It's all in the wording Double strike says,
"At 9th level, a two-weapon warrior may, as a standard action, make one attack with both his primary and secondary weapons."
This doesn't work, as a standard action isn't the "attack action" standard action.
You wrote that it says "When you take an attack action you attack with both weapons." This maybe could work and you'd need to look into it, but this isn't what it says so we don't need to worry.
Mighty Strike (Ex): At 6th level, a heritor knight gains Vital Strike and Improved Vital Strike as bonus feats. Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.
What happens now?
Mighty Strike (Ex): At 6th level, a heritor knight gains Vital Strike and Improved Vital Strike as bonus feats. Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.What happens now?
Seem that's it just a more limited form of vital strike, being melee only and not any attack.
Seem that's it just a more limited form of vital strike, being melee only and not any attack.Mighty Strike (Ex): At 6th level, a heritor knight gains Vital Strike and Improved Vital Strike as bonus feats. Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.What happens now?
The general assumption is longsword since the PRC has like 4 other abilities that require that.
Seem that's it just a more limited form of vital strike, being melee only and not any attack.Mighty Strike (Ex): At 6th level, a heritor knight gains Vital Strike and Improved Vital Strike as bonus feats. Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.What happens now?
No, it's makes vital strike combine with any standard action attack not just the 'attack action' -it's a pretty sweet ability.
Not sure if it works with doublestrike as that is two attacks not 'a melee attack', but I could be persuaded that it at least applies to one of them.
Seem that's it just a more limited form of vital strike, being melee only and not any attack.Mighty Strike (Ex): At 6th level, a heritor knight gains Vital Strike and Improved Vital Strike as bonus feats. Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.What happens now?No, it's makes vital strike combine with any standard action attack not just the 'attack action' -it's a pretty sweet ability.
Not sure if it works with doublestrike as that is two attacks not 'a melee attack', but I could be persuaded that it at least applies to one of them.
Agreed. Same situation with cleave. One of them would be vital. It doesn't point to a weapon so it still could be an oversized bastard sword. It is an awesome ability.
Cleave is a standard action.
Deadly stroke is a standard action
Heritor Knight Mighty Strike:
"Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead."
Pretty sure this ability lets you add vital strike to the two above as well as any other attack that takes a standard action normally.
that's not how cleave works with vital, you can't use them together its not that only 1 of the cleave attacks get vital, neither gets itAgreed. Same situation with cleave. One of them would be vital. It doesn't point to a weapon so it still could be an oversized bastard sword. It is an awesome ability.Seem that's it just a more limited form of vital strike, being melee only and not any attack.Mighty Strike (Ex): At 6th level, a heritor knight gains Vital Strike and Improved Vital Strike as bonus feats. Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.What happens now?No, it's makes vital strike combine with any standard action attack not just the 'attack action' -it's a pretty sweet ability.
Not sure if it works with doublestrike as that is two attacks not 'a melee attack', but I could be persuaded that it at least applies to one of them.
As Bladelock points out Mighty Strike changes the rules.
Heritor knight is actually one of the best martial prestige classes ive seen ...basically ever. Its clearly for fighter with the weapon training advancement but works with other martials, it fills a lot of the practical gaps of a martial, as well as minimizing the full attack dependency.
Agreed, while there may be some debate over whether "whenever [you make] a melee attack as a standard action... [you] can apply effects of VS to that attack" is exclusive to standard actions that cause only a single attack, or allows standard actions that cause multiple attacks (or other non-attack functions)... the difference vs. Vital Strike "Attack Action" requirement is clear. IMHO it is reasonable to exclude inherently multi-attack actions (like Doublestrike) from working with Mighty Strike. I would allow Cleave to work with Double strike because the action is only directly causing a single attack, even if that attack has 'rider' effect that can allow more attacks.
The OP makes common mistake conflating "Standard Action" and "Attack Action", which is obviously promoted by Paizo's confusing terminology (and in fact the Core Rules suffers this same confusion, putting rules for Unarmed, Ranged, Critical Hits under the specific (Standard) Attack Action, despite them clearly intended to apply to all attack rules, as seen by the explicit references to Full-Attacks).
IMHO, it's best to understand abilities that read "as a standard action, you may..." as "their own" unique Standard Action, e.g. a Doublestrike (Standard) Action, or a "Grapple" (Standard) Action. Many can also be seen as application of the "Use extraordinary ability" Action. The "Attack" (Standard) Action is distinct from other Standard Actions even if both cause only one attack (as in case of Grapple).
Heritor Knight's Mighty Strike actually makes me consider giving all Full BAB ("Martial") classes Vital Strike Chain for free, as they qualify for it from Class BAB (seems reasonable to allow stacking ala fractional BAB when multiclassing different Martial classes). This leaves out lesser BAB classes but those already expect to be less powerful generically and/or have specific means to compensate (Sneak Attack / Inquisitor Bane). They can still take Vital Strike normally as Feat, and can get it for free with a 6 level martial dip (if somebody took VS Feat before getting it for free, seems reasonable to allow gaining of Improved VS if they qualify re: BAB). But more importantly, it also leaves out big melee monsters (unless you give them 6 levels of martial class) which was the balance problem with free Vital Strike for all.
You cannot combine the Vital Strike chain with any other kind of attack action. Thats not how it works.
"Benefit: When you use the attack action, you can make one attack at your highest base attack bonus that deals additional damage."
Where you are getting confused is the difference between an attack action and standard action.
A single attack action takes a standard action to do.
Just like casting a spell requires a standard action to do.
Just like picking a lock requires a standard action to do.
Just like Double Strike requires a standard action to do.
See?
They are all the same kind of action.
Its the old logical game, all attack actions are standard actions but not all standard actions are attack actions.
Finally, the mighty strike ability just gives you the first two Vital feats for free, you still have to follow all their rules. The only limit is that apparently you can only do it in melee, not ranged. A pretty good trade since you are getting Improved VS like 3 levels early.
Hope that clears things up!
AtD
The mighty strike ability literally changes the rules on when you can use vital strike Ahpook.
Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.
Which means things like Cleave, The advanced benefit of Iomedae's divine fighting style, Deadly Stroke and almost every ability from the PrC you get it from, plus who knows how many archetypes that give some wonky standard action attack option.
I kind of feel like I've missed any discussion that might have gone on regarding that ability, or if it hasn't happened thats a shame cause its really kind of groundbreaking for fighter in particular.
The mighty strike ability literally changes the rules on when you can use vital strike Ahpook.
Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.Which means things like Cleave, The advanced benefit of Iomedae's divine fighting style, Deadly Stroke and almost every ability from the PrC you get it from, plus who knows how many archetypes that give some wonky standard action attack option.
I kind of feel like I've missed any discussion that might have gone on regarding that ability, or if it hasn't happened thats a shame cause its really kind of groundbreaking for fighter in particular.
People are so used to saying 'it doesn't work with Vital Strike' at this point that it's kinda hard to change bad habits when something like Mighty Strike creeps along and says 'Here I am to change all that'.
Also, that's real neat that it combines with her divine fighting style. Hooray for flavor-cohesion!
The mighty strike ability literally changes the rules on when you can use vital strike Ahpook.
Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.Which means things like Cleave, The advanced benefit of Iomedae's divine fighting style, Deadly Stroke and almost every ability from the PrC you get it from, plus who knows how many archetypes that give some wonky standard action attack option.
I kind of feel like I've missed any discussion that might have gone on regarding that ability, or if it hasn't happened thats a shame cause its really kind of groundbreaking for fighter in particular.
People are so used to saying 'it doesn't work with Vital Strike' at this point that it's kinda hard to change bad habits when something like Mighty Strike creeps along and says 'Here I am to change all that'.
Also, that's real neat that it combines with her divine fighting style. Hooray for flavor-cohesion!
And really one of the biggest things about its wording is that it seems like cleave/great cleave lets you apply vital strike to every hit, as they are an attack taken as a standard action.
If you're playing with combat stamina, it works with spring attack too.
any ways to get mighty strike from elsewere?
Nope, 6 levels of heritor knight. Sticks you with longsword but gaming the system hard a Large longsword in two hands beefs up nicely with impact and any size increase and should work with all the tricks as well for a -2 to hit.
well that sucks that's pretty much the only ability that i find useful from the class and the flavor of the class blows imo. all though you could potentially use a greatsword instead just not have access to some of the longsword only ability and sacrifice a feat for the prerequisitesany ways to get mighty strike from elsewere?Nope, 6 levels of heritor knight. Sticks you with longsword but gaming the system hard a Large longsword in two hands beefs up nicely with impact and any size increase and should work with all the tricks as well for a -2 to hit.
I feel like at that point you really reach "whats the point" though, 3 blank class levels. I think cha to will saves and save vs curse/hex is pretty solid and if you buy in to the longsword use you've got some decently varied combat options, and the fact that weapon training stacks mean you don't forfeit access to AWT later on.
well that sucks that's pretty much the only ability that i find useful from the class and the flavor of the class blows imo. all though you could potentially use a greatsword instead just not have access to some of the longsword only ability and sacrifice a feat for the prerequisitesany ways to get mighty strike from elsewere?Nope, 6 levels of heritor knight. Sticks you with longsword but gaming the system hard a Large longsword in two hands beefs up nicely with impact and any size increase and should work with all the tricks as well for a -2 to hit.
Mighty Strike does not say it is restricted to Long Swords. Several Heritor Knight abilities are sword specific but that language is not part of Mighty Strike.
And really one of the biggest things about its wording is that it seems like cleave/great cleave lets you apply vital strike to every hit, as they are an attack taken as a standard action.
If you're playing with combat stamina, it works with spring attack too.
No wording says that you can Vital Strike with more than one of the cleave attacks. I think they would need to add a condition to make that happen. Without the ability calling it out I think only the first attack of Cleave would be a Vital Strike.
Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.
Are you making a melee attack with the second attack in cleave?
YesDid it come as the result of a standard action?
Yes
You can apply the effects of improved vital strike to that attack.
besides cleave are there any other interesting abilities to use the ability with?
Deadly stroke,
If you're doing combat stamina you can use it with spring attack.
Seems like it works on partial charges when you can take them as a standard.
Iomedae's advanced divine fighting technique
The strike and seize one handed weapon trick, the dual slice two weapon trick, targeted blow.
I think the 2hander fighter archetype can go 6 in the prc and still end up with a standard attack that bull rushes/trips
Merciless butchery, though the build path to get there has to be wonky as hell
You can use it when fighting defensively as a standard too, so there's probably some choices you can take to just have out of control AC for your level while not losing out on damage in quite the same way.
You've got enough feats to take the divine fighting technique, a couple cleave feats and all of dazzling display to have it fully online by 12. If you forgo deadly stroke you've got more than enough to go full greater cleave.
Two weapon warrior archetype may be the damage king with the ability, stop at heritor 6 and fighter 9 and you can vital strike with two weapons.
With versatile design on a longsword a Learned duelist at 9 also gets to add int to damage on vital strikes as well as automatically max damage on crits and still get the divine fighting and prc options.
Thats about all the abuse ive found for it so far.
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Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.Are you making a melee attack with the second attack in cleave?
Yes
Did it come as the result of a standard action?
YesYou can apply the effects of improved vital strike to that attack.
However a cleave is multiple attacks not an attack. You can combine the 2 actions but I don't see where it says every extra attack becomes a vital strike. Since it doesn't say that only 1 of the attacks would be a Vital Strike unless you have another feat to support.
However a cleave is multiple attacks not an attack. You can combine the 2 actions but I don't see where it says every extra attack becomes a vital strike. Since it doesn't say that only 1 of the attacks would be a Vital Strike unless you have another feat to support.
Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.Are you making a melee attack with the second attack in cleave?
Yes
Did it come as the result of a standard action?
YesYou can apply the effects of improved vital strike to that attack.
Are you making a melee attack with that Cleave attack?
YesDid it come as he result of a standard action?
Yes.
Those are literally the only two criteria for applying the vital strike bonus once you have Mighty Strike. Mighty strike does not read "when you make an attack action" or "when you make a single melee attack as a standard action" It reads "Whenever the Heritor Knight makes a melee attack as a standard action"
If melee attack yes and standard action yes then vital strike bonus also yes.
and Lady J doesn't seem to be a way to do whirlwind attack as standard earlier than 20, but there are 2 ways to standard action a MH/OH.
dang wanted to use whirl wind with a great sword or a reach weaponHowever a cleave is multiple attacks not an attack. You can combine the 2 actions but I don't see where it says every extra attack becomes a vital strike. Since it doesn't say that only 1 of the attacks would be a Vital Strike unless you have another feat to support.
Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.Are you making a melee attack with the second attack in cleave?
Yes
Did it come as the result of a standard action?
YesYou can apply the effects of improved vital strike to that attack.
Are you making a melee attack with that second action?
Yes
Did it come as he result of a standard action?
Yes.Those are literally the only two criteria for applying the vital strike bonus once you have Mighty Strike. Mighty strike does not read "when you make an attack action" or "when you make a single melee attack as a standard action" It reads "Whenever the Heritor Knight makes a melee attack as a standard action"
If melee attack yes and standard action yes then vital strike bonus also yes.
and Lady J doesn't seem to be a way to do whirlwind attack as standard earlier than 20, but there are 2 ways to standard action a MH/OH.
3rd party apparently there are a million martial maneuvers that are standard action maneuvers that this would work with too. I just don't generally hunt the 3pp since as a point of discussion it tends to be hit/miss
Ok, we have a winner though
Warpriest of Iomedae w improved unarmed and unarmed strike + combat stamina + pummeling style can full attack as a standard and apply the vital strike bonuses to each hit, then combine all that damage before applying DR.
would bladed dash work? also any 3rd party that would allow ww as a standard?
Seems like it should, its a melee attack that comes as a part of a standard action.
Are you making a melee attack with that Cleave attack?
Yes
Did it come as he result of a standard action?
Yes.Those are literally the only two criteria for applying the vital strike bonus once you have Mighty Strike. Mighty strike does not read "when you make an attack action" or "when you make a single melee attack as a standard action" It reads "Whenever the Heritor Knight makes a melee attack as a standard action"
If melee attack yes and standard action yes then vital strike bonus also yes.
Those are not the only criteria. It says "a melee attack."
How many attacks is "a melee attack?" It is one. So when a Heritor knight makes 1 attack as a standard action they can add Vital Strike damage to it. At best they can add Vital Strike to one attack with a cleave.
After re-reading I can also see why cleave, despite being a standard action, could be read as not working at all. It seems pretty clear that it is one or none.
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Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack. If she has Greater Vital Strike, she can apply that feat’s effects instead.Are you making a melee attack with the second attack in cleave?
Yes
Did it come as the result of a standard action?
YesYou can apply the effects of improved vital strike to that attack.
You are inventing "as a result of" a standard action. It has to be made "AS a standard action." Bonus cleave attacks are not made AS standard actions, they are extra attacks that don't use an action.
Would the Kineticist Blade/Whip whirlwind infusion work?
nice that puts magus on the table, know of any 3rd party feats that are whirlwind like but as a standard action or 3rd party class abilities that would be whirlwind as a standard action?would bladed dash work? also any 3rd party that would allow ww as a standard?Seems like it should, its a melee attack that comes as a part of a standard action.
WhirlWind is also a series of single attacks rather than one big attack. Even if you could get it as a standard action it would only effect the first attack in the action... at best.
Just like with cleave, it is one or none. I think it is one.
I still think that this is just further restricting vital strike to only melee attacks and not doing anything else.
Are you making a melee attack with that Cleave attack?
Yes
Did it come as he result of a standard action?
Yes.Those are literally the only two criteria for applying the vital strike bonus once you have Mighty Strike. Mighty strike does not read "when you make an attack action" or "when you make a single melee attack as a standard action" It reads "Whenever the Heritor Knight makes a melee attack as a standard action"
If melee attack yes and standard action yes then vital strike bonus also yes.
Those are not the only criteria. It says "a melee attack."
How many attacks is "a melee attack?" It is one. So when a Heritor knight makes 1 attack as a standard action they can add Vital Strike damage to it. At best they can add Vital Strike to one attack with a cleave.
After re-reading I can also see why cleave, despite being a standard action, could be read as not working at all. It seems pretty clear that it is one or none.
I'm not inventing anything, im using the english language as written. Y'all are the ones inserting single subconsciously into the ability.
When you take the second attack in a cleave, did you make a melee attack? Did you make it as a standard action? Yes to both, vital strike dice to both.
If you want to subconsciously insert single in the writing thats fine for your table but its not how the ability actually reads.