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<blockquote data-quote="Imban" data-source="post: 4898877" data-attributes="member: 29206">Uh, Vital Strike isn't actually all that useful. Now, the one in the Pathfinder Beta wasn't, but the new one? Yeah.See, you're actually fairly likely to hit on your first attack (unless you're just boned) and your attack at -5. The attacks at -10 and -15 are significantly less likely, to the point where that attack at -15 rarely matters at all.If you hit 2.5 times, you're doing 2.5x the damage of hitting once, both the weapon dice, any bonus dice you might be adding, any fixed damage from Strength, et cetera. If you use Greater Vital Strike, you're hitting once, so 1x damage, plus 3x the weapon dice. Assuming something relatively decent, like a Large PC, 30 Strength, using an... I dunno, flaming holy greatsword +2, you're dealing 3d6 (weapon) + 15 (Strength) + 2 (+2) + 1d6 fire (flaming) + 2d6 (holy) damage per hit, average 38 damage.Greater Vital Strike would give you the same, except the first hit would be for 12d6, hence 69.5 average damage. Hitting twice - on your first attack and your -5 attack - would deal 76 average damage.It's nice if the enemy is managing to stop you from ever getting a full attack in, but if you're not sticking solely with Pathfinder, there are plenty of ways in 3.5e to get Pounce and full attack off of a charge. Alternatively, it's nice if you're using various size cheese to make your weapon damage dice already something crazy like 12d6, since then Greater Vital Strike pushes it up to an absurd 48d6.(The beta Vital Strike was amazingly strong, because it let you drop the -15 attack for an extra +3d6 damage on your hits that actually have a chance of hitting. So yeah.)</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Imban, post: 4898877, member: 29206"] Uh, Vital Strike isn't actually all that useful. Now, the one in the Pathfinder Beta wasn't, but the new one? Yeah. See, you're actually fairly likely to hit on your first attack (unless you're just boned) and your attack at -5. The attacks at -10 and -15 are significantly less likely, to the point where that attack at -15 rarely matters at all. If you hit 2.5 times, you're doing 2.5x the damage of hitting once, both the weapon dice, any bonus dice you might be adding, any fixed damage from Strength, et cetera. If you use Greater Vital Strike, you're hitting once, so 1x damage, plus 3x the weapon dice. Assuming something relatively decent, like a Large PC, 30 Strength, using an... I dunno, flaming holy greatsword +2, you're dealing 3d6 (weapon) + 15 (Strength) + 2 (+2) + 1d6 fire (flaming) + 2d6 (holy) damage per hit, average 38 damage. Greater Vital Strike would give you the same, except the first hit would be for 12d6, hence 69.5 average damage. Hitting twice - on your first attack and your -5 attack - would deal 76 average damage. It's nice if the enemy is managing to stop you from ever getting a full attack in, but if you're not sticking solely with Pathfinder, there are plenty of ways in 3.5e to get Pounce and full attack off of a charge. Alternatively, it's nice if you're using various size cheese to make your weapon damage dice already something crazy like 12d6, since then Greater Vital Strike pushes it up to an absurd 48d6. (The beta Vital Strike was amazingly strong, because it let you drop the -15 attack for an extra +3d6 damage on your hits that actually have a chance of hitting. So yeah.) [/QUOTE]

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