Vital Strike and Storm of Blades

[Savior_Self]

Can Storm of Blades be used with Vital Strike? I know Vital Strike doesn't work with full-round actions like Pounce. "Vital Strike can only be used a part of an attack action, which is a specific kind of standard action."
Storm of Blades reads:
As a standard action, you can make a single attack with your chosen weapon while setting up a vortex of cuts that lasts until the beginning of your next turn. Any creature that begins its turn threatened by this weapon takes damage equal to your Strength or Dexterity bonus, whichever is greater.

My question is, can use VS on an SoB attack? My gut feeling is no, but I want to be sure.

[doomman47]

It can be but it needs a lot of investment, you need 6 levels in heritor knight and get 11 bab for the feat.

[Savior_Self]

doomman47 wrote:

It can be but it needs a lot of investment, you need 6 levels in heritor knight and get 11 bab for the feat.

Forgive my ignorance, but why do need I heritor knight? I was thinking a VS Warpriest of Gorum. I get weapon focus and VS from the bonus feats, and could potentially pick this up as a bonus as well. (Assuming I'm not missing something) The 11 bab allows me to add the base weapon damage, in this case a greatsword.

[doomman47]

Because in order to get vital strike on any standard attack you need 6 levels in the prestige class, otherwise you can not use vital strike with the feat.

[Slyme]

Neither Vital Strike nor Storm of Blades has anything to do with Heritor Knight...anyone who meets the requirements can take either of those feats.

As for using Storm of Blades with Vital Strike, I would say no...SoB is a Standard Action...Vital Strike is an Attack Action...you cannot do both in a single round.

If SoB said it could be used as part of an attack action, then yes...but as is you are basically just flailing your weapon around you to hurt anyone close, while VS you are doing a directed attack and focusing all your might and skill into it.

[doomman47]

Slyme wrote:

Neither Vital Strike nor Storm of Blades has anything to do with Heritor Knight...anyone who meets the requirements can take either of those feats.

As for using Storm of Blades with Vital Strike, I would say no...SoB is a Standard Action...Vital Strike is an Attack Action...you cannot do both in a single round.

If SoB said it could be used as part of an attack action, then yes...but as is you are basically just flailing your weapon around you to hurt anyone close, while VS you are doing a directed attack and focusing all your might and skill into it.

Heritor knight lets you use vital strike with any standard action with a melee attack.

Storm of blades is a standard action for a special effect on a melee attack.

Heritor knight lets you use vital strike with storm of blades.

[Slyme]

That is a very lenient interpretation of the rules... As a GM, I personally would not allow it...your GM may feel differently, I would check with them before you try to build a character around it. Paizo has made it fairly clear that they only meant VS to be used by itself and not combined with other abilities like Spring Attack, etc. I also doubt most PFS GM's would allow it.

[doomman47]

You are literally ruling against what the ability says it does, also spring attack is a full round action not a standard action.

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 is storm of blades, a melee standard action attack there for you can apply vital strike to it.

[Slyme]

Storm of blades is a standard action which grants an attack as part of it, which is not the same thing as an melee attack as a standard action.

One of them your action is an attack, the other your action is setting up a vortex of cuts which grants you an attack.

Paizo has a bad habit of wording things terribly and inconsistently, the Heritor Knight is a prime example of this, since Vital Strike is always part of a standard attack action.

Heritor Knight does not allow you to break action economy to vital strike with any and all standard actions. You can not drink a potion and vital strike, or cast a spell and vital strike, etc. etc.

[Arachnofiend]

Slyme wrote:

That is a very lenient interpretation of the rules... As a GM, I personally would not allow it...your GM may feel differently, I would check with them before you try to build a character around it. Paizo has made it fairly clear that they only meant VS to be used by itself and not combined with other abilities like Spring Attack, etc. I also doubt most PFS GM's would allow it.

Funny you mention Spring Attack, since the Warrior Poet exists and has an ability that quite explicitly makes Vital Strike work on Spring Attack.

The entire purpose of the Heritor Knight's Mighty Strike is to use Vital Strike with other types of standard action attacks, which is normally not allowed. The ability literally does nothing if that isn't the intent. This is not the normal interaction, Heritor Knight changes it so that any standard action that involves making an attack (so yes, it's a different thing than your reductio ad absurdum of "drink a potion and vital strike") can be used with Vital Strike.

[Temperans]

You are confusing things. A melee attack as a standard action is not the same as an attack action. There has been ample debate over this and the reason why you cant use Vital Strike as part of a Cleave or any other standard action attack.

It's also important to note that vital strike is not normally part of a standard action. Its an add on to the attack action, which is can be used with a standard action. Again this goes to the reason why you can't normally Vital Strike as part of Cleave or other standard action abilities.

The other things is that most, to not say all, feats and abilities start by stating what type of action they use. So by your logic the Heritor Knight's ability does not work at all, even thou no FAQ request was asked or released when the question was asked here: thread 1, thread 2, and thread 3.

So in short, yes the entire point of that ability is to allow any standard action ability with a melee attack to also get Vital Strike.

***********************
Regarding, Storm of Blades, as was stated by default it is not possible to combine the abilities due to the attack action only limit.

With Heritor Knight, as long as you make a melee attack as part of the attack given by Storm of Blades, you can add Vital Strike to it.

***********************
They have also released 3 abilities to use Vital Strike as part of attacks of opportunity; There is also an archetype that let's you Vital Strike with Kinetic Blasts, which by default can't benefit from Vital Strike.

[doomman47]

Temperans wrote:

There is also an archetype that let's you Vital Strike with Kinetic Blasts, which by default can't benefit from Vital Strike.

Ya and unfortunately that archetype makes kinetic blast a steaming pile of dung and removes half of the other draw of playing a kinetisist.

[blahpers]

Slyme wrote:

That is a very lenient interpretation of the rules... As a GM, I personally would not allow it...your GM may feel differently, I would check with them before you try to build a character around it. Paizo has made it fairly clear that they only meant VS to be used by itself and not combined with other abilities like Spring Attack, etc. I also doubt most PFS GM's would allow it.

You are correct that Paizo normally does not allow Vital Strike to be used with other abilities. However, the heritor knight's mighty strike ability was specifically designed to allow Vital Strike to work with other standard action abilities. It's intended to work that way. In fact, the sentence

Mighty Strike wrote:

Whenever the heritor knight makes a melee attack as a standard action, she can apply the effects of Improved Vital Strike to that attack.

is completely meaningless if it did not work that way, as the heritor knight automatically gains the Improved Vital Strike feat at the same prestige class level, and that feat already allows you to apply its effects when taking the "Attack" standard action.

If you still disagree, I can only urge you to check previous discussions on the topic of the heritor knight before committing to that judgment. If it sounds overpowered, remember that it's an ability available only to 11+-level characters taking a particular prestige class bound to a specific deity and requires giving up whatever class abilities one would have gotten from more traditional martial classes. In practice, it works fine.

[Slyme]

I stand corrected then. I was not aware that the writer intended the ability to interact that way, it appeared to just be erroneous text saying the same thing the feat said just worded slightly differently.

Paizo is horrible at erroneous text...see my rules question thread about the Brawler archetypes for just one example.

[Diego Rossi]

§RAI it is meant to allow vital strike with all the standard actions that give an attack.
RAW? Questionable. It could be written way better.

[blahpers]

Slyme wrote:

I stand corrected then. I was not aware that the writer intended the ability to interact that way, it appeared to just be erroneous text saying the same thing the feat said just worded slightly differently.

Paizo is horrible at erroneous text...see my rules question thread about the Brawler archetypes for just one example.

Hoo, you ain't kidding. Like when a rule is only specified in (or even the previously-stated rule is contradicted by) the "Normal" section of a feat description. That's my absolute favorite.