Thief Acrobat - No Mercy?

[TheBlueFox]

How does a pure rogue thief acrobat utilize no mercy. As far as I can tell, there are no rogue abilities that induce "Helplessness" on an enemy. There's trip, but that's just a knockdown effect. Assassin has assassinate, Mechanic has wrack construct, but I don't see anything that would place an enemy under the helpless condition.

Stunning blow perhaps, but because the Acrobat's trip abilities, damage, and attack are dexterity based it makes it hard to want to take that.

Is no mercy meant for cross classes?

[Wh070aa]

Stat damage (assasin tree has some, there are weapons with it on), traps (some spell traps do that, mechanic tree has DC boosts to make it work), or if yo play with CC Caster/hierling.

There also are summons (if you UMD/have item for it), weapon and guard effects, and epic destinies later on.

http://ddowiki.com/page/Helpless

Sadly most effects were nerfed, so helplessness sucks now.

[TheBlueFox]

So crippling strike sneak attacks, stat damage weaponry, a caster buddy with hold monster, a fighter/monk buddy with stunning whatever, or serious ranks into mechanic for trapmaking hold Person traps.

Hmm... I think I'll invest only when I've got nothing better...

[Hobgoblin]

So crippling strike sneak attacks, stat damage weaponry, a caster buddy with hold monster, a fighter/monk buddy with stunning whatever, or serious ranks into mechanic for trapmaking hold Person traps.

Hmm... I think I'll invest only when I've got nothing better...

i think you are underestimating what a decent rogue can do with a wop and crippling strike

there is also the fact that sneak damage is multipled by helpless

[Wh070aa]

So crippling strike sneak attacks, stat damage weaponry, a caster buddy with hold monster, a fighter/monk buddy with stunning whatever, or serious ranks into mechanic for trapmaking hold Person traps.

Hmm... I think I'll invest only when I've got nothing better...

its 8 total points of investment for tier 3 Improved Traps. its not that bad, for having skill to DC for many things (Glitterdust and web traps are pretty sweet man). Only problem is setup/casting time and targeting, but AOE, high DC stuns and blindness(free sneak attacks, and 50% miss chance, works on undead) are pretty sweet.

I personally put it down before doors, or sneak(/invisibility)jump on top of enemies and place down traps midair (look at how casters jumpcast, barbs jump potion and drink some jump pots or whatever for best results).

Farming for magic trap parts is kinda boring tho, but it's not that bad (poison traps from Wheloon are the best source).

Try it out even with 50% of you disable device DC you should be able to hit decent DC's.

[Saekee]

you splash 2 barb for ear smash/knockout
OR
run in Fury and do a fury melee hit

[Enderoc]

Aren't knockdowns considered helpless?

[unbongwah]

i think you are underestimating what a decent rogue can do with a wop and crippling strike
Except we're talking about Acrobats, who have lousy crit range with a regular q-staff, and Puncturing is a proc-on-crit effect. So they get a lot less mileage outta Wounding of Puncturing than TWF Assassins. Plus aren't we about to lose the ability to craft WoP in U32?

Aren't knockdowns considered helpless?
Not regular knockdowns (Trip, Sweeping Strikes, etc.): only the KDs from Balanced Attacks and Overwhelming Force, AFAIK.

[HuneyMunster]

In heroic levels its not that useful if you are either soloing or in a group that doesn't have any cc that induces helpless. Epic levels have the choice of Fury destiny as mentioned here already. At level 29 you could take dire charge for aoe stun.

[Saekee]

How does a pure rogue thief acrobat utilize no mercy. As far as I can tell, there are no rogue abilities that induce "Helplessness" on an enemy. There's trip, but that's just a knockdown effect. Assassin has assassinate, Mechanic has wrack construct, but I don't see anything that would place an enemy under the helpless condition.

Stunning blow perhaps, but because the Acrobat's trip abilities, damage, and attack are dexterity based it makes it hard to want to take that.

Is no mercy meant for cross classes?
TWF dex assassins go up the TA tree in part for No Mercy since it synergizes with Balanced Attacks. That doesn't help a stick wielder though.

[TheBlueFox]

That's kind of a shame. Especially since helplessness is perhaps the WORST status effect to be under in the actual pen and paper game.

Helpless meant you were at the mercy of your opponent. Anyone with a rusty spork could come over and Coup De Grace you. And all you can do is hope that nobody does.

Helpless USED to be auto-crit, which meant it was one of the most fun CC statuses, because once you made something helpless all those nifty "On Crit" effects happened every hit, all your numbers were bold, and you were swinging triple digits every strike.

I WOULD take this, if I had my own way of inflicting this status effect. But as it stands now Quarterstaves are not a good weapon for making someone helpless. Even using a sleep trap is 1 strike, and you can't make Hold Monster traps, Only Hold Person. BUT! Even saying that, I WILL probably dabble into mechanic and get the Improved traps ability for hold person traps. Web traps, hold person, and Glitterdust to a certain degree are really good traps to make.

Crippling strike I Have a bit of a problem with.

Back when Helplessness inflicted auto crits I would go around with Dual WoP Rapiers. (This was before the assassin tree had synergy with daggers. This was actually before assassin was even a thing.) And ruining con and str on an enemy was great!

But ever since the change, and the now lack of WoP On items, I actually haven't been able to inflict enough stat damage to offset the pure damage I'm doing to an enemy. Crippling strike reduces an enemies strength score on sneak attacks. You would think that this would be deadly to casters, just like how charisma loss is pretty harmful to anyone who's not a paladin or sorc. The issue is that casters don't live through enough sneak attacks to become helpless unless you're tickling them. Against meatier targets it also seems that they live through enough hits to avoid the condition.

I might take it to mess with it, and see if the lower damage of the quarterstaff (Compared to the rapid plinks of a repeater or the brutal criticals and stabs of a dagger/kukri) can make this a reality. I'll know in 1 more level when I hit 13.

[Saekee]

back in the day, stunning items had a chance to proc a stun on the target on any attack (maybe it was 'dazing' lootgen?). Not sure what is going on now but that is something to consider--it would proc a half dozen times in medium quests.
Stun=helpless
edit: it was the old 'stunning' items not dazing that had a 3% proc like this one: http://m.ddowiki.com/page/Item:Ratkiller_(Level_8)

there were also monk rogue splashes to take advantage of this-2 monk/18 rogue unarmed wisdom-based stunning fist

[TheBlueFox]

edit: it was the old 'stunning' items not dazing that had a 3% proc like this one: http://m.ddowiki.com/page/Item:Ratkiller_(Level_8)

there were also monk rogue splashes to take advantage of this-2 monk/18 rogue unarmed wisdom-based stunning fist

That makes absolutely no sense at all. Stunning fist cannot be used with a weapon, it can only be used unarmed. Using ARMOR with stunning, maybe though.

I actually had originally thought of using armor with stunning to utilize the No Mercy ability, but it's not available as a weapon proc anymore, only + to stunning blow which is still strength based.

[Saekee]

That makes absolutely no sense at all. Stunning fist cannot be used with a weapon, it can only be used unarmed. Using ARMOR with stunning, maybe though.

I actually had originally thought of using armor with stunning to utilize the No Mercy ability, but it's not available as a weapon proc anymore, only + to stunning blow which is still strength based.
wraps had stunning. eg:

http://m.ddowiki.com/images/Stonedust_handwraps_description.jpg

[TheBlueFox]

Ah, by your wording I thought you meant that rogue splashes were able to take advantage of "This", "This" being the item that you linked, which was a maul or some such.

Which, as wonderful as it is, does not help the Stick monk trying to use stick abilities. I'm not going to multi into a Monk just to use fist powers that require an entirely different synergy...blarg

[Saekee]

Ah, by your wording I thought you meant that rogue splashes were able to take advantage of "This", "This" being the item that you linked, which was a maul or some such.

Which, as wonderful as it is, does not help the Stick monk trying to use stick abilities. I'm not going to multi into a Monk just to use fist powers that require an entirely different synergy...blarg

yes--there were all sorts of lootgen stunning items so rogues could use a weapon of choice with stunning. I just linked the Ratkiller maul as an example & tge wraps screenie shiws the description (of the % to stun on every hit with a DC). These lootgen were dropped by Turbine, maybe when lootgen got ghostbaned.

Still, this is not very helpful, so apologies.

[Wh070aa]

There is also that rogue feat that does 2 strength damage on SA hits.

[Saekee]

There is also that rogue feat that does 2 strength damage on SA hits.

the problem with that is you will take it after the more important ones like imp. evasion, opportunist etc so that means at best late teens--by then, if you are sneak attacking something, it drops real fast, long before stat would go.

I suppose you could make niche beaters like weakening of enfeebling to be a terror to beholders (who have about 10 str) but that crafting prefix/suffix is (I believe) disappearing.

They should change that feat to CON drain so that it is more tempting.

[TheBlueFox]

I haven't yet gotten my rogue to 13 to take crippling strike (Still debating whether or not to take it at 13 or opportunist because I know opportunist is good), but I tried out Crippling strike on my 19 rogue Mechanic with a repeater.

A repeater! Surely that wills stack str loss pretty quick, right?

Not quick enough... with -6 strength per volley (3 shots, all getting strength loss sneak attacks) but triple sneak attack damage, enemies at level 19 drop utterly dead before I see the helplessness.

The only time I've seen it land is with an enemy that had some kind of piercing resistance to my main damage, but I was still getting sneak attack damage off on him. It made him helpless JUST before he bit the dust.

Granted, I am using a powerful crossbow (http://ddowiki.com/page/Item:The_Fatal_Flaw) but still.

I will take it at level 13, worse comes to worse I can talk to fred and have it swapped out after doing the dragonmark quest. I'll see how it works on a stick beater