Precision damage such as SA and penalties

[Wyvernhand]

You guys are overthinking it. Its very simple

If you are sneak attacking for lethal damage with a weapon that normally deals lethal damage, you are fine.

If you are sneak attacking for non-lethal damage with a weapon that normally deals non-lethal damage, you are fine.

If you are sneak attacking for NON-LETHAL damage with a weapon that deals LETHAL damage, then you CAN'T SNEAK ATTACK.

If you are sneak attacking for LETHAL damage with a weapon that deals NON-LETHAL damage, then you CAN'T SNEAK ATTACK.

If you want to SA for lethal damage, use a normal weapon. If you want to SA for non-lethal damage, use a sap or UAS.

Everything else is irrelevant. You can SA while TWFing. You can SA while TWFing with 2x 1handed weapons. You can SA while PAing. You can SA while prone, or while balancing, or while entangled, or fatigued, or a host of other conditions that impose penalties. The text quoted is ONLY for dealing an inappropriate damage type with an inappropriate weapon. Period.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

We understand how the rules work. The problem is, the RC text is super vague and leads to the sort of problems the OP is having does not.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Sneak attacking while Power Attacking means you swing really hard at the enemy's balls.

Two of the most famous practitioners of Nutjitsu:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSUl54CmziU]YouTube - ‪Ed Belfour Cheap Shots Martin Lapointe‬‏[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JHgAgRAa4dw]YouTube - ‪Steven Seagal Against Balls‬‏[/ame]

 

[Jimlock]

First of all, where did you read this? The Fail Rules Compendium?

But as I said, that godawful quote leaves things open for "interpretation." It's stupid re-wordings and rules changes, almost always for the worse, that is why I passionately ignore the Rules Compendium's existence and encourage everyone else to do the same. Terrible book. It's pretty sad when I've never actually read it and only know about it from page/section quotes on this forum that I can look at a sentence of incredibly poor rules language and immediately guess the exact book it was spewed from.

We understand how the rules work. The problem is, the RC text is super vague and leads to the sort of problems the OP is having does not.

Ok... after 3 posts, i think we understand how you dislike Rules Compendium, not how the rules works as far as SA is concerned though.

So I assume... that you are also implying that the core books and all the supplements after them had it all "explicitly" covered down to the last detail, until the Rules Compendium come out to mess it all up?....

Not how it worked out for me, and not how it worked out for all the gamers I know that got to read RC.

IMO, after a lot of crappy books that came out in-between the core books and the RC (the last supplement for 3.5 I think), RC was perhaps one of the most useful ones. After the 3.5 revision, the Errata and the Q&A, finally the got a book out that "at least" tries to clarify all the preceding mess. Don't get me wrong, it's not like RC answers everything, far from it... yet it's a book that provides a lot of clarifications and brings together a lot of rules scattered around in various supplements, rules that SHOULD have been in a rules books in the first place!


Now let's see what SRD says about sneak attack, and what RC says as well:

SRD:
Sneak Attack
If a rogue can catch an opponent when he is unable to defend himself effectively from her attack, she can strike a vital spot for extra damage.

The rogue’s attack deals extra damage any time her target would be denied a Dexterity bonus to AC (whether the target actually has a Dexterity bonus or not), or when the rogue flanks her target. This extra damage is 1d6 at 1st level, and it increases by 1d6 every two rogue levels thereafter. Should the rogue score a critical hit with a sneak attack, this extra damage is not multiplied.

Ranged attacks can count as sneak attacks only if the target is within 30 feet.

With a sap (blackjack) or an unarmed strike, a rogue can make a sneak attack that deals nonlethal damage instead of lethal damage. She cannot use a weapon that deals lethal damage to deal nonlethal damage in a sneak attack, not even with the usual -4 penalty.

A rogue can sneak attack only living creatures with discernible anatomies—undead, constructs, oozes, plants, and incorporeal creatures lack vital areas to attack. Any creature that is immune to critical hits is not vulnerable to sneak attacks. The rogue must be able to see the target well enough to pick out a vital spot and must be able to reach such a spot. A rogue cannot sneak attack while striking a creature with concealment or striking the limbs of a creature whose vitals are beyond reach.

And now from the "evil" book...


RC:
PRECISION DAMAGE
A number of abilities in the game allow a creature to deal extra damage by striking a vital area. This category of abilities includes sneak attack and other abilities that work like it, such as aninja’ssudden strike (Complete Adventurer 8) and scout’s skirmish (Complete Adventurer 12). For the sake of simplicity, the extra damage such abilities deal is referred to as precision damage. Several factors are important to keep in mind regarding this sort of damage.

So far so good...

• Precision damage applies on any attack that meets the requirements of the ability that grants the damage. This includes multiple attacks made during a full attack. If conditions somehow change between multiple attacks, attacks that not longer meet the ability’s requirements can’t deal precision damage.

I remember a lot of confusion on whether a sneak attack can/should be applied on all attacks during a full round action. Some were saying it's too broken, some were saying that it's clear by SRD, some were saying that SRD does not specify what happens in case of a full round action... until it was answered in Q&A. Now I'm sure that there are still a lot of people that haven't read Q&A or RC, that are still uncertain on how to rule this...

Sure... SRD covers this, but it's not like SRD is screaming it out loud. I think it's ok to find this written down in a rules book...

• An attacker can deal precision damage with any weapon he can wield, but he must wield that weapon in the optimal way. If an attacker takes the –4 penalty to deal nonlethal damage with a lethal weapon, for example, no precision damage is possible.

What is the problem with that? I don't see how this can create a confusion in respect to TWF... Especially after reading the last • (see below, the last paragraph in green).
Moreover in the same book, p148:

MIN-MAX TWO-WEAPON FIGHTING
Many methods can maximize the benefits you get from fighting using two weapons. My favorite utilizes sneak attack and fighter bonus feats.
By playing a fighter/rogue, you swiftly gain access to Weapon Finesse and Weapon Focus. Using the same light weapon in each hand, or using an exotic weapon with two striking ends, you benefit from both feats, more than making up for the pen- alty for fighting with two weapons. Sneak attack and Weapon Specialization get you past the lower damage dealt by light weapons. Taking feats such as Improved Two-Weapon Fighting and Greater Two-Weapon Fighting tips the scales even farther in your favor. I like using weapons with wide critical threat ranges
and taking the Improved Critical feat. That way, a larger number of attacks have a much greater possibility of producing a spec- tacular hit.
This advice might seem heavy on min-maxing, but the choices you make about these mechanics can lead to interest- ing roleplaying concepts. You character might be a dwarf hunter who fights using two throwing axes, keeping several others handy on his belt. Or maybe she’s a fierce human gladiator who wields two punching daggers. Perhaps instead your character is a lightly armored elf fencer who wields two short swords and uses Combat Expertise and Two-Weapon Defense.
—Matthew Sernett, designer

• Ranged attacks can deal precision damage only if the range is 30 feet or less.

ok...the same, simple SRD stuff...

• Precision damage applies only against living creatures that have discernible anatomies. Undead, constructs, deathless, oozes, plants, and incorporeal creatures are not subject to precision damage, and creatures that are not subject to critical hits are not subject to precision damage.

yep... pretty clear too... nothing changed from SRD...

• To deal precision damage, the attacker must see (or otherwise sense) the target accurately enough to pick out a vital spot. Any degree of concealment foils the ability to deal precision damage.

I don't think it's such a crime to specify the "Any degree of concealment".
Again, the SRD covers this adequately, yet some people tend to forget how SA is not possible under shadowy Illumination (20% Concealment). I don't think this is such an "evil" overstatement.

• To deal precision damage, an attacker must be able to reach the target’s vital spots. If the attacker can’t do so, he can’t deal precision damage. If the bonus damage from a precision damage ability is expressed as extra dice of damage, the damage from those dice is never multiplied when the attack receives a damage multiplier (such as from a critical hit).

Hmmm let's see... a character gets the Craven feat:

CRAVEN [GENERAL]
Like most sly rogues, you are a dangerous coward. However, your sneak attacks deal more damage than normal.
Prerequisite: Sneak attack class feature, cannot be immune to fear
Benefit: You take a -2 penalty on saving throws against fear effects. However, when making a sneak attack, you deal an extra 1 point of damage per character level.
Rulebook: Champions of Ruin (p. 17)

So what happens with a crit now? According to SRD: "Should the rogue score a critical hit with a sneak attack, this extra damage is not multiplied."

Some will argue that the damage from the craven feat is different because SRD says that THIS (extra die damage) is no multiplied, while the damage from the feat is different... Some will argue that a sneak attack is a sneak attack and all damage deriving from SA should be treated the same way...

Well, with RC's "...is expressed as extra dice of damage...", it is now clear that the extra damage from Craven is indeed multiplied.
That's a nice clarification to have, and I don't see anything "open to interpretation"...


• A form of attack that enables an attacker to make multiple attacks during an action
other than a full-round action, such as the Many-shot feat (standard action) or a quickened scorching ray (swift ac-
tion), allows precision damage to be applied only to the first attack in the group.

Now this rule was introduced in Complete Arcane (as far as spells go), and perhaps some other supplement as far as "standard actions & SA" are concerned...or perhaps it was never spelled out (don't remember)... leading to even greater confusion when one brought up the rule from Complete Arcane...

It's nice to have this rule in a rules book, and not in some other supplement...


Now,something else, not DIRECTLY related to SA, but strongly related to it nonetheless is the condition of being "hidden"...

SRD fails to specify the condition of a hidden person in respect to those this person is hidden from! Quite preposterous if you think of it!

I mean from the 2000 3rd edition (and while this was asked in the 3.0 Q&A) up until the 2007 RC, the "hidden" condition was never specified in the rule books!

People, were "assuming" that the hidden person is treated as invisible, but it was never clear...

After 7 years, RC FINALLY states that a hidden person is treated as "invisible" in respect to those who fail to see him, and it also incorporates the various "extras" from Complete Adventurer such as Blend into a Crowd, Move between Cover, Sneak up from Hiding.

If I took the time, I assure you, that I would have come up with dozens of clarifications RC provides.

When WotC brought forth Expanded Psionics Handbook, Magic of Incarnum, Tome Of Magic, Tome of Battle... books that introduce new rules SYSTEMS in a game that is already encumbered by rules, when they brought forth other ineffectual books just for the money, i don't think that we can be angry about a book that manages to clarify a good number of fuzzy core rules, as well as for putting together various rules scattered all over the various supplements.

And since:

It's pretty sad when I've never actually read it

...may I suggest that you first, at least, leaf through a book before coming out so strong about it?

 

[Wyvernhand]

• An attacker can deal precision damage with any weapon he can wield, but he must wield that weapon in the optimal way. If an attacker takes the –4 penalty to deal nonlethal damage with a lethal weapon, for example, no precision damage is possible.

This is the heart of the matter. The bolded word THE, specific. Which penalty are we talking about? This one.

Nonlethal Damage with a Weapon that Deals Lethal Damage

You can use a melee weapon that deals lethal damage to deal nonlethal damage instead, but you take a -4 penalty on your attack roll.
Lethal Damage with a Weapon that Deals Nonlethal Damage

You can use a weapon that deals nonlethal damage, including an unarmed strike, to deal lethal damage instead, but you take a -4 penalty on your attack roll.

That is the -4 penalty they are talking about, the penalty for using a weapon improperly to deal a type of damage other than what it is intended to deal. Its not ambiguous, people just don't know how to read. If it had said "any penalty", or "a -4 penalty", without further clarification, THEN I could see some confusion. As it stands, it specifies in the RC that if you take THE penalty for wielding a weapon improperly, you can not use that weapon to make sneak attacks while doing so. Period.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

What does it mean to wield your weapon "in the optimal way"? Taking a -4 to do nonlethal is listed as an example. RC could have easily made an exclusive list of all such cases of not wielding a weapon optimally, or just avoided that phrase entirely, but it did not. Is using a second weapon suboptimal? Is taking an attack penalty for power attack or defensive fighting suboptimal? Is trying to fight on with your weapon after an enemy mage coated the handle in Grease suboptimal?

 

[Wyvernhand]

Again, its not saying "use unoptimally", which is abiguous, but rather "the penalty for using a weapon inoptimially" which is a direct reference to the rules about Non-Lethal Damage that I linked. THAT is the rules for using a weapon in a non-optimal manner.

And its not on a per-weapon basis, but a per attack basis. You can declare any given attack you make to be an attempt at non-lethal damage (or lethal, if you are wielding a sap or other non-lethal weapon). If you get 4 attacks because you are TWFing, you can declare one, two, three, or all four of them, in any order you choose, to be attacks for subdual damage. Any hits that were declared as attempts to strike for subdual damage prior to the attack will not result in any SA damage, because the rules state that they don't.

Its not ambiguous, its a reference to another rule. The rule I quoted. It could have been named a LITTLE better, but there it is. Using a weapon suboptimally is a reference to the non-lethal damage rules.

 

[Dross]

• An attacker can deal precision damage with any weapon he can wield, but he must wield that weapon in the optimal way. If an attacker takes the –4 penalty to deal nonlethal damage with a lethal weapon, for example, no precision damage is possible.

This is the heart of the matter. The bolded word THE, specific. Which penalty are we talking about? This one.



That is the -4 penalty they are talking about, the penalty for using a weapon improperly to deal a type of damage other than what it is intended to deal. Its not ambiguous, people just don't know how to read. If it had said "any penalty", or "a -4 penalty", without further clarification, THEN I could see some confusion. As it stands, it specifies in the RC that if you take THE penalty for wielding a weapon improperly, you can not use that weapon to make sneak attacks while doing so. Period.

So what do you make of the underlined part?

The "the" you are referencing is talking about a specific example yes, but being an example implies it is not the only way of using a weapon improperly but one of a number.


Another example I could think of is not having proficiency in the weapon being used.

 

[Andras]

• A form of attack that enables an attacker to make multiple attacks during an action
other than a full-round action, such as the Many-shot feat (standard action) or a quickened scorching ray (swift ac-
tion), allows precision damage to be applied only to the first attack in the group.

So by the words of this, if one spontaneously metamagiced a Scorching ray spell and had SA dice, one could get SA dice on each ray since it's now a FRA and the condtions were appropriate?

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

... Clever Girl.