Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

Ok, for the record i will break down this post into three issues (i should say controlled rants).

I. Pologue

II. Feint...and sense motive.

III. What feint is.

IV. Proposed fix.

I.
right, well i guess short story is, i was going to play NWN 2 with a friend, and he told me "feint is broken, roll a HIPSer" and sure enough...wow...BAB + spot...scary. so i made a HIPSer, but i couldnt stand it, recanted and rerolled. Feint isnt bad but a few things drive me absolutely off the wall...like mobs with spot scripts, and who is actually able to detect feints.

II.
i hear this alot right. "well i can just see a feint, so spot makes sense" yeah. no. feint takes advantage of the concept of "selective attentinon"

the feinter relies on bluff to get you focus on what he wants you to see. You require intuition to make sense of those images to discern a threat. this is why sense motive was originally implemented for countering feints. the only classes in game who get sense motive as a class skill are Bards and Rogues. this is probably why it was never implemented. This was supposed to be a finesse feat that got for some reason, pitted against one of the most often used power skills in the game...*facepalm*

III.
The game developers seems to have attempted to take a "middle road" approach to deal with this skill.
For starters...feint used to be free...no joke. it wasn't even a feat, it was something you could do automatically, using your bluff modifier (untrained allowed). however in game you need to feat into it and thus it was augmented to slightly less than the level three IB Feat "improved feint". sacrifice an attack to feint works as a concept.

IV.
The fix for feint is this...keep BAB as the determining factor for feint difficulty. take spot out completely. This is already a buff seeing as how any non-bard, non-rogue class would reach 15 max in sense motive naturally since they would cross-train it. and everyone gets the skill for free.

anyway, your thoughts would be welcome, cheers. i dont really expect change really...but god...i thought i should at least explain how this overlooked and undervalued skill is supposed to work in PnP...this was just kinda building up for awhile...much like a festering intellectual tumor.

*stops laughing* Sorry. The thing is: it's pretty easy to raise bluff skill over 50 with a few items and maxed out bluff. There are people out there who specialize further in this stuff and have over 70+ in the skill. Without 1d20 roll. Do you realize how bad will it be if rogues with 15d6 sneak attack dice will start feinting people who with their max 30 BAB will have no chance whatsoever to defend themselves?

Edit: Sense motive seems like a good suggestion but it will destroy many many builds.

why not? =P

This isnt World of Warcraft. This is about bringing things in line with the D&D world...

besides...the rogue still has to feat into feint and then land a successful attack on you....which is the hard part...if you think about it.


btw, how did you like the video?

seriously...go through the monster manual and look for sense motive...its nonexistent....the stat is so esoteric its not even funny....

Vadenor wrote:why not? =P

This isnt World of Warcraft. This is about bringing things in line with the D&D world...

besides...the rogue still has to feat into feint and then land a successful attack on you....which is the hard part...if you think about it.


btw, how did you like the video?

Okay mate. In P&P you need to use a standard action to feint. With the feat, you do it with a move action.

So your rogue can't do a full attack in a round, only one.

I don't mind if you ask those changes, but theses, should be implemented as well.

To stay in line with P&P, right?

Page 46. complete warrior. works for me randall.

its under uncanny feint.

Complete what?

Sorry, I just play with the PHB usually. =op

IB ability, feint becomes a free action at class level 5. (i never chose to put this class IG mind you)

Rainbow Prism wrote:Edit: Sense motive seems like a good suggestion but it will destroy many many builds.

Meh, it's a part of the Core Skill List...this server needs bunch more skills anyways. And I don't care how many old builds would be "ruined" skills that actually effect one's combat use would have already been maxed out. All this does is give players more choices to make more kinds of characters to get that much more deeper into the story.

I would love to see skills such as "Use rope" implemented personally.

Jump, swim. Swim could be like tumble a bit...

Swim: Each 10 ranks give you a dodge bonus +1 against water elementals.

part of the whole issue that made me so bitter is vad is supposed to have like 21 bluff or so at level 30... insane stats on these monsters make me feel forced to artificially boost him. The end result is i do what should be effortless barely adequately. The lack of necessary and available skills also allows for stat pumping, but i understand why they weren't implemented.

Vadenor wrote:part of the whole issue that made me so bitter is vad is supposed to have like 21 bluff or so at level 30... insane stats on these monsters make me feel forced to artificially boost him. The end result is i do what should be effortless barely adequately. The lack of necessary and available skills also allows for stat pumping, but i understand why they weren't implemented.

I don't think you should base your character on their PnP counterpart. You can do it, but only partially. Don't forget that in PnP things are very different than in this game. For example, you can roll your base attributes much much higher in PnP. Here you are given a fixed amount of points to spend on them.

Simian Approbatur wrote:http://nwn2db.com/build.php?id=46460&version=1

SILENCE! Simian...you of all people....

You're supposed to be the patron saint of gimped abilities and classes...

WHERE IS MY EMPATHY?! I DEMAND EMPATHY!

I am? Usually people over NWN2 call me the most horrid power gamer out there.

Anyhow, had I the time to play, it is a character I would like to play. In addition, you can find alternative builds with 50~ base bluff and much better AB.

Ahem, since empathy is a feeling I am unable to feel in my cold machine heart, here is a picture of a bear:

oh hell im drunk and dont know where i was going with that...but im not gonna roll a gimmick build...i mean 50 base bluff...you should be able to convince helm your a demi-god made mortal by mistake.....