Many thanks for the review, Majuba!

Robert
4WFG

Ryan Costello Jr has created a new prestige class for S&T and posted it on our forums

Has the 20% disccount for 2010/2011 been applied to this product?

Has the 20% disccount for 2010/2011 been applied to this product?

I don't know what you mean... the publisher set the price on this, and to my knowledge, has not revised it.

Masika wrote:

Has the 20% disccount for 2010/2011 been applied to this product?

I don't know what you mean... the publisher set the price on this, and to my knowledge, has not revised it.

They are having a sale right now. I think Masika was asking is, if the price shown right now is with it having the 20% off or not.

Vic Wertz wrote:

Masika wrote:

Has the 20% disccount for 2010/2011 been applied to this product?

I don't know what you mean... the publisher set the price on this, and to my knowledge, has not revised it.

They are having a sale right now. I think Masika was asking is, if the price shown right now is with it having the 20% off or not.

Oh! Yes... yes, it is.

Has the 20% disccount for 2010/2011 been applied to this product?

Yes it has! The regular price for the bundle is $18.95, or $10.95 for the PDF only.

I wrote of a review of this at Robot Viking.

I wrote of a review of this at Robot Viking.

And we appreciate you reviewing it!

Conclusion:
Layout adheres to the two-column-standard, artwork is b/w and classic in style and e.g. all the PrCs get their own artwork. Editing is top-notch and I didn't notice any typos or editing glitches. The snarky and snide comments of Flynn make an otherwise dry and crunch-heavy book a great read and while some PrCs didn't strike my fancy, they are all well-designed and some just plain rock. The apprentice-class is a stroke of genius and the variant class features are cool and well-designed. On the downside, the spells, while not bad, left me absolutely unimpressed and the sever-limbs-mechanic is terrible in my opinion. This book is about options, though, and thus I'll just ignore these and use the rest. The book sets out to make fighters smart and succeeds in this endeavor. More importantly, though, this book also avoids power-creep and still offers interesting and cool options. Due to me not liking some mechanics and the spells, I'll refrain from giving the full 5 stars and instead settle for a final verdict of 4.5 stars.

Posted here, EnWorld on RPGaggression and also sent my review to GMS magazine.

Conclusion:

Layout adheres to the two-column-standard, artwork is b/w and classic in style and e.g. all the PrCs get their own artwork. Editing is top-notch and I didn't notice any typos or editing glitches. The snarky and snide comments of Flynn make an otherwise dry and crunch-heavy book a great read and while some PrCs didn't strike my fancy, they are all well-designed and some just plain rock. The apprentice-class is a stroke of genius and the variant class features are cool and well-designed. On the downside, the spells, while not bad, left me absolutely unimpressed and the sever-limbs-mechanic is terrible in my opinion. This book is about options, though, and thus I'll just ignore these and use the rest. The book sets out to make fighters smart and succeeds in this endeavor. More importantly, though, this book also avoids power-creep and still offers interesting and cool options. Due to me not liking some mechanics and the spells, I'll refrain from giving the full 5 stars and instead settle for a final verdict of 4.5 stars.

Posted here, EnWorld on RPGaggression and also sent my review to GMS magazine.

Wow, thanks a lot!

Nice review End.

Conclusion:

Layout adheres to the two-column-standard, artwork is b/w and classic in style and e.g. all the PrCs get their own artwork. Editing is top-notch and I didn't notice any typos or editing glitches. The snarky and snide comments of Flynn make an otherwise dry and crunch-heavy book a great read and while some PrCs didn't strike my fancy, they are all well-designed and some just plain rock. The apprentice-class is a stroke of genius and the variant class features are cool and well-designed. On the downside, the spells, while not bad, left me absolutely unimpressed and the sever-limbs-mechanic is terrible in my opinion. This book is about options, though, and thus I'll just ignore these and use the rest. The book sets out to make fighters smart and succeeds in this endeavor. More importantly, though, this book also avoids power-creep and still offers interesting and cool options. Due to me not liking some mechanics and the spells, I'll refrain from giving the full 5 stars and instead settle for a final verdict of 4.5 stars.

Posted here, EnWorld on RPGaggression and also sent my review to GMS magazine.

Many, many thanks for the great review! We appreciate it.

I've got more of your pdfs scheduled for the immediate future. :)

Thanks Endzeitgeist! I don't know if I've just been blessed or if all Pathfinder 3rd party publishers are so lucky to get such well-organized and meticulous reviewers. I'm at the "do my sentences even make sense?" stage of Tyranny & Manipulation, so a boost of confidence like this is particularly appreciated.

I have to say, S&T's biggest misstep had to be the demand for severing limbs. It was the heart of the book and the first of the options I developed and yet receives little praise. Meanwhile, the prestige classes, which I feared would make the book look dated when I got my copy of the APG, are still very popular. I'm sure there's something I should be learning as a developer from that, but the best I can come up with is "how about that?"

I've got more of your pdfs scheduled for the immediate future. :)

We look forward to them!

Tyranny & Manipulation? Now that sounds like something right up my alley! Write faster! ;)

With regards to the sever-limbs mechanic:
I think there are two reasons for this mechanic to not appeal to people:

1) There are not many more traumatic ways to maim and maul the human body than to sever limbs. While I recognize the need to balance the loss, not losing any HP just feels terribly wrong. I once cut off my left thumb as a child while slicing bread. It hurt like friggin' hell, sewing it back on hurt and it took years to regain tactile feeling in the body part. It was a nasty experience and I bled like hell. We all know that HP are abstractions, but bleeding like crazy due to a lost limb, the pain etc. - if that is not damage, what is? For me personally, that nukes the fridge.

2) Taking a limb is something that is traditionally reserved to special monsters, vorpal swords etc., not something you do on a regular basis. I use hero points in my homebrew and one use would be to maim an opponent. One reason is that magic can't easily knit the limb back, you need Regeneration, a high-level spell I usually ban in my campaigns or tie to quests. I don't know how other people feel, but losing a limb is traumatic and should be iconic, not some everyday occurrence that is either alleviated or marginalized by a lot of available magic or a more or less permanent punishment due to a lack of high-level magic, like in low-magic settings. In either case, the mechanic loses.

Just my 2 cents, of course.

On the other hand, I LOVE the Pikeman. I love the class to death. It's humble, concise and FINALLY makes the spear a valid and extremely cool weapon of choice. It's a prime example of excellent PrC-design. As is the Jinx. Damn, the class made me actually want to play one instead of just building NPCs. (I usually only DM, I've read too many published RPG-books & adventures...) ;P

Ryan: On Sever and the related things, don't feel too bad. I know I had misgivings about how it worked early on, but all of that material is still crazy useful, particularly the penalties. The actual severing options just need to be adjusted a bit for each campaign to feel right.

I know in my standard I'd probably add some houserules to it, but there are other campaigns where it would fit in as written just fine.

In our off-to-the-side evil game, each PC gets a special unique ability. Priest of Zon-Kuthon got access to the Sever stuff as written. He is trained in surgery after all. ;)

A major NPC is totally rocking out levels in Butcher as well.

I more or less agree with End about the sever rules. I thought it was a neat idea but to make it balanced it hamstrings it to much so it doesn't feel "realistic". :)

I was personally hoping for someone more along the lines of Rolemasters crit chart system made for Pathfinder crits, with targeted crits needing to do X amount to sever a limb. Then add in rules for being able to fix said loss of limbs.

So I like the idea of the rules but was hoping for something else. But thats ok cause as others said the rest of the book is good.

I personally really liked the sever mechanic, especially since it dovetailed nicely with the ideas I had for prosthetics in LLG&TS, though most of the ones you see in LLG&TS and S&T were Ryan's idea, if I recall correctly.

Heck, I'm probably making the same mistake working on a bone-breaking mechanic for Paths of Power 2, but to me, that's an essential part of the many martial arts based classes/variants I'm working on. Granted, broken bones can be treated with Heal skill and time, whereas severed limbs basically require Regeneration... but at the same time, Regeneration makes a point of saying it cures severed limbs and broken bones, and the other curative spells don't.

The PDF is now $9.99!

I initially posted the following on the site d20pfsrd.com but realized that they weren't the product's owners. Come to think of it, neither is paizo. But at least this discussion thread will be read (and answered) more easily by 4 Winds.

Nice.

Question about "Elbow Strikes": suppose I have Strength 14 and a +1 Flaming reach weapon, and I'm able to deal 2d6 damage when unarmed. Among other attacks (for which I'm using Power Attack), I'm successfully using the weapon to Trip a foe 10 ft away.
- Would I be able to deal 2d6 damage to said foe?
- Would I add my Strength modifier to the damage?
- Would said modifier be further modified by the fact that the weapon is used two-handed?
- Would I get to add +1 and 1d6 fire to the damage from the weapon's properties?
- Would I get to add the Power Attack bonuses as well?

Thanks for clarifying these questions.

I'd like to add the following:

Many thanks for this beautiful product, and (in advance) for an answer to these.

Well Louis IX, that's a series of thinkers. My intention with elbow strikes was that the monk is adept with his body as a weapon that he can deliver an elbow or a stomp or the like in conjunction with the performance of his combat maneuver. So even if the daredevil uses a weapon to perform the combat maneuver, he is using his body to deliver the extra damage.

So I would say:

- Would I be able to deal 2d6 damage to said foe? No*
- Would I add my Strength modifier to the damage? Yes
- Would said modifier be further modified by the fact that the weapon is used two-handed? No*
- Would I get to add +1 and 1d6 fire to the damage from the weapon's properties? No*
- Would I get to add the Power Attack bonuses as well? Yes**
- Would any bonuses to unarmed attacks (AoMF, for instance) apply to the damage dealt? Yes

*I say no because in this case the reach is gained by the weapon. If you use a weapon to trip a target within your natural reach, you could also deal your unarmed strike in that case, but it still would not be modified by the weapon's bonuses.

**Assuming you took the Power Attack penalty to the combat maneuver attack roll, you would add the Power Attack bonus to damage.

Thanks for your answers. I had envisioned a character using this ability while wielding a whip, but was confused about the method to deal the unarmed damage at range. Not so useful, then (for that build).