Christopher Vrysen's page

Goblin Squad Member. Organized Play Member. 36 posts (820 including aliases). No reviews. No lists. No wishlists. 1 Organized Play character. 1 alias.


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Trips and grapples will not deny dex. If high enough level, shadowdancer flanking buddy is best. Otherwise feints and umd vanish & grtr invis.


Domains and bloodlines and mysteries all can give spells at lower or higher spell levels.


The stats on that scabbard is my biggest problem with the AA. Gonna have to house rule it down, since a edged scabbard should not be closer to a scimitar than a clunky shortsword.


I've always wanted to make a variant caster class based on the Call of Cthulu d20 magic system, probably converting the sanity cost to hp damage, and the class giving resistance to ability drain and downgrading damage to nonlethal as it levels up. Would have to make damage prohibitive but not quite impossible with insufficient caster levels.
Alas, I'm too lazy. With the pooled level system, it does give casters more top level spells per day, or nigh endless low levels, which can shift balances further caster in unexpected ways. However, it's pretty much the DDO version, and plenty of people like that game.


Robes of archmagi.
Don't recall but I bet there's some in the APG classes.


Duelist comes to mind first.
If other books are allowed, a dip into swashbuckler to get the extra int to dmg.
Heh, I was pondering a duelist mounted lancer the other day.

(Edit: golly I'm a slow typer)

RtrnofdMax wrote:

I really like the idea of being a highly knowledgeable warrior who can pick out flaws in his enemies to augment his prowess. It's also quite flavorful to be able to rely on mental quickness (INT) rather than muscle memory. I am having a bit of trouble fitting it into a build though. Being a combat oriented Prestige Class, you need to get the +5 BAB, but which base class would get the most out of a good intelligence score?

First thing that comes to mind is an Eldritch Knight, but I would rather be good at walking up to something and hitting it, than be a weak caster and a weak fighter. I am sure there are plenty of ways to bork gishes, but what else would make a good melee combatant with intelligence?


I think monks need an all-around fix. I'd like the option to pursue either a CM style or the striking style.
For the first, no flurry but a constant full BAB for CMs, access to greaters, set bonuses to maneuvers (possibly particularly chosen ones), capping at combining 2 or more maneuvers into one action.
The second, I'd cut back on their maneuver bonues but add more striking options, maybe the choice between full attack flurry power and standard action massive damage.
As is, now and over the years past, they consistantly are exciting on paper and frustrating when played, barring intensive DM mollycoddling.


Any situation where the attackers can see the party ok but not vice versa, and you can't break their concealment it evens the playing field, they have to come in and share the blindness or give you some breathing room to recover & plan from their ambush. Also, my Oracle of War with his blindsense and blind-fighting feat uses it to tilt the odds in his favor when he's fighting on his own.


IMO Exploding dice means you re-roll any die that rolls the max value, not any set of dice that all roll the max value. The excitement of that possibility and the cool "Poison Elves"-ish style is enough to make the feat worth it to my peoples.


Given the full facts, I'd say the paladin would consider this unacceptable behavior, and depending on his flavor either a) leave the party to prepare to defend nearby villages from the goblin armies, b) kick the summoner out of his party, c) challenge summoner to trial by combat, d) or agree to work with the party only until the current goblin threat is vanquished as that evil takes priority and then resolve the issue with the summoner.


Scipion del Ferro wrote:

I would use the rules for dealing damage with a falling object

** spoiler omitted **

Oh! That's much better!


Falling damage instead, distance from base of tree = distance fallen up to height of tree. Also, a Reflex save isntead of attack makes sense to me, but gargoyle should've gotten one too if the Paladin did.


Don't know what sort of power level you're looking for. Maybe tie it into the user's hitpoints? (At 75% of total hp it deals double damage, 50% triple, 25% quadruple, self destruct starts at 0 and acts like the Magi staff.) Also give it a loading ability, where it loads itself from a matched ammo container, or if it not, maybe if the character doesn't have time to load it then it will keep firing, converting 1hp into a bullet per shot? Also maybe a 1/x ability to fire off all 6 barrels at once, like a greater many shot?


Bipedal, so two attacks, slam & bite, one close and one reach. Not bad for 1st level, but it's not going to out-perform the party combatants if they also get the buffs.


Are they taking time out of game during the combat to work out tactics?
If so, then yes, require the Rary's.
If not, then consider that the people that meet once or twice a week to throw dice have worked out the trust and tactical training to pull this maneuvering off, as opposed to the fictional folks that live and sleep and eat and bleed together. And also consider that the lynchpin of this is a God wizard, the reason why kill-the-mage-first is a universal tactic and mantra.


I'd like a sheet with a full CMD modifier list, and weapons & CMB with a side section in atk/dmg for buffed stats.


Seeing this made me think, what I'd really like to see for a PF sheet is an extended CMD block, since there's a half-dozen more types of bonuses with not even a misc field to jot them down in.
Maybe also a Maneuver field in the weapons section too, since there's plenty of bonuses to a CMB that are attack specific.


My records got less complicated by referring to the strength score of the bonus rather than the bonus itself, which is why I believe the Mighty has survived, to differentiate the str min/dmg from an enhancement bonus.

I much prefer a +3 Composite Longbow (Str14) rather than a +3 Composite Longbow (+2) or a +3 (Mighty +2) Composite Longbow or whatever other shorthand is available. Less confusion as to which number is which.


I, too, noticed people mentioning getting mighty composites for free as an arcane bond, and have just ignored it, as it would clearly be just the base masterwork.

Also, from PRD: "If the object of an arcane bond is lost or destroyed, it can be replaced after 1 week in a special ritual that costs 200 gp per wizard level plus the cost of the masterwork item."

So, first off, do you count being sold as being lost, otherwise they're SOL until they get it back.
Even if that does count as lost, they gotta deal with 1 week of having to make that spellcraft check to cast anything, which can be a scary check at low levels.
And finally, the ritual to re-bond an item does not give you the item for free, you're buying (or could be considered to be crafting it per that reading but spending full price instead of 1/3 and only taking 8hrs) the item separately then spending the gold to rebond it.

So, the idea of selling arcane bonded items as a profession is actually more ludicrous then getting a mighty+50 composite longbow for free at 1st level.


See, if SA allows just an attack as part of a full round action, like Shot On The Run, then you could substitute trip and disarm and sunder (since they can replace an attack, like an iterative in a Full Attack Action), but not VS, since you can only apply that to an Attack Action, and not Cleave, since that's its own type of Standard Action.

If it allows a Standard Action to be taken at any point during their Move, like Flyby Attack, then you could use that Standard to Cleave or Deadly Stroke, you could use that Standard as an Attack to VS, and the attack done with that special Standard or Attack could be a trip/etc.

If it allows an Attack Action to be taken at any point during their Move, then they get to apply VS, subsitute a maneuver for the attack granted by the Attack Action, but not use an alternate Standard Action to cleave or deadly stroke.


That works too, thanks.


The movies and books that I prefer have the characters I would consider PCs die regularly when they're doing something dangerous. The effect on roleplay when they realize adventuring's not all fun and games, when that thing over there is eating their buddy's heart, when they watch daddy get beheaded, makes for the kind of characters that we enjoy playing.

And the CR of an encounter is indeed written as to be compared by addition, not multiplication, but by my experience the multiplier makes a difference. +2 CR is tougher at levels 1 & 2 then at levels 11 & 12.

Of course, as I'm sure y'all are very familiar with, there are usually non-lethal options for the big bad even if they are a bastard. Half or more of the party at negatives due to no good luck on their rolls and the rest barely standing? Offer the chance to surrender, lock up for nefarious purposes like hostages or ritual sacrifice on the next holy day, and you've set up some fun prison break challenges. Also, if the standing members get the rest of the party killed before they go negative, meeting fellow prisoners is an easy way to bring in a new PC.


Until further errata, I'm going to interpret Spring Attack as allowing you to take a melee Attack Action at any point during your Move Action. So, no cleaves or deadly strokes that are their own type of Standard Action, but okay on vital strikes or sunders or other abilities that modify an Attack Action or an attack.

I'm thinking about house ruling the Spring Attack feat further. As modified above, but adding that if the character also has Point Blank Shot, they can choose to take a ranged Attack Action instead (I'm okay with skirmishing archers being able to VS on the run), and/or if they also have Combat Casting to take a Cast A Spell Action instead. Only one feat for the 3 mobility options makes sense to me.


Crap, that "All afflictions grant a saving throw when they are contracted. If successful, the creature does not suffer from the affliction and does not need to make any further rolls" seems pretty clear, don't know how I missed that. I hate it when I post a reply in hopes of helpful to find out I was wrong. Grr.

I just hate the idea of giving two chances to save and negate all the 1 save cure poisons, never taking any damage even if they fail the first one as long as they get the second. I don't know if it would be a full on house rule or actually a valid interpretation, but I think with immediate onset poisons, they'll get their initial affliction save to ignore it, but if they fail then they'll just immediately take the damage as if they'd also failed their first post-immediate-onset save. So, catch it on roll 1 and it's done, if not then wait for round 2 for your next chance.

Thanks for catching my error, FarmerBob, sorry for the erroneous post.


You only get to use the initial Onset save to negate the affliction if it does have an Onset delay. Ingest and Inhale poisons have no Onset delay, not just an immediate Onset, so no extra save there. Just the immediate save for round 1, and the save at the beginning of the poison's initiative each round.

The frequency says how often it tries to damage you and you get a save to negate, the cure says how many consecutive saves you have to make to end the affliction early, the duration is the max rounds.

Second doses of the same poison stack, so they'll still damage on the initiative of the original affliction, not adding an extra poison save vs damage on their addition, just adding half the base duration again and increasing the save by 2 for the next save vs poison damage, so you never make more than one save per round per affliction type.

And yeah, if the pally in question has hit such a run of bad luck and bad tactics to not only get stung this many times but fail all those saves, it's unlikely to turn around. Poison seems to be one of those things that you fight off early or go down and hope you've got a competent team around that includes a healer.


Wyvern Poison | type: injury | DC 17 | no onset time | frequency: 1/rd. | duration: 6 rds. | damage: 1d4 Con | cure: 2 saves. (from the PRD)

So on round one, dc17 fortitude, fails and takes 1d4 con. Every round after that he has to make another dc17 fortitude save vs 1d4 con damage, until he makes 2 consecutive successes or the 6 rounds are up.

If he made successful dc17 saves on rounds 2 & 3 then he doesn't have to make any more saves, poison is done. At round 6 he gets hit again, and has to start over again, hopefully making a successful dc17 save in rnd 6 and rnd 7 to end it unscathed, except for the 1d4 con dmg in rnd 1.

If he's having a bad day, and only makes every other save, then at the start of rnd 6 he's taken 3d4 con dmg (rnds 1, 3, 5) and his 2 successful saves (rnds 2 & 4) didn't end the poison because not consecutive. However, he makes his 6th and last save attempt on the wyvern's action before it attacks again, so succeed or not the rnd 1's poison's out of his system and it just starts again.

Now if he's having a reallly bad day, and the wyvern hits him again on rnd 5 right after he failed that dc17 save for the third time, on the bright side he doesn't have to make an immediate save again, since the second dose is just going to enhance the first. In this case, the dc goes up to 19 and the duration has increased from 6 to 9, so on rnd 6 he gets to make a dc19 save, and will have to continue making dc19 saves on rnds 7, 8, & 9, unless he gets 2 consecutive successes, hopefully for his sake right away on 6 & 7.


Actually, saw in another thread, official word that Shield Master only adds the base shield bonus (+1 or +2) to attack and damage, not the enhanced (+7), unless that was all weapon enchant on your MW / +5 shield.

So if I understand, if that was a +1 bashing / +3 heavy shield, it would have: +3 shield bonus to AC not counting any focus feats, and +3 weapon enhancement bonus (the +1 from bashing wouldn't stack), with an extra non-magic +2 to atk and damage from Shield Master, doing 1d8 base damage.

If it was a +3 spiked +1 bashing shield then the argument is whether that would be 2d6 or still just 1d8 base damage. I know that spells that increase size don't stack, but don't see anything that says effects that increase weapon damage as if size were increased stack or not.

And I just can't keep from flip-flopping on whether it would cost 4k+18k=22k or 6k+18k=24k. The simplest reading I guess would be 22k, since that doesn't require flipping over to the more detailed item creation rules, but I don't know if requiring to be enchanted separately is an official exception to the otherwise clear penalty on multiple enchants on the same item.


So, double weapons don't take the 1.5 price multiplier to the cheaper end, but shields do? I'm pretty sure they both have the same specification of being enchanted "separately". The more I think about it though, they're both certainly the same item ... I think I'm going to switch to using the multiple enchantment penalty for both double weapons and shields.


So, a Fireball doesn't get the benefit of Inspire Courage or Prayer, but Scorching Ray does?
What about touch attack spells that do ability damage instead of hp? They still double up on a crit, but do they do bonus HP damage too when those buffs are up?
I'm curious, since I always thought the point of specifying weapon damage was to exclude spells, not just the non-attack roll spells?


The magic body slots would make any enchantments on the second shield inactive, so for the dual shielder there's no bashing enchant on one of their weapons. Shield bonuses don't stack, so only the better shield would give AC, so basically dual shielding is just a feat saver until Shield Mastery takes the attack penalties away.

The only question to me is if a spiked shield enchanted as a weapon counts as a weapon or a shield for body slots. If the fact that it's a shield rules, then this definitely isn't overpowered, since the build is required to use a functionally mundane weapon as half of the 2 weapon style, giving up the option of a 2nd enchanted weapon to save on feats and class abilities is not worth it. If the weapon style enchantments on a shield count as a weapon, then OP can be argued, although the 20/x2 base crit is a little painful, especially without the bashing shield enchant to up the damage dice, like choosing to use simple weapons instead of martial. Also, I don't think it's a free action to throw down a heavy shield, so much like wearing two lock gauntlets, you need a friend to strap you in and unstrap you, losing a lot of versatility and all independence.

Also, I would never agree that shield bashing is limitted to 1/rnd, regardless of what level of 2weapon feats you have. And I can't accept it being limitted to off hand, for the example of the escaping prisoner or disarmed fighter who takes up a shield and uses it as primary by necessity.


It depends on the buff, many of those, like Inspire Courage, do specify weapon damage rather than just any damage.

Farabor wrote:

Also, just for your food for thought, other +hit/+damage stuff works on your ranged touch attack spells. So kick that cleric to cast Prayer, get that bard to inspire courage, etc. :)


I've noticed that rogue thing as well. Seems pretty straight forward given the ability descriptions. If the DM takes exception to the plurality of spells, then taking both Major and Minor Magics should satisfy that.
The nifty-icity also improves for a disarm / catch off guard improvised weapon sort of rogue or bard.

And actually, the description of the rogue abilities states that the spell's caster level is equal to the rogue's level, so it would scale full just like the bard.

I suppose it could be argued that AS requires the ability to cast spells, and the rogue abilities are actually spell-like abilities, but that's not how I'd read it.


Wow, I did not see that in the glossary, looks like they tried to meet the old 3.0 table half way, so the special materials aren't obsolete, but give an extra reward for straight enhancement rather than abilities on a magic weapon. Seems every time I read the PF core book I find another bit that I had assumed stayed the same so didn't process on earlier readings. Apologies for my incorrect post, and thanks for the correction.
However, the +4/40 style of DR is still an artifact of 3.0. Good questions if you are playing with that still, I don't have the answers in that case.


As mentioned previously, this is handled by the magic item body slots. A character only has one slot for magic armor, so much like putting on a third magic ring, the magic kilt would fail to function if they were already wearing magic armor, just like magic piecemeal greaves would fail to function if already wearing a magic breastplate.


Damage resistance based off enhancement bonus hasn't been since 3.0, 3.5 and Pathfinder only check for Magic or not. Somewhere in 3.5 there was the conversion to change a scary +4/40 DR to Magic/10 or something like that


I don't think that every possible multi-class combo needs to be a viable choice. Multi-classing is an advanced character building technique that can munchkin well if done right, but will cripple if done poorly, and my group's always liked that. Caster multi-classing is a bad move without a compatible prestige class, or a character concept that's cool with the gimped magic, and we're cool with that too. Given that Pathfinder has fixed our perceived problem with Wizards and Sorcerors and Clerics and Fighters needing to prestige class as early as possible to compete with the other bases, it'll be at least a year before any of us start wanting to branch out and try anything crazy from the base classes. Mystic Theurges and other dual caster advancements are badass with their versatility and nigh unlimitted ammunition, definitely don't need to be powered up to their balanced lack of highest level spells.