Spellstriking with Imaginary Weapon - two attacks?

Spellstrike reads:

You Cast a Spell that takes 1 or 2 actions to cast and requires a spell attack roll. Make a melee Strike with a weapon or unarmed attack. Your spell is coupled with your attack, using your attack roll result to determine the effects of both the Strike and the spell.

[...]

One Target: The spell targets only the target of your Strike, even if it normally allows more targets.

[...]

Multiple Defenses: Any additional rolls after the initial spell attack still happen normally, such as the Fortitude save attempted by the target of a disintegrate spell. Similarly, a spell that allows you to attack with it again on subsequent rounds would only combine a Strike with its initial attack roll, not with any later ones.

The Imaginary Weapon cantrip, which a Magus can access via Psychic Dedication, reads:

Amp: You form multiple force weapons to lash out at multiple foes. You make two imaginary weapon Strikes, each against a different target. Your multiple attack penalty doesn't increase until you've made both Strikes.

Does this mean that by Spellstriking with Imaginary Weapon, you can make two Imaginary Weapon Strikes against the same target?

"One Target" says that the spell targets only the target of the Spellstrike. The argument is whether effects that would otherwise have targeted others are lost, or retargeted to the Spellstrike target. The wording seems to favor retargeting. Thus, the One Target rule rewrites the description of Imaginary Weapon's Amp effect to omit "each against a different target". By the rule in Multiple Defenses, the second attack would not be resolved based on the weapon Strike, but it's still two attacks with extra heightening damage.

No. You only get one Spellstrike with Imaginary Weapon against one target. Affects on other targets are lost. There's no retrieving to get extra effects on one target, and no basis to think there is.

But if you used Spell Swipe, you could hit two adjacent targets.

Multiple Defenses rules aren't relevant here, because Imaginary weapons only has initial spell attacks, not any followup.

One Target rules don't say anything at all to imply EXTRA effects to one target. Just that you don't get effects on other targets.

TL/DR: The second IW strike is lost with a basic spellstrike. However with Spell swipe (8th level class feat) both attacks can be made.

Reasoning: (SS = spellstrike, IW = imaginary weapon)

1) "Make a melee Strike"
>> from SS rules: one strike, singular

2) "The spell targets only the target of your Strike, even if it normally allows more targets."
>> from SS rules: only one target

3) "You make two imaginary weapon Strikes, each against a different target."
>> from IW rules: imaginary weapon multiple attacks *must* be against different targets.

4) "Ancillary Effects: Your spell still has any non-targeted effects that might affect creatures other than the target, as well as any ongoing effects starting from the moment you hit with the Strike. For example, acid splash would still deal its splash damage to creatures other than the target and tanglefoot's circumstance penalty would last for its normal duration. The spell takes effect after the Strike deals damage; if the Strike has other special effects, the GM determines whether they happen before or after the spell."
>> Since the potential second strike of Imaginary Weapon is targeted, the ancillary effects exception does not apply

Summary conclusion:
>> The Magus gets one spellstrike, against one target. The potential second IW strike is a targeted effect, so it fails the SS one target rule, and does not meet the ancillary effect exception. Therefore it is lost. This is probably obvious, but the One Target language changes the number of targets (Two, Three, etc become just One), not how the target is selected.

Expansive Spellstrike works the same way: "If the spell lets you select a number of targets, it instead targets only the creature you attacked with your Strike."

Spell Swipe would let the Magus use both attacks though: "Make a Spellstrike, but roll separate Strikes to attack two creatures, each of whom must be within your melee reach and adjacent to each other. If your spell could affect two or more targets, your spell affects whichever foes you hit, not just the first target"

It's possibly the best use case for spell swipe.

It's a good enough use case for spell swipe that it's almost worth trying to put together a build for it. I'm thinking... bladed scarf? As compared to greataxe you're dropping from a d12 to a d6, but adding in the reach makes the combo a lot easier to pull off, helps with the opportunity attacks, and even offers opportunistic spellsweeping sometimes. Pick up Expansive Spellstrike as well, so that you can use EArc and/or Scatter Scree for when the opportunity presents and you don't want to burn slots or focus points.

Bladed scarf is an interesting choice. How much athletics maneuvers is an inexorable iron magus gonna use though?

Well, anyone who's played one knows that spellstriking every round is not how melee magus life goes, so I don't see any reason why a high STR melee character wouldn't sometimes be using maneuvers when appropriate.

Well, anyone who's played one knows that spellstriking every round is not how melee magus life goes, so I don't see any reason why a high STR melee character wouldn't sometimes be using maneuvers when appropriate.

That's true. I'd probably opt for a strength weapon though rather than a finesse one for tripping.

Finesse has nothing to do with tripping.

On the Bladed Scarf, I'd mostly been looking for reach+sweep. Looking back through the options again, though, it looks like the Fauchard is basically better for our purposes on all counts, and the build should use that instead.

The trip is mostly a nice-to-have... though the ability to trip with reach *is* potentially nice to have, for some situations. Happily, the Fauchard gets that, too.

Finesse has nothing to do with tripping.

Right, but finesse weapons suffer from smaller die sizes. If you're doing athletics, you probably want to be strength based anyways.

Yeah. Fauchard is pretty good. Leave the bladed scarf for gymnasts.

On the Bladed Scarf, I'd mostly been looking for reach+sweep. Looking back through the options again, though, it looks like the Fauchard is basically better for our purposes on all counts, and the build should use that instead.

The trip is mostly a nice-to-have... though the ability to trip with reach *is* potentially nice to have, for some situations. Happily, the Fauchard gets that, too.

The Broadspear from the new LO book looks super sweet for spell swiping. It is advanced, though.