I'm looking for anything I could use to bypass immunities to sneak attack damage that are allowed in PFS? So the powerful sneak feat is useless as it is a lvl 18 feat and PFS only goes to lvl 13 tops.
Or perhaps items, spells or otherwise that could at least make an enemy vulnerable to things like say slashing, piercing, or bludgeoning?
Anyone?
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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I can't think of anything practical, no. Directly bypassing immunity probably isn't an option. But what about shifting the question a bit -
1) What kind of enemies are resistant/immune to sneak attack?
Typically, these are oozes and incorporeal creatures. There are a few others that are "like" oozes and incorporeal creatures.
Many oozes have low AC, although not all. Other creatures (and objects) that also have really low AC are also more likely to be immune to critical hits and sneak attacks.
Incorporeal creatures tend to have low HP to compensate for how hard it is to land a hit on them.
2) What kind of enemies are resistant/immune to slashing, piercing, bludgeoning?
Outright immunity is extremely rare. Some oozes are immune to piercing/slashing because something else happens when they take that kind of damage (splitting). So it does do something, but you need a bludgeoning attack to finish them. (Like unarmed strikes.)
Incorporeal creatures resist all damage, so also these kinds of damage, unless you have a ghost touch weapon.
Devils are a common creature type that resists physical damage that can be bypassed (with silver weapons).
Skeletal undead tend to need bludgeoning attacks to bypass their resistances.
3) What can I do as a rogue to be effective in those combats?
What you probably won't get is an ability that somehow makes sure you can always keep following Plan A. The game is designed so that occasionally switching to a plan B or C is just better than always doing the same thing.
For example, backup weapons. You probably have a favorite weapon that you'll use against enemies most of the time. But against some enemies it's just better to switch to a different weapon.
- Sometimes you absolutely need a bludgeoning weapon.
- Sometimes life is hard without a silver or ghost touch weapon.
- Sometimes you're missing out on triggering enemy weaknesses without a slashing or cold iron weapon.
- Sometimes your normal melee weapon would work perfectly fine on an enemy, but the enemy has absolutely no ranged options and if you used a ranged weapon, you could make the fight really unfair.
And against for example an ooze that can't be critted or sneak attacked, but has low AC, you could try just hitting it really often, probably with a bludgeoning weapon. Bonus if you can get one with Fatal, because you can still get some extra damage from that.
It might also be possible to take advantage of other things, for example if the ooze has really slow movement speed. If you can move into melee, strike once, and move out so far that the ooze spends its whole turn just moving to you, you're going to win this fight. Might take a while but it's a guaranteed victory.
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Bypassing precision immunity, no. There are a few ways to bypass energy immunity, but that's generally for minimal consolation damage. Precision damage already comes attached to consolation damage: the main attack.
Weakness has Vicious Debilitations for Ruffian Rogue at 10, Seal Fate as a fourth rank spell, and the critical effect of the Frostbite cantrip. Thaumaturge dedication gives a creature weakness 2 against your strikes, but it doesn't scale.
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I think something OP might want to consider is that outright immunity to precision damage isn't common anymore, like it was in PF1.
Will you encounter incorporeal or oozes in PFS? Probably a few, but I don't think they compose anything close to significant number of the enemies you will encounter.
Bring some backup weapons that deal bludgeoning damage, and maybe a back up silver or cold iron weapon. Don't worry about trying to keep them runed up, but having them as a back up option you can switch to in the right situation is good.
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Bring some backup weapons that deal bludgeoning damage, and maybe a back up silver or cold iron weapon. Don't worry about trying to keep them runed up, but having them as a back up option you can switch to in the right situation is good.
I agree with all the sentiments about bringing a variety of weapons. However, you can make sure they have level-appropriate runes if your rogue doesn’t use both hands in combat (e.g., a shield or two handed weapon). With doubling rings you can keep your main weapon in hand, pull out another weapon in your usually empty hand, and get all the benefits of your primary weapon’s runes without having to pay for exact duplicates.
That's a fair point, however (and it's been a while since I've looked at my last rogue build) I feel like there are some rogue class feats that are very attractive the require you to be wielding two weapons. Although a casual reinspection of it doesn't preclude simply switching out your off-hand weapon to get those special material or alternate damage type benefits while still wielding your main one handed weapon.
So it probably works pretty well in the scenario where you're going up against something immune to precision damage.
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So, assuming this is about the Avenger of Shizuru you've been building in previous threads, while you can't find exactly what you're asking for, I can give tactical advice for fighting against the four main types of enemies immune to precision, Oozes, Incorporeal Enemies, swarms and Animated objects. One thing to keep in mind is that since you're not sneak attacking, you also don't need to hunt prey, freeing up actions you will be used to using (That's still not great, but it does mean you have more freedom with your actions in these fights.
1) Your Avenger is actually unusually well suited to fighting oozes for a rogue. The two ganded katana gives you more damage, and immunity to critical hits only prevent the doubling of damage, so your Katan's deadly d8 trait will trigger quite frequently (Direct your gm to the section in Immunity to critical hits on pg. 408 of the Player Core if they don't believe you).
2) Swarms are tricky to fight for most martials. I reccomend having a backup bludgeoning weapon since most swarms have a lower weakness to one of the three physical damage types, and between that and your Katana you cover all three. Bombs are also an excellent tool.
3) Animated objects and their ilk are vulnerable to atheltic maneuvers. Since you're already a strength based character, onvesting in athletics will make you very good at tripping, grappling, and shoving these creatures. You're playing more of a support role here, but you can still make it easier for your allies to crit the monster and break its construct armor.
4) Incorporeal creatures are probably the trickiest here. Look into ghost charge bombs or a ghost touch/astral rune.
Its not about the Avenger. I dropped that and made him a Ruffian Rogue who just uses his katana with one hand if he can sneak attack something. If not, he switches to two hands.
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Fair enough. I've also had to change subclasses or classes when a character concept runs into a problem with execution. Most of what I mentioned applies to the Ruffian Rogue, but not using a class archetype frees up your 2nd level feat and your ability to take an Archetype, so you have more flexibility there.