What's Your Weapon?

Friday, April 30, 2018

For many heroes, their choice of weapon says more about their personality and sense of aesthetics than their penchant for mechanical optimization. For others, form follows function, and still others blend the two. But what sort of weapon fits your personality best? Let's take a look at various weapons and figure it out!

Simple, Martial, or Exotic?

All weapons in Pathfinder are simple, martial, or exotic, based on their rough level of power. Unlike in Pathfinder First Edition, exotic weapons are not just a mixture of powerful European weapons and weapons from other cultures that only occasionally had a leg up over their martial kin. In Pathfinder Second Edition, we have a different way of talking about whether a weapon is likely to be found in a particular region, and so a weapon's type instead describes a weapon's mix of power and flexibility. Simple weapons usually have a smaller damage die than similar martial weapons (d6 rather than d8, for instance), and exotic weapons usually use the same damage die as a martial weapon but include additional abilities that make the weapon more complex.

Characters start with proficiency in either groups of weapons or lists of individual weapons, and they can take ancestry or general feats (and, rarely, class feats) to gain more!

Weapon Traits

Whatever your weapon proficiencies, you'll want to choose a weapon with useful traits that match your taste and play style. Even among martial weapons that use two hands, a bo staff, a greatsword, and a glaive all feel very different.

A greatsword deals a lot of damage, perfect for a bruiser character like a worshiper of Gorum: its damage die is d12 and you can seamlessly switch between piercing and slashing damage to avoid enemy resistances and exploit their weaknesses.

A bo staff is all about controlling the fight. Its damage die is only d8, but it has reach (allowing you to Strike enemies up to 10 feet away), parry (allowing you to spend an action to increase your AC much like a light shield), and trip (giving you several benefits to your attempts to trip enemies). Plus, it has the monk trait, which weapon-wielding monks particularly enjoy.

The glaive has a d8 damage die like the bo staff and shares its reach, but that's where the similarities end. The glaive has deadly d8 (dealing additional d8s of damage on a critical hit), and it is forceful (which means once you get it going and build up momentum, your attacks become more and more powerful: 1 extra damage per die on the second attack of your turn, 2 extra damage for any attacks after that). The glaive-user isn't interested in giving up an action for defense like a character with a bo staff; instead, she does best if she artfully sweeps the blade like a brush, focusing on accuracy and multiple attacks to really dish out the damage—particularly fitting for a follower of Shelyn.

We want to give every weapon a different personality like this so that we can better serve the infinite personalities that players bring with their characters!

Some other fun weapon traits I haven't covered yet: Twin weapons like the saw-toothed saber deal more damage if you fight with two of them. Backswing weapons like the greatclub gain a little accuracy after a miss. Backstabber weapons like the dogslicer deal more damage to flat-footed targets. Agile weapons like the shortsword decrease the penalty for making multiple attacks in a single turn. Finesse weapons like the rapier use your Dexterity modifier for attack rolls if you prefer. Two-hand weapons like the bastard sword deal much higher damage if you wield them in two hands instead of one!

Illustration by Wayne Reynolds

Critical Specialization and Weapon Groups

Traits give us some really cool ways to distinguish weapons, but we decided to throw one more customization factor into the mix, this time for similar groups of weapons: critical specialization effects.

Characters who unlock their weapon's critical specialization effect gain a special bonus effect on a critical hit that's different for each weapon group. For example, let's compare swords, spears, and axes.

Swords make the target flat-footed on a critical hit, making it easier for you and your allies to hit the target again (and making the group's rogue very happy). This cements swords like the greatsword or a longsword as great choices for dealing damage to challenging foes like bosses, as they have high damage and decrease the boss's AC so your team can hit more often.

Spears pierce the target and weaken its attacks. This makes a spear a good option for someone using a more defensive strategy built around negating enemy attacks.

Axes swing to an adjacent target (if any), damaging that target, too! Combined with the fact that axes usually have the sweep trait, giving you a bonus on attacks when you move on to a new target in the same turn, this makes axes extremely well suited for sweeping up groups of enemies.

These are just a few of the possibilities. For instance, daggers can cause persistent bleed damage, and clubs can knock the target up to 10 feet away (particularly amusing on a well-placed Attack of Opportunity).

Weapon Quality

Weapons, as well as other non-weapon items (but come on, those aren't as cool as weapons, right?), can be poor quality, standard quality, expert quality, master quality, or legendary quality.

Quality grants an item bonus or penalty of the same value as the matching proficiency (so an expert bow grants a +1 item bonus to hit and a legendary axe grants a +3 item bonus to hit). You have to have the matching proficiency to Craft a weapon of that quality though, so you can't make a master sword, for instance, unless you are a master at Crafting.

And now you know the basics about weapons! All there is to do now is choose the weapon that suits you. Until next time!

Mark Seifter
Designer

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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Weather Report wrote:
John Lynch 106 wrote:
Cleave and vital strike don't mix.
Seems like cleave is now a property of critically hitting with axes, if I read that right?

I believe you can still get cleave (might be misrembering it with Whirlwind Attack) but Axes get a free cleave on a crit.


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Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

At first glance:

...so it looks like martials are going to need to have a Weapon Bag of Holding to cover all the weapon options because they're situational and what may be good for one encounter may be horrible for the next?


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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Happy to see changes to ensure that no weapon strictly trumps another. Even happier to see weapons becoming distinctively different. Another great blog post!

UnArcaneElection wrote:
Maybe a better name would be in order. Instead of calling them "Monk" weapons, they would have the "Flurry" trait -- in the Core Rulebook, Monks would be the only class that could Flurry with them, but other classes or archetypes might come out later that could also Flurry with them (like for instance, if they decide to port the Brawler over to 2nd Edition Pathfinder, whether as its own class or as an archetype of something else).

That's... a really good idea. Seconded!

Grand Lodge

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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Rulebook Subscriber
Lemartes wrote:

I like that swords can switch between piercing and slashing damage. Very good. :)

I would rather swords give a defensive bonus than the flat footed deal as swords are extremely good at parrying.

Otherwise it sounds pretty fun, I have some minor other gripes but nothing too concerning.

I think the parrying thing is why they leave opponents open, it is a weapon for skillful manipulation and interaction with your opponents weapon. Imagining they come at you with their big arse axe, and you turn their momentum, leaving them off balance. So yes that should also improve your AC, but I think it works for the leaving them open as well.

I think will see a lot of "well weapon group X would be able to also do the special thing weapon group Y is doing" and while probably logically true, we are playing a combat simulator, and so they are striving for variety and balance, so things that might logical be true, sometimes shouldn't be in the rules, because it homogenizes the game.


Wei Ji the Learner wrote:


At first glance:

...so it looks like martials are going to need to have a Weapon Bag of Holding to cover all the weapon options because they're situational and what may be good for one encounter may be horrible for the next?

I don’t know about horrible. Well, apart from DR.

You can also grab a weapon that covers more situations. Scimitars have a property for attacking one target, and s property for attacking multiple targets.


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Wei Ji the Learner wrote:

At first glance:

...so it looks like martials are going to need to have a Weapon Bag of Holding to cover all the weapon options because they're situational and what may be good for one encounter may be horrible for the next?

What I'm actually hoping for is that from the jump, 2E has some baked-in version of ABP, and there will be more incentive (or at least the option) to not be married to one particular weapon.

For me that just hearkens back to a WWCD* type of thing, as the big guy rarely used the same weapon twice.

*:
"What Would Conan Do?"


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The more I read the more I pray HeroLab is ready day one. I love the options but there are so many, as a GM, it will really help to have a program do some record keeping and math.


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Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
GM Red Box wrote:
The more I read the more I pray HeroLab is ready day one. I love the options but there are so many, as a GM, it will really help to have a program do some record keeping and math.

AS long as it's not HLO.

Classic? Sure. HLO no.


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Porridge wrote:

Happy to see changes to ensure that no weapon strictly trumps another. Even happier to see weapons becoming distinctively different. Another great blog post!

UnArcaneElection wrote:
Maybe a better name would be in order. Instead of calling them "Monk" weapons, they would have the "Flurry" trait -- in the Core Rulebook, Monks would be the only class that could Flurry with them, but other classes or archetypes might come out later that could also Flurry with them (like for instance, if they decide to port the Brawler over to 2nd Edition Pathfinder, whether as its own class or as an archetype of something else).
That's... a really good idea. Seconded!

Flurry, as we know it, is going away, along with natural attack blenders. In return, Monks no longer have to spend double on their amulet of mighty fists. I wonder what the replacement will be. Flexible weapon qualities on fists would be pretty cool- be the weapons golf bag you want to see in the world.


Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
QuidEst wrote:


That's... a really good idea. Seconded!
Flurry, as we know it, is going away, along with natural attack blenders. In return, Monks no longer have to spend double on their amulet of mighty fists. I wonder what the replacement will be. Flexible weapon qualities on fists would be pretty cool- be the weapons golf bag you want to see in the world.

Or feet or brow ridges or elbows or shoulders or hips or...

But yes, NOT locking monk weapon damage type behind a feet would be a good start.


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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
QuidEst wrote:
Porridge wrote:

Happy to see changes to ensure that no weapon strictly trumps another. Even happier to see weapons becoming distinctively different. Another great blog post!

UnArcaneElection wrote:
Maybe a better name would be in order. Instead of calling them "Monk" weapons, they would have the "Flurry" trait -- in the Core Rulebook, Monks would be the only class that could Flurry with them, but other classes or archetypes might come out later that could also Flurry with them (like for instance, if they decide to port the Brawler over to 2nd Edition Pathfinder, whether as its own class or as an archetype of something else).
That's... a really good idea. Seconded!
Flurry, as we know it, is going away, along with natural attack blenders. In return, Monks no longer have to spend double on their amulet of mighty fists. I wonder what the replacement will be. Flexible weapon qualities on fists would be pretty cool- be the weapons golf bag you want to see in the world.

Fair enough; the label "flurry" itself might not make sense, depending on how they redo the Monk class. But the general idea behind the proposal - replacing the label "Monk" with a label indicating the class feature(s) it can be used with - strikes me as a very good one.

(If the only reason for labelling a weapon a "Monk" weapon was to indicate that Monks were proficient with them, then this proposal wouldn't work. But if that's all the "Monk" trait means, then it's hard to see how its doing enough to justify its inclusion.

The sole rationale for including the "Monk" label would be that when introducing new weapon you wouldn't have to state that Monks are proficient in them. But it's not clear why Monks are special in that regard. One might introduce weapons that it's natural to have Rogues be proficient in (the Thieves Guild "Special"), or weapons that it's natural to have Wizards be proficient in (the Wizarding Staff), but we aren't inclined to add "Rogue" or "Wizard" traits to indicate that.

Better, I think, to specify class proficiencies in broad strokes, and separate class proficiency and weapon traits entirely.)

Silver Crusade Contributor

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Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
GM Red Box wrote:
The more I read the more I pray HeroLab is ready day one. I love the options but there are so many, as a GM, it will really help to have a program do some record keeping and math.

AS long as it's not HLO.

Classic? Sure. HLO no.

+100


Bardarok wrote:
Wasn't excaliber the one that was given to arthur by the strange lady lying in a pond not the one in the rock? I think I remember the scabbard being an invulnerability mcguffin to.

If I remember it prevents bleeding (one of the major cause of death back then) and a few other cool features.


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Any chance you can have advanced combat techniques to allow things like Half-Swording and Mordhau?

"Foolish mortal! You bring a greatsword to a battle with a lich?"

*Fighter reverses grip.*

"You're going to hurt yourself holding the bla... OH GODS HE'S REINTRODUCING ME TO PAIN!!!"


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Malthraz wrote:

Weapon traits look great. Really improve how weapons are distinguished from each other.

Do we know if strength is added to damage on a crit or is a crit now just extra dice and special mechanics?

I think I would prefer no strength. Curve the extra damage on crits down a bit, but that is compensated by interesting effects.

----

Like some others have mentioned, I would like weapons names to better align with the common terminology. Such as long sword being a 2 hander, falchion being a one hander.
The one hander sword (PFe1 longsword) being called an arming sword. A curvy two hander (PFe1 fachion) possibly being a kriegsmesser.
I can understand the desire to keep the names the same. I feel fairly rational about this.

What I do not feel rational about is "studded leather armour".
/rant
OMG there is not such thing as "studded leather armour". It's troll poo! The studs are actually rivets for plates that lie between two layers of leather. Two examples of historical armour are the Jack of Plates (lighter) and the Brigandine (heavier). Please get rid of any reference to "studded leather armour".
/rantoff

Expect more ranting in the armour preview.

My hopes are not high, but I would like this as well. Longsword/Arming sword is the set I am least concerned about, but I would overall like to see weapons and armor match more closer the real world inspiration. Plus plenty of fantastical weapons from previous editions and media that work because they are cool.

For instance, buckler could be a low die martial weapon with the parry trait. Add in other traits that match up with binding and grappling. Make it into one of the off hand weapons of choice (dagger being another popular choice).

Scarab Sages

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Mark Seifter wrote:
Mimo Tomblebur wrote:
It sounds like the weapons will be generating more minor bonuses and penalties for the poor GM to keep track of, though. Will there be new conventions in the stat-blocks to make it easier for the GM to remember, without having to open the equipment chart in the book for every NPC?
Statblocks will list any weapon traits you need (so for instead, they won't list "finesse" because we'll take care of applying the Dex bonus already, but they will list sweep or versatile piercing)

The problem with this, is that even in PF1, you had weapons with traits like Deadly for the Katana, that I had to look up what it meant every time (cause it rarely came into effect), and that was as a player. For things that add static bonuses, those are easily taken care of, but for things that grant circumstantial things, not having the text of the thing in the stat block, and especially expanding out special things to just about every weapon, means the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.


I like the emphasis on weapon "traits" in this blog, but also don't want to see this overdone... I'd much prefer to have a key set of traits available on Simple/Martial weapons, say maybe 10, and not go crazy with each weapon having a completely unique ability. I enjoy the options and flavor, but I don't want regular weapon traits to become the "+1 bonus cost" equivalent of magical items... "Ohh, you're a barbarian, well then you want a +1 keen furious answering smiting longsword".

It sounds like the number of traits will be limited here, but with future additional resources, I can see this potentially getting out hand quickly.


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Tallow wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Mimo Tomblebur wrote:
It sounds like the weapons will be generating more minor bonuses and penalties for the poor GM to keep track of, though. Will there be new conventions in the stat-blocks to make it easier for the GM to remember, without having to open the equipment chart in the book for every NPC?
Statblocks will list any weapon traits you need (so for instead, they won't list "finesse" because we'll take care of applying the Dex bonus already, but they will list sweep or versatile piercing)
The problem with this, is that even in PF1, you had weapons with traits like Deadly for the Katana, that I had to look up what it meant every time (cause it rarely came into effect), and that was as a player. For things that add static bonuses, those are easily taken care of, but for things that grant circumstantial things, not having the text of the thing in the stat block, and especially expanding out special things to just about every weapon, means the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.

Why? Is it too much to ask if the players know what the weapons their characters are proficient in and use do?

If you're talking about NPCs or monsters, that part would come up naturally during prep.

Scarab Sages

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Kalindlara wrote:
Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
GM Red Box wrote:
The more I read the more I pray HeroLab is ready day one. I love the options but there are so many, as a GM, it will really help to have a program do some record keeping and math.

AS long as it's not HLO.

Classic? Sure. HLO no.

+100

Agreed


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StarBreaker wrote:

Any chance you can have advanced combat techniques to allow things like Half-Swording and Mordhau?

"Foolish mortal! You bring a greatsword to a battle with a lich?"

*Fighter reverses grip.*

"You're going to hurt yourself holding the bla... OH GODS HE'S REINTRODUCING ME TO PAIN!!!"

Heh. I always let my players deal damage types outside of the weapon's stats by declaring it an improvised weapon, so long as they can describe how they're going about it. I've also never had a DM tell me no when I've tried it myself.

It's fun to beat skeletons with the butt end of your crossbow. Finally, a use for a crossbow!

Scarab Sages

GentleGiant wrote:
Tallow wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Mimo Tomblebur wrote:
It sounds like the weapons will be generating more minor bonuses and penalties for the poor GM to keep track of, though. Will there be new conventions in the stat-blocks to make it easier for the GM to remember, without having to open the equipment chart in the book for every NPC?
Statblocks will list any weapon traits you need (so for instead, they won't list "finesse" because we'll take care of applying the Dex bonus already, but they will list sweep or versatile piercing)
The problem with this, is that even in PF1, you had weapons with traits like Deadly for the Katana, that I had to look up what it meant every time (cause it rarely came into effect), and that was as a player. For things that add static bonuses, those are easily taken care of, but for things that grant circumstantial things, not having the text of the thing in the stat block, and especially expanding out special things to just about every weapon, means the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.

Why? Is it too much to ask if the players know what the weapons their characters are proficient in and use do?

If you're talking about NPCs or monsters, that part would come up naturally during prep.

Perhaps, but it sounds like there are going to be more options on average per NPC/Monster than before. Prepping an entire adventure will make that more problematic. Sure, I can print out the rules necessary for each NPC myself I suppose. I just wish that if a stat block is going to be printed, it includes all the special abilities.

RPG Superstar 2010 Top 32

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I didn't think I could be excited about weapons in a D&D/PF game.

Friends, I am excited about weapons in PF2.


Starbuck_II wrote:
Bardarok wrote:
Wasn't excaliber the one that was given to arthur by the strange lady lying in a pond not the one in the rock? I think I remember the scabbard being an invulnerability mcguffin to.
If I remember it prevents bleeding (one of the major cause of death back then) and a few other cool features.

Yeah, in 1st Ed AD&D, it caused thrusting and slashing weapons to do half damage vs. the wearer.


Tallow wrote:
GentleGiant wrote:
Tallow wrote:


The problem with this, is that even in PF1, you had weapons with traits like Deadly for the Katana, that I had to look up what it meant every time (cause it rarely came into effect), and that was as a player. For things that add static bonuses, those are easily taken care of, but for things that grant circumstantial things, not having the text of the thing in the stat block, and especially expanding out special things to just about every weapon, means the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.

Why? Is it too much to ask if the players know what the weapons their characters are proficient in and use do?

If you're talking about NPCs or monsters, that part would come up naturally during prep.
Perhaps, but it sounds like there are going to be more options on average per NPC/Monster than before. Prepping an entire adventure will make that more problematic. Sure, I can print out the rules necessary for each NPC myself I suppose. I just wish that if a stat block is going to be printed, it includes all the special abilities.

Keep in mind that the extra special abilities actually requires investment in proficiency with the weapons. So any low level mook or non-fighter-type probably won't have access to the critical hit traits. So no need to memorize anything there. The other weapon traits, such as reach, are no different than having to know them in PF1 too.


Tallow wrote:
GentleGiant wrote:
Tallow wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Mimo Tomblebur wrote:
It sounds like the weapons will be generating more minor bonuses and penalties for the poor GM to keep track of, though. Will there be new conventions in the stat-blocks to make it easier for the GM to remember, without having to open the equipment chart in the book for every NPC?
Statblocks will list any weapon traits you need (so for instead, they won't list "finesse" because we'll take care of applying the Dex bonus already, but they will list sweep or versatile piercing)
The problem with this, is that even in PF1, you had weapons with traits like Deadly for the Katana, that I had to look up what it meant every time (cause it rarely came into effect), and that was as a player. For things that add static bonuses, those are easily taken care of, but for things that grant circumstantial things, not having the text of the thing in the stat block, and especially expanding out special things to just about every weapon, means the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.

Why? Is it too much to ask if the players know what the weapons their characters are proficient in and use do?

If you're talking about NPCs or monsters, that part would come up naturally during prep.
Perhaps, but it sounds like there are going to be more options on average per NPC/Monster than before. Prepping an entire adventure will make that more problematic. Sure, I can print out the rules necessary for each NPC myself I suppose. I just wish that if a stat block is going to be printed, it includes all the special abilities.

I can see this being a juggle, the keeping track of the 4 tiers of success for the monster's attacks, and special weapon properties, plus critical effects for the weapon.


Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Doktor Weasel wrote:
So now we have dumb things like dire flails and urgroshes cluttering up the weapon list. Has anyone ever seen any of these things in use? I haven't.

The barbarian/rogue/living monolith one of my players played through all of Mummy's Mask was a dire flail user. To be fair i houseruled that double weapons were not utterly terrible like they were in 1st edition and that they worked with power attack how all other two-handed weapons work with power attack...


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With regard to some of what's been brought up...

Exotic: We don't know what weapons in PF2 are actually designated as exotic. It may be (and should be) far less than in PF1. As long as they ARE weapons that actually WOULD be harder to use, as opposed to simply a somehow "better" version of a sword, it's totally fine. Starfinder only has two exotic weapons: the shuriken and net. Also these were called "Special" in Starfinder, which I'm fine with, but then I'm also fine with "Exotic" as a name, so whatevs.

Names: Not hung up on these. It'd probably be more confusing than it's worth to use more "accurate" names at this point. Players come in with expectations from having played every /other/ RPG and cRPG under the sun.

Monk: As has been noted, "Monk" has almost never counted against the ability budget of a weapon before. If it doesn't do anything for anyone who isn't a monk in PF2, I wouldn't expect it to count against ability budget here either, so you don't have to worry about a weapon with that trait being suboptimal if you're not a monk. It's just a clean way of future proofing a unique "weapon group" that crosses over multiple other weapon groups.

(To be fair, this does maybe mean it could be tagged in the weapon table's Group column instead of the Traits column. So a weapon could be "Axe, Monk" or even "Axe*" where the asterisk is called out at the bottom of the table as meaning it is a monk weapon.)

Of course, they could easily say it does reflect an ability that interacts with, say, two-weapon fighting or the ability to better channel abilities like ki or magus Arcana. In which case anyone who picks up abilities of this type would be able to benefit from the trait, even if they aren't a monk. In this case though, I would definitely recommend changing the name of the ability. In the case of a "channeling" weapon, heck, just call the trait Channeling.


Another set of stuff that could be stolen to be used in PF1, kinda like the revamped skill rules. Not overly impressed with what I'm seeing in PF2. Oh, well.

Scarab Sages

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GentleGiant wrote:
Tallow wrote:
GentleGiant wrote:
Tallow wrote:


The problem with this, is that even in PF1, you had weapons with traits like Deadly for the Katana, that I had to look up what it meant every time (cause it rarely came into effect), and that was as a player. For things that add static bonuses, those are easily taken care of, but for things that grant circumstantial things, not having the text of the thing in the stat block, and especially expanding out special things to just about every weapon, means the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.

Why? Is it too much to ask if the players know what the weapons their characters are proficient in and use do?

If you're talking about NPCs or monsters, that part would come up naturally during prep.
Perhaps, but it sounds like there are going to be more options on average per NPC/Monster than before. Prepping an entire adventure will make that more problematic. Sure, I can print out the rules necessary for each NPC myself I suppose. I just wish that if a stat block is going to be printed, it includes all the special abilities.
Keep in mind that the extra special abilities actually requires investment in proficiency with the weapons. So any low level mook or non-fighter-type probably won't have access to the critical hit traits. So no need to memorize anything there. The other weapon traits, such as reach, are no different than having to know them in PF1 too.

Agreed. There are a handful of weapon traits that will have either static bonuses that can just be folded into the stat block without extra word count or that you'll just know what they do (like Reach.) But if each weapon/weapon type has their own sets of special traits, that's going to be a ton to "just remember". And in a standard adventure, a lieutenant, sub-boss and boss will all have the feats to do these things. In a high level adventure, I expect every single NPC to be able to have those abilities.

I'm just asking that those things not just be "named" but rather the ability added to the end of the stat block where other special abilities are typically defined.


Tallow wrote:
GentleGiant wrote:
Tallow wrote:
GentleGiant wrote:
Tallow wrote:


The problem with this, is that even in PF1, you had weapons with traits like Deadly for the Katana, that I had to look up what it meant every time (cause it rarely came into effect), and that was as a player. For things that add static bonuses, those are easily taken care of, but for things that grant circumstantial things, not having the text of the thing in the stat block, and especially expanding out special things to just about every weapon, means the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.

Why? Is it too much to ask if the players know what the weapons their characters are proficient in and use do?

If you're talking about NPCs or monsters, that part would come up naturally during prep.
Perhaps, but it sounds like there are going to be more options on average per NPC/Monster than before. Prepping an entire adventure will make that more problematic. Sure, I can print out the rules necessary for each NPC myself I suppose. I just wish that if a stat block is going to be printed, it includes all the special abilities.
Keep in mind that the extra special abilities actually requires investment in proficiency with the weapons. So any low level mook or non-fighter-type probably won't have access to the critical hit traits. So no need to memorize anything there. The other weapon traits, such as reach, are no different than having to know them in PF1 too.
Agreed. There are a handful of weapon traits that will have either static bonuses that can just be folded into the stat block without extra word count or that you'll just know what they do (like Reach.) But if each weapon/weapon type has their own sets of special traits, that's going to be a ton to "just remember". And in a standard adventure, a lieutenant, sub-boss and boss will all have the feats to do these things. In a high level adventure, I expect every single NPC to be able to...

Yeah, like remembering what a feat does and when to use it for a monster, alongside their SLAs, SAs, and SQs, etc. Hopefully they will make it manageable.


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Wei Ji the Learner wrote:
GM Red Box wrote:
The more I read the more I pray HeroLab is ready day one. I love the options but there are so many, as a GM, it will really help to have a program do some record keeping and math.

AS long as it's not HLO.

Classic? Sure. HLO no.

This a thousand times


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Wei Ji the Learner wrote:


At first glance:

...so it looks like martials are going to need to have a Weapon Bag of Holding to cover all the weapon options because they're situational and what may be good for one encounter may be horrible for the next?

I think thats just a first glance. Things like swords doing slash or pierce damage helps avoid the golf bag of weapons. It's true, you probably cant just grab one weapon and be an ace in every situation, but id be disappointed if you could. Will be curious to see what they do with DR and magic necessity for certain foes though.

Shadow Lodge

Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder PF Special Edition Subscriber

Am i missing something with the glaive? The static bonus of 1 or 2 on damage seems fairly trivial for successive attacks.


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Doktor Weasel wrote:
Weather Report wrote:
John Lynch 106 wrote:
Weather Report wrote:
I would prefer not to have race specific weapons in the Core
Alas that boat sailed 9 years ago with the elven curved blade, orc double axe and dwarven urgrosh

Yeah, actually, the urgrosh is going on 18-years now (...and now I'm depressed...), I wasn't that keen then, and have not warmed to it (in core).

Some of the double weapons are absurd, the dire flail, was it?

Some? Just about all are pretty absurd (the quarterstaff being the only sane one, because they just shoehorned it into the new designation). The whole classification of double weapons seems to have been created because Darth Maul was cool. Let that sink in. They used Phantom Menace as an indicator of what is cool...

So now we have dumb things like dire flails and urgroshes cluttering up the weapon list. Has anyone ever seen any of these things in use? I haven't.

I agree dire flails and urgoshes are awkward and I have never seen them used. But damn it Darth Maul is cool. I personally want both double sided swords and also some sort of Bat'leth Orcish Double Blade. It is a fantasy game after all.

Liberty's Edge

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Joe Wells wrote:

I didn't think I could be excited about weapons in a D&D/PF game.

Friends, I am excited about weapons in PF2.

I second that. If nothing else I may just incorporate 2nd edition weapons rules into my 1st edition campaign.

Silver Crusade Contributor

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Tallow wrote:
...the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.

This sounds like an excellent candidate for inclusion on the inside of the GM screen, to me. ^_^

(At least until folks start getting them memorized through familiarity.)


Gunny wrote:
Joe Wells wrote:

I didn't think I could be excited about weapons in a D&D/PF game.

Friends, I am excited about weapons in PF2.

I second that. If nothing else I may just incorporate 2nd edition weapons rules into my 1st edition campaign.

Total, I have already added finesse and agile.


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Cat-thulhu wrote:
Am i missing something with the glaive? The static bonus of 1 or 2 on damage seems fairly trivial for successive attacks.

It's +1 (or +2 for later attacks) damage per damage die and it gets extra damage die on crits. Plus weapons being +x now grant increased damage die instead of a flat damage bonus (and + accuracy seems to be based on the quality of the weapon). Add on top of that special attacks (such as power attack) can add damage die. It does seem a bit weak at first glance but it seems like there are plenty of ways to get increased damage die so it actually could be extremely powerful. Imagine a glaive wielder with a +1 glaive getting hasted, attacking twice normally, and then power attacking with the extra action and critting. Tons of damage die and each one of those damage die becomes an extra +2. It can add up pretty quick.


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Cat-thulhu wrote:
Am i missing something with the glaive? The static bonus of 1 or 2 on damage seems fairly trivial for successive attacks.

It’s per die. That +1 is +20% weapon damage if it hits, and that +2 is +45% or so. Glaive users will care a lot about their accuracy, since it helps crits and iterative hits.

Silver Crusade

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brad2411 wrote:
Nathan Goodrich wrote:
Shelyn is getting name-dropped a lot in these playtest articles. Is she becoming more prominent in the new version, or does our article writer just really like her?
Could also be that the god they decided to talk about was Shelyn so they keep talking about it.

Either way, I’ve been ecstatic to hear* so much about her in the Playtest Blogs. Shelyn is the goddess that speaks to my heart. How wonderful to see the glaive that I bear in her name get called out in the blog for its special qualities.

_____
* Okay, so as a deaf character, maybe I’m not actually ‘hearing’ the message of Shelyn in a literal sense. Maybe it’s just being sung directly to my heart.


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I am hoping setting unique weapons like the Aldori Dueling Sword and Earthbreaker are included as part of the core rules.

Grand Lodge

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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Tallow wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Mimo Tomblebur wrote:
It sounds like the weapons will be generating more minor bonuses and penalties for the poor GM to keep track of, though. Will there be new conventions in the stat-blocks to make it easier for the GM to remember, without having to open the equipment chart in the book for every NPC?
Statblocks will list any weapon traits you need (so for instead, they won't list "finesse" because we'll take care of applying the Dex bonus already, but they will list sweep or versatile piercing)
The problem with this, is that even in PF1, you had weapons with traits like Deadly for the Katana, that I had to look up what it meant every time (cause it rarely came into effect), and that was as a player. For things that add static bonuses, those are easily taken care of, but for things that grant circumstantial things, not having the text of the thing in the stat block, and especially expanding out special things to just about every weapon, means the GM will need to have a special weapon property cheat sheet at the very least just to run a game.

As someone who will be GMing Playtest Games in the Demo Hall at GenCon, my guess is that one of the things that I will be doing is creating those cheat sheets — not just for my own use — especially for any weapon that the pregen iconics will be using.

Here’s a plea that I’m going to make right now to the team designing the Pathfinder Iconics. Can you have weapon special properties on the iconic’s sheets, along with what their spells do? It’s okay if those sheets are two-sided.

Also can you put some of the clever VOs that you already have under NDA — Lau Bannenburg of the Netherlands comes to mind — to spot check the math on the pregens before their GenCon release? Or let those of us on the demo team help you spot check them? (I’m rubbish at math, mind, but I’m otherwise an excellent editor.)

The reason why I ask is that the Starfinder Pregens had some pretty egregious early errors on them, and it was hard to figure out what some of their weapons actually did. I had players continually looking up information that first weekend that slowed games down. I would love to have more cheat sheets and quick references available so that everyone could just play.

The other problem with the Starfinder Pregens was that they only came out days before the convention. They came out so late that none of us GMs had time to study them, and most of us GMs wound up printing our own copies, because they came out too late to get printed in the official pre-convention print runs. So, in your pre-con production schedule, can you get the Pregens out a month ahead of the convention? That will allow for spot-checking, better print jobs and for better prepared convention GMs.

We want new players to just jump into the game and be wowed, not overcome by minutiae! We want to be well-prepped ourselves so that we can make the game as fun and engaging as possible.

Thank you for listening.

Hmm


The traits are an interesting idea, but I can't help feeling that they could bog down play in practice...


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Crayon wrote:
The traits are an interesting idea, but I can't help feeling that they could bog down play in practice...

I’ll be encouraging players who can’t track two or three conditional modifiers to use simpler weapons (like swords), or adding reminders in the weapon notes so that it shows up with the virtual roll results.


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Crayon wrote:
The traits are an interesting idea, but I can't help feeling that they could bog down play in practice...

I feel they might increase character creation time, especially at first as people get used to them. But in play, it shouldn't bog things down at all after you play for a session or two. No one's going to carry the entire weapon table around with them, they'll pick like two or three weapons at most and after a session will just have internalized how they work.

If someone actually had a metamorphic weapon or "weapon summoning" ability, I would just expect them to have a printout of the weapon table as part of their character sheet packet. Because that sort of thing would bog down any game otherwise, be it PF2 or PF1 or 5E.

Scarab Sages

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Looking at all these weapon qualities, and thinking about monks, I can't help but think about how cool it would be if part of gaining improved Proficiency as a monk meant granting certain Weapon Qualities to your unarmed strikes. What if you get nothing at basic proficiency, but each higher proficiency you get a little more damage AND get to choose a weapon property? You could have deadly, agile, finesse fists, or maybe parry, trip, and versatile (slashing)? There are so many cool combinations, and would really reward unarmed combat while not invalidating weapon-focused combat, because you can always carry a weapon that has the qualities your fists don't.

The more I think about it, the more excited I get. Agile + Forceful? It's like a DIY Flurry of Blows, especially if we get to do two-weapon fighting and it gives extra attacks.


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Davor wrote:

Looking at all these weapon qualities, and thinking about monks, I can't help but think about how cool it would be if part of gaining improved Proficiency as a monk meant granting certain Weapon Qualities to your unarmed strikes. What if you get nothing at basic proficiency, but each higher proficiency you get a little more damage AND get to choose a weapon property? You could have deadly, agile, finesse fists, or maybe parry, trip, and versatile (slashing)? There are so many cool combinations, and would really reward unarmed combat while not invalidating weapon-focused combat, because you can always carry a weapon that has the qualities your fists don't.

The more I think about it, the more excited I get. Agile + Forceful? It's like a DIY Flurry of Blows, especially if we get to do two-weapon fighting and it gives extra attacks.

Ah, now that's an interesting idea, a way to pimp out your unarmed strikes all the way through higher levels, no need to resort to magic weapons. What about quality, though, can we get legendary fists?


Fuzzypaws wrote:
Crayon wrote:
The traits are an interesting idea, but I can't help feeling that they could bog down play in practice...

I feel they might increase character creation time, especially at first as people get used to them. But in play, it shouldn't bog things down at all after you play for a session or two. No one's going to carry the entire weapon table around with them, they'll pick like two or three weapons at most and after a session will just have internalized how they work.

If someone actually had a metamorphic weapon or "weapon summoning" ability, I would just expect them to have a printout of the weapon table as part of their character sheet packet. Because that sort of thing would bog down any game otherwise, be it PF2 or PF1 or 5E.

True, though I am looking at it from the DMing angle, hope it's not too much to track. Looking forward to see how Armour works out, probably more than anything else at this point.


Galnörag wrote:
Lemartes wrote:

I like that swords can switch between piercing and slashing damage. Very good. :)

I would rather swords give a defensive bonus than the flat footed deal as swords are extremely good at parrying.

Otherwise it sounds pretty fun, I have some minor other gripes but nothing too concerning.

I think the parrying thing is why they leave opponents open, it is a weapon for skillful manipulation and interaction with your opponents weapon. Imagining they come at you with their big arse axe, and you turn their momentum, leaving them off balance. So yes that should also improve your AC, but I think it works for the leaving them open as well.

I think will see a lot of "well weapon group X would be able to also do the special thing weapon group Y is doing" and while probably logically true, we are playing a combat simulator, and so they are striving for variety and balance, so things that might logical be true, sometimes shouldn't be in the rules, because it homogenizes the game.

Well you can explain or flavour text any mechanical ability in a logical way and I'm not faulting you're explanation except that if I'm not mistaken the sword causes people to be flatfooted after it crits. This implies it's not parrying to me. Barring that yes you can explain any effect it many many ways. Your's makes as much sense as any other.

I'm still for swords getting the ability to up AC or some defensive bonus...vs melee attacks. I could go into a lengthy reason why but I'm confident all those who care already know most or all of what I'm going to say. :)

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