feign weakness: how does it work?

[Venger]

the feat is in sword and fist. you bluff vs an enemy's sense motive, and if you beat him, he makes an aoo against you, thinking you unarmed. you get an attack against him and he's considered flat-footed. you can do this unarmed at no penalty, or with a weapon incurring a penalty based on size.

this feat is clearly a mess. I have no idea how it actually works. what kind of action is it to activate? can I use it when it's not my turn? how many times can I use it against an enemy? if I beat an enemy's sense motive and hit him with a counter attack, does his aoo against me still go off, or not? and probably other things I haven't thought to ask.

does anyone have any insight into what the deal with this feat is?

[Darrin]

Action type... Based on the SRD section on skills, any bluff outside of combat is a full-round action. Any bluff during combat would be a standard action. However, the way the feat is worded, any Bluff check made for any reason should qualify. So you could get Improved Feint to improve it to a move action.

Hmm... Would Einhander work here? Doesn't use Bluff, so probably not.

If we just call it a standard action... I think this is an improvement over a normal feint because you condense the Bluff check and the attack into the same action. So instead of standard/move to feint and then standard to attack, you Bluff as a standard, get your attack before the AoO, and still have a move action left.

[Venger]

Action type... Based on the SRD section on skills, any bluff outside of combat is a full-round action. Any bluff during combat would be a standard action. However, the way the feat is worded, any Bluff check made for any reason should qualify. So you could get Improved Feint to improve it to a move action.

Hmm... Would Einhander work here?

If we just call it a standard action... I think this is an improvement over a normal feint because you condense the Bluff check and the attack into the same action. So instead of standard/move to feint and then standard to attack, you Bluff as a standard, get your attack before the AoO, and still have a move action left.

That all definitely makes sense. But there are still some unanswered questions:

Do I only provoke an aoo from an enemy if he's got one left, or does this add one to his pool? if I hit the enemy successfully but don't drop him, does he still get the aoo against me?

[Darrin]

Are you using an online source? You may be missing some text:

"Using Feign Weakness is a standard action, just like a feint, except that if you succeed you get to make your attack immediately. You can only Feign Weakness once per encounter. After one use, your opponents are too wary to fall for this maneuver again."

[Venger]

Are you using an online source? You may be missing some text:

"Using Feign Weakness is a standard action, just like a feint, except that if you succeed you get to make your attack immediately. You can only Feign Weakness once per encounter. After one use, your opponents are too wary to fall for this maneuver again."
Yes, that's exactly what happened, I was afb at the time. thanks for explaining. still a really weird terrible feat. after investing in ius so my enemies can't make aoos, I burn another feat so they can... make aoos again?

what synergy are you seeing with einhander? I feel like I'm missing something

[Darrin]

what synergy are you seeing with einhander? I feel like I'm missing something

There's an option that lets you make a feint with the Sleight of Hand skill, except it's nearly useless because all of the effects that help you feint assume you're using the Bluff skill.

[Venger]

There's an option that lets you make a feint with the Sleight of Hand skill, except it's nearly useless because all of the effects that help you feint assume you're using the Bluff skill.

master pickpocket, I guess?

[Zaq]

Are you using an online source? You may be missing some text:

"Using Feign Weakness is a standard action, just like a feint, except that if you succeed you get to make your attack immediately. You can only Feign Weakness once per encounter. After one use, your opponents are too wary to fall for this maneuver again."

I've got Sword and Fist open to pg. 6 right now, and I don't see those sentences you quoted. Which source are you using? I don't have the errata file open, so if that was in the errata, that might be it, but it's not in the actual text of SaF.

It's been a while since I've flipped through the feats in Sword and Fist, and I've gotta say, lots of them are written in a manner that's far more sloppy than post-3.0 sources are. Circle Kick, for instance. My gut feeling on the RAI is that you're supposed to take a full-round action to make one unarmed attack and one possible extra attack if you hit, but it looks like the RAW is that you can use it as many times as you get unarmed attacks in the round, provided that you're making a full attack.

[Venger]

I've got Sword and Fist open to pg. 6 right now, and I don't see those sentences you quoted. Which source are you using? I don't have the errata file open, so if that was in the errata, that might be it, but it's not in the actual text of SaF.

It's been a while since I've flipped through the feats in Sword and Fist, and I've gotta say, lots of them are written in a manner that's far more sloppy than post-3.0 sources are. Circle Kick, for instance. My gut feeling on the RAI is that you're supposed to take a full-round action to make one unarmed attack and one possible extra attack if you hit, but it looks like the RAW is that you can use it as many times as you get unarmed attacks in the round, provided that you're making a full attack.

the part darrin's quoting is actually on page 7. it falls on a page break that they in their infinite wisdom just put like that. yeah sword and fist feats are weird and terrible

[Troacctid]

It is in the errata.


p.7 Feign Weakness
Insert to second Benefit paragraph’s end:
Using Feign Weakness is a standard action, just like a feint, except that if you succeed you get to make your attack immediately. You can only Feign Weakness once per encounter. After one use, your opponents are too wary to fall for this maneuver again

[Zaq]

the part darrin's quoting is actually on page 7. it falls on a page break that they in their infinite wisdom just put like that. yeah sword and fist feats are weird and terrible

. . . Were there different editions of Sword and Fist? Mine doesn't have Feign Weakness on a page break. It finishes Feign Weakness on pg. 6, starts Fists of Iron also on pg. 6, and finishes Fists of Iron on pg. 7, with nothing else about Feign Weakness to be found. Bizarre.


It is in the errata.

Figured as much. Weird that there's so much confusion to begin with, though.

Other goofy stuff in Sword and Fist: by strict RAW, Lightning Fists debuffs not only your own attack rolls, but indeed everyone's attack rolls. Expert Tactician is hilarious if you pretend that it functions under 3.5 rules, though of course it takes a very generous GM to allow that. Off-Hand Parry requires "proficiency with weapon." Not any specific weapon, mind you. Just proficiency with weapon.

Oh, and unless I missed something, none of the feats in Sword and Fist are Fighter bonus feats. Because of course they aren't. Why should Fighters get nice toys, even in a book specifically designed to help them?

[Venger]

. . . Were there different editions of Sword and Fist? Mine doesn't have Feign Weakness on a page break. It finishes Feign Weakness on pg. 6, starts Fists of Iron also on pg. 6, and finishes Fists of Iron on pg. 7, with nothing else about Feign Weakness to be found. Bizarre.



Figured as much. Weird that there's so much confusion to begin with, though.

Other goofy stuff in Sword and Fist: by strict RAW, Lightning Fists debuffs not only your own attack rolls, but indeed everyone's attack rolls. Expert Tactician is hilarious if you pretend that it functions under 3.5 rules, though of course it takes a very generous GM to allow that. Off-Hand Parry requires "proficiency with weapon." Not any specific weapon, mind you. Just proficiency with weapon.

Oh, and unless I missed something, none of the feats in Sword and Fist are Fighter bonus feats. Because of course they aren't. Why should Fighters get nice toys, even in a book specifically designed to help them?

Mine's on a page break.

(reads expert tactician)
(head implodes)

who needs white raven?

it's not just that they forgot to make them fighter feats, they specifically tagged them as not fighter feats.

[Gemini476]

Unfortunately Expert Tactician got updated in Song & Silence to just give you an extra attack instead of an actual partial action, and then it was updated to 3.5 in Complete Adventurer (read:completely changed) to instead just give you and all your allies +2 to hit an opponent you've hit with an AoO.

But yeah, that original one is pretty nuts. How good were 3.0 casters at casting in melee?

[Troacctid]

How about that 3.0 haste, amirite?

[Mordaedil]

Reading the description of that feat, it attempts to expend the enemy's aoo, so he can't pull it against anyone else, and you spend your own aoo as well as you have successfully goaded him.