatically missing, you'd hit a random adjacent creature.
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It's been a few campaigns, and we still talk about our one ranged character who took the Reckless Aim feat and dealt with cover all the time, and shot at least one ally in every combat we've participated in, either because cover, or rolling 1's. It's more for laughs at this point than anything else. (Heck, I'm playing one right now, and the fellow PCs are sitting there trying to be all like "Don't shoot me man, don't be like X character!")
Sounds like you have the right kind of group to deal with this. Some groups are not as lighthearted about such matters. :)
precise shot. PFS groups are herds of cats and they will be in your shooting gallery. -8 from shooting into melee + parties overly large keister cover bonus is about the only thing that can make you miss.
-8 from shooting into melee?? Not -4?
But yes, your party is a herd of cats.
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-8 from shooting into melee?? Not -4?precise shot. PFS groups are herds of cats and they will be in your shooting gallery. -8 from shooting into melee + parties overly large keister cover bonus is about the only thing that can make you miss.
I'm pretty sure that BNW meant that to be read as...
-8 from (shooting into melee + parties overly large keister cover bonus)
-8 because you're firing into melee (-4) and your allies are providing the enemy with soft cover (-4).
Yesbut he said " -8 from shooting into melee + parties overly large keister cover bonus ".
I think Gisher is correct.
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Gisher is indeed correct. When firing at an opponent that an ally is currently engaged with in melee combat, without Precise Shot you will suffer a -4 at best and a -8 if you can't get a clear line of effect.
I strongly recommend taking Precise Shot at level 3 over Rapid Shot.
First, hitting more consistently is preferable to hitting harder at early levels. Second, you will have more available wealth to afford alchemical cartridges at higher levels than you will at lower levels.
Some will try to argue that since you're attacking a target's Touch AC, the -8 isn't that big of a deal. Those same people that argue that seem to consistently forget that firearms only hit Touch AC at the first range increment, which you are not always going to have the luxury of attacking, especially when using pistols.
Don't be a rube. Get Precise Shot.