Feinting (PF)

I've been thinking a while about altering the feinting rules a bit and I'd appreciate some critique.

1. Standard feinting is a move action, not a standard action.
2. Improved Feint makes it a Swift action instead of a move action, and does not require Combat Expertise or Int 13+ as a prerequisite, and the target loses Dex versus all your attacks the round you feint.
3. Greater Feint makes target lose Dex bonus against all attacks until the beginning of your next turn. Remove Combat Expertise and Int as prereqs.

This should make things a bit easier on the poor Rogue and allow feinting to be a viable tactic even for those who don't specialize in it with a feat. The drawbacks I can see is a TWF Rogue can suddenly deal a lot of damage to targets with a minimum of fuss. Granted, they could use a bit of a boost but I'm unsure if this is too much of a boost.

Hm...I'll admit that feinting likely isn't getting used as much normally, though a rogue *would* suddenly get sneak attack damage a lot easier without waiting for flanking from a party member or something makes them shine more in combat. Then again rogues shine in combat already the moment they get a second attack and start landing sneak attacks (either at BAB +6 or with TWF) so I'm not too sure. I think it depends moreso on your party and how well the rogue is managing to get sneak attack off in most games without feinting. If you feel that he needs help putting out more dps, I say go for it. If your rogues are already leading the dps war, then this is a bit much.

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1. Standard feinting is a move action, not a standard action.
2. Improved Feint makes it a Swift action instead of a move action, and does not require Combat Expertise or Int 13+ as a prerequisite, and the target loses Dex versus all your attacks the turn you feint.
3. Greater Feint makes target lose Dex bonus against all attacks until the beginning of your next turn. Remove Combat Expertise and Int as prereqs.

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Fixed that for you.
Also, I'd have GF make the action an immediate, rather than swift, so you can do it off-turn if desired. Its a minor buff, but it's useful, and it gives 'em a reason to take it (since currently the rogue doesn't really benefit from GF, his team does). As it stands, most rogues try and talk the fighter into taking this chain, so he can burn his worthless time making feints to benefit the rogue. By allowing the rogue to feint as a swift action, you're removing any desire he might ever have to take the final feat in this chain.

Consider instead having ALL "Improved Combat Maneuver" feats grant their "Greater" versions when your BAB reaches a certain point (6 or 8, probably)

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Originally Posted by gr8artist

Fixed that for you.
Also, I'd have GF make the action an immediate, rather than swift, so you can do it off-turn if desired. Its a minor buff, but it's useful, and it gives 'em a reason to take it (since currently the rogue doesn't really benefit from GF, his team does). As it stands, most rogues try and talk the fighter into taking this chain, so he can burn his worthless time making feints to benefit the rogue. By allowing the rogue to feint as a swift action, you're removing any desire he might ever have to take the final feat in this chain.

Consider instead having ALL "Improved Combat Maneuver" feats grant their "Greater" versions when your BAB reaches a certain point (6 or 8, probably)

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Feinting only denies their Dex modifier to attacks made by the one performing the feint.

Thanks for the replies.

As it is few people have wanted to play rogues in my games. I haven't spoken to them about the reasons but I suspect that being useful in combat is not the primary concern. I don't want rogues to outshine the full BAB classes in damage dealing on a regular basis but putting two-feat tax on making rogue being regularly somewhat competent in combat is a bit harsh, imo. I probably won't have to worry about my players abusing anything and giving them this boost might just entice someone to try something other than what they have so far. I know that technically feinting is available to all melee combatants but it's hard to shake the feeling that only rogues are ever going to use it.

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Originally Posted by gr8artist

Fixed that for you.

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Good catch.

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Also, I'd have GF make the action an immediate, rather than swift, so you can do it off-turn if desired. Its a minor buff, but it's useful, and it gives 'em a reason to take it (since currently the rogue doesn't really benefit from GF, his team does). As it stands, most rogues try and talk the fighter into taking this chain, so he can burn his worthless time making feints to benefit the rogue. By allowing the rogue to feint as a swift action, you're removing any desire he might ever have to take the final feat in this chain.

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I see what you're driving at here but I'm a bit unsure if I want to give people auto-feint. The point of GF was to leave the target open until your next turn and to weaken him for others. Making it a swift action means that the feinter must make some sort of effort to trick his target (which will probably have a high chance of success for rogues, consdiering the changes I've made to the rogue class). For the most part it it won't matter either way but ther emay be situations where you have to choose between feinting your opponent and doing something else like Smiting or LoH or whatever.

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Consider instead having ALL "Improved Combat Maneuver" feats grant their "Greater" versions when your BAB reaches a certain point (6 or 8, probably)

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Way ahead of you. :smallwink: I just felt that feinting needed some extra love.