What's Wrong with Wonnilon?

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Wonnilon is another NPC that has too few Feats (3 instead of 5) and seems to have the wrong ones. What use is Power Attack and Cleave to a little guy with a dagger, except perhaps to damage someone nearby if he drops someone else with a Sneak Attack? A Belt of Giant Strength +6 would help, of course. But Gloves of DEX and Weapon Finesse might be better.

He isn't even proficient with his magical repeating crossbow. Anyone know what's happening with him?

Personally, I think a Repeating Crossbow should be a bonus racial proficiency for Gnomes, due to their knack with mechanical devices (at least in 1E/2E). But then, I'd prefer their racial adjustments to be +2 INT and -2 WIS, rather than CON and STR, but then I'm Old School.

Anyway, I got to grips with the Protos editor and I made these changes, based on how I'd have run the character if I had created him.

As we have Scorpp after going in through the rear Tower and back out, we already had Wonnilon's scroll and crossbow. So I gave him a +2 rapier and mithral shirt as well.

Wonnilon
Ftr/Rog 3/3
True Neutral male Gnome

STR 15 +1 at 12th
DEX 17 +1 at 8th
CON 18
INT 12
WIS 09
CHA 10

01 Rog 01 Imp Inititaive
02 Ftr 01 Exotic - Repeating Crossbow
03 Rog 02 Point Blank Shot
04 Ftr 02 Precise Shot
05 Rog 03
06 Ftr 03 Weapon Focus (Repeating Crossbow)

07 Ftr 04 Weapon Specialisation (Repeating Crossbow)
08 Rog 04
09 Rog 05 Dodge
10 Ftr 05
11 Ftr 06 Mobility
12 Rog 06 Shot on the Run (does it even work?)

I'll give him back Power Attack and Cleave once I've crafted some items for him.

While with the party he'll pump up Use Magic Device, Hide, Move Silently, Listen and Spot as the party Rogue handles traps, locks, Sleight of Hand etc


Can anyone think of any better feats for him?


What about his crossbow? The SRD says: The repeating crossbow (whether heavy or light) holds 5 crossbow bolts. As long as it holds bolts, you can reload it by pulling the reloading lever (a free action). Loading a new case of 5 bolts is a full-round action that provokes attacks of opportunity... you must fire the weapon with two hands in order to use the reloading lever, and you must use two hands to load a new case of bolts.

So is he supposed to use it as a free action and once he fires 5 bolts from the cartridge he loses a round reloading?

Would Rapid Reload be any use to him?

When the description in the game said it can be used without reloading, I thought it generated it's own infinite ammo, but sadly this is not the case.


Cheers

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U can attack with it as u attack with longbow.

I dont think so, but rapid shot would be a great choice. It is to me :evilgrin:

ROTFLOL!!!

Yeah it generates it's own ammo, and you can choose to have +5 bolts, +3 bolts, silver, masterwork BUT NOT ORIDINARY bolts..:no:

SAVE VS: STUPID
FAILED!


P.S. Great work on Wonnilon, I would chose same feats for him.

 

tyranar: Ain't rapid shot only for short- or longbows?

 

yeah in pnp, but it works in the game for repeating crossbow as well. it worked for spugnoir.

 

I don't know why you have such interest in the Shot on the Run feat tree. Mobility is a great feat for getting into melee, or for spellcasters to get out of melee.

But why not just take a 5' step and then blow your full wad on your attacker. At character level 13, he would have 3 attacks. Shot on the Run would only allow you one. Is the AI of Giant types clever enough to close in on you toe to toe, or do they always, I believe, attack from reach. Only if they go toe to toe would you need Mobility / Shot on the Run. Even if they did, you still get +4 Dodge bonus vs Giants.

Accoring to 3.5 srd:
RAPID SHOT [GENERAL]
Prerequisites: Dex 13, Point Blank Shot.
Benefit: You can get one extra attack per round with a ranged weapon.

Obviously, this wouldn't work for thrown weapons (unless one also has Quick Draw).

RAPID RELOAD [GENERAL]
Choose a type of crossbow (hand, light, or heavy).

Oh well, if I were making the rules, I would allow Rapid Reload to reduce the clip change to take a standard action rather than a full-round action.

So, will feats for Elmo and Wonnilon be reworked in a new CMF?

 

They were fixed for Elmo in the 5.05 fix, but they forgot Wonnilon.

I decided against Shot on the Run - I don't think it works properly but I imagined being able to move, fire, move, or fire move, fie and so on as there are lots of awkward corners on several dungeon levels. But usually, as you suggest, a 5 foot step and a full attack where you choose where to shoot your three shots is best. But sometimes a 5 foot step doesn't get you far enough to hit what's hiding in the next room or round the corner.

In ToEE, Rapid Shot gives the repeating crossbow an extra shot per round. I don't know about normal light and heavy crossbows.


Does Many Shot work at all? It doesn't seem to work at the same time as Rapid Shot, but I don't think it even works at all on it's own.

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Manyshot works like a treat (at least in Co8 5.0.0). It takes a standard action to use Manyshot (as in the real rules), and a full attack action to use Rapid Shot, which is why you can't use both at the same time. I've just got Manyshot for my Rogue/Fighter archer and it's excellent - when you want to change position, you move and use Manyshot to attack. If you don't need to change positon (or a 5-foot step is enough), you use a full attack action and Rapid Shot.

Manyshot is actually slightly wrong - it should give a -4 to hit penalty, but only gives -2.

I think if you can just leave both the boxes ticked to select both Manyshot and Rapid Shot and the game will just use whichever is appropriate.

 

Both are usable in PnP simultaneously during a full attack. The archer loads multiple arrows for his first shot as a free action, fires them, and reloads individual arrows for any remaining attacks he has for that full attack, so Rapid Shot should work in conjunction, albeit with a hefty penalty on that first shot (-6) and the regular -2 penalty for the successive shots.

If Manyshot only has a -2 on TOEE, then it is overpowered. It should be -4 for two arrows, -6 for 3 arrows @+11BAB, and -8 for 4 arrows @+16 BAB. These penalty modifiers do not apply to the remaining individual shots for that round.

In PnP, when playing an archer with both feats, I tend not to utilize Rapid Shot because the risk of missing a high AC enemy becomes too great.

 

Are you sure both can be used during a full attack in PnP? From what I understood, a standard action and full attack cannot both be used(unless hasted), and since there's no rules for loading a longbow/shortbow, you can't pre-load a longbow as you would a crossbow. I'm no PnP rules expert by any means though.

 

It seems that we have inferred the rules differently. In support of my position (SRD):

Deciding between an Attack or a Full Attack: After your first attack, you can decide to take a move action instead of making your remaining attacks, depending on how the first attack turns out.

For example, IMHO, one could use Manyshot and apply the Rapid Shot penalty - just in case you wish to continue with the full-attack. Also, if the rules wish to prevent this kind of combination, it would state that drawing the arrows requires a move action.

 

Except, if as your first attack you choose to use Manyshot, you've used a standard action (as manyshot requires a standard action), and only have a move action remaining. If you've already used a standard action, you can't then choose to make a full attack in the same round.

The SRD says: "In a normal round, you can perform a standard action and a move action, or you can perform a full-round action. You can also perform one or more free actions. You can always take a move action in place of a standard action."

Since Manyshot is a standard action, you can't then also perform Rapid Shot, which is a full-round action.

That's the bonus of many shot though; in those situations in which you have to move (to get in range, to negate cover) and sacrifice your rapid shot, you can at least still fire multiple arrows, albeit in one shot and at a negative.

 

This rule lawyering is fun!!

Perhaps my Math is too simplistic: Standard Action + Move Action = Full-round Action.

Is there a difference between the attack value of a single attack and the attack value of the first attack in a Full-attack? No.

Let me give another example. A Two-weapon dude does a full-attack and takes the -2 penalty for all his attacks, but he drops his foe with the first hit. Can he then move? Yes (see above).

Also, if we compare the number of attacks of an Archer-Ranger and a Two-weapon-Ranger, we can see that your interpretation seriously weakens the Archer. The former at 11th level would have only 3 arrows with Manyshot + move action OR 4 arrows with Rapid Shot compared with 6 attacks of the melee Ranger. With my interpretation, the Archer-Ranger would have 6 arrows using both Manyshot and Rapid Shot.

Balanced? I would say so, since the Archer-Ranger would still need to use feat slots for Precise Shot to be effective and that his extra Manyshot arrows cannot apply precision-based damage. Moreover, the damage output is typically less than the Two-weapon dude (if character generation by point-buy system).

Back to the Wonnilon feat question above, Shot on the Run is a great feat with Manyshot, but Manyshot cannot be used with Crossbows.

 

Rules lawyering is fun -- I don't know why, but it is.

It's true that the first attack in a full-attack is the same as it is in a single attack, the only difference of course is that when using the full attack action, you can use any iterative attacks you may have, whereas you can't with a single attack. With the single attack you can still move your speed in the round, with the full-attack you're limited to a 5-foot step.

He can move, yes, but then cannot make the rest of his attacks, unless it's only a 5-foot step.

Edit: Strange place for an edit, but this got me to thinking about the retroactive paradoxes possible within the system.

Consider this: A melee fighter is doing battle with a wizard. This wizard opens a portal and a demon charges through and makes a single attack on the fighter. The single attack hurts, so the fighter decides to take only a move action (thus no attack of opportunity) to retreat. There's no exits safely within distance, so he decides to risk it, and moves to the portal that's only 20 feet away and steps through.

On the other side, he immediately finds himself confronted with a weak demon that he knows he could destroy with one hit, and it's only 5 feet away. So far, he's only moved 20 feet, and still has time to stride forward and smite it. He decides to do so. Unfortunately for him, this standard action retroactively created an attack of opportunity from the Demon he left on the other side of the portal...

Hmm, I seem to be getting different numbers than you. The melee ranger should get 5 attacks -- 3 for his BAB, 1 for his offhand attack, and another from improved two weapon fighting. So it would be 5 for the melee ranger, 4 for the archer ranger.

The damage output is a little less, indeed, but this should be balanced. The archer doesn't have to put himself in melee range and thus be vulnerable to devastating melee attacks; he gets to do his damage from the relative safety of range.

Despite this, there always was argument regarding how balanced Ranger/archers were -- strangely enough, the most powerful archer builds combined Cleric and PrC levels. But then again, the most damaging two-weapon builds combined fighter and PrC classes rather than Ranger. The Ranger supposedly made up for this with his other bonuses, increased skill points and skill accessibility. I know that doesn't mean a whole lot in regards to ToEE given its limitations, but that was the rationale.

And finally, from the 3.5 PHB, page 143, paragraph 1 under the heading "Full-Round Actions": "A full-round actions requires an entire round to complete. Thus, it can't be coupled with a standard or a move actions, though if it does not involve moving any distance, you can take a 5-foot step."

 

You forgot about Greater two-weapon Fighting.

I like your example about the portal. I have always felt Withdraw was messed up by allowing double speed (= 2 move actions + some kind of action to pay attention to your adversaries). This is why in my PnP group Withdraw is not allowed. Only Total Defense can be used and Mobility feat is encouraged.

I have actually experienced a less esoteric, but very similar, Witdraw situation: the DM retroactively Aopped me, knocking my character unconscious and negating my hastily planned standard action. Let me know when computer AI can handle that.

You cited, "[Full-round actions] cannot be coupled with a standard or a move action." Of course they can't! I was simply saying that character/monster free-will allows the choice mid-round of retro-actively changing from Full to Standard as per my aforementioned citation.

The question that we are really dealing with is whether or not Manyshot can also be used as part of a Full-round action (with or without Rapid Shot). I concede that the rules do not state this explicitly. To attempt to ascertain the implicit meaning we must look for similar standard action attack feats.

The result of this orthodox view is that Manyshot is a "skirmishing" feat, not part of a hailstorm of arrows. IMHO, the Archer-Ranger has lost a lot of appeal.

I conclude that, lacking any other citations from the canonical texts, my views are heretical and I yield you, Grand Inquisitor. Pelagius shall confine himself and his views to his secretive PnP gatherings. Can anyone redeem me?