Sneaky Sneak Attack

When my friend James and I were looking over the playtest packet yesterday, we both noticed the sorry state of Sneak Attack. This is supposed to be an iconic class feature for the rogue -- perhaps even more so than, say, Turn Undead for the cleric -- but its current incarnation does not appear to be a viable tactical choice.

To use Sneak Attack, the rogue takes disadvantage on the attack roll to gain +1D6 damage on a hit (the damage increases as the rogue goes up in level). As you may recall, the D&D Next "disadvantage" mechanic means that the player rolls a D20 twice and takes the lower result. This is a huge penalty to accuracy. I'm doubly disappointed because I had hoped that the designers had learned their lesson from 4th Edition, where modifiers to hit and modifiers to damage are often presented as roughly equal alternatives (e.g., the Weapon Focus and Weapon Expertise feats). Of course, they're not. Accuracy is far more important. So in D&D Next, why would a low-level rogue ever take such a massive penalty to accuracy for such a small damage bonus?

Well, it turns out that the situation is a bit more complicated. Depending on the type of rogue, the character also gets one of the following two features:

• Backstab: Advantage on attacks if there is another creature hostile to the target within 5 feet of it.
• Isolated Strike: Advantage on attacks if there are no creatures hostile to the target within 5 feet of it.

A rogue with Backstab, for example, is going to try to tag-team with allies in order to gain advantage (roll D20 twice and take the higher number) every round. That's a significant bonus to accuracy. If the rogue wants to use Sneak Attack, then, the advantage from Backstab or Isolated Strike would cancel out the disadvantage from the Sneak Attack mechanic and the rogue would therefore make the attack roll with no bonus or penalty. Weird, huh?

But is that even a good choice? We've already established that taking disadvantage to gain a small damage boost is a poor tactical option. How about the advantage-cancelling-disadvantage situation that would allow a rogue to attack nearly every round with a normal attack roll and Sneak Attack bonus damage? That's a pretty good option, but is it better than foregoing Sneak Attack and simply making normal attacks with advantage every round? At lower levels, when the damage bonus is only +1D6, you're still better off taking advantage on regular attacks because the huge bonus to hit outweighs the measly bonus damage.

So not using your class's iconic combat feature is arguably the superior tactical choice for a large percentage of characters. I think they need to go back to the drawing board on this one.