I was watching Know Directions recently, and the topic of setting lore made me wonder something. Do you now know how Aroden died, and if not is that by choice, or policy?
Also Happy Thanksgiving.
I'm not certain of this, but I think a few of the inner circle know by policy to ensure that the truth isn't contradicted accidentally by freelance turnovers that bump into it quite by accident. I am not one of this circle though.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and Lisa!
Hi Mark,
Here are a bag of white-haired witch questions. Feel free to quote the Wizard of Oz at me instead of answering them.
1. Is the free grapple attempt you get after hitting with hair...is that the 'grab' monster power?
2. If it is grab, then does the size of grab-able targets increase as your hair gets longer, or only if your size increases?
3. Are the constrict, trip, and pull riders swift actions or free actions?
4. When you grapple with your hair, is that performing a combat maneuver with a weapon, for the purposes of Weapon Finesse? (and, say, adding the bonus from an amulet of mighty fists to your grapple check?)
5. Here's a scenario that depends on yes to the last questiona) a white-haired witch with Weapon Finesse get +Int to CMB when initiating a grapple with her hair, and (hopefully) gets +Dex to her CMB when maintaining the grapple.
b) let's say her grappling target turns the tables on her. She gains the grappled condition (where she didn't have it before).Can she still use +Dex to grapple? Or does she now need to use +Str? If she decides to attack with her hair while grappled, and succeeds on her grapple check, is the grapple condition on her effectively broken? (because she's using her hair and not her limbs anymore)
6. If you grapple a creature at range, the target is forced to move adjacent to the witch. Does this movement provoke attacks of opportunity, and if so, from who?
7. A witch isn't grappled when grappling with her hair. Even though the target is forced to move adjacent to her after the grapple is initiated, she's not forced to stay adjacent, is she? Could she move away from the target? If so, how far?
8. A witch casts a touch spell while grappling someone with her hair. Can she discharge the spell automatically? Can she discharge it by using the constrict special ability?
9. At what point are you forced to release a grapple? When you use whatever action you'd otherwise need to maintain it, or at the end of your turn having not maintained it?
10....
As usual, this is just my reading of it, not an official rules source. Particularly since this isn't in the Pathfinder RPG line. I will use # to represent the third truth value beyond true and false (for example "Is the current king of France bald?" has a truth value of # because there's not a current king of France)
1) No. It works like it in some ways, but it isn't the same power.
2) #
3) Swift, as Patrick intended that to be errata. It probably needs to go in the Golarion FAQ though.
4) No. Grapple never gets those.
5) #
6) No
7) It's a bit unclear but seems so. I would rule that you can move to the extent of your hair's reach.
8) That depends on the nature of holding the charge and the definition of "touch" therein. If "touch" includes all body parts, then a barefoot character or unclothed monster can never hold a charge unless flying, as they will always be touching the ground and discharging the spell. If "touch" means you are holding the charge on some part of the body in particular that generally touches, like a hand or tentacle, then it makes sense that the hair could be one such body part.
9) At start of turn, you can choose to take the requisite action to maintain. If you don't, or if you fail CMB, you release.
10) It doesn't say the hair is fully prehensile like fingers or hands in the white hair ability, so no.
11) No, while it's still on the witch's body, it has the effects specified, and if you cut it off to make it into one of those other objects, it is no longer the witch's white hair class feature and thus loses the class feature properties. As a GM in a home game, I'd probably let it be better than normal for an object made of hair in things like hp and hardness because it's just a cool idea, but not invincible.
12) Since constrict is a swift, only one constrict. You could theoretically grapple more than one person if you kept dropping the people you grappled as a free action.
13) Sort of, maybe. In any case, the brawler's ability is even more strongly tied to the actual TWF feat, and the hair is definitely just one weapon. However, you could presumably TWF with hair and something else. It's hard to say for sure because FCT is so vague (possibly the vaguest feat we have) and potentially elastic (almost certainly the most potentially elastic feat we have).
Wands would make low-level scrolls obsolete if you could craft them with any number of charges. Part of the math of the cost per charge is that you have to "buy it in bulk".
About what time next week should we expect the Kineticist post-mortem? It's kind of hard to regularly check that forum now.
About what time next week should we expect the Kineticist post-mortem? It's kind of hard to regularly check that forum now.
Hopefully it'll be around when I mentioned in my most recent post in that thread, Wednesdayish.
When you confirm a critical or threaten one, can you forgo it? I think that the representation of a critical is having your attack roll high enough to quickly hit hard in a vital area before your opponents' defenses take action.
I haven't seen any instances of "may", so I think you have to crit. Given that Pathfinder nonlethal damage is already kind of unrealistically safe to the person taking it, the chance to accidentally crit at the end and do a bunch of lethal seems like a good thing to me personally.
Is FAQ Friday still on for tomorrow? D:
Is FAQ Friday still on for tomorrow? D:
Nope, we have off today and tomorrow.
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Mark, other than mithril which halves the weight Adamantine does not really do anything for firearms. Perhaps it should reduce the explosion failure to zero because the chamber is a lot stronger than a firearm made of steel or iron.
Ah okay, that would be cool for Adamantine firearms. Mark, I second this Precious Rock's question.
Mark, other than mithril which halves the weight Adamantine does not really do anything for firearms. Perhaps it should reduce the explosion failure to zero because the chamber is a lot stronger than a firearm made of steel or iron.Ah okay, that would be cool for Adamantine firearms. Mark, I second this Precious Rock's question.
But that's not a question, its a call for action. *Pushes up literary glasses.*
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But that's not a question, its a call for action. *Pushes up literary glasses.*Mark, other than mithril which halves the weight Adamantine does not really do anything for firearms. Perhaps it should reduce the explosion failure to zero because the chamber is a lot stronger than a firearm made of steel or iron.Ah okay, that would be cool for Adamantine firearms. Mark, I second this Precious Rock's question.
I meant the first question which this "call for action" better explains.
Hello Mark, Hope you enjoyed Turkey Day!
Just wanted to ask a quick question. Say a 10th level Druid with the Cave Druid archetype Wildshapes into an ooze as per their class ability:
A cave druid gains this ability at 6th level, except that her effective druid level for this ability is equal to her druid level –2. She cannot use wild shape to adopt a plant form. At 10th level, the cave druid can assume the form of a Small or Medium ooze as if using beast shape III, and at 12th level that of a Tiny or Large ooze as if using beast shape IV (treating the ooze as if it were a magical beast without a natural armor bonus). When in ooze form, the cave druid has no discernible anatomy and is immune to poison, sneak attacks, and critical hits.
Are they automatically blind because oozes have no eyes and they don't gain the Ooze's blindsight ability as per the Wildshape rules?
Thanks for the help,
prototype00
hmm, you used an interesting phrase twice back there 'potentially elastic'. What does that mean, if a thing is 'potentially elastic'?
If you wanted a power in the game like what FCT might do, how would you write it to avoid potential elasticity and vagueness?
It's potentially elastic because it contains the vague wording "effects that augment an unarmed strike". A less elastic way to write it would involve spelling out what types of effects work with it, but that would take more wordcount.
Does the Savage Technologist have Profession as a class skill? On the PRD, it say Perception twice.
That's not my line, so I don't really know. It may just be a double, given barbarian doesn't have profession.
Mark, in forth coing book could rules be added for firearms made of mithirl and adamintine?
Are there rules for mediums using Ouija boards or to contact the spirit world?
I think you can just do it. Mithral would halve the weight and be of some use against werewolves. Adamantine would be useful for breaking stuff with the pistol whip deed.
Hello Mark, Hope you enjoyed Turkey Day!
Just wanted to ask a quick question. Say a 10th level Druid with the Cave Druid archetype Wildshapes into an ooze as per their class ability:
A cave druid gains this ability at 6th level, except that her effective druid level for this ability is equal to her druid level –2. She cannot use wild shape to adopt a plant form. At 10th level, the cave druid can assume the form of a Small or Medium ooze as if using beast shape III, and at 12th level that of a Tiny or Large ooze as if using beast shape IV (treating the ooze as if it were a magical beast without a natural armor bonus). When in ooze form, the cave druid has no discernible anatomy and is immune to poison, sneak attacks, and critical hits.Are they automatically blind because oozes have no eyes and they don't gain the Ooze's blindsight ability as per the Wildshape rules?
Thanks for the help,
prototype00
An intriguing question. It depends on two things.
1) Is ordinary vision an extraordinary ability? Because you definitely lose darkvision and keen senses. One would assume you would lose regular vision too. I mean, from where do you see? However it may not be the case depending on that question.
2) Is blindsense considered a "lesser version" of blindsight? If so, you would at least get blindsense, though you still can't target things you aren't touching and have a 50% miss chance, so that isn't perfect.
Neither of these is clear, though I'm slightly inclined toward the strict answers being Yes and No, but I could go either way on it.
An intriguing question. It depends on two things.
1) Is ordinary vision an extraordinary ability? Because you definitely lose darkvision and keen senses. One would assume you would lose regular vision too. I mean, from where do you see? However it may not be the case depending on that question.
2) Is blindsense considered a "lesser version" of blindsight? If so, you would at least get blindsense, though you still can't target things you aren't touching and have a 50% miss chance, so that isn't perfect.
Neither of these is clear, though I'm slightly inclined toward the strict answers being Yes and No, but I could go either way on it.
Thanks very much for the reply, I do feel sorry for all the potential players who wanted to play the archetype but are automatically struck blind by its most iconic ability.
However the issue has been faq-ed enough on the forums that the Design Team will attend to it in due course, so I am content to wait upon that.
prototype00
@ Mark Seifter
There is some local debate about Qinggong Monks and caster levels.
My Qinggong Monk is multiclassing as Fighter. I would like to take the Additional Traits feat for Magical Knack trait in hopes of keeping my Barkskin effects up.
Qinggong Monk
Spells: These ki powers duplicate the effects of a spell, and are spell-like abilities. A qinggong monk's class level is the caster level for these spell-like abilities, and she uses Wisdom to determine her concentration check bonus.
Magical Knack: You were raised, either wholly or in part, by a magical creature, either after it found you abandoned in the woods or because your parents often left you in the care of a magical minion. This constant exposure to magic has made its mysteries easy for you to understand, even when you turn your mind to other devotions and tasks. Pick a class when you gain this trait—your caster level in that class gains a +2 trait bonus as long as this bonus doesn't raise your caster level above your current Hit Dice.
This seemed fairly straightforward to me but I'm being told that despite the line explicitly saying I have caster levels I cannot benefit from a trait that increases my caster levels.
Can you please clarify?
@ Mark Seifter
There is some local debate about Qinggong Monks and caster levels.
My Qinggong Monk is multiclassing as Fighter. I would like to take the Additional Traits feat for Magical Knack trait in hopes of keeping my Barkskin effects up.Qinggong Monk
Spells: These ki powers duplicate the effects of a spell, and are spell-like abilities. A qinggong monk's class level is the caster level for these spell-like abilities, and she uses Wisdom to determine her concentration check bonus.Magical Knack: You were raised, either wholly or in part, by a magical creature, either after it found you abandoned in the woods or because your parents often left you in the care of a magical minion. This constant exposure to magic has made its mysteries easy for you to understand, even when you turn your mind to other devotions and tasks. Pick a class when you gain this trait—your caster level in that class gains a +2 trait bonus as long as this bonus doesn't raise your caster level above your current Hit Dice.This seemed fairly straightforward to me but I'm being told that despite the line explicitly saying I have caster levels I cannot benefit from a trait that increases my caster levels.
Can you please clarify?
Well you clearly can select monk with the trait, since it says "pick a class", so even a nonspellcasting class will do. You could even pick fighter and gain no benefit if you wanted. The GM's leeway for interpretation comes in due to the fact that the qinggong monk doesn't have an innate caster level and so calculates effective caster level by substituting in class level "the caster level for these spell-like abilities" is not necessarily the same as "caster level in that class". I think the GM does have that leeway. Personally I'd probably rule in favor of the monk, but language is very hard to pin down 100%, and this one I think is open to either interpretation.
I would like some explanation as to how grab/grapple and constrict work together since the language in the book is not clear. So far I have not seen a consensus on it.
My question is this--> What is the best way to get a blog on it similar to the blog done on poison and how it works?
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I would like some explanation as to how grab/grapple and constrict work together since the language in the book is not clear. So far I have not seen a consensus on it.
My question is this--> What is the best way to get a blog on it similar to the blog done on poison and how it works?
I intend to write such a blog some day, as well as ones on other rules that need some clarification like simulacrum. It's definitely on my personal list, and I believe in the case of grapple that we as a team have agreed that the best way to handle it is a blog at some point, so it seems likely it will exist one day.
Do you like tacos?
I prefer burritos, as veggie burritos tend to have more oomph to them than veggie tacos do. Do you like tacos?
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Do you like tacos?I prefer burritos, as veggie burritos tend to have more oomph to them than veggie tacos do. Do you like tacos?
HEY! This isn't the ASK *BARKER* ALL YOUR QUESTIONS HERE! thread. Oh...wait...this isn't the ASK *BARKER* ALL YOUR QUESTIONS HERE! thread?
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Mark, is there any difference between the arcane pool of the Magus and the arcane Reservoir of the arcanist?
I am going to make a PRC that combines a Magus and an Arcanist. I plan on giving the PRC the Black Blade of the Magus the arcane pool of the Magus and arcane exploits of the Arcanist but no additional spell casting.
Can you give me some advice on how to do this and have a good balanced class.
Mark, is there any difference between the arcane pool of the Magus and the arcane Reservoir of the arcanist?
I am going to make a PRC that combines a Magus and an Arcanist. I plan on giving the PRC the Black Blade of the Magus the arcane pool of the Magus and arcane exploits of the Arcanist but no additional spell casting.
Can you give me some advice on how to do this and have a good balanced class.
They are normally different, but I see no reason that a dedicated PrC you created couldn't find a way to synergize them together.
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Is it Friday again? Yes, it is!
When I use a magic item like ring of invisibility or hat of disguise that can be activated to gain the effects of a spell, does the wording "as the spell" also include the spell’s duration?
Yes, such items' effects have a duration, as indicated by the spell’s duration and the item’s caster level. If the item has no daily use limit, however, you can simply use the item again to reset the duration.
RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Is it Friday again? Yes, it is!
When I use a magic item like ring of invisibility or hat of disguise that can be activated to gain the effects of a spell, does the wording "as the spell" also include the spell’s duration?
Yes, such items' effects have a duration, as indicated by the spell’s duration and the item’s caster level. If the item has no daily use limit, however, you can simply use the item again to extend the duration.
Thank you for specifically mentioning the "as the spell" language so as not to include things like mistmail. (That was on purpose, right?)
Question: what is required to reactivate the hat of disguise?
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Is it Friday again? Yes, it is!
When I use a magic item like ring of invisibility or hat of disguise that can be activated to gain the effects of a spell, does the wording "as the spell" also include the spell’s duration?
Yes, such items' effects have a duration, as indicated by the spell’s duration and the item’s caster level. If the item has no daily use limit, however, you can simply use the item again to extend the duration.Thank you for specifically mentioning the "as the spell" language so as not to include things like mistmail. (That was on purpose, right?)
Question: what is required to reactivate the hat of disguise?
Mistmail doesn't specify a spell's name in the rules description, so yeah. Also, default activation for a magic item when unstated is always a standard action, I believe.
I am so keeping a link to that post. It is amazing how many people say that mistmail carries the duration of obscuring mist just because it's in the construction requirements.
Don't get me wrong, mistmail is a problematic and ambiguous item that needs a FAQ, and I can even see why people who are going up against the "strongest" interpretation of mistmail would want to give it a duration, especially since with the 1/day thing and the price it may well have been intended to have a duration originally and the duration has just been left out. But even so, there is no ground to stand on whatsoever right now to give it a duration, other than a house rule for a home game, of course. If we wanted to do that, we'd need to FAQ it and then errata next printing.
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Don't get me wrong, mistmail is a problematic and ambiguous item that needs a FAQ, and I can even see why people who are going up against the "strongest" interpretation of mistmail would want to give it a duration, especially since with the 1/day thing and the price it may well have been intended to have a duration originally and the duration has just been left out. But even so, there is no ground to stand on whatsoever right now to give it a duration, other than a house rule for a home game, of course. If we wanted to do that, we'd need to FAQ it and then errata next printing.
As far as power goes, I honestly don't think it's problematic, even with the "all day" idea. It's a 20% miss chance on a character who doesn't get to have an armor bonus to AC. Compare to the arcane bloodrager, whose rage only drops his AC by 2 points (compared to 5) in exchange for the same 20% miss chance (unless there's something even better that he wants instead).
And then if something messes with the fog (presumably a fire AoE would do it, and those aren't exactly rare), then you're stuck with a +5 armor bonus that will never get better as you level because it's a named magic item rather than a special quality that can be added to anything.
I admit I haven't run the math, but I can't help thinking that someone with mistmail running all day is getting hit nearly 4 out of 5 times (hardly overpowered), and beyond a certain level he'll start getting hit by just about everything if his fog gets burned.
But that's just my conjecture. :)
Ah, okay, I have that filed in my head as two threads, so I wasn't thinking of that topic as being what you were talking about. Yeah, that one probably needs a blog.
Don't get me wrong, mistmail is a problematic and ambiguous item that needs a FAQ, and I can even see why people who are going up against the "strongest" interpretation of mistmail would want to give it a duration, especially since with the 1/day thing and the price it may well have been intended to have a duration originally and the duration has just been left out. But even so, there is no ground to stand on whatsoever right now to give it a duration, other than a house rule for a home game, of course. If we wanted to do that, we'd need to FAQ it and then errata next printing.As far as power goes, I honestly don't think it's problematic, even with the "all day" idea. It's a 20% miss chance on a character who doesn't get to have an armor bonus to AC. Compare to the arcane bloodrager, whose rage only drops his AC by 2 points (compared to 5) in exchange for the same 20% miss chance (unless there's something even better that he wants instead).
And then if something messes with the fog (presumably a fire AoE would do it, and those aren't exactly rare), then you're stuck with a +5 armor bonus that will never get better as you level because it's a named magic item rather than a special quality that can be added to anything.
I admit I haven't run the math, but I can't help thinking that someone with mistmail running all day is getting hit nearly 4 out of 5 times (hardly overpowered), and beyond a certain level he'll start getting hit by just about everything if his fog gets burned.
But that's just my conjecture. :)
Ah, but my conjecture (which may be wrong) is that most people who want to limit it somehow are going up against players attempting to use the "strongest interpretation" (where it doesn't count as an armor so you can just wear armor afterwards or use it as a monk or other character who needs to not wear armor or druid who needs to not wear metal armor and then mage armor over it as usual) in which case the trade-off you indicated doesn't exist and it's just an underpriced cloak of displacement but far better too because it doesn't take your cloak slot that you want for a cloak of resistance.
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Ah, but my conjecture (which may be wrong) is that most people who want to limit it somehow are going up against players attempting to use the "strongest interpretation" (where it doesn't count as an armor so you can just wear armor afterwards or use it as a monk or other character who needs to not wear armor or druid who needs to not wear metal armor and then mage armor over it as usual) in which case the...
Oh, that's the "strongest interpretation" you're talking about? Well, at the very least, the "mist it then put on other armor" is explicitly verboten, causing the mistmail to re-form at your feet.
As for the monks and such, I think all you'd need is a quick "this still counts as wearing armor" FAQ.
But hey, I'm just happy that I can say with confidence that it doesn't have obscuring mist's duration. Maybe I can finally build my Lakitu character now!
Mark,Would you know or be able to confirm if this was by design or simply an oversight? If Investigators can still poison themselves on a 1, this really undercuts an already suspect benefit.
Thanks again.
Thought I'd resubmit this incase it was overlooked. If Poison Lore was intended to allow Investigators to use poisoned weapons, seems important to allow them to avoid poisoning themselves when rolling a 1 as well, yes?
Thanks.
RE: Light and Darkness -
The thing that throws me for a loop is that as I understand it, a Darkness spell is stronger than a Light spell of the same level. Intuitively, one should cancel the other on a 1 to 1 basis, but it apparently doesn't work that way. If I am correct on this, blog should point this out and perhaps offer an rationalization as to why it works this way.
I spent some more time looking into this for you, and I think the problem is that poison use itself has the same wording about prevention. Annoyingly, the only reason poison use protects you from both is not in the wording of poison use but instead in the poison section itself, which references poison use and gives you more information than the actual poison use ability (I really don't like it when that happens, but it does). Given that, it's fairly easy to see what happened (poison lore copied the wording from poison use, but of course the CRB would never be changed in the poison section to add poison lore), so it seems pretty certain that lore should protect from both.
Is a red dragon, who can go swimming in a pool of lava, subject to damage from hanging out in the desert?
Ah, but my conjecture (which may be wrong) is that most people who want to limit it somehow are going up against players attempting to use the "strongest interpretation" (where it doesn't count as an armor so you can just wear armor afterwards or use it as a monk or other character who needs to not wear armor or druid who needs to not wear metal armor and then mage armor over it as usual) in which case the...Oh, that's the "strongest interpretation" you're talking about? Well, at the very least, the "mist it then put on other armor" is explicitly verboten, causing the mistmail to re-form at your feet.
As for the monks and such, I think all you'd need is a quick "this still counts as wearing armor" FAQ.
But hey, I'm just happy that I can say with confidence that it doesn't have obscuring mist's duration. Maybe I can finally build my Lakitu character now!
Yeah, it seems mostly fair (still a bit low priced, but not shockingly so) if it keeps all the restrictions from the armor (if it doesn't keep the Max Dex bonus, then the fair number of characters who are allowed to wear armor but use mage armor anyway due to high Dex will get a free ride from it). With that restriction, in fact, it's maybe not even priced too low at all for a home game, where a villain who knows about the item and the PC's use of it can prepare a simple fire spell or wind effect to take it out for the day, rather than in PFS where few scenarios have such spells in them.
Is a red dragon, who can go swimming in a pool of lava, subject to damage from hanging out in the desert?
No. While there are numerous examples of creatures with resist that live in deserts and tundras and supposedly don't all go extinct, technically it's still ambiguous despite my statement of No, for all the usual reasons of "This is not an official response, etc". Get it up on the FAQ queue and I can get it FAQed, eventually.
The ACG Mongrel Mage says it allows you to obtain lvl 7 powers at lvl 7 when you activate your reservoir.
Is this a typo?
Sorcerers have lvl 9 powers not 7. Does this mean the power you gain at lvl 7 is the lvl 9 one and/or does it mean you gain the lvl 9 power at lvl 9?
Typo, as you expected.