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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Felon" data-source="post: 3003608" data-attributes="member: 8158">It is naive not to accept that sniper character builds in general present significant balance issues. Given ideal conditions, they strike with deadly effect from a tremendous distance and then simply hide and re-position when anything gets close. This goes against the spirit of heroic warriors engaging in face-to-face, toe-to-toe conflict, which is for many is the entire appeal of the fantasy genre over modern settings in the first place. It is certainly the reason why certain abilities like sneak attack and favored enemy have a hard-coded 30-foot range limit. In MMOG's, this playstyle of earning XP without ever being subject to retaliation is called "kiting", and many consider it a form of cheating (although granted, many don't). In a number of OG's, a game's combat engine accounts for kiting by having monsters speed up so that they basically teleport to within striking distance of their opponent. Actually, IME it is generally the DM "doing something wrong" and having a poor understanding of the rules that proves the bane of snipers. Many DM's have monsters simply appear within spitting distance of a party, even when you have high Spot/Listen characters actively scouting for ambushes. POOF! Bad guys materialize! Roll initiative! Playing it straight by the rules, a good scout should spot most opposition without getting spotted in return. Then it's just a matter of pulling back as far as possible and loosing a volley of death.Of course, there are legitimate counters to sniping. Most obviously, the DM simply has to put the party in some close-quarters sometimes. This is a good place to employ those dungeon thingys we hear about from time to time in D&D. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />  Villains that employ scouts or stealth are also an effective counter. Unfortunately, many DM's seem to prefer the brute force approach with big giants and dragons stomping all over the place, and that's when the non-confrontational killer is king.EDIT--as a bit of a counter-point, I think it's also worth pointing out that what a sniping archer does is very similar to the role that a wizard typically fills in a party: stay way back, and rain damage while others serve as decoys (to use Arkhandus's term). Throw improved invisibility on the wiz, and you have someone who can snipe from mere feet away. Note that many hate this playstyle as well, while others consider it perfectly valid.</blockquote>

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