Smite evil action

[Roctopus]

Hi all,
I'm a newbie here.

I need some guidance in smite evil paladin's action.
The Player's guide reports "Once per day, a paladin may attempt to smite evil with one normal melee attack."
Combat rules reports: "Using a supernatural ability is a standard action unless noted otherwise."

Does this mean that in the same round the standard action comprises the attack and the smite evil action?
Can the paladin smite evil with a full attack without any other feat?

Thank you.

[Necroticplague]

Yes, no.
Text to get up to minimum

[Stealth Marmot]

Hi all,
I'm a newbie here.

I need some guidance in smite evil paladin's action.
The Player's guide reports "Once per day, a paladin may attempt to smite evil with one normal melee attack."
Combat rules reports: "Using a supernatural ability is a standard action unless noted otherwise."

Does this mean that in the same round the standard action comprises the attack and the smite evil action?
Can the paladin smite evil with a full attack without any other feat?

Thank you.

Smite evil is part of the attack. You can do a full attack with multiple attacks and you pick which one gets the smite evil. In fact you can use multiple smites in a single full attack if so inclined and you have multiple smite evils per day.

The smite ONLY applies to one attack though, using it with a full attack does NOT apply the bonuses to all the attacks, just the one.

You can use Smite Evil as part of a charge attack too.

[legomaster00156]

You might want to ask your GM if you can use the Pathfinder Paladin's Smite Evil ability (if not the entire PF Paladin). It's a lot less sucky.

[Zaq]

The game seems to think that Smite Evil is just something you do as part of a normal attack rather than a special standard action that you take. For example, the Charging Smite ability from PHB2 is written from the assumption that a charge attack, which is normally a full-round action, can include a smite, and it doesn't explicitly give you the ability to smite while charging—it just makes things better when you do, so it assumes that you already can, despite the action cost being incompatible if smiting is its own standard action. (I have a vague memory of some feat/ACF/PrC ability requiring that you use multiple smites in the same round, which is another thing that would be impossible without the assumption that smiting is something that can just be tacked on to an existing normal attack, but I can't find the actual ability, so I may be misremembering it or confusing it with something else.)

That said, you are correct that by the rules as written, Smite Evil is a (Su) ability that has no specified action cost, and therefore it defaults to a standard action, thereby making it impossible to smite on a full attack (or an AoO or while activating a martial strike or anything else like that).

I've never met a GM who plays it like that, either because they don't realize that the rules are written that way or because they choose not to nerf the already underpowered Paladin. If this is for a real game, it's definitely worth having that discussion with your GM.

[Roctopus]

Please, don't be so rude with a poor DM that is trying only to figure out how an ability works. :smallbiggrin:

Thank you for all comments.

I'll take a look at Pathfinder Paladin class. I already read this thread entitled "Paladins- Smite Evil" and was curious about it.

Greetings.