First of all, thanks to Paizo for the APG. It's a great read and I enjoyed meeting James, Jason, Erik, Lisa, and everyone else at GenCon.
/fanboygush
Now, the human alt FC option for Sorcerers. WTF!! I must be reading it wrong, because it sounds a lot like every level a human sorcerer has the option of adding a spell to his list of spells known as long as it is at least 1 level lower than the max level he can cast.
Which, ignoring cantrips, effectively adds 17 spells known to the sorcerer. IMO, that's just TOO good. Sorcerers have always had issues with the whole "known" list, and they are not on par with Wizards in terms of varied utility spells, but an additional 2 spells at every level (sans 9th) goes a long way towards evening those odds. Especially with spont casting.
Now, I may be wrong in my reading of the ability, or there may be a misprint. If someone knows something I don't, could they please steer me in the correct direction? Thanks.
It may just be my imagination, but it seems the messageboards are dropping more posts than they historically have. I suppose much of that is likely server load, but isn't there a way to insert a command line so that the post gets updated, even if not in a timely manner?
Can we get some adventurous IT's to form a party and slay the dreaded Post-Monster?
A long time ago, I tried to create a system where we could abandon spellcasting using spells.
Taking a page from the Epic Level Handbook, I organized the spell seeds, changed them to better reflect a lower level of power, and designed a mechanic for them to be used to create spells.
Here is the document. The instructions are at the bottom of the doc, but here is the re-print:
Instructions:
Casting Spells
To cast a spell, choose a seed that describes the desired effect. The base difficulty to cast a spell is 10 + the seed Spellcraft DC. To cast a spell, an available spell slot must be expended. The spell slot modifies the spells Spellcraft DC. See table Spell Slots Contributed. The spell slot expended also determines the saving throw and spell level (for purposes of dispelling, identifying, etc.) Non-spontaneous casters may choose to prepare spells ahead of time to be cast later. While preparing a spell, a caster is allowed to take 10 on the Spellcraft check. When cast later, no additional check is required.
Adding Seed DCs
When two or more seeds are combined in a spell, their base Spellcraft DCs are added together. Both contribute toward the spell’s final Spellcraft DC.
Determining School
When combining two or more seeds to develop a spell, the caster from among the seeds that make up the spell decides the school of the finished spell.
Combining Descriptors
When two or more seeds are combined in a spell, all the descriptors from each seed apply to the finished spell.
Combining Range, Targets, Area, and Effect
One seed might have a range of long, another seed might have a range of medium, and a third seed might not have a range at all. Likewise, some seeds have targets, while others have an effect or an area. To determine which seed takes precedence in the finished spell, the character must decide which seed is the base seed. The seed most important to the spell’s overall purpose is the base seed, and it determines the casting time, range, target, and so on. The other seeds apply only their specific effects to the finished spell. It is occasionally difficult to determine a base seed by examining the spell’s effects. If no one seed is most important, simply pick one seed for the purposes of making this determination.
Combining Durations
When combining two or more seeds to develop a spell, the seed with the shortest duration determines the duration of the finished spell. If any seed of a spell is dismissible by the caster, the spell is dismissible.
Saving Throws
Even if more than one seed has an associated saving throw, the final spell will have only a single saving throw. If two or more seeds have the same kind of saving throw (Fortitude, Reflex, or Will), then obviously that will be used for the spell’s saving throw. If the seeds have different kinds of saving throws, simply choose the saving throw that seems most appropriate for the final spell.
Spell Resistance
When combining two or more seeds to develop a spell, if even one seed is subject to spell resistance, the finished spell is subject to it as well.
Additional Participants
Spells can be developed that specifically require additional participants. These spells are called rituals. A spell developed as a ritual requires a specific number of additional participants, who each must use up one spell slot of a specified level for the day. During a spell’s development, the spell’s creator determines the number of additional participants and the level of the spell slots to be contributed. If the exact number of spellcasters does not partake in the casting, or if the casters do not each contribute the proper spell slot, the spell automatically fails. To participate, each participant readies an action to contribute his or her raw spell energy when the primary caster begins the spell. Additional participants in a ritual spell each reduce the Spellcraft DC according to the spell slot contributed. Each additional participant may only contribute one spell slot. It doesn’t matter whether the additional participants are arcane or divine spellcasters; only the level of the spell slot contributed matters. A contributed spell slot is treated as if normally cast. A wizard may contribute either a prepared, uncast spell slot, or an open, unprepared slot. The Spellcraft DC adjustments for each additional participant stack.
Special
A ritual spell that takes longer than 1 standard action to cast requires all extra participants to stand as if casting for the same amount of time. If an extra participant is attacked while contributing a spell slot, the participant must make a Concentration check as if casting a spell of the same level as the slot contributed. If the attack disrupts the participant in the ritual, the spell is not necessarily ruined. However, the Spellcraft DC reduction that would have been provided by that additional participant cannot be applied to the final Spellcraft DC of the spell. Thus the ritual spell will be harder for the primary spellcaster to cast.
Basically, it is a skill-based system designed to replicate any spell in the Core book.
Any feedback would be appreciated. I abandoned it during 3.5, so if you notice things that need to be changed due to PF rules, let me know. Also, what do you think? Would you play a caster under these rules?
What are the limits of this, do you think? Can you drink water through your roots? Can you photosynthesize?
I assume you could do both in Wild Shape.
What about flowering? Or producing fruit? Can I become a kukui nut tree and produce a ton of flamable oil containing nuts? Or a guava tree and feed the party?
1. All gamers are entitled to not play the game. None should ever force a game upon another.
2. All gamers are entitled to play the game. None should ever prevent another from playing without due cause.
3. All gamers are entitled to equal treatment. No favoritism or undue hostility should ever be manifest.
4. All gamers are due the respect owed their status as human beings. None should ever denigrate nor attempt to subjugate another.
5. All gamers are entitled to have fun. None should purposely sabotage the fun of another, nor allow their own fun to be sabotaged.
6. All gamers are entitled to their opinion. None should challenge the opinion of another without due cause or factual contradictory evidence.
7. All gamers are entitled to a life of their own. None should force another to sacrifice some aspect of their life for the sake of the game.
8. All gamers are entitled to their own aspirations, whether it be for characters or campaign story. None should purposely usurp nor sabotage those aspirations.
9. All gamers are entitled to all rights due them for adherence to the game’s social contract. None should deny, in part or in whole, the rights of gamers without justifiable due cause.
Ammunition: Projectile weapons use ammunition: arrows (for bows), bolts (for crossbows), darts (for blowguns), or sling bullets (for slings and halfling sling staves). When using a bow, a character can draw ammunition as a free action; crossbows and slings require an action for reloading (as noted in their descriptions). Generally speaking, ammunition that hits its target is destroyed or rendered useless, while ammunition that misses has a 50% chance of being destroyed or lost.
PF SRD wrote:
Masterwork ammunition is damaged (effectively destroyed) when used. The enhancement bonus of masterwork ammunition does not stack with any enhancement bonus of the projectile weapon firing it.
Now, the bolded statement in part 2 leads me to believe that masterwork ammunition when used gains the Broken condition:
PF SRD wrote:
Damaged Objects
A damaged object remains functional with the broken condition until the item's hit points are reduced to 0, at which point it is destroyed.
Damaged (but not destroyed) objects can be repaired with the Craft skill and a number of spells.
Obviously the phrase "effectively destroyed" means you cannot fire broken ammunition. However, it does not state that the ammo is ACTUALLY destroyed, leading again the the broken condition.
Is this the case? If so, masterwork ammunition should be repairable with the Mending spell, and magical ammo repairable with Make Whole. Thanks in advance for well-though out answers.
Don’t you get tired of players with thousands upon thousands of gold pieces? Or D&D economies that completely overvalue items?
Well, so do I. Here is my overly complicated solution:
Step1: All currency step exchanges (i.e. silver to gold) are 100 to 1, not 10 to 1.
Step 2: 100 coins of any value equal 1 pound.
Step 3: All GP values listed are actually SP. Any value in CP is now x10 CP.
Step 4: Exceptions are made for trade goods (pound of gold is calculated based on new system) and sailing ships (list in GP at 1/10 list value).
Results –
A pound of platinum is literally worth a Kings ransom (10,000gp)
A Kings ransom actually has some meaning 10K gp = 1M gp in old system
Common items are more expensive, but comparative value between item that used to cost 1sp and 1cp has been preserved
Alternatively, you could say expensive items are now worth significantly less
No more buying fleets of vessels (1K gp for a Caravel = 100K gp in old system)
Some armor is better at deflecting some damage types than others. I have opted to present optional armor rules for both increased AC and DR. I recommend using only 1.
Example: Warrior with 10 dex is wearing chainmail. Base AC is 16. VS a longsword or an arrow, the AC increases to 18, but a mace hits on AC 16.
Padded: +1 saves vs cold effects; +1 AC vs Bludgeoning / DR 1/Slashing or Piercing
Leather and Studded Leather: +1 AC vs Piercing / DR 1/Bludgeoning or Slashing
Chain Shirt: +2 AC vs Slashing / DR 2/Bludgeoning or Piercing
Hide: +2 AC vs Piercing and Bludgeoning / DR 2/Slashing
Scale mail and Chainmail: +2 AC vs Slashing and Piercing / DR 2/Bludgeoning
Breastplate: +2 AC vs Slashing and Bludgeoning / DR 2/Piercing
Splint mail: +3 AC vs Piercing and Bludgeoning / DR 3/Slashing
Banded mail: +3 AC vs Slashing and Bludgeoning / DR 3/Piercing
Half-plate: +1 saves vs AoE damage dealing effects; +3 AC vs Slashing and Bludgeoning / DR 3/Piercing
Full plate: +2 saves vs AoE damage dealing effects;+3 AC vs Slashing and Bludgeoning / DR 3/Piercing
Often times, we get bogged down in numbers. Who gets what powers at what level and such. But that's not the characters we REALLY remember playing. The ones we love, even years later, were fun concepts.
In this spirit, I invite you to post the character concepts you had the most fun playing, or playing with.
Mine: Acid, the stoner elf illusionist. He was high ALL the time. Perma-fried does not even begin. He would sometimes confuse in his mind the difference between illusion and conjuration. The best part was that, as the party faced more challenges and things got more serious, the others started partaking in his unique "blends". He eventually even got a load of mind-altering magic pills from the fey, who likes his outlook and partying nature.
I love the change to Staves where they can be recharged, but I wanted to see a mechanic for Wands, too. My thinking goes along 2 routes:
1) Drop the # of charges to 10 and allow Wands to be recharged like staves
2) As long as there is a single charge left, the wand can be recharged by anyone who can craft the wand. It costs 1/2 the COST to craft the wand to recharge it (so 1/4 base price). If the spell requires a material component, it must also be provided (x50, as per item creation). Recharging takes 1 day per 1000gp of the COST to recharge (so 1/4 creation time).
Which option would you use, or is there another mechanic that would be better? Also, if PFRPG HAS a mechanic for recharging wands, please let me know. It's kinda hard to track all the changes :(
Arcane Apotheosis (Ex): At 20th level, your body surges with arcane power. You can add any metamagic feats that you know to your spells without increasing their casting time, although you must still expend higher-level spell slots. Whenever you use magic items that require charges, you can instead expend spell slots to power the item. For every three levels of spell slots that you expend, you consume one less charge when using a magic item that expends charges.
I see no limit on the # of times you can use this, nor any variation on the # spell levels necessary to trigger a charge, nor any limit on the combination of spell levels you can use to power the ability.
Ability: Arcane Bond, specifically
PF SRD wrote:
A wizard can add additional magic abilities to his bonded object as if he has the required Item Creation Feats and if he meets the level prerequisites of the feat.
Staves start with 10 charges, and cost 400 x spell level x caster level for the primary spell. If the spell has an expensive material component, it must be provided for every charge. If the item uses more than 1 charge, it's costs are reduced proportionally (2 charges = 2/10 or 1/5, 5 charges = 5/10 or 1/2, etc.). I assume the same will hold true for the material component cost.
Staff of Wish: 3 charges to activate. Cost 400 x 9 x 17 x 3/10 = 42,840. Material cost 25000 x 3 (# uses in the staff) = 75000. Total cost: 117,840 gp.
Using Arcane Apotheosis, you sacrifice a 9th level spell and use it to fuel a Wish from the staff. OR you sactifice an 8th level spell AND a 1st level spell and fuel the Wish. Ad nauseum.
With just the spells granted by the basic Sorcerer chart, that's 30 wishes a day without ever spending a charge.
Unlike other afflictions, multiple doses of the same poison stack. Poisons delivered by injury and contact cannot inflict more than one dose of poison at a time, but inhaled and ingested poisons can inflict multiple doses at once. Each additional dose extends the total duration of the poison (as noted under frequency) by half its total duration. In addition, each dose of poison increases the DC to resist the poison by +2. This increase is cumulative. Multiple doses do not alter the cure conditions of the poison, and meeting these conditions ends the affliction for all the doses. For example, a character is bit three times in the same round by a trio of Medium monstrous spiders, injecting him with three doses of Medium spider venom. The unfortunate character must make a DC 18 Fortitude save for the next 8 rounds. Fortunately, just one successful save cures the character of all three doses of the poison.
I have a couple of questions that have come up:
1) Poisons delivered by injury and contact cannot inflict more than one dose of poison at a time. What does this mean, exactly? If an assassin fires 4 poison arrows and all 4 hit, is the target hit by 4 doses of poison, or 1. I am inclined to say 4.
2) When do you roll the save? At the beginning of your next turn? If you go in init 11, and opponents go in init 13 and 9, both of them hit you and poison you, do you roll immediately for each or just once on your turn. So if you succeed the first save is the second save at standard DC or DC+2 for multiple doses? I am inclined to say you roll at the beginning of your next turn.
It was brought up that crafting as-is is both too beneficial to the party and too dependant on downtime. I have found both of these to be true, especially with Magic Items and especially now with craft skills subbing for spellcasting (sort of, with a feat).
Would it be to the benefit of the game if some alternate crafting rules were in place?
Suggestion - Quick Crafting: By spending materials equal to the full value of the item being crafted, a character can craft a magic item at 5x the normal rate. Non-magical items can be crafted at 10x the normal rate.
Implications: Yes, they could just try to find the item and buy it. However, in games where that may not be possible, or at times where it would be inconveniant or draw too much attention, or when upgrading existing magic items, this rule would allow characters to quickly accomplish the task at increased cost. Yes, it means that, considering time, it would cost more to do things this way.
It may also allow non-magical items to spam. Now, everything everyone has is MW, despite being stuck in the village of Mudpit. That may not be too good. As a player I would spam some of the better alchemical items, which may also by a problem. However, this will not inflate the party wealth, but will allow for increased customization, even where lack of downtime may prevent it normally. And, if you have the time, you can still craft normally.
Obviously, the skills need re-worked. Should the skill ranks change to 2 or 3? Is linguistics really appropriate for Sacred Geometry, or should it be something else? Is 6+INT way too many skills, or is it balanced by loosing 4 levels of casting?
Oh, and the HD needs to be changed to d6, the BAB and saves are as a Wiz.
Core book, there is a great PrC for Sorcerers with the draconic bloodline: The Dragon Disciple
Why are there not others for all the OTHER bloodlines? Should "Dragon Disciple" be more generic, giving powers based on any bloodline (so like "Disciple of the Bloodline" or something)
I did not play a lot of monks, but the FoB ability always seemed to be rather cool. Now, it's just TWF. This seems to be a big nerf at higher levels, when the monk used to get another attack at full BAB, but now gets a less useful secondary attack.
Was the monk really so overpowered that they needed a nerf?
I want a weapon with an activation rune, which I can thumb to boost it's power. Sort of a WH or WH40K feel...
The weapon must be at least a +1 standard magic weapon. By activating the rune, whatever additional properties that are contained within the weapon manifest for up to 10 rounds per day (need not be used consecutively).
So, a +1 longsword can become a +1 flaming longsword for up to 1 min. When the additional powers are added, the base price and cost are adjusted to 37.5% of their usual total (effectively modifying the x2000 multiplier to x750).
This does have the effect of putting more powerful magic items in the hands of lower level characters, since they will be able to afford them earlier.
Is this just too much? Is there something I am missing in even considering this?
To start, I love the changes to sword-and-board, and integrating it with two-weapon fighting was simply too obvious to not pass up. Especially with fighter Armor bonuses (Full plate and 18 dex anyone?)
But what about the two-handed fighters? What happened to Overhand Chop, Backswing, and Devestating Blow? Those were great THF feats, and worked extremly well. Now with the critical feats, you are better off TWF with keen scimitars!
