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Can a paladin with the Holy Guide archetype use the Extra Mercy feat to gain extra favored terrains?

PRD wrote:
Favored Terrain (Ex): At 3rd level, a holy guide chooses a favored terrain from the ranger favored terrains table. This ability otherwise functions as the ranger class feature of the same name. This ability replaces the mercy gained at 3rd level. Every time a holy guide would be able to select another mercy, he can instead select another favored terrain and increase his bonuses for one existing favored terrain, just as a ranger can.
PRD wrote:

Extra Mercy

Your lay on hands ability adds an additional mercy.

Prerequisites: Lay on hands class feature, mercy class feature.

Benefit: Select one additional mercy for which you qualify. When you use lay on hands to heal damage to one target, it also receives the additional effects of this mercy.

Special: You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take this feat, select a new mercy.

Emphasis Mine


I appreciate all the help!

I felt inspired to write a short story to start the campaign off...
-----------------------------------------------------------
The real winners of the battle were the crows.

Centurion Aelius crossed the field towards the Legatus's tent, watching as soldiers and camp followers searched the fallen - looking for wounded survivors, prisoners, or in some cases precious baubles among the corpses. Outnumbering all the human searchers, however, were the crows. Everywhere they flapped across the battlefield. As Aelius spotted one nearby, standing on the remains of a Pictish soldier. As he watched, it dug down with a sharp beak, plucking out the dead man's eye. A tasty morsel.

The Legion had fought off the Pictish warband, but the crows were the ones who had won.

Disgusted, Aelius turned away and continued towards the Legatus's tent, thinking back on the events leading up to this. Reports had come in of Imperial lands being raided by a particularly large force, Pictish warriors in their strange paints. The bulk of the legion had been on patrol in the north, searching for the raiders, but the raiders had found them first. Howling, coming through the trees, the Picts had slammed into the Roman force. The legion was well trained but the Pict ambush had been a complete surprise, and the terrain had not been favorable to the Romans. Aelius wondered why the outriding scouts hadn't given more warning. Surely such a large force would have been noticed sooner?

It seemed Aelius was the last to arrive at the meeting; as he entered the Legatus's tent, he heard the other centurions speaking.

"...heavy losses across the legion. The sixth cohort has been completely destroyed; the first and seventh have lost eight men in ten..."
"...much of the baggage train set on fire, but we should have provisions to return to Eboracum..."
"...a number of the enemy were women, truly a barbaric people..."
"...we did catch a fair number of prisoners, should bring some good coin from the slave markets..."

The man at the center of the tent raised a hand, and the conversation stopped. Legatus Fabius Avitus was young for his position, but had earned the respect of his centurions. "For the glory of Emporer Hadrian, we have been victorious here today, but at great cost. We will return to to Eboracum, but for now we must set up camp and deal with our dead. The vexillations should return to join us before we move out. Gaius Severus," Fabius indicated a nearby centurion, "you will take over as primus pilus. Centurions, get your men ready to move at dawn a day after next. Dismissed."

***

It was a cold night, and Aelius sat close to the fire near his tent. Many of his men had already gone to bed; the last few up were on first shift for guard duty. Aelius, however, couldn't sleep. It wasn't the first time he had seen war, or even the fifty-first, but for some reason the battle of the previous day had left him unsettled. There was something... wrong about it. Something to do with the scouts, and the lack of warning.

A log shifted in the fire, throwing a shower of sparks into the air, and a burst of warm air distracted him from his troubled thoughts. He shrugged. The scouts likely had been intercepted by the Picts before they could bring back warning. If the forest was thick enough, even a large force might be missed by even the keenest observers until it was too late. At these thoughts, Aelius stood up and walked to his tent. Soldiers got precious little sleep as it was and he really shouldn't waste time when he could.

***

It felt like he had just closed his eyes a moment when Aelius was awoken by one of his men.

"Centurion!" the legionaire whispered. "Wake up! The fog... it's..." The man's eyes were wide with fear, and he pointed.

Aelius realized a moment later that he could see the man's eyes, despite the lack of firelight in the tent. He looked outside and saw almost nothing. A thick fog had rolled into the encampment, so dense that Aelius couldn't see the fire he had been sitting at hours before. And the fog was glowing. He jerked back, alarmed. Was he imagining it? No, the thick, gray wall outside his tent was definitely lit up, a sickly greenish glow that would not have been perceptible during the day but was readily apparent in the dark of the night. What witchcraft was this? Pictish magic?

"Stay here," he told the frightened soldier who had woken him, then stepped out into the fog. One hand, holding tightly to the tent flap, trembled violently, but he forced himself not to flee. He peered out, trying in vain to see around him. Why hadn't anybody noticed this? Where were the guards? Where were the noises of the camp, even at night?

"Hello?" he called out, but his voice sounded muffled, even to him, as though he was speaking through thick linens. "Can anyone hear me?"

When he heard no answer he searched among his tentmates' belongings for a rope. Tying it around his waist, and around the frame of the tent, he stepped back out into the fog. It took all of his courage to move away from the tent, away from what felt like the one spot left in the world where men still existed, and out into the gray-green witchlight swirling around him.

It was only a few yards away, but it seemed like miles, when he found the first body. He almost stumbled over it in the fog, and he let out a brief yelp - a vocalization of fear that barely reached his own ears. The corpses from the battle had been cleared away from the camp, so he knew it wasn't from that. And yet here was a man in legion uniform, lying face down, his hand grasping a gladius... his hand...

Aelius leaned over and looked closer. The hand holding the gladius had been torn at, ragged wounds that looked like... bites? Rounded, but small. As though by a child. Now that he was looking he could see more bite marks, on the soldier's arms, on his legs. But despite the profusion of bites there was little blood around the body. Aelius had seen many men die - some at his own hand. He had seen bodies torn at by wild animals. This was new to him. Fearfully he followed the rope back to his tent.

The legionaires in his tent asked him what he had seen but he couldn't bring himself to speak, at first. Finally he managed to give an order. "Stay alert. Keep your weapons at hand."

***

Hours later, dawn arrived. The weary soldiers had stayed up all night, and saw the sun's rays burn through the fog, dissipating it. As they looked however, they realized something had changed - the terrain nearby looked completely different. There were fewer tents than there should have been. On the horizon, away from where the sun broke was the moon - but there was another one higher in the sky, as well.
Two moons, thought Aelius. How were there two moons?


Admittedly I'm a planner - I love those elements of shows like Mission Impossible, The Italian Job, or Leverage where they accounted for little details.

I'd argue against the "Just Do It" mentality - one thing that has frustrated me a lot is one guy I sometimes play with that will take that approach. The quintessential example involves a game where our five person party was trying to infiltrate some enemy HQ and make a clean getaway; four of us spent half an hour coming up with a plan but were still working out smaller details when the fifth got bored and drove a car through the front door.

I can understand a player - and a character - getting bored. I'd expect something to force us to make a move when it is minor stuff left to resolve. What I don't want is for one person to *invalidate* the decisions of four people and make that half hour a complete waste of time.


Ryze Kuja wrote:

What if you house ruled something similar to the 5E rules for healing during short rests?

Short Rest

A short rest is a period of downtime, at least 1 hour long, during which a character does nothing more strenuous than eating, drinking, reading, and tending to wounds.

A character can spend one or more Hit Dice at the end of a short rest, up to the character’s maximum number of Hit Dice, which is equal to the character’s level. For each Hit Die spent in this way, the player rolls the die and adds the character’s Constitution modifier to it. The character regains Hit Points equal to the total. The player can decide to spend an additional Hit Die after each roll. A character regains some spent Hit Dice upon finishing a long rest, as explained below.

I'm not as familiar with 5E - is there some limit on this? What stops a party from healing up after every fight?


Hmm, perhaps I should explain the campaign a bit better - many of these are great ideas but wouldn't work in this specific campaign.

Basically I'm borrowing an idea from Jim Butcher's Codex Alera, in part - the IX Hispania Roman Legion, or rather a portion of it along with a portion of the camp followers, are on Earth in 121 CE, but through supernatural means are transported to a high fantasy world. The players will take the role of a contubernium of exploratores/speculatores - a squad of scouts.

This means they will start with technology level appropriate for 121 CE Earth. Alchemical options wouldn't work.

Now, the Romans did have some rudimentary surgery, so Kimera757's answer might be best. The healing herbs of avr could also work, though getting them for free risks them totally replacing potions. Perhaps if they also came with a downside - 1 point of Wisdom damage, so using one a day would be okay but using two or more would start to accumulate penalties?


I'm toying with the idea of a campaign where the players are part of an expeditionary force to a new world; the world they came from has no magic, and they'll discover it as their adventure unfolds. This would have the mechanical effect of making them start with no spellcasting classes but with the option of multiclassing later.

However, one challenge I'm trying to figure out is how they would have healing early on. I don't want to make them take forever to heal naturally; I also don't want to make it so easy that it reduces the awe of getting divine magic later. And which natives are friendly will depend on their actions so I can't even assume that throwing a native NPC healer in for them will work.

So how do I a) allow early healing, before they have discovered magic, but b) not make nonmagical healing so potent that there is no incentive to use magical later?


Technically speaking, you can only take spirit hexes, so chant and misfortune are out. Many consider this a mistake and some GMs will allow generic shaman hexes as well, but RAW it is only spirit hexes.


piquwee wrote:
Since there are no Christians in Pathfinder, I would say this was a tall tale.

Do you mean there are no Christians that play or none in the setting? But in either case it is a joke, not an example from the game.


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Reminds me of the joke...

A Pastor was walking past a pet shop one day when he noticed a sign in the window: "Christian Horse for Sale."
Being that the Pastor owned a large ranch, he was immediately interested, and went into the shop. The owner took the Pastor out to the back, where he saw a beautiful Arabian stallion. He agreed to allow the Pastor to take a "test run." The Pastor grabbed the reins. "giddyap." The horse ignored him. "no, no," counseled the owner. This is a Christian horse. If you want him to move, you must say, "Praise the Lord!" The Pastor did as he was told, and the horse started off on a leisurely walk. However, he soon found that the horse would not stop. "He won't answer to 'Whoa', said the owner. It's "Amen." The Pastor decided that he liked the horse, so he bought him and took him home to his ranch in the country. He saddled the horse up again, said, "Praise the Lord," and went riding into the countryside. Suddenly, the horse saw a rattlesnake crossing the path. Frightened, he reared and bolted straight for a cliff. The Pastor cried "whoa!" but the horse only ran faster. In vain, he tried one word after another. Finally, he remembered the correct command and screamed "AMEN!!!!!" just as the horse approached the edge of the cliff. The Pastor was so thrilled that his life had been saved that he raised his hands to the sky and shouted, "PRAISE THE LORD!"


This came up in my General Discussion thread and I wanted to get more input on the rules of it.

Adept Channel requires the "Summon Familiar" class ability. The class feature of a shaman is "Spirit Animal" - but it largely functions the same way.

Now, due to similarity I wouldn't see it as a stretch for a GM to houserule it as okay, but I wanted to see if this was RAW legal without a houserule. Does shaman qualify for Adept Channel?


DeathlessOne wrote:
These abilities are pretty much the same thing. They do almost EXACTLY the same thing. If it looks like a duck, quacks likes a duck, and waddles like a duck... It might be a dragon in disguise, but otherwise... it is a duck.

This is why I said it would not be a stretch for a GM to allow it... but RAW they are not the same.

Examples:
An invulnerable rager does not qualify for increased damage reduction, because they don't have damage reduction class ability anymore, even though the ability that replaces it gives DR.
You have a class feature only if the class description says you have it.
Spell mastery only works for wizards. Using it for witches, alchemists, and maguses is a house rule (though one the FAQ specifically calls out as reasonable).

However, this may not exactly be cut and dried. This isn't an archetype, so this may not apply, but it seems in some cases a similar ability *does* count as the orginal. I guess it might depend on whether shaman counts as an alternate class of witch/oracle or its own separate thing? This seems to contradict the second example above anyhow so this might be worth a FAQ clarification.


I'm a fan of using soup as a metaphor for spellcasting. Some (wizards) buy all the ingredients at a store and cook it from scratch. Some (alchemists) buy a can and microwave it. Some (clerics) go to someone else's house and have them make it. Regardless they all get soup in the end.

A cleric creating a spell is like going to someone else's house and making it yourself. You put in the knowledge and work but you are using their kitchen and ingredients.


Shamans can't actually take Adept Channel. While the spirit animal functions as a familiar, it is not the summon familiar ability and thus Shamans do not quality. While I don't think it would stretch things too much for a GM to allow this, RAW it does not work.


So while creating a character recently I decided to play a shaman, and then I decided to make him a necromatic shaman. While I'm sticking with the concept, I noticed something odd...

Shamans get Create Undead and Create Greater Undead on their spell list, but they have NO way to control the created undead. They do not get Control or Command Undead, nor do they have a way of channeling negative energy in order to take the feat to do so.

While I realize creating intelligent undead isn't the best decision gameplay-wise anyhow, I'm surprised they have the option but not even the basics of minion management to use it without multiclassing.

Even a Bones spirit doesn't grant negative energy channeling.

This can be mitigated by a half-elf, half-orc, or human shaman; their favored class option lets them add cleric spells to their spell list. Other races seem to be out of luck though.

Am I missing something? Is this an oversight?


Agreed with the above. As wraithstrike quoted from the FAQ, it is the whole kitten kaboodle.

Now, if that allows qualifiying for racial archetypes is questionable (are those effects as well?)


I simultaneously agree they are awesome but disagree that they make sense.

Will.Spencer mentioned that he has retrained in his life... but I bet he still has access to some of the old skills.

Retraining doesn't make sense because in real life, the experiences and skills we gain are additive. We might get rusty at something we haven't done in a long time but we don't entirely lose it. We just layer more stuff over it.

But because of the abstraction of the game, that option doesn't exist. We don't get new skill points or feats or class abilities until we level up, and once we hit level 20 we can't level up any more. If a level 20 character studied for decades he still couldn't learn a new language because it would require putting a skill rank he will never get into the linguistics skill.

So really, retraining is is nonsensical way to make another nonsensical part of the game less nonsensical.

Which is also awesome in its own way. :-D


I'm not saying you are wrong; I understand the distinction you are making. I do question whether it should be a meaningful distinction regarding the craft skill. For example, one of the Core Rulebook specializations is Craft: Calligraphy. Unless I am misunderstanding calligraphy, it doesn't create a widget - it is a very stylized writing. Artistry even calls out that there is a blurry line with Craft: Paintings and Craft: Sculpture. Arguably, the difference between a chunk of baked clay or raw marble and a sculpture is purely ephemeral.

Ultimately it comes down to: we will use an extra skill because I'm limiting this other skill.

Now, arguably some of that is needed - at some level we could group several skills. (Indeed there is a PFU section on that, too!) At the extreme end, we could have a single skill, Doing or Knowing, that covers everything. That would be silly, thus we limit skills and divide them up.

But doing this too much would also be silly - we wouldn't want skills for, say... Climbing Stairs, Climbing Rope, Climbing Walls, etc. They are different but similar enough that we can just have a Climb skill.

So in the end I suppose Artistry is a matter of taste - is it different enough from Craft to justify a separate skill? In games I GM, the answer is no. ;-)


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Tiefling, Orc, or Drow Paladin: not disallowed but really against type.

Aasimar Antipaladin: As above but in reverse.

Hill Giant Rogue: *hides behind a tree* "YOU CAN'T SEE ME!"

Gnome Monk: Because any race that literally dies from boredom should NOT be quietly meditating.


Benjamin Medrano wrote:
Also, while I may think the prices are a bit out of whack, Artistry only costs 1/4 the finished value of the creation, while Craft costs 1/3. I feel that's far more appropriate to the subject matter than what Craft charges.

One note on that - alterations to the Craft skill in PFU make that also cost 1/4th.


Benjamin Medrano wrote:
I haven't seen Lore used, but I have seen people use Artistry in my games. It's more for forms of art that don't comfortably fit in Craft or Perform, IMO. How does Craft (Composer) work, for instance? Or Craft (Author)? I feel that's more what it's geared toward.

See, to me craft should target the creation, not the creator. You have Craft: Weapons, not Craft: Weaponsmithing. Thus the above would simply be Craft: Musical Composition and Craft: Story.

But as for "useless stuff" - I think my argument would go something like this:
Either it is game relevant or it is not. If it is game relevant, you should have tradeoffs so players can make choices. This makes a Lore skill you barely use strictly inferior - if I put the same point into a profession I can at least make gold on it. If something is NOT game relevant, you shouldn't have to spend limited resources on it.

Thus (borrowing PossibleCabbage's tea example) if my character should be an expert on tea, but not other things that fit into Knowledge: Nature, I should either a) simply know this for free as part of my background the same way I know my parents' names or the name of the store I was a tavern server, or b) spend a background skill point in Profession: Tea Critic and get all the benefits I'd have gotten with Lore and the additional ability to make money.


Looking again through some PF Unchained Rules on Background Skills and was reminded of the Artistry and Lore skills.

Specifically, Artistry is used to make works of art - replacing Craft or Perform for these functions. Lore works like Knowledge, except it is for much more specific information. However, both of these seem like useless skills to me.

Lore might have some value - only some of the Knowledge Skills are Background skills, so you could use a background skill on Lore: Green Dragons of Varisia, whereas a rank in Knowledge: Arcana would cost an adventuring skill point. The problem I have with this is that it is either too good or too bad, depending on campaign. If you are in a campaign set in Varisia with lots of green dragons, a point of Lore: Green Dragons of Varisia is worth almost as much as a point of Knowledge: Arcana, thus essentially allowing you to use a background skill as an adventuring skill. On the other hand, if you are in a campaign set in the Mana Wastes, the question of Green Dragons of Varisia will never come up and it is a waste of background skills. It's either feast or famine, rather than a consistently-useful-but-not-as-much-as-adventuring-skill skill.

Artistry is even worse, I think. Both Craft and Perform are already background skills. So there is no reason to remove, for example, Craft: Painting and make it Artistry: Painting. They do the same thing, with the same resources. What's the advantage?


tonyz wrote:
If you really want to twist the players expectations, Broderick Quink in Sandpoint could be a Leng cultist.

Oh, I *really* like this...


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SheepishEidolon wrote:

Well, you are not the first who asks to stretch the definition of a paladin or antipaladin. A common answer is 'play a warpriest, damit', and I actually agree with that. No offense intended.

There is another crossbreed between warpriest and (anti)paladin: The warpriest archetype champion of the faith. It might fit your concept well.

I have always found this answer a bit unsatisfactory. There is nothing inherent to LG or CE that allows only those alignments to have full BAB, minor casting, holy warriors while every other alignment has to settle for noncasting holy warriors or less martial/more casting holy warriors.

I always wish I could play a NG or CG "paladin".


I'm running RotRL AE for some coworkers and have a fairly large group - I'm at my GM comfort max with 7 players! As a result I know they'll be running behind in experience and I want to add a secondary plot.

The idea is to have cultists of Mhar take a more prominent role - it was their leader who set Mokmurian on his path, and they want Karzoug to succeed... but only so the Leng Device can be used to bring Mhar into the world. I want to add content sprinkled throughout the campaign path, or at least after the first chapter. This will include introducing Denizens of Leng a little early, and their human(oid) minions even earlier.

Other than the Leng Device, what might the cult be at odds with Karzoug's minions over? And where in each chapter does the story have enough breaks to include extra content? Not just adding to existing encounters but adding new encounters in new areas?


So I'm currently playing in an Iron Gods campaign. My character is a Shoanti Shaman, walking with the spirits of his tribe. Now, as part of the Shaman favored class bonus for humans, I can add cleric spells to my spell list and one obvious choice I thought for this campaign was Protection from Technology.

However, as my GM has pointed out, my character doesn't believe in technology. Specifically, he has stated there is no such thing, that "technology" is just magic sufficiently advanced so someone doesn't understand it. After all, anything done "technologically" can be done with a spell. And thus, my GM points out, I shouldn't really be able to take a spell that requires belief in technology.

I want to keep my RP attitude inverting Clarke's third law, so how can I flavor the mechanics of taking the spell while still roleplay insisting technology doesn't exist?


42) The ship is tied to the crew's life force and they literally start to die if separated from it for too long.

43) They CAN sell the ship. Sadly, this leaves them stranded at whatever port they are at. Campaign over, make new characters for the next one!

44) The ship is cursed and if sold, will still be on the next landing pad they attempt to leave by. They are hounded through the galaxy by people who think (possibly incorrectly at first but certainly correctly later) they have been swindled, that the party took the money and the ship both.


Had been considering for a while running a Firefly styled game and was considering D20 Future or Star Wars D20 (without Force powers) about the time Starfinder was announced.

I'm curious how the game runs if you strip all the magic out. If I remove access to Mystics, Solarions, and Technomancers, would it severely unbalance the game?

I'm comparing it to trying to run a fantasy game without magic - take out clerics and wizards and only allow fighters, rogues, trapper rangers, etc. and you lose access to magical healing, a lot of battlefield control, etc. which dramatically impacts how you design adventures. Is Starfinder the same way or is the magic fairly easy to remove?


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I'll just leave this here.


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Tacticslion wrote:

Familial bloodline lich

Wow. They used my idea from many years ago!


Good call. Missed that once wording. Thank you!


Awesome. Thanks for the help!


So let's suppose I'm an 8th level Geokineticist who has taken on Pyrokinesis as well at 7th level. I have two options for my kinetic blade - an earth one and a fire one.

Now, Pennywise is on my left side and Jack Napier's on my right. Pennywise has spell resistance. I want to make a full attack action, but my second iterative attack is at a -5.

Can I hit Pennywise with my first attack using an Earth-blast Blade to avoid SR, then change to a Fire-blast Blade to hit Jack Napier as a touch attack?

Extra points if you catch the song reference in this question.


After some players recently left our group, I'm developing a new character to fill in a missing need. Basically, I'm making a primary melee character who can stand in front of squishier friends and dish out damage.

I want to play a fighter - paladins aren't ideal for the group and we have had a barbarian so I want something different. (Open to ranger as well.) We are playing a modification of the Mummy's Mask campaign (not looking for spoilers) so it takes place in a desert setting. We are level 8.

Stats are rolled and I already did so - they aren't great. 14, 14, 11, 11, 10, 8. Equivalent to a 10-pt buy. I had been thinking of either a two-handed fighter or a two-weapon fighter but I don't have the stats for the latter and maybe not even good for the former. :-/

My thoughts: Given strength is going to be low, iterative attacks are less reliable. A vital strike/critical build with a falchion may be desirable. This would also give me more mobility - or a move action to pull a potion of enlarge person or oil of bless weapon.

My roommate suggested an elf with an elven curveblade and the agile weapon quality, so I could make more use of dex than strength. Yes or no?

EDIT: Additional info - we have an arcanist focused on summoning and battlefield control, a cleric focused on healing and buffs, and an archaeologist bard who is okay in melee but hardly a tank. We tend to find ourselves in old crypts and dungeons a lot, though sometimes on open ground; terrain quality rarely seems to be an issue but walls are. I am open to other classes and build that accomplish the same party role but don't want to step on toes.


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Mechalibur wrote:
Marco Massoudi wrote:
1. This sounds a lot like D&D 4th edition, i don´t know if i like this yet.
How so? 4th edition had hp, healing surges, and action points, none of which were really like how this stamina/health system is described.

This actually sounds a lot like the CRPG Pillars of Eternity. I kind of like it.

http://pillarsofeternity.gamepedia.com/Vitality


Couldn't find this previously asked.

Came to me as I was rolling up a kineticist... if an attack lists multiple damage types, saying half the damage is one type and half another, would you lose 1 damage on an odd roll?

For example: Magma Blast does half bludgeoning and half fire. Let's say I roll 17 damage. Because of half rules, that should deal 8 bludgeoning and 8 fire... does the remaining damage get lost? Do I get to choose how to split it?

This would apply to a cleric's flamestrike spell as well, and more sources as well I'm sure.


Incorporeal creatures take half damage from magic spells; swarms take 50% more damage from area of effect spells.

If you have an incorporeal swarm, how do these stack? Does each modify the original damage (so they basically negate each other) or do they stack (doing 75% damage)?


I recall in 3.5 hearing that if an ability on a class table was different from the text, the text took precedence.

If this is the case in Pathfinder as well, I may have spotted an error in the PRD, on the Inquisitor. The table shows them getting detect alignment at 2nd level, but the text for the ability - unlike every other ability gained at higher levels - doesn't specify it comes at 2nd level.

So by this, inquisitors should be able to detect alignment at 1st level.


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Son of the Veterinarian wrote:
Kick dinosaurs through windows.

You missed a golden opportunity that I shall pick up on instead...

Defenestrating dilophosauruses!


So here's the problem with the "LE may choose L" and "CE may choose C", at least in my view.

Alignment is DESCRIPTIVE, not PRESCRIPTIVE - that is, a LE character isn't LE and therefore values and acts on both; he's LE because his actions fit a pattern identified as LE. And what that means is that his actions show a lawful MEANS to reach evil ENDS. A CE character is similar - he'll use chaotic MEANS to reach evil ENDS. A neutral character will use any and all means to reach evil ends. But in all three cases, the result is still evil, just a different flavor of evil.


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Honestly, while I do say a haversack is a backpack, I'm opposed to the ability to make it masterwork... precisely because it increases the frequency of the paradox in my OP. Since it always weighs 5 lb. you will come across it any time there is a 5 lb. gap between the "Medium" load at one strength and the "Light" load at the next - which is the case at every strength score above 12. Having light loads in the masterwork backpack is what causes the problem, and the Handy Haversack makes everything that fits a light load.


Next time I see it, I will!


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A haversack IS a type of backpack. The big difference is that a haversack has only one shoulder strap.


It really depends on timeframe considered.

Chaotic Evil can descend into deeper depravities than the other two - they take the most *joy* in committing evil acts. So in short time horizons, I think they are the most evil.

But... as time horizons lengthen, it is Lawful Evil that pulls ahead - methodically corrupting and destroying people en masse, leaving black stains across the history books.

If you had to spend a day with one of the two, I'd rather suffer the presence of Adolf Hitler than Charles Manson... and yet Hitler is responsible for greater atrocities in the long run.

Then again, one could argue Neutral Evil can be the worst of both worlds...


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A masterwork backpack makes you treat your strength score 1 higher for carrying capacity purposes.

So imagine the following scenario...

A person with a strength of 12 is wearing equipment and carrying a masterwork backpack with 1 lb. of stuff in it. The total weight is 50 lb. He's carrying a light load.

He drops the backpack, losing the 1 lb. of stuff plus the 4 lb. of backpack. Now he is carrying a medium load and suffers speed and armor check penalties.


Son of the Veterinarian wrote:
At the risk of sounding cliche - "You're Batman".

Oddly, I had imagined him more like the Question, hahaha!


I'm considering inquisitor if he doesn't go for the paladin.

And yeah, it's more like he just doesn't advertise things. I see him as the kind of person who takes in everything but gives out almost nothing - not lying, but not volunteering the truth. His allies may figure it out after a few levels, and that's fine... but he's not going to go up to a group of strangers in a tavern (no idea what our party hook actually is yet) and tell them he's a spy for holiness.


I'm about to be starting a new game soon, and I'm discussing a character with my GM. I'd like to play an Investigator, but my idea for the character also includes taking a level or two of a divine class - he'll be a devotee of Kelinahat. (http://pathfinderwiki.com/wiki/Kelinahat) (I know, not optimal, but I'm not doing it to optimize.) I was thinking Paladin.

I'm keeping this secret from my group (not a huge deal if they find out but at least at first I'm playing my cards close to my chest).

The GM isn't fully sold on the idea of a paladin behaving in a sneaky way, but he also hasn't overruled it - he wanted more explanation. Now, I won't be heartbroken if it isn't a paladin, but if he does allow it, I'd like to work out a paladin code for his perusal.

So two questions... do you think a paladin could follow this deity, and if so, what kind of code would such a paladin have?


Second time this has happened, and I finally figured out at least part of it. (Last time I just didn't buy what I was interested in.)

At the resolution I'm using (1920x1080) on Google Chrome on a 32" monitor, several windows critical to the checkout process - including entering new addresses for billing on a new card - don't scroll down far enough to see the buttons. Hitting enter on the form didn't autosubmit, either, and I couldn't see whether tab was getting me to the right spot.

I finally was able to make my purchase by zooming out to 75%, clicking the submit button, and then zooming back in, but not everyone will think of that; like I said, I didn't the first time.

Further, the checkout screen links you to saved addresses, but I didn't see a way to select or add one through that screen; I had to start the checkout process over, which was annoying.


Best advice I can give... plan out the tech tree in advance and make sure everyone knows it.

I once tried playing in a game like this (before PF so the rules were very handwaved) and it was horrible. I was trying to build up my economy first, and the GM as it turned out favored military development. So the players who focused on that made several breakthroughs early on giving them advantages each time, while those of us who went a more peaceful route kept spending our turns building "prerequisites" to what we wanted, none of which actually gave any benefits.

For example:
Player 1 develops sharpened stone, giving bonuses to attack! Player 1 develops unit tactics giving bonuses to attack! Player 1 develops armor giving bonuses to defense!
Player 2 develops the idea of digging. Player 2 develops the idea of harvesting raw materials. Player 2 develops the idea of using raw materials. Player 2 develops the idea of making simple huts, finally giving a bonus to survival in cold climates.


And if so, what would you like to see in it?

Personally, I'd like...

1) Clarifications on various rules and spells that have been made on the boards, so people who don't keep up with the FAQ can find them.
2) Advice on dealing with experienced players who have different rules interpretations.
3) More advice on building your own campaign setting, esp. regarding planar cosmology.
4) Pros and cons of various table policies. (For example, penalizing death makes players more likely to swap characters when they die, while penalizing new characters will make players stick with their characters even if it means paying for a resurrection.)
5) Updated encounter tables, using later Bestiaries as well, and giving low/medium/high CR ranges for each type of terrain.

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