Playtest: Level 11 Arcanist versus Elven Entanglement


Playtest Feedback


2 people marked this as a favorite.

So, I thought I would give another PFS scenario a go with our test Arcanist. This time I have picked a scenario less susceptible to a single group of spells.

The briefing for this adventure doesn't really give much indication of what you are likely to face so he goes with a fairly generic spell list. When he arrives at the start point there isn't enough time to switch things around so we go with what we have.

Arcanist:
Marcus D'Avore, Arcanist Extraordinaire
Male Human (Varisian) Arcanist 11
N Medium humanoid (human)
Init +8; Senses darkvision 120 ft.; Perception +18

--------------------
Defense
--------------------
AC 17, touch 13, flat-footed 15 (+4 armour, +2 Dex, +1 deflection)
hp 106/90 (11d6+44)
Fort +12, Ref +9, Will +13
DR10/Magic versus arrows

--------------------
Offense
--------------------
Speed 30 ft., fly 40 ft. (average)

Arcanist Spells Prepared (CL 11th; concentration +18):

5th (4/day)—baleful polymorph (DC 24), summon monster v
4th (5/day)—greater invisibility, resilient sphere (DC 21), confusion (DC 21)
3rd (6/day)—stinking cloud (DC 20), dispel magic, suggestion (DC 20), slow (DC 22)
2nd (6/day)—resist energy, mirror image, glitterdust (DC 19), scorching ray, blindness/deafness (DC 19)
1st (6/day)—shield, magic missile, silent image (DC 18), protection from evil, charm person (DC 18)
0 (at will)—mage hand, open/close (DC 19), detect magic, detect poison, light, arcane mark, message, ghost sound (DC 17), prestidigitation (DC 17)

--------------------
Statistics
--------------------
Str 7, Dex 14, Con 16, Int 25, Wis 14, Cha 7
Base Atk +5; CMB +3; CMD 16

Feats: Great Fortitude, Greater Spell Focus (transmutation), Greater Spell Penetration, Improved Initiative, Persistent Spell, Quicken Spell, Reach Spell, Spell Focus (transmutation), Spell Penetration

Traits: magical lineage (baleful polymorph), reactionary

Skills: Diplomacy +9, Escape Artist +13, Fly +10, Knowledge (arcana) +21, Knowledge (dungeoneering) +15, Knowledge (engineering) +11, Knowledge (geography) +11, Knowledge (history) +11, Knowledge (local) +11, Knowledge (nature) +15, Knowledge (nobility) +11, Knowledge (planes) +21, Knowledge (religion) +21, Linguistics +11, Perception +18, Spellcraft +21, Stealth +13, Use Magic Device +2

Languages: Abyssal, Auran, Celestial, Common, Draconic, Ignan, Infernal, Osiriani, Ancient, Terran, Varisian

Special Qualities: arcane reservoir, arcanist exploits (dimensional slide [110'], greater metamagic knowledge, metamagic knowledge, metamixing, potent magic, spell tinkerer [±50% duration or suppress 1 rds] [), consume spells

Gear: Ring of invisibility, Scroll of Touch of the Sea, Detect Secret Doors, Air Bubble, Disguise Self, Endure Elements, Mount, Expeditious Retreat, Obscuring Mist, Protection from Good, Reduce Person. Unseen Servant, Alter Self, Arcane Lock, Command Undead, Knock, See Invisibility, Magic Circle against Evil, Teleport, Wand of Infernal Healing, Belt of mighty constitution +2, Blessed book, Cloak of resistance +4, Eyes of the eagle, Handy haversack (empty), Headband of vast intelligence +4 (Escape Artist, Stealth), Ioun stone (clear spindle), Ring of protection +1, Wayfinder (1 @ 0 lbs), masterwork

--------------------
Extended spells cast the previous day:

Mage Armour, Greater Darkvision, Misdirection (Tree Stump), False Life (16 temp HP), Protection from Arrows, Countless Eyes, Non Detection, Detect Scrying

Other buffs cast the previous day:

Overland Flight, Life Bubble.

When he sets off he swaps out Extend for Reach Spell. Each buff is Tinkered three times to increase their duration to 3 days/1.5 days respectively.

This costs a grand total of 20 points, easily dealt with by sacrificing a few spell slots on his off day.


Encounter 1:
So, cloaking himself in invisibility Marcus is teleported to the adventure location only to be confronted by a hideous abomination and a bunch of desperate elves. Battle is joined immediately.

Initiative: 18, 14

Marcus 26
Horror 17
Elves 15

Round 1:

Marcus: Knowledge Nature 17 doesn't get him anything but given its the size of a house he will certainly avoid fortitude effects. Confusion wont help him as there is nothing for it to fight and he wont be charming it. That really cuts down on the options. He dimensionally steps 110' into the air and starts casting Summon Monster V

Horror: With no target in sight or range it eats an elf

Elves: Launch attacks at the monster, deal 8 damage.

Round 2:

Marcus: Completes casting SMV and brings forth 5 Lantern Archons 30' above the beast. He orders them to attack the creature. They need a 1 to hit and score 8 hits and 1 crit. They deal 35 damage ignoring its DR. Marcus begins casting another SMV.

Horror: Has a new target, it devours an archon.

Elves: Cheered by the glowing balls of light attacking the beast they join in dealing 8 damage.

Round 3:

Marcus: Completes SMV summoning another 4 archons. 8 now shoot at the beast with 1 miss dealing 48 damage
Deciding he doesn't need to summon more Marcus launches a scorching ray at the beast. He
beats
its SR and all 3 hit but its 15 fire resistance means it takes only 6 damage. It is down to 39HP.

Horror: It only has 1 attack and hits an archon on a 2 so devours another. We are down to 7.

Elves: Fire at the beast, 8 damage

Round 3:

Marcus: Realiisng it is resistant to fire damage but reasonably confident in this archons he launches a battery of magic missiles which beat SR with a 2 (thank you greater spell pen) but only deal 12 damage.

The remaining 7 archons open fire. All of them hit with one crit for 46 damage which kills it.

Remaining resources:

Spells: 5/5/6/5/2
Points: 5

Marcus descends down to the elves to see if they are OK. He has his balls of light liberally apply their aid spell to everyone. Sadly he has lost one elf.


Marcus is unable to convince any of the ungrateful elves to accompany him into the Tanglebriar to rescue their commander. He briefly considers hitting their leader with a Suggestion spell but decides against it. He burns a level 3 spell slot for extra points, takes the supplies they offer, sighs at the prospect of becoming horribly lost and floats into the forest, invisible of course.

Encounter 2: The Claw Brush:
Reaching this area while flying takes two hours and assumes that he gets lost (he takes 10 on the survival check and fails). He still has the elves map but he is forced to make 2 fortitude saves to avoid the toxins. He saves on a 2 and passes both.

Approaching the claw brush he spots the Vrock but puts faith in his Invisibility. It cannot see him and so he scoots quickly over the area and ducks into the foliage beyond.

Encounter 3:
Marcus approaches the ruins of Kethalia. The Babau's see him approaching with their see invisibility. He will be approaching carefully but will inevitably lose cover from time to time and in any event they have a high perception. He is unlikely to spot them given their stealth scores. The wolf in sheep's clothing is unlikely to see him and he has the advantage in spotting its disguise. He doesnt quite identify what it is but knows something is up so exercises caution.

The babau's get a surprise round as he cannot detect them. I allow the rogue the chance to sneak up into melee range. The other will be using spell likes at the start anyway. I start Marcus 55' away from the wolf (the limit of his close range)

Initiative: 7, 5, 15, 9

Marcus 15
Rogue 12
Babau 20
Wolf 12

Surprise Round:

Babau - surprise! casts dispel magic seeking to make him visible so the wolf can get at him. success oh dear.

Rogue - surprise! sneak attack with a longspear, hits for 28 damage. Ouch!

Round 1:

Babau - casts Darkness and moves up to flank (base light is dim), Marcus has Darkvision so isn't affected

Marcus - Flanked by a pair of demons is a terrible place to be. He dimensionally slides himself 50' upwards (the map suggests there is no thick canopy here) and casts potent Slow at the Babau's. DC is 24 (versus will of +5 and SR17). He beats SR for both and both fail their save.

Rogue: Tries to dispel the fly, CL7 versus DC 24 passes and Marcus floats down. That isn't good.

Wolf: Out of range of everyone it shuffles forward with a double move putting it 35' away.

Round 2:

Babau - back within reach but slowed it takes a single swing at Marcus, hitting for 15 damage

Marcus - still not keen on being flanked by Demons he dimensionally slides across the ruins and drops a potent Confusion on them (DC23). He cant quite get the wolf in it as well. He beats SR for both and both fail their saves.

Rogue - attacks nearest ally, in this case the normal babau, still slowed it only gets one attack, hitting for 6 damage due to DR

Wolf - it is not interested in eating the Babau and its prospective meal is too far away. It runs towards him moving 40' and still ending up quite some distance away.

Round 2:

The Babaus have entered a confusion attack loop but wont do much damage due to DR. I am going to leave them fight each other now and instead focus on trying to deal with the wolf.

Marcus - an ambulatory plant is an alarming thing but it is moving slowly. However he has lost his flight which is a big worry. He tries potent Confusion on the plant which it saves against
and he jogs further away from it.

Plant: Its terrible movement rate means it must rely on surprising its enemies. It like a crocodile pretending to be a log, once it has burst out of the water and missed there's not much chance of catching prey. It shuffles back to its spot.

Round 3:
Marcus: He still needs to deal with the Wolf as he wants to explore the area. He moves forward near to where the Babau's are and casts Mirror Image getting 6 images.

Wolf: It obliges and runs 40' towards him putting him within reach. Sadly neither a single move or a charge will get it close enough to attack but at least it is threatening.

Round 4:

Marcus: Dimensional Slide followed by another potent Confusion. This time it takes hold. He makes sure not to include the Babau's to avoid breaking their Confusion loop.

At this point the three monsters will inevitably end up fighting each other. However the wolf can barely beat the Babau's DR and every time it makes one of it 9 natural attacks it is liable to take slime damage. By the time the spell runs out in many rounds there is not likely to be much left other than mop up so I call this one here.

Searching the area he easily finds the secret stash. He collects as much of the cold iron as he can fit into his Haversack and marks the area for a later visit by teleportation.

He burns another level 3 slot and a level 2 slot for points. He would dearly love a chance to rest and recover the ability to fly as well as swap out to some other useful spells but he doesn't really have time to waste. He guzzles a couple of the free potions and heads out.

Resources available:
Spells: 5/3/3/3/2
Points: 7


I just want to point out at this point that Dimensional Slide is an amazing ability. Being able to freely move wherever the hell you want with a move action with no risk of provoking is incredibly strong.


Encounter 4:
It is far from clear that this encounter would take place as the Queen cannot detect the invisible Marcus and he only gets a save against the Veil if he interacts with it. For the sake of drama I am going to assume it does happen. Maybe she spots him while he is taking a pee or renewing his Invisibility or something.

Now on foot it takes Marcus about two hours to reach the new area. He makes both fort saves. He will spot the lurking Treant but not Eukalia due to the Veil. He recognises the spore pods with take 10 but not their source so he stays well away from them. Eukalia gets a surprise round.

Initiative: 3, 4, 6 no-one is covering themselves in glory here.

Marcus 11 (dex14)
Eukalia 11 (dex 17)
Treant 5

Surprise Round:

Eukalia: Charm Monster, fails due to Ioun Stone, alerts Marcus to the presence of an enemy. Perception check of 26 lets him spot where it came from. I give him a save against the Veil as he is trying to work out how a shrub cast a spell at him and he saves. He ID's what she is with a natural 20 learning that she is a plant creature along with 3 additional bits of information. I give him the energy drain, a weak will save and the sporepod ability.

Round 1:

Eukalia: frustrated at the failure of her first spell she casts Mind Fog at him which he fails against. Ouch.

Marcus: Faced with a potentially dangerous treant and a spell casting plant monster he has to prioritise the caster. She is immune to almost all of his spells so he does the only sensible thing and drops improved invisibility. He moves half speed away from his starting location and the Treant has no real chance to detect him.

Treat: Shuffles forward to where he was and flails about.

Round 2:

Eukalia: She has no spells which can detect him. Detect thoughts would give a presence but wont tell you where. She readies to cast a spell if he becomes visible.

Marcus: Scorching Ray on Eukalia. Beats SR but only 1 hits with two 1's on the attack rolls! Deals 19 damage. He then moves off again. Eukalias readied action does not go off as he is not visible (all of her spells require her to target)

Treant: Rumbles to where he was and then readies an action to attack.

Round 3:

Eukalia: Readied

Marcus: Scorching Ray, beats SR and all three hit this time for 40 damage.

Treant: Animates a tree to try and cover more ground.

Round 4:

Eukalia has been reduced to nearly half HP and is unable to engage her foe. She does the only sensible thing she can do and retreats. Marcus does not pursue and heads onwards.

Silver Crusade

andreww wrote:

So, I thought I would give another PFS scenario a go with our test Arcanist. This time I have picked a scenario less susceptible to a single group of spells.

The briefing for this adventure doesn't really give much indication of what you are likely to face so he goes with a fairly generic spell list. When he arrives at the start point there isn't enough time to switch things around so we go with what we have.

** spoiler omitted **...

Your character is heavily relying on a few tricks

1) extended casting of spells the day before. Not legal in PFS and I suspect a great many GMs would shut it down rapidly.

2) you're using dimensional slide without provoking. Not at all clear to me that it works that way. But I thin that it s overpowered even if it provokes.

3) using the combination of fly, invisibility and summon to push an "I win" button. Legal, sure. But wizards and sorcerers can do the same boring thing too. Not sure that is proving much beyond "wizards and sorcerers rock at level 11"


3 people marked this as a favorite.
pauljathome wrote:

Your character is heavily relying on a few tricks

1) extended casting of spells the day before. Not legal in PFS and I suspect a great many GMs would shut it down rapidly.

See that bolded statement? It means nothing. What PFS does, or does not, permit is PFS's problem and not Paizo's. Yes, it's a wonderful and popular play venue. However, they still. Are. Using. House. Rules. Okay? Okay. I don't know how many times I have to say this. If Paizo doesn't want the extended spells to work they need to hardwire the ban into the ability. Presence of function is evidence of intent.

Quote:
2) you're using dimensional slide without provoking. Not at all clear to me that it works that way. But I thin that it s overpowered even if it provokes.

So...you're telling me that this playtest has revealed a potential mechanical imbalance? Almost like it's a test of some kind, perhaps to gather data? Not sure why this is an objection.

Quote:
3) using the combination of fly, invisibility and summon to push an "I win" button. Legal, sure. But wizards and sorcerers can do the same boring thing too. Not sure that is proving much beyond "wizards and sorcerers rock at level 11"

It's proving that people who claim that Arcanist is weaker than its parents are wrong.

Dark Archive

Can't wait to see how the arcanist fares vs the toad demon with class levels.


Very interesting, Andrew.

Have you tried having someone run your arcanist through a scenario or module you aren't familiar with? So it'd just be the GM and you playing.

That would definitely help the legitimacy of these reports.

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I'm a little tired of "playtests" where it's a single invisible caster without a party. The game is usually played with a whole party, at least some of whom won't be invisible. You completely change the nature of the game when it's just your invisible self.

You also seriously ramp up the power of confusion when "attack nearest creature" is never a PC and "attack the last creature to attack it" is never a PC because, again, you don't have a party with you.

Also, starting the casting of a 1 round spell (like summon monster) is a full-round action, not a standard action. Dimensional Slide is part of a move action. Thus, your first turn of the first encounter is illegal.

And speaking of the first encounter, the REDACTED is supposed to trample for about 50 damage on round 1, but again, not having a party there changed things. If there was a party instead of a single invisible PC, the invisible PC (unless he won initiative and left the area) would have been trampled right along with them.

I'm having trouble seeing exactly what valid data can be drawn from this particular playtest.


Jiggy wrote:
I'm a little tired of "playtests" where it's a single invisible caster without a party. The game is usually played with a whole party, at least some of whom won't be invisible. You completely change the nature of the game when it's just your invisible self.

Never leave home without your Rings of Invisibility, kids. Or your Winged Boots, for that matter. They're mandatory items as soon as you can afford them.

Quote:
You also seriously ramp up the power of confusion when "attack nearest creature" is never a PC and "attack the last creature to attack it" is never a PC because, again, you don't have a party with you.

"Psst, hey guys, I'm gonna cast Confusion on these idiots. Just stay back until they kill each other." Preferably through telepathic bonds (pay a spellcaster to get them permanent ASAP) instead of out loud.


3 people marked this as a favorite.
Jiggy wrote:


I'm having trouble seeing exactly what valid data can be drawn from this particular playtest.

Luckily that's not your job.

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

Yet.

;)


pauljathome wrote:

Your character is heavily relying on a few tricks

1) extended casting of spells the day before. Not legal in PFS and I suspect a great many GMs would shut it down rapidly.

That's nice but I tend to assume a playtest should be played using the rules which we have rather than what any particular GM might change them to. If there is an issue with the rules then it should be highlighted so it can be looked at before it is published.

Quote:
2) you're using dimensional slide without provoking. Not at all clear to me that it works that way. But I thin that it s overpowered even if it provokes.

It is only unclear if you haven't read the ability which specifies that the initial movement through the gate you create does not provoke. The rest of your movement does but by that time you are out of reach.

Quote:
3) using the combination of fly, invisibility and summon to push an "I win" button. Legal, sure. But wizards and sorcerers can do the same boring thing too. Not sure that is proving much beyond "wizards and sorcerers rock at level 11"

That is something which is worth demonstrating. If a handful of classes can do that but most cant then that suggests that there may possibly be an imbalance. At the moment the PF devs deny that such an imbalance exists. You never know, when PF2 rolls around things might actually change a bit.

Also I have pretty much only used the summons in one fight so far.


Cheapy wrote:

Very interesting, Andrew.

Have you tried having someone run your arcanist through a scenario or module you aren't familiar with? So it'd just be the GM and you playing.

That would definitely help the legitimacy of these reports.

That would be preferable but online PbP takes a long time and there isn't much time left in the playtest. Happy to give it a go if someone wants to volunteer.


Jiggy wrote:

I'm a little tired of "playtests" where it's a single invisible caster without a party. The game is usually played with a whole party, at least some of whom won't be invisible. You completely change the nature of the game when it's just your invisible self.

You also seriously ramp up the power of confusion when "attack nearest creature" is never a PC and "attack the last creature to attack it" is never a PC because, again, you don't have a party with you.

This is very true however if your entire party is composed of flying invisible casters you continue to benefit from such tactics.

Quote:
Also, starting the casting of a 1 round spell (like summon monster) is a full-round action, not a standard action. Dimensional Slide is part of a move action. Thus, your first turn of the first encounter is illegal.

Fair point, I guess we lose another elf.

Quote:
And speaking of the first encounter, the REDACTED is supposed to trample for about 50 damage on round 1, but again, not having a party there changed things. If there was a party instead of a single invisible PC, the invisible PC (unless he won initiative and left the area) would have been trampled right along with them.

It makes no actual difference. He went before and was out of the way. Alternately if he had not moved and instead, say, tried to polymorph it, then he would simply Emergency Force Sphere to avoid the trample.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
andreww wrote:
That's nice but I tend to assume a playtest should be played using the rules which we have rather than what any particular GM might change them to. If there is an issue with the rules then it should be highlighted so it can be looked at before it is published.

Part of the parameters of this scenario are that you are suddenly teleported to Kyonin unexpectedly without any advance notice whatsoever.

Now, granted, with the obviously-going-to-be-errataed exponential growth factor multiple tinkering, that's less of a problem because the age of our universe is 7.26x10^16 rounds and it only takes 47 arcane points to make your hour per level spells last that long. In fact, with the as-written spell tinkering, there is no reason that an arcanist with a year of downtime (say Kingmaker) wouldn't have dozens of copies of every buff spell in his entire spellbook active, even the round per level spells (dozens of copies in case several enemies use greater dispel magic), so I think we can safely assume they won't keep that in the final version. With only a single spell tinkering allowed, the buffs wouldn't last long enough after resting to survive and Marcus would be down one of his 5th level prebuffs simply due to not being able to have both of them prepped and also have SM5.

Dark Archive

Good observation on Dimensional Slide, that's indeed a potentially nasty ability.

andreww wrote:


That is something which is worth demonstrating. If a handful of classes can do that but most cant then that suggests that there may possibly be an imbalance. At the moment the PF devs deny that such an imbalance exists.

Spoiler:

I saw no denials - they've said it's possible to subvert the game in this way, just that it's not as big a deal in practice as you think it is. Designing around the assumption that every player will want to hang back invisibly while the caster drops confusion on everything is certainly a thing one could do, but I'm guessing that even if the other players are okay with this tactic, the DM will not be and this will lead to an arms race at best.

Silver Crusade

I think I should have been clearer. I think that you are genuinely showing some things are brokenly good and that is a very valuable thing to do. But I think you,very already shown that.

andreww wrote:


That's nice but I tend to assume a playtest should be played using the rules which we have rather than what any particular GM might change them to. If there is an issue with the rules then it should be highlighted so it can be looked at before it is published.

Absolutely agreed. I think you've proven that ability is very abusable.

Which is interesting. But its time to move on and test something else.

Quote:


It is only unclear if you haven't read the ability which specifies that the initial movement through the gate you create does not provoke. The rest of your movement does but by that time you are out of reach.

Missed that. Yeah, broken. Now, again, its time to move on.

Quote:
Quote:
3) using the combination of fly, invisibility and summon to push an "I win" button. Legal, sure. But wizards and sorcerers can do the same boring thing too. Not sure that is proving much beyond "wizards and sorcerers rock at level 11"

That is something which is worth demonstrating. If a handful of classes can do that but most cant then that suggests that there may possibly be an imbalance. At the moment the PF devs deny that such an imbalance exists. You never know, when PF2 rolls around things might actually change a bit.

Also I have pretty much only used the summons in one fight so far.

The only question of interest has to be how this fares relative to a wizard or sorcerer. We're not play testing 2nd edition, showing how powerful spellcasters can be accomplishes NOTHING.


pauljathome wrote:
3) using the combination of fly, invisibility and summon to push an "I win" button. Legal, sure. But wizards and sorcerers can do the same boring thing too. Not sure that is proving much beyond "wizards and sorcerers rock at level 11"

I disagree, actually. The main strength of the Arcanist is that it is as capable of preparing for any encounter as a wizard, but as capable of adjusting to changes as a sorcerer. In essence, the Arcanist gets the "best of both worlds," so to speak. I think this is a even more apparent in playtests like this than it is on paper.

In andreww's previous playtest, we saw Marcus's wizard-like ability to completely negate any encounter about which he had a any kind of foreknowledge; "Oh, giants? Those guys are idiots, time for some enchantment spells." In this playtest, we see Marcus's sorcerer-like ability to adjust to situations for which he cannot be as prepared by having spontaneous access to his spells. In both playtests, there are situations where either parent class would be at a disadvantage that the Arcanist is able to ignore entirely.

Jiggy wrote:
I'm a little tired of "playtests" where it's a single invisible caster without a party. The game is usually played with a whole party, at least some of whom won't be invisible.

I think the fact that a party is more of a liability than an asset to some classes is a pretty serious concern to which attention should be drawn. I mean, seriously, let's say Marcus is a member of an adventuring party. His best option is to just leave them behind and do everything himself because they get in the way.

In other words, Gorzak the Gorespattered could best contribute to the team's success not by hewing through the flesh of foes with his mighty axe, but by staying at home and having a beer while his buddy Marcus does everything. Sure, it's not how things are usually going to be dealt with in practice, but I don't think that means it isn't a problem.


So we head into the final confrontation with the following resources:

Spells: 5/1/3/2/2
Points: 7

Encounter 5:
Arriving at the edge of the horrid bog invisibly Marcus decides he may well need a fair amount of pool as there is no way he is wading through the much. He burns two level one spell slots for pool.

Spells: 3/1/3/2/2
Points: 9

It will take him a couple of hours to get there as he will get lost. I don't bother with the fortitude saves as he only fails on a 1 and has the lesser restoration potions if he does. He arrives on the silty hummock from the west. I give the quasits a chance to see him as he is wading through water but their perception is only 7 so they fail. I assume Fihralaz will become aware with his much higher perception but he will also be spotted as he is making no attempt to hide. I assume the leeches and swarm are underwater and the quasits are invisible. I am not giving anyone a surprise round as Fihralaz will telepathically warn the quasits while the leech and swarms will become apparent when they start to move.

Initiative: 3,2,8,10,14
Marcus 11
Hezrou 9
Quasits 14
Leech 11
Leech Swarms 18

Round 1:

Swarm: The swarm has a blindsight range of 30' which Marcus is currently outside of and it doesn't yet know he is there. It does nothing

Quasits: They know something is here but don't know where. They delay.

Marcus: Fortunately long duration life bubble makes him immune to the stench aura. The only enemy he is currently sure of is the Hezrou. He recognises what it is but that is about all. He casts Greater Invisbility

Leech: Marcus is within its blindsight range and it charges at him but it misses

Quasits: Now they know which square their enemy is in they charge and try to slash with their poisonous claws. two of them hit for all of 2 damage but they force 2 Fortitude saves which both pass.

Hezrou: Moves forward to bring him within its melee reach and casts Blasphemy. Marcus identifies the spell and drops Emergency Force Sphere which as an interrupt breaks line of effect and prevents him from being mauled. The leech explodes.

Round 2:

Swarm: Begins to surge towards the Hezrou in the hope of a meal.

Marcus: Dimensional steps out of his bubble to the other side of the clearing. Casts potent Confusion from a level 5 spell slot hitting the quasits and hezrou. He beats the hezrous SR and all of them fail their saves.

Quasits: They babble and stab and are pretty much out of things at this point.

Hezrou: He might still be ok if he gets to act normally. Then he can teleport away and come back when the spell is cleared. It gives Marcus time to work but better than destroying his own minions. He gets attack nearest target which will be a quasit. He murderises it with his harpoon, no real need to roll.

Round 3:

Swarm: Reaches the Hezrou, nothing there to eat.

Marcus: Casts mirror image getting 6 images

Quasits: Confusion one acts normally and one stabs itself. The normal acting one hangs to a chrysalis and begins to attack it.

Hezrou: attacks nearest, another Quasit dies.

Round 4:

Swarm: swirls around hunting for the meal that is supposed to be here. I use a run move for it and give it a 50/50 chance of bringing him within its blinsight (1-50 success). It fails

Marcus: Casts Shield, moves well away from the swarm

Quasit: Stabs itself but its irrelevant in the face of its DR

Hezrou: Stabs itself for 7 damage

Round 5:

Swarm, hunting again, another 50% chance gives a success and it rolls over him! Eek. He takes 8 damage and fails the poison save with a 1 taking 2 dex drain. He makes the distraction save

Marcus: Starting in the swarm he takes 1 point of con and str damage and makes the poison save.

He dimensionally steps away from the swarm. It is a SU ability so doesn't require a concentration check. He lands on solid ground to make it less likely the swarm will find him. He begins to cast SMV

Quasit: Acts normally and continues to chop down the cocoon.

Hezrou: Drools

[b]Round 6:

Swarm: Hunts, I reduce its chance to find him to 10% given he is on solid ground and its land move speed is 5. I will increase it each round it hunts. It just fails.

Marcus: Completes casting SMV. Conjures 5 lantern archons and commands them to get into the air and destroy the quasit. They rise up out of melee reach and each takes a single blast needing an 11. Four hit and they deal 16 damage which staggers it. Marcus finishes it off with a magic missile doing 17 damage and then moves further from the swarm.

Hezrou: stabs himself for 2 damage, this could take a while

Round 7:

Swarm: Hunts, 20% chance of location but doesnt find

Marcus: Casts potent Slow at the Hezrou becoming the focus of its attentions. He beats sr with a 20 and it fails its save with a 1. He becomes its target. He then directs the archons to attack it and they become the target. Its touch AC is 11. They need an 8 and 4 hit dealing 13 damage

Hezrou: Unable to reach the annoying balls of light in melee he unholy blights one. He is only catching one as they are spread out. It fails its save and explodes

Round 8:

Swarm: Hunt at 30% fails

Marcus: Running critically low on spells he is getting a bit desperate. He drops a potent Suggestion on the Hezrou that is would have a much nicer day if it left the area to enjoy itself hunting mortals along the now open border for the rest of the day. The DC is 22 but he fails to beat SR. Not good. He directs the Archons to continue their attack and this time 6 hit for 18 damage.

He then Dimensionally Steps well away from the Swarm to reduce its chance of finding him back down.

Hezrou: Destroys an archon

Round 9:

Swarm: Hunting still but no luck now that he is far away again

Marcus: Another potent Suggestion. This time it beats SR but it makes its will save. The archons also attack hitting 3 times for 9 damage. He is still on 150hp.

Hezrou: Destroys yet another archon

Round 10:

Swarm: Hunting fails

Marcus: He is now pretty much out of spells and his improved invisibility goes next turn. With a sigh he draws his scroll of teleport from his pack and uses it to return to the court. He will have to rest up and come back tomorrow. Refuelled and with the Hezrou down on allies if should be an easier fight, unless it reports to its masters of course and has more surprises waiting for him.

Either way he loses some more of the prisoners at the very best.

Well, he didn't beat the final encounter yet but he has another chance at it. To be honest I should probably have lead off with potent Suggestions on the Hezrou as the most dangerous enemy to get rid of it. Success didn't require me to kill it. I also made the classic PFS mistake of not having something handy that can affect a swarm.


One thing I would also add is that if I was playing this as a PFS character I would not be going with Magical Lineage (Baleful Polymorph) and GSF (Transmutation) as they come on line too late. I would be much more likely to go with enchantment for Persistent Charm or Suggestion or possibly Evocation for early Dazing spells.

Dark Archive

I'm pretty sure the mission is timed, and if you teleport away to come back the next day, then the captured elves all die/turn into demons.


Victor Zajic wrote:
I'm pretty sure the mission is timed, and if you teleport away to come back the next day, then the captured elves all die/turn into demons.

It is actually really unclear. I believe there was supposed to have been a timer but it seems to have been removed during development. The adventure includes a rest spot but warns that delay could have consequences.

Dark Archive

I don't have the mod on me, but I remember reading an explicit timer on the scenario, and it being possible to fail just from wasting time from survival checks and the centipede eating elfs.

Though, being able to almost solo the module is an impressive feat, even if you can't quite make it without allies.

Also, why wasn't the toad demon hiding with it's camoflage when the encounter started? I thought that was mentioned in the tactics.

Edit: Checked Mod. An elf dies/is transformed every 12 hours. 7 elves must suceed to not fail the primary sucess condition.

The Toad Demon's tactics explicitly say he hides before combat, using 3 points of his camoflage ability. So the Ancanist is probably flat footed when Blasphemy goes off, so I think that means no immediate action spells.


Victor is correct on both counts. He was hiding in our 10-11 playthrough with a stealth that even our perception monkey couldn't see, and you do lose plenty of elves if you tarry.


A fair point, I blame my lack of familiarity with rogues. I haven't had the time to check but not sure how well he would be able to stealth up. Combat having started and me having acted already I don't think I would have been flat footed even if I didn't spot him coming.

Getting dazed from Blasphemy would have been bad but as I recall its duration is 1 round so it would have meant a few additional quasit attacks, maybe a single swarm one.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Not quite. Here's how it happened in the game I played and would happen at my table if you were playing this with Marcus (by the way, you didn't prepare Emergency Force Sphere. Maybe you meant to prep that instead of resilient?):

Surprise round for enemies is triggered when Marcus comes within charge range of the hiding hezrou. Leeches and swarms spend it getting out of the muck and moving and cannot reach Marcus. Quasits are useless. Hezrou grapples Marcus, easily making the CMB to do so and getting lucky on the 50/50 miss chance. I'm not really convinced that EMF gets you out of a grapple, but dimensional slide clearly does not (since you have to be able to take a move action to step into the rift and you can't).

Leech Swarms move into Marcus's space and deal 8 damage, but he makes both saves. On Marcus's turn, he takes 3 Con damage and 2 Str damage. If EMF can break grapples (I would rule you can't even cast it when grappled for the same reason you can't cast wall of force through the middle of a large creature, since it says "as wall of force"), he could try a Conc check. He would have no idea how high it is even if he knew hezrou CMB because it's a classed hezrou, but it's actually high enough that he would need a natural 20 to succeed. He could also try Escape Artist, but that fails automatically. Regardless, I roll a 14 on a d20 for him, so even if he was trying to cast a cantrip, he failed whatever he tried.

The Hezrou pins him easily, hoping to nauseate him. Because the playtest document says you can only tinker once, he would fail the Fort save on a roll of 12 due to loss of life bubble, but assume he succeeded on the Fort save.

Next round.

The swarm hits for 5 damage, and he makes both saves.

He is now pinned, and he takes 1 Con damage and 3 Str damage from the swarm. He can barely do anything right now, since most of his spells have somatic components and he didn't take any offensive exploits. He decides to try EFS again, continuing to rely on the tenuous rules interpretation that it would auto-free him from a pin somehow. He fails to get the 20 again.

The Hezrou maintains the pin for 38 damage.

Next round.

The swarm hits for only 3 damage, and he makes both saves.

At the start of his turn, he takes 1 Con damage again and 2 Str damage. He is now paralyzed from 0 Str and the hezrou kills him.


Jiggy wrote:
Also, starting the casting of a 1 round spell (like summon monster) is a full-round action, not a standard action. Dimensional Slide is part of a move action. Thus, your first turn of the first encounter is illegal.
PRD wrote:
The “start full-round action” standard action lets you start undertaking a full-round action, which you can complete in the following round by using another standard action. You can't use this action to start or complete a full attack, charge, run, or withdraw.

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

Vivianne Laflamme wrote:
Jiggy wrote:
Also, starting the casting of a 1 round spell (like summon monster) is a full-round action, not a standard action. Dimensional Slide is part of a move action. Thus, your first turn of the first encounter is illegal.
PRD wrote:
The “start full-round action” standard action lets you start undertaking a full-round action, which you can complete in the following round by using another standard action. You can't use this action to start or complete a full attack, charge, run, or withdraw.

Yes, so once he spends his second standard action, he will have finished the full-round action portion of casting a 1 round spell. Now all that's left is waiting until right before his next turn for it to finish.


Rogue Eidolon wrote:
Not quite. Here's how it happened in the game I played and would happen at my table if you were playing this with Marcus (by the way, you didn't prepare Emergency Force Sphere. Maybe you meant to prep that instead of resilient?):

Yeah I don't have the HeroLab addon that provides EFS so I have to keep remembering to edit it in.

Anyway the new version is now out so I am looking at rejigging a new character and throwing him at stuff. I want to see how well an Arcanist works who doesn't rely quite so heavily on save or suck. Look out for a Dwarf evocation specialist coming your way soon.

Silver Crusade

andreww wrote:
A fair point, I blame my lack of familiarity with rogues. I haven't had the time to check but not sure how well he would be able to stealth up. Combat having started and me having acted already I don't think I would have been flat footed even if I didn't spot him coming.

The answer is "extremely well," and if you're unaware of an attack you lose your Dexterity bonus against it and are thus susceptible to sneak attack, etc even if you've already acted. If you're going to test against something, be aware of what it can do.

I understand that arcanists (and wizards, sorcerers, etc) are stupidly powerful when built well, but you kind of undermine the point when you make the mistake of blatantly underestimating the mundane classes. They're not completely useless. :p


Renegade Paladin wrote:
andreww wrote:
A fair point, I blame my lack of familiarity with rogues. I haven't had the time to check but not sure how well he would be able to stealth up. Combat having started and me having acted already I don't think I would have been flat footed even if I didn't spot him coming.

The answer is "extremely well," and if you're unaware of an attack you lose your Dexterity bonus against it and are thus susceptible to sneak attack, etc even if you've already acted. If you're going to test against something, be aware of what it can do.

I understand that arcanists (and wizards, sorcerers, etc) are stupidly powerful when built well, but you kind of undermine the point when you make the mistake of blatantly underestimating the mundane classes. They're not completely useless. :p

Thats not really the issue. The issue is would I be flatfooted and therefore unable to negate his atacks with emergency force sphere.


I think the biggest problem that is being missed here, is that Marcus would never have gotten to level 11 when he's either skipping all the encounters he might come across, or letting the enemies finish themselves off.

I know Paizo adventures often allow PCs to gain XP for creative, non-combat solutions to encounters, along with story awards, but I'd think using the same trick time and again hardly counts as "creative".

:P :)


That might be an issue if I were claiming that the Arcanist could operate on his own at all levels. I am not entirely sure when the switch happens but there does come a point when you can quite happily start to adventure on your own and where characters who cannot pull off the same sorts of tricks become a potential liability.

Not really an issue for thsi thread though.


Cthulhudrew wrote:

I think the biggest problem that is being missed here, is that Marcus would never have gotten to level 11 when he's either skipping all the encounters he might come across, or letting the enemies finish themselves off.

I know Paizo adventures often allow PCs to gain XP for creative, non-combat solutions to encounters, along with story awards, but I'd think using the same trick time and again hardly counts as "creative".

Alice the Wizard and Bob the Rogue are adventuring together. They spy a small goblin encampment. Alice throws a specialized empowered fireball (with magical lineage) into the camp, killing all the goblins instantly.

Should Bob get XP for this?

Dark Archive

andreww wrote:
Renegade Paladin wrote:
andreww wrote:
A fair point, I blame my lack of familiarity with rogues. I haven't had the time to check but not sure how well he would be able to stealth up. Combat having started and me having acted already I don't think I would have been flat footed even if I didn't spot him coming.

The answer is "extremely well," and if you're unaware of an attack you lose your Dexterity bonus against it and are thus susceptible to sneak attack, etc even if you've already acted. If you're going to test against something, be aware of what it can do.

I understand that arcanists (and wizards, sorcerers, etc) are stupidly powerful when built well, but you kind of undermine the point when you make the mistake of blatantly underestimating the mundane classes. They're not completely useless. :p

Thats not really the issue. The issue is would I be flatfooted and therefore unable to negate his atacks with emergency force sphere.

He would get a surprise round against you, where your higher initiative score wouldn't matter, and you'd definitly be flat footed.

The fact that you are flying and invisibile probably stops him from using your dazed round to close and grapple/nauseate you.

Dark Archive

Cthulhudrew wrote:

I think the biggest problem that is being missed here, is that Marcus would never have gotten to level 11 when he's either skipping all the encounters he might come across, or letting the enemies finish themselves off.

I know Paizo adventures often allow PCs to gain XP for creative, non-combat solutions to encounters, along with story awards, but I'd think using the same trick time and again hardly counts as "creative".

:P :)

I don't see how this has any relevance to playtesting the new classes, or adds to the playtest discussion in any sort of useful way.

Dark Archive

Jiggy wrote:
Vivianne Laflamme wrote:
Jiggy wrote:
Also, starting the casting of a 1 round spell (like summon monster) is a full-round action, not a standard action. Dimensional Slide is part of a move action. Thus, your first turn of the first encounter is illegal.
PRD wrote:
The “start full-round action” standard action lets you start undertaking a full-round action, which you can complete in the following round by using another standard action. You can't use this action to start or complete a full attack, charge, run, or withdraw.
Yes, so once he spends his second standard action, he will have finished the full-round action portion of casting a 1 round spell. Now all that's left is waiting until right before his next turn for it to finish.

I don't think that's how it works, Jiggy. He doesn't stop casting between standard action 1 and stardard action 2.

Grand Lodge RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

Never said he did. Just said that, per the rules quoted by Vivianne, it's not until the second standard action is spent that he finishes his full-round action. Given that, per the Magic chapter, you start a 1-round timer after the full-round action finishes, that means he still needs to wait after that second standard action.

Liberty's Edge

andreww wrote:

Extended spells cast the previous day:

Mage Armour, Greater Darkvision, Misdirection (Tree Stump), False Life (16 temp HP), Protection from Arrows, Countless Eyes, Non Detection, Detect Scrying

Other buffs cast the previous day:

Overland Flight, Life Bubble.

When he sets off he swaps out Extend for Reach Spell. Each buff is Tinkered three times to increase their duration to 3 days/1.5 days respectively.

This costs a grand total of 20 points, easily dealt with by sacrificing a few spell slots on his off day.

Doing this sort of thing assumes perfect information on what is going to happen in the future. I notice these spells are not on your current spell list for the day. How does the Arcanist know today is the day when everything goes down or just is another day devoted to pre-buffing? I'm not familiar with this scenario, so maybe it is possible, but often adventurers live in an unpredictable world.

There is useful information here, but it is presented in an unusual corner-case fashion so it may be difficult to generalize to standard play. It does a great job of showing the strength of spell tinkerer and dimensional slide in certain situations though.


It largely assumes a proactive player rather than a reactive ones largely because that is the sort of game I prefer to run and play. The scenario gives you some notice of what is happening. To be fair, under the previous version of spell tinker you could set all of your buffs to last forever as it was not limited to being used once so I didn't really matter when you set them up, only the impact if they were dispelled.

With the new version of the class and in particular the change to spell tinker and ability to grab bloodline and school abilities I shall be looking at alternate scenarios.

Community / Forums / Archive / Pathfinder / Playtests & Prerelease Discussions / Advanced Class Guide Playtest / Playtest Feedback / Playtest: Level 11 Arcanist versus Elven Entanglement All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.
Recent threads in Playtest Feedback