Thoughts on Occult Adventures


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Imbicatus wrote:


Yet someone else who doesn't understand how non-lethal works giving out misinformation.

When you take non-lethal damage (including burn) you keep a tally of NL damage that is right next to your regular HP. If you ever have more damage than your current HP, you fall unconscious. Doing regular damage will knock out a Kinectist faster than doing NL, because you will likely do more damage and not need to switch to backup weapon or take a -4 to hit.

I get how non-lethal damage works sweetie. The kineticist can mitigate lethal damage by a variety of means, including Kinetic Healer. But you can't in any way mitigate the effects of non-lethal once you have a single point of burn:"A kineticist who has accepted burn never benefits from abilities that allow her to ignore or alter the effects she receives from nonlethal damage." (Occult Adventures, Page 11). Unless this get errata'ed it means it applies to non-lethal from any source, once you have Burn you can't shrug off or ignore any non-lethal or any effects that come from it. Yes, it will probably be a hit of regular damage that KO's the character, once the NL is so high that he is only one good blow from having it exceed his current, but it is the NL that he just has to take once he starts taking it. Until one full night's rest.

Designer

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AntiDjinn wrote:
Imbicatus wrote:


Yet someone else who doesn't understand how non-lethal works giving out misinformation.

When you take non-lethal damage (including burn) you keep a tally of NL damage that is right next to your regular HP. If you ever have more damage than your current HP, you fall unconscious. Doing regular damage will knock out a Kinectist faster than doing NL, because you will likely do more damage and not need to switch to backup weapon or take a -4 to hit.

I get how non-lethal damage works sweetie. The kineticist can mitigate lethal damage by a variety of means, including Kinetic Healer. But you can't in any way mitigate the effects of non-lethal once you have a single point of burn:"A kineticist who has accepted burn never benefits from abilities that allow her to ignore or alter the effects she receives from nonlethal damage." (Occult Adventures, Page 11). Unless this get errata'ed it means it applies to non-lethal from any source, once you have Burn you can't shrug off or ignore any non-lethal or any effects that come from it. Yes, it will probably be a hit of regular damage that KO's the character, once the NL is so high that he is only one good blow from having it exceed his current, but it is the NL that he just has to take once he starts taking it. Until one full night's rest.

Can't ignore or alter the effects from nonlethal damage does not mean can't heal the nonlethal damage that isn't from burn.

It means you get knocked out by nonlethal damage as normal for the rules in nonlethal damage (this might seem like it goes without saying, but there's weird abilities out there that can let you ignore the effects of nonlethal damage; yes I'm not sure why we have those either).


As written, even if you have DR it stops working vs non-lethal as long as you have a point of Burn.


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Pixie, the Leng Queen wrote:
Ventnor wrote:


Not all of them are that gritty. There is literally a Psychic Discipline which represents a Psychic who got his/her powers through the power of friendship.

So friendship IS magic lol xD

Awakened horse here i come lol

Soooo... Psychic Awakened Horse with Mythic levels. Princess Celestia?


Natan Linggod 327 wrote:
Pixie, the Leng Queen wrote:
Ventnor wrote:


Not all of them are that gritty. There is literally a Psychic Discipline which represents a Psychic who got his/her powers through the power of friendship.

So friendship IS magic lol xD

Awakened horse here i come lol

Soooo... Psychic Awakened Horse with Mythic levels. Princess Celestia?

Winning lol

Scarab Sages

AntiDjinn wrote:
As written, even if you have DR it stops working vs non-lethal as long as you have a point of Burn.

Even if true, so what? If you have access to healing spells, you still heal an equal amount of non-burn NL damage with Lethal damage, making healing spells cure twice as much. You are always going to be better served by using lethal damage unless you are an unchained monk with elbow strike, are using sap master, enforcer, or something similar.

And I'm pretty sure that the intent is only Burn damage bypasses any of the abilites that allow you to ignore NL or NL DR.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

I feel that AntiDjinn's interpretation isn't what was intended, nor is it what I got out of reading the same passage.

Silver Crusade

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber

Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.

Designer

Terminalmancer wrote:
Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.

My previous clarification already clarifies this. "the effects she receives from nonlethal damage" does not mean the nonlethal damage itself. It means being staggered when the nld matches her current hp and unconscious when the nld is greater. Those are the effects. Yes there are weird ways in the game to get around that otherwise (without becoming immune to nld and being unable to use burn), even though that seems like the most basic definitional function of nld.

Scarab Sages

Mark Seifter wrote:
Terminalmancer wrote:
Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.
My previous clarification already clarifies this. "the effects she receives from nonlethal damage" does not mean the nonlethal damage itself. It means being staggered when the nld matches her current hp and unconscious when the nld is greater. Those are the effects. Yes there are weird ways in the game to get around that otherwise (without becoming immune to nld and being unable to use burn), even though that seems like the most basic definitional function of nld.

So, for example, the Flagellant feat would stop functioning when you are under the effects of burn?

Designer

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Imbicatus wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Terminalmancer wrote:
Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.
My previous clarification already clarifies this. "the effects she receives from nonlethal damage" does not mean the nonlethal damage itself. It means being staggered when the nld matches her current hp and unconscious when the nld is greater. Those are the effects. Yes there are weird ways in the game to get around that otherwise (without becoming immune to nld and being unable to use burn), even though that seems like the most basic definitional function of nld.
So, for example, the Flagellant feat would stop functioning when you are under the effects of burn?

Precisely. That is an iconic example of what that clause prevents.

Silver Crusade

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber
Mark Seifter wrote:
Terminalmancer wrote:
Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.
My previous clarification already clarifies this. "the effects she receives from nonlethal damage" does not mean the nonlethal damage itself. It means being staggered when the nld matches her current hp and unconscious when the nld is greater. Those are the effects. Yes there are weird ways in the game to get around that otherwise (without becoming immune to nld and being unable to use burn), even though that seems like the most basic definitional function of nld.

I was agreeing with you and how you suggested the line should be interpreted; I was just also suggesting that maybe a note could be made for a future errata to clarify the language. (if possible; I don't know if the Pathfinder ruleset really has the kind of standardized language templates in place to support this sort of clarity)

That particular line does seem to require a fair amount of system expertise to understand, and I don't think most PF players will luck into seeing your clarification on the forums.


Exguardi wrote:


Brutal honesty time because I really did like the flavor of the Spiritualist and feel as though my expectations of the class were entirely dashed.

I was disappointed with the lack of developer feedback on the Spiritualist during the playtests, and I remain disappointed with the class in its final iteration. The additions to the class seem lazy and/or lacking.

The Phantom doesn't appear to have any viability as a martial combatant without use of an archetype; its stats are lacking, its abilities while flavorful and varied are incredibly fixed in terms of options and rarely contribute meaningfully to augment its combat prowess to an acceptable level. Incorporeal scouting and phasing through walls remains cool, but of limited impressiveness beyond low levels.

The archetype that trades away the physical manifestation of the Phantom appears to then nerf the incorporeal Phantom rather than empower it, taking away its emotional focus in exchange for some bland, generic "ghost" powers.

The foci themselves have seemingly not been updated at all since the playtest, beyond adding a couple of foci that just seem like retreads of abilities from other foci.

The spell list is obviously much improved with the addition of the unique psychic spells, but the Spiritualist still gets a painfully small amount of them with no real options in-class that seem like an acceptable alternative use of that important standard action. Considering one of the two "better than the base class" archetypes sucks up spell slots like crazy, that's pretty painful.

My PFS Spiritualist already felt close to a burden to the tables I played at, with most of its contributions coming in the form of "cute" tricks with the incorporeal Phantom or using the ectoplasmic Phantom as...

Thats exactly what i am feeling.

After comparing the offical release and the test doc. I am extremly disappointed and as you already sayd the lack of communication just lets it look like the dev dident realy care, it certainly looks like it.

Not much more thought was put into it then for the obvious. Its like the playtest was the first draft and the release just finished it.

A minor/obvious buff/nerf hear and there, and the only thing that the class was "op" in is now more restrictive but still usable.
Most of it just looks "fresh" because of wording and/or structual change. But actualy nothing much realy happend.

the biggest change was the spell list. And even this is more or less obvious why dident the phantom have more touch spells already in the play test when he can deliver touch spells? just so his/her spell list looks even better with the new psy spells?

But hey, i dont want a phantom just to be the imba scout. There are more or less cheap items for that.

At least if there was an archtype that can make the phantom combat vailable that would have been great. And the haunted archtype certainly dident do it.
Where you just so/that affraid of makeing the phantom accutualy good?

Ok to be fair if the archtype enlarge, spell enlarge and the anger enlarge stack (what i dont believe and i cant look atm) a collosal anger phantom sounds at least at first funny.

I would have loved to see a teamwork/(feat) fokust Archtype, that would have been interesting/great.

Sovereign Court

Pathfinder Starfinder Society Subscriber

I'm not sure why you say that phantoms aren't viable in combat.

A level 1 anger phantom has slam +3/+3 1d8+3, or using the free Power Attack +2/+2 1d8+5. Not bad for first level

And they advance fairly well. That damage die goes up to 2d8 by level 10, with Str 20. They have effectively 3/4 BAB, have that trade AC for accuracy aura, and 1/day can rage and enlarge.

They aren't PC level strong, but they can make an effective combat companion. By lvl 10 you can have Cornugon Smash to add Intimidate to your attacks. That's a baseline slam +13/+13 2d8+9 with -2AC.

What is the "acceptable level"?

Also, can an anger phantom take Improved Natural Attack, or will that not stack with its Powerful Strike?


Mark Seifter wrote:
Terminalmancer wrote:
Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.
My previous clarification already clarifies this. "the effects she receives from nonlethal damage" does not mean the nonlethal damage itself. It means being staggered when the nld matches her current hp and unconscious when the nld is greater. Those are the effects. Yes there are weird ways in the game to get around that otherwise (without becoming immune to nld and being unable to use burn), even though that seems like the most basic definitional function of nld.

Out of curiousity Mark, is an undead or elemental kineticist effectively worthless then?

Seems especially odd for an elemental...

Designer

Myrryr wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Terminalmancer wrote:
Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.
My previous clarification already clarifies this. "the effects she receives from nonlethal damage" does not mean the nonlethal damage itself. It means being staggered when the nld matches her current hp and unconscious when the nld is greater. Those are the effects. Yes there are weird ways in the game to get around that otherwise (without becoming immune to nld and being unable to use burn), even though that seems like the most basic definitional function of nld.

Out of curiousity Mark, is an undead or elemental kineticist effectively worthless then?

Seems especially odd for an elemental...

Undead should be overwhelming souls. Full-out elementals being kineticists is actually a bit weird conceptually, since it's all about the mixture of the elemental energy with a different sort of being, but I see absolutely nothing preventing or hindering it (unless I've somehow been missing something about elementals and nonlethal damage all this time?)


Elementals can be kineticists without issue, they are not immune to non-lethal damage.

This was rather crucial for me since in one of my settings, all followers granted by leadership are elementals and elementals between the levels where the appropriate CR's were granted kineticist levels to be the correct CR.


Mark Seifter wrote:
Myrryr wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Terminalmancer wrote:
Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.
My previous clarification already clarifies this. "the effects she receives from nonlethal damage" does not mean the nonlethal damage itself. It means being staggered when the nld matches her current hp and unconscious when the nld is greater. Those are the effects. Yes there are weird ways in the game to get around that otherwise (without becoming immune to nld and being unable to use burn), even though that seems like the most basic definitional function of nld.

Out of curiousity Mark, is an undead or elemental kineticist effectively worthless then?

Seems especially odd for an elemental...

Undead should be overwhelming souls. Full-out elementals being kineticists is actually a bit weird conceptually, since it's all about the mixture of the elemental energy with a different sort of being, but I see absolutely nothing preventing or hindering it (unless I've somehow been missing something about elementals and nonlethal damage all this time?)

So what about the vast majority of kineticists who accidentally become undead? Who are in fact most undead as the only true voluntary undead is a Lich IIRC, and kineticists don't have a caster level. Do they automatically gain the overwhelming soul archetype? Or just... suck.

And holy crap you're right about elementals. I uh... guess I can knock a fire elemental unconscious by punching it repeatedly. That... makes no sense whatsoever. They're also immune to being unconscious, so non-lethal HP has zero effect at all until they reach the point where it's converted into lethal. Actually kind of OK with that as an elemental kineticist should be less vulnerable to burn. Granted, I kind of feel a fire elemental should be able to use any fire or composite fire ability and just ignore it's burn cost because, well, elemental of fire.

Designer

Myrryr wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Myrryr wrote:
Mark Seifter wrote:
Terminalmancer wrote:
Me either. A clarification for those folks who don't visit the forums might be nice, but I don't plan on running kineticist nonlethal that way regardless.
My previous clarification already clarifies this. "the effects she receives from nonlethal damage" does not mean the nonlethal damage itself. It means being staggered when the nld matches her current hp and unconscious when the nld is greater. Those are the effects. Yes there are weird ways in the game to get around that otherwise (without becoming immune to nld and being unable to use burn), even though that seems like the most basic definitional function of nld.

Out of curiousity Mark, is an undead or elemental kineticist effectively worthless then?

Seems especially odd for an elemental...

Undead should be overwhelming souls. Full-out elementals being kineticists is actually a bit weird conceptually, since it's all about the mixture of the elemental energy with a different sort of being, but I see absolutely nothing preventing or hindering it (unless I've somehow been missing something about elementals and nonlethal damage all this time?)

So what about the vast majority of kineticists who accidentally become undead? Who are in fact most undead as the only true voluntary undead is a Lich IIRC, and kineticists don't have a caster level. Do they automatically gain the overwhelming soul archetype? Or just... suck.

And holy crap you're right about elementals. I uh... guess I can knock a fire elemental unconscious by punching it repeatedly. That... makes no sense whatsoever. They're also immune to being unconscious, so non-lethal HP has zero effect at all until they reach the point where it's converted into lethal. Actually kind of OK with that as an elemental kineticist should be less vulnerable to burn. Granted, I kind of feel a fire elemental should be able to use any fire or composite fire ability and just ignore it's...

I don't think elementals are immune to being unconscious.


PRD:
"Elemental Subtype: An elemental is a being composed entirely from one of the four classical elements: air, earth, fire, or water. An elemental has the following features.

Immunity to bleed, paralysis, poison, sleep effects, and stunning.
Not subject to critical hits or flanking. Does not take additional damage from precision-based attacks, such as sneak attack.
Proficient with natural weapons only, unless generally humanoid in form, in which case proficient with all simple weapons and any weapons mentioned in its entry.
Proficient with whatever type of armor (light, medium, or heavy) it is described as wearing, as well as all lighter types. Elementals not indicated as wearing armor are not proficient with armor. Elementals are proficient with shields if they are proficient with any form of armor.
Elementals do not breathe, eat, or sleep."

They are immune to being stunned or slept, but not to being unconscious.


I know that's technically true, but it's a natural extension of being immune to sleep effects and for me, being unconscious is due to having a physical brain shut down. You can tear an elemental apart by damaging it, but for the same reason it's immune to poison, crits, diseases, etc., it doesn't have an organic body to rely on things. How exactly do you turn off a rocks head besides destroying it? There's no brain to shut down. It's entirely, solidly, and completely, a rock.


Myrryr wrote:
I know that's technically true, but it's a natural extension of being immune to sleep effects and for me, being unconscious is due to having a physical brain shut down. You can tear an elemental apart by damaging it, but for the same reason it's immune to poison, crits, diseases, etc., it doesn't have an organic body to rely on things. How exactly do you turn off a rocks head besides destroying it? There's no brain to shut down. It's entirely, solidly, and completely, a rock.

Then make them immune to nonlethal and/or being knocked unconscious. You have the RAW, you have the RAI, and you have (ostensibly) your house rule.


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Your punches have made the earth elemental quite fatigued and it goes unconscious.


Puna'chong wrote:
Myrryr wrote:
I know that's technically true, but it's a natural extension of being immune to sleep effects and for me, being unconscious is due to having a physical brain shut down. You can tear an elemental apart by damaging it, but for the same reason it's immune to poison, crits, diseases, etc., it doesn't have an organic body to rely on things. How exactly do you turn off a rocks head besides destroying it? There's no brain to shut down. It's entirely, solidly, and completely, a rock.
Then make them immune to nonlethal and/or being knocked unconscious. You have the RAW, you have the RAI, and you have (ostensibly) your house rule.

Yeah... On the plus side, I can now make elementals actually quite terrifying encounters. PC's generally just see them as big punching things, or maybe a whirlwind trick.

That large Earth Elemental suddenly throw Impale blasts and raising cover or creating rough, spiky terrain... yeah, yeah I rather like. I might just make it a base thing for all elementals to gain some kineticist abilities.

Designer

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Myrryr wrote:
Puna'chong wrote:
Myrryr wrote:
I know that's technically true, but it's a natural extension of being immune to sleep effects and for me, being unconscious is due to having a physical brain shut down. You can tear an elemental apart by damaging it, but for the same reason it's immune to poison, crits, diseases, etc., it doesn't have an organic body to rely on things. How exactly do you turn off a rocks head besides destroying it? There's no brain to shut down. It's entirely, solidly, and completely, a rock.
Then make them immune to nonlethal and/or being knocked unconscious. You have the RAW, you have the RAI, and you have (ostensibly) your house rule.

Yeah... On the plus side, I can now make elementals actually quite terrifying encounters. PC's generally just see them as big punching things, or maybe a whirlwind trick.

That large Earth Elemental suddenly throw Impale blasts and raising cover or creating rough, spiky terrain... yeah, yeah I rather like. I might just make it a base thing for all elementals to gain some kineticist abilities.

I will say this; if you like this idea, just you wait for the powerful elementally-themed monsters in B5. The anemos was one that we mentioned at a Gencon panel, for instance.


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I like the idea of a sleeping water elemental being a lake, or a sleeping fire elemental being cinders drifting about.


KingOfAnything wrote:

I'm not sure why you say that phantoms aren't viable in combat.

A level 1 anger phantom has slam +3/+3 1d8+3, or using the free Power Attack +2/+2 1d8+5. Not bad for first level

And they advance fairly well. That damage die goes up to 2d8 by level 10, with Str 20. They have effectively 3/4 BAB, have that trade AC for accuracy aura, and 1/day can rage and enlarge.

They aren't PC level strong, but they can make an effective combat companion. By lvl 10 you can have Cornugon Smash to add Intimidate to your attacks. That's a baseline slam +13/+13 2d8+9 with -2AC.

What is the "acceptable level"?

Also, can an anger phantom take Improved Natural Attack, or will that not stack with its Powerful Strike?

Taking the most damage fokust emotion and showing of what it can do at lvl1 is not proving anything. The only saving grace for it is that the phantom gets a full bab secound attack from lvl1 on.

And even then i can do the same with any other companion optimized and optimizing it further for damage and i can potentially double and depending on how far i want to go out of my way to do damage, even triple your damage at every lvl if i want to.
And most likely will still have a good amount more AC and/or hp.

And most importenly i am still not out of options.
Show me how you get with you anger phantom on a resonable amount of ac without armor and dex bonus.
On entry says you can, on you cant and even if you can always reequiping that gear can be realy annoying and potensially dangerous the spiritualist armor is connected to so as long as your phantom wears armor your spiritualist can not wear any.
Or more hp apart from ability bonus and toughness any other companion can get to and they still gets 1 more at the end.

Fact is, other companions can do at least almost as much damage as your anger phantom (the most straight damage one) and will still overall be better. Sorry but i am not starting with saves etc. the only think i am saying as an anger phantom you ref save will be terrible.


I could imagine a water elemental "punching" another water elemental hard enough that it is dispersed for a time. Not dead, but "offline" until it manages to re-coalesce. Otherwise, if you are a water elemental, roaming the plane of elemental water, and most of the other beings you encounter are other water elementals, is it really the case that all your interactions with your kind are either non-violent or fights to the death? In all their millennia of coexistence they never figured out how to take out one of their own without killing it?

Liberty's Edge

KingOfAnything wrote:

I'm not sure why you say that phantoms aren't viable in combat.

A level 1 anger phantom has slam +3/+3 1d8+3, or using the free Power Attack +2/+2 1d8+5. Not bad for first level

And they advance fairly well. That damage die goes up to 2d8 by level 10, with Str 20. They have effectively 3/4 BAB, have that trade AC for accuracy aura, and 1/day can rage and enlarge.

They aren't PC level strong, but they can make an effective combat companion. By lvl 10 you can have Cornugon Smash to add Intimidate to your attacks. That's a baseline slam +13/+13 2d8+9 with -2AC.

What is the "acceptable level"?

Also, can an anger phantom take Improved Natural Attack, or will that not stack with its Powerful Strike?

The problem with the phantom is that they don't age well. They're fairly strong at low level, but effectiveness drops of significantly. At higher levels they're not close to Eidolon level strength, which considering how close the class designs are, you would think it would be a little closer. But the real problem is that they aren't even animal companion level strong. Or rather, they have comparable stats to an animal companion, but don't get abilities like pounce, stun, grab, trip. And they only ever have the 2 natural attacks, compared to most animal companions that have 3+ or one super attack, plus the multiattack ability. And there are a lot of really great animal only buffs. I can't think of any that are outsider only off hand, and a lot of buff spells specify humanoid, which means the spiritualist is the only one who can cast it.

On top of that, every animal companion class is more capable in combat than the spiritualist. Outside of using the incorporeal phantom to scout 50 feet away, or using it to deliver touch attack, the spiritualist just doesn't have much going for it. And there's only one Focus for the Phantom that can fight effectively without weapon finesse and an agile amulet of mighty fists.

I'll admit, I haven't gone over every option for the spiritualist with a fine tooth comb yet, but from the amount of time I've spent looking at the class, it appears to be the weakest companion class yet, with very few interesting options.


Deighton Thrane wrote:

Or rather, they have comparable stats to an animal companion, but don't get abilities like pounce, stun, grab, trip. And they only ever have the 2 natural attacks, compared to most animal companions that have 3+ or one super attack, plus the multiattack ability. And there are a lot of really great animal only buffs. I can't think of any that are outsider only off hand, and a lot of buff spells specify humanoid, which means the spiritualist is the only one who can cast it.

Comparable stats to an animal companions without the significant upgrade at lvl7 and the animal can wear armor/apropiate items without it getting to annoying/dangerous.

seriously the phantom has just 4 things going for it over other companions.

-A very good scout abilitys (something you can safer reproduce with a more or less cheap item).
-More skill points mostly because of the bonus skillpoints of the emotional fokus.
-and every phantom has more or less one/some form of party buff.
Some bad, some ok and some good but non are significant enough to justify the sorry base.
-it can deliver touch spells for you at range that can honestly be very good but if you miss the spell is lost/still used up because the phantom can not "hold the charge".

GREAT!


As I cannot find it in the book I'll ask it there: what creature Type is the Phantom? Undead, Outsider or something else?


Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Entryhazard wrote:
As I cannot find it in the book I'll ask it there: what creature Type is the Phantom? Undead, Outsider or something else?

Page 79 in Starting Statistics, phantoms are Outsiders with the Phantom subtype.

Silver Crusade

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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

I really want to make a spiritualist archetype with his phantom bound to a zombie or a skeleton.


I really hate to admit this because of both how pathetic kineticist blasts are and because Burn's just bad, but the class as-is IS a bloody perfect fit -right down to even the burn- for actual elementals. Even explains itself if you're firing off chunks of yourself.


DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:
I really want to make a spiritualist archetype with his phantom bound to a zombie or a skeleton.

If you have nothing against 3rd party or are to fokust on the spiritualist.

try the white necromancer with the grave bound archetype
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/3rd-party-classes/kobold-press-open-design/ white-necromancer/archetypes/grave-bound

and if you are dead set on spiritualist you can let your phantom look like whatever you want.
I mean as example we are supposed to "choose" our own look of weapon.
As phantom you have slam attacks but in the release it says that you can let it look like any weapon you want because the phantom may try to cut you with a scythe but in reality he hits you with its ectoplasmic body.


I dunno, I think burn is cool. My players like it as a mechanic too. Gives a good reason to be a little conservative because there's a bite to it, and a nice trade-off for hitting harder or using some abilities. And it's for a class that'll usually be getting at least the equivalent of a d12 because it's basically a Con SAD class.


Puna'chong wrote:
I dunno, I think burn is cool. My players like it as a mechanic too. Gives a good reason to be a little conservative because there's a bite to it, and a nice trade-off for hitting harder or using some abilities. And it's for a class that'll usually be getting at least the equivalent of a d12 because it's basically a Con SAD class.

Still need to pump some points into Dex... can't damage what you can't hit! Granted, if you go with the energy blasts over physical then it's not as big of a deal. My personal opinion... physical blast is the way to go early on, then pick up the energy after the fact.


Luthorne wrote:
Entryhazard wrote:
As I cannot find it in the book I'll ask it there: what creature Type is the Phantom? Undead, Outsider or something else?
Page 79 in Starting Statistics, phantoms are Outsiders with the Phantom subtype.

Thank you , I couldn't really find the line


Puna'chong wrote:
I dunno, I think burn is cool. My players like it as a mechanic too. Gives a good reason to be a little conservative because there's a bite to it, and a nice trade-off for hitting harder or using some abilities. And it's for a class that'll usually be getting at least the equivalent of a d12 because it's basically a Con SAD class.

That would work if you were actually hitting hard, or if your abilities weren't things most others can do without killing themselves.


Technically if you want to put time into it you could Gather Energy to avoid taking Burn.

Especially when you get the Buffer, I think it's possible to fill it using Gather Energy instead of actually accepting Burn.

Liberty's Edge

Jamie Charlan wrote:
That would work if you were actually hitting hard, or if your abilities weren't things most others can do without killing themselves.

Almost every character I've seen had a 12-14 Constitution, save for a few truly dedicated defensive characters who had a 16 (but those are usually warrior types that are meant for melee combat anyway). My sixth level Kineticist has a 22. That plus Toughness means that I can use 4 points of burn and still have as many hit points available as any other d8 HD character, and I can use a few more points of burn and still be fine since I'm a ranged blaster, and I'm staying out of melee anyway. Plus, that buffer of nonlethal damage means that I will almost never die outright from damage: I'll fall unconscious long before there's a chance of damage getting me to -Con. HP.

And when you consider that I can routinely get my burn abilities to 0 burn with a move action and Infusion specialization, burn really isn't that big of a problem (in fact, most of my current infusions aren't meant to be combined, meaning that my blast is almost always 0 burn). And the first few points of burn are a benefit to me anyway, granting me +2 to attack and damage and a +2 size bonus to Dexterity and Constitution (which, coincidentally, negates the drawback of that third point of burn by giving me more hit points).

I don't need to deal a ton of damage with every hit, since I'm dealing consistently decent damage every round, with a ton of options for control or some utility bits. My Pyrokineticist can lay down waves of fire all over the battlefield with an at-will area attack for 3d6+5 fire damage in a 15ft. cone. My single-target blast can set people on fire with no save allowed, which is either considerable ongoing damage over time, or action-denial while they try to put the fire out... only for me to set them on fire again next round. I can pseudo-fly at-will at 6th level (an Aerokineticist can actually fly perfectly at the same level). With Searing Flame, I don't even blink at fire resistance, and I can put out a burning building with a single thought with Fire Sculptor. I've got an at-will ranged touch attack for decent damage, a massive pool of hit points that only goes down when I want it to, and several very interesting utility powers.

The Kineticist is just fine.


Gather Power says it works with blast wild talents. Internal Buffer isn't a kinetic blast, and it says you add 1 point to the buffer by accepting Burn, not by preventing it. It doesn't appear you can use Gather Power with talents like Kinetic Healer either. It heals damage equal to your kinetic blast's damage, but you don't actually manifest a kinetic blast when healing. It also has special rules for distributing the Burn to your subject (they are a lot less efficient at taking Burn than you are, apparently). If you could Gather Power with Kinetic Healer then you would be looking a infinite healing, between encounters, with the only resource being spent being the extra move action to prevent the Burn. And you would never leave the subject of your healing with 1 point of N-L damage per level or hit dice if you could have negated with a little extra time and a flashy display.


Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Entryhazard wrote:

Technically if you want to put time into it you could Gather Energy to avoid taking Burn.

Especially when you get the Buffer, I think it's possible to fill it using Gather Energy instead of actually accepting Burn.

You can't do that, but you can fill it by accepting burn just before you sleep and heal all the burn while still having a full buffer.

It is generally quite possible to avoid taking burn, though, or only taking burn for some of the nicer 24 hour buffs.


KingOfAnything wrote:

I'm not sure why you say that phantoms aren't viable in combat.

A level 1 anger phantom has slam +3/+3 1d8+3, or using the free Power Attack +2/+2 1d8+5. Not bad for first level

And they advance fairly well. That damage die goes up to 2d8 by level 10, with Str 20. They have effectively 3/4 BAB, have that trade AC for accuracy aura, and 1/day can rage and enlarge.

They aren't PC level strong, but they can make an effective combat companion. By lvl 10 you can have Cornugon Smash to add Intimidate to your attacks. That's a baseline slam +13/+13 2d8+9 with -2AC.

What is the "acceptable level"?

Also, can an anger phantom take Improved Natural Attack, or will that not stack with its Powerful Strike?

The emotion effects of phantoms like fear and despair can shut down psychic magic users who have many emotion component spells. Like a lot of PF expansions OA appears balanced against itself. When playtesting people used these classes and probably ran them against each other. It is also assumed that many people using OA are going to run "an occult-based game." If your Spiritualist is fighting opponents who need their minds free of emotional effects on a regular basis, then you are golden. Thrown into the wider game, this effect is less impressive. Certainly a Wizard or Alchemist who is under a Fear effect is going to be hindered, just like anyone else, but they won't loose access to whole swaths of their abilities.

I still like the class, but my first one is going to be an NPC to mess with my party rather than a personal character.


So let me get this straight.

-Nerf scissors (spiritualist)
-because it CAN BE op against paper(other OA classes)
-so it gets crushed even harder by rock (other classes)

But rock does not exist in this microcosmos of balance, so that leaves us with this.

-paper most of the time beats scissors. (its not like paper has a little less reliable tools to do the same to scissors)
-and scissors may barely beat paper in the op/same circumstance.

Is that what you are saying? Sounds realy balanced to me.

The dev did a realy good job.


They have a games sub-forum if you want to play rock, paper, scissors :-)


It is kinda worse than that. It would be R-P-S if Pathfinder were a PVP arena brawl. But you don't earn your XP by beating up other PC's you earn it by contributing to the party's efforts to overcome challenges.

The new set of psychic spellcasting rules includes that restriction that you can't cast a spell with an Emotion component if you are under an emotion effect yourself. This was part of the public playtest, so fans had a chance to speak up. Many home playtesting groups probably ran these classes against each other. I imagine the game devs were also running OA classes against monsters from the upcoming Occult Bestiary (64 page paperback, listed as containing 40+ monsters and variants) and material for the upcoming Bestiary 5. The phantom's emotion effects probably over-performed in those playtests.

But there are 4 Bestiary books, not a one of which contains a single monster who looses access to a key ability if it is under an emotional effect. There are over a dozen adventure paths and umpteen modules, none of which has a challenge that looses a chunk of its spell repertoire if it is under an emotion effect. None of the exiting PC and NPC classes cares about an emotion effect, beyond what the effect actually does to them. Occult Bestiary and B5 might change this, but it will mean DM's going out of their way to integrate material meant to make OA classes shine (or maybe hurt them extra -- I really don't know what the devs have in mind here).

If they had inserted the casting nerf into the phantom's description ("while under the effects of this despair, the following types of spells can not be cast:...") then it would have been backwards-compatible. But it is included in the type of magic, and it is a type that isn't in common use yet.


Bloodrealm wrote:
Milo v3 wrote:
Bloodrealm wrote:
Reading the posts on the Product Discussion from when just Subscribers had the book this book sounded great! Overwhelmingly positive on EVERYTHING. But now that it's out for everyone, all I'm seeing is complaints of everything in the book being incredibly underpowered and worthless, if flavourful, to the point where it's probably not worth the flavour to be so worthless. It's really killing my interest...
Only one class is underpowered, kineticist. And that's because it's basically a martial.

Yeah, I'm noticing that they're moving from "martials suck" up to "anything that even resembles a martial sucks."

Goodbye, Kensai sustainability. No thanks, Scarred Witch Doctor, don't need you around, so go cast in the back with the rest. Check out our hilarious Vigilante playtest: it thinks it's people! What we really need is ANOTHER full caster! BLANDY MCPSYCHIC and his 6-level sidekick GUY WHO STARES AT STUFF! One is just a Sorcerer, and the other stares at stuff!

Wait, what? What did i miss, what did they do to the Kensai?!


Torbyne wrote:
Bloodrealm wrote:
Milo v3 wrote:
Bloodrealm wrote:
Reading the posts on the Product Discussion from when just Subscribers had the book this book sounded great! Overwhelmingly positive on EVERYTHING. But now that it's out for everyone, all I'm seeing is complaints of everything in the book being incredibly underpowered and worthless, if flavourful, to the point where it's probably not worth the flavour to be so worthless. It's really killing my interest...
Only one class is underpowered, kineticist. And that's because it's basically a martial.

Yeah, I'm noticing that they're moving from "martials suck" up to "anything that even resembles a martial sucks."

Goodbye, Kensai sustainability. No thanks, Scarred Witch Doctor, don't need you around, so go cast in the back with the rest. Check out our hilarious Vigilante playtest: it thinks it's people! What we really need is ANOTHER full caster! BLANDY MCPSYCHIC and his 6-level sidekick GUY WHO STARES AT STUFF! One is just a Sorcerer, and the other stares at stuff!
Wait, what? What did i miss, what did they do to the Kensai?!

Flamboyant Arcana and Arcane Deed were nerfed into worthlessness, and Slashing Grace no longer works with Spell Combat, so grab your Scimitars and Rapiers.


Oh, yeah, I saw those but didn't see them as ending the kensai's usefulness. They are just preserving the dervish dancer tradition. Fine fine. The two most popular weapon choices for magus are still in play. I actually got to play a rapier using precise strike magus before the nerf,lots of fun and still not the highest damage dealer in the group. Oh well.

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