Wulf's Collected Story Hour -- FINAL UPDATE 12/25

[Metus]

I'm not exactly cryin' into my beer for the poor "innocent" drow.

I can't help but feel sorry for her, though. She was just going about her business.

You seemed to explain it well enough, Keldas. It makes perfect sense after hearing about the background. That's what I meant by I know I'm not a player in the game, so I'm probably not as informed about all of your characters (and motivations) as I should be. I was just saying what it looked like from an outsider's view.

In any case, it certainly seems justifiable now.

Note: Would've responded earlier, but the board problems interfered.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

I agree, but we've been over this here before, and it really is a moot point now.

I'm cashing out my personally hand-made cloak of shadows. I'm cashing out my personally hand-made chain shirt of silence. Yes, I'll miss having Nightscale's brain-pan leering out from over my own noggin, but it's time to face facts. I can drop the useless cloak and my amulet of resistance, take a cloak of resistance and amulet of natural armor instead. Then I sell my crap-ass chain shirt and trade it out for plate. I should be able to get my AC well over 30, not even counting the Expertise/Superior Expertise feats I'm picking up. Sure, I'm proud of the fact that I made it past 14th level with a 21 AC, but I have reached the limit of sheer dwarven bull-headedness on this issue.

The limit of such in-character decisions hinges on finding a "slow time" demi-plane (as seen in PC's story hour) where I can find a forge and a few years to crank out some personal stuff with all this adamantine. Barring that I'll just hock the old crap and buy magic plate off the rack. Pragmatism trumps pride.

Henceforth I will have all the subtlety of a sledge to the forehead.


Wulf

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

You can still get sneak attacks just by flanking, at least.

Yeah, but I hate for the sum total of the rogue experience to be my sneak attack dice, which is what it's come to.

(Don't get me wrong, though, there are quite a few bodies in the dead bad guy pile who are wishing I didn't have those sneak attack dice. I kicked some ass yesterday...)

But, it's always something. I was alone, I was way out in front of the "guys in clunky plate mail," I am sneaking and silenced and hiding and invisible... and something else pops up. Scent-based blindsight. Go figure.

As for masking that scent-- and I may be way off here-- I would presume that a large portion of having a +16 Hide skill entails a few simple tricks, like, say, staying upwind. Far be it from me to assume that a 16th level character knows something that your average cub scout can't figure out... I mean, I don't know precisely what +16 Hide is supposed to represent, but I am pretty sure it isn't "Nothing much."

And I really hope it isn't, "Nothing that a novice wizard with 2nd level illusions can't do better."

But again... Moot point. My scoutin' days are over. My official title is now "doorstop."


Wulf

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Major Image (wiz3) should do it. That's the first level at which illusions cover smell.

But that's hardly a satisfactory fix. I want to rely on another spell to remind me that my skills are useless compared to the meager arcane abilities of Myron the Mage?

I have a serious problem with spells that supercede skills in every situation. I don't want to add to the already prevalent case where a 1st level spell is better than the skills of a 20th level expert. That has huge repurcussions on campaign verisimilitude for me...

So this is the campaign paradigm that I am facing. My skills are irrelevant in the face of the spellcasters (who are reaching the point where they can one-shot a lot of the stuff we face). So it is far, far more useful for me to take Expertise and Superior Expertise, jack my AC into the 50's or so, and just use my Devoted Defender ability to keep taking the hits for Keldas or Dorn so they can get their F-U spells off. I got the AC, I got the hit points, so... whatever.

I'd hate to break the game or ruin the adventure by successfully sneaking up on anything. Fortunately the designers of the adventure path have seen fit to include a creature with blindsight in every module since Forge of Fury-- and that's not even counting the "undead can detect life" rule I had to live with for a while.

Don't cry for the rogue, Nail. At this stage in the game sneaking up on CR16 critters is suicide anyway.

Wulf

 

[Squire James]

If Blindsight and Scent totally trumps stealth skills in your campaign, then hanging up your sublety at the door is the right thing to do. The proportion of monsters with Scent/Tremorsense/Blindsight goes UP as level goes up, not down!

As a DM, I usually assign a large circumstance bonus for monsters with detection specials to find hiding people, since hiding people are HIDING and not simply invisible. I'd much rather tell Wulf that his +16 Hide skill is inadequate to overcome the +10 Blindsight bonus the dragon had to his already-high Spot skill (HD +Wis bonus +3!) than tell him that Blindsight trumps Hide entirely.

To use a classical example, if Smaug knew exactly where Bilbo was from the get-go, the Hobbit would have had an entirely different ending! It seemed to take some time for the dragon to locate him. However, most D&D rules about dragons seem to be designed to keep PC's from doing anywhere near as well as Bilbo did...

 

[Numion]

I'd hate to break the game or ruin the adventure by successfully sneaking up on anything.

Wulf

I don't know if I failed my saving throw vs. sarcasm or what, but I've got lot's of experience DMing characters who have sneak attack, and that ability hardly breaks the game or ruins adventures.

Sneak attack works best from Imp. Invisibility or flanking; surprise round (or the round after it if you've got initiative too) doesn't really matter that much. (So I have to wonder why your DM has made it really difficult? A surprise round with sneaks just isn't that big of a deal that'd it affect fun for anyone.)

IMO sneak attacks are one thing that the 3e playtesters (and designers, of course) got right. It seems suspicious, but it really is balanced. IIRC Monte even said that the system was balanced on the premise that Rogues get sneak attack damage on every attack.

 

[Rune]

Wulf's problem isn't that he isn't getting sneak attacks, it's that he doesn't get to sneak up on anything at all using nonmagical means--and he's kinda feeling hosed for having a +16 bonus to do nothing.

And to do it with less consistency than a low-level spell caster.

He gets sneak attacks from flanking all the time. But sneaking up on something does not necessarily lead to attacking it (unless you have no choice, because you were detected, because you can't sneak up on it, because you aren't using magic, etc.).

As I see it, the designers really expected rogues to go into prestige classes by the time they hit higher levels, or to use magic consistent. The only way to compensate for this is to broaden the definition of the "Hide" skill, as Wulf suggests.

 

[LightPhoenix]

Sneak attack works best from Imp. Invisibility or flanking; surprise round (or the round after it if you've got initiative too) doesn't really matter that much.

Except you just missed his entire point.

Improved Invis. means he has to rely on a spell, from another class, to use his ability effectively. An ability which is one of the major tenets of the class. Same deal with sneaking - if he has to rely on another person to cast spells on him to use major functions of his class, why even bother with the class?

Similar sort of thing with flanking. When it does come up, it means Wulf is right on the front lines, and an extra 1d6 damage (or is it 2d6, I forget how many Rogue levels Wulf has) at those levels isn't worth the levels put into Rogue. He'd have been better off taking levels of Ranger for the skills, and get some more fighting prowess out of it.

For the record, while Blindsight does say that creatures usually don't have to make Spot or Listen checks if you're in their range, as long as you know what kind of Blindsight they have and take measures against it, they should have to make a check. Blindsight though scent could be countered by rolling in the dirt or mud... maybe the first has them make a check with a +10 bonus, the second a normal check.

(Personal opinion)
Blindsight is a misnomer for the ability, I think. If it's just an alternative form of sight, they should still have to make checks. Hell, Dwarves don't automatically see anything within 60 feet of them when there's no light, why should something with echolocation? IMO Spot isn't just seeing stuff, it's interpretation of little things that are wrong - whether it's noticing that the bush over there just rustled and there's no wind, or there's a slight bump from the signal you received from that rock.

And on that note, why would something with scent-based Darkvision get a bonus to Listen? Maybe something with echolocation might, but something with vibration-based blindsight certainly shouldn't.

Of course, this argument is harder to make with something scent-based, but that's when you do something like I described above - don't make it a flat out success no matter what, but add a hefty bonus unless precautions are taken. A +20 bonus to a Spot check would suffice.

The more I think about this ability, the more recoculous I think it is. Maybe I'll write something up in House Rules about it.

 

[Tony Vargas]

As I see it, the designers really expected rogues to go into prestige classes by the time they hit higher levels, or to use magic consistent.

PrCs are optional, so, no I don't think there's a built-in expectation of use of them. Using magic items does seem to be assumed - there are wealth/level guidelines, item availability guidelines, and the generic NPCs in the DMG all have items - including those specificially to help complement thier skills/roles.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Hey Wulf,

Have fun trying to take no damage from breath weapons and fireballs with that shiny new plate armor.

Funny you should mention that, since last time we played there was a table ruling that folks in a grapple get no Reflex save. I took 3 or 4 lightning bolts dead center, no save.

It was fine with me at the time (and it makes a certain kind of sense) but I have since come to the conclusion that, unless a spell specifically says you get no save, you ALWAYS get a saving throw. So in my game, at least, I won't be negating saves for any "logical" reason. They defy logic.

Saving throws aren't there to simulate realism, they are there to simulate heroism.

Wulf