Is sneak attack broken?

[brentrb]

My understanding is that if another member of the party is threatening a creature, and the rogue not disadvantaged, sneak attack adds damage - but it almost never works. What am I missing?

[Zetor]

I am also having this problem; I think it's a bug. A good portion of the time I can't sneak attack with an adjacent ally.

[Alealexi]

Originally posted by brentrb:

My understanding is that if another member of the party is threatening a creature, and the rogue not disadvantaged, sneak attack adds damage - but it almost never works. What am I missing?

It seems to be bugged.

[Revan619]

It might be because the text reads when attacking from advantage and they removed rogues having advantage when flanking. They will need to revert to 5e rules

[TheBlueFox]

It is possible that you have Disadvantage.

I have found that having both, Advantage and Disadvantage, when it SHOULD negate them both, perhaps triggers code that tries to see if you have Disadvantage on the attack, and negates sneak attack.

I personally have not noticed "missing" a sneak attack due to Ally proximity, yet. But I fully believe it likely.

[nemthos]

Originally posted by TheBlueFox:

It is possible that you have Disadvantage.

I have found that having both, Advantage and Disadvantage, when it SHOULD negate them both, perhaps triggers code that tries to see if you have Disadvantage on the attack, and negates sneak attack.

I personally have not noticed "missing" a sneak attack due to Ally proximity, yet. But I fully believe it likely.

Advantage and Disadvantage don't negate each other. You only roll one dice, but you're still considered to have Disadvantage on the roll which means you can't use Sneak attack
Edit: nvm, just read the book again and you're right, it will negate each other. So it's propably just that having advantage and disadvantage flag in game still seals of sneak attack

[dolby]

worked for me so far, on other hand you can't sneak attack with off hand so that's big one as well...

[Revan619]

I checked. I believe OP is not using the sneak attack button and was assuming it would be automatic

[Zetor]

Originally posted by Revan619:

I checked. I believe OP is not using the sneak attack button and was assuming it would be automatic

I can't speak for OP, but I can assure you *I* was using the button (which shouldn't be required, but whatever). I can't say with 100% that this has never happened when I didn't have disadvantage, but I'm fairly sure it has.

[Patrick]

Sneak attack does not seem to work according to 5E rules (or the text description in game). My rogue was next to the Bullete - which was surrounded by my party members - and clicking sneak attack kept on saying "you need advantage on your roll". I checked, and there was nothing giving me disadvantage, and as far as I could see none of the other 3 characters had disadvantage (I thought maybe lighting was an issue, but they were all within melee range and shadowheart has darkvision at least).

Also, as a rogue you do NOT need advantage if there are allies that are close to the creature and threatening it. Sometimes it seems to work - but mostly when I have advantage e.g. attacking from stealth or height advantage on ranged attacks. So something is definitely not working as it should.

[Patrick]

To qualify the last point - yes , I know that if the threatening melee combatants have disadvantage then that would be an issue, but to be clear: there were 3 people attacking the creature, and there was no indication that they all had disadvantage. I hope they fix this in the next patch.

[Patrick]

yeah, but it doesn't work all the time for me - and many others have pointed this out (on the Larian forums). If you are generally stealthed - and so have advantage - you will get the SA off, but the point is you should't need such advantage if allies are threatening the target. And in many cases, that is not working for me (and others). Rogues do not have to be stealthed all the time, they can move in, damage an opponent and then use a 'cunning action' to disengage. Well, at least according to the actual rules.

[dulany67]

Basically, your rogue must have advantage to perform a sneak attack (button is called "sneak attack" but Larian communication says "back stab"). No class currently gets advantage from flanking, so the rogue either has to be in stealth or at height to sneak attack. If the rogue has both advantage and disadvantage, they cancel out- and so the rogue does not have advantage and can not sneak attack.

[Aldaris]

Originally posted by dulany67:

Basically, your rogue must have advantage to perform a sneak attack (button is called "sneak attack" but Larian communication says "back stab"). No class currently gets advantage from flanking, so the rogue either has to be in stealth or at height to sneak attack. If the rogue has both advantage and disadvantage, they cancel out- and so the rogue does not have advantage and can not sneak attack.

Which isn't D&D rules as the OP explained.

[dulany67]

Originally posted by Aldaris:

Originally posted by dulany67:

Basically, your rogue must have advantage to perform a sneak attack (button is called "sneak attack" but Larian communication says "back stab"). No class currently gets advantage from flanking, so the rogue either has to be in stealth or at height to sneak attack. If the rogue has both advantage and disadvantage, they cancel out- and so the rogue does not have advantage and can not sneak attack.

Which isn't D&D rules as the OP explained.

But it is how the game currently works.

[Aldaris]

Originally posted by dulany67:

Originally posted by Aldaris:

Which isn't D&D rules as the OP explained.

But it is how the game currently works.

Which is irrelevant to their point. It's not supposed to work like that