Sheriff Bart's page

** Pathfinder Society GM. 16 posts (123 including aliases). 5 reviews. No lists. 2 wishlists. 4 Organized Play characters. 2 aliases.


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Sovereign Court

Thanks everyone - enjoying the discussion.

I am not near books right now but I do remember that Greater Create Demiplane allows the creator to determine several things about the plane. That means the creating PC should certainly be able to specify how the portal works and what it takes to activate it, read: including things like a physical key, puzzle (oh YES the puzzles turnabout would be tasty), needing a specific physical quality, etc. The portal is still open from both sides and works, given the proper conditions and there a plenty of precedents for having such safeguards.

There are also several precedents to trapping a powerful entity in a plane. If I knew what the big bad was, of course it would be much easier to describe. But from my guess it has stats, (because there are hints of fighting it sometime) and that means not upper level divine.

I suppose the next question is "what, in the list of mythic abilities would allow the entity to ignore the effects of a dead magic plane?" I don't recall any specifically but I am not the expert, hence my post here. If there aren't any, of course the GM gets to decide but GMs should also reward a good plan, barring any obvious, specific flaw.

As for getting the entity there, well, there's a reason why it might be chasing us anyway so baiting it shouldn't be an issue if things work out.

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first of all, thank you for the reply - I was half expecting one of the 53 books published since we paused would destroy the whole idea without my knowledge.

I'm a player, not the GM. I won't get to know the unknowns until they are right there in the face. Just from previous encounters with minions we "know" that this is not just some lord of his realm - something divine about him and his level of power. Since it's homebrewed (I assume unless the GM is pulling from published sources - again not going to know until we're there) he can basically do what he wants.

I was just wondering what the chances might be like that this could work. Maybe in the plane's magic specs I can inhibit divination also.

The having to have the physical key to the portal might be the way to go. It locks us in to fighting over an object and not rules if we can establish the portal is the only way on or off. At least then the minions have to come find us to get the key while we seek a method to destroy the gawd of whatever he is.

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Wow, long time no read nor post about Pathfinder. The short version of the story is I have been away for some time and might have a high level group to play some adventures with in the next few months.

Without a whole lot of backstory, could the resident smart people tell me if this idea might work or not or what to look out for, if possible?

Setting: high level combat involving planar travel. What's needed: banishing or trapping a demigod/minor deity level creature before it can destroy a (yet another) realm, or some other good campaign-like reason. I am not privy to its stats or abilities but am trying to figure out a way to trap an entity securely in case we cannot kill it.

What I came up with-

1) PC creates demiplane, greater, and specifies dead magic throughout, making the plane permanent. Does not include a portal (I am not seeing the specified need to travel to said plane in order to create one)

2) Getting the entity to follow the PC to the plane OR plane shifting it there oneself (can't cast while ON the plane but I can't find anything saying you cannot arrive there, just that you're trapped once there without said portal - if necessary perhaps using a Nail of Blood to arrive)

3) Trapping the entity there/leaving by using the same Nail of Blood, or just using a standard action to eject oneself from the plane. As the plane's creator, I don't see why that wouldn't work.

4) Magic used to find the entity or scry @the plane should be useless?

Barring that, including a portal but also requiring a physical key that is taken with you, creature subtype needed to trigger the portal, password or probably other unique-to-plane's-creator type restrictions.

Would this work, assuming the entity doesn't have its own Nail, or specific countermeasures to that mentioned (being able to mimic your subtype, etc.)? I am not that familiar with HL combats of 17th-20th level and haven't accessed all the references so I do not know if there is a "hand wave they are deities so they do what they want even your puny dead magic area" rules.

Thanks - hope this was clear. 'Course I could just tell the fighter it's his problem and I'll be back there (points to infinite horizon)

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I found what I was looking for - it is a feat from Ultimate Intrigue called "Swipe and Stash."

Perfect for what I'm doing.

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We know how to take stuff, but how do we forcibly give stuff?

I'm trying to make a familiar whose job it is to plant items on a foe but I can't find the relevant rules and if it is a skill or a combat maneuver or what.

The idea is the familiar will have a high stealth and be undetected (sleight of hand can't be done in combat if the opponent is aware) but I'd like to be ready for either being noticed or not being noticed.

Anyone ever do this? Which skill or maneuver applies and if you've done it, how did you optimize it?

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Personally, I'm hoping the ultimate evil BBG is Leia.

Or 3P0.

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3 people marked this as a favorite.

I liked the movie. The more I think about it, including points made above, the more I like it. I was a big critic of plot holes, etc. too but there are so few films that can come close to "being accurate" in an explainable way (especially since every year brings new discoveries) that it doesn't seem worth it anymore so I have learned to view movies from ignorance. Its more fun that way.

One thing to add to the nerdgasm here - I don't remember (above) who it was mentioning the "same old themes" but John Williams' score is as much Star Wars as lightsabers are. Star Wars wouldn't be as popular without either one of them.

Even when Williams signs off of writing new SW themes in the very near future, his work will still be there and I will bet my next 10 paychecks the main theme still opens every movie.

You can play that main title in almost any part of the world and have it recognized - often in one chord. Few things are that famous.

My favorite part of the movie was when my childhood intersected with my daughter's childhood. Ain't nothing that will ever replace that. I saw SW at 7 and she is 11.

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1 person marked this as a favorite.

I had a blast this year also - the pregen specials were fantastic. I had more fun this year than any in recent memory. Mustering was the best I have seen since the old Mecca days. The sound system does need to be better though and the slide show operator needed help, but these are small things.

I did have minor issues with two GMs - one was fairly slow and though we soldiered through this it cost us a prestige point as it was contingent essentially on time/how far we got in the event (that time we lost while the GM couldn't find stat blocks, notes, had to read encounters several times, etc.)

We also lost time for announcements and awards and while I think these are definitely worth doing, it ate into the slots. Those two things combined pushed us from one encounter to another. Well, and the design of the Friday special seemed to be controlled from one table. We would get one round into each combat and the "fast table" in the room would get something solved and pushed every other table to the next thing, destroying any continuity we could have had.

The other GM issue was at the Sunday special. I enjoyed the GM initially but as the slot progressed it was obvious he had somewhere to be. Those who know the event can be as galled as I was with this -- he hand waved the final encounter.

Yeah, that one.

Once the PCs got the upper hand (and we had over an hour left in the slot at this point), he basically dismissed the table and handed out chronicles. The other players we happy we survived. I was miffed we got no opportunity to enjoy the moment.

I think the order of events was appropriate. If you want to play the specials and are too tired on Sunday to enjoy them, thats on you... I'd like to see more people stick around on Sunday but realize that isn't possible for some.

I have shied away from specials in past years due to the tendency of many to be resource burners but if they are going to be of this quality I will be there every chance I get.

Kudos to all the volunteers and staff - a job well done.

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Sorry for the necro - looking at a similar build myself - but the trait applying to hunter can only be applied if hunter is your first level, right? I am not up on the latest rules but thought traits had to be 1st level and cannot be retrained in PFS. Also, can you take monk and be neutral?

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I think I have about $350 in it. That is a wild guess.

Chris Mortika wrote:
By the way, how much does HeroLab, with all the books legal for PFS, cost these days?

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Gauss wrote:

Do you generally know the rules? Do you read the books? If the answer to these is "yes" then my comment regarding a 'crutch' was not addressed to you. To liken it to a person in physical rehab, using the crutch to avoid physical rehab is the problem here. *Some* people use it to avoid learning the rules.

My experience regarding "Hero Lab said so" is that the people who claim that are wrong much of the time, far more than 0.1% of the time.
Now, I do not claim that this is due to Hero Lab being wrong but probable user error on the part of the person making the claim.
The problem is that the perception of Hero Lab being infallible is giving these people a false sense that anything they build with Hero Lab cannot possibly be incorrect. That sense is what I have a problem with. Of course, that is not necessarily a problem with Hero Lab.

It sounds like none of my comments cover you as a user, perhaps you should not take them as if they did.

1) Actually no, I don't read rulebooks much at all. I have in the past but there are too many sources now, as I said before. I read only the relevant bits that I need from the PRD and then only when HL doesn't make them clear, which is rare. HL is much easier and accurate enough that it has never yet caused a real problem in any of my builds.

Does that make my style of play inferior to yours because it is different? That I am more casual in my approach to this game? By the above, I'm guessing the answer is yes, but correct me if I am wrong.

The fallacy in that position is the assumption "Hero Lab MUST be wrong" somehow. Well, so can the published source. So can the interpretation of said source. So can the human doing math in his or her noodle. HL ain't the issue when it comes to rules accuracy.

You choose to memorize rules. I choose to spend my time doing other things because I have multiple sources that I can check in a few seconds, should the need arise. 15-20 years ago I might have agreed with you. Now I have other things to do with my time.

2) You were by far not the only person using the word "crutch" in reference to HeroLab, over hundreds of posts on this board, some of them in this thread, so take thine own advice as I wasn't responding to you specifically. :)

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4 people marked this as a favorite.

I'm happy to keep using HL as a "crutch." ;)

I use an airplane as a crutch sometimes when I don't want to hitch up a covered wagon and travel several years to my destination.

(As an aside, the use of the word crutch is baiting - trying to imply that one is a better person/player than you are if you use HeroLab - which every time I hear/read it I envision a cantankerous old man with a cane stomping in his doorway telling kids to get off'n his lawn and yelling things like "back in MY day...")

I'm bringing a minimum of 3 devices to every table at which I play (laptop, ipad, phone). I can have several sources open at the same time that way in a very small space compared to a stack of books or even printed pdf pages. That way I also have three copies of everything I own. I rarely use all 3 but when things get busy or if I am GMing they are useful to have.

There is simply too much material to remember. No one here knows all of it. Everyone here uses a "crutch" to help them organize the game unless you are using physical copies of every single source, every single time (in which case I pity you - how archaic!)

I also have no problem with people saying "HeroLab said so" because 99.9% of the time, HL is correct. Many of the examples given above have nothing to do with the tool being used. They are also easily corrected by looking at the screen modifiers when they occur.

People showing up without purchased sources has nothing to do with HeroLab, either. The rule is the rule. I've seen people show up without sources of any kind -- same issue but no HL involved.

And as long as we are using personal experiences as a basis for argument (as if it matters to the reader), here's mine. I have been challenged at tables exactly five times on rules / whatnot that appeared in HeroLab while I was using it. All five times the GM was incorrect and HeroLab was right. These included 5-star GMs and GMs who are (very) outspoken that HeroLab is badwrongfun.

I find the experience...satisfying when that happens.

HeroLab is more accurate than my CRB. I have the first printing of that and I'm not taking it anywhere anymore. Sure, the pdf is updated but the physical product I purchased from Paizo isn't. HeroLab *keeps* me accurate.

I don't care who you are or how good you think you are. Unless you have that special brand of autism that allows you to remember every single page number and verbatim rules, HeroLab "knows" more rules than you do and HeroLab is more accurate and faster than you are when several modifiers are involved.

Maybe the players people are using in their anecdotal experience are idiots. Maybe they have some form of mental setback like I do (I have eidetic memory for many things but I have every edition of this game rattling around in my head over the last 37 years and at times I remember earlier edition rules in place of current ones, or rulings on the boards that changed 3 times since I read them).

I would love, simply love to sit at a gm's table at a con or public event and have them tell me the use of herolab is invalid and try to remove me from the table.

If questioned about sources, I'm going to show the GM my downloads page that proves I bought the source material and then I am going to use primarily HL until questioned on mechanics, then use the PRD to show that HL is likely again correct. Its faster and easier.

If a GM decides to audit my PC during the slot simply because I am using HeroLab, we'll be having a chat at HQ as to why you think your ego is more important than players' time, because IMO that is all this is about. Any GM who wastes players' time just because they don't like HL shouldn't be a GM at all.

My opinion is the people who don't like HeroLab are not wanting to shell out the cash for it and therefore want others to not do so either. Using the argument that since it is not infallible it should not be used also applies to all humans, which includes character sheets (and chronicles) written by said humans.

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When my witch uses this spell with manacles, she simply says "Here, try these on."

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Not sure I have ever posted a build before, but this one intrigues me so I am asking for help.

This is for PFS and the reason I am trying it is specifically because the rules are so slanted toward using bows and therefore everyone uses them.

Disclaimer / things I already know:
1) "Use a CLbow, stupid." I know I lose on DPx with Xbow. I may yet switch
2) Straight fighters can handle the feat load better - am considering this but then becomes pretty 1-dimensional and boring
3) This build lacks clustershot, manyshot, devastating strike, imp. crit and dazzling display/shatter defenses. I am debating them and that is part of why I am posting

This is a bounty hunter type of PC who masquerades as a barmaid. I chose slayer because of the ability to snipe and the vital strike feats for the ability to stack with sneak in sniping. I threw in some magic item ideas that would fit the build but am open to suggestions on that too.

So, can it be viable even if not powerful?

Female Human Slayer 12
CG Medium humanoid (human)
Init +5; Senses Perception +15
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Defense
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AC 31, touch 17, flat-footed 26 (+10 armor, +4 shield, +5 Dex, +2 deflection)
hp 124 (12d10+48)
Fort +15, Ref +16, Will +7; +2 trait bonus vs. mind-affecting
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Offense
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Speed 40 ft.
Ranged +1 holy seeking darkwood underwater heavy crossbow +19/+14/+9 (1d10+1/19-20 plus 2d6 vs. evil)
Special Attacks favored target, sneak attack +4d6
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Statistics
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Str 13, Dex 18 (20), Con 16 (18), Int 14, Wis 10, Cha 10
Base Atk +12; CMB +13; CMD 30
Feats Combat Reflexes, Crossbow Mastery[APG], Deadly Aim, Improved Snap Shot[UC], Improved Vital Strike, Point-Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Snap Shot[UC], Vital Strike, Weapon Focus (underwater heavy crossbow)
Traits dangerously curious, sound of mind

Skills Acrobatics +20 (+25 to jump), Bluff +11, Climb +9, Diplomacy +1, Disguise +8, Heal +6, Intimidate +11, Knowledge (arcana) +3, Knowledge (dungeoneering) +6, Knowledge (engineering) +3, Knowledge (geography) +6, Knowledge (history) +3, Knowledge (local) +11, Knowledge (nature) +3, Knowledge (nobility) +3, Knowledge (planes) +3, Knowledge (religion) +3, Linguistics +4, Perception +15, Profession (barmaid) +4, Ride +9, Sense Motive +11, Sleight of Hand +8, Stealth +25, Survival +14, Swim +5, Use Magic Device +16;

slayer talents (bonus feat, combat trick, fast stealth, ranger combat style, ranger combat style, stealthy sniper)

Languages Common, Jistka, Minkaian, Osiriani, Tien

SQ combat styles (crossbow), swift tracker, track +6

Combat Gear +1 clustershot adamantine crossbow bolts (50), +1 ghost touch silversheen crossbow bolts (50), hand of glory, masterwork cold iron crossbow bolts (50), sniper goggles, unfettered shirt, wand of invisibility, greater, smokestick (5); Other Gear +4 comfort shadow mithral agile breastplate, +3 mithral buckler, +1 holy seeking darkwood underwater heavy crossbow, belt of physical might +2 (Dex, Con), boots of striding and springing, cloak of resistance +3, efficient quiver, ring of protection +2, 150 gp
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Special Abilities
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Combat Reflexes (6 AoO/round) Can make extra attacks of opportunity/rd, and even when flat-footed.
Crossbow Mastery (Underwater heavy crossbow) You can reload any crossbow as a free action. With your chosen crossbow type, this does not provoke attacks of opportunity.
Deadly Aim -4/+8 Trade a penalty to ranged attacks for a bonus to ranged damage.
Fast Stealth (Ex) You may move at full speed while using the Stealth skill without penalty.
Favored Target (+3, 3 at a time, Swift) (Ex) Study foe as a Swift action, gain +3 to att/dam & some skills vs. them.
Improved Snap Shot You threaten an additional 10 feet with Snap Shot
Point-Blank Shot +1 to attack and damage rolls with ranged weapons at up to 30 feet.
Precise Shot You don't get -4 to hit when shooting or throwing into melee.
Rapid Shot You get an extra attack with ranged weapons. Each attack is at -2.
Snap Shot Threaten squares within 5 feet of you when wielding a ranged weapon
Sneak Attack +4d6 Attacks deal extra dam if flank foe or if foe is flat-footed.
Sniper goggles The leather strap attached to these bulbous lenses allows their wearer to fit them to his head. The wearer of these goggles can make ranged sneak attacks from any distance instead of the normal 30 feet. When making ranged sneak attacks within 30 feet, the wearer gains a +2 circumstance bonus on each sneak attack damage die.

Sound of Mind +2 trait bonus to saves vs mind-affecting effects.
Stealthy Sniper (Ex) Sniping is only a -10 penalty, rather than -20.
Swift Tracker (Ex) Tracking penalties when moving at normal speed or faster are reduced.
Track +6 Add the listed bonus to survival checks made to track.
Vital Strike Standard action: x2 weapon damage dice.
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(the site defaulted to my other username here)

Yeah, I have it too and the behaviors I listed are very common in most sources describing it. I am not in this for an argument. The simple fact is that knowing where someone is coming from makes it much easier to understand and deal with them. The diagnosis alone has been known to quickly change relationships.

And yes, there are multiple strategies in a dozen books that can work, but that dissertation doesn't belong here. We don't even know if the guy is on the spectrum. It was merely a suggestion.

aboniks wrote:


As a fellow aspie, I agree with Deadman. On the other hand, I don't act much like the player described. We're all different though...the general similarities among those with the condition will manifest themselves in different ways, and in different contexts. At the table, my (occasionally obsessive) attention to detail comes out in my players actions, rather than my own...I know how and when to close my mouth and let rest of the group play with the ball too, even though my brain is busy telling me the ball is fun to hold and I should touch it.

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Shot in the dark here -- I don't know the guy.

The player sounds like an Aspie.

As in, Asperger's or high functioning autism. Insistence on rigid rules and routines are very common for people with this condition. People with this condition also take things personally when they aren't meant that way (hence the GM vs. player idea - it is incredibly hard to trust for people with this condition). Any type of potentially competitive situation (even when others don't see it that way) is difficult to deal with and his reaction fits the profile.

If this is his focused interest, it would also explain the extreme rules knowledge and excellent memory.

In other words, he may very well be insistent on rules because he can't see the game any other way. This type of approach is a means of control over their environment and autism is (just a guess on my part) seemingly more common among gamers.

As I said, just a shot in the dark here. But if he is, and you read up on autism and specifically how to deal with people/players with autism, you'll get some insight.

If not, then maybe he is just someone who was never told "no" as a child. ;)