thepuregamer's page

if you are ok with your ranged character using guns then...

PROTON CANNON

6d8 collosal rifle

6d6 scatter shot shooting shotgun

with rifle you can use vital strike feat line for

12,18, or 24d8 damage dice.

As usual, a class comparison thread has tons of back and forth.

Also, I am not sure why people are doing dpr comparisons in this thread based off of the expected CR's in the monster creation section. That will literally lead to eidolon winning the dpr comparison. Go look at the dpr Olympics if you have any doubts.

AC's expected by CR in monster creation fit perfectly into that happy zone where eidolon's have just the right amount of to hit chance to hit 90-95% of the time.

If you want the fighter to win the dpr comparison, do comparisons of dpr at expected AC by CR +5(This will be your hard battle comparison which is when it is important for the fighter to shine).

While he has lots of attacks, the miss rate on the eidolon seems alot higher. Generally speaking i always find tgese fighter vs casters pet discussions often ignore how fragile the pets are.

But an eidolon can have much higher ac than a fighter(even without spending much gp), so not sure how they are more fragile. It comes down to Fighters being able to get at most a 14 armor bonus, a 5 max dex bonus(7 w/mithral full plate)= 19-21 bonus. The eidolon can get an 18 nat armor bonus, +5-7 dex bonus, and mage armor=27-29. Every other bonus in the game can be given to them equally and the eidolon still maintains an ac lead even if the summoner buys them smaller bonus rings of prot, dex boosting equipment, etc. Also, an eidolon can get up to 10 more ac with imp nat armor evo.

If eidolon's are squishy, then the whole party is squishy.

I still say, fighter versus summoner, the fighter wins, no matter how built his eidolon is, because the little guy behind the monster is just a wannabe wizard waiting to be cut down.

I am gonna say that ring of invisibility and a good stealth score went a long way when I played my summoner. I would let my eidolon hold attention while I buffed the party. Not a permanent solution but it helped me avoid a lot of caster targeting. Also if another full caster were in the party it was easy for them to be a more important target than me.

pure I've found the fighter can easily have a higher AC than the eidolon.

Armor helps.

well it has been awhile since I looked at faq's and errata so the eidolon's ac could have been nerfed.

But from equipment a fighter can get at most +14 from full plate and a max dex bonus of +5 toward the end. If he picks up a shield he can net 7 more ac but he loses a bit of his dpr advantage against DR.

An eidolon by the end has +18 nat armor w/o evolutions. +28 nat armor with imp nat armor evolution. Can benefit from mage armor and the shield spell(I do not feel like arguing about actual shields. I am not up to date on official paizo opinions. They may have already clarified their position on shields).

AC=29(end fighter w/o shield but max dex) vs AC=37(end biped eidolon w/mage armor, w/20 dex(standard), w/o nat armor evolutions).

A fighter can close the gap a little at the cost of offense(+7 from shield) but an eidolon can still go higher w/ their nat armor evolution.

Most anything else we can add to a fighter, can also be added to an eidolon(deflection bonuses, enhancement bonus to dex, defending weapons, etc) so I am gonna be lazy unless you want to flesh it out.

Eidolons can have sweet damage but in a comparison I would say that they each have zones of effectiveness.

Eidolon
Pros: can get many at full hit bonus natural attacks, can get many more attacks at near full hit bonus if you go multiweapon fighting route.

Also, a biped eidolon will have superior defenses to a fighter. ok fort, will save(devotion also helps) and high ac with little effort.

cons:
Thus against targets without DR or really high ac, eidolons could produce superior dpr.

Fighter
Pros: can get higher attack bonus and higher damage per hit meaning they can hit higher ac targets more easily and bypass DR more easily.

cons: Fighters have to reduce their offensive capability much more to have AC like an eidolon. Thus if a fighter were competing across both offensive and defensive fronts against an eidolon it would be harder to optimize the fighter sucessfully.

dpr competitions like some on here thus ignore both the eidolon's and fighters weakpoints. The defense minimums and target ac minimums we often see in a dpr comparison thread are often low.

The takeaway is that eidolon's have fare well against mid range ac targets. Fighters(since their hit bonus is normally 5-10 higher) start to win against enemies that the eidolon's hit percentages drop to 50-60%.

My games tend to be relatively free form. That is, I present a world, let them pick a direction. Thus they get used to doing whatever the heck they want which can turn funny at points.

In one game, my player's went on a quest to get an artifact for a halflich that had charmed them(I gave them a relatively high dc save if they were to beat it and they got 1 save per day to slowly weaken it). Except several of them stopped trusting the halflich by the time they had the artifact in hand and then they ran off with it during the hand off. They did one of those everyone runs in a different direction things and some use invisiblility and then my lich fails several perception checks and through repeated bad luck, my halflich was unable to find them(I was unwilling to make my halflich auto find them since I do not like strong arming them).

So then my halflich was missing out on his plot object that would let him become a complete lich and raise very large amounts of undead. Thus my final battle occurred somewhat sooner since the final boss wasn't going to be as strong and the party eventually decided to kill my poor demilich with a healing potion.

Freeform is fun but sometimes your plot arcs and bosses get humiliated. So don't be too attached to the stuff you spend hours thinking up for them because the game isn't on the usual railroad tracks.

thepuregamer wrote:

Quote:

Most wizard's won't have that cohort

This is why the leadership point is silly. If you want AM BARBARIAN plus a cohort to fight an enemy without a cohort than you are stacking your competition.

You don't see the difference between "most wizard's wont have _that_ cohort" and "most wizards won't have _a_ cohort"?

Again:

Quote:

about a hundred wizards have stated a tactic that would lead to ragelancepounce-death. That is proof enough that he IS able to find casters, because those casters have been found.

My bad, I read it too quick and misread.

I have trouble believing you have any proof considering that AM BARBARIAN supposedly doesn't have a build yet. So that is really nothing. But I think the main mistake that people make is trying to play the wizard like a non-caster. There is no need for instantly attacking the barbarian. You can observe him many hundred feat before he can observe you. Take your time there is no rush. To attack and kill somebody the second they appear in front of you is not the way of a caster. Why spot an enemy and instantly send 2 enervations there way. Investigate them from safety because you can and when you feel like it, take him down using his weaknesses while exposing none of your own.

So a caster would definitely attack with minions since ac is the barbarians weakest trait. I won't get more specific than that though because I only went far enough into a wizard build to show that a wizard with minimal investment can't be found by the barbarian. I have been listed reasons why that isn't true yet. 120ft arcane sight and 40ft blindsense will not do the trick as the wizard is detecting him from further away than that. Especially if we are counting the wizards familiar and a cohort.

If you want to mention a counter point, counter the 50 point difference in the difficulty of spotting the barbarian vs the wizard. This is all that really matters. If you can't counter this, then there is no RAGELANCEPOUNCE and certainly no RAGELANCEPOUNCE-DEATH

Everyone does not, and not from the same cohorts. Even if you can make an anti-AM wizard that has this cohort, most casty's won't; they'll have some other kind of cohort. And wizards, if they have familiars, have a harder time attracting a high-level cohort (and if they always fly around invisible, they'll hardly be of "great renown" either). Most wizards will probably have other cohorts, and if asked what cohort you would have BEFORE AM presented his batty-bat, or even appeared on the scene (say, if you're going for a high-level adventure) you'd probably say something completely different than a synthesist/oracle half-elf with maxed perception. That is the very essence of the shroedingers wizard - not stating beforehand what the wizard is capable of, thus being able to _afterwards_ analyze the martial's tactics and capabilities and building a wizard that matches it.

cut the bs. A high sense minion is not a terribly unlikely minion. And the minion doesn't exist to kill AM. Its AM's minion anyway. The minion serves the same purpose for him that it would serve for anybody. Increasing chances of getting a surprise round and increasing mobility. That hardly targets anybody.

Also, the wizard is more likely to be able to attract a synthesist minion considering synthesists are casters and the barbie's personal quest is to kill casters. That is a bigger contradiction than anything you claimed. I have not in any way created a can do anything for any situation caster. My argument doesn't change from point to point.

I have only listed things that cost the caster little or no resources.

Most wizard's won't have that cohort

This is why the leadership point is silly. If you want AM BARBARIAN plus a cohort to fight an enemy without a cohort than you are stacking your competition. I would hope that 2 characters would have a good chance of taking 1 down. Which means anything you claim after that is meaningless except as a joke. Which is what this is.

, and most wizard's won't be diviner. Due to this, the very majority of wizards will get ragelancepounced to oblivion - quite far from your claim that "he is 100% unable to sneak up on a caster" and "he cannot find a caster before a caster finds him". Yes, there might be this single wizard in the world that just happens to be a perfect match for his powers, but even at this point, about a hundred wizards have stated a tactic that would lead to ragelancepounce-death. That is proof enough that he IS able to find...

the wizards do not have to be diviners. They are undetectable and his surprise round pounce range is half anyway and his range of detection is even lower. look at my claim. This is not a single wizard. This is a 20k investment that any wizard can afford and makes the chances of the anyone sneaking up on him incredibly low. the average 50 point difference in the dc of their required perception checks to see each other should have been a hint for you.

thepuregamer wrote:

Having to use leadership to close a major weakness is just further proof of how big your weakness is.

I have to ask... Why is it? Is usage of quicken or persistant spell proof of how weak a wizard is? Are you only "allowed" to use bad feats or "prove" that you're weak?

Its also related to the fact that anyone can pretty much equally benefit from leadership. There is no actual net change in circumstances. Which is why introducing leadership into a build or balance competition is silly and pointless.

Any high mobility/high perception sensor henchman that barbie comes up with is just as useful for a caster. In fact if the barbie weren't wasting his leadership feat on a mount, he could get a full caster to buff him/support him more across the board. This would be an improvement for him since he already cannot sneak up on the caster(which was the original purpose of grabbing leadership). Pathetic in its failure.

Jason,
Don't quote me and then attribute a ton of points to me that were not said by me.

1. thepuregamer did not mention enervation + quickened enervation as a possible response. And if I did, well that was stupid because obviously spell turning is common at this lvl. But I am pretty sure I didn't.
2. I also definitely did not mention casting silent and still. Another dude.
3. Not me.
4. yeah area dispel around him and his mount is a smart idea because it does a dispel on each of them and they each likely have something worth stripping off. Magical flight is a heavy possibility on a mounted martial character. So an area dispel from a safe distance outside his detectable range remains a very good idea. Since it will also not bounce back in your face. Note that reach spell feat comes in handy again because it can upgrade your greater dispel range from medium to long. You can snipe him from very far away. Doing it this way leaves you perfectly safe from counter attack because once you pinpoint him, you can bring yourself to your maximum spell range(even a non silent stilled spell cannot be seen when cast from 1200 ft away) and take off his buffs. A reach greater dispel is just a 7th lvl spell.

Also you mention a cohort mount. That is something I have already talked about in this thread. Having to use leadership to close a major weakness is just further proof of how big your weakness is. I am sure that the barbarian plus several other guys could kill a caster. High lvl parties do this all the time. The caster is called a bbeg.
5-6. more enervation stuff.
7-rest. also not me.

I already clarified why the caster will always spot the barbie first. The dc to spot the caster will always be atleast 20 points higher(mind blank + invisibility assure this). Count the fact that the barbarian who does not have access to mind blank is spot-able even if he picks up invisibility( see invisibility is based off of your range of vision unlike arcane sight). So spotting him is basically just the dc to notice a visible creature(0 + 1/10ft distance from you). As where the dc of barbie's perception check to see you is d20+20 invisibility+20ranks+ misc. Do you see the average 50pt difference.

This is usually where AM BARBARIAN pops in and shouts "BLINDSENSE!!!" (that bat's blindsense is only 40 ft. and longer blindsense's creatures still max out at 120ft... not helping at the range the caster is noticing him)

but I suspect that is just because he is in the mode of roleplaying an idiot. Like Stephen Colbert who is also a funny guy. Thus we cannot hold that against him.

You see this right?

He can follow the barbarian around always perfectly concealed and he can prep as much as he wants. Barbarians have really s$~$ty ac(I would know his ac if he had a build but alas no build yet). Casters can pump out a bunch of minions that are just summons who can tag his ac(once again I cannot completely confirm this because he has no build which makes it easy for him to claim invincibility).

Other important point. How is AM BARBARIAN, a notorious casty killer getting anyone to cast permanent arcane sight on him or PaO or any other spell for that matter. I am guessing its with threats.

That's a funny thought all powerful wizards are nigh undetectable out of "precaution" of a level 20 encounter coming from 300 yards away.

Hey its the same thing I said in a wizard vs cleric thread. I was of the opinion that there would be no actual fight because they would never find each other...

People were like
"I think wizards would win. cause they have a better spell list."
or
"I think clerics would win because they used to ransack tokyo alot in the 80s!!"

I am more like
"How do they find each other. They both have mind blank, invisibility, and flight. A lvl 20 cleric doesn't even know lvl 20 wizards exist. Wizards are like chupacabras! They only exist in mexico..."

Also it makes a ton of sense that powerful wizards would be preparing for surprise lvl 20 encounters. You gotta kill a ton of people to get to lvl 20. Very few people do it through roleplaying experience. You gotta be undetectable most of the time so that the circle of hatred isn't completed with your own corpse. And it helps that a 20k ring and 1 8th lvl spell and 1 5th lvl spell a day get it done. Pretty cheap in my opinion and now somebody has to get within 120 ft of a target that spends a good portion of his travel high in the sky. subconsciously I must have meant wizards for weed when I wrote the previous sentence.

I'm just trying to imagine that has to fly around invisibly and mind blanked in constant fear for his life.

Honestly if I were that casty I'd be reassesing my life considering that it might have been simpler to locate off-plane where a wizard can freely frolic in meadows without suddenly being splattered into a fine mist by barbarians that crash like thunder and go to technical school.

I do not think that using 3 spells to be nigh undetectable is equivalent to living in constant fear. Its just being prepared. Like wearing a seat belt. Takes little effort and prevents death in case of car crash. Car crashes do not occupy casty's mind all the time though. Just a possible consequence of driving so fast. You gotta cut off a lot of people to get to lvl 20 so fast.

Honestly though the real victim here is the synthesists being reduced to pack animals.

Please.

Think of the synthesists.

I agree, it is the synthesist that are the unfortunate ones. What this thread really really emphasizes is that the true best character is a synthesist with a synthesist mount henchman...

I attempted and failed to make a text drawing of a quadruped on a quadruped mount. My apologies...

or a synthesist with a barbarian henchman who gives him rage and tons of powers. Tack that onto your 20 gauntlet attacks that are pumped by multiple amulets of might fists(some slot-less)...

Main issue here is that someone can't seem to realize that he is 100% unable to sneak up on a caster since he cannot detect a caster until he is within 120 ft(and even within 120 ft, arcane sight vs. mind blank is debatable). A caster can easily detect him from further away and act in any of several ways he sees fit. Summon minions from outside detected range, switch to greater invisibility while still undetected and commence taking away barbarian flight from an undetectable range, make barbarian a friend from an undetectable range.

Also this supposed 800 ft has never been substantiated. He can only surprise round charge 80 ft at most. (not that the barbarian can detect from that far away anyway. thus max distance no matter what is 120ft.)

With a synthesist minion(haven't seen one statted yet so unsure) he claims 800 ft or so. But is likely full of something since once again a partial charge can only go up to your mounts movement. not double.

And yes a synthesist minion would be just as good for a caster as for a barbie. It provides high speed movement as a mount and also adds an extra enemy detector for the caster. Since both the barbie and the caster could have synthesist henchmen, they both have the same movement and the same detection abilities. But sadly, the caster is mindblanked and invisible so the caster will see the barbarian 200 ft sooner on average.

And still unless he claims he is mind blanked? Not sure how, he has no umd, he has a synthesist henchmen who cannot cast mind blank. So even invisibility is useless for him. Caster will detect first...

I repeat, he cannot find a caster before a caster finds him. Period. Thus there does not exist a surprise round charge against a caster. and after that surprise round, barbie quickly loses all his methods of attack. his flight will go, he will become surrounded by summoned enemies, the wizard will remain outside his range of detection, and have a multitude of options.

Also note that spell turning will not turn greater dispel when it is used as a 20 ft burst around barbie and his mount. you can be area dispelled from 300 ft away.

THING 1. IF BARBARIAN AM MOUNTED FURY, BARBARIAN AM ALSO SUPERSTITIOUS. PLEASE EXPLAIN HOW CASTY SNEAK UP ON BARBARIAN WITH NATURAL BLINDSENSE? IF BARBARIAN AM NOT MOUNTED FURY, BARBARIAN HAVE STUPIDICULOUS AWESOME BATTY BAT. AM PRETTY CLEAR CASTY AM NOT SNEAKING UP ON BATTY BAT. AM JUST SAYING.

40 ft blindsense is not going to do much of anything... so once again how is barbie ever finding wizard from farther than 120ft away?

THING 2. CASTY AM STILL FORGETTING MOUNTED FURY AM CRAZY AWESOME ARCHETYPE, FULL OF AWESOME THINGS. LIKE FOR INSTANCE +10 FOOT MOUNT MOVE SPEED. THAT MAKE MOUNT HAVE 60 MOVE. THEN AM ADDING BOOTS OF HASTE. SUDDENLY AM 90 MOVE. HRM. THINK BARBARIAN AM ABLE GET WITHIN 90 FT OF CASTY? BARBARIAN AM WILLING TO BET SO.

dire bat base speed is 40 ft. I already added your barbarian speed increase to get it to 50. And 10 rounds out of entire day your bat(can it even wear boots? really?) can move at 80 ft. 10 charges in a day.

THING 3. AS HAVE BEEN ESTABLISHED, USING READIED ACTION HIT BARBARIAN WITH HAPPYTIME SPELL NOT NEGATE CHARGE ALREADY IN PROGRESS. AM FULL ROUND ACTION ONCE CALLED. WHAT HAVE BEEN DONE AM NOT BEING UNDONE WITHOUT SOMEHOW BLOCK CHARGE LANE. BARBARIAN FEEL HAPPYTIME NOW, BUT QUESTION AM SIMPLE: AM BARBARIAN MURDER CASTY IN 1 ROUND DURING ACTION ALREADY IN PROGRESS? (IF THIS AM STILL QUESTION AT THIS POINT, CASTY AM NOT PAYING ATTENTION. BARBARIAN NOT ANSWER)

barbie cannot charge invisible caster.

Also again, barbie cannot even see invisible caster to know it is a person. He can see some auras. within 120 ft. How smart is barbie? Perhaps when he is statted we will know if he can actually figure anything out.

THING 4. CASTY AM USING MOMENT OF PRESENCE FOR UNITIATIVE. AM CASTY STILL NOT READING SPELL EFFECTS? PRESENCE AM FOR OPPOSED ABILITY OR SKILL CHECK, SAVE, ATTACK ROLL, OR COMBAT MANUVER. UNITIATIVE AM NONE OF THE ABOVE. POOR CASTY AM GETTING 3.5 CONFUSED WITH PATHFINDER AGAIN. NEED BETTER PLAN.

that could be true

THING 5. BARBARIAN SAY THIS ONCE, VERY SLOWLY.

BARBARIAN MOUNT.

HAVE WINGS.

HOW AM.

CASTY.

GOING TO DISPEL WINGS?

AM HAVING MAGICAL QUICKENED GREATER DISPEL WINGS? AM NOT SEE THAT ON SPELL LIST.

barbie

FINAL THING. ANTAGONIZE AM KEEPING CASTY FROM MOVING THROUGH OBVIOUSLY DAMAGING TERRAIN EFFECTS TO HIT BARBARIAN. BARBARIAN BEING MANLY AM NOT DAMAGING TERRAIN EFFECT. STOP TRYING GAME MIND-AFFECTING ABILITY JUST BECAUSE CASTY PISSY ABOUT IT BEING USED AGAINST CASTY FOR ONCE. AM NOT SEE FIGHTYS COMPLAINING ABOUT ALL CASTY ENCHANTMENT...

you confuse real question about actual functionality with whining.

Wow, 3 pages in a day. Had to read em so I could post without worrying about people saying I was missing stuff.

Ton of something to wade through.

1. Any late game caster can easily afford to have a ring of invisibility(invisible pretty much all the time), have mind blank on(all day), and be flying using overland flight.
1a. mind blank blocks arcane sight and other divinations. Thus invisibility remains untouched.
1b. Thus a barbarian with a mount PaO'd into a bat will have a fly speed of 50 and a blindsense of 40ft at his disposal. With regular perception checks, a spotting a flying invisible stealthing caster will require a dc perception check of d20+20 invis+20 ranks+ dex mod+ distance penalty. At 100 ft away, that is on average a dc 65ish perception check just to pinpoint the casty(casty remains invisible). If the caster actually focuses on stealth and drops a feat( not really a requirement), it's up to 71 or so. At 800 ft away, it will take a dc 140 or so perception check to just pinpoint.
1c. Which brings me to line of sight. He is invisible. invisible-->total concealment--> no line of sight --> no targeting or charging and possibly no antagonize since you can't target without line of sight.

2. Caster does not need to be a divination spec to pretty much auto win initiative. That is what moment of prescience is for. Also lasts all day.

3. In a surprise round, barbie can only make a partial charge. Thus halving his surprise attack distance. On a mount PaO'd into a dire bat, that is a 50ft distance. He is definitely not going to be charging in from 50 ft and surprising a caster. The caster will likely see his magically modified mount at 120 ft, with permanent arcane sight. Another small investment for the caster.

4. Quickened dispel or greater dispel(this can be done via a rod of quicken metamagic or lesser metamagic) is another cheap and effective response to a barbarian whose mount can only fly via spells. And dispel or greater dispel is not an unlikely spell to have memorized. If he can't fly to you, his lance cannot reach you.

5. If we are going to go the leadership --> synthesist mount path, a wizard can get the same mount and cast spells while mounted. The concentration dc is minimal anyway (10+spell lvl or 15 + spell lvl). I do not care to venture so far into stupidity but the blame lies squarely on people who are attempting to prove how awesome a barbarian is by saying he needs an extra character in order to compete with others. If you cannot the reality of this. well too bad.

6. This one is less serious and more of the kind of caster talk people have been b#+@!ing about. The one where the wizard always has the right tool for your attack. But using your moment of prescience bonus on attack or using a quickened true strike, ready a reach euphoric tranquility at your charging attacker when he comes into range of the spell. No save ranged touch attack at +30 ish and your enemy is pacified for 20 rounds.

Anyway, these examples seem to go very far into showing that any high end caster can with minimal expenditure be nigh impossible to find/surprise/target/charge/even get to. I need not go down the path of time stop and 9th lvl spell spamming to show this.

There is not much more to say until I see a build. But barbarians do not normally have great ac so summoning tons of ranged attackers is not a bad idea after successfully removing his flight.

Obviously if closer rules inspection shows that even invisible targets can be antagonized, then obviously any high lvl caster would know to plan around that ability. If such non magical mind control existed it would be well documented. So things I wanted to clarify about antagonize.
1. Is it hearing dependent? If the caster plugs his ears, he can't understand what you are saying as he can't hear you.
2. What is the general interpretation of "The effect ends if the creature is prevented from reaching you or attempting to do so would harm him"? Clearly charging a barbarian with reach would provoke an AoO. That would harm him. Thus effect ends. Or, a squishy caster would be greatly harmed by running up next to a big melee bruiser. Effect ends.

Just wondering.

AM BARBARIAN is winning the initiative game because the wizard doesn't know he is there yet. Unless the player or wizard is meta gaming during the surprise round and even though the wizard has first initiative due to being a divination specialist, he cannot cast a dispel magic due to limitations on range (with the exception of the reach meta magic to increase the distance) and the lack of perception.

can someone spell out how barbie knows where the caster is without the caster knowing where the barbie is? Does your answer involve henchmen from leadership? If yes, note that anyone can have henchmen fill in their weaknesses.

I think you should actually look at the caster-martial disparity thread adn discover just what you are doing wrong here.

NOT RAGELANCEPOUNCE. FOR ONCE. DESTRUCITY AM BEING NOT ANNOYING YET.

BARBARIAN GIVE HINT: IT AM 'ARGUING WITH BARBARIAN WITH ANY HOPE OF WINNING.' AM PRETTY CLEAR AM NOT FAMILIAR WITH, LIKE, ANY RULES RELATED TO MARTIAL CHARACTERS, CHARGING, OR BARBARIAN ARCHETYPES.

There is a fundamental misunderstanding here. I am not arguing for the sake of winning. Winning is irrelevant. I was arguing for the fun of it. And I pretty much like picking up the language of the other side. Hell I would have made a counter account called AM CASTY but I think it is likely already taken.

So for all those who do not seem to understand. I was throwing logic at the barbie to waste some free time. I did not expect logic to have any effect on the barbie. I just did it anyway.

BARBARIAN NOTE CASTY HAVE NO ACTUAL EXAMPLES, ONLY 'CAN TOTALLY DO THIS.' SCHRODINGER CASTY AM ABOUT TO MEET LANCE OF OBSERVED STATE.

BARBARIAN PUT MONEY ON LANCE. AM SMART BET.

Well. I was being nice. I assumed you could find casty. (later on when casty has mind blank... you really can't). I assumed that casty can't find you(not sure why casty can't. You have arcane sight. Casty can have arcane sight. You have ranks in perception. Casty likely has more int than AM barb. I have trouble seeing how casty cannot afford ranks in perception. Your mount can pick up 40 ft blind sense... yay. That isn't gonna help much.) But lets say casty can't find you. You can partial charge casty in a surprise round from a single move away. 30ft with overland movement. 40 with dire bat. 50 as a pteranodon. (speaking of examples. AM BARBARIAN still has not listed what form his Animal Companion is in so that it can get a better fly speed.) So if you get within 50ft of casty. Hope casty isn't more than 50ft above the ground. If he is in your tiny range you can charge him. Hopefully casty dies otherwise, casty wins initiative. Takes away your flight and you take falling damage. And have no way to get to him with your lance.

thepuregamer wrote:

casty has long duration summoned minions who can do that for casty.

Which one, or ones?

dunno, not sure why casty needs a specific minion to be able to kill a single AC. They are all pretty capable of handling that task.

What are you targeting with the dispel magic? Also how are you casting a 10th level spell? How are you out of reach of a bow?

quicken metamagic rods? Or if all you want to hit is his source of flight, lesser quicken metamagic rod on regular dispel magic. All casty's buy em cause they are that good. by the time casty is supposedly trampling all other classes. there are multiple easy solutions to bows. Are you saying AM Barb is using the bow? I thought am barb only uses lance?

TRUE. AWESOME AM HALF OF BEING BARBARIAN.

ALSO, BARBARIAN WONDER WHERE CASTY AM GETTING IDEA OF 30 FT FLY SPEED? AND SPELL SUNDER ON MINIONS WHO AM PROVOKING AOO? WHICH THEY AM, BARBARIAN USE REACH WEAPON.

well, 30ft fly speed with overland flight. If you turn into an animal with flight and blind sense(PaO into dire bat?) then you have 40 ft flight. oh noes. Um, reach with lance is 10 ft. There are all sorts of enemies that can hit your mount without having to proc AoOs. No sunder occurs.

CASTY NEED THINK THINGS THROUGH, NOT JUST THROW RANDOM STATMENTS OUT THERE WITHOUT FACT TO BACK UP. AT LEAST PRETEND HAVE LOGIC, NOT SAY THINGS TO JUST SAY THEM.

WHAT AM YOU, SOME KIND MARTIAL CHARACTER? PEE-SHAW.

True can't argue with a joke build.

thepuregamer wrote:

yeah cause imp evasion protects them from enemy full attacks.

WAIT.

BARBARIAN MUST HAVE FAILED PERCEPTION CHECK.

AM CASTY... INSINUATING... BEST WAY FOR CASTY... TO DEAL WITH BARBARIAN... AM FULL ATTACK?

IN MELEE?

casty has long duration summoned minions who can do that for casty.

...

WITH BARBARIAN STANDING RIGHT THERE?

FOR SERIOUS?

ALSO, POLYMORPH ANY OBJECT AM HAVING DURATION ABLE TO BE PERMANENCY IF BARBARIAN RECALL CORRECTLY. AND IF CASTY AM IN RANGE TO DISPEL BUFFS, BARBARIAN AM IN RANGE TO SMASH CASTY. AM KIND OF SILLY TO DISPEL WHEN IT AM MEANING CASTY INSTANTLY DIES.

well casty is flying all the time. Casty can quickened greater dispel on AM BARELY FLYING and then barbarian is not flying and casty is 100% out of reach. Casty seems happy with his decision.

Pretty sure something like that is down to a DM call, then.

Hmm. What's your initiative bonus like, AM?

AM barbarian can still partial charge in a surprise round. So a half movement pounce is possible. IE 30 ft to a flying target. AM barbarian literally has to be humping casty's leg just before surprise round to be close enough to get his full attack.

PLEASE ALLOW BARBARIAN TO GO DOWN LIST FAIRLY QUICKLY, TO BEST RAGELANCEPOUNCE ARGUMENT. FAR ENOUGH TO SMASH CASTY, NEARLY 200 FEET IF AM CORRECT, POSSIBLY MORE. POLYMORPH ANIMAL COMPANION INTO THING THAT AM ABLE TO FLY WITH BLINDSENSE. BLINDSENSE. PERMANENT ARCANE SIGHT. HIGH PERCEPTION CHECK PLUS BLINDSENSE. BARBARIAN MAY HAVE GOTTEN SOME ANSWERS MIXED ROUND, BUT AM ALL THERE SOMEWHERE. CASTY HAVE INT, RIGHT? BARBARIAN SURE CASTY AM FIGURE OUT.

most polymorph subschool spells last minutes. What spell is all caps barbarian using? Thus you are still stuck at 60 ft flying charge range. Assume you get blindsense. All 60 ft of it? You can detect a flying invisible enemy from 60ft away. They already know where you are and are in the process of dispelling all your buffs.

16 HD ANIMAL AM SURPRISINGLY RESILIENT WITH FREE IMPROVED EVASION (ANIMAL COMPANIONS AM GETTING THAT. CASTY AM REMEMBERING THIS, RIGHT? BETTING NOT) AS WELL AS BARBARIAN SUPERSTITCHIN BONUS. AM HONESTLY EASIER TO KILL BARBARIAN. WHICH AM IMPOSSIBLE, SO. WELL, BARBARIAN LEAVE CASTY TO DRAW OBVIOUS CONCLUSION. BARBARIAN NOT EXPECTED DO ALL WORK ROUND HERE.

yeah cause imp evasion protects them from enemy full attacks.

BARBARIAN FEAR CASTY MISSED SOMETHING: ARGUMENT AM ALREADY OVER. BARBARIAN AM WINNER. FAR BETTER CASTYS TRIED OVER 21 PAGES TO BEAT BARBARIAN, AND ONLY MANAGE TO KILL BAT, AND ONLY IF BATTY BAT AM 6 HD BAT. AM PRETTY SAD KINDA.

CASTY MISSED MEMO. BATTLE AM ALREADY OVER, BARBARIAN AM WINNER. BARBARIAN AM ALWAYS WINNER....

I agree though. Love your work.

thepuregamer wrote:

see fair enough. All you had to say to clarify was "joke build". Sorry to pounce on your parade.

You are adorable.

Tell you what, you have any other points about the build, feel free to bring 'em my way and I'll be happy to address them asap.

yeah. how fast can you get a barbarian animal companion to go? How far away can you sense enemies without a synthesist npc as a crutch? How do you get a flying animal companion as a barbarian(so far I am thinking overland flight... that is 30ft/60 on a charge). How are you finding flying mind blanked invisible enemies w/out a synthesist and how are you charging at flying targets from outside their visual range? Leadership? These are the kinds of question that come up if you are being serious.

Without leadership your whole build relies on a 16 hd animal. Imagine that it dies(its at most 250 hp can go in a round at lvl 20). I can't get more specific than that though since I haven't seen the build yet. Had one been made?

Anyway, glad to bring some cuteness to the thread. good luck on your quest to smash the notion of caster superiority.

thepuregamer wrote:

because a synthesist could never afford to pick up arms... 2 evolution points are just too hard to come by.

My snipe was at anyone who needs leadership to show a build is strong. They are in fact doing the opposite.

My X is awesome. Especially when I have extra leadership npc character Y tacked in to fill my Z weaknesses.

In the case of AM barbarian who makes awesome long distance mounted pounces, I think you are trying(I am not certain exactly though since I have not found the build yet) to get him a mount that can sense from far away, attack from far away, and survive up close. Something I have trouble believing the barbarian can do with his own class abilities.

If not for the fact that you can do the same thing only less 'ramped up to 11' with Mounted Fury, you might have a point. The only thing you miss out on is a 860 foot charge radius.

(And when you're using an 860 foot charge radius, 2 evolution points are quite hard to come by.)

Does the build need leadership? No, I dare say it does not. I could do the same thing with Mounted Fury, replacing Boon Companion over Leadership. The point of this build, however, is to test the very limits of how silly I can make a Barbarian, and since Leadership does make a much stronger choice objectively than MF/BC, naturally Leadership is the choice to make. And since the other stated goal of the build is to be awesome...

What's more awesome: A barbarian on a normal mount (albeit one that can fly and charge), or a barbarian on a Dire Unicorn-Dragon-Pegasus swooping in at nearly 100 miles an hour from the other side of a tornado spinning at the speed of awesome to deliver a drill that will pierce the heavens straight to your very soul?

The reason for my choice is crystal clear, I'd like to think.

see fair enough. All you had to say to clarify was "joke build". Sorry to pounce on your parade.

thepuregamer wrote:

Something I have trouble believing the barbarian can do with his own class abilities.

Given the presence of the Mounted Fury archetype, you're barking up the wrong tree. AM would be less obscene with an animal companion, but his RAGELANCEPOUNCE would still be just as brutal and he could still do it from quite far away.

actually I know all about mounted fury. double's his rage usage and makes his mount more impressive. But it doesn't give him access to a flying mount. It does get him a horse/camel at progression -4 though. So probably dying pretty quickly. And still not allowing him to sense anything. How is the mount getting a "charge radius of 860 feet with ride-by attack, and your mount has a vision range of 730ish ft while speaking common to coordinate."

A regular AC is going to have a 60ft land speed no natural fly speed and a magical fly speed of 30. Good luck pouncing from outside anyone's visual range.

I love a joke build and joke posts just as much as everyone else. I love the AM barbarian posts. Are we still joking around or is this a legitimate concept?

Cheapy wrote:

Actually, synthesists suck compared to the base summoner. AM just doesn't want to drag along a Casty.

This. The synthesist himself can't really use spells due to a lack of arms (bipedal, no evolutions), and its only attack is a vastly underpowered bite. It acts solely as a fast defense and perception juggernaut.

I picked synthesist because I didn't then want the response to be 'I automatically know where the summoner is and kill him.'

Your attempt to snipe was valiant, but lacking in proficiency. -4s are harsh, man.

because a synthesist could never afford to pick up arms... 2 evolution points are just too hard to come by.

My snipe was at anyone who needs leadership to show a build is strong. They are in fact doing the opposite.

My X is awesome. Especially when I have extra leadership npc character Y tacked in to fill my Z weaknesses.

In the case of AM barbarian who makes awesome long distance mounted pounces, I think you are trying(I am not certain exactly though since I have not found the build yet) to get him a mount that can sense from far away, attack from far away, and survive up close. Something I have trouble believing the barbarian can do with his own class abilities.

barbarian with a synthesist mount... lol we are using leadership to show how powerful something is... I agree. Synthesists are crazy awesome as well. If I were any martial class I would want to secretly play a synthesist by taking leadership as well.

Only one problem I see with this suggestion; the eidelon's advancement chart specifically limits the number of attacks per round that an eidelon can make. Not even the Rake ability allows for more attack rolls, though it does add additional damage as though you hit your target two extra times, assuming you cam hit twice in the first place.

Taking these two "virtual attacks" into account, an eidelon only gets 6 attacks at lvl 8, 7 at lvl 12, and maxes at 9 at lvl 20.

IMO, you're better off using a monk with flurry of blows. if you're ambitious, you can even take 4 lvls of druid to get wildshape and the Shaping Focus feat as needed to advance that ability and use a form with Rake. (no rule stating it doesn't stack with itself, but check with your DM) it might not be the best 8th or 12th lvl attack build, but it adds up by lvl 20.

eidolon's have a limit to natural attacks. Not all attacks. they can make as many weapon attacks as they are capable of. A number limited by their number of limbs and bab.

Um, stop giving them encounters that can't be beat? A hard encounter that might be lethal is fine-my DM throws them at us on a weekly basis. But he never flat out tells us we're SUPPOSED to run from them. When this does happen, it's usually because we simply weren't working together, or using our brains, or picking up on the clues to defeat it. I have trouble imagining throwing too hard to beat encounters at PCs repeatedly.

That just doesn't sound fun.

Respawning is in poor tast, I agree, but it doesn't seem like the problem starts there.

Well what is comes down to is whether your dm likes to have his games to be ones that attempt to simulate a world or one where it is catered directly to the players. I personally like simulation and sand box style games because they make more sense. I do not think that the party should always find things appropriate to their level. If they go searching for dragons and they find dragons and the dragon tpk's them well their mistake.

If they arrive upon random encounters that are too hard for them( ie they are in a more dangerous area), I tend to like my players having an opportunity to retreat.

I am not sure if this is how their current dm works or not but if he does, it is their mistake for never taking the option of running away.

I personally do not enjoy a game that is an endless romp of victory. Seems kind of boring.

Let set up a situation:

You have two targets attacking you -- one is tougher and will take longer to wipe out and one is weaker and will be wiped out faster. With both there they can assist each other in the form of flanking and teamwork bonuses -- which do you take out first?

The weaker one.

except how do the enemies consistently know which player is higher lvl and which one has more hit points? That is knowledge the dm may have but, do his npc's have a reliable means of telling which one is tougher? The only easily perceived information a npc might glean is how hard each enemy hits and how easy it is to hit these enemies. Though how hard you hit and how easy you are to hit is also variable for characters of the same lvl.

Also the difference between a lvl 6 and a lvl 7 player is very little hp and very little defense. I would see this as only a major issue at around lvls 1-4 when a lvl is a major percentage of your hit points, your hit chance, and other meaningful factors that impact survival.

As long as the penalty is temporary or fixable over time, then a penalty for changing your character(either from death or other reasons like item loss... lol) is a perfectly reasonable method of getting players to treat character death like an outcome to avoid.

Also on the item loss thing. I am surprised my players have never sent that idea my way. I have previously used enemies that steal and sunder their equipment. Not all the time but sundering, stealing, and rust monsters are the funniest dm tools in existence. How can I not use them?

if you do not want your players to act in this manner tell them that everytime they die or reroll a character, they take an xp and gp penalty. Then dying has an actual negative impact on them.

best way to get away with being lawful evil in a party with a paladin... kill the paladin while the other party members aren't looking. paladin problem solved. or you can go with the less interesting solution( talking it over).

technically, if we were outside of rpg roleplaying land, killing unconscious people would be a definite act of evil. So it would be pretty simple, if you are not an evil or falling person, killing unconscious bad guys would be bad. You would need to restrain them and take them to whatever the closest source of legal justice was. Hopefully they won't have the death penalty at this place.

Otherwise, stick to the moral code of dnd. Killing bad people is always good. Assume people that fight you are bad people. Rinse and repeat.

I had been of the mind that, favored class abilities do not overlap if they give different kinds of bonuses.

for races, you will want to be human, half orc, or half elf (so that getting 2 favored classes is possible. Either as a half elf you get 2, or you can take the feat eclectic to get a 2nd favored class.

per attack you bring your avg sneak attack damage up from 21 to 24. So a 3 point gain at the cost of 2 points to hit. I'd rather grab pressure points and crippling strike and deal 3 points of str damage per hit at no penalty to attack.

cr 12- copper dragon (adult), green dragon (adult), lich, purple worm, roper, sea serpent against your example lvl 11 ninja. 1 CR up would not be a terribly difficult encounter for a lvl 11 party. That was the entire list of cr 12 enemies that I saw in the prd.

Sadly, most of their armor class is natural armor, and some of them do not even have a dex bonus. Meaning any benefit you gain from invisibility is canceled out by deadly sneak attack.

dex bonus to ac is not one of the larger bonuses that enemies usually have. by being invisible you are dropping the ac of armored opponents by 5 or 6 on average(4 dex bonus and -2 ac from invis). With heavy armor users, you are likely dropping their ac by 3-5. Deadly sneak drops you back down 2 to hit as well. So invisibility isn't getting you much more than a +2 to hit.

Also a ninja or rogue is a 3/4 bab class w/o another feature that adds a bonus to hit.

It is a mistake to assume more than your first 2 hits get through.

deadly sneak attack improves avg sneak attack die damage from 3.5 to 4. At 10th lvl, a ninja with 5 attacks that all hit is getting an extra 12.5 damage. Best case scenario.

assuming all attacks hit...

Possibly a fatal flaw in any argument unless these supposed attacks are touch attacks.

sounds like a lot of cheese to me, should use a Tetsubo instead. would be less awkward.

It's not cheesy. Just terribly ineffective for 17 lvls. In 3.5, I made a fighter who dual wielded greatswords using monkey grip. For all those guys attempting to make huge weapon users, it seems like a cool idea.

I'm one of those "phantom people," and I'm not sure how myself and others on this thread who are exceptions to this comment suddenly found themselves invisible. You'll see upthread other players actively playing this class (and another, Ral'Yareth, above) that don't have the problems that the rest of you armchair critics seem to have.

Just to correct brandon here. He is quite wrong when he says that all the people who are unhappy with how the class works are just armchair critics. I have actually played the class. With house rules and without. I don't buy the online pdf's just to have them. If I become focused on a class, its because I am playing it.

For my synthesist there have been several issues where I have to follow required patterns because of raw limitations:
1. I have to select rejuvenate eidolon as a spell known early on.(that is 1 of my 2 only 1st lvl spells known at 1st lvl). For a spontaneous caster class to forced into taking a specific spell just to heal themselves have major impact at low lvls.
2. If you can somehow wait until lvl 2 or 3 for healing, you can possibly buy a wand of rejuvenate eidolon instead of using up 1 of your few spells known. But that requires a relatively friendly dm. IE, how many magic marts are definitely going to have a wand that only heals 1 classes pet? So if that doesn't exist, I have to make the wand. (See how clumsy this has become for me already?)
3. If we go down the list of things a synthesist has to have to fully use his class it is pretty impressive. A spell known, access to someone who can make him wands of rejuvenate eidolon, hands(or no spellcasting).

There is more I would post about but lunch calls.

I guess the limited sorcerer spells known list and lack of archetypes is just an "irritation" as well?

BTW, if a class or archetype irritates you, don't play it. Nobody is requiring you to play it. They're actually designed so they play differently, so they suit different people. That's why there are ninteen classes in the game, and dozens of archetypes.

Whatever thought process you need to follow to help you feel like you did a good job on this archetype... keep following it I guess.

You should probably drop that opinion into the titan mauler archetype threads.

technically all one has to do to use a shield is to wield it. Weapon rules provide a way for one to wield a large heavy shield.

RAW says that a shield for a Medium humanoid creature, barring special construction, is Weight x1, Cost x1 of the values listed in Table 6-6. An object that doesn't fit those specifications, but is allegedly a named type of shield, is not a Medium humanoid's shield. It's some other kind of thing whose stats as a Medium shield are undefined.

But its stats as a heavy shield are defined. And since a shield is also a weapon, there are already rules for wielding a larger version of it.

A large shield is not undefined even for a medium creature.

The archetype HAS to have a drawback relating to this advantage, or it's just more powerful and long-lasting than a regular summoner. Either you have a hard time curing those temporary hit points (and the summoner has a class spell that lets him do that)

Making it difficult to heal doesn't balance the class. It makes the class awkward to play. It doesn't actually make them weaker in any significant way. I can just use wands of lesser rejuvenate eidolon for my out of combat healing. But the fact that I need to buy special wands for myself is an extra piece of irritation in playing a class.

anyway, regular wands of clw are already cheap enough out of combat healing. It is hardly necessary to attempt an unlimited healing item anyway since wands of clw might only eat up 2 or 3% of your party's wealth anyway.

well there is a table for making things with infinite charges but otherwise, paizo has not yet made or priced an item that allows you infinite uses of clw's per day. By the item creation chart, it would be quite cheap.

Use-activated or continuous spell effect items are Spell level x caster level x 2,000 gp. Though this clearly makes for a super cheap unlimited healing item. I say make it a longsword of healing and then it does d8 damage and heals d8 +1 :p

fozbek, he was referring to the two weapon warrior archetype I think. which gives you 2 relevant abilities.

Improved Balance (Ex): At 11th level, the attack penalties for fighting with two weapons are reduced by –1 for a two-weapon warrior. Alternatively, he may use a one-handed weapon in his off-hand, treating it as if it were a light weapon with the normal light weapon penalties. This ability replaces armor training 3.

Perfect Balance (Ex): At 15th level, the penalties for fighting with two weapons are reduced by an additional –1 for a two-weapon warrior. This benefit stacks with improved balance. If he is using a one-handed weapon in his off hand, treating it as a light weapon, he uses the normal light weapon penalties. This ability replaces armor training 4.

also looks like one wouldn't get the full benefit of this class until lvl 17. I was wrong when I said 13 before. Since it would be 2 titan mauler barb/15 two weapon warrior fighter.

well it would not be broken to allow it, since you aren't getting the full benefit until lvl 15 anyway. If you are not in a PFS game, talk to your dm about it.

Again, this is one of the increasingly common board discussions where you know how something should work, and you're deliberately acting like you don't know that just so you can prove a point that the rules are "unclear," in that they aren't thousands of pages long that explain every possible permutation of possibility.

You understand how the rules should work.

I don't talk to you like you don't understand how the rules should work.

Why are you presenting an argument as if you don't understand how the rules should work?

that is clearly not what is happening here. He is just poring over what the logical consequences are of your statements and the rules as you describe them. But instead of fixing problems apparently the solution is to attempt to just duct tape over each issue as it comes up instead of just addressing them thoroughly. Being lazy about it by deciding to just use temporary hp and then attempting to half fix your mistake by making a single temporary hp healing exception(rejuvenate eidolon) is just one example of the backwards way this archetype is being approached.

Edit: fixed duck tape for those who find it easier to nitpick typos then to actually do anything useful. I would be much more embarrassed if I were part of a group of four developers who spent an entire conversation discussing fixing an archetype without knowing how one of its abilities worked(I'm talking about some people who supposedly fixed the rules without knowing how share spells works).