really general question about Sneak Attack

[Constance Clochard]

Just looking for some opinions/other's experience.
My Rogue is about to go up to 3rd level (I'm a newbie to 3.5 and so is just about every one in my group - none are newbies to D&D just so you don't laugh at me too much!). This is good and all but, I've only had the opportunity to actually roll to hit with Sneak Attack damage one time -- and of course I failed to hit! There's plenty of combat going on -- my Rogue has gone to negative HP several times. As it is, it's looking like I'll soon be a 3rd level Rogue who's never done SA damage. Is setting up/getting to give SA damage typically this infrequent? I don't want to be a "virgin" forever!

I'll 'fess up -- I wasn't quite clear on how it all worked when I set up the character and started playing (and neither was anyone else playing). I've determined I need to sink some skill points into Bluff to make Feinting a bit more successful! And I probably should have taken some different Feats (took improved initiative and Two Weapon Fighting). We're all learning as we go along. If my dearth of SA opportunities isn't typical it would be helpful to know so I can work on figuring out what I'm doing wrong or what I don't understand.

 

[milo]

Most of the time when I play a rogue I go dex heavy and take weapon finesse. Max out ranks in tumble and wait for the tank to engage an enemy and tumble in behind if you don't go first. Flanking will help with the low attack bonus also. If you go first run in and sneak attack.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

First off, avoid Imp. Feint. Feinting is a horrible method to gain SA -- the enemy adds his BAB to th opposed roll, and oftentimes will have a high BAB from Hit Dice alone.

The biggest problem for most people with your D&D experience is to confuse SA of 3E with the backstab of ye olde edition. SA should be much more frequent, and easier to obtain, than backstab, though for a less dramatic damage figure. You gain it if a foe is flatfooted or otherwise loses dex to AC (like when grappling), or if you flank. On the first round of combat, per rules as written, anyone who hasn't acted yet is flatfooted, so Imp. Initiative was a fine feat choice.

You took TWF, so you must focus on melee. The easiest way to get melee SA is to flank with the party fighter (making DC 15 tumble to get into position if need be), or have the party wizard, cleric or druid summon a monster to flank with you (often called the "flanking buddy").

Once you gain more levels and pump you use magic device modifier to +19, you can use ANY wand or staff, giving you spell options. For example, characters w/o 5 ranks in balance lose dex to AC while balancing. Grease is a level 1 spell that leaves the victim balancing, even if he succeeds on the roll. Try to target footwear if possible, so they are stuck balancing no matter where they move after casting it.

Other possibilities depend on what books your group uses, but yes. You should have cut out another person's liver by now.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

First off, avoid Imp. Feint. Feinting is a horrible method to gain SA -- the enemy adds his BAB to th opposed roll, and oftentimes will have a high BAB from Hit Dice alone.

Enh. A rogue with max ranks in Bluff should have a pretty good chance of feinting. (High-BAB stuff doesn't often have Sense Motive, and vice-versa.) You could argue it's not worth the feat, and for rogues with flanking partners, that's probably true. For solo rogues, though, feinting is often the only way to get sneak attack at all.

For the OP, don't rush into combat, first thing, just to get one sneak attack, unless you're pretty sure you'll put the target down. The worst thing that can happen to a rogue is getting a single sneak attack off and then being exposed to a retaliatory full attack from a combat monster. (That's probably leading cause of death for rogues.) Carry some missile weapons for those first-strike opportunities, and wait to engage until the bad guy is deep in it with your team's own melee god. (Or just go after the wizard. No BAB and no Sense Motive!)

BTW, grease doesn't make people auto-sneak attackable.

from Wizards Customer Support <wizardscusthelp@wizards.com>
reply-to Wizards Customer Support <wizardscusthelp@wizards.com>
to jeff.wilder@gmail.com
date Wed, Jul 27, 2005 at 11:00 AM
subject [D&D} When is a character "balancing"? [Incident: 050725-000379]

Jeff,

A character is considered to be balancing only while he is in the situation or performing an action that requires him to make a balance check. Not before and not after. Usually, this means that opponents will not be able to take advantage of the character's flat-footed state unless that character provokes an AoO for moving through a threatened square, or if the opponent had readied an action to attack him when he moved.

If he is standing in the area of the grease spell, but not moving, then he is not balancing. If he successfully made his balance check to move out of the area, as soon as he gets out of the area, he is no longer flat-footed. If you did not ready an action to strike him when he moved, and if he did not perform any actions to provoke an Attack of Opportunity, then you will not have the ability to strike him when he's flat-footed.

Same thing on the hill. As long as he is charging down the hill, he is flat-footed. As soon as he slows to a walk, or stops, then he is no longer flat-footed.


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As always, you can argue that Customer Service is wrong -- God knows I won't defend them, generally speaking -- but, seriously, should a 1st-level spell be that powerful?

 

[green slime]

As a rogue, you may consider picking up the bow as well.

It grants you the ability to actually apply sneak attack damage from the start of the battle, without running up to the enemy and getting yourself into trouble.

In a few levels time, the mage can cast invisibility upon you, either of the ordinary or improved sort. This also grants you the ability to shoot (or attack) people and score SA-damage (within 30 feet range, if shooting).

DMs tend to get very frustrated when the bow-armed Rogue has improved invisibility (around 7th-9th level) and blasts everyone. If the opponents are not immune to criticals (such as plants & undead), they are for more efficient than any fighter types.

All the SA-damage really stacks up very fast.

Around those mid-levels is the most fun: afterwards, more creatures are immune to criticals, and/or have improved ability to detect invisibility. But once again, you cannot deny the fun of rolling +8d6 SA on a single cut/arrow when you get the chance.

Just a word of warning: the TWF feat chain is less rewarding, the further you persue it. TWF is good, ITWF is less so. GTWF is a waste.

 

[Shin Okada]

I prefer splash weapons (such as alchemists fire or acid flask) over bow. Ranged touch attack is so sweet and you can apply sneak attack damage bonus (Xd6 acid　damages! yay!). After taking Weapon Finesse, consider taking Quickdraw feat. It helps.

 

[blargney the second]

I'm a fan of multiclassing rogue with other, tougher classes like fighter and/or barbarian. Especially if you've gone the TWF route.

 

[Starbuck_II]

BTW, grease doesn't make people auto-sneak attackable.

As always, you can argue that Customer Service is wrong -- God knows I won't defend them, generally speaking -- but, seriously, should a 1st-level spell be that powerful?

I argue they don't have any idea what they talking about.

Should grease do it is a differentr question than does Grease do it. By the rules it should, but is this okay?


Well, I think Rogues need the help and that way Wizards can spread the fun.

Really, the choices are damage, Sneak attack allowed (Grease), unconscious (Color Spray/Sleep), buff (Enlarge, Magic Weapon), or utillty for low level wizard.

I think it is fine personally.

 

[azhrei_fje]

I prefer splash weapons (such as alchemists fire or acid flask) over bow. Ranged touch attack is so sweet and you can apply sneak attack damage bonus (Xd6 acid　damages! yay!). After taking Weapon Finesse, consider taking Quickdraw feat. It helps.

And a rogue with the ability to use ray of frost gets SA damage if the ranged touch required by the spell hits and the attack would other do SA (such as a bow would).

Grappling denies the combatants their Dex bonus to opponents who are not engaged in the grapple. So have the mage summon a creature and direct it to grapple. It will have natural attacks it can use, but the opponent will have to use only light weapons. And the rogue standing nearby can full attack and get SA damage on each strike. Even if the summoned creature only lasts a couple of rounds, this is very valuable.

At higher levels, see if you can get a ring of blinking or you can bump up your Hide skill (successful hiding is equivalent to attacking while invisible).

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Enh. A rogue with max ranks in Bluff should have a pretty good chance of feinting. (High-BAB stuff doesn't often have Sense Motive, and vice-versa.) You could argue it's not worth the feat, and for rogues with flanking partners, that's probably true. For solo rogues, though, feinting is often the only way to get sneak attack at all.

There are still other ways, at least with spells from items if playing core-only, and even if not, the feat makes it a move action. So if you're also attacking you are trading one SA per round (which could very well miss or fail on the bluff check), in return for the foe full attacking you. That is incredibly dangerous, as you point out below, and as a Rogue I would never want to give an enemy a full attack on me unless I was at least getting a full attack SA on him, and even then, probably only if I had TWF for good measure. So on all fronts, feinting is a bad plan IMHO. I think it should at least be houseruled to be Sense Motive Ranks OR BAB, whichever is higher. Or possibly add half BAB. Oh well.

For the OP, don't rush into combat, first thing, just to get one sneak attack, unless you're pretty sure you'll put the target down. The worst thing that can happen to a rogue is getting a single sneak attack off and then being exposed to a retaliatory full attack from a combat monster. (That's probably leading cause of death for rogues.) Carry some missile weapons for those first-strike opportunities, and wait to engage until the bad guy is deep in it with your team's own melee god.

Good advice.

BTW, grease doesn't make people auto-sneak attackable.

As always, you can argue that Customer Service is wrong -- God knows I won't defend them, generally speaking -- but, seriously, should a 1st-level spell be that powerful?

And I will argue that they're wrong.

Logical argument: It makes no sense that you're only balancing on a an area of slick grease for a single instant every six seconds. Imagine an orc standing on a greased area, not moving at all. Once each round, when all the time around these occurances he was doing just fine, he needs to keep himself from falling all of a sudden? What? "Ack, slippery! Ok doing fine, doing fine.... wait, it's slippery again! Ok, still standing, nothing wrong now... what the hell! Argh!"

Game balance argument: No, it's not broken to allow. This will occur in one of two ways: either the Rogue's setting it all up by himself, or another PC is helping him by casting the spell. If the latter, yay teamwork! If the former, it automatically must pass the "this is more broken than True Strike + Full PA" test. Now, considering SA i only useable on certain enemies, this cuts into it a little. Both methods require a round devoted to "setup," eating your standard action. If they're not wearing shoes, there's a good chance they can walk out of the area before you even can take advantage with the grease. And while True Strike MUST be used by the end of next round, Grease from an item would have to be at least CL 2 to even work as a setup. True Strike is adding +40 damage (I'm assuming two-hands) at level 20, SA is adding +10d6, or 35 damage. yeah....looks balanced to me...