Bastille's page

In-game the character is not created instantaneously. The point at which you start playing is the point at which the character is finally ready to start adventuring after years of living off-screen. It is amazing that the PC is ready to play just when you want to play that character, but why look a gift horse in the mouth?

Children did exist as a playable option for those who wanted to scratch that itch as part of a long-term campaign. It does make things a bit wonky to pull off that "You were all childhood friends" shtick though unless you're human or a race of similar lifespan.

Per the D20 SRD, the difference between the youngest possible starting age for other classes, and the eldest for a Cleric, Druid, Monk, or Wizard, is 11 years. If you used the eldest possible for other classes and the youngest for Cleric, Druid, Monk, or Wizard, the Wizard can actually start out 4 years younger than the other class. For humans, of course.

For elves, the maximum disparity would be the Wizard being elder by 56 years, if the youngest other class age and highest Wizard age were used, or, if vice versa, the Wizard could be 26 years younger than the other class. Not much of a difference at all.

Basing things off the extremes will always produce wonky comparisons though. Much better to work off the averages.

The average human barbarian will be 17/18 years old.
The average human bard will be 18/19 years old.
The average human wizard will be 22 years old.

There will always be exceptions but if you're playing a character of a Trained class who is below average age, they're likely going to be a prodigy who devoted most of their adulthood solely to their class.

It's not the people that benefit from broken things who will complain (typically). It's the GMs whose game has been made ridiculous and the weaker players who feel overshadowed.

Yep, the inevitable cycle of the GM needing to make encounters harder so they're no longer a cake walk. This is then followed by the other players no longer being able to hit monsters on a consistent basis. Sometimes this is pushed even further along by the GM trying to increase the combat prowess of those characters. The end result tends to turn into the players wielding rocket launchers.

N N 959 wrote:

Bardarok wrote:

OOTS #126

Awesome, thank you.

Ragni, please read this strip as it totally applies to your question

The biggest flaw with the strip is that it assumes that it takes a long time under normal circumstances to become a wizard. There is no age restriction for being a wizard.

You can have the backstory of, "I found this old spellbook yesterday, and after reading it for a few hours, I was able to prepare and cast spells", and that's completely valid.

Given that an INT of 10 is all you need to be able to comprehend cantrips and 10 INT is average, I don't think it's too much of a stretch to assume that a 14 or 16 INT character could learn how to cast a few spells in a day or two.

Classes did have age minimums in Pathfinder. Based on your race and class, there was a minimum age that you had to be. Using humans as an example, 16 was the youngest you could make a Barb, Sorc, or Bard but you would have to be at least 17 to be a cleric, monk, or wizard. Intuitive classes were 15+1d4, Self-Taught were 15+1d6, and then Trained were 15+2d6 as their randomized starting age.

Assurance seems more like a low-entry cost, scaling version of Skill Mastery than 'taking 10 as a feat tax'.

The impression I have is that in all those situations where taking 10 would have benefited the narrative, you still won't be making a roll. Conversely in the situations where your ability to take 10 might have hurt the narrative, you'll be required to roll instead.

If that is the balance metric being aimed for in terms of rolling/not rolling for skills, that's fine. I'm apprehensive about the change but I'll still give it a try before outright condemning it.

On a side note, all the talk about 4E and result charts is making me remember Bear Lore.

Here's an example of each of these situations:

** spoiler omitted **...

Perception DCs are probably one of the hardest thing to handle, both numerically and for discouraging repeated attempts.

When it comes to the DC, you'll often have one player who makes themselves the living embodiment of Perception. If you try to make it so the checks are still a threat to them, then them failing means no one else has a chance probably. If you don't take them into consideration, you may as well not make anything hidden to begin with.

If time loss is the only major repercussion for searching til the cows come home, players will go to town on searching a location. They will often try until they reach some suitable result, moving on if it doesn't trigger anything.

"Oh, I didn't find anything on a natural 18? Guess there's nothing here. Let's move on, guys."

Bastille wrote:

Is taking 10 no longer a thing? I feel like so many concerns about low/trivial DCs are moot in the face of taking 10.

Taking 10 is no longer a thing.

You can take a feat called "assurance" that gives you a *final result* of 10 (not 10+ modifiers) but in general there will be no longer situations where you simply take 10 and laugh at every skill check. As you rank up (expert, master, etc) your assurance result gets higher.

Ah, I see... I feel Assurance would be useful for covering the situations that taking 10 would have not applied to, at the very least. Removing taking 10 entirely feels like a design omission, given how many of the cases brought up in earlier comments could be fixed with "They take 10 when making breakfast so they avoid the situation where they burn their house down".

My group will still give it the ol' college try during the playtest though and see how the new system plays out before harping on it too much. My initial gut reaction to hearing that however is "Oh boy, something that should've been available to everyone requires a feat to access!". Those carryovers from 3.5 into PF were often subject to house rules to try and fix them. Would've been nice for PF2 to remove them entirely.

Is taking 10 no longer a thing? I feel like so many concerns about low/trivial DCs are moot in the face of taking 10.

Will Spell Kenning still potentially be a thing? That was my favourite addition to the Skald. It felt like something Bards should have had from the start.

I have an issue with the Armageddon Orb as a trap. If its a thing just sitting there on a pedestal, sure. But if the bad guy has it in their pocket and the trigger is their death, do you even have a chance to notice it?

Simple solution: Shatter any semblance of mood/atmosphere by asking the Big Bad "Is that an Armageddon Orb in your pocket or are you just happy to see us?"

Would an AMF on the Armageddon Orb render it harmless during its trigger point? Seems like most magical traps could still be rendered moot by an AMF.

Has anything been mentioned yet for knowledge rolls on monsters? Will that wind up being laid out in the fluff for each monster?

Charles Dunwoody wrote:

Power Attack and Quick Reversal both sound really useful. And the 14th level shield ability oddly specific. Maybe it has more applications.

Yeah, +1 or +2 to Reflex saves requiring an action to activate. Not exactly thrilling for a 14th-level ability.

I'd imagine it would apply your full shield bonus, unless they're ditching enhancement bonuses in PF2E? That said, you'd still be looking at around a +5-+7 bonus max at that point. Maybe there are some other ways to boost it that we haven't been shown yet?

Now if only he'd get around to uploading the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge video that he did as Valeros. His co-workers should join in on pestering him to do that :V

Could be worse. 60~% of the human body's weight is water. Just imagine if that was vulnerable to this.

You have to use a 2h weapon (or 1h weapon in two hands) to use Furious Focus. Tiger Pounce doesn't specifically say it only works with an Unarmed Strike, but since the entire feat tree and all bonuses regarding it relate to unarmed strikes I think it's fair to say that it was an oversight that will probably be errata'd.

Yeah, none of the style feats are really that appealing to a 2H-er but at the same time, my DM allowed ToB so going Unarmed Fighter gives me IUS which can be used to take Snap Kick for a free extra attack. It's either that or find some other flavour of fighter, or another martial class which makes for a good 1 level dip, to take as my second martial level before I go back to warblade having prevented the stance pitfall.

TP would render FF useless. The reason is the remaining attacks after the first still benefit from TP. By the time your go is over the penalty from TP is already in affect.

To be honest once you begin to charge TP should be activated so even if you take an AoO the penalty to AC is already in affect. Some abilities just don't work will together.

I had figured it'd work out that way but wanted to make sure.

Tiger Pounce lets you dump the PA penalty into your AC instead of your attack bonus.
Furious Focus lets you ignore the PA penalty for your first attack.

Would using Tiger Pounce render Furious Focus completely useless or would FF still have some effect, like having full AC for the first attack made against you?