Wheldrake's page

"If I went 'round saying I was an emperor, just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away!"

Another option is to have a companion of some sort, such as an animal companion, casting a summoning spell yourself, and having a familiar. If you really need three minions capable of combat, there is the Spirit Guide familiar, or give the familiar the Spellcasting ability and a summoning spell that they can cast and sustain on their own.

Several problems with a familiar casting a summoning spell:

Minions have at most 2 actions, and all summoning spells take 3 actions.

Minions cannot have their own minions. Last line of the Minion trait: "A minion can't control other creatures."

So you could theoretically have a companion, a familiar and a summoned creature, spend all three of your actions commanding them, and do nothing else yourself. Very few familiars have any relevant combat abilities. Summoned creatures are generally 3-4 levels below the spellcaster that summoned them. Animal companions are nice, but their combat stats are 1-3 levels below their master's level. So it's a moot point what you plan to do with your zoo.

You take 50 damage from shared life, while your fighter buddy takes 100 damage. in PF2 math, 25 hit points minus 100 damage equals zero hit point, unconscious and dying 1.

You have a similar situation trying to use wolvesbane to cure lycanthropy on a low-ish level character. 12d6, 16d6 and 20d6 feels like a lot of damage to take when your character is only around 5th level, but it's still only a single instance of damage, taking you to zero or to the next dying increment.

I've been gone for a while, and see my question raised a lot of discussion, some of it pretty fringe stuff.

So the way I treat scrolls (below) would appear to be a house rule, based on RPG tradition more than current PF2 rules.

My house rules on scrolls:
- Scrolls are written scripture, and this has numerous consequences.
- They are written in a language. If you can't read the language, you need special means to read them. Many arcane and occult spellcasters use Draconic, but many use common or whatever language is most prevalent in their region. Necromantic spells might be written in Necril, for example. The creator of a scroll can write them in any language he knows.
- They require sight to read them, so blindness and darkness (without darkvision) make scrolls unusable.
- They are often fragile, and adverse conditions (burning, or submersion in water) can destroy a scroll.

These elements seem to be assumed, in PF2, even if there are no actual rules references for them. But I have no problem with them being house rules.

YMMV.

A guy pointed out something odd in the PF2 rules.

At no point does it actually specify that you need to read a scroll to activate it, or that the blinded condition or total darkness or being underwater would be an impediment to casting a spell from a scroll. Or that a scroll might be written in some off-beat language that the spellcaster can't in fact read.

My gut feeling is that a scroll, by its nature as "magical scripture", requires being able to see and understand the writing on it. But on closer examination, this sort of restriction doesn't appear to be present in the PF2 rules - unless I missed it, in some out-of-the-way spot.

Sure, we know the action cost, and the need for a free hand to hold it (barring various special items) and the requirement to have it on your spell list.

But... what about the need to actually read the scroll?

The Pathfinder Beginner Box is out of stock in our store and we do not yet have a release date for a reprint. You may find a copy at your favorite local game store or online.

Thanks, Aaron. I'll keep my eyes peeled.

I just had a look into buying another physical copy of the Beginner Box through the Paizo website, but it's marked as "unavailable". Does anyone know when or if this item will be available again?

Captain, I tend to agree with you, but since Counterspell just talks about your ability to "see its manifestations" I'm having a hard time coming up with a solid rule requiring line of effect.

Is it as simple as the first line of the Line of Effect section?

"When creating an effect, you usually need an unblocked path to the target of a spell, the origin point of an effect’s area, or the place where you create something with a spell or other ability."

I looked around a bit and, predictably, most existing threads dealt with countering the scrying itself.

What I want to ask folks about is whether a wizard using scrying can counterspell a spell or magical effect that he can see through the scrying sensor.

1) No range is indicated for the Counterspell feats, or for the Counteracting section.

2) The Counterspell feat says, laconically, "When a foe Casts a Spell and you can see its manifestations, you can use your own magic to counter it."

3) The Scrying spell says, "You magically spy on a creature of your choice." One can only infer that "spy on" is the equivalent of "seeing" the target, its spellcasting and spellcasting manifestations.

So the question is, if you're scrying on a guy, and he casts a spell, can you attempt to counteract his spell, assuming you satisfy all other relevant criteria for counterspells?

(My gut feeling is that this shouldn't be able to work, but I was unable to find any rule reference to show that my gut feeling was right.)

Not only can you not put cantrips into wands, but a Wand of Reaching is crafted with a single spell of a given level, and the reach part only works on that one spell.

It's not like "apply reach metamagic to any spell you like".

So the wand's level depends entirely on what spell at what level that is crafted into it.

"Rise, ye dead, and speak!" (casting thread necromancy)

This whole discussion on Quick Spring seems predicated on the notion that it is a one-action feat.

Did nobody check page 81 of Firebrands, and notice that in fact this feat is entirely missing any action icon?

IMHO, even though it's very restrictive regarding who can select this feat, enabling a PC to trade every stride action for a double move is "too good to be true".

This feat has suffered from extreme editing, somewhere, and it should either have the flourish trait (as was mentioned before) or be a variable number of actions (one or two) or both.

Something is missing, even if it's only the one-action action icon.

The SoM spell "Warrior's Regret" seems to have two problems:
1) the damage doesn't appear to have a specified type. Seems to me mental damage would be most appropriate.
2) It doesn't appear to take into account any damage to others done outside of the victim's turn, say, from AoOs or other damaging reactions. This would be a major issue with creatures that have multiple reactions, like a hydra.

I can't help feeling that the spell should also include reaction made since your last turn in the number of attacks the victim "regrets". Am I overthinking it?

I'm sure the OP fully understands the logic of Battle Medicine, since he keeps returning to the same point so as to provike others into contradicting him.

In some games, you use fire on those sorts of creatures, to stop their regeneration.

The Flammable Fumes spell https://2e.aonprd.com/Spells.aspx?ID=913
lists no saving throw at all.

Is both the poison damage and the explosive damage really without a save? Could it be an oversight?

I'd expect a fort save for the poison and a reflex save for the explosion.

PF2 simply abstracts all details about raw materials. The gold cost for crafting a scroll (or a set of 4 scrolls, as you would usually do it, for consumables) includes whatever exotic inks, paper, vellum, papyrus, treebark or stone tablets you might need to craft those scrolls.

FWIW, nothing says that you "cast a spell into a scroll". Instead, you must cast the spell during the casting process and the magic is "trapped" inside the scroll. You still need to take the full time to create a scroll, presumably preparing the writing surface, preparing the special inks, inscribing the actual writing and so on.

You can style it however you like.

It's kind of funny that this conversation was tacked onto an earlier one that took place prior to the errata that made it clear you only need a single formula for scrolls, regardless of the level of spell written on it.

*cough* The Control Water spell is woefully imprecise on how it works.

The sidebar on page 33 refers to the Brimgate Walker character background in the Gatewalkers Player's Guide, but said player's guide contains no such background. I'm guessing that it got cut for space, but perhaps Jason or someone else at Paizo might care to enlighten us?

Even the name, "Brimgate Walker" doesn't resemble the names of the other backgrounds. Either there was some renaming involved, or as you say, something got cut between the player's guide and the actual AP books.

Breit is spot on, but many would say that he is too kind, and that the Summoner archetype is hot trash.

Whatever you do, your base class Thaumaturge is very good. But it's also fairly action intensive, IMHO. You could bolt on almost any spellcasting archetype for some extra magic, but you can already use scrolls of any tradition, so you get less mileage out of that than other martials.

I'd seriously consider Acrobat (for autoscaling Acrobatics) and/or MC rogue archetype for more skills.

Or just take MC Summoner archetype for the roleplay potential, and spend most of your time on Thaumaturge-specific stuff.

It's not possible for a character to speak or cast a spell because the character will drop from the mouth ?

A polymorphed character in a battle form can't cast spells, period.

Even though it doesn't mention battle forms as such in the spell, we have to assume this is one, since you have listed attacks.

Even if you took the form of a dragon (and we know that dragons can cast spells), you can't cast any spells. Regardless of the spell components.

Wheldrake wrote:

spending a class feat

... or two.

Depending on which instance of the Multiclass Spellcasting Archetype rules you are going with.

The CRB says that you also need Basic Spellcasting as well in order to get the spellcasting class feature.

The APG doesn't.

This tired argument was put to rest some time ago by dev comment from Logan. Despite apparent contradiction that some folks managed to worm out of the rules on spellcasting dedications, the dedication along is enough to use scrolls and wands.

Indeed, Logan says "spells and wands and staves".

Best way to let your barbarian use scrolls and wands is not using TMI, it's spending a class feat on an MC spellcaster archetype (assuming you have a 14 INT, CHA or WIS).

I suspect the real reason people ask whether most familiars are animals is because they are trying to allow their familiar to activate items like potions.

I always assumed that familiars, like companions, could not activate any magic items (except those very few with the companion trait). The more I look at it, the more I suspect the answer is more ambiguous than that. Especially for explicitly non-animal familiars. Unless there is a specific rule I'm missing about familiars (with manual dexterity) activating items (like potions) that lack specific activation requirements.

Obviously, they can't activate wands or scrolls, since they lack a spell list. Potions? Elixirs? It looks less clear-cut.

It's fundamentally ambiguous.
"If you have the wounded condition, remember to add the value of your wounded condition to your dying value."

This could mean two things:

1) You determine your dying value normally, increment it as necessary, and add the wounded value once to the total.

or

2) You add the dying value each and every time your dying condition increases, making wounded 1 count as 2 or more points towards death.

I can't believe that (2) is intended, and after reading the discussion in this thread I'm not convinced that is the RAW.

IMHO, the main reason why there aren't specific rules saying that firing a "reload 0" weapon like a bow provokes AoOs because it has a built-in manipulate action is because, for the devs, this fact was blindingly obvious.

How anyone can claim that drawing a nocking an arrow doesn't require manipulation, even if it's not an additional manipulate action as such, is beyond me.

The existence of feats like Mobile Shot Stance just put another nail in the coffin of the "no manipulation for reload 0 weapons" camp. That feat makes it clear what the standard rule is, even if it isn't stated as clearly as some would like.

There are no such rules. It's totally DM fiat.

The only recommendation we can make is that it should be very time consuming, and give results in line with existing spells.

Charau-Ka are the "goblins" of PF2.

Kobolds have been cool at least since Neverwinter Nights. Deekin lives!

Returning to the original question, no, you can only have one thesis as a wizard.

IMHO it's a shame to waste it on a familiar, given that there are so many other ways to get one.

I would hands down always pick the Spell Substitution thesis, because there is no other way tp hot swap spell slots with only 10 minutes' work.

Some folks prefer the Spell Blending thesis, to have one more top-level spell slot, and I'd still take that before the Familiar thesis.

Yow! This thread is **still** going on???

Oh, now I see. It's devolved into a discussion of whether or not we should use the word "fluff" to describe so-called "flavor text".

Yes, it's an offensive term, and "flavor text" doesn't exist. It's all part of the rules, even if no mechanical elements are invoked in a given sentence. Everything helps determine intent and usage.

And yes, there is an interact action baked into firing a bow, or any "reload 0" weapon. <g>

Also, you're not going to break your game if you go slightly over the listed treasure tables.

Sometimes, players will keep a few lesser magic weapons as backups, or transfer their runes to a bow if they are primarily melee-oriented. Sometimes the DM just feels that it's right to reward a tough fight with a cool item.

The treasure tables are a guideline, so that you know what's expected. They aren't a **rule** as such. The RPG police is not going to raid your gaming venue because you were a little over generous.

Call it a "cutlass".

Alchemists and Investigators are probably the weakest classes - or at least the hardest ones to make competitive. People will chime in and say, "well, if you build them in just such and so a way, they're fine" and they're probably not wrong. But it is certainly far easier to make a profoundly unsatisfying alchemist or investigator than any other class in the game.

Note that Detect Magic only tells you "yes or no, is there magic present, within (30' emanation) range?"

It doesn't tell you what is magical, or how much. Later on, it can identify general schools, but not which item(s). Sure you can exclude your friend's magic items, but you still don't get anything specific.

(edited)

At the end of the day, you have to ask yourself, "what is this spell supposed to do?" and "how far is that in line with a 5th-level spell"?

The problem is the missing parts in the spell perameters and description. Interpreting what is written in strict RAW terms simply doesn't give a satisfactory result.

I do this systematically.
I make a word file with collumns for AC, hit points, saves, perception, stealth and a few other skills and bonuses (spell attack rolls, etc) and update it each time the PCs gain a level.
Print it out before each session.
Also has lines below to track initiative, and below that adversaries and their initiative, damage and conditions.

Really saves time, especially for secret checks.

This is an interesting discussion, even if it is afflicted with thread necromancy.

IMHO the spell description is incomplete, and the discussions over how to treat spells with no listed duration are moot.

For me, the "lower water by 10'" effect should be played like a "Moses effect" - Moses parting the Red Sea. In a shallow body of water (a river, a bit of lake between the shore and an island, etc) this could allow folks to move across the muddy bottom to reach their goal. The surrounding water is held back for an unspecified duration.

The "raise water" effect should create a 50' x 50' area of raised water, as long as there is a stream, pond or lake surface, with "invisible" border that holds for an unspecified duration.

Yes, I know, the spell doesn't specify a duration. IMHO that is an error in the spell's conception. I houseruled a duration of 10 minutes per spell level (50 minutes for the base spell) or until dismissed. I further houseruled that on expiration or on dismissal, the water rushes to assume its normal level, pushing foes and allies around using the spell DC as an Athletics check.

Yeah, that's a lot of houserules. But IMHO it's the only way to respect the spirit of the spell, and to allow Moses to call the Red Sea in to crush Pharaoh's soldiers.

Also, it's the only way to make it a viable 5th-level spell.

FWIW, I also posited that if the spell level is increased, it affects a larger area. But that hasn't come up yet.

YMMV.

If I were making a random shop generator, I would first make a shortlist of very common things that should always be found in shops, like healing potions and alchemical bombs and +1 runed weapons. Then add a section for more rarely seen items (even if they are classified as "common") that can be pulled from a random list by level.

Leitner, I've gotten good use out of your basic random loot generator, and have recommended it to many people. Keep up the good work!

Bulk is an abstraction, intended to simplify the bookkeeping for human sized characters carrying all their gear and the kitchen sink around.

It is not intended to represent the carrying capacity of mounts, and even less of flying mounts. Put simply, the math doesn't work.

I agree with Baarogue - a large-sized flying mount should be expected to carry no lore than a large-sized horse - one rider with their gear, perhaps in emergencies a second rider at half speed. If both riders are wearing heavy armor with a ton of stuff (like a typical adventurer) I'd say no to a second rider.

The best solution is to simply handwave mount carrying capacity, since the system is not designed to support such math games.

I do the same as a few other folks here: alignment damage affects all targets not of the same alignment as the damage. So Evil damage affects all creatures not of evil alignment.

I don't want to fiddle with half damage calculations. And it really solves all my problems, since I don't allow evil PCs in my groups. We play heroic fantasy, not selfish "in it for yourself" fantasy. YMMV.

Thanks for the quick reply James.
In keeping with the creepy atmosphere of Malevolence, I could see Crook(ed) Cove as a *mostly* abandoned town, fallen into ruin, but with a few denizens clinging to those ruins. Like an innkeeper/hunter who also happens to be a werewolf, and isn't above eating his "guests" if they demonstrate their weakness. Or a small community of ghouls lurking in the ruined churchyard, starved for conversation as much as fresh flesh. Or other spooky inhabitants.

Do let us know if and when you release any "Whispers in Ravounel" content.

James,

Have you given any thought to publishing further elements from the "Whispers in Ravounel" campaign that gave rise to the Malevolence adventure?

I'm specifically thinking of details on Crook(ed) Cove and the wilderlands around that area.

We're looking at playing Malevolence when our current campaign runs its course and it feels like it would work better if there were some support for actions outside the manor.

I'm assuming that none of these details have made it into print, so I'll have to homebrew anything I want to use, but thought I'd ask nonetheless.

When I ran it for my group, it was much more organic. The manor was one location of literally dozens that the group could explore as they wished, and they started and stoped exploration of it in favor of other locations several times, sometimes in the same session.

James (and anyone else who has run this adventure), have you posted or published any of these "dozens of locations" anywhere?

I'm planning on beginning **Malevolence** in a couple weeks, and I've started detailing some interesting locations in the ruins of Crook(ed) Cove and the surrounding hills and forests, as well as some starting handouts for the players. But it would be great if some other DM material were available.

I know my players, and I'd bet my bottom dollar that by the time they finish with the manor itself, they'll want to continue with these characters, especially if the heir to Xarwin manor survives and they have the opportunity to reclaim the lands and title.

You don't need to be faster than the bear. Just your buddy.
"That dwarf paladin was a swell bloke. Just couldn't run to save his life."

Familiars usually aren't useful in combat because their stats are abysmal.

More than that: most of their stats are undefined.

This said, let's not forget that it's a roleplaying game. If it makes sense for a familiar to be able to use an exploration activity, the DM can certainly allow that. From earlier examples, if a hound or wolf are being used to follow a trail, it seems highly appropriate to allow a survival check for that. And if a flying "pet" were commanded to scout around, it wouldn't be game-breaking to give the party the meager +1 initiative check that comes from that, or even to allow a separate perception check for the search activity.

As DM I draw the line when a player tries to give his "pet" complex commands. Maybe Lassie can run and get the sherriff to help get Timmy out of the well, but most complex actions are going to be beyond a "pet".

In the Pendragon RPG, there is virtually no magic. A single healing potion giving 1d6 healing is a valuable artifact.
Furthermore, natural healing (even with the assistance of a chirurgeon of some sort) is agonizingly slow, often requiring months. The Pendragon RPG is designed to have a single adventure each year, with the rest of the year being spent managing the PC knight's estate.

It seems self-evident that a PF2 campaign set in the world of Pendragon would be very different indeed. Even if you removed all magic, and used ABP to avoid a profusion of magic items, you would have a very, very different situation if PCs had access to standard PF2 medicine-based healing.

I'm not saying that it can't be done. Simply that you'll need to have extensive houserules, and that the end result won't look anything like the Pendragon RPG.

One of the things I really liked about Pendragon was the concept of opposed virtues and flaws, and they way they are used to determine PCs' actions. IMHO that would be a hard sell to players used to more free-form RPGs.

Since companions can't take reactions, they can never Grab an Edge when falling off a cliff.
Sad widdow putty tat.

Yet another reason why Grab an Edge should've been a free action, not a reaction.

Everybody engaging in Paizo-bashing here needs to take a deep breath and a step back.

Yes, mistakes were made. No, we'll never know the whole story. Heck, I doubt if even the people involved directly in this situation know the whole story.

The most heartening part of this whole crisis is that the top folks at Paizo have admitted to making mistakes and pledged to do better in the future.

If this incident makes some people take a knee-jerk reaction against the company as a whole, that really saddens me. Paizo has gone above and beyond in supporting diversity and inclusion, and the fact that top management hasn't always managed to keep to the straight and narrow path of virtue only shows that they are human, with human weaknesses and shortcomings, just like lesser mortals.

I for one will *continue* to support Päizo, and continue to support their efforts to foster inclusion and diversity in our hobby.

Thank you Erik, Jeff, Jason and others for being so forthcoming and for trying to better in the future. Thank you Sara, Diego, Crystal, Jessica, and Lissa for helping to not only bring us great content, but to champion important social issues that affect us all. Thank you Owen, Jim Sonja, Mark, Aaron for weighing in and helping maintain balance in these difficult times. My condolences and support to those who lost their jobs, or lost less tangible but no less important things like respect, trust and confidence in this whole situation.

Thank you Paizo, for facing these obstacles and shortcomings and trying to do better in future.

Cheers, --- Wheldrake (aka Phil Benz)

Regardless of the relative merits of undercasting some focus spells or cantrips, nothing in the rules allows you to "undercast".

Indeed cantrips say, "A cantrip is always automatically heightened to half your level, rounded up."

Focus spells also say, "Focus spells are automatically heightened to half your level rounded up, just like cantrips are."

So any decision to allow the undercasting of spells is a pure houserule subject to DM fiat. It's an entirely reasonable houserule, for many of the reasons brought up in this thread. But the RAW make no allowances for it.

There is nothing in the slingstaff entry that says it isn't a staff.
If you look at the historical version of the slingstaff, it is simply a staff with some cloth or leather stips attached to it.
(as distinct from the wacky artist who thought a slingstaff should look like an oversized slingshot)

One really good way to start is with the Beginner box adventure (which takes PCs to 2nd level) and then link it with Troubles in Otari.

I believe these are fully supported on Foundry, so you shouldn't need to wrangle any maps or tokens or statblocks.

Having an adversarial relationship between players and GMs is a squiffy basis for a group.

Absolutely true. I've known DMs who were trying to sadistically screw over their players in the end, and it ain't pretty.

Way back in the days of yore the game was built with an intended adversarial role.

No, it wasn't. Way back in the mid-70s we also knew that the best way to play was in a cooperative, non-adversarial way. You may have known some people who adopted an adversarial style, but the game itself was never "built" that way.

Just sayin'.

Also, on the topic of learning spells from spellcasters of other traditions: there is nothing stopping a wizard from learning a spell from a druid, per RAW. If your DM doesn't want to allow it, fine, but do make it clear that he's imposing a house rule, and that if he's going to make it that much harder for you to learn spells, he'd better make some allowances for other methods, like granting access to an appropriately-leveled NPC spellcaster from time to time.