Spreadsheet analysis- Vital strike

[dataseer21]

Basically everyone kept talking about vital strike. I already closed the spread sheet. It was done with a d8 weapon like a longbow. Assuming hits and resolved crits for calculation simplification. A regular attack does more damage than vital strike. This difference in damage in multiplied with magical weapons. As the benefit from magical weapons increases with multiple attacks but not with vital strike. I didn't count feats like rapid shot and many shot or whatever it is called giving 2 additional attacks.

It really is a shame that I closed the document. Assuming all hits is a big ask but even if the last shot misses for the multiple attacks the non vital strike attack is still much stronger.

There is only it seems one glaring exception. Rowdy rogue is made for vital strike. Also with the damage increase I think that it is the only way you should be using vital strike. Not only do you get it sooner which is overpowered but you also potentially add 20d6 extra dice. This makes it have more damage than regular attacks. That is assuming hits for the most part. I think assuming hits is more favorable to the rowdy rogue because it is a 3/4 BAB attacker and the fighter and demonslayer can get large bonuses to hit increasing the disparity.

I was getting numbers toward the end where the 4 times bonus vital strike was like half the damage of the 4 attacks.

In short there seems to be a lot of misinformation on the web. Or at least in these forums. Vital strike actually doesn't seem to be that good with first inspection. It is just that rowdy rogue gets a super large damage bonus.

I will probably forget about this post and this is just with the first inspection of the way that things work in act 1. I guess it could be different if vital strike multiplied the bonus from an extra 1d6 in sonic for a weapon or something.

Right now I'm thinking of doing a game with 3 archers. One rowdy vital strike, one fighter vital strike, and one demon slayer regular attack. Then I will compare the difference.

I think the confusion with something like this is that vital strike is a huge number. It is big and shiny. But with the math it seems that regular attacks typically beat it with the exception of rowdy. Or some rowdy multiclass but then I think before calculating anything that rowdy could be your best bet. Assuming people aren't lying about getting their huge bonuses to hit they claim.

[Soul]

i'd say its probably better off on characters like arcane tricksters....

rowdy rogue dip.... arcane trickster 10.... thats 9d6 sneak attack there... plus 1 from book in Act 5.... pluse sense vitals extended to 24 hour duration would give another 5d6 sneak attack.... and finally a loremaster dip for greater vital strike and precise shot to negate the -4 penalty for shooting into melee.... also invisibility greater and mind blank 24 hour duration for sneak attacks all day.... oh and hurricane bow and enlarge person spells...

so longbow wise thats +2 size increases turning 1d8 into 3d6... which greater vital strike turns into 12d6..... and with all the sneak attack from before is total of 15d6 sneak attack.... so 30d6 vital force.... with greater invisibility 24 hour duration then sneak attack is always in effect.... making it a total of 57d6 worth of damage... legendary proportions can make that number even higher.... but that damage is basically like a hellfire ray thats been intensified that you can spam per round...

and as a caster your BAB just isnt nearly as good as full martial characters.... and being able to move and use vital strike / greater vital strike gives you an edge over other characters that need to move in 5ft increments in order to pull off their full BAB worth of attacks from ranged... poor Lann use to be the powerhouse for me early game....

playing a game now going that route with both me and Nenio as Arcane tricksters but different specializations of spells.... and especially early game their just deleting enemies before other characters can react pretty much... and lots of ways to get sneak attacks added.... tanks have mounts so always flanking when their engaged.... glitterdust to aoe blind..... greater invisibility to sneak attack and deny their Dex to AC making em easier to hit... quicken rod with true strike for +20 to hit... till sorcerous reflex that is and can do it for free quicken every combat...

[dataseer21]

I didn't think of if you combo it with a ton of spells. I would imagine though that it can still fall behind. I guess arcane trickster might be a really good use of it. It is just that I made an error in the spreadsheet I think(I since closed it without saving) I just multiplied crit damage on all of the weapon dice including the increase from vital strike.

So that is about 200 damage on average with what you said soul.

I remember the one that was crazy but didn't stand out for a good portion of the game. That was my 2 weapon demonslayer. I think I got like 9 or 10 attacks. That was +10 damage with favored enemy. Weapons that did like 1d4+3(rounding because they were two different). It was angel so I added a 2d6 from the angel ability. I didn't even use the angel broken spells. There is a spell that adds like 5d6 on a hit and its name escapes me that is an angel spell. so that right there from 9 or 10 attacks would be like 70d6 with +70 damage from favored enemy + 10d4+30 + 6*10 from strength = 425 damage. I remember that I increased the difficulty on deskari for the combat. I don't remember what difficulty I put it at but it was one of the higher ones. I reduced deskari to like half health in one round from one guy. I should have taken a pet but I didn't.

But I think that we agree though is that some amount of rowdy seems to be what makes vital strike viable.

[Soul]

Originally posted by dataseer21:

I didn't think of if you combo it with a ton of spells. I would imagine though that it can still fall behind. I guess arcane trickster might be a really good use of it. It is just that I made an error in the spreadsheet I think(I since closed it without saving) I just multiplied crit damage on all of the weapon dice including the increase from vital strike.

So that is about 200 damage on average with what you said soul.

I remember the one that was crazy but didn't stand out for a good portion of the game. That was my 2 weapon demonslayer. I think I got like 9 or 10 attacks. That was +10 damage with favored enemy. Weapons that did like 1d4+3(rounding because they were two different). It was angel so I added a 2d6 from the angel ability. I didn't even use the angel broken spells. There is a spell that adds like 5d6 on a hit and its name escapes me that is an angel spell. so that right there from 9 or 10 attacks would be like 70d6 with +70 damage from favored enemy + 10d4+30 + 6*10 from strength = 425 damage. I remember that I increased the difficulty on deskari for the combat. I don't remember what difficulty I put it at but it was one of the higher ones. I reduced deskari to like half health in one round from one guy. I should have taken a pet but I didn't.

But I think that we agree though is that some amount of rowdy seems to be what makes vital strike viable.

I agree about the rowdy thing....

I used to stay away from arcane trickster and all just going pure caster.... but with that one patch adding intensified metamagic decided to try it out.... cause bolster wouldnt allow sneak attacks.... but intensified metamagic does... so base spell is normal with sneak attack.... then intensified and sneak attack stacks.... then intensified and bolster for the next level....

also playing as a sage sorcerer for first time.... and while multiclassing I dont get much out of the bloodline itself... having my stat casting modifier as intelligence for once is nice... im a skill monkey.... or fox just like Nenio lol....

also... think its doing pretty decent.... latest run I reached Act 3 like 4 hours earlier than I usually do...

[Gentlest Giant]

So you made a model that assumed all hits and used a d8 for base damage and thought that was sufficient to conclude something fishy was going on?
Do it properly.

[Сосались_2_Оленя]

Originally posted by Gentlest Giant:

So you made a model that assumed all hits and used a d8 for base damage and thought that was sufficient to conclude something fishy was going on?
Do it properly.

Agree. The whole point of Vital Strike is modifying the BASE weapon damage dice, so logically you should take a weapon with the highest base dice and built around it. Taking a crappy d8 dice to calculate does Vital Strike no justice.

There are several classes in particular that work with base damage dices: warpriest, sword saint, and classes with access to Lead Blades spell (ranger, hunter).
For SS in partucular, you can take an earthbreaker (2d6 base dice - the highest in the game) or the Battleforged warhammer (the highest base physical damage in the game). With the special SS ability Perfect Strike your base damage is now always 12 (maximazied). Couple that with either quickened True Strike or True Strike as a move action (with aspect of Coloxus on Demon mythic) and your SS becomes a fun blender.
Lead blades spell with something like Battleforged warhammer is also really fun.
Also please do not optimise the fun out of game with all those spreadsheets lol. That's how whole communities die, with only minmaxers left alive.

[hilburnashua]

One major problem with the OP's spreadsheeting is he isn't taking into account Mythic Vital Strike which multiples the bonus damage by the same that amount the base damage dice would be multiplied. So x2 for Vital, x3 for Improved, X4 for Greater (although the base dice aren't being multipled, they are technically bonus dice). One reason this is important is when you consider the effects of iterative attack penalties vs the high AC of many creatures in this game. One hit that does two, three or four times damage is much better then three or four attacks attacks if two of the attacks have a low probability to hit.

Another major problem with the OP's analysis is that he is using a ranged weapon for comparison. Trouble with this is ranged weapons can almost always full attack. One of the areas in which vital strike is amazing is when you need to be able to move up to attack an opponent. One of the reasons why mounts are so broken in WotR is they can take a full move actions and the rider still gets a full attack round instead of the standard attack they are supposed to get.

The bigger damage die and increasing it doesn't really change things too much. If you are doing 6d6 (two handed sword 2d6, lead blades makes it 3d6, legendary proportions makes that 6d6) and you are making 4 attacks a round that have a high hit chance the damage isn't really any different then if you make one attack and do four times damage. In fact, if you have a high crit chance you would have a chance to do more damage since a crit with two or more attacks will do more damage then a crit with one vital strike. Although that math does change a bit with Mythic Vital Strike.

Yes, Rowdy Rogue is very overpowered. Owlcat created the archetype, it isn't an official Pathfinder archetype.

[hilburnashua]

If I remember correctly, Warpriests weapons do a base 2d8 at level 20, combine that with lead blades and legendary proportions it should 6d8, 8d8 if the FexWiki is correct in saying monk unarmed damage is 4d8 for a large lvl 20 monk.

In tabletop a lvl 20 monk does 2d10 with an unarmed attack so WotR is a bit nerfed.

[dataseer21]

Man I had a whole thing typed out but then I clicked on something and it all disappeared. Noooooo. I don't want to type it out again so I will just include a portion.

Ignoring rowdy and ignoring the mythic ability to analyze vital strike. 4x with the 3d6 weapon dice would only add 12d6 damage. That is 42 damage. With 4 attacks at level 20. Can you do more than 42 damage with 3 attacks admittingly with -5s. Furthermore other options can give additional attacks. Can you do more than 42 damage with 5 attacks for example many shot. Can you do more than 42 damage with extra attacks with two weapons. Or the -5/+15 which translates to 45 extra damage.

I admit that the appeal was that you only hit with the first attack kind of idea. People are out here though talking about getting +100 to hit. I'm done. I typed out a huge thing then clicked on something and it all disappeared.

[Soul]

Originally posted by dataseer21:

Man I had a whole thing typed out but then I clicked on something and it all disappeared. Noooooo. I don't want to type it out again so I will just include a portion.

Ignoring rowdy and ignoring the mythic ability to analyze vital strike. 4x with the 3d6 weapon dice would only add 12d6 damage. That is 42 damage. With 4 attacks at level 20. Can you do more than 42 damage with 3 attacks admittingly with -5s. Furthermore other options can give additional attacks. Can you do more than 42 damage with 5 attacks for example many shot. Can you do more than 42 damage with extra attacks with two weapons. Or the -5/+15 which translates to 45 extra damage.

I admit that the appeal was that you only hit with the first attack kind of idea. People are out here though talking about getting +100 to hit. I'm done. I typed out a huge thing then clicked on something and it all disappeared.

why would you ignore mythic vital strike feat?..... if your wanting to run with vital strike its basically part of the build afterall.... not counting it is basically like giving it a handicap against it....

greater vital strike hits for 4 times base weapon damage..... which you could get as soon as level 8 pretty much though loremaster.... normally its a feat that requires 16 BAB in order to get.... and normal martial characters like fighters only have 2 attacks per round by that level....

so my arcane trickster is doing 4 weapon attacks worth while my martial's are dealing only 2 weapon attacks..... without haste.... and both melee and ranged have to worry about positioning in order to take advantage of the full BAB of multiple attacks.... enemy out of range?... gotta move and attack one time..... greater vital strike builds can move more than 5ft step and attack.... even surprise rounds where you dont get all your actions and are limited to only a standard action the greater vital strike build can still attack just fine...

and with mythic greater vital strike it multiplies all the other bonuses that would normally be multiplied for multiple attacks.... so in essence greater vital strike mythic feat makes the damage of your greater vital stirke mirror as if you had made 4 attacks with strength bonuses and such added alongside the normal base weapon damage....

the only downsides are if you can attack more than 4 times then it drops off.... and if you are playing a crit build like with outflank or cleaving shots... more shots = more chances to crit = more chances to proc outflank or cleaving shots

but even then..... vital strike and greater vital strike do great at surprise rounds where you dont have your full BAB available....

also rowdy makes it even more useful if your building a sneak attack build... making it about 60d6 worth of damage in one shot....

[mk11]

Also, Vital Strike is good against those tough enemies where you use True strike to get that bonus to hit. Also Vital Strike + Mythic Vital Strike + 2h-wpn + power attack + Mythic power attack then focused strike to get the vital strike to hit even though iterative attacks would miss.

[dataseer21]

I could be mistaken but a roll of 20 auto hits it just doesn't auto crit. So vital strike would be better on hard to hit enemies that you hit on a 20? However with 4 attacks you would hit about 19.6% of the time. More attacks more 20s.

I am currently ignoring the mythic ability because I'm not at a point to test it in game. It could change some things. This is analysis of vital strike not what over powered stuff they put in the game. Like rowdy. A question is if they put demonslayer in the game? You could just select all demons in kingmaker after all. I didn't play pnp pathfinder. Like items are obviously ignored.

The other uses that I could see is bypass damage reduction but I haven't tested that to see how the game does the math.

Also you should consider that it is a 4 feat investment. With the mythic.

Also the uses that I thought of so far where you could you it as someone says is if you are melee person you can do it in place of one attack but full attack is still better with multiple.

So those are the 2 applications that I could think of.

It is possible that the mythic ability is so overpowered that it is like last stand which is basically an auto take almost every time. Compared with always a chance that is near useless. Like if the mythic ability is basically like a guaranteed crit every time.

[Soul]

Originally posted by dataseer21:

I could be mistaken but a roll of 20 auto hits it just doesn't auto crit. So vital strike would be better on hard to hit enemies that you hit on a 20? However with 4 attacks you would hit about 19.6% of the time. More attacks more 20s.

I am currently ignoring the mythic ability because I'm not at a point to test it in game. It could change some things. This is analysis of vital strike not what over powered stuff they put in the game. Like rowdy. A question is if they put demonslayer in the game? You could just select all demons in kingmaker after all. I didn't play pnp pathfinder. Like items are obviously ignored.

The other uses that I could see is bypass damage reduction but I haven't tested that to see how the game does the math.

Also you should consider that it is a 4 feat investment. With the mythic.

Also the uses that I thought of so far where you could you it as someone says is if you are melee person you can do it in place of one attack but full attack is still better with multiple.

So those are the 2 applications that I could think of.

It is possible that the mythic ability is so overpowered that it is like last stand which is basically an auto take almost every time. Compared with always a chance that is near useless. Like if the mythic ability is basically like a guaranteed crit every time.

basically mythic vital strike works like.... well greater vital strike for instance... its one attack..... that just quadruples your base weapon damage.... so if you do 3d6 its gonna hit 12d6.... so its almost like 4 attacks in one but not quite there yet.... mythic vital strike brings it there.... your enhancement bonuses and stat bonuses will be quadrupled as well.... so lets say you have a +5 strength bonus with a +5 enhancement composite longbow.... just greater vital strike by itself wont multiply that damage.... but mythic vital strike will quadruple those numbers so +20 from strength and +20 from enhancement bonus damage added on.... making it really as if you attacked 4 times at once...

of course the downside is its just one attack so cant spam against multiple enemies.... only able to take out one at a time basically... and outflank and cleaving shot type builds that rely on crits wont be wanting to spam this....

but its a great replacement for cantrips for spellcasters.... lol

full progression spellcasters usually get like 2 attacks by max level.... and their BAB is the lowest of all the classes... a +10 / +5 to their base attack bonus compared to say a fighter who has a +20 / +15 / +10 / +5 to their BAB...

as for feat requirements... its not that big of a deal with spellcasters.... I mean one rowdy rogue dip gives you vital strike.... so essentially 2 attacks worth of damage at the start of the game.... 1 feat for accomplished sneak attacker which adds more damage to sneak attack and vital force..... so a dip and a feat so far.... then pick up a knowledge world or arcane to qualify for loremaster by level 8.... and 3 dips into loremaster can nab you precise shot and greater vital strike without requirements...

[dataseer21]

So this isn't a type of spread sheet analysis. This is from the game combat turnbased. I just did the defenders heart on core. Seelah with a mount got 5 kills, Rowdy got 12, Fighter got 9, and Demonslayer got a measly 4. Demonslayer from prior playthroughs seems to pop off toward the later part of the game. I counted the kills from the animal companions because that is part of the character. Though I forgot to level up the boar of the demonslayer and I didn't get boon companion so it was level 1. Everybody was level 5 and I got a near perfect with no damage done to the building or whatever. This doesn't go against what I said rowdy is overpowered. Now that I know it was homebrew from the devs I think people should respect people that do homebrew that they playtest more.

Then I did another combat on core. This time it was the boss that drains levels in the market square. This one I'm going to count it but there are problems. Still though the way it turned out means that it is even more shifted in the direction of the fighter. The fighter did more damage than rowdy rogue. Then with the ghouls for some reason the rowdy was useless and the fighter was one of 3 characters not paralyzed that ended the encounter.

So some people give more credence to in game play than spreadsheets. If someone has a truly bad take I will block them. Though feel free to comment. Don't take it personally it is the way of the internet.

The fighter and demonslayer didn't have vital strike which this thread is about. However the fighter did have deadly aim and rapid shot with weapon specialization and point blank shot/precise shot. The demon slayer had rapid shot and pointblank/precise. Appropriate weapon focuses. Fighter did way more damage of the two. Fighter had better to hit than rowdy but against demons demonslayer had better to hit than fighter. I'm still going to get vital strike on fighter but not on demonslayer. This in a sense gives a sense of the power of vital strike whether it is good or bad. For the fighter I can easily switch between the two.

Also there are some flaws. Putting it at core the beginning of the tavern defense everyone was hit with stinking clouds. Though the rest of the fight went off fine.

Also I'm doing archery because that is what everyone mentioned in the comments of other threads. Suddenly in these comments they aren't fine with it. I don't know what happened. Also demonslayer is slightly underpowered because they have a shortbow. The reason is because the other two are taking up longbows. Just for item scarcity.

Also fighter archer is good. Shocker.

[dataseer21]

Also until I know what the mythic multiplies I'm not comfortable commenting on it. It could be a reasonable buff or it could be an auto take. Maybe that is why everyone keeps talking about vital strike because the devs didn't know how to balance one of them. Which is fine last stand is still the strongest.

[dataseer21]

Oh also for tavern fight the rowdy got more possibly because she was targeting some of the weaker ones I think. The other two got stuck a couple of rounds on demons with high damage reduction.