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1) Will you promise to ensure that we all have fun? 2) Will you promise to take the time, before the session, to understand the potential rules you will need (environment, swimming, grapple, etc) based on what you have planned? 3) Will you promise to not make rules up on the fly? 4) Will you promise to use the Table of Contents and Index as needed to look up rules? 5) Will you promise to use the Search function on the PRD/PFD/etc? What I'm getting at is that you don't have to be tested on your rules knowledge. That will come with time. If the group isn't having fun, that is a problem, but criticizing the GM isn't the solution. Work with him to help him learn the rules better. We all started with no understanding. We all needed different levels of help. We are all still learning, even if we've been playing the same game for years. 
This is an exemplary guide to the zen archer monk archetype. I’m not praising my own work: what I mean is that I’m going to present a zen archer as an example, then put him through some high level challenges to show how the class runs and where it ends up. After the fights there’s some discussion and a guide, but I’m going to lead with examples to illustrate the way the zen archer works in play. That’s the plan: on with the show. *************************************************************** One would be a zen archer. Rain and shine since childhood, One has sat at the grotty feet of Ichi, his flea-ridden, novelty-bearded sensei, studying the way of the bow. He’s a slow learner, this One - but now, at last, he’s ready to go forth and bring monastic law (and monastic fleas) to the world. Many escapades and 19 levels later, One will be ennobled as Lord Ghostslayer and given stewardship of the Nine Kingdoms he calls home...but not yet, not yet. For the moment One is a 1st level human Zen Archer Qinggong monk, built with 20-point buy, and he looks like this: Spoiler:
Name: One. Race: Human. Class/Level: Zen Qinggong Monk 1. Favoured Bonus: H∞.
Age: 25. Height: 6’1”. Weight: 180lbs. Alignment: LN. Pointbuy: 14/14/14/7/17/7 = 20. Strength 14, Dexterity 14, Constitution 14, Intelligence 7, Wisdom 19, Charisma 7 Initiative +8
Speed 30
Traits: Exile, Resilient
Skills: Acrobatics +6 (1 rank, 3 class, 2 stat), Perception+8 (1 rank, 3 class, 4 stat), Stealth +6 (1 rank, 3 class, 2 stat) Gear (35gp): shortbow (30gp, 2lb), 20 arrows (1gp, 3lb), 20 blunt arrows (2gp, 3lb),
Kobolds quail before him. One improves well with age, though- here he is at 6th, primed to unleash hell: Spoiler:
Name: One. Race: Human. Class/Level: Zen Qinggong Monk 6. Favoured Bonus: H∞. Age: 30. Height: 6’1”. Weight: 180lbs.
Strength 14, Dexterity 14, Constitution 14, Intelligence 7, Wisdom 20 (22), Charisma 7 Initiative +8
Speed 50
Traits: Exile, Resilient
The Way of One:
Skills: Acrobatics +11, jump+37 (6 ranks, 3 class, 2 stat/6 class, 20 speed), Perception+15 (6 ranks, 3 class, 6 stat), Sense Motive+10 (1 rank, 3 class, 6 stat), Stealth +10 (5 ranks, 3 class, 2 stat) Gear (16,000gp): composite str14 longbow+2 (8600gp, 3lb), headband of wisdom+2 (4000gp), ring of protection+1 (2000gp), cloak of resistance+1 (1000gp), 2 potions of mage armour (100gp), 10 smoke arrows (100gp, 10lb), masterwork backpack (50gp, 4lb), 200 arrows (10gp, 30lb), 10 monk’s outfits (50gp, 10lb), 40 blunt arrows (4gp, 6lb), cold iron knuckles (2gp, 1lb), soap (1gp, 2lb), 83gp Encumbrance (light 66lb): 66lb Finally, here he is in his pomp at 20th: Spoiler:
Name: One. Race: Human. Class/Level: Qinggong Zen Monk 20. Favoured
Bonus: H∞. Age: 30. Height: 5’. Weight: 130lbs. Alignment: LN. Pointbuy: 14/14/14/7/17/7 = 20. Str 18 (24), Dex 18 (24), Con 14 (20), Int 7 (9), Wis 28 (34), Cha 7 Initiative +13
Speed 90, fly 40
Traits: Exile, Resilient
The Way of One:
Skills: Acrobatics +27, jump+71 (16 ranks, 3 class, 7 stat, 1 luck/20 class, 24 speed), Fly+17 (1 rank, 7 stat, 1 luck, 4 item, 4 man), Heal+16 (3 ranks, 12 stat, 1 luck), Knowledge Planar+20 (20 ranks, -1 stat, 1 luck), Perception+41 (20 ranks, 3 class, 12 stat, 1 luck, 5 item), Sense Motive+17 (1 rank, 3 class, 12 stat, 1 luck), Stealth +30 (19 ranks, 3 class, 7 stat, 1 luck) Gear (880,000gp): belt of physical perfection+6 & dwarvenkind (166,350gp, 1lb), tome of wisdom+4 (expended, 110,000gp), manual of strength+4 (expended, 110,000gp), manual of dexterity+4 (expended, 110,000gp), composite merciful str24 longbow+5 (73,100gp, 3lb, hardness 15, hp55), vest of armour+8 (64,000gp, 1lb), ring of protection+5 & counterspells (56,000gp; greater dispel 660gp), headband of wis+6 and int+2 (Know: Planar, 42,000gp, 1lb), ring of evasion & counterspells (31,000gp; greater dispel 660gp), greater bracers of archery (25,000gp), cloak of resistance+5 (25,000gp, 1lb), luckstone (20,000gp), broom of flying (17,000gp, 3lb), boots of speed (12,000gp, 1lb), bottle of air (7250gp, 1lb), ioun stone+1 armour (5000gp), eyes of the eagle (2500gp), handy haversack (2000gp, 5lb), 2 ioun torches (150gp), mwk backpack (50gp, 4lb), 300 arrows (15gp, 45lb), cold iron knuckle (2gp, 1lb), 2 weapon cords, 7gp In the haversack: 20 monk’s outfits (100gp, 20lbs), 2 holy waters (50gp, 2lb), 2 unholy waters (50gp, 2lb), 5 smoke arrows (50gp, 5lb), 40 blunt arrows (4gp, 6lb), soap (1gp, 2lb), waterskin (1gp, 4lb) Encumbrance (light 266lb): 67lb with broom. Encumbrance for broom (light 200lb): 194lb At this point One is ready to undertake the Trial of Beastmass , in which he must single-handedly defeat the seven toughest creatures fully detailed in the Bestiary, and do it within two days - that is, with only one rest. Uncommon resilience, extreme offensiveness and a dash of versatility - these are the qualities Beastmass requires. Can the Trial be overcome? Why would One even try? Well, he probably gets a Blue Peter badge or something (please excuse the in-joke for British readers). Anyway, some brief pre-match analysis, also known as ‘bits readers might disagree with’: Spoiler:
Perfect Stun : at 1st level One gains Perfect Strike, which ‘replaces Stunning Fist.’ At 11th level he qualifies for Stunning Fist and takes it. Now, monks get beefed-up versions of various feats, and Stunning Fist is a case in point. Monkhood gives extra stuns as well as an assortment of alternative effects, from fatigue to paralysis. When a zen archer monk takes the feat, does he treat it as a beefy monk feat - does he gain a use per level and the alternative effects?
It’s worth noting that the official online site links Perfect Strike’s replacement of Stunning Fist to the feat, not the class ability. This seems to suggest that zen archers have dormant beef-up class potential, which becomes active when the feat is taken. I’m going to make a judgement call here, though: I think the intention is that One gains a stun per level (as per the feat description) but not the alternate effects (as per the class text). This means that, when he eventually gains Ki Focus Bow, One can shoot stunning arrows but not paralysing ones. Do mark this guide for faq if you think this is a point worth clarifying. Ki Arrows : at 17th level One gains Ki Focus Bow, and treats ‘all arrows fired from his bow as if they were ki focus weapons, allowing him to use his special ki attacks as if his arrows were unarmed attacks.’ What is a special ki attack? The ki focus weapon quality gives a list, which ‘includes’ ki strike, Quivering Palm and Stunning Fist - but it doesn’t give a definition. This is a shame, because the new material gives us various feats that look like they might well be ki attacks, too. The use of ‘include’ does seem to leave room for additions, but it’s impossible to be sure. For example, several monk archetypes get a beefed-up feat as a straight replacement for Stunning Fist - are these ki attacks? Elemental Fist and Touch of Serenity both look likely candidates. Then too, Ultimate Magic describes ki powers in its treatment of the qinggong archetype - is an offensive ki power a ki attack? Again I’m going to make a judgement call here for the time being: I reckon the Stunning Fist substitute feats are ki attacks, because they replace a ki attack class ability. To avoid greyzoneness, though, I’m not going to use either Elemental Fist or Touch of Serenity in One’s build. Again, mark this guide for faq if you think a definition of kit attacks would be nice to have. Deadly Aim : on 07/08/11 Pathfinder released an errata to the effect that, when a monk uses Combat Expertise or Power Attack with flurry, he ‘uses his improved flurrying BAB to determine the effect of these feats.’ This applies equally to Deadly Aim. I’m incorporating this, although it’s worth noting that (a) it’s not a huge change (-2 attack/+4 damage at 20th), (b) it’s not necessarily advantageous to a monk, who doesn’t have attack bonusses out of the wahooly, and (c) it doesn’t change the outcome of any of the Beastmass fights. (I’ll also note that I think this is good errata, but that it’s liable to confuse people, since the monk’s flurrying base attack - +1 per level - isn’t laid out plainly on the monk’s class table, which is where many people will look for it. It would be good if this were made clearer in future printings or versions). Zen Vows : at 5th level One takes the vows of cleanliness and truth; at 15th level he adds the vow of fasting (‘a monk can take a vow at any level’). Can a zen archer have these? ‘A monk who takes a vow never gains the Still Mind class feature’: zen archers never gain it in the first place. Note, though, that the wording doesn’t say you have to have Still Mind to swap out, and in fact this is careful writing, because ‘any user of ki’ can take a vow - and other users, like the ninja, don’t have Still Mind either. So the zen archer falls into the same category as a ninja here; he doesn’t have Still Mind, and thus has nothing to lose when he avows himself. Gear : One has a vest of armour , since Pathfinder has no magic slot flavour restrictions: a robe, shirt or vest would fit the bill anyway. This allows him greater bracers of archery . He still misses out on armour and shield slots, of course. He also stacks up some secondary enchantments on their traditional slots, but he pays the 150% secondary rates. More controversially (in duel terms), One wears two rings of counterspells with greater dispels in them. PCs need magic items, beasts don’t, and at these levels, against at-will greater dispels , item nerf protection is mandatory. He pays for both the rings and spells as normal, of course, and the counterspells are gone for good when they’re expended. Qinggongness : In place of infinite Slow Fall, One takes barkskin for 1 ki; it lasts 3 hours 20 minutes a pop and gives a +5 natural armour enhancement. By default he simply uses this three times a day at noncombat intervals. He starts off 3 ki down each day to reflect this. He also has restoration (2 ki) in place of Wholeness of Body from 8th, and shadow walk (3 ki) in place of Timeless Body from 17th, though these don’t play much significance in the Trial. Skills : it won’t matter in the Trial, but I’ll just note here that items built on fly/overland flight give nice bonusses to the Fly skill, just as the spells do, though the items routinely forget to mention half the goodness. One’s broom of flying gives +8 (+4 for half caster level, +4 for good maneuverability). You have a maneuverability, it’s good, you get the bonus. Fight Rules : no one flees for good - the pride of monkdom and the Bestiary are at stake. Single d20s always result in 10, multiple d20s (like full attacks) go 10-11-9, 10-9-11, and repeat. Threats kick in when the percentages from hits (not misses) build up to 60% within or over rounds (eg. 12 basic /20x2 hits would offer one threat and confirmation). Strictly mathematically speaking, multiple 20x2 threats don’t produce exact 5% threat chances, apparently, but for a game guide I reckon a flat 5% per pip will do. If there’s a decisive close call I’ll flag it. Rough but simple... Or nearly so. One has Hammer the Gap, which adds a cumulative +1 damage to hits on a successful run of shots. This damage is critiplied, which means he does more damage on a critical if it occurs later on in his flurry routine. To keep this fair (and conservative), I’m going to add the following rider: if One crits during a full attack, it occurs on the first shot if he hits once or twice, the second shot if he hits three/four times, the third shot if he hits five/six times, and the fourth shot if he hits with seven or all eight attacks. One’s Attacks : it’ll save time to deconstruct these now. Throughout the trial, One either flurries with his bow or shoots as a standard action. He always uses Deadly Aim, and he has his merciful bow set to nonlethal by default. On the default flurry he activates his boots for haste (free action), spends 1 ki on unarmed arrow damage (swift action), uses Perfect Strike - which gives a 30% threat chance on one shot (actually 29.95%, apparently) - and attaches up to two Su or Ex abilities to the best shots - Quivering Palm and Stunning Fist. This is bow attack option no.5 on the 20th level sheet above. If he thinks stunning is better than raw damage he activates Mantis Style on his first turn, which takes up his swift action and so prohibits unarmed damage that round. If he’s limited to a standard shot, by default One uses Pinpoint Targetting, Improved Vital Strike, Perfect Strike, Quivering Palm (subsequently Stunning Fist), and spends one ki point again for unarmed damage. He doesn’t bother activating the boots on single shots. Mantis Style is again an option, if he has reason to prefer stunning to damage. Pinpoint Targetting means he can’t move in the same round, so he has to forgo it now and then. Pinpoint Targetting and the vital strike work together because the first is a standard attack action, and the second can be tagged on ‘when you use the attack action’ (which is to say, a standard action used for an attack). If they were both standard actions they wouldn’t combine, but as written they do. This is bow option no.2 on the 20th level zen archer above. Okay, buckle up, here we go.
Spoiler:
Perturbed by the trials ahead, One leaves bright and early to see a smart friend, a merman monk - but One is hardly smart himself, being minmaxed, and gets his days mixed up, departing on the first day of Beastmass itself. He’s cruising along through the sunbeamy sea on his trusty broom, taking nips of air from his bottle every four minutes, bow in hand, when he detects a disturbance in the currents and something vast hoves into view. Avast! It is the dread shoggoth, the first of One’s adversaries.
The ocean has 90’ visibility, and this is good for the shog (a nice charge distance) so we’ll use it as the start point. Everyone has smashing Perception, no one is surprised. The shog has +11 Initiative, but One goes first. Also the ocean is studded with tiny harmless jellyfish just where the fight occurs, so everything has normal concealment beyond 20’, which the shog ignores through tremorsense... though in fact One does too, courtesy of Improved Precise Shot. Also, One is half out of air when the fight kicks off: he has 20 rounds, and loses an extra round each time he attacks. The shoggoth is only a CR19, so we’re trying to stack some chips in its favour here. Ding-ding, round one: One doesn’t shoot, because the water imposes a minus 34 penalty on ranged attacks - bummer. He does ready his pinpoint vital shot when the ooze comes within 5’. Shog’s turn: it begins its Maddening Cacophony (free action), and charges 90’, trampling. One saves against the cacophony (on a 2), saves against the trample (on a 9) and evades. Is he engulfed? No, because he isn’t trampled - and even if he was (it’s a close save, after all) the shog would need to make a grapple check (as if Swallowing Whole), for which it requires a natural 20. In the meantime One’s readied shot goes off: it hits on a 2 and does 50 nonlethal after DR (oozes aren’t immune to nonlethal). The shoggoth is on 283 hp but immediately heals to 293hp (it’s only nonlethal damage, of course, but the distinction is irrelevant here). One acts immediately before it next round. Round two: One goes for the Full Monty flurry, haste and all. He hits seven times for 248 nonlethal damage after typeless DR. The shoggoth is immune to the Quivering Palm, the stun and the criticals that One would normally threaten, but it’s on 45hp. What else does it have up its soggy sleeve? Not enough. The shoggoth fast-heals 10 hp again, but the truth is it can’t hurt the monk. It needs natural 20s to slam or succeed on maneuvers. One saves against the cacophony and saves and evades the trample: we could rule that he fails a save against the latter, since it’s borderline, but he can survive it and won’t be engulfed. The shog can’t flee in this fight and has no ranged ability. Engulf is its trump, and since it’s none too bright, it’s going to fast-heal and try that again. One reduces it to unconscious primeval sludge in 3 rounds (conservatively) and kills it stone dead with a few more rounds of unmerciful flurries thereafter. 6 ki (including the day’s natural armour) and 2 charges of the boots of speed used, and the Quivering Palm wasted, but job done!
Spoiler:
One falls unconscious and wakes to find himself on his damp broom, in a charred cavern, 10’ by 10’ and 100’ high, lit by guttering candles. As he explores there is a sound like the shrieking of flensed souls and the towering balor appears in midair before him! The combatants are 10’ apart, One wins initiative, but we’ll say the demon gets a surprise round, because I don’t want Beastmass to come down to initiative. The Balor is big on brains, so we’ll say he’s done his homework on One, too, and we’ll do it for him now.
The balor is a SMACC - a Spellcaster on a Mighty Awesome Combat Chassis. He’s pretty offensive toe-to-toe, but his real strengths are his spell-likes - implosion, fire storm, at-will greater dispel and dominate , quickened telekinesis , and the CR17 marilith he can summon. Boojah! Actually, none of this is going to work on One and the balor knows it. The offensive spell-likes need 10s to go through One’s Spell Resistance (which equals success for the balor, per fight rules), but One then saves on a 2 against anything. Telekinesis fails against One’s AC, CMD and saves, and the marilith is a one-round road-bump - she can’t hit or grapple the monk barring natural 20s, and One’s flurry hits her seven times and crits once for 408 nonlethal damage, which doesn’t do wonders for her health. Worse, the balor knows it can’t touch One physically. It too needs natural 20s to succeed on all maneuver checks (telekinetic or otherwise), and ditto on attack rolls. It needs consecutive natural 20s to slay One with its vorpal weapons. If One was a normal monk he might take fire damage when flurrying, but that’s someone else’s problem. The balor can’t bullrush One off the broom, or sunder his bow, or disarm it, or telekinese it, or get One in a grapple where he can’t shoot and gets burned. The balor can’t even quick-telekinese itself a tower shield out of some conveniently handy steel plate, because it happens to know that One can shoot around total cover for 3 ki a round. So what can the demon do? Plan A: targetted greater dispels at will against One’s gear (area dispels won’t work on items). Per fight rules it’ll succeed against One’s SR and will easily succeed on dispel checks against the bow, belt and headband (on a 7, 6 and 2), which it has identified as One’s key items. Unfortunately, the balor also knows that One wears two rings which will automatically counter its first two greater dispels , but still, this plan has merit. It’d be better if the balor could sunder the suppressed bow, but that won’t be an option... curses... Plan B: if the balor can do 83 damage, it can use power word stun - no save - but it’s going to have the devil of a time doing that much damage. Finally - Plan C - the balor can just make full attacks, hoping for vorpal strikes. It gets seven chances a round, but the likelihood of getting consecutive 20s is miniscule. The balor goes for Plan A. The greater dispel bounces but one ring of counterspells is emptied. For pride’s sake, the demon uses quickened telekinesis to throw up a mass of cave rubble between One and itself, but the rubble is cover, not total cover, and the monk ignores it (Improved Precise Shot). Round One, One’s turn: he flurries. He hits five times, critting once, for 306 nonlethal. The balor saves against the stun (on a 9) but has 64hp remaining, and is unconscious unless it can stop One shooting next round, which it can’t (it can’t flee, has no healing or buffing to make teleport a viable temporary retreat and it can’t hide from the perceptive monk). Next round it gets porcupined and, some ki-less-, haste-less flurries thereafter, explodes in a blinding flash of demonic fire, but One saves against it (on a 6) and evades. 7 ki and 3 haste used so far...
Spoiler:
Again One passes out, but doesn’t wake to find himself free - he’s still in the cavern, though the candles have gone out and it appears altered when he explores, 60’ by 60’ by 60’. Maybe this is a different hellhole?
Anyway, bummer. He could turn ethereal or (possibly) shadow walk his way out of here, but instead he waits for his next Beastmass beast, meditating on his ioun torches . Suddenly a gate opens, its hinges weeping blood, and the indomitable force that is the pit fiend steps into the darkness. The combatants are 50’ apart, One has darkvision, but the devil wins initiative for real. Round One: the fiend may be the smartest beast in the Bestiary, so we’ll give it advanced knowledge. Like the balor, the pit fiend is a SMACC. Its combat chassis is less offensive but better defensively, and its spellcasting is superior - it has wish . It can also summon a CR16 horned devil, but it has no silver bullets that’ll shoot down zen archers. For starters, the fiend is (surprisingly) only Caster Level 18, and so needs a 12 to overcome One’s Spell Resistance. It’ll fail that check under fight rules, but then One will make all his saves on 2s anyway. The horned devil won’t hit and will go down in a round (Perfect Strike gives seven hits, with one crit, for 408 nonlethal). The fiend has some touch spells ( scorching ray and the initial portion of meteor swarm ) but the ranged touch attacks fail against both SR and AC; and like the balor, the fiend needs natural 20s to hit One with melee attacks or maneuvers. Its poison, disease and constrict are useless. So what can it do? Plan A: targetted dispels. It’s heard its demonic opposite tried this and failed, though. Damn those slightly cheesy rings! It could cast invisibility and a persistant image of itself to gain time, but the monk’s range mean the illusion will only buy off one bowshot, and the invisibility will fail as soon as the devil targets One’s attended items with a dispel. Plan B: wish for the worst. The fiend likes the second option. It wishes . Our zen archer plays by the book (rings aside), so ditto the beasts (initiative aside): the devil can do anything on the normal wish list. Destruction will do 35 damage on a save, the humble true strike more next round if the fiend survives that long, since it could then Vital bite for 57 (after One’s DR is applied) - but a chunk of damage is no good if the devil can’t follow up. Summon monster viii is nothing but a round of unhelpful flanking. Waves of exhaustion? The monk’s SR will nerf it, and anyway, the fiend happens to know One has restoration ; besides, he’d still be able to use his bow at a flat -2 penalty. Wind wall? The monk will just run into it, or fly into it, or shoot up the apertures at the top or bottom of the cylinder... (Point of law for zen archers to remember and mention in a non-confrontational manner if and when necessary: a wind wall has to be vertical. Not horizonal, not diagonal. The fiend could make it a cylinder or square, but not a cube or a cone. This means it can’t close off the top or bottom with arrow-negating wind. In the cave the bottom might be closed by rock, but there is likely a 10’ wide aperture at the top: were One up there, he’d be looking down a 90’ wind tunnel at the devil. For a 3rd level spell this is still a formidable obstacle to archers...but it’s not the 100% arrow-negator it’s sometimes presented as being.) ...But wait! The diabolical genius has a better plan - deeper darkness . As a devil it has See in Darkness. The monk may have darkvision, but he can only overcome supernatural darkness if he has daylight or the like - which he lacks - and despite appearances the pit fiend is horribly quiet (Stealth+28) and its spell-likes are silent. In deeper darkness it can throw quickened fireballs and get dispels off unseen while flying around. It can nerf One’s belt and for two rounds and he’ll be at -6 on all physical stats, which means -60 hp, -3 AC, saves and CMD, -2 bow attack and -3 damage; then it can take out his headband, for another -3 bow attack, Will, Perception and AC, and then ... Muahaha. The ioun torches wink out: the entire cavern goes utterly black. The devil flies up 30’, using Stealth, and ends its surprise round with a quickened fireball for the hell of it, but One evades (on a 2). One gets a reactive Perception check as the devil moves, or perhaps as the fireball pellet whirrs towards him; either way, his result (51) beats the fiend’s Stealth result (46 with distance): he has pinpointed its squares. Still Round One: One’s first turn. The fiend is 50’ away laterally and 30’ up. One can’t see it, but he knows the squares it occupies. He flurries. He spends 2 ki to ignore the total concealment miss chance for one round (swift action) and hits five times (because of Perfect Strike), critting once, for 254 nonlethal damage - a reduced figure, because he lacks the swift action to gain unarmed arrow damage and is also beyond Point Blank Shot range. (Note that there’s no rule to stop him using ki twice a round - what he lacks here are two swift actions). The fiend is down to 96 virtual hp, but it’s irrelevant, because One has Stunning Fist on the first arrow and the pit fiend needs a 16 to save. (It would need a 14 to beat Quivering Palm, were it available, though it wouldn’t die because its regeneration is still functioning this round). It’s stunned, with or without One’s Ability Focus or Mantis Style. He flurries again next round without hasting , rendering the fiend unconscious, then kills it with some hasteless, ki-less flurries, because his +5 bow overcomes Good DR. If you rule that he needs an actual Good weapon or spell to stop the regeneration, then he repeatedly coup-de-graces the unconscious form to a mulch of minus-whatever-you-like with his hundreds of arrows, eventually realises the regenerating gobbets need something more, pours holy water on the sizzling goujons, then flurries again. He’s used the boots of speed 4 out of 10 times, has used 5 of 20 Perfect Strikes, 5 of 21 Stunning Fists, and has expended 11 of 33 ki points.
Spoiler:
At last One is transported away from the Charred Caverns. He finds himself on a mossy bank, with the moon sailing overhead and a dark mountain lake winking at his feet... quite charming, really. But wait, what’s this? Warship-sized ripples arrow none-too-stealthily towards him and, as he draws his bow, a mighty two-headed drake breaks the surface, sending arcs of spray moonwards: lo! It is the tarn linnorm, and it means business. Everyone ignores the low light on attack rolls, no one is surprised, and One goes first - but that’s going to be dull, so let’s give the linnorm a turn because of its sheer awesomeness.
Round one: the linnorm may be the only creature in the Bestiary bar the tarrasque that has a realistic hope of sticking a combat maneuver on the zen monk: on a 17 it can grapple him. It still needs natural 20s to hit him on melee attacks, though, so the grapple would be a standard action with a minimal chance of success - and anyway, the cunning-but-brutish linnorm believes it has better options. As a full round action it raises its twin heads and breathes two titanic overlapping cones of acid, for 44d8 damage, with 4d6 Strength damage to follow next round...except there’s a DC32 Reflex save against each breath weapon, and One makes them on 5s and evades them both. One’s turn: he flurries. Five hits, one crit, for 306 nonlethal. The linnorn is on 79 virtual hp, but the opening arrows hit on 2s. The linnorm fails its Will save (it needs a 14), wouldn’t die if Quivering Palm were available (because it’s regenerating this round), but is stunned. One strikes it into unconsciousness next round without haste or a ki point and kills it soon thereafter, because his +5 bow overcomes cold iron DR, and so stops the beast regenerating (though you might rule he needs an actual cold iron weapon, in which case he eventually smacks the arrow-riddled drake with his knuckles). Its Curse of Death falls on One (DC29 Will) but he shrugs it off effortlessly, scratches at a monastic flea (their jump skills are most impressive) and settles down to supper. It’s only tofu, but he’s taken no damage all day so he rewards himself with an extra chunk.
Spoiler:
One wakes early and flies up to watch for trouble. He’s 100’ up on his broom, crosslegged, bow athwart his knees, when he perceives the dragon of dragons (well, at least of those fully detailed). The dawn skies are clear and our doughty archer isn’t caught unawares - he sees sun glancing off the gargantuan shining drake at 640’ (maximum sight distance 840’, the average for plains), and at that distance the gold perceives him only on a 20. For the first time we have a favourable surprise situation - though in actual play, in open settings, a hyper-perceptive zen archer can expect these fairly often. One even has the luxury of standing and waiting a round before attacking.
Surprise Round: One single shots. Distance gives him a -10 penalty, but Pinpoint Targetting negates every shred of scaly armour the gold has. It goes from AC39 to AC5 and One hits on a 2 for 59 nonlethal damage. The gold saves against death, but the monk wins initiative. Round 1: One single-shots again and this time he crits for 130. The dragon isn’t stunned and is on 188hp. The ancient’s turn. It roars, contorts its vast sinuous coils, and heals to 338 virtual hp ( heal gets it back 150 hp a time; it can cast the spell up to a dozen times). Impudent human! Still, the dragon is smart and its Beastmass quarry is somewhat pricklier than it anticipated. Having healed it sensibly considers its options. Let’s go through it, since One is going to win and it’s going to be a long and repetitive fight. The salient points are; A: One can always hit the gold. Even if it teleports away and buffs to AC51, the zen archer can use Pinpoint Targetting to take a shot a round against AC9, which he’ll make on a 2 at anywhere up to 640’; and he’ll crit with every other single shot, for 189 nonlethal every two rounds. If the dragon doesn’t buff but stays beyond Point Blank range, One can still flurry and hit five times (with Perfect Strike) at up to 110’, critting once, for 298 damage, or three times at up to 480’, using ki for range and doing 107 a round if he doesn’t crit, 172 if he does (50% chance on first such long distance flurry, 100% on second). B: The gold needs 17s to hit One in melee. Even if it teleports away and buffs, it can’t get a melee bonus greater than +39 and still needs 14s to hit. The gold’s breath weapons are also useless: One saves and evades the fire (on a 4) and makes the Fortitude save to entirely avoid the weakening breath (with a 7). (I think the Bestiary has an error on the ancient gold’s cone breath range, by the way; it should be 60’, not 120’). Combat maneuvers aren’t viable either (natural 20s needed); nor are offensive plane shifts (One saves on 2s). C: At some point in this long fight One is going to think about putting up Mantis Style. He’ll do less damage that round, but his stun DC will go up to 36 thereafter. The gold needs a 12 for that, will fail, fall out of the sky for a bit of damage, and will start the next turn prone and probably still within One’s vast range. Since this is a borderline fight-changing save, we’ll say the gold saves against every other stun once Mantis Style goes up, but the stunned rounds are still going to mess it up badly - not least because it reduces it to moving on the ground, while One hovers 100’ above it. D: The gold has basic dispel magics , which might circumvent One’s rings if you want to rule it that way, but the dragon only has a Caster Level of 15 with its true spells. This means it needs a 12 to nullify One’s belt, his most crucial item. The dragon might eventually nullify the bow for 2 rounds (it needs an 11, so it’ll take two castings to do this using the multiple d20 fight rule; it might quicken to cast twice in a round) and it can easily nerf the headband or broom - but these things aren’t crucial to One. He still bypasses the dragon’s DR/magic (his arrows are Supernaturally ki focus weapons, and gain that quality whenever he shoots) and he still hits with Pinpoint Targetting; he also hits with three attacks of his flurry at up to 160’ with his dispelled bow. E: The gold has antimagic field , which will take some sting out of One’s arrows, but if it uses this it can’t cast heal - which it has to do repeatedly and urgently, because One is always doing significant damage. F: The gold has up to 12 uses of heal ; 7 sixth level slots, 5 seventh level ones. This could keep it feeling moderately chipper for about 10 rounds at 150hp healing a pop, assuming it casts no quickened dispel magics . The thing is, this takes up the dragon’s rounds and slots, and One has 30 ki points post- barkskin and only needs one each round, to spend either on unarmed damage or on increased range. Eventually the dragon is reduced to cure moderate wounds if it wants to heal. Each cure heals 19hp, which doesn’t remotely counter One’s damage, and the dragon can’t quicken these, because it has run out of higher level slots. The gold’s only other significant ability is geas/quest . This is lethal - no save, and CL26 to counter Spell Resistance - but it has a 10 minute casting time. The upshot is that One looks like he might take his first Beastmass damage when the dragon dispels his broom, but actually the broom uses overland flight , which uses fly , which means the broom descends gracefully and the drop deals no harm. And that’s all the dragon has. One slays the earthbound gold with an arrow to the eye roundabout round 10 from 110’ altitude. He hasn’t used his boots of speed on the Pinpointed single shots, but he’s probably still used 5 of 10 hastes , 13 of 33 ki (including barkskin ), 10 of 20 Perfect Strikes, 10 of 21 Stunning Fists, and his Quivering Palm. Game on!
Spoiler:
How to kill angels? It ain’t easy, that’s for sure - and One is aware of that, because despite being on the thick side, he has Knowledge (Planar). He knows this is the Bestiary’s best shot at a win. The solar - a CR23 SMACC healer-buffer par excellance - is facing off against one measly 20th level human, so we’re not going to let it buff ahead of time. It will do that as soon as it feels threatened, though, because it’ll plane shift to Heaven, magic up to the hilt, then use miracle to plane shift back and wish to greater teleport to the battlefield. Buffed, it defeats One in a dozen rounds, courtesy of DR15/epic, regeneration 15, copious healing, holy aura (+4 all saves), limitless CL20 greater dispels , and the deadly downwards spiral of the power words blind, stun and kill. In short, One has to defeat the solar before it gets a standard action off.
One is transported to the angel’s earthly residence, which is a rustic cottage surrounded by heavenly gardens. The solar is tending its sunflowers. The monk approaches on his broom, flying through the earth 5’ under the angel’s vineyards, ethereal (3 ki) and unperceived, because although the angel’s true seeing spots ethereality, it doesn’t penetrate solid objects. One creeps about, making auditory Perception checks through a foot of earth to hear the solar’s secateurs (results of 51 are eventually good enough), then rises up close or adjacent to the solar (5’ step) and comes out of ethereality (dismissing is a standard action which doesn’t provoke. This is One’s surprise round). Everyone perceives everyone. One goes first. He activates Mantis Style and flurries. He hits only with the first three shots, doesn’t threaten, doesn’t do unarmed damage (no swift action left) and doesn’t overcome the angel’s epic DR, so that’s a paltry 66 nonlethal. The solar is still on 297 nonlethal hp, but it fails against the stun - it needs a 13 now the monk is making like a mantis. Since this is pretty borderline and a fight-changer I’m going to ignore fight rules and say the angel saves against every third stunning arrow. Solar’s turn. It’s stunned, but still regenerates to 312 hp. One’s turn. He flurries against a stunned AC40. With unarmed damage back online again, he hits four times (because of Perfect Strike) and crits once (50% chance from last round, 60% chance this round). That’s a better 196 nonlethal after epic DR, and the angel (116 virtual hp) is stunned for a second time: it still regenerates to 131hp. One’s turn - and in fact two failed stuns are all he needs. He flurries, hits four times, crits once, and does another 196 nonlethal after DR. The angel is unconscious on minus 65 virtual hp and regenerates to minus 50. One stops expending ki and haste, flurries the carcass awhile longer, then finally gets with the programme, pours unholy water on the divine remnants, flurries some more, rinses and repeats. ‘There can be only One,’ he murmurs contemplatively, as he takes the dead solar’s bow as a memento. (On the other hand, maybe the angel makes its second save. I think it’s slightly unlikely, but I’m no mathematician and if it does, that’s the only chance a solar requires. It 5’ steps back and vanishes, then reappears fully healed and buffed 12 rounds later, majestically ready to avenge the mortal’s insult. With a buffed AC of 49 and a Will save of +27 it beats the stun on a 9, heals damage almost as fast as One can inflict it (Pinpoint Targetting nets him one hit and one crit every two rounds against AC16 for an averaged 50 damage a round, after DR and regeneration) and once it dispels One’s belt it has him in range of the power words . Our doughty zen archer is stuffed.) We’ve still got the big guy for One to fight, though, so let’s get a breath of life in him and on with the show, eh?
Spoiler:
One has 1 charge of haste , 17 ki points, 6 Perfect Strikes and 8 stuns left for his last fight. He goes first. He flurries, he hits (openers on 2s), he stuns (the tarrasque needs a 20 to save). One spends the next few rounds pumping stunning flurries into the beast, followed by about 340 coup-de-grace vital-strike arrows, reducing the tarrasque to about minus 16,000 virtual hp (taking into account DR and regeneration, obviously), which gives him all the time he needs to shovel the machinegunned remains into four bags of holding he’s hired for the day, then turn ethereal (3 ki) and dump them out on the Ethereal Plane, where the beast drives all ghosts to extinction over the course of a decade, then starves into a permanent coma (because regeneration can’t heal starvation damage).
In recognition of his services to the multiverse, One the Zen Archer is awarded the title Lord Ghostslayer and stewardship of the Nine Kingdoms he calls home, where he lives happily ever after. So the solar was only a narrow victory. Still, One put on a rather good show, didn’t he? Can a wizard or cleric beat Beastmass? Can a paladin or barbarian? How many builds can do it without taking a single point of damage? Let’s look at why One does well, and then consider some build points. **************************************************************** 
I have seen people quote double cost if you make an item for a slot other than the one intended, but I can't find that in the book right now. All I see is if it is a slotless item, the cost is doubled. I think some folks believe that 3.5's 'slot affinity' is applicable in Pathfinder. That is one of the (stated) reasons behind the even higher cost of the Amulet of Mighty Fists in 3.5: it had an extra 50% tagged on for being in an inappropriate slot. Pathfinder removed the slot affinity, which should have cut the cost for a +1 AoMF from 6,000 gp (3.5) to 4,000 gp, but instead they priced it at 5,000 gp. Same applies to the +2, +3, +4, and +5 versions. Reasoning being that the AoMF doesn't need an actual +1 bonus to get a special weapon property (such as flaming). I don't know about you guys, but I'd be fine with dumping that aspect to get even a small price break on the AoMF. After all, the problem with the monk isn't damage; it's hitting CR appropriate targets in the first place and getting through their DR. If the AoMF was cheaper, and if its enhancement bonuses work like weapon enhancement bonuses (i.e., bypass damage reduction at +3 or higher), then a lot of the grumbling would go away. Speaking of which, that is another question that has never (to the best of my knowledge) been answered by a developer: I have a monk with a +5 Amulet of Mighty Fists. No special weapon properties, just a straight up +5 enhancement bonus. Does this mean my unarmed strikes ignore DR based on cold iron and silver (+3 equivilant), adamantine (+4 equivilant), and alignment (+5 equivilant)? Master Arminas 
I understand his point about power creep, I don't think he understands that the monk in combat is not cutting it at the current state of affairs, and hitting it with the nerf bat isn't helping. Power creep for the monk isn't a problem, it fixes a problem. MY suggestion is:
Thoughts/feedback? 
And you shouldn't. It's a wonderful feat, full of excellent roleplaying opportunities. But there should be guidelines, and that's fine. Stipulating what you need to in order to keep things balanced, that's fine. Cohorts must travel with the party at most, if not all, times.
Ideas like these that give broad expectations but allow you to limit things that might be overpowered will result in happy times for you and your players. And as always, you have the final call. 
Blame White Wolf. Once upon a time, they said words to the effect of "choose your name, then choose your concepts, then choose everything else, and try to have everything else fit the concept." I think a lot of us had already intuited this, but they said it early and well, formalising the concept first view of roleplaying. For a concept first roleplayer, optimisation is a useful but distant tool. It is a way of making a concept work well, not the starting point from which to build the character. It is the way decide between two equally appropriate choices, not a way of selecting options from the raw list. Optimisation can damage a persons ability to play in this style. If your desire to be 'effective' runs stronger than your desire to play to concept, you end up with character that don't fit the concept they set out to begin with. If your desire runs strong, but not as strong as your desire to play to concept, it tends to end up limiting your choice of concepts. Neither of these things is a good thing as far as roleplaying goes, at least to the "concept first mind set." It leads to situations like "Magnus Vaska, 12th arch mages of vann, living god", and the fish hook street boys heroing together, and the fish hook street boys getting royally narked that their carefully crafted and observed characters, which fit the adventures power level and setting, are getting completely sideline by a god wizard, who for some reason is hanging around with their gang of misfits. 
Peoples opinions on fudging may have to do with their preferred style of DMing, or which edition of the game they started with. Older editions of Dungeons & Dragons required the DM to make a lot of rulings, as the rules weren't as complete as more recent editions. Since the DM was already making many decisions, fudging a roll wasn't that different and was probably more acceptable. DMs had more power in the game. With more recent editions, however, the rules are fairly complete, and many see the DMs job as only being there to referee and run the NPCs. The current rules editions moved the power from the DM to a codified set of rules (A mistake in my opinion), so a DM changing things on the fly is not acceptable. (Yeah, there are old-school gamers who dislike fudging, just as there are gamers who started with the recent versions who find it acceptable. But what I said above could be the case for a lot of people.) 
My group is coming up soon on Chapter 2, so I took a look at the kingdom building rules. I didn't like the emphasis on a magic item economy, so I changed things around. While I modified it, I also found that I wasn't wild about Unrest as something directly affected by buildings, and more or less lumped it into Stability. Here are the rules that I came up with. At the bottom of the page, I included a modified version of one of the Excel kingdom spreadsheets that you may find useful. I've playtested it to an extent and am pretty satisfied with what I've got, but I'd like some input and feedback. I used the utterly fantastic Jon Brazer Enterprises version of the rules as my starting point. MAJOR CHANGES:
=====================================================================
Definitions:
Alignment: Lawful kingdoms gain a +2 bonus on Economy checks. Chaotic kingdoms gain a +2 bonus on Loyalty checks. Good kingdoms gain a +2 bonus on Loyalty checks. Evil kingdoms gain a +2 bonus on Economy checks. Neutral kingdoms gain a +2 bonus on Stability checks. A truly neutral kingdom gains this bonus twice.
Size: Your size is equal to the number of claimed hexes, whether developed or not. Control DC: The Control DC is equal to 20 + size. Population: The population is equal to 250 per non-city hex plus 250 per city block. Stability, Economy, and Loyalty: A kingdom’s initial scores in all three is 0 + the kingdom’s alignment modifiers. A natural 1 is always a failure for these checks, and a natural 20 is always a success. The score is affected by alignment, leadership, buildings, developments, edicts, and temporary bonuses/penalties from events. Unrest: A kingdom’s Unrest score is applied as a penalty on all Stability, Economy, and Loyalty checks. If a kingdom’s Unrest is above 10, you begin to lose control of hexes you have claimed. If a kingdom’s Unrest score ever reaches 20, it falls into anarchy. Unrest can never go below 0. Treasury: The kingdom produces Build Points (BP) that it can spend to explore and develop. Consumption: The kingdom must pay its Consumption cost every turn or increase Unrest by 2. The kingdom's Consumption is equal to its size plus its City Consumption, which is equal to the number of city squares. These numbers can be reduced by developments and buildings, though the reduction is halved in the winter months. (The winter months are Neth (November), Kuthona (December), Abadius (January), and Calistril (February).) Cities: Cities are the primary living areas for the population, and the primary drivers of Economy, Loyalty, and Stability scores. City Block: Every building takes up at least 1 city block. Some take up to a 2x2 section, which must be contiguous (but can be in different city squares). Blocks within the same city square are separated by alleys. City Square: There are 4 city blocks in a city square, and 9 city squares in a district. Squares are separated by roads. City District: There are 36 city blocks in a city district. Several buildings only effect the same district, or have limitations based on number of city districts. Districts are separated by major avenues, and can be bordered by waterways or other natural features. Leadership:
Leadership: There are 11 roles that can be filled in the kingdom.
1. Ruler: Add Charisma to 1 score of your choice. (Add to 2 scores of your choice at a size of 21-80, and to 3 scores at a size of 81+.) If vacant, decrease Stability by 8. Two characters can share this role if married or related; add both Charisma to same score. 2. Councilor: Add Wisdom or Charisma to Loyalty. If vacant, decrease Loyalty by 4 and Stability by 2. 3. General: Add Strength or Charisma to Stability. If vacant, decrease Stability by 4. 4. Grand Diplomat: Add Intelligence or Charisma to Stability. If vacant, decrease Stability by 2. 5. High Priest: Add Wisdom or Charisma to Stability. If vacant, decrease Stability by 4 and Loyalty by 2. 6. Magister: Add Intelligence or Charisma to Economy. If vacant, decrease Economy by 4. 7. Marshal: Add Strength or Constitution to Loyalty. If vacant, decrease Loyalty by 4 and Stability by 2. 8. Royal Assassin: Add Strength or Dexterity to Loyalty, and decrease Unrest by 1 each turn. 9. Spymaster: Add Dexterity or Intelligence to one score of your choice. If vacant, decrease Economy by 4 and Stability by 2. 10. Treasurer: Add Intelligence or Wisdom to Economy. If vacant, decrease Economy by 4. 11. Warden: Add Dexterity or Wisdom to Economy. If vacant, decrease Economy by 4. Kingdom Turn:
Kingdom Turn:
1. Stability Check: Make a Stability check against the Control DC. If you succeed, reduce Unrest by 1, or gain 1 BP if Unrest is already at 0. If you fail, increase Unrest by 1; if you fail by 5 or more, increase Unrest by 2. 2. Pay Consumption: Pay the Consumption cost in BP from the treasury, after reductions from developments and buildings. You gain no benefit if your Consumption score is negative. If you cannot pay your Consumption cost, increase Unrest by 2. 3. Economy Check: Make an Economy check against the Control DC. If you succeed, divide the total result by 5 and add that amount (rounded down) in BP to your treasury. If your Kingdom is between 21-40 hexes in size, divide by 4 instead. If it is between 41-80 hexes, divide by 3 instead. If it is 81+ hexes, divide by 2 instead. 4. Unrest Effects:If your Unrest is 11 or higher, the kingdom loses a hex of your choice (destroying any developments in the process). If your kingdom has a Royal Assassin, reduce Unrest by 1. You may reduce Unrest by 1 by paying the current Unrest value, as many times per turn as you wish. 5. Leadership Changes: You may change leaders at this point, including replacements of vacancies. You may also change the scores affected by the Ruler and Spymaster. 6. Claim Hexes: Pay 1 BP to explore and claim any hex adjacent to your kingdom, increasing its size by 1. You may claim 1 hex per turn at size 1-10, 2 per turn at 11-25, 3 per turn at 26-50, 4 per turn at 51-100, 8 per turn at 101-200, and 12 per turn at 201+. 7. Develop Hexes: You may build 1 road per turn at size 1-10, 2 per turn at 11-25, 3 per turn at 26-50, 4 at 51-100, 6 per turn at 101-200, and 8 per turn at 201+. You may build 1 development per turn at size 1-25, 2 per turn at 26-100, 3 per turn at 101-200, and 4 per turn at 201+. See Chart 1 for their effects. 8. Establish/Improve Cities: You may build 1 new city per turn on an explored hex by paying 1 BP. You may improve any city, including one built this turn, by paying the BP cost of the desired building. You are limited to 1 new building per city each turn; each city can build an additional number of buildings per turn equal to the number of Mills in that city. See Chart 2 for their effects. 9. Set Edicts: Adjust the edict levels of Taxation, Festivals, and Promotion to the desired levels. 10. Kingdom Events: There is a 25% chance that a notable random event occurs during this phase, which increases to 75% if there was no random event in the previous turn. ===================================================================== Buildings and Developments Commercial Buildings:
1. Shop: 6 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy, Limit 1 per House 2. Tradesman: 6 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy, Limit 1 per 2 Houses 3. Exotic Craftsman: 10 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy, +1 Loyalty, Limit 1 per Mansion 4. Inn Commercial: 10 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy, +1 Stability, Requires Market in same district; Special: Increase a Market's Economy bonus by 1, Limit 1 per Market 5. Piers: 12 BP, 1x1, +2 Economy, Must be adjacent to Water 6. Market: 12 BP, 1x1, +2 Economy, Limit 1 per 3 Houses 7. Luxury Store: 21 BP, 1x1, +3 Economy, Limit 1 per Mansion 8. Guild Hall: 24 BP, 1x2, +2 Economy, Requires Tradesman in same district; Special: Halves cost of Pier, Stable, Tradesman in district 9. Magic Shop: 32 BP, 1x1, +4 Economy, Limit 1 per Noble Villa 10. Waterfront: 90 BP, 2x2, +5 Economy, Must be adjacent to Water; Special: Halves cost of Guild Hall, Market in district, Taxation Edict has double effect; Limit 1 per City Defense Buildings:
11. City Guard: 6 BP, 1x1, +1 Stability 12. Watchtower: 8 BP, 1x1, +1 Stability; City Defense +2, Limit 1 per District 13. Barracks: 12 BP, 1x1, +1 Stability; Special: Allows Infantry Units; City Defense +2, Limit 1 per District 14. City Wall: 12 BP, 1x1, City Defense +4, Limit 4 per City 15. Jail: 14 BP, 1x1, +2 Stability, +1 Loyalty 16. Garrison: 28 BP, 1x2, +2 Stability, +2 Loyalty; Special: Halves cost of City Wall, Granary, Jail in same district 17. Keep: 30 BP, 1x1, +1 Stability, +1 Loyalty, City Defense +4, Limit 1 per District 18. Castle: 54 BP, 2x2, +2 Economy, +4 Stability, +2 Loyalty; Special: Halves costs of Keep, Noble Villa in district, Halves cost of Promotion Edict; City Defense +8; Limit 1 per City Food Buildings:
19. Baker: 6 BP, 1x1, Reduces City Consumption by 1, Limit 2 per Farm 20. Tavern: 12 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy, -1 Stability, +2 Loyalty 21. Butcher: 12 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy, Reduces City Consumption by 1, Limit 1 per Farm 22. Granary: 12 BP, 1x1, +1 Stability, +1 Loyalty, Special: Can carry over 1 negative Consumption per turn 23. Brewery: 4 BP, 1x1, +1 Loyalty Industrial Buildings:
24. Fletcher: 10 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy; Special: Allows Archery Units 25. Mill: 10 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy; Special: Increase Buildings per Turn by 1 26. Smith: 10 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy; Special: Allows Heavy Armor Units 27. Stable: 10 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy; Special: Allows Horseback Units 28. Tannery: 10 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy; Special: Allows Light Armor Units 29. Carpenter: 30 BP, 1x2, +2 Economy, Requires, Mill in same district; Special: Reduces cost of all buildings by 1 in district, Limit 1 per District Knowledge Buildings:
30. Library: 6 BP, 1x1, +1 Stability 31. Caster Tower: 30 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy, +1 Loyalty, Requires Library in same district; Special: Allows Magical Units 32. Academy: 52 BP, 1x2, +2 Economy, +2 Loyalty, Requires Library in same district; Special: Halves cost of Caster's Tower, Library, Magic Shop in district Knowledge Buildings:
33. Graveyard: 4 BP, 1x1, +1 Loyalty 34. Town Commons: 4 BP, 1x1, +1 Stability 35. Monument: 10 BP, 1x1, +2 Loyalty 36. Shrine: 10 BP, 1x1, +1 Stability, +1 Loyalty 37. Park: 16 BP, 1x2, +3 Loyalty 38. Meeting Hall: 22 BP, 1x2, +1 Economy, +2 Stability, +1 Loyalty; Special: Halves cost of Town Commons in district 39. Temple: 32 BP, 1x2, +2 Stability, +2 Loyalty; Special: Halves cost of Graveyard, Shrine, Monument in district 40. Arena: 40 BP, 2x2, +2 Economy, +4 Loyalty; Requires Meeting Hall in same district; Special: Halves cost of Garrison, Theater in district, Festival Edict has double effect/cost; Limit 1 per City 41. Theater: 44 BP, 1x2 +2 Economy, +3 Loyalty, Requires Meeting Hall in same district; Special: Halves cost of Festival Edict; Limit 1 per City 42. Cathedral: 58 BP, 2x2, +1 Economy, +4 Stability, +3 Loyalty; Special: Halves cost of Temple, Academy in district, Promotion Edict has double effect/cost; Limit 1 per City Residential Buildings:
43. Tenement: 1 BP, 1x1, -1 Stability, Counts as 1 House 44. House: 3 BP, 1x1 45. Mansion: 10 BP, 1x1, Counts as 2 Houses 46. Noble Villa: 24 BP, 1x2, Counts as 3 Houses, 2 Mansions Underground Buildings:
47. Brothel: 6 BP, 1x1, +1 Economy, -2 Stability, +1 Loyalty, Must be adjacent to 1 Tenement 48. Gambling House: 10 BP, 1x1, +2 Economy, -2 Stability, +2 Loyalty, Must be adjacent to 1 Tenement 49. Black Market: 24 BP, 1x1, +4 Economy, -3 Stability, +1 Loyalty, Must be adjacent to 2 Tenements Hex Developments:
1. Farm: -2 to Consumption (-3 if adjacent to water); Costs 2 in Plains, 4 in Hills 2. Mine: +1 to Economy (+2/+3/+4 for silver/gold/mithril); Costs 4 in Hills, 8 in Mountain 3. Camp: +1 to Economy (+2 if valuable resource); Costs 4 in Forest, 8 in Swamps 4. Fishery: -2 to Consumption, +1 to Economy, must be adjacent to water; Costs 4 in Plains 5. Fort: +1 to Stability, half upkeep cost for nearby armies; Costs 12 in all terrains 6. Signal Tower: +1 to Stability; Costs 6 in Plains, 4 in Hills, 2 in Mountains ===================================================================== Kingdom Sheet 
Wow. Just wow. An absolutely perfect answer in the first reply. This is absolutely what you should do. Rules lawyers are valuable and can seriously enhance the game if you, you know, cooperate with them a little. After all, it IS a cooperative game. 
As Ravingdork said, the first answer on this thread is also the best one. If you can trust him, make him your rules lawyer. I'm my group's rules lawyer. When we need a specific rule, the DM turns on me and I explain it - or if I don't remember 100%, in which case I also say that I'm not sure of what I'm talking about, I suggest a quick way to resolve the problem with logic and balance (example : during a game yesterday, I didn't remember what was the DC for a Heal check against the poison killing an ally, so I proposed that the check should be equal to the poison's DC and should require one use from a healer's kit, to give a +2 circumstance bonus to the victim - I was right, except I didn't need a healer's kit and the bonus was a +4, but don't worry, the guy survived), always giving the DM the last word on how things work.
With the DM trusting the rule lawyer while trying to follow the rules as closer as possible, and the rule lawyer doing it's best to quickly give a useful answer so the fluff doesn't suffer because of the crunch, we don't slow the game and everyone is happy. 
Rule zero is fine, but should not be used to justify a lack of rules knowledge, which is what the rules-centric character is concerned about.
I'm going to respectfully disagree. As a GM, it's your job to provide an exciting opportunity for the players to have a fun time. If they walk away bored, or frustrated, or confused, then it doesn't matter whether you know the changes to the grease spell or the way Vital Strike is supposed to work. Most* of the very best referees I know couldn't give a horn-swaggle about the rules while they're at the table. They're telling an awesome story, you've got a starring role in it, and let's go. They want you thinking about what you're going to say, once the Squadron Opproborious hauls your butt before the Darakul King for sentencing, rather than how you can eke out another +2 to your PC's Diplomacy check. In the interest of honest advertising, they probably don't promote their campaign as "Pathfinder by the book." Maybe "Pathfinder you'll be telling people about, ten years from now." If you're in the middle of a Call of C'thulhu encounter and you're mentally calculating how many dice of damage your PC is likely to take when he rams his jeep into a star vampire, I'd liken that to balancing your checkbook while keeping one eye on a horror movie. It's bad Zen. * I was going to say "Some" here. But then I considered the "take no prisoners" GMs I've played under or watched at cons, and I ammended that. Having said that, when some of those selfsame GMs turn their attention to writing for Pathfinder, they demonstrate impressive system-mastery. But there's a time and place for making sure that the guitar is in tune, and a time and place to rock out. 
Robert Brambley
(Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, Adventure Path, Campaign Setting, Companion, Modules Subscriber)
It's very myopic to consider using the D&D or Pathfinder rules in one catch-all campaign setting style. They are intended to be compatible with a number of styles, flavors, and settings. They are designed to be adjustable when the setting of the campaing is counter-intuitive to the rules as written. Ravenloft, Planescape, Dark Sun, Midnight, Eberron, Birthright to name a few are vastly different than the default cookie-cutter Golarion type realm. But they are no less viable, certainly just as entertaining to those that favor them; but each has a certain style and flavor of their own that does not necessarily interact well with the high level of magic use you are preaching about. If someone wanted to run a "Game of Thrones" esque setting, a la Birthright campaign setting, then the otherwise high level of magic that is rampant in other campaigns would be counter-intuitive and certain stretches of the rules, alterations, modifications, additions, deletions etc would be paramount towards it being a successful campaing. Published alternate settings do this for you. Ravenloft greatly alters a number of spells - especially Divine. Midnight setting removed divine spellcasting. Thus there is a precendence set that certiain default rulings need be changed to move away from the default setting style. I personally do not assume that the way I play is the way that everyone does, and I certainly do not feel that my way is the only right way to play the game. Most RPGs, and the fun within is very subjective to the player/DM and their group as a whole. If you're lucky you find others with similar preferences, or at least the ability to compromise and accept what your style is. Robert 
Primus : I think RAW, as a whole, is fine as long as you don't try to break it. By break it, I mean intentionally look for and exploit loopholes. This is a living system, and you can't have a living system that doesn't have a bug in it when you start combining books. Just look at any Ravingdork thread to see what I mean by intentionally borking the system. You can do that with anything, including Kirth's houseruled until it no longer looks like Pathfinder system. It's just different breakage points when you push the envelopes. Any game requires the GM and the Players to have a social contract with each other. The GM's side of the contract is this : I, as the GM, swear to do my best to provide an interesting story for you. I also, as the GM, swear not to kill you with no chance of survival. I also, as the GM, swear not to be a dick. The Player's side of the social contract is this : I, as the Player, swear to do my best to not break the system. I also, as the Player, swear not to try to destroy the story you worked on so hard. I also, as the Player, swear not to be a dick. Note the common element at the end of both contracts. Really you could shorten both contracts to that one line. But I prefer expanding them a bit so people keep straight what their part of the job is, one person making the world and story and the others furthering the story and not trying to break the system. Secundus : Things that I find are broken are, in no particular order...
Tertius :
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[/QUOTE="FAQ regarding rays and counting as weapons"] Ray: Do rays count as weapons for the purpose of spells and effects that affect weapons? Yes. For example, a bard's inspire courage says it affects "weapon damage rolls," which is worded that way so don't try to add the bonus to a spell like fireball. However, rays are treated as weapons, whether they're from spells, a monster ability, a class ability, or some other source, so the inspire courage bonus applies to ray attack rolls and ray damage rolls. The same rule applies to weapon-like spells such as flame blade, mage's sword, and spiritual weapon--effects that affect weapons work on these spells. —Sean K Reynolds, 07/29/11
Vital Strike (and its desecendant feats) have been excluded from working with weapon-like spells according to a different FAQ. The question is, does Vital Strike work with innate ray attacks such as the Jabberwock's eye rays? Spoiler:
The described tactics in Kingmaker #6 indicates that it does. There is some debate that it should not. Killer GMs' need to know! 
On another note, I don't need a PHD in mother goose in order to comment on it. Religious texts and Mother goose have the same level of validity, Dr. ;-) Before you make a comment, ask yourself "Can this hurt or offend someone?" if the answer is yes, then whatever your beliefs or non-beliefs are, ask yourself "Is this really a good idea to hurt or offend?" If your beliefs or non-beliefs in something or the non-existence of something are such that you feel you MUST educate fellow gamers with your perceived truth, then ask yourself, "Would educating them be worth my time, or would doing so really have any significance on the cosmic level". Thank you for listening. I'll be here all week. :P 
Because i spent a good deal of time last night locating guides, i thought that it would be good to share my findings with the rest of the forums so that new posters don't have to look all over the place for them.
Treantmonk's Guides:
Rogue Eidolon's Guides:
Ogre's Guides:
Cryptic's Paladin Guide is here. MinstrelintheGallery's Sorcerer Guide here. Tark's Cleric Guide here. Saph's Summoner Guide can be found here. If there are more of them out there please provide links.
EDIT: Added Ogre's guides 
redcelt32, have you checked out the Random Name Generator at Behind the Name? One of the tricks I use is generate a whole bunch of NPC names ahead of time and keep it in my GM notebook and scratch names off as I go. 
Adding so people can vote (remember the idea is to post an idea so people can favorite it) Worldwound 
How does your DM handle that? Or if you are a DM, how do you handle it? I'd say, "How about you let Hobbun play his character, and you play your character?"
3 people marked this as FAQ candidate.
14 people marked this as a favorite.
First, let me give a bit of background. Back when I was at Wizards, at the start of 3E I worked with Jonathan Tweet on a bunch of advice columns, including an article called "How to Design a Feat." One of the concepts we established was "things should be the same, or they should be different." (And by "different" I mean "very different" so you don't mix up the two.) That concept helps players remember different rules--if rule X is already in the game, and you're creating new rule Y that works a lot like X, you should either (1) make Y work EXACTLY like X, or make Y work differently than X. That way, players can remember that Y works like X, or not accidentally confuse how Y and X work. And if Y feels a lot like X, it's almost certainly supposed to work like X, and things that attach to X should be able to attach to Y. For example, imagine an alternate universe where the PFRPG feat Improved Trip gave a +2 bonus on trip maneuvers, but Improved Sunder gave a +3 on sunder maneuvers, Improved Grapple gave a +4 on grapples, and Improved Disarm gave a +2, and only some of them said you didn't provoke an AOO for attempting the maneuver. That would be incredibly confusing and hard to remember--unless you were a total memory freak, every time you encountered one of those feats you'd have to look up the exact bonus it gave because the listed bonuses were all very similar, and you'd have to look up whether or not it provoked an AOO because there wasn't a clear pattern to which ones did or didn't. Instead, in this universe, all of those feats give a +2, they all let you do the maneuver without provoking an AOO, and all of them give you a +2 to your CMD when defending against that sort of maneuver. Not only does this mean the feats are balanced against each other, but they're consistent and therefore easy to remember. Likewise, all of the +2/+2 skill feats give you +2 to two skills, not +1 to one skill and +3 to another skill. Consistency in rules means you have to memorize fewer specifics and just remember things like "the core skill bonus feats give +2/+2" and "the improved maneuver feats are all +2 offense/+2 defense/no AOO." That helps you play the game and run the game. So when the cleric class has a header section called "Class Features" and under that is an entry that says "Channel Energy," and the oracle class has a section called "Class Features" and under that is an entry that says "Channel: You can channel positive energy like a cleric," and the paladin class has a section called "Class Features" and under that is an entry that says "Channel Positive Energy (Su): ... she gains the supernatural ability to channel positive energy like a cleric," those all are intended to work the same way, even though they're not given identical names. For one, because the paladin and oracle "versions" of that ability tell you it works like the cleric "version" of the ability. For two, because having them all work the same way is simpler and easier to remember than each of them working a different way. Now, given, the oracle gets 1+Chamod per day instead of the cleric's 3+Chamod, and the paladin spends uses of lay on hands instead of a separate X/day allotment, but if you line up a good cleric 5, a life oracle 5, and a paladin 5, and tell each of them to channel a burst of positive energy, all three of them are healing 3d6 to living or dealing 3d6 to undead, DC 10 + 1/2 level + Chamod, 30 ft. radius, no AOO, and so on. Exactly the same. Because it's easier to remember that way. Because it makes the game easier to run that way. And that means things like Improved Channel and Alignment Channel and Extra Channel should apply equally to the cleric, life oracle, and paladin (you'll note for Extra Channel the paladin ability's counting method of uses per day for the feat is slightly diff because the paladin ability is based on using lay on hands, but the net result is the paladin gets +2 uses of channel per day, just like the cleric and oracle). Because to do otherwise means we need different versions of these feats for oracles and paladins because under the strictest interpretation, neither of them has a class ability that's specifically and explicitly named "channel energy;" and three sets of redundant identical feats for clerics, oracles, and paladins is lame and a waste of space. If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's probably a duck. If you line up Daffy Duck, Donald Duck, Duckman, and Howard the Duck, from a game standpoint it makes sense that a +1 duck-bane arrow is going to do +2d6 damage in addition to normal arrow damage if you shoot any of them, because they're all ducks. And if you shot that arrow at "Duckie" from Pretty in Pink, it wouldn't get any bonus damage, because he isn't a duck. And you should be able to see why those first four are ducks and the last one isn't. And if for some reason two things that seem almost the same (like "channel energy" vs. "channel" vs. "channel positive energy") shouldn't act exactly the same, count on us to tell you how it is different. For example, take the necromancer "power over undead" ability; you can't heal or harm with it, but you can use Command Undead or Turn Undead with it (both of which are based on channeling), and can take feats that augment those two applications, but not feats that alter your purpose away from undead. So, necromancers get an ability that works just like channel energy, except (1) it always works like Command Undead or Turn Undead (i.e., no heal-harm aspect), and (2) can't ever be used on something other than undead. Does the necromancer have an ability called "channel energy"? No. Does it let you do stuff that clerics with Command Undead or Turn Undead can? Yes. In those cases, does it work exactly like channel energy modified by those feats? Yes. Does it make sense that the necromancer can use feats and abilities that rely on channel energy as long as the feat or ability augments their power over undead? Yes. So if there was a "Prerequisite: channel energy class feature" feat that increase the number of d6s you healed or harmed, would you let a necromancer take it? No, because their channel never heals or harms. If there was a "Prerequisite: channel energy class feature" feat that increased the number of HD of undead you could command or turn at one time, would you let a necromancer take it? Yeah, because that sounds exactly like something the necromancer should be able to do with his channeling ability, as it's something a Command Undead/Turn Undead cleric ought to be able to do it. What about a channel feat that changed the area from a sphere to a cone? Sure, because you could see a Command Undead/Turn Undead cleric taking that feat. Sometimes rules aren't going to have the exact same name or wording.
Could the game be more "perfect" by using exactly the same terminology? Yes, mostly. But I think holding that up as some kind of ideal is a pipe dream. Even programmers, who copy a subroutine from one part of a program to use as a model in a different part, still make changes sometimes, either because they better understand how the coding works since they wrote the original sub, or something unique is needed for that sub in the new location, or whatever. But, as Monte says, "the DM is not a robot." Players aren't robots, either. And as James Wyatt says, "You can never write a rule that is so clear that *everyone* understands it." Skip Williams used to get Sage Advice questions like, "Do I have to take Power Attack before I take Cleave?" Obviously the answer is "yes"... but it wasn't obvious to that reader, for some reason. Now, that's a very simplistic example, and the "channel energy class feature" prereq is not a simplistic example, but I think you get the gist of it: sometimes you're going to have to make rulings based on how you think the rules fit together. Sometimes it's more obvious than others how those rules fit together, but if they seem to have the same root, it's better to assume they're supposed to work the same way than to doubt your own ability to realize the similarities between them. If "channel energy" and "channel positive energy" and "channel" aren't all class features , you'd have to wonder why the Core Rulebook didn't include paladin versions of Improved Channel and Turn Undead that have "channel positive energy" as a prerequisite. And you'd have to wonder why consecrate boosts cleric channel energy DCs but not paladin channel positive energy DCs (the spell specifically says "The DC to resist positive channeled energy..." which probably means a cleric channeling positive energy, but is unclear if that also means a paladin's "channel positive energy" ability). And so on. When, realistically, it makes sense that paladins should be able to take Improved Channel, and that consecrate should affect paladin channel DCs just as well as it affects cleric positive channel DCs. And likewise for life oracles. And necromancers. Things should be the same, or they should be different. (To be continued, as I don't want to lose this post....) (Actually, I'm going to bed, I'll address the other points tomorrow!) 
At this time in history, that is what I have been told by people in the hobby distribution trade, the book trade, and other avenues that both games sell their products into. If you talk to the various retailers, it is a mixed bag, with one telling you one thing and another a different story. But when you talk to the folks who sell those retailers the product that they sell, then you get a clearer picture. And I am just talking table-top RPG business. I am not talking about board games or card games or video games or whatnot. Just books and digital copies of those books for use in playing a table-top RPG. -Lisa 
On that topic...is there an official ranking of any kind of the relative power of the various Runelords, in terms of level/CR?...She is one of two Runelords confirmed as being epic level (the other being Xanderghul, who is even higher level than she is).Actually... Alaznist is in that category too, although only just barely. Not in print, but I've got a list in my head that looks something like this, starting with the most powerful runelord at position #1 and counting down to the least powerful one at position #7, with position #4 being the only runelord we have nailed down with a CR score (CR 20). 1: Xhanderghul (pride)
Oh, also? Fans of the Runelords will be interested to know that we've got illustrations of Sorshen and Xanderghul for the first time in the upcoming "Inner Sea Magic." 
I don't need to see your posts Ashiel, I am well aware of your position on this issue. I respectfully completely disagree with your position pretty vigorously. I believe you are completely at odds with the very fundamental concept of "role playing." I know you don't agree. You've written the equivalent of a small novella on the subject. I just don't buy your arguments. 
Get a 5 Strength score. Trust me, you will notice it. When you are a caster, having to count every pound becomes insane I do it for this guy RIGHT Here, and ya know what? I love it. It makes it so much more challenging.
I most sincerely hope you are being ironic. Most sincerely.
.... because those mechanical rules define the ROLE that you are supposed to PLAY. But since this concept appears to be completely foreign to some people.... Have fun making your character be mechanically ideal for one purpose and then pretending he's something entirely different when you want to. Good thing we don't play together... 
Pathfinder would never have succeeded if Wizards hadn't essentially abandoned the network... Once again, Vic is 100% correct. This isn't really even open to reasonable debate. I mean, I was there. This is how it was. The man is telling you the truth. Vic FTW.
...huge clip..., stating Pathfinder is proof the OGL experiment failed... I don't agree. In fact, I think if you ask Ryan Dancey he'd say the existence of Pathfinder is proof the OGL experiment worked. That is certainly my view--that Pathfinder is proof the OGL worked. |
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