There's no particular reason it should tank your damage. You're using a dagger anyway and you pick up both Snap Shot and Low Slash as encounter choices by 7th.
It's an interesting case because for a melee user, I honestly believe Darting Strike should be picked over Snap Shot until your static mods become noticably higher (at which point, Tumbling Strike comes online). 1d4+8 is nickels and dimes compared to a very easy to trigger off-turn attack that guarentees another use of Sneak Attack.
Except it is extremely difficult to guarantee that Darting Strike happens against the correct focus fire target and in the first round. No such problem with Snap Shot.
And you can be higher than +8 damage at 8th level reasonably easily: +2 Frost Dagger Shard of +1 coldness +2 Cold damage feat Light Blade Expertise for +1 damage Dex for +6
That's +12 static mods which jumps to +23(+3 frost dagger, +3 shard, +3 feat, +2 expertise, +5 vulnerability, +7 Dex and I'm leaving stuff out such as the possibility of extra crit possibilities, gloves of ice, etc...) by 14th or so.
Actually, you can boost the Samurai's shift distance with the Reckless Scramble feat if you're an Artful Dodger rogue. Anytime a power gives you a shift distance, you can turn it into a "move shift distance +2" so that's 5 squares for a good portion of your career. It's good for more than just rogue powers.
Reckless Scramble is an interesting feat, if you combine it with Daring Gamble on an Artful Dodger rogue. Daring Gamble gives you encounter-long CA whenever someone attacks you, and that includes OAs. If you use Reckless Scramble on a power like Vaulting Charge or First and Final Strike, you can boost your AC against OAs to the point where they can only hit you on a 20, especially if you indulge in gear like the Cloak of Displacement and the Helm of Able Defenses. Unerring Ambush lets you roll twice on attacks in the first round which pairs nicely with Samurai, and if you're a halfling, you can go into Halfling Quickblade in paragon and add your Charisma to your intiative, plus bonuses for things like a Hidden Weapon or a Battle Harness or Warlord (with the former two also helping you be a quickdraw samurai). Reckless Scramble also turns Acrobatic Strike into a "move 3 squares before or after the attack" which can help you close the distance, which is nice.
So you can have an iniative in the high 50s, with the option to roll twice if you really want to drop a feat on it, and pretty much ensure that you go first. Then you fire up Daring Gamble, then use Vaulting Charge/First and Final Strike to zoom through enemy ranks, boosting your AC and provoking OAs. Anyone who takes a swing at you will probably miss (unless they target one of your NADs with their MBA, which is usually just incorporeal enemies vs. Reflex, but there are other options so watch out) and grant you CA until the end of the encounter. With Reckless Scramble, you can provoke OAs on something like three or four times your speed in distance after throwing Tumbling Strike in there, so you might be able to draw a fairly good loop around the field before finding a spot in the center to turtle for a round, using Swift Parry/Second Chance/Leaping Dodge as appropriate (since this is a build that does not care too much about OAs that target AC, Leaping Dodge can help). With all this quick draw stuff (and maybe Fast Hands if you're really especially classy), you can basically iaijutsu everything to death even if only your first power officially does that. Just take a rapier and pretend it's a swordcane, and you too can be stylish.
I have no idea what the highest initiative bonuses on monsters are though, so I have no idea if +54 to Initiative, roll twice at level 30 is overkill or not (I suspect it is).
My DDI access failed on me over the weekend, so bear with me. I'm gonna do what I can off the top of my head...
MwaO:
Yes, 1d4+12 is reasonable damage for a minor attack (its what, 20% SMHP at level 7?), though I cannot understate just how awesome getting an off-turn attack with guarenteed CA really is - with the same frost setup, that could be 1d4+2d8+18 or so, nearly 40% SMHP. The key here is that the value of sneak attack has a massive premium in heroic, because the damage output is nearly equivalent to a standard MBA. I don't think you're wrong for prefering Snap Shot, but I don't think I'm necessary wrong for prescribing Darting Strike either - the power is basically analogous to Curtain of Steel on a barbarian (off turn, big damage, reliable trigger but can't control target).
LightWarden:
Yeah, +54 double roll initiative is pretty ridiculous overkill.
I still can't justify rating Samurai any higher than black because it requires a very situational feat to fix a half-functioning power. Unless you're playing in a very confined dungeon with small maps and limited space, there are going to be often times when even a move 5 won't cut it. Commonly in paragon+, you're going to see large-size maps where this simply won't work. Alternatively, your DM might just wise up to you and start placing his creatures 6 away to start the fight.
Same deal with Daring Gamble. While I inherently like the power (possibly because I mount it on a mass-marking hybrid Rogue|Paladin build), it is excessively subjective to DM discretion. A smart DM who wises up to your antics will just not take the OAs, at which point Daring Gamble becomes a very mild deterrence factor, or else a small consolation for getting the crap beat out of you. The rest of what you described seems fairly typical of Artful Dodger play though, since being able to gain free choice targetting capacity with little fear of OA reprisal is basically their calling card.
And before we open a can of worms on the whole 'If your DM's metagaming his monsters, he's a jerk', I offer the opposite perspective of 'My DM is taking me seriously as an optimizer by playing intelligently. That he is playing his A-game is a nod of respect.' All power ratings should be viewed under the assumption of optimal play - from both sides of the table. The fact some factors are up to the DM rather than solely within the realm of your own control, they get dinged in the face of truly optimal behavior. If your DM is much more forgiving, then you may easily consider the power to be more desirable at your own perogative.
Interesting point, the one about respect. It's one that doesn't come up often but is worth debating - at which point does the line between respecting an optimized party and metagaming to even things up get crossed? The power that comes to mind as a benchmark for this kinda stuff is Brash Assault. By a rules-reading of it, the mob knows it's gonna eat an attack if it takes the shot - which is patently ludicrous, because what, suddenly all monsters have a flash of mind-reading insight? I consider it metagaming if the DM always forgoes the shot because he has out of game reasons to do so, even if we're fighting dumb beasts (and honestly, even when fighting experienced swordsmen because they shouldn't see the trap coming without in-character knowledge, at least the first time), but wouldn't consider it metagaming if he employed the occasional Ready Action on a monster to bypass a Fighter's challenge, so long as it didn't become the norm. Where's the line drawn?
Mountain Cleave Rule: You can have any sort of fun, including broken, silly fun, so long as I get to have that fun too (e. g., if you can warp reality with your spells, I can cleave mountains with my blade).
My personal feeling is that its not just a combat sim, but a roleplaying game. 1 or 2 intelligence monsters act on instinct, not on my combat knowledge (I'm usually the DM). If I have party members abusing setups, and tricks (I usually don't, its me thats the optimizer in our groups) I'd add an extra monster or 2 to compensate, not make dumb monsters metagamers.
Thats not to say its badwrongfun if you guys like the combat sim aspect, but if I have Hobgoblins with tactical knowledge, they'll catch on fast to your tricks and communicate to each other. Large rats, not so much, they won't catch on, or communicate with each other. I also would only abuse readying if the party was abusing it. Its lame.
It devalues the abilities themselves if the DM stops provoking. Thats my feeling on it.
No, it isn't. Unless you're hitting on a 2 even after the penalty, which I doubt.
When attacking from hidden, Champions of the Vigil re-roll misses. Plus, if I really want to be funny, I can land and use my normal movement mode (walking) to make all of my normal attacks without any -2 penalty. The flight is for the shift-2 eldritch strike hiding. The attack of opportunity gains a +CHA to hit and damage, from Yakuza, and re-rolls misses.
So yes, I basically hit on a 2 and re-roll 1s for the attacks of opportunity, the only time I actually need to be in the air. Further, the fact that I am mostly on the ground means enemies have even less reason to suspect a hidden rogue hovering in the air either above them or above-diagonoly from them. I can soak a -2 penalty and not give a damn.
Two seconds of thought after looking at the build would have made this clear, so you either did not think, or just did not bother to look at the build.
My personal feeling is that its not just a combat sim, but a roleplaying game. 1 or 2 intelligence monsters act on instinct, not on my combat knowledge (I'm usually the DM). If I have party members abusing setups, and tricks (I usually don't, its me thats the optimizer in our groups) I'd add an extra monster or 2 to compensate, not make dumb monsters metagamers.
Thats not to say its badwrongfun if you guys like the combat sim aspect, but if I have Hobgoblins with tactical knowledge, they'll catch on fast to your tricks and communicate to each other. Large rats, not so much, they won't catch on, or communicate with each other. I also would only abuse readying if the party was abusing it. Its lame.
It devalues the abilities themselves if the DM stops provoking. Thats my feeling on it.
I agree with the sentiment, but would like to point out that at paragon, high paragon, and all of epic, 90% of the opponents you face ARE highly intelligent; demons, devils, dragons, the like.
Additionally, a lot of monsters with low intelligence have surpisingly high wisdom - the stat I'd reference for a monster's insight into your tactics and abilities, anyway. Hell, I'd say a monster with 20 intelligence but 8 wisdom is more likely to fall for a trick then catch on to it.
When attacking from hidden, Champions of the Vigil re-roll misses. Plus, if I really want to be funny, I can land and use my normal movement mode (walking) to make all of my normal attacks without any -2 penalty. The flight is for the shift-2 eldritch strike hiding. The attack of opportunity gains a +CHA to hit and damage, from Yakuza, and re-rolls misses.
To be fair, the build is tucked away a few pages back, and so a knee-jerk reaction to taking a -2 to hit isn't really anything unexpected out of left field. I actually completely missed the benefit of Champion of the Vigil when I first saw the build as well, because literally the first and only thing I saw was "hey, an Eldstrike Charger/Yakuza with perma-hidden capabilities. Sweet!"
Also, there are some items in the game I'd frankly rather pretend didn't exist if I could. One of them is the flying broom, the other, the chain shirt. Unfortunately, they do exist and I have to give them begrudgingly excellent ratings (the latter of which is gold). But seriously, I would never get these things for myself unless the DM was seriously, seriously asking for it.
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The thing about Brash Strike was that it was written prior to the advent of MBA-strikers. Unless marked by a defender, at which point you have a perfectly valid reason not to take the attack, it was at least reasonably fair for the monster to take the extra attack because at the rate of hp and damage the system was used it, it was a somewhat equitable exchange of damage which sped up the overall resolution of combat, generally a good thing for both sides of the table. Nowadays, the equation is so utterly weighted to the MBA-striker side of the table, that while it might not be in-character for a dumb creature not to take the free hit, the person on the other side of the table controlling the creature would literally feel bad to do something so utterly dumb.
So sure, expecting your DM to take the hits based on intelligence of the creature might be more fun because its realistic, but in game terms, it could also feel like you're really just exploiting bad AI - the novelty of which wears off after a while. For the record, I take a combat-sim approach to all of this because that assumes the most conservative, 'worst-case-scenario' position, and everything could only get better.
Also, readied actions are another can of worms. As a rogue, it's almost a dominant strategy to do it because the 1/turn nature of your feature actively encourages you to seek off-turn attack applications, and in doing so, directly obsolete the feat Slaying Action. But the fear is that it openly invites DMs to try the same readied action tactics on you to circumvent mark punishment (or your own riposte strike). There's effectively an unspoken compact there that neither of you play like dicks that make it both hard to describe and judge. My only advice is that if you're readying actions just so you can sneak attack, try and do so with a plausibly legitimate trigger that actually conveys tactical meaning rather than is a blatant attempt to score SA again. Alternatively, pick powers such as Lashing Blade that naturally give up your standard action in favor of a certain-trigger off-turn action.
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On the state of the handbook: I'm not a deadbeat! Really! I finally get a decent chunk of time to work on this today, but at worst, I just take what LDB has pre-written, copypasta, and slowly work on updates throughout the rest of the week.
The thing about Brash Strike was that it was written prior to the advent of MBA-strikers. Unless marked by a defender, at which point you have a perfectly valid reason not to take the attack, it was at least reasonably fair for the monster to take the extra attack because at the rate of hp and damage the system was used it, it was a somewhat equitable exchange of damage which sped up the overall resolution of combat, generally a good thing for both sides of the table. Nowadays, the equation is so utterly weighted to the MBA-striker side of the table, that while it might not be in-character for a dumb creature not to take the free hit, the person on the other side of the table controlling the creature would literally feel bad to do something so utterly dumb.
Actually, the problem with Brash Assault is that it is stupid to use Brash Assault - if the DM doesn't take the free attack, then the Warlord has done a 1w+stat attack that is strictly worse than an MBA.
