blind and sneak attack

[wild_down_under]

I am curious about this....

So I was fighting vampires that do sneak attack. I blinded them with Word of Faith. Yes, I checked and they were indeed blind. I fought them, no problem. The curious thing I saw was that they still did sneak attack.

So my question is, if something is blind.... can they/should they be able to do sneak attack?

[Hellblazer]

yes they can, in a rp way it takes long and special training to learn where to precisely hit to do the most damage. unlike let say a barbarian that just swings his axe with fury, sneak attacks takes minute and very precise strikes to accomplish. With such specialize training one can learn to do it blind folded (think a bit ninja like vs samurai like for weapon master which I always thought they were closer to). Same goes for weapon master, in the difference that they do not precisely learn to slice and stab at vital points exactly like the rogue learns.

mechanically, you'd have to check if they don't have also blind fighting, which enables one to locate his opponent by sound.

[osxmallard]

I don't believe blindness removes sneak damage, just adds the 50% miss chance, -4 penalty to attack rolls, makes the attacker flat footed, and does not allow attacking ranged targets.

[Dremora]

To be honest I felt that sneak attack was more to do with being an oppurtunist. Not all rogues are ninjas or indeed have any dedicated training to anything. In my view it would be more along the lines of attacking an opponents weak points that are obvious to the eye without any particular regard for fair fighting, such as challenging your opponent to face you or stiking to established sword techniques etc like a fighter may. You see a distracted enemy, you rush in behind your enemy, grab him and stab an unprotected or obviously vital area and thats it.Break off, find new target: Sneak attack. The type of precision and training you mention makes it sound more like Death Attack with some Blind fight training.

Edit: and yes to what Ox said because its the same principle when fighting in darkness. You may fail your SR check, essentially be blinded but you'll be capable of performing sneak attacks as will your opponent even if you are attacking eachother directly. You basically count as flat-footed and so sneak always gets through. This was my understanding of it anyway; its been a while since I fought in darkness without blind fight and have never blinded my opponents with anything else.

[Masterjack]

Sneak attacks only work when the person who has the feat is not in combat against the person he is attacking. So if you are fighting three vampires alone then two out of the three will be able to do sneak attacks against you. The one you are fighting can not because you are dealing with them directly.

One thing I`m not sure about is how Whirlwind attack deals with this in game since you are attacking everyone at once.

[Dremora]

In that situation no vampire would would get a sneak attack if the player's character uses whirlwind. I've used it to take on Misted Village mobs with goblins and halflings that have sneak attack, so I can assure you it prevents sneak attack useage against the PC.

[willhoff]

I agree with Dremora but you have to time the whirlwind attack precisely (something you'll have to play with to get the timing right)  or they will get some sneak attacks in.

[Dremora]

Correct, but since I've played melee characters for ages, I tend not to have problems with it. That said a misclick can land you in a world of hurt if your taking on a tough spawn and everything has sneak .

[Chazzler]

*Gringes his teeth as he recalls a certain spawn of Dark Elf Master Rogues in the Deep*

[Dremora]

That sounds like a spawn in which a misclick would make things very bad indeed.