Sneak Attack--Help me stop my DM from banishing it!

[Fusiox]

Thanks for reading this. I appreciate your support!

To get to the meat:
I play a rogue--a drow rogue, to be exact. Because of their racial powers, and rogue powers in general, my drow rogue tends to gain CA a lot of the time in combat.
What does that mean? More sneak attacks! Yay for me!...
Except my DM feels it is too overpowered for the group and wants to make it an encounter power to deal Sneak Attack damage, as well as make undead immune to the sneak attack--which his current super-adventure has a big whack of...

What do I do? I feel that if my DM does this, I will lose my job as a rogue. However, I don't want to argue with the DM, and he's right--being able to deal 16+ damage at level 2 with a Sly Flourish Sneak Attack seems rather powerful for the heroic tier.

How do I get him to stop? Can someone explain to me how sneak attack works--do I just have to flank to be able to do that? Is it that easy? Or are monsters supposed to have defenses against this, leveling the playing field on my account?

Thanks for reading this! It's great to be part of a community like ENWorld!

 

[Almacov]

As a striker it's your job to deal the big damage. Sneak attack is how rogues accomplish that.
It shouldn't be surprising if you're outstripping the other party members in the sheer hit-point-subtraction category.

Ideally your DM would compensate through monster tactics rather than neutering your character.
Undead were immune to sneak attack last edition, but that was explicitly removed with the advent of 4e because it meant rogues were somewhat useless when facing them exclusively.

Not sure how I can advise you to approach your DM on this topic though. Perhaps others will have advice there.

 

[Unwise]

Does your group have other strikers in it? If not, then a rogue will certainly blow everyone else out of the water for damage. Neither the GM nor other players should be attempting to compare your damage to another non-strikers.

In many groups, especially groups where the players are new to the game, rogues do considerably more damage than other strikers, which is often seen as a bit of an issue. Other classes do catch up though and I do not think that there is enough of a disparity of damage to cause a major issue.

If I were a player an my GM banned sneak attack, I would simply make up a new character. Losing sneak attack simply destroys the point of a rogue. Their powers and tactics are designed around getting CA a great deal. This makes their play style interesting.

If the GM made sneak attack once per enounter, how can he justify that compared to rangers and warlocks who get +1d6 (d8 with feat) every turn without effort or planning on their part. A rogue under those rules would be substandard to every other striker class.

In the game I run, everyone talks about how overpowered the rogues damage is, but as a GM I can tell the avenger is actually doing more damage. He just doesn't miss, so has far more consistent damage which is not as flashy or remarkable, but adds up over time (the rogue admittedly has terrible luck with to-hit rolls). Rogue just pull out big hits that make people say wow more often that other classes, most other strikers are a little more consistent.

 

[Prestidigitalis]

Well, first off, you can point out that a Twin Strike-ing Ranger can easily do 16 damage every round, as can a Brash Strike-ing Fighter or a Warden using Weight of Earth with Crippling Crush. 16 is good, but not ridiculously so.

Next, you can remind the DM that strikers are supposed to be able to inflict a lot of damage. It's pretty much their sole reason for being.

...and the "defense" that monsters have against a Rogue who has CA is to kill him quickly.

However, you really should check the new feats introduced in the Essentials books -- CA is now almost guaranteed so long as you take the right feats.

Your DM seems to want to turn 4e into 3e. That's just... unfortunate.

 

[Obryn]

Hey, and welcome!

Short and sweet - You're a Striker. Doing lots of damage is your job. As a Rogue, you should generally try and (1) get combat advantage, and (2) deal sneak attack damage every single round. That's the assumption built into the game.

If you're not dealing sneak attack damage several times per combat, you're simply not being a very good striker, and you should probably play something else. That 1d4+8 you're getting from Sly Flourish is pretty much nothing in comparison. Fighters are doing that much damage, and they also get a lot of tools to control the battlefield. Oh, and lots of hit points and healing surges. And yeah, fighters' armor class isn't balls, either. Damage is basically all you've got.

It's not overpowered at all to deal 16+ damage per round at level 2. That's about 50% of a same-level enemy's hit points, which right about on par for a striker. Other strikers deal similarly high damage at this level, too.

The undead thing may be a tougher sell to your DM, but in general, when there's a choice between versimilitude and game balance in 4e, game balance wins out. So, while your DM might be stuck in a 3e mindset where undead don't have vital areas, 4e still allows your rogue to find vital spots. (Seriously, almost every bit of undead fiction gives them a physical weakness, be it the neck, head, or heart.)

-O

 

[Dr_Ruminahui]

Tell him that you are a striker, and damage is what you do.

I'm guessing that you are the only striker in your party, as it seems your DM hasn't seen what other strikers can do. For example, at level 2, your typical:

- sorceror is doing d10+9 against multiple targets
- slayer is doing d12+10 versus single targets
- ranger is doing d12+d12+d8 against single targets

Basically, reiterate to him that every class has a role - have him reread that section in the PH or in Essentials. Defenders (such as the fighter) are good at being the centre of the battle, having high AC and HP, and punishing enemies who try to attack other PCs.

Leaders heal and buff the other PCs, helping keep them standing, but don't have the AC or HP of a defender.

Controllers focus on damaging multiple enemies at once, imposing status conditions, and generally disrupting the enemies plans. They have even lower AC and HP.

Finally, strikers do damage. That's their role - finishing off the enemy as quickly as possible. As such, they tend to have the AC and HPs of a leader, but none of a leaders buffing/healing, nor the control of a defender or a controller. Both of his suggestions prevent you from fulfilling your role, and leave you being useless - asides from damage, there is little else that you can do well in combat.

Really, if you are doing tons of damage, what your DM should be doing is having the enemies try to take you out - for the most part, monsters aren't stupid, and you will be relatively fragile.

 

[malraux]

Pretty much as a rogue, you should be SA almost every turn. You can SA any time you have combat advantage, be that because you are flanking, hiding, the target is dazed, etc. Is it over powered? Well you'll do a lot more damage than a bard, for example. Or really any non-striker class.

The way to understand 4e class design (very simplified) is that classes are balanced by power across role and by ability to contribute to a fight between roles. So if you are the only striker in your party, you'll appear to do a lot of damage compared to everyone else. But you can't handle large groups well, that's the controller's job. And you're relatively squishy so you need a defender to protect you; a leader to heal you, etc.

Point is, of course you do a lot of damage (should be something like 1d6+2d8+4 at second level) But a ranger is doing 2d10+1d8 without even being in melee. My dragonborn sorcerer was doing 1d8+9 damage in a close blast 3. The rogue gets a bit more damage than these cases but is doing it in melee and without any sort of controllery effects. The rogue is built for damage.

For giving undead immunity to SA, that's really not fair. Monster HP were figured with the idea of the striker being in the party dishing out damage. If you don't get to use you class's niche, then what's the point of having that niche.

<Ninja is not my class>

 

[Aegeri]

Sounds like your DM is stuck in 3rd edition, where rogues were made spectacularly useless against undead for no real reason. It can already be very hard to affect undead with certain things, like poisons (that they are immune to). Being resistant to damage isn't really something they need in particular.

To be honest, if he nerfs sneak attack this bad you're going to have no real advantages and fall behind even a standard fighter in damage. Although DMs are welcome to make any rulings they want, I think it was over a year into playing 4E before I felt like I understood the system enough to start making changes as I wanted. It's best to understand how the system works before making changes - especially those that impact a class as much as this.

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

This basically sounds like your DM is blaming you because of his inability to build an encounter robust enough to challenge your group. This is on him, not you.

I would ask him exactly what the problem is. Are the encounters not lasting as long as he thinks they should? Are they not challenging the party? What monsters is he using? (Supposedly the "new" monster math will provide a greater challenge.)

I agree with the others; he should not be messing with Sneak Attack. CA every turn is the assumption the designers made. That's what makes the Rogue work. Giant gobs of damage until he gets clobbered and is forced to retreat to safer ground.

Welcome to ENWorld.

 

[Fusiox]

Thank you so much for helping me with this! I now have an arsenal of counter-arguments in favor of SA. My rogue has been saved after all!

However, I may let the undead thing slide, strange as it is already. I guess you could counter the undead's immunity to sneak attack by making them really stupid fighters (not like most of them aren't already), so while I'm not spectacularly useful against undead, they aren't actively trying to gang-kill me like most intelligent enemies would--unless, of course, I'm really stupid and throw myself in the middle of a swarm of zombies... in which case, the DM has every right to swarm my rogue.

Thanks for helping me out! I just joined, but I'm already loving the community's activeness here