Too much sneak attack? [3.5]

[kulosle]

I'm running a campaign with mid optimization players that started at level one, but is now level 5. 2 flaws where allowed and all official WotC 3.5 materials are allowed as long as they can show it to me. They are all good aligned players and are hunting down evil. One of the players is trying to max out his SA dice by taking one level in any class that offers SA at first level. Is this going to be a problem? Penetrating strike, craven, and sacred strike might add up to be quite a lot. Any thoughts?

[dextercorvia]

He'll find it to be a problem when he can't hit anything. Also, he still needs to find a way to trigger his sneak attack (preferably more than once per round). You only have to worry if he starts steamrolling your encounters.

[legomaster00156]

No. There are a ton of enemies immune to Sneak Attack. In fact, he's basically weakening himself by taking all of these 1-level dips. Most SA classes don't have full BAB, so he'll end up with no attack bonus at level 20 (which basically means that he'll never hit the broadside of a barn). In addition, none of the abilities will be anything worth a monster's worries. I would actually advise him against this not because he'd be too powerful, but because he'd be too weak.

[kulosle]

Oh something to note is that we use fractional BAB progression so thats not a problem. Isn't there a way to make SA on AoO. If he did that and started tripping it might be a problem. Plus he's a sneaky little bastard. A ring of invisibility, or the party wizard casting it on him, could be a problem. One party member advised him to dip into a initiator class to gain the stance that adds 2d6. I don't like making encounters that specifically negate someones abilities or not let them get items to help it along. I already decided no costume magic items so he can't get a cheap +30. Is that all I need to do?

[Lonely Tylenol]

You don't have to create encounters to specifically negate someone's Sneak Attack for it to be situational. Constructs, Undead, and Oozes exist in the world whether he likes it or not, and they have to show up *sometime*. It's also not uncommon for humanoids (especially those that are militarized) to formulate strategies that make it more difficult to pick out a weak spot (like forming close-knit groups so as to avoid letting anybody through, making it difficult to flank). These strategies aren't necessarily mean; they're commonsense (a group of pikemen, for instance, might form a line to break a group of charging cavalry, or to avoid having people break through and taking the flank; this would force him to either move around or make the Tumble check through the line, provoking attacks of opportunity upon failure, to get a flanking bonus). This will filter out any roll-playing munchkinry that you might be concerned with and mete out any hopes of an easy win every combat; he may yet get his sneak attack bonus in a great many combat situations (not involving oozes, undead or constructs), but it won't happen all the time, unless he's smart enough to apply a little ingenuity, think outside the box, and outwit his enemies on a regular basis (in which case, his sneak attack min/maxing will be rewarded through his ability to find creative new ways to apply it to everything).

Other than that, the closest thing I can see to a problem is that taking one-level dips in everything isn't going to get him meaningfully far in any class, so classes whose features become more developed through a serious investment (such as the Spellthief) aren't going to get him anywhere. In fact, he's going to end up with a lot of Sneak Attack dice and little else, which... Well, that's his deal. I guess if all he really needs is one big combat trick, then why not?

(I have a player who's doing the same thing, but without fractional BAB. I managed to talk him down to simply taking a one-level dip in Spellthief and two dips into Swordsage, when he'd get second- and third-level maneuvers/stances, and otherwise just progress a single class meaningfully, for his own sake.)

[Mystify]

Ring of invisiblity isn't a problem. its just normal invisibility, and hence it will conk out after his first attack, and need a standard to turn it back on.

However, there are plenty of other ways to get it reliably, and to get past the immunities of most foes.

Exactly how much sneak attack/ level are we talking, and what is he doing to maximize its output(i.e. dual weilding, archery tricks, etc)?

[Gwendol]

Not really a problem. Rogues are still very fragile.

[kulosle]

So far he has 4d6 at level 5. One less because he took 3 levels of rogue so he could get penetrating strike. Which is really 4d8+5 (23 on average) because of craven and sacred strike, because the majority of what they are fighting are evil. He's going with archery, to avoid being on the front lines. He hasn't decided between many shot or rapid shot tactics yet.

[Greenish]

With archery, it's even harder to qualify for SA.

Still, if it's a problem, talk to him.

[sonofzeal]

If he's jumping through the hoops, let him have his fun. He's a one-trick pony, but it's a good trick. If he's having fun with it, and nobody else is complaining, go for it

[Cespenar]

Maybe some light fortification armor, on earlier bosses. A thought.

[Curmudgeon]

Maybe some light fortification armor, on earlier bosses. A thought.
That's not going to matter much, both because that's the weakest type and because of Penetrating Strike. Fortification gives a (varying percentage based on type, with 25% for light) chance of immunity to critical hits and sneak attack. Penetrating Strike kicks in to deliver sneak attack with half the usual dice when the target would normally be immune to sneak attack. But Craven isn't reduced, so the net effect is that you retain about 68% of full sneak attack damage vs. enemies even with 100% fortification.

[Aotrs Commander]

When you get a Rogue/Ninja/Inivisible Blade at level 15 who's dealing out 9D6 Sneak Attack/Sudden Strike, plus 2D6 extra from equipment on top (and can fly with Wings of Flying) - on about five/six attacks per round - you can worry...(And that's not even counting the fact he's going to attempt to pick up Swordsage level for that Shadow Hand stance that adds another two or three D6...) And with the "Bluff as a free action" from invisible blade, and a maxed-out check, even when he ain't invisible, it tends not to matter... He's even got a Wraithstrike bracers or something, so there's not much he can't murderise...

Taking one level in every class that grants Sneak Attack is a pretty poor way of going about it - sure, for a few level he'll get a boost, but then it'll tail off quite rapidly (and also everything else about the character will suffer, even with fractional BAB), and he won't gain much in the way of abilities that will let him Sneak Attack especially at range, where it's much harder to get the opportunity...

How many classes actually offer SA or equivilent in 3.5anyway... Lurk, Psionic Rogue, Rogue, Ninja, Scout (ish), factofum (I think), and PrC... The aforemention Shadow Hand stance whose name escapes me... Any more? That's a pretty meh combination (and some screwy saves if you're not using fractional saves as well...) of abilities... I mean, there's some synergy there, but as it's all bottom level stuff, and the amount of redundant abilities goes up pretty fast when he has to start taking second levels or something...

I could be wrong, of course, there could be a way to make that all work, but I don't think it's the best way to go about it.

[Myth]

Don't be worried, just let the party have fun and challenge them. Pitting that SA guy versus a high level Barbarain with some good mobility and Pounce will make him bite his lip.

[Person_Man]

Let the Rogue be a master of stabbing people sometimes. And challenge him other times. It's not a bug, it's a feature.

As a DM, it's very easy for you to just add more enemies, or occasionally throw in enemies that are immune to Sneak Attack, or give them more hit points, or give them templates, or use a variety of different tactics (ambushes, shooting arrows from a high wall, burrowing, Flyby Attack, etc) which Rogues have little defense against, etc. Also, intelligent enemies can react intelligently. If Bob the Rogue Tumbles into Flanking position and kills their friend, they can recognize that they should probably avoid letting him do that.

[mikau013]

Even straight rogue can do enough damage to one-round everyone who isn't immune to sneak attack, and more if she uses wands of gravestrike / golemstrike etc.

It is usually not a problem because melee can also do similiar kinds of damage with for example shock trooper, leap attack and pounce etc. And full casters of course just bypass the damage game entirely if they want.

Though keep in mind penetrating strike requires the rogue to flank her target, so if she's going for range she needs another feat to count her target as being flanked by her.

In short, if the rest of the players use basic optimization than the rogue will not be very good since she can't do anything but damage, but if the rest of your players don't use any optimization than have a talk with the rogue about towning down the damage a bit and giving her other things (for example out of combat utility) instead.

[Czin]

I think the fact that his saves, base attack bonus, and experience point gain will all suck is punishment enough. Plus, as you get higher up on the level chain, the sneak attack damage bonus simply isn't that much relative to what others can dish out without the need for getting the enemy off guard at the higher levels.

A level 20 rogue with a +5 Shortsword can do 1d6+5 damage plus let's say, let's say he has a strength score of about 18, 13 natural, five from wishes, +4 damage, then give him a belt of giant's strength to raise it to put another +3, so +7, add another +2 from bull's strength, totaling to 1d6+10 then add 10d6 damage. With a full attack he can hit three times, only one of which gets the bonus. But let's say he has haste to give him another attack. So in total four 1d6+14s with an added 10d6 on the first attack.

That averages out to about 98 damage, sounds respectable doesn't it? If he somehow managed to dip into enough classes to make that 20d6 then it becomes 128. This would be enough to put a serious dent on most enemies out there.

Now the half orc barbarian with his +5 greataxe will likely have 20 strength right off the bat, Then let's consider that he's likely to spend his new ability score points on strength, so +7, then add five wishes, so +10, then throw in bull's strength, +12, then put in a giant's belt, +15, now unlike the rogue he's likely to have enlarge person since he doesn't need stealth so that ups it to +16, then make him rage +20, plus five from the weapon itself so +25, then consider that two handed weapons get their damage bonuses multiplied by one and a half times, +37. With haste he'll get five attacks. So five 1d12+37s.

This averages out to a grand total of 215, enough to outright kill 90% of the opponents in the monster manual. Without even considering power attack shenanigans. Sneak attacks don't scale particularly well, though of course; a sneak attack's advantage over the full attack is that you only need to attack once to do a mean amount of damage.

Of course if I'm wrong about sneak attacks only applying to the first attack in a full attack then this whole argument is bunk. Though I am unsure whether giant's belt and bull's strength would stack, if they didn't it would only slightly edge things in the rogue's favor.

[dextercorvia]

So far he has 4d6 at level 5. One less because he took 3 levels of rogue so he could get penetrating strike. Which is really 4d8+5 (23 on average) because of craven and sacred strike, because the majority of what they are fighting are evil. He's going with archery, to avoid being on the front lines. He hasn't decided between many shot or rapid shot tactics yet.


With archery, it's even harder to qualify for SA.

Still, if it's a problem, talk to him.

This. Remember, he will need Greater Manyshot to tack SA on to all of his rolls if he goes that route, and if he hasn't even started taking the feats yet... That is just never going to happen.

Besides, Penetrating Strike is incompatible with Archery, and so is Flanking in general.

Just remember, if he only gets a single sneak attack per round, even if he has SAdice=HD, then he is doing less damage than an unoptimized warmage, who will either be making a ranged touch attack, or hitting an area for the same kind of damage.

Relying on invisibility is actually going to limit him to 1 per 2 rounds, which means he will be doing less damage than an unoptimzed warlock.

Now if he had 4-8 natural attacks, Multi-attack, HiPS, and Dark Stalker, then you might need to worry about a couple of extra dice of sneak attack

[Amphetryon]

Of course if I'm wrong about sneak attacks only applying to the first attack in a full attack then this whole argument is bunk. Sneak Attack applies on every attack in the round where the other conditions (flanking, or opponent flat-footed, etc) apply. It still doesn't make for "too much" sneak attack, unless he's making the rest of the party feel like sidekicks.

[Cespenar]

That's not going to matter much, both because that's the weakest type and because of Penetrating Strike. Fortification gives a (varying percentage based on type, with 25% for light) chance of immunity to critical hits and sneak attack. Penetrating Strike kicks in to deliver sneak attack with half the usual dice when the target would normally be immune to sneak attack. But Craven isn't reduced, so the net effect is that you retain about 68% of full sneak attack damage vs. enemies even with 100% fortification.

Interesting. Never mind, then.

[DeAnno]

Ranged Sneak Attack is really an uphill climb. There are various ways to make it work better (sniping, Greater Invis, going first, various esoteric tricks) but all of them have their problems and tend to be very resource intensive. Unless he dips Barb and starts charging into melee it is unlikely he will accomplish anything too world shattering.

[Randomguy]

If it starts becoming a problem through in a few sneak attack immune monsters in any combat. Not enough to completely make him useful, just a few that make sense, like plants when fighting evil druids, for example. Enemy archers could be another viable opponent, since they could attack from out of sneak attack range.

[Czin]

If it starts becoming a problem through in a few sneak attack immune monsters in any combat. Not enough to completely make him useful, just a few that make sense, like plants when fighting evil druids, for example. Enemy archers could be another viable opponent, since they could attack from out of sneak attack range.
Or if you really want to be evil, Mounted Archers. The bane of many a short ranged build.

[Polarity Shift]

I think the fact that his saves, base attack bonus, and experience point gain will all suck is punishment enough. Plus, as you get higher up on the level chain, the sneak attack damage bonus simply isn't that much relative to what others can dish out without the need for getting the enemy off guard at the higher levels.

There is so much wrong with this I don't know where to begin.

1: Enhancement bonuses do not stack.
2: What self respecting Rogue is only getting one sneak attack a round?
3: 98 or 128 damage would be decent at 10. You are talking about 20.
4: Only Strength gets the 1.5 multiplier. Not other damage.
5: 215 does not kill a single CR 20 in the Monster Manual. It might barely kill some things a few levels lower.
6: All of the self respecting enemies that do have below 300ish HP at this level have all sorts of measures to make them hard to kill anyways.

For an honest comparison assume Rogue with full attack sneak attacks vs Barbarian with stacking damage bonuses. In such a case both characters do enough damage to one round whatever they can get their weapons into. But there are many more things that block sneak attack and the Rogue's defenses are dramatically inferior to the Barbarian's, leading to the Rogue being shut down a lot more and being capable of being one rounded by almost anything whereas the Barbarian has at least 5 extra HP per level and much better Fort and Will saves.

[dextercorvia]

Or if you really want to be evil, Mounted Archers. The bane of many a short ranged build.

No, if you are really evil, then it is a squad of DFI Bard Archers with Knowledge Devotion and different flavors of elemental damage. Now, make them Warforged, so they never get fatigued from singing. Let him taste the wrath of your Shadowrun sized pile of d6's.

[Czin]

There is so much wrong with this I don't know where to begin.

1: Enhancement bonuses do not stack.
2: What self respecting Rogue is only getting one sneak attack a round?
3: 98 or 128 damage would be decent at 10. You are talking about 20.
4: Only Strength gets the 1.5 multiplier. Not other damage.
5: 215 does not kill a single CR 20 in the Monster Manual. It might barely kill some things a few levels lower.
6: All of the self respecting enemies that do have below 300ish HP at this level have all sorts of measures to make them hard to kill anyways.

For an honest comparison assume Rogue with full attack sneak attacks vs Barbarian with stacking damage bonuses. In such a case both characters do enough damage to one round whatever they can get their weapons into. But there are many more things that block sneak attack and the Rogue's defenses are dramatically inferior to the Barbarian's, leading to the Rogue being shut down a lot more and being capable of being one rounded by almost anything whereas the Barbarian has at least 5 extra HP per level and much better Fort and Will saves.
Ah thank you for correcting my errors.

[Slipperychicken]

Let the Rogue be a master of stabbing people sometimes. And challenge him other times. It's not a bug, it's a feature.

As a DM, it's very easy for you to just add more enemies, or occasionally throw in enemies that are immune to Sneak Attack, or give them more hit points, or give them templates, or use a variety of different tactics (ambushes, shooting arrows from a high wall, burrowing, Flyby Attack, etc) which Rogues have little defense against, etc. Also, intelligent enemies can react intelligently. If Bob the Rogue Tumbles into Flanking position and kills their friend, they can recognize that they should probably avoid letting him do that.

+1 to this. Smart enemies don't stand there eating Sneak Attacks every round till they die.

[kulosle]

Oh so the party does have a bard that for what ever reason isn't going DFI, that's why I'm concerned. Normally the problem with these builds is that they can't hit anything. But the bard, slightly IC optimized, is making it so he can. Oh I forgot about Invisible Blade. We don't use the errata because that makes the class lame. He could switch two daggers and then that might be a problem. He currently isn't a problem I was just wondering if it would be. Thanks for the advice, I don't think I'll worry about it till higher levels.

[Greenish]

I think the fact that his saves, base attack bonus, and experience point gain will all suck is punishment enough.Except for fractional BAB and saves OP already said they use. And the easiest way to avoid multiclass penalties (if your group even uses them) is just to dip a little into several classes before going into PrCs.

[Aotrs Commander]

Oh so the party does have a bard that for what ever reason isn't going DFI, that's why I'm concerned. Normally the problem with these builds is that they can't hit anything. But the bard, slightly IC optimized, is making it so he can. Oh I forgot about Invisible Blade. We don't use the errata because that makes the class lame. He could switch two daggers and then that might be a problem. He currently isn't a problem I was just wondering if it would be. Thanks for the advice, I don't think I'll worry about it till higher levels.

Wasn't the Invisible Blade errata to stop them making infinite Bluff checks as free actions? Once per attack would be a sensible limit, at any rate. (I think we've actually been playing it slightly wrong, now that I think about it, not that it matters much; we've been letting him make only one Bluff check per round - but applying that check to all his attacks, not just the first one. But one per attack wouldn't make much difference, as not many of the opposition - mostly classed enemies - have Sense Motive or not high enough to matter..!)

Combined with the ability to take ten (Feint Mastery), plus the Group Fake Out skill trick, it's pretty good, even if you only did give it one per round - you just stab more than one dude if you can!

(And if you have a few rounds of Ninja invisibility, the bluff becomes much less important anyway - my player went for it for the SA progression mostly.)

[Ernir]

Isn't there a way to make SA on AoO.

It's an epic feat. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/feats.htm#sneakAttackOfOpportunity)

[Mystify]

It's an epic feat. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/feats.htm#sneakAttackOfOpportunity)

There are non-epic ways to do it, but they only function on the first attack op.

[nedz]

These feats might be useful for him, but YMMV

Sneak Attack of Opportunity - does what you would expect, but only on the first AoO. Its from Dragon Magasine 340 though

Deadeye Shot from PH2
Req: BAB +4, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Skirmish or Sneak Attack class ability
Follow these steps to use this feat:
1) Ready an Action to make a Ranged Attack on an opponent when any of your allies hit it in melee.
2) If the Action is triggered, the opponent looses its Dexterity bonus

Foe Specialist From MH
Req: Sneak Attack class ability, BAB +4
Choose a creature type from the Ranger Favored Enemy list that is vulnerable to Critical Hits. Your Sneak Attacks do +1d6 damage against this type of creature.
You may take this feat multiple times, each with a different type of creature.

Persistent Attacker CSco
Req: 5d6 Sneak Attack / Sudden Strike
On a successful Sneak Attack, you may reduce the Sneak Attack dice by 4d6 to make your first attack on the next round against the same foe be considered a Sneak Attack too, even if circumstances have changed