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

So!

Sneak/Death attacks: Your understanding of anatomy and armours through experience, intuition or formal study has given you the ability to make on-the-spot decisions to quickly identify and exploit the exposures of such weak spots to inflict vastly greater damage than the size of your weapon or the strength behind the blow would otherwise suggest. However, you need your opponent distracted or not paying attention to be able to properly capitalize

Weapon Specialization and other fighter feats that give bonus damage: Your knowledge of how your weapon interacts with muscle, sinew and bone, alongside various armours, combined with extensive training to control your blade has allowed you to make more effective strikes that deal more damage without requiring greater blade velocity or inertia.

Insightful Strike (only works with finesseable weapons, which are almost exclusively piercing damage except for kukri): Your experience fighting with weapons of high risk, high reward due to their chance of hitting absolutely nothing vital and going through gaps easily has manifested itself in turning your wits into your strength as you decide on spot where to stab to either exhaust the target by forcing a rapid response or outright kill them in a single stroke to the heart or the throat. -What makes this any different from Fighter weapon specialization or Sneak attack? Why does this use raw int instead of sneak attack die?

Combat Insight (works with any weapon): ??? -What makes this any different from Fighter weapon specialization or Sneak attack? Why does this use raw int instead of sneak attack die?

Combat Insight & Insightful strike (for 2x int damage!): ???!!! -How does this even work? It implies Insightful strike and combat insight are two different things, seeing they stack.


I'm not asking for these feats to be touched. I'm looking for a way to figure out how to RP them, as atm, as far I see, any warrior with weapon specialization and the like use the exact same RP. (Knowing where to hit, how to hit, why hit.)

Use your brains, not your brawn.

Steve wrote:Use your brains, not your brawn.

That's what makes fighters[who are worth their salt] (whose source of damage is their feats) different from barbarians (who go Ulfriik smassh!#!#).

But what makes combat insight different from fighters?

The easiest answer is that one of them knows where to hit, and one of the thinks he does but doesn't really, doesn't know as much, knows vaguely where to hit but focuses much more on other aspects of combat training, or one warrior knows where to hit on the opponent period and one knows how to maximize damage with a specific weapon (this applies particularly to weapon specialization, as a good target for a flail and a good target for a rapier might not be the same thing, so leveraging training with a particular weapon to maximize effectiveness versus leveraging training with incapacitating via targeting weak points of the enemy anatomy is not the same thing), etc.

Justify it however you like, similar to how monks on our server, all of which could follow a different discipline, get basically the same abilities from the class. All of the martial arts disciplines could be different, but this is a game and you have to have some standards somewhere.

So from an RP perspective, justify it however you like.

Just a slight correction. There are actually three weapons that offer slashing and three (well 2+unarmed) that offer blunt damage.

Blunt:
Mace
Light Hammer
Unarmed Strike

Slashing:
Kukri
Sickle
Hand Axe

Regarding the RP Behind it I would consider Sneak Attack for what it is, you are catching your opponent unawares (flatfooted). Insightful Strike is gained via Swashbuckler and only works with finesse weapons I would consider that to be RP'd by understanding the weapon type you are using and how it might best be applied to armors to do more damage (ie. it is knowledge of how a particular type of weapon works best). Combat Insight is an epic feat and works with any weapon so I would RP that as knowledge of how armor works and where each type of armors weak points are and how various types of weapon (blunt/slashing/piercing) can exploit those weaknesses.

So in short:
Sneak Attack = knowing how to make a strike count when opponent is unaware..
Insightful Strike =- knowing how best to use finesse weapons to do more damage.
Combat Insight = knowing the weaknesses of various types of armor and how to exploit them with any given weapon.

Hope this helps.

I always thought of Combat Insight being like that scene in that ridiculous but fun Sherlock Holmes movie. Where he plans out his attack based on tactical analysis of the fight. Approaching the fight as a cause and effect string. I like it as it even explains why it increases damage not really AB. Knowing what you have to do is deadly, being able to do it is an entirely separate question though.

The way I see it is:

Sneak Attack: Catch your target off guard and strike them in the most vital spot left exposed while they cannot accurately protect themselves.

Combat Insight: Use your opponents strength against them to expose or open their guard to further attacks.

Combat Insight is general. Fighter focus and specialization is particular.