Unbalancing Strike+Exp. Tactician+Sneak Attack or Unbalanced Strike?

[Ishamael]

Ishamael, you are contradicting yourself.

You come up with a really good, potentially broken strategy, and it hinges on the use of Unbalancing Strike.

Then someone says that Unbalancing Strike should have a limited number of uses per day, and you say that that would make it useless because Unbalancing Strike isn't very powerful.

Unbalancing Strike would still be a powerful ability, even with it's uses per day capped, your first example proves that.

--Incontrovertible Spikey

How exactly am I contradicting myself? Those are two seperate issues.

1. The combination above is potentially unbalanced. As a result, I suggested not applying Sneak Attack damage to Unbalancing Strike. Never did I say that it's number of uses should be limited.

2. daTim made the statement about Unbalancing Strike using up a Stunning attack. I responded that I didn't think that it should because it would cripple it far too much and IMO make it nearly useless.

My opinion is that Unbalancing Strike is potentially too powerful as written and may need to be modified so that the Unbalancing Strike itself cannot be a Sneak Attack. However, I believe that if you limit it's usage to using up a Stunning Attack, it weakens it far too much and makes it basicly a useless feat. How is that contradictory?

In the example above, you would be far better off using a Stunning Attack than an Unbalancing Strike. If you have to use up the Stunning Attack anyway, why would you opt to use the Unbalancing Strike? You might say it's because you believe the Orc Fighter has a poor reflex save. Yes, that is probably true.

However, I would rather go for the Stunning Attack and possibly put him out of commision a whole other round. The orc has a better chance of passing a Fortitude check, but if he fails, the results will be far more benificial than an Unbalancing Strike. It's nice to have the option, but harly worth the cost.

For a straight monk, the feat would be especially useless. Why would you want to force a low Reflex creature to lose it's Dex bonus? It probably doesn't even have a Dex bonus. That's why it's Reflex sucks so much to start with. The most you'll get out of it is the creature loosing it's Dex bonus (probably nothing) and +2 to hit. You loose a Stunning Attack and you don't get the bonuses until the next round. You'd be better off with Weapon Focus.

 

[SpikeyFreak]

How about this as a solution, instead of creating a mechanic that doesn't already exist (an attack that meats the requirements for a sneak attack but doesn't do sneak attack damage):

Limit the number of attacks in the same manner as Stunning Fist (which is actually what I think daTim was saying they do). Eg, if you can use stunning fist twice, you can use unbalancing strike two time in addition to the two times that you can use stunning fist (not instead of the two times you can use stunning fist).

--Empathic Spikey

 

[Ishamael]

Re: Not worth it.

It might work if you say that the monk has the same number of Unbalancing Strikes as he does Stunning Attacks, but still, you'd be better off just taking Extra Stunning Attacks.

Notice Spikey, that I've already mentioned this. My apolgies to daTim as I did indeed misinterpret what he was saying.

However, I personally like my ruling better. I sent an e-mail to James, who wrote OA, to see what he has to say.

I actually think either ruling is balanced.

 

[daTim]

Sorry for the confusion in my previous post, what I meant is that you would have the same number of Unbalancing strikes as Stunning fists (3+lvl i think...) The problem with the Unbalancing strike not allowing a sneak attack, in my opinion, is that it just complicates the rules more without a reasonable explination. For example, you succed at the Unbalancing strike and can hit him again, but not sneak attack, but can someone else threatening his area (but not flanking him) get *their* sneak attack on him? I think a good ruling can be thought of that does not require complication and bending of the rules.

Mabey have it so that you can only do the Unbalancing strike once per wisdom bonus (example: 18(+4)wisdom = 4 unbalancing strikes per combat) in combat, as your opponent will quickly get wise to that technique and guard against it, much like combat bluffing can only be done once per encounter. The benefit of the unbalancing strike over a simple combat bluff, is it requires an easier check, and doesnt take lots of skill points to make decent, just one feat. Just an example...

I do look foward to James' response to your e-mail, as this is a question I have been wondering about myself, as it applies to Freezing the lifeblood, and Falling star strike.