Sure strike sneaky fixes or not.

[Garthanos]

I noticed a number of feats that build on the Sure strike.... do any of these make it better than... well a basic attack?

I like the various arena fighting feats and a lot of the style feats for their own sake quite flavorful and some of my favorite powers get a lot of love in them... I am just wondering if a sure strike fix could have slipped in.

Let's see we have as possibilities...
Exotic Fighting style (add your superior weapons proficiency to damage)
Forge Rager (sure strike with an enbalanced weapon... +2/3/4 to damage used in retaliation for an attack which hit last turn ... and +2 on intimidate ;-)).
Grudge Style (hmmm wisdom modifier damage bonus on retaliatory strike).
Nerathi Vangard style +1 feat benefit to ac for a turn if you hit and have a shield.
Zombie Veteran heritage feat on a roll of 15 or higher you get extra damage equal to your strength only against undead of course.

Exotic fighting style requires another feat (but its not a bad one superior weapons are kind of nice) but is not as situational as the others.,

Have I left anything out?

 

[Dalzig]

I haven't looked at the specifics, but the problem is probably still there. There are just as many feats (I think) that modify Twin Strike. Therefore, Twin Strike will still be a better choice at the same cost.

 

[Garthanos]

Well I was thinking the fighters ability(rather than careful strike) and yes the abilities cleave or reaping strike or brash strike are what we end up comparing to... instead of arguably the best at-will available.

 

[Saeviomagy]

The fighter version does have ONE use: if the fighter gets HBO, then he can use it to make it more certain that a foe is stopped in his tracks when he moves past or away from the fighter.

That's pretty much it.

 

[DracoSuave]

Here's something to consider.

If you think that taking -2 to hit for 4 damage is a bad tradeoff, then Sure Strike is actually a good power.

You can calculate the sweet spot for this power the same way as you can for power attack.

Level 1 Dwarf Battlerage Vigor Fighter, DWT as first feat, using Mordenkrad, 16 Strength.

Now, let's say you have Temp Hps. Not an unusual situation for a battlerager.

So, your choices are +7 to hit for 2d6(b1)+4 damage, or +5 to hit for 2d6(b1)+7.

(21+7-AC)*(12) > (21+5-ac)*(15)
28(12)-12AC > 26(15)-15AC
3AC > 390 - 336
AC > 18

So against monsters with greater than 18 AC (not at all unusual for 1st level characters to face) Sure Strike is the optimal choice!

Is Sure Strike suboptimal against a mathematicly contrived average? Yes. But against real world targets? It is a different story. Dwarf and Eladrin fighters might actually consider this attack simply because their lesser Strength makes the trade off for Sure Strike less of an issue.

And if your strength is 16 in these cases, not using it is -exactly- like using Power Attack. So, either you think Power Attack sucks and Sure Strike is therefore optimal, or you think Sure Strike sucks and therefore Power Attack is optimal...

...Or you understand each is situational and can be quantified in terms of when it is useful... then use said situation to judge.

 

[Nifft]

I noticed a number of feats that build on the Sure strike.... do any of these make it better than... well a basic attack?

I like the various arena fighting feats and a lot of the style feats for their own sake quite flavorful and some of my favorite powers get a lot of love in them... I am just wondering if a sure strike fix could have slipped in.

Let's see we have as possibilities...
Exotic Fighting style (add your superior weapons proficiency to damage)
Forge Rager (sure strike with an enbalanced weapon... +2/3/4 to damage used in retaliation for an attack which hit last turn ... and +2 on intimidate ;-)).
Grudge Style (hmmm wisdom modifier damage bonus on retaliatory strike).
Nerathi Vangard style +1 feat benefit to ac for a turn if you hit and have a shield.
Zombie Veteran heritage feat on a roll of 15 or higher you get extra damage equal to your strength only against undead of course.

Exotic fighting style requires another feat (but its not a bad one superior weapons are kind of nice) but is not as situational as the others.,

Exotic Fighting Style is all you need to make Sure Strike better than an MBA -- or strictly better if you're a 2nd level Dwarf. However, as has been pointed out earlier in this thread, once those feats are on the table, you should look at all the other At-Will powers available and what goodies they could get instead. The benefits to other At-Wills are harder to quantify, since they tend to be more than just a flat damage bonus.

IMHO some of the better ones are:

Deft Hurler Style + Cleave: You can forgo dealing damage to the adjacent enemy to instead make a ranged basic attack with a heavy thrown weapon. This ranged basic attack does not provoke opportunity attacks.

Mocking Knave Style + Tide of Iron: If you hit with this exploit, you can forgo pushing the target to instead pull one ally you can see 1 square and shift 1 square.

Spear and Shield Style + Tide of Iron: While armed with a spear and a shield, your reach extends by 1 square for using this exploit.

Trickster's Blade Style + Footwork Lure: You can shift 1 square before the attack.

Untamed Berserker Style + Cleave: You can forgo dealing damage to an adjacent enemy to instead gain temporary hit points equal to your Constitution modifier.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Garthanos]

Draco You and your break even points... breaking even isnt good enough!.. so it becomes equal to a "basic attack" when used against an enemy usually 3 levels higher than you which yes you may run in to sometimes... and you just spent 1 of your two at=will choices for something that works as good as a basic attack.(and you better choose a big weapon not a sword and board fighter again) and further it gets progressively worse as your ability to damage by attribute bonus gets better over the life of your character even if you have a 16 attack and never increase it unlike power attack it doesnt scale up it almost scales down (except you will increase the weapon dice size) ...nor does it combine with every move you do like the power blow... so putting aside the weirdness of comparing a feat and a power.

Reaping strike does it in the dirt.... more reliable even when it is doing what it seems designed for.

 

[Garthanos]

Now if we had things which could append riders to another attack requiring a hit... so that sure strike could gets some shine on..

 

[Obryn]

In answer to the OP: Yes, I think there is a general trend to power-up low-powered at-wills (hyphen overload!) with feats. It's the feat-patch philosophy at work!

-O

 

[Garthanos]

Exotic Fighting Style is all you need to make Sure Strike better than an MBA -- or strictly better if you're a 2nd level Dwarf.

I meant to have proficiency with the superior weapon that costs a feat... so two feats EFS and a proficiency one.... and this is the cost to fix an at-will... which normally are already better than a basic attack and not "about equal" when your party is on the verge of being tpk'd