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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The Crimson Binome" data-source="post: 6307515" data-attributes="member: 6775031">Something just doesn't sit right with me about the way the playtest packets approached things like sneak attack. As written, a typical rogue would use two weapons and make two attacks, and sneak attack could be applied to one of them. Generally, you would make your first attack, and apply sneak attack if successful; then, you would make your off-hand attack, and apply sneak attack if that one was successful but the first one failed. (Let's ignore a situation where the DM lets you roll both attack simultaneously, so that you can choose to apply sneak attack to the one which happened to score the critical hit.)It's weird to me that the state of success of your first attack should alter the properties of your second attack. The opening that your opponent leaves is not suddenly wider for the second attack, just because you happened to miss the first time. (I mean, I guess it could be, but that makes the situation much more complicated to imagine.)What I was wondering, to anyone mathematically inclined, is what would happen if Sneak Attack was its own action, which wasn't just a modified attack (so you couldn't use it along with Extra Attack, and it wouldn't benefit from dual-wielding rules, among other things). The rogue just declares the Sneak Attack action, at which point the attack roll is made and damage is dealt. Would the loss of the second weapon - the second chance to apply sneak attack - really hurt all that much? And if so, could anything be done to re-balance it?(Smites also really bug me, since you can see whether an attack is a critical hit before you decide whether to smite or not. I would want that to be declared ahead of time, as well, even if you didn't spend the use if the attack happened to miss.)</blockquote>

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