Contributor
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First, thanks for posting - I never knew about that item before / knew an item like that was PFS-legal!
I'd think an Oracle of healing would fit best, since you can stack out your charisma and also pick up channeling as a mystery power, maybe a Cleric as an alternative build.
Quick Channel is a must, and either a SLWS or Quick Draw - then you can use a swift action to get your siphon, standard action to throw/use the siphon, and then if the haunt isn't KO'd, use two uses of channel to smack it with more positive energy. If you're making a haunt-hunter concept, Improved Initiative and a high perception check (and anything that boosts perception and initiative) could also help.
Equipment I'm not as sure on, but you've piqued my interest with this concept, so I may take a look through Ultimate Equipment when I've got more time tomorrow :)
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Honestly, I'd really just like it if they'd make some way for a skill roll (Knowledge Religion, even?) or item to give hints on how to disable the Haunt. There is no realistic way to figure it out in game without knowing things your character couldn't reasonably know.
But yes, Haunt Siphons should be part of your standard toolkit when you can afford to keep one on hand.
I thought in the suprise round it was a standard only?
The wrist sheath requires a swift first.
Ok, and I have not looked in my "real" book yet. (not at home ATM)
But the d20SRD says.
The Surprise Round
If some but not all of the combatants are aware of their opponents, a surprise round happens before regular rounds begin. In initiative order (highest to lowest), combatants who started the battle aware of their opponents each take a standard or move action during the surprise round. You can also take free actions during the surprise round. If no one or everyone is surprised, no surprise round occurs.
No mention of a swift.
Now again, the real book may have different wording.
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The PRD also says:
Swift Actions
A swift action consumes a very small amount of time, but represents a larger expenditure of effort than a free action. You can perform one swift action per turn without affecting your ability to perform other actions. In that regard, a swift action is like a free action. You can, however, perform only one single swift action per turn, regardless of what other actions you take. You can take a swift action anytime you would normally be allowed to take a free action. Swift actions usually involve spellcasting, activating a feat, or the activation of magic items.
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Contributor
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Can't Quick Draw a Haunt Siphon....though YMMV.
Ze PRD, she zays:
Quick Draw (Combat)
You can draw weapons faster than most.
Prerequisite: Base attack bonus +1.Benefit: You can draw a weapon as a free action instead of as a move action. You can draw a hidden weapon (see the Sleight of Hand skill) as a move action.
A character who has selected this feat may throw weapons at his full normal rate of attacks (much like a character with a bow).
Alchemical items, potions, scrolls, and wands cannot be drawn quickly using this feat.
If the table GM agrees that a Haunt Siphon is, indeed, a weapon (all it does is deal damage to haunts and then becomes a grenade-like weapon), it certainly doesn't fall under any of the categories listed above. If a PC had it in a SLWS, it'd be more than ok even without Quick Draw, since the SLWS doesn't put restrictions on how small the items can be that are loaded into it.
Although, in the end, I do agree with nosig - YMMV.
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...There is no realistic way to figure it out in game without knowing things your character couldn't reasonably know.
THIS
I have a group in a PBP right now.
They used door sense - and I gave some first hints.
They opened the door and I allowed different knowledge checks to pick up more hints.
They still entered - well - at least 2 out of 6.
So they triggered it - to give more hints I described the effect for both but for one it was only temporary as it faded away (he made his saving throw). The other one still feels off. A third character entering had no such feelings.
I added a few more hints for the player affected.
Meta-gaming they know there was a haunt and that one player was effected. But it is unlikely they will figure out more until in an hour game time - when the damage (might) start.
I really try to play this out. Doing PBP I have the time. But I would hate to have a haunt buster at the table - as I'm sure he/she would feel cheated.
The haunt buster would be great to have once the haunt has reset. Because by that time the group will have gathered enough information that they could use a Haunt Siphon.
But for the first time around - it's spooky, it's unnatural, something is wrong in that room.
Option a: stay out
Option b: enter and get hit
Option b allows then option c:
Learn from the effect what actually might have happened and how to defeat it.
A Haunt Buster works against permanent or persistent haunts.
He might work against a haunt that manifests very obviously - like materialises as a ghost.
But a sudden drop in temperature / rise in temperature / an item moving / a strange sound
Meta-gaming tells you there is a haunt. In character you might just run to avoid it and hope you are out of range. But a high proportion of haunts do reveal most information by actually hitting you with an effect - not by ominous signs ahead of hitting you.
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Contributor
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...There is no realistic way to figure it out in game without knowing things your character couldn't reasonably know.
THIS
*snip*
But a sudden drop in temperature / rise in temperature / an item moving / a strange sound
Meta-gaming tells you there is a haunt. In character you might just run to avoid it and hope you are out of range. But a high proportion of haunts do reveal most information by actually hitting you with an effect - not by ominous signs ahead of hitting you.
This brings up an odd thought - since Haunt Siphons only work against haunts, what's to stop a PC who's been in a haunt before from trying to use one (and then nothing happens if it's not a haunt)?
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RPG Superstar 2015 Top 32, RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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It sounds to me like someone playing a character who learns from her experiences.
I've seriously considered taking notes every time one of my PCs either makes a knowledge check to ID an enemy, or learns something about a monster in battle. (For example, my Eldritch Knight knows what a flesh golem is and that it has construct traits, and then learned in combat that fire slows it down.)
Then at sessions I could go by that instead of making new checks and potentially knowing more (or strangely, less) about that creature.
But that'd be a lot of work. :/
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Thod, could you explain to me how that's meta-gaming?
IT sounds to me like someone playing a character who learns from her experiences.
If you play a haunt buster what do you do in the following dilemma. What do you do if you know meta gaming it is a haunt - in character you suspect but aren't sure.
As player I would not use the siphon because I'm not sure 100% if I follow meta information or in character info and motives.
So in this case avoiding meta-gaming would stop me exactly from using a haunt at every scary opportunity.
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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(shrug)
What do you do if your character suspects that an NPC isn't on the level, or that there's a monster in the dark, or that there's a trap on a door? Depends on the PC, but many of them would act with caution and assume the worst.
So, have your siphon at the ready, and if it is just a cool breeze or just an air vent carrying the sounds of were-rats laughing somewhere else in the complex, then no harm done.
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RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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As an aside, then: [ooc]I read the description of a haunt siphon, and I guess I can see how someone might read that as a haunt siphon is used up if there's no haunt, but that's not my reading at all.
"You must be within the haunt’s area of influence to use a haunt siphon." If there's no haunt, you can't activate a haunt siphon. So it remains inert until you actually use it, and then it's a one-shot item.
If you "kill" a haunt with it, you get a free bomb. Otherwise, it just does damage.
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On the flip side, I'm perfectly fine with players who go "Oh. This is a haunt" and start to pull out haunt syphons. That's when you have fun as a event coordinator. Plan 3 or 4 mods with nasty haunts, then run The Darkest Vengeance.
EDIT: Dammit, used the tags for BGG instead of Paizo.
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Chris
Yes - I read it that way that it is used up if you unscrew it.
Otherwise you just carry an unscrewed haunt siphon around your neck.
Unscrew it at start of game - rescrew it when done. Otherwise auto hit.
So if it isn't used up then this is the only alternative reading and that makes them ridiciolous as it haunts to a small GP tax. But this is probably a rules question.
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Nosig
Yes - you get the problem I have with a haunt buster.
Know Religion does not by RAW identify a haunt. As GM I'm likely giving you extra hints for various knowledge skills. And i think im a pretty benevolent GM and try not to screw over players. But RAW i dont see any skill that identifies them for sure - and i follow the rules - dont expect me to identify just because you have knowledge x +50.
But this makes identification of haunts - unless in the haunts description - dependent on the GM. This is acceptable for normal play but becomes problematic for a specialist build.
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a wrist shieth to get the siphon out on the surprise round.
I wouldn't allow Haunt Siphons to be loaded into wrist sheathes. Not until I know how big they are, but since I don't own PF #43 I will never know.
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Just play a paladin. Haunts have no effect on them, since they are fear effect, once they get immunity to fear.
Fantastic - perception is fear = paladin is blind to ever detect them.
Haunts have MANY effects.
Just checking the game mastery guide
A haunt can have virtually ANY effect identical to an existing spell effect, but often with different and distinctly more frightening of unnerving sensory or physical features than that spell effect normally has.
Snip
A spell might cause a room to explode into flames (duplicating fireball or firestorm) ... And it goes on
Some haunts have fear effects - but that doesn't make a paladin immune to all of them. Ask paladin players in Carrion Crown.
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Venture-Captain, Michigan—Mt. Pleasant
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Keep reading Thod:
"All primary effects created by a haunt are mind-affecting fear effects, even those that actually produce
physical effects. Immunity to fear grants immunity to a
haunt’s direct effects, but not to secondary effects that
arise as a result of the haunt’s attack."
Also, paladins can have constant detect evil going to detect them, and they also get channel energy.
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RPG Superstar 2015 Top 32, RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Unless we in PFS have a way of detecting this, then haunts just become a random event that PCs just have to suffer thru - kind of like the weather. Is this the way we want them to work?
....
Normally it goes like:
Judge: "make a perception check"
Twee: "Take 10 for 40."
Judge: "roll Init"
Twee: "roll a 5 get 20."
Judge: "You have a feeling of impending doom - what do you do?"So, what do you do?
I think this is the crux of the "haunt issue" in PFS. Haunts are supposed to be flavorful plot points that happen to include a challenge to overcome. But so many of them get thrown into scenarios where they can't be explored in a way to make you experience them like you should.
The classic trope is to hear about a place being haunted before you get there (like by someone warning you not to go down into the basement), get some advance warning of what it's like ("people start hearing voices when they get down there - one man couldn't take it ran out and hanged himself!") and then spend some time investigating, learning, and solving.
But instead, haunts in PFS are encountered in the most random places, with no build-up or exposition, they take you by surprise, affect you, and then they're done and they're no longer a part of the scenario. It's like walking to the dungeon and getting struck by lightning - it blindsides you out of nowhere, makes no sense, and maybe you get an inkling that something's about to happen (like your hair buzzing a bit right before a lightning strike) but have no good reason to take appropriate action ("my hair feels funny - guess I'll cast resist energy in case lightning is about to strike me!").
Last time I encountered a haunt, it was literally "You're walking down the street. Roll initiative. Take some damage - make a will save to see how many charges to mark off your wands. Now, on to your destination".
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So the point of all my rambling is this: it's not that haunts don't have solutions, it's that the solutions that haunts are supposed to have (forewarning, local legends, etc) are being left out of the encounters in PFS. As a result, players are either just sucking it up and accepting "random lightning strikes" or else scrambling for any kind of counter they can possibly come up with, no matter how much specialization it takes.
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Keep reading Thod:
"All primary effects created by a haunt are mind-affecting fear effects, even those that actually produce
physical effects. Immunity to fear grants immunity to a
haunt’s direct effects, but not to secondary effects that
arise as a result of the haunt’s attack."Also, paladins can have constant detect evil going to detect them, and they also get channel energy.
Thanks for pointing that out. I wasn't truly aware of it.
But detect evil isn't giving you an autodetect. You can do a perception ahead of it manifesting - at -4 for perception. And the question than is - what does he/she notice.
Is it the same what someone else would notice in the suprise round?
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So the point of all my rambling is this: it's not that haunts don't have solutions,it's that haunts are supposed to have (forewarning, local legends, etc) are being left out of the encounters in PFS. As a result, players are either just sucking it up and accepting "random lightning strikes" or else scrambling for any kind of counter they can possibly come up with, no matter how much specialization it takes.
Exactly this !!
Ideally a haunt should slowly build up with signs, warning, etc. There shouldn't be a single skill / roll to detect them.
But to do the warnings / signs etc. takes time and players needs to pay attention and need to figure it out.
But this makes it diffcult for a PFS scenario - especially if done in a time restricted environment.
I detest if they are presented as undetectable traps and always try to weave in some hints / allow player to pick something up. But too often I notice that they pick up ooc that something is going on and still don't know better and just walk in and trigger it.
It is this frustration when I feel I have trouble making them 'fun' for players that result in me thinking a haunt buster is a bad idea. As I just feel that at some stage I will very likely disappoint the haunt buster player. Not because I try to but rather as a randomly dropped in haunt becomes nearly undetectable.
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Contributor
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Thanks Chris. I'll have to start asking judges on how they read it. You're the first to point out this bit of ... table variation.As an aside, then: [ooc]I read the description of a haunt siphon, and I guess I can see how someone might read that as a haunt siphon is used up if there's no haunt, but that's not my reading at all.
"You must be within the haunt’s area of influence to use a haunt siphon." If there's no haunt, you can't activate a haunt siphon. So it remains inert until you actually use it, and then it's a one-shot item.
If you "kill" a haunt with it, you get a free bomb. Otherwise, it just does damage.
Yea, that's something I didn't think about either until you mentioned that - I don't have the hardcopy myself, but does someone who does have the full/exact text? (Just in case the SRD missed something or reworded something...)
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Nosig
Yes - you get the problem I have with a haunt buster.
Know Religion does not by RAW identify a haunt. As GM I'm likely giving you extra hints for various knowledge skills. And i think im a pretty benevolent GM and try not to screw over players. But RAW i dont see any skill that identifies them for sure - and i follow the rules - dont expect me to identify just because you have knowledge x +50.
But this makes identification of haunts - unless in the haunts description - dependent on the GM. This is acceptable for normal play but becomes problematic for a specialist build.
Just a question for you: How does Knowledge (Religion) NOT, by RAW, apply to Haunts?
Since they can be detected by Detect Undead does that not necessarily make them Undead by definition, which means that knowledge about haunts would be provided by Knowledge (Religion)?
Religion (gods and goddesses, mythic history, ecclesiastic
tradition, holy symbols, undead)
Haunts are Undead, since they are detectable by Detect Undead, so knowledge about haunts would be covered by Knowledge (Religion) since that covers knowledge about undead.
Haunts might be 15 + CR, but not in an area where they are common. A known haunted house, for example, should be 10 + CR, if not 5 + CR.