Talk:Unseen Assailant (3.5e Feat)

Thoughts
Few things I wanted to mention.
 * The name is weak. Aside from being a prestige class and a tome base class, it's not sufficiently narrow to give an idea of what this feat is supposed to do. Does it poison people? Does it kill them in the middle of a crowd? Does it snipe them? Does it use some more obscure method of murdering their targets? The name is just too vague to give a sense of what the feat is about, and it could be better.
 * +1d6 sneak attack is useful, but quickly becomes just a minor thing unless you have them as a class feature in general. You could replace it with "gain a minimum sneak attack of 1d6 per 3 ranks, or +1d6 if you already exceed this amount" if you wanted it to be more consistently useful without stepping on class feature toes. Alternately, +1d6 sneak attack per 2 ranks as a standard action attack, with a small bonus to existing otherwise, would also work and limits the attacks sufficiently to avoid rogue envy. Restricting to ranged or melee attacks only would also help in that regard (I'd suggest melee actually given the ignore combat penalty later on). This change might make it more appropriate at a higher rank though.
 * The at-will invis and silent thing probably needs to go. It's granting spell effects that duplicate abilities you already have, which is weird to begin with, but they're not particularly effective at that level since perception opponents can ignore them get past them with a standard action and a check. You can also spend them on other people, which seems out of trope. It's made even worse by the fact that "people not seeing you while taking 0" is pretty damn close to at-will invis and silent already, since people have to spend actions to see you like they would if you were magiced up. So I'd probably just drop it and find something else (shuffling the 0 thing around if needed, since it's fine at 14 or 19).

Dropping the SLAs is going to open some slots up, and deciding on a new name and a more narrow form of what it's supposed to be should help you fill them in. If it's melee-ish, making them show poorly (or not at all) to scent might be useful since scent is not currently opposed by stealth and it's potentially a bitch in close combat. If it's ranged-ish you may want something else, but the "in-combat" thing stops fitting as much I'm not sure off hand what to suggest for either slot. It's also competing with the sniper combat feat, which may be problematic for other reasons, but doesn't mean it wouldn't work. - Tarkisflux Talk 17:37, 20 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Do you have any idea of names?--75.40.72.247 18:48, 20 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Unseen Assailant or Shadow Combatant maybe. Nothing really interesting has sprung to mind.


 * Regarding the changes, the rank 4 ability means that characters who max stealth start with 2d6 sneak, matching characters with the class ability. Not sure if that was intentional or not. The concealment stuff seems a good call, and if you're worried about the total concealment you can write it up as blur and displacement instead. Unfortunately, the rank 19 ability mimics the rank 14 ability of stealth and is redundant. You could treat it as HiPS and reduce opponents' bonuses to finding you by half though, and you could let it stack with HiPS to eliminate their bonus entirely. - Tarkisflux Talk 19:38, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Not Rogue
This is not Rogue-level. It gives you 80% above normal sneak attack, which puts it 80% above rogue with the 4-rank ability alone. With a bit of cleanup, it might make a decent Wizard-level feat, though. --DanielDraco 00:10, 21 August 2011 (UTC)


 * It's badly worded, but this is not the case. "If you have sneak attack or sudden strike this instead opperates as a +1d6 bonus to that damage" appears at the end of the section, meaning that you get at best an extra die. Which is a pretty big deal at level 1 but not an 80% increase over all levels.


 * That's not to say I disagree with the balance assessment though. Being functionally invisible when you decide to stealth around is non-trivial, as are swift action miss chances. - Tarkisflux Talk  00:35, 21 August 2011 (UTC)


 * I meant for it to be wizard level. Must have made a typo.--ParakeeTalk 00:41, 21 August 2011 (UTC)