Star Wars Saga Ed. and total concealment

[Nowhere Girl]

So as we all know, in 3.x D&D, if you have total concealment, anyone you target is denied his or her Dex bonus to AC, making sneak attacks possible.

In Star Wars Saga Edition, after looking a little more carefully, I'm wondering ... is total concealment supposed to grant that same benefit in those rules, too? If it is, I can't find where it says so. I can see they definitely changed how it's determined whether someone is flat-footed; I suppose they might have changed total concealment, too.

Anyone?

[Nowhere Girl]

Bump because I'm really hoping someone has a thought on this. I'll give up if there's still no response, though.

[Jack Zander]

I play SWSE but am just as clueless as you are. Still rather new to the whole thing. From what I read, targets who have concealment do not get to sneak attack, but personally, that is just dumb and will probably be errata'd if it hasn't already.

[Nowhere Girl]

I play SWSE but am just as clueless as you are. Still rather new to the whole thing. From what I read, targets who have concealment do not get to sneak attack, but personally, that is just dumb and will probably be errata'd if it hasn't already.

The conditions given for Sneak Attack and Dastardly Strike seem to be any in which the target is denied Dexterity to AC. There's no mention of flanking, but otherwise, that looks like 3.5 D&D. Fine so far.

Flat-footed is changed to a condition that only occurs when you're surprised and haven't acted yet ... which makes sense. Fine.

But then it's also revealed (on page 49, under Uncanny Dodge I) that you can lose your Dexterity bonus when struck by a hidden attacker as well as when flat-footed, just as in D&D. It reveals this by indicating that the ability prevents that from happening, which can logically only occur if it was going to happen before you got that ability.

Finally, we come to the question of what, exactly, concealment is in Saga. There's no question about partial concealment -- when partially concealed, you're clearly not effectively hidden unless you've successfully used the Stealth skill while unobserved. Fine. Total concealment, however, is described on page 157 in terms ("if he is in total darkness or if you're blinded" ... "You can't attack a target that has total concealment, though you can attack into a square that you think he occupies") that make it look almost exactly like D&D total concealment (the -10 to Perception checks thing being the only difference, as in D&D, it grants a +20 to Hide instead), which is invisibility. And in D&D, at least, being invisible to someone is effectively the same thing as being hidden. Considering that, in Saga just as in D&D, you can't directly attack someone with total concealment and can only target the square you think the person is in, it certainly seems it's being treated the same way.

So the question is simply this: is total concealment in Saga the same thing as being hidden for the purposes of Dastardly Strike and Sneak Attack? If it is, the scout talent called Total Concealment is potentially extremely powerful, especially when combined with Keen Shot to allow you to use or create partial concealment conditions that don't hinder you at all but make you effectively invisible and let you do brutal ninja-like things to your enemies. In effect, given any effective partial concealment conditions, you become able to benefit from the Saga equivalent of Improved Invisibility.

[Seatbelt]

It makes a limited kind of sense when you consider that most characters in Saga are going to use blasters, because blasters are COOL. If you're going to play a Star Wars game where you use a sword, you are doing it wrong. (Unless you are a Jedi). It's a lot harder in D&D to get in your sneak attack damage with a ranged weapon, unless you get the suprise round or you're hidden or invisible. But since invisibility spells dont exist in Saga, ranged characters need another easy way to get at their juicy sneak attack damage.

[Nowhere Girl]

Oh, well, it doesn't make any less sense than anything else that happens in gaming. I'm just wishing it were more clear, is all. Total concealment definitely either does or does not yield the same benefits as being hidden with respect to Sneak Attack and Dastardly Strike ... and it's not entirely clear which is the case.

For the most part, Saga is a well-written ruleset, but this is one very problematic issue.

On a separate note, anyone notice how surprisingly strong Improved Quick Draw is as well? On the surface, it doesn't look that great, but then look a little more carefully: any time you're surprised, you get to act in the surprise round by drawing and firing your blaster pistol, as long as you have one at hand. The only way you can be caught flat-footed in Saga is to not have acted yet in any combat that begins with a surprise round. So with Improved Quick Draw, as long as you can roll a higher initiative than someone who surprises you, you cannot be caught flat-footed, even if surprised (because you just acted)! Furthermore, if you beat the initiative of a person who surprises you, you actually catch that person flat-footed because there was a surprise round, and that person hadn't acted yet!

On top of all of that, you get to perform both a swift action (draw pistol) and a standard action (fire pistol) in the surprise round, whereas normally, you could only perform a single swift, move or standard action when acting in a surprise round. So that means that, in many ways, with the Improved Quick Draw talent, you actually perform better when you're surprised than when you aren't!

Madness! :smalltongue:

[TheGreatJabu]

Hah! I hadn't caught the thing about Improved Quickdraw before, but that is true. As for the total concealment thing, I'll venture an opinion later tonight; don't have my book on me, and I'll check the errata and the Jedi Counseling stuff at Wizards before I start throwing my ideas around.

However, the sheer destructive potential of a Scoundrel/Scout with sneak attack, Dastardly Strike, and Total Concealment is somewhat dulled by one flaw I see in Saga's design. Sheer, overwhelming inability to hit.

Every single level, a heroic character's Reflex Defense increases. A soldier or Jedi has their attack bonus increase at the same rate, so they seem like they can keep up, right? Well, you add your Dexterity mod to both, so we'll cancel those two out. But then there's Class bonuses to Defense. There's no "class bonus to attack", so the odds are starting to shift. Then there are feats like Dodge (why though?!), Improved Defenses, and the Martial Arts feats. Point Blank Shot, Weapon Focus (AND Greater W.F.) can't quite keep up with that. Then there are many talents that improve your defense in certain situations (Armor Specialist talents, Lightsaber Defense talents, concealment talents, etc.) Since I counted Greater W.F. as a feat (which it technically isn't), there are effectively no talents that increase your likelihood of hitting.

I'd have to say that by the time you hit level 20, soldiers and Jedi who are well-built offensively still can't boast more than a 25% chance to hit without spending a Force Point (which increases your odds back up to maaaaybe 50% chance). Area Attacks seem to be the only way to accomplish anything by then (except for the old RCR "he who rolls the most 20s wins" contest). With that in mind, every single time you dip a level into a class that doesn't have full BAB progression, you're losing a considerable amount of combat effectiveness.

[Nowhere Girl]

Familiar Foe and Acrobatic Strike want a word with you. :smallbiggrin:

[Jack Zander]

Familiar Foe and Acrobatic Strike want a word with you. :smallbiggrin:

Acrobatic Strike FTW. Finally, the only reason to play a nimble fighter instead of an armored one.

[TheGreatJabu]

Although yes, Acrobatic Strike increases your chance of hitting, you still have to hit your foe 1000 times before you take 'em down. With the exception of Rapid Strike, you lose access to all of the feats that improve your overall melee attack power (Mighty Swing, Double Attack, Power Charge, etc.)

Also: who else liked the way that I claimed I'd venture my opinion on Total Concealment last night, and I completely didn't?! My bad - I forget about the threads I don't subscribe to. Again, at work now so my thoughts will have to wait.

[Nowhere Girl]

Although yes, Acrobatic Strike increases your chance of hitting, you still have to hit your foe 1000 times before you take 'em down. With the exception of Rapid Strike, you lose access to all of the feats that improve your overall melee attack power (Mighty Swing, Double Attack, Power Charge, etc.)

Untrue, actually. Powerful Charge only requires that you perform a charge, which in Saga is a standard action. Acrobatic Strike only requires that you tumble to avoid an attack of opportunity from your intended target and then execute an attack against that target before the end of your turn. Since you can take both a move action and a standard action in the same turn, there's no reason at all, aside from an arbitrary house rule, why you cannot fulfill both requirements in a single turn.

Also, bounty hunters, in addition to having the ability, as of bounty hunter 10, to buff themselves to +5 to hit and +5 Reflex defense against a single chosen opponent as a full-round action, can use the Hunter's Target talent to give themselves a bonus to damage equal to their bounty hunter level (so +10 at bounty hunter 10) for the duration of the encounter against a single chosen target as a free action. Then remember you also deal bonus damage equal to one-half your level regardless of weapon used, in addition to any other sources of bonus damage you have.

[TheGreatJabu]

Untrue, actually. Powerful Charge only requires that you perform a charge, which in Saga is a standard action.

...dear God. I had just always told myself that no one could tumble away far enough to get the distance for a charge in one turn, but I was wrong. If you begin the round standing adjacent to your foe, tumble 3 squares away (the max you're allowed since tumbling costs double movement), you'll be able to charge the bare minimum of 2 squares for it to count. That hurts my head. :smallfrown:


Also, bounty hunters, in addition to having the ability, as of bounty hunter 10, to buff themselves to +5 to hit and +5 Reflex defense against a single chosen opponent as a full-round action, can use the Hunter's Target talent to give themselves a bonus to damage equal to their bounty hunter level (so +10 at bounty hunter 10) for the duration of the encounter against a single chosen target as a free action.

I was pretty much ignoring that fact. The fact that one single class gets an ability that overcomes a deficiency in game design doesn't take away the problem, in my mind. Or maybe I'm just being overly critical of how the system works at high levels. To be perfectly honest though, I've never in all my years of gaming, made a character beyond level 15, so I shouldn't be griping so much.

Either way, let me shut my cakehole and get back on topic! Concealment! I went through the official errata, and I went through every edition of Jedi Counseling that's been released since Saga. None of 'em have anything to say about Concealment.

Here's my theory. The only things that really seems to catch opponents flat-footed in Saga are to catch them "unaware" or to qualify as a "hidden attacker". To be unaware, the opponent can't have perceived your location and then acted. Total Concealment, as written, doesn't give you the ability to catch people flat-footed by itself. It also fails to directly say that it makes you "hidden". However, it DOES give your foes a large penalty to their Perception checks to find you. The Stealth skill specifically says that success leaves your foe unaware of you/catch your enemy off-guard. So here's how I'm reading it!

1. Create situation that provides total concealment for yourself, giving your foe penalties to Perception.
2. Use Stealth skill to sneak up to foe.
3. Attack foe, catching them unaware (and thus, flat-footed)
4. Use Stealth to change your location - with success, you remain "hidden" to your foe, and the next attack should qualify to deny Dex. Note: a mean GM may require you to make a successful Deception check to "create a diversion" before making your next Stealth check.

As-written, I think concealment is just a fancy way to make your Stealth checks more potent. You could still be pretty fierce at dishing it out to most characters, but Use the Force/Sense Surroundings will kind of ruin your fun. If you've got Skill Focus: Stealth and training in Deception, though, you may still be able to ninja yourself some Jedi. :smallbiggrin:

[Nowhere Girl]

...dear God. I had just always told myself that no one could tumble away far enough to get the distance for a charge in one turn, but I was wrong. If you begin the round standing adjacent to your foe, tumble 3 squares away (the max you're allowed since tumbling costs double movement), you'll be able to charge the bare minimum of 2 squares for it to count. That hurts my head. :smallfrown:

The lightsaber form talent Sokan also helps, as does the Surge Force power.


I was pretty much ignoring that fact. The fact that one single class gets an ability that overcomes a deficiency in game design doesn't take away the problem, in my mind. Or maybe I'm just being overly critical of how the system works at high levels. To be perfectly honest though, I've never in all my years of gaming, made a character beyond level 15, so I shouldn't be griping so much.

There are other ways to potentially even things out. A gunslinger with the Deceptive Shot talent can spend two swift actions and beat your Will defense with a Deception check to deny you your Dexterity bonus to Reflex defense. To a twi'lek optimized for Deception, especially against most Will defenses, this is child's play. Aside from the Dastardly Strike and Sneak Attack benefits, there's the fact that this also actually removes the Dexterity bonus (and all dodge bonuses) to Reflex Defense against that attack and that in Saga, that really matters!

As for total concealment, here's the problem with your assessment:

"You can't attack an opponent that has total concealment, though you can attack into a square that you think he occupies."

That happens independently of the Stealth skill. As written, even if you have a penalty to your Stealth skill of -1,000,000, and your opponent is someone with a Perception skill of 1,000,000, he cannot attack you, although he can attack into a square that he thinks you occupy.

My interpretation, based on that (and on the fact that one way to get total concealment is to blind your opponent), is that total concealment is the same thing as invisibility, just as it is in D&D. The Perception check that you take a -10 penalty on would be to notice the person, not be able to see the person. You could make the check and pinpoint the square the person occupies and then attack into that square ... at a -5 penalty to your attack roll, as the passage under Total Concealment indicates.

Actually, all of that seems rather clear. The only thing I'm unclear on is whether total concealment would count for the purposes of Dastardly Strike and Sneak Attack. Intuitively, it should because it's effectively invisibility, but then, not everything that's true in D&D is true in exactly the same way in Saga. So I'm not certain.

Here's another fun thing to ponder: the "Sense Surroundings" function of Use the Force lets you "ignore the effects of cover or concealment when making Perception checks to detect or observe targets." The key part here is "when making Perception checks." At first it looks like it's saying you ignore the effects of cover and concealment entirely, but a closer look reveals that it only lets you make your Perception checks more easily. All of the other effects of total concealment (including that you can only attack into the square of someone with it, and at a -5 penalty) still apply, rules as written. You're still ... invisible. They just have an easier time pinpointing your location.

Of course, if you have total concealment and just stand there full-attacking, blasters blazing, you can't take the "Sniping" action under Stealth, so pinpointing the square you occupy is going to be trivial for most opponents anyway whether they have Use the Force or not.

But then they're still attacking at a -5 penalty, and ... you might be able to use Sneak Attack/Dastardly Strike on them. Because you're invisible.

And if it's true, that's just mean. :smalltongue:

(Or it could be looked at as "that's why you have to get through two talent prerequisites just to get to the Total Concealment talent.")

[TheGreatJabu]

Hey, I'm honestly not disagreeing with you, Nowhere Girl. I'd actually LIKE it if Total Concealment as the equivalent of Invisibility. The only reason that we're saying different things is that you're saying what you think the rules should imply, and I'm just coughing up my interpretation of what they literally say. I'm going to email this question to the Jedi Counseling folks in the (vain) hopes that it'll be directly addressed some day.

'Cuz come on - how awesome would it be if you could make that ninja machine?