Stab and blast MAP

[Momar]

Feat text from archives: Make a melee Strike with the required weapon. If the Strike is successful, you can immediately make a ranged Strike against the same target with a +2 circumstance bonus to the attack roll. This counts as two attacks toward your multiple attack penalty, but you don't apply the multiple attack penalty until after making both attacks.

If you stab and blast and miss, or otherwise choose not to use the second attack, does it count as one attack or two for MAP?

Another way, does "This" in the final sentence refer to the stab and blast action as a whole, or is the final sentence there to guide you through MAP application if you make the second attack?

[breithauptclan]

Stab and Blast.

Yeah, that one is a bit tricky. I would expect that different GMs and tables are going to run it slightly differently.

I'm seeing four valid interpretations:

1) Most strict (probably too bad to be true): If you miss the first Strike, you aren't able to make the ranged Strike, but the action still counts as two attacks for MAP progression.

2) If you miss the first Strike, you aren't able to make the ranged Strike, but since you only attempted one attack, it only progresses MAP by one level.

3) If you miss the first Strike, you can choose to make the ranged Strike anyway. If you do, you won't get the +2 circumstance bonus. Whether you make the ranged Strike or not, your MAP will progress by two stages.

4) Most permissive: If you miss the first Strike, you can choose to make the ranged Strike anyway. If you do, you won't get the +2 circumstance bonus and it will progress MAP by two stages. If you don't make the ranged Strike then it will only progress MAP by one stage.

[Karmagator]

Huh, it is weird that I never really thought about this.

As written, just using the activity increases MAP to -10 afterwards, regardless of which parts you get to use. It refers to the "stab and blast" activity as a whole.

But I'd definitely consider softening the blow by saying that you only get MAP for the parts you actually end up doing.

[breithauptclan]

Yeah, Ruling #1 is really the only way to interpret it and say that you are running the ability 'by the book'.

But it is really harsh, especially when compared to something like Double Slice or even Swipe.

[breithauptclan]

The way that I would actually prefer that the feat worked:

Make the melee Strike, then the ranged Strike. If the melee attack is successful, you get a +2 circumstance bonus to the ranged attack. This counts as two attacks for multiple attack penalty, but the penalty does not increase until after both attacks are made.

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By making the ranged Strike non-optional, it avoids a lot of strange edge cases.

[aobst128]

I don't mind the risky part of it since it's pretty stacked if you do land the first attack. It's the balance point I think. If you could always make the ranged strike, it should probably add MAP. Would still be very good because of the action economy.

[Ascalaphus]

There's another hyper literal and crazy reading:

Stab and Blast wrote:

Make a melee Strike with the required weapon. If the Strike is successful, you can immediately make a ranged Strike against the same target with a +2 circumstance bonus to the attack roll. This counts as two attacks toward your multiple attack penalty, but you don't apply the multiple attack penalty until after making both attacks.

If your melee strike doesn't hit, you don't get to make a ranged strike. Clear enough.

Then, you don't increase MAP until both attacks have been made. But you're never making the second attack, so MAP doesn't increase for the first attack either. It's just left... hanging... forever.

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I think #2 is the sane reading.

If you hit the first attack you may make a second attack (if you still want to). For the second attack, the MAP of the first attack isn't applied yet.

If you didn't hit the first attack, there's no second attack and MAP can't increase from something that didn't happen.

[The Raven Black]

I would go for 2 too.

[Squiggit]

breithauptclan wrote:

But it is really harsh, especially when compared to something like Double Slice or even Swipe.

I mean, Double Slice is two attacks for two actions and conditionally applies a penalty to the second action. Swipe is two actions and requires you to have two enemies you can hit.

Stab and Blast is two attacks for one action and ignores MAP on the second attack and gives the second attack a to-hit bonus.

It's genuinely a super stacked action that breaks most of the normal design rules for how these types of abilities work (usually it's an action discount but normal MAP or no MAP but full actions).
So the activity being a bit riskier because it's so good honestly seems pretty reasonable to me and making it completely risk free seems a little TGTBT (or at least, better than what I'd expect Paizo to give someone).

[Kyrone]

I agree with Squiggit here, 1 action for a possibility of 2 strikes with no MAP is pretty good and being riskier looks like a fair price for that amount of action economy boost.

[Guntermench]

I think option 1 is the most reasonable. This ability is really strong when it works.