I'm not sure where you guys are coming from but from my perspective on the mass effect 3 complaints is that it didn't come from the lack of a happy ending but the fact that your choices ultimately meant nothing. Which is fine, if the game series wasn't sold and praised for your choices actually mattering. Bioware games were known to have your choices change how the story plays and in the end, your choices dictated what sort of endings were available to you. Mass effect 3 even with the added ending made it so that it didn't actually matter what kind of person you played shepherd as, you pick your ending in the end. At least with the good ending added you could pretend like your decisions prior mattered but it was a huge let down.
And to keep this on topic, I am absolutely disgusted with natural attack builds that stretch to get as many natural attacks as possible. Two claws are fine, add a bite and it's still fine but there are others who aren't satisfied unless they get two wings a ogre and a tail slap and I'm glad I've never had to play with a player who accepts that.
You eventually are going to hit dead points where your cold spells are useless but the prestige class has features to bypass cold resistance and immunities. When that happens you just play as a normal witch with fewer hexs. You'll be fine if you like the base witch.
He said he thinks that Paizo is incorrect on one thing and you understand that as he thinks the design team is less capable than himself personally? Am I understanding you correctly?
He straight up said he thinks that crossblooded dipping like this wasn't looked at when he ruling was made and that the current ruling is not appropriate with this situation in mind.
I think the DrDeth's point is that its silly that a potent level one power that certain sorcerers get to make them unique to other arcane casting classes can just be transferred to any class that cast spells, especially a wizard who arguably doesn't need the help doing anything. The design team probably only allows it because blasting at high levels is as much of a non issue as sneak attack at high levels.
I find it funny that you count rogue talents as being just as valuable as feats when the general critisism for rogue talents is that the ones that don't outright grant feats are considerably weaker.
You're also ignoring that heavy armor proficiency requires medium armor proficiency which the fighter also has over the rogue. You would make a better argument that a Dex based fighter is similar to the rogue but then armor training wouldn't be so under valued in your analysis.
Items were updated every few days since release and a second document came up with major updates leaving most of the classes in a strong spot.
Disliked:
Felt like the design team stretched too thin during the entire thing. Playtest was run right in the holidays and felt like we had a dead week in the middle of the playtest. Also there were some classes that felt ignored for a large portion time because other classes were taking priority.
People keep talking about increasing the slayers damage with a bane like ability but why not just increase the damage of favored target?
Boost the slayers damage up without giving them a stronger to hit and incentivizes going into two weapon fighting over rangers who get free feats and fighters that can archetype for pounce.
I also think favored target should be a swift much earlier than level 10. Currently playing a freebooter and I'm spending the same action to give a team wide buff albeit at a single target only. Maybe moving it to a swift at 5 or 6 and then a free at 12 or 14.
Ok I decided to try this class out and I'm surprised that it actually plays out a bit better than I had assumed from reading. This is going to be a long one so I tried to summarize it in the last paragraph.
Test Details:
Played a few encounters each level up to 8, swapping between a wildshaping combat druid and a melee focused hunter. Both had the same Tiger Companion.
Both had similar builds:
16 STR (+2 racial) [4th and 8th level advancement brings it to 18]
14 DEX
14 CON
12 INT
16/14 WIS (With or without Dual talent)
8 CHA
-Hunter-
Toughness
Power Attack
*Back to Back
Furious Focus
*Precise Strike
Iron Will or Endurance (You're forced into medium armor its not a bad idea)
-Druid-
Toughness
Power Attack
Natural Spell
Planar Wildshape or Heavy armor Proficiency (dragon hide or stone plate in the future but this can wait)
Earlier levels go to the Hunter hands down. The +2 enhancement bonus in a pinch is nice for a single encounter a day but the druid isn't putting anything on the table other than spellcasting which the hunter is on par with at this level. Not to mention the companion getting this bonus as well.
When the druid starts getting wildshape they start getting even in power with it leaning a bit more towards the druid. Druid gets 1 use of wildshape but with the appropriate trait they can stay shaped for 8 hours straight compared to the hunters twice a day for 1 minute each. It really depends on the scenario which one pulls more weight. I should also note that the hunter gains a teamwork feat before wildshape is an option for the druid. I chose back to back to try to gain some armor if we were ever surrounded. I don't think the +2 AC really made an impact since if we were surrounded as such, we could just muscle the better positioned enemies out first.
Finally at level 8 it stopped looking like I was playing two druids. Druids sitting at Large wildshape 3/day 8 hours each and a standard to activate. Hunter is sitting at Double animal focus 3/day 1 minutes each and a swift to assume. At a minimum the druid can shape for 3 encounters if he is forced to change into human between encounters, so the druid can last 4-5 encounters a day with his bonuses. The hunter on the other hand has stronger bonuses, but is realistically only able to use them in 3 encounters. There is a merit to being able to buff yourself as a swift rather than spending your first standard shape shifting however a druid can gain pounce with this levels wildshape, allowing the druid to make up for lost time. At this point they almost felt as equals in power with the druid being more consistent and having access to great spells like strong jaw and freedom of movement before the hunter.
What I pulled from the test:
1. Enhancement bonuses are not as bad as me and other people thought. If you instead plan to not buy a belt of STR because you are going to animal focus it and instead spend that money on another magic item, like a belt of CON, you can get some powerful results.
2. Animal focus is too short. Yes I was able to only have to use one per encounter but it sucks to have all those skill bonuses that seem to be there for out of combat use and be limited to 1 min every three levels. Im not saying make it an hour/level like the druid but it needs to be something higher. Maybe 10 minutes a level per use.
3. Using weapons is nice. Using magic weapons compared to an amulet of fist is so nice compared to the combat druid.
4. Better Armor. The hunter has much stronger armor up until the wild enhancement is a possibility. Then the Hunter will be behind whatever he cant match with an amulet of natural armor and a +3 enhancement bonus.
5. Money saved. Having to enhance 1 weapon instead of an amulet of fist is offset by the druid not needing an amulet of natural armor. Not having to buy a Belt of physical stats saves a chunk of change for the hunter over time which can be spent to increase other stats or to increase his combat viability. Also he does not need a +3 enhancement to have good armor while in animal focus like a druid does in wildshape.
6. Teamwork feats are next to useless. This is part of the reason I traded them out on an inquisitor I'm playing currently. I just don't feel like they have much power compared to regular feats considering how much more niche they are. At one point I was considering going a Wolf companion and taking tandem trip but I never followed through with that idea. I'm hoping we will see more feats and not just ranged ones like Sean has said.
7. Where's the ranger at? I see we get track and swift track and a few weapons outside of the druid grouping but beyond that it seems like those were an after thought to the class.
Overall I think this class is much better than I had anticipated but still needs a few minor changes. If the duration of animal focus could be increased and widened to allow for more non combat applications and get a few more desirable team work feats we could have a pretty nice class for people like me looking for a more melee centric druid. The addition of a few more ranger weapons would be nice too. Also am I right to assume that a Hunter can use breastplate without any special materials?
I have wanted to destroy every single town in carrion crown so far. Halfway through the 5th book right now and every single location has left me with a bad taste in my mouth. Mostly because your "allies" end up being more difficult to deal with than your enemies. In one of the books the sheriff had us find out what happened to a certain important NPC. When we came back I told the truth and it was so over the top that he thought we were lying and was going to have us arrested. Needless to say we were level 9 at the time and there are now a lot of fatherless children. I don't blame the GM either. With the way things turned out I wouldn't believe me.
