Can extra sneak attack damage work?

[Zeta Kai]

I'm familiar with extra spells/day, extra turning/day, & extra raging, but why can't extra sneak attack damage work? I've never seen it done, so tell me if this sounds broken:

EDIT: Radical rewrite to match later post.

Extra Sneak Attack [Special]
You are adept at dealing damage with a sneak attack.
Prerequisite: Sneak Attack class feature
Benefit: Upon a successful sneak attack, the damage you deal to an opponent is d8. This feat can be taken multiple times. If taken twice, the damage you deal to an opponent is d10. If taken three times, the damage you deal to an opponent is d12. You cannot take this feat more than three times.
Normal: Extra damage dealt using a sneak attack is d6.


Is this a viable feat? PEACH.

P.S.: If you've seen it done elsewhere, let me know.

[Closet_Skeleton]

It's an Epic Feat already. Could be re-balanced for non epic like Two-Weapon Rend was.

[Duke of URL]

Improved Sneak Attack [Epic]
Prerequisite: Sneak attack +8d6.
Benefit: Add +1d6 to your sneak attack damage.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects stack.


From the d20 SRD -- edited for layout only.

[Latronis]

as is a human rogue can start at lv1 with a +3d6 sneak attack.......

[Zeta Kai]

Hmmm... You're right, Latronis. How about this:

Extra Sneak Attack [Special]
You are adept at dealing damage with a sneak attack.
Prerequisite: Sneak Attack class feature
Benefit: Upon a successful sneak attack, the damage you deal to an opponent is d8. This feat can be taken multiple times. If taken twice, the damage you deal to an opponent is d10. If taken three times, the damage you deal to an opponent is d12. You cannot take this feat more than three times.
Normal: Extra damage dealt using a sneak attack is d6.

This way, a human rogue can only beef up to +1d10 at first level, which I have no real qualms about. Human rogues could probably use a little boost anyway. This also keeps this feat well out of Epic range. Any thoughts on this rather different approach?

[Eighth_Seraph]

...which kills all flanked, flat-footed, stunned, charmed or otherwise unaware opponents in one hit. This would be difficult to balance out of epic, and I could definitely see every battle-rogue taking it early on, right after Combat Reflexes.

Gr. Ninja'd.

[Fizban]

Do the same as practice spellcaster and natural bond, limit the max. But I'm guessing you want more than the usual amount one could have. The thing about those example feats you listed is that they don't make those abilities more powerful, they just make them usable more times per day. Extra sneak attack damage would be like adding more bonuses in rage or allowing a higher level spell in that vein.

[RegarMage]

I dont think either of those are viable,think along these lines, if it is so good you cant imagine someone not wanting to take it, it is probably too powerful.

now, a feat that adds +1 to sneak attack damage, (mebbe +2, but that is pushing it) would be acceptable.

Adam

[Thomar_of_Uointer]

I would limit its usage and not make it stackable. For instance, limiting it to one attack per round (because rogues are able to decimate opponents with full attacks) would be fine. It should have a prerequisite too, I would peg it at 3d6 sneak attack damage before you can start doing this, to mitigate its impact on damage output.

[SpartacusThe2nd]

higher pre-req cause human rogues will OWN (sorry im 15) at 1st level.
Higher dice is better than more die in my opinion.

[Latronis]

Maybe if you limit it to character level\2

that way non-epics still can't get more then 10d6 and gives multiclasses a little extra oomph our a decent sneak attack for characters that prc into a sneak attack class

Going beyond the 10d6 is a little much... though i wouldn't have qualms about about increasing die damage though not so high as that

Maybe so you can only take it once so it increases sneak attacks to d8's and an epic version that increases it beyond that.

I assume either way it works for other precision based attacks as well such as ninja and scout?

[Daracaex]

higher pre-req cause human rogues will OWN (sorry im 15) at 1st level.
Higher dice is better than more die in my opinion.
A higher dice value is not better than more dice. Which range would you rather have, 1-8 damage, or 2-12? Not only does the second give you a higher potential damage, it guarantees a damage of at least two. Given this, it would be preferable to have 2d4 rather than 1d8.

[Weezer]

maybe have the feat give +1 damage per dice, so it scales with level and makes it a worthwhile feat.

[Duke of URL]

Meh... I'd leave the feat exactly as written in the SRD, just remove the epic requirement. You'd still have to have 8d6 SA to take it, which means, at best, a 20th level pure Rogue could get an extra 2d6 SA (feats at CL 15 and 18).

Unless you're going to do something insane like add the feat to the fighter bonus list...

[Tim4488]

Book of Exalted Deeds had a feat that allowed rogues to sneak attack with d8's, but only against evil enemies.

Considering how crazy the prerequisites in that book tended to be (especially in terms of character behavior), and the limit on the alignment of enemies, and my personal experience with sneak attack (we had a human rogue using hand crossbows who was pretty much guaranteed to kill one opponent in the first round of combat around 9th level), upping the dice value would be insane.

I think a safer route may be +1 damage/die of sneak attack, with a prerequisite. Maybe +2 if you give it slightly higher prerequisites.

[Reinboom]

With each die type increase, increases average damage by 1.
d6 average = 3.5
d8 average = 4.5
d10 average=5.5
d12 average=6.5

So, increasing by +1 damage and a die type per die rolled isn't very different.

when I refer to "this feat", I'm referring to both the die type increase and the +1 damage to each sneak attack die versions.

With that, in comparison to adding dice, since d6s give 3.5 average, this means that a single addition of the epic feat gives the equivalent of what a character would get from +1 per die or increase to d8s at level 3.The 8d6 sneak attack required by the epic feat, using this feat instead, would give +8 damage average compared to the epic feats +3.5 damage average.

However, you would need to take this feat 5 times (if it gives + bonuses) for the epic feat to give close to as much as what the feats shown here gives. If it's the die type increase, the epic feat will never be as good.

Mind, throughout all of this, this is comparing it still to an epic feat.

An idea:
Feat:
Improved Sneak Attack
You make sure your sneak attacks hurt.
Prerequisite: Sneak attack +2d6
Benefit: Treat all 1s and 2s on sneak attack damage rolls as 3s.
(optional) This feat may be taken a second time to increase the minimum damage to 4s.

This changes the math a bit, as when it's taken it changes the probability to 4 damage average, a .5 per die increase. Which means, it's a 4 damage average increase by the time you reach 8d6 that keeps scaling upwards. This improves the epic feat (which is lacking in my opinion anyways) without destroying it.
The optional increase to 4s would further change probability to 4.5.

[Zeta Kai]

I like your brew, SweetRein. Nice job backing it up with the math.

As for my revised version, this is not "too powerful." Compare to Extra Turning. I've yet to see a cleric who didn't take it within their first 3 feats. I once played with a guy who choose it 5 time in a row. It was an undead campaign, but still the man was a turning machine.

[UglyPanda]

You have to work under the assumption that whenever a rogue launches a sneak attack, all of their sneak attacks are going to hit. An eighth level rogue typically makes three attacks for 4d6 sneak attack each. Adding damage to the sneak attack die means a lot of damage is added in a full attack.

Despite your assertions to the contrary, the quantity aspect of extra rage and extra turning are not equal to the quality aspect of an improved sneak attack damage feat. Also, extra turning is situational and isn't that powerful without divine metamagic cheese. This is because undead aren't the most fearsome in the game and not every DM is forced to use them. They're in the top ten, but so are dragons, aberrations, elementals, planar beings, constructs, etc. Your DM probably just likes undead.

Also, your friends who always took extra turning, did they ever take a feat to contribute to melee combat such as power attack? The strength of a cleric is that they are capable of being tanks, since most of their spells are weaker than a wizards.



DEADLY PRECISION [GENERAL]
You empty your mind of all distracting emotion, becoming an instrument of deadly precision.

Prerequisite: Dex 15, base attack bonus +5.

Benefit: You have deadly accuracy with your sneak attacks. You can reroll any result of 1 on your sneak attack’s extra damage dice. You must keep the result of the reroll, even if it is another 1.

This feat increases damage by about .4167 per sneak attack die.

[Fax Celestis]

You have to work under the assumption that whenever a rogue launches a sneak attack, all of their sneak attacks are going to hit. An eighth level rogue typically makes three attacks for 4d6 sneak attack each. Adding damage to the sneak attack die means a lot of damage is added in a full attack.

Er, +12 damage is not "a lot."

[Reinboom]

actually, let's assume 4 attacks, with 8d6 sneak attack, giving the +1 benefit OR 8d8 (comes out to the same average damage as I described.)
4.5 damage per, lets say, 3/4 hit constantly, with a short sword (standard, nonmagical)
that's 111.5 damage average. In comparison to without this feat, that would be 87.5 damage, a 24 damage shift. That's a good ~27.4% increase.
On the other hand, this only works against enemies with discernible anatomies (golem and gravestrike not counting), and they must be flat footed, or flanked, etc.

However, this is all still unpracticed math. Nothing tests better than a game where it's applied.

[UglyPanda]

It is a lot considering that the rogue is not the fighter or wizard. Rogues work off of quantity of attacks, not quality. A rogue's number of sneak attack dice increase exponentially. Improve quality too much and it becomes brutal. Also, three attacks is the minimum to expect from a rogue at that level. Three attacks is when the rogue is thirty feet away and next to the fighter who has combat reflexes. Accepting a small hit in BAB can get you extra hit dice or an extra attack through monk levels.

I'm fine with increasing the number of dice to 1/2 character level i.e. practiced spellcaster and/or that monk one in tome of battle.

[Fax Celestis]

It is a lot considering that the rogue is not a fighter. Rogues work off of quantity of attacks, not quality.

It's still not that big a deal. Damage is something every class can do, and the rogue can only do exceptionally in specific situations, against specific opponents.

[UglyPanda]

I meant that the feat increases damage too quickly. I like rogues, it's just that it is easy to add dice. Even leap attack only really increases damage by about 15 to 20 at that level (Factor in not being able to use a second attack in your calculations). A bit more if you add in shock trooper, but compare that to taking that sneak attack feat twice.

[Legoman]

Extra Turning/Rage/Music helps with longevity. It makes that fourth or fifth encounter of the day not so harrowing.

It's not comparable to something that upps damage output all the time. It'd be like a feat that allows you to rage twice, gaining the bonuses from both.

[Brazeku]

If you want to have die increases like that, from d6 to d8 to d10 etc, what you can do is make it a chain of feats (improved sneak attack, greater sneak attack, and so on). That way you can scale it by level.

Frankly at low level, having d8 sneak attacks is not significant. At around level 8, it's probably okay to do d10s, and d12s at 13 or so. The increase can be impressive, but at the same time rogues are starting to lose their lustre as skills get more useless with all the magic floating around.