[3.5] [Feat] An arrow astray might as well have been thrown away. (P.E.A.C.H.)

[Draco Dei]

Regarding thread title: The series this was from was... passible at best. Also, I had to redo the phrase to make it fit in the character limit.

Sniper's Patience [Fighter]
You can see the path of the arrow in your mind before it ever leaves the string. If it is not acceptable, you simply do not fire.
Prerequisites: Far Shot (PH), +7 base attack bonus
Benefit: Once per round if one of your ranged attack rolls would miss by 3 or more you do not actually fire that specific shot (including all arrows of a Many-Shot). This still takes the same amount of time/actions as actually firing, but conserves ammunition (and spells such as True Strike since the attack is never actually made), prevents the need for repeated hide checks, and overall preserves the element of surprise.
Special: A fighter may select Sniper's Patience as one of his fighter bonus feats.


Like a lot of my stuff, this is really niche, but at the very least it helps save on expensive arrows, and with an ACTUAL sniper/assassin build it could be invaluable. If it is too powerful, we can throw on Precise Shot, and/or Improved Precise Shot as pre-requisites, or drop the bit about conserving True Strike.

In Jan 2013, I had the following conversation about this feat:

(click to show/hide)

20:13   <DracoDei >Very niche, but also very strong.
20:14   <DanielDraco >Yeah, incredibly niche. I see the utility in it...hrm, I wonder if there might be a way to make it an eensy bit more useful. Because it doesn't actually make you any more powerful. It just makes you less likely to get unlucky.
20:15   <DracoDei >If you are really sniping, it means you have a 15% chance of ever missing.
20:15   <DracoDei >If your target is somewhat stationary.
20:16   <DracoDei >It just takes longer to line up the shot sometimes.
20:17   <DanielDraco >Yeah, it's basically like a +7 bonus on your first attack in a surprise round. Which is...eh, really cool to have but will not actually do you very much.
20:17   <HockeyCid >If I am gonna be investing a feat in it, I feel like you could make it any miss at all
20:17   <HockeyCid >Especially given that there are all sorts of other ways for your shot to be messed up, thus totally ruining your whole plan
20:17   <DracoDei >Such as?
20:18   <DanielDraco >Being spotted.
20:18   <HockeyCid >That's probably venturing into Very High-level material, but Protection From Arrows for one
20:18   <HockeyCid >That
20:18   <HockeyCid >Deflect Arrows or any equivalent
20:18   <DracoDei >Miss chances?
20:18   <HockeyCid >and even monks have that
20:18   <HockeyCid >Yes, blink/blur/displacement, etc.
20:19   <DracoDei >Protection from Arrows is bypassed by magical weapons.
20:19   <DracoDei >And thus DOESN'T apply at high-level.
20:19   <HockeyCid >Alright, so you got by one
20:19   <DanielDraco >I would add onto it a damage bonus versus flat-footed foes. The problem with it now is that it near-guarantees your first attack...but that is ONE attack. One attack is /nothing/, in the grand scheme of things.
20:19   <DracoDei >Miss chances... yeah.
20:20   <DracoDei >DanielDraco: Depends. There are a lot of things designed to make that count, especially in homebrew.
20:20   <HockeyCid >I'm just saying that there are other factors in play other than your attack roll, so giving yourself away because you fired and then, for whatever other reason unrelated to your attack roll, missed
20:20   <DracoDei >I could link you to a discipline on the subject.
20:20   <HockeyCid >Or the Tome Assassin
20:20   <HockeyCid >An extreme example, but hey
20:20   <DanielDraco >I can't think of terribly many. Death attacks and true strikes are all I've seen.
20:20   <DracoDei >Haven't read that.
20:21   <DanielDraco >But if you say they exist, then I'll relent to that.
20:21   <DanielDraco >So yeah, if there's enough stuff out there to make the first attack actually matter, then this is a solid feat.
20:21   <HockeyCid >Diamond Mind strikes come to mind
20:22   <DanielDraco >Ranged attacks, cid
20:22   <HockeyCid >Ah, right
20:22   <HockeyCid >derp

[June]

This feels needlessly restrictive. The ability for an arrow to "return" if it misses (but only sometimes) seems pretty low-value, and only early-mid game at that. You already have the ability to retrieve half your missed arrows anyways, after a combat.

I'd consider making it apply to all missed shots, or even just straight-up making it a magic item (a magic quiver, or a +GP ammunition special ability). A cheap one.

[Draco Dei]

Perhaps, but I suspect you are missing some of the functionality, also means that you have only a 15% chance of your first shot missing based on AC if your target is completely unaware of you for a few rounds.

Granted, as was said in the spoilered review, that isn't much if sticking fairly close to published material, but, as was also said there, it does synergize well with homebrew archery ToB-style maneuvers.

EDIT: I'm now strongly considering at least dropping the "1/round" limitation.

[Kazimir_Iskander]

This version drops the true strike while remaining concise:

"Once per round, you may disregard one of your ranged attack rolls after it has been rolled. The action is still spent, but the attack and any associated effects do not occur."


My main concern with this ability is that the attack roll is a mechanical concept intrinsically tied to to a bunch of other things. You are likely to find a lot of weird corner cases with defensive measures that trigger on the attack roll or before it, such as an immediate action spell that ends up going off just from your "intent" to fire.