So, for example, if you wanted a sorcerer in full plate, all you have to do is take the psychic bloodline, which makes your spells count as psychic. The mindblade magus could start with heavy armor and a shield, as well, and have no spell failure chance.
The regular psychic casters can take whatever armor they want, and thus it seems like they'll be very tanky for casters.
Or am I missing something very obvious? I've been poring over relevant sections and searching for any sort of "spell failure" related phrase, but I simply can't find anything that contradicts this.
Well minus the "are they even trained in it" youare correct. Psychic has no ASF since there is no Somatic component.
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So, for example, if you wanted a sorcerer in full plate, all you have to do is take the psychic bloodline, which makes your spells count as psychic. The mindblade magus could start with heavy armor and a shield, as well, and have no spell failure chance.
The regular psychic casters can take whatever armor they want, and thus it seems like they'll be very tanky for casters.
Or am I missing something very obvious? I've been poring over relevant sections and searching for any sort of "spell failure" related phrase, but I simply can't find anything that contradicts this.
Flipside, you can now lose the ability to cast spells because a big muscly guy gave you an angry look.
This is now making me toy with the idea of a mindblade magus that fights using a sword/board style. Sword/shield is something the magus could never manage before for multiple reasons, but now that he doesn't suffer ASF and later abilities let him use spell combat while TWF, I think he can make it work.
I'm a little shaky on the details, especially early levels. What do you guys think?
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Flipside, you can now lose the ability to cast spells because a big muscly guy gave you an angry look.So, for example, if you wanted a sorcerer in full plate, all you have to do is take the psychic bloodline, which makes your spells count as psychic. The mindblade magus could start with heavy armor and a shield, as well, and have no spell failure chance.
The regular psychic casters can take whatever armor they want, and thus it seems like they'll be very tanky for casters.
Or am I missing something very obvious? I've been poring over relevant sections and searching for any sort of "spell failure" related phrase, but I simply can't find anything that contradicts this.
Unless there's been a FAQ response or blog post to say this, no, Intimidate does not trigger the Emotion component failure condition. It is a fear effect, but it does not have the fear descriptor because it is not a spell. Emotion components are only impacted by emotion and fear descriptors. Only spells have descriptors.
This was pointed out in the playtest and IIRC the designers said that was intended. Why should armor interfere with your mind working anyway?
This is now making me toy with the idea of a mindblade magus that fights using a sword/board style. Sword/shield is something the magus could never manage before for multiple reasons, but now that he doesn't suffer ASF and later abilities let him use spell combat while TWF, I think he can make it work.
I'm a little shaky on the details, especially early levels. What do you guys think?
At 7th level he can use Spell Combat while TWF with two weapons, but only if both weapons are psychic weapons.
When using two-weapon fighting with two psychic weapons or a psychic double weapon, the mindblade can use her spell combat ability as though she had a hand free.
So your shield would have to be one of your psychic weapons. That should work with a light shield, heavy shield, or klar since they are all listed as weapons. But your shield would only be enhanced as a weapon, not as a shield so you are only looking at the base shield bonus of +1 or +2. And that won't stack with other shield bonuses. It wouldn't really be worth it to me, compared to fighting with two high-crit psychic weapons.
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Unless there's been a FAQ response or blog post to say this, no, Intimidate does not trigger the Emotion component failure condition. It is a fear effect, but it does not have the fear descriptor because it is not a spell. Emotion components are only impacted by emotion and fear descriptors. Only spells have descriptors.Flipside, you can now lose the ability to cast spells because a big muscly guy gave you an angry look.So, for example, if you wanted a sorcerer in full plate, all you have to do is take the psychic bloodline, which makes your spells count as psychic. The mindblade magus could start with heavy armor and a shield, as well, and have no spell failure chance.
The regular psychic casters can take whatever armor they want, and thus it seems like they'll be very tanky for casters.
Or am I missing something very obvious? I've been poring over relevant sections and searching for any sort of "spell failure" related phrase, but I simply can't find anything that contradicts this.
Apparently you don't have to be a spell to have a spell descriptor, since "Intimidate, in particular, is a mind-affecting fear effect".
So yeah, Intimidate shuts down psychic casting, which makes the whole "no arcane spell failure" benefit just a nice perk, not some huge advantage.
***Edit***
Wait, I just realized that you're trying to say that just because it's a fear effect, doesn't mean it's an effect with the fear descriptor. That's a really nice attempt at rules chicanery, but I don't buy it for a minute. Intimidate shuts down psychic casting, RAW and RAI.
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Wait, I just realized that you're trying to say that just because it's a fear effect, doesn't mean it's an effect with the fear descriptor. That's a really nice attempt at rules chicanery, but I don't buy it for a minute. Intimidate shuts down psychic casting, RAW and RAI.
The rules do not state that fear effects shut down psychic casting. Instead they specifically call out effects with the emotion or fear descriptors, and those are exclusive to spells and SLAs. I don't believe that this was an accident. (Note that the text specifically points out that the emotion descriptor is the spell descriptor from UM.)
I'm feeling lazy tonight, so I'm going to cut and paste from a previous post of mine.
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In my opinion, spells or SLA's with the "emotion" or "fear" descriptors prevent you from casting psychic spells with emotion components, but other things that create fear or other emotions do not.
Emotion Components: Emotion components represent a particular emotional state required to cast the spell. A psychic spellcaster marshals her desire in order to focus and release the spell’s energy. It is impossible to cast a spell with an emotion component while the spellcaster is under the influence of a non-harmless effect with the emotion or fear descriptors. (The emotion descriptor was originally introduced in Pathfinder RPG Ultimate Magic.) Even if the effect’s emotion matches the necessary emotion to cast the psychic spell, the spellcaster is not in control of her own desires and animal impulses, which is a necessary part of providing an emotion component.
The first two sentences make it clear that the term "emotion components" literally means that the psychic caster uses her emotions as spell components. The caster digs deep into her own anger, happiness, fear, etc. and uses that emotion as fuel for a spell. She needs that emotion to succeed. Reading the third sentence by itself might suggest that fear effects prevent casting because it overwhelms a psychic caster, but given the context I don't see it that way. When a barbarian swings his greatsword in a Dazzling Display, the psychic caster may well be shaken, but that fear is just another log she can throw on the bonfire of her mind. Her strangely wired brain can turn that fear into magic.
So if emotions help psychic casters, then why does it say that effects with the emotion or fear descriptors prevent them from casting spells with emotion components?
I think the key distinction is put forth in the last sentence. Even if the caster normally uses her fear to fuel a particular spell, she can't cast that spell if she is under the influence of, say, the Fear Spell. And this is because while under the effect of that spell "the spellcaster is not in control of her own desires and animal impulses." The aforementioned barbarian might have inspired fear in the psychic caster, but that fear belonged to the caster. It came from her own body and brain. But the fear created by the Fear Spell doesn't arise from within the psychic caster. It is externally imposed by magic. The psychic caster can't manipulate that external energy, and it overwhelms her normal ability to access and use her own emotions. I think that the language regarding "descriptors" was chosen specifically because it separates these emotion-imposing spells and SLA's from the various actions that merely inspire emotional reactions.
But people are going to keep arguing about this until we get a FAQ, so please go here and click the FAQ button.
Seems to me that Intimidate is a fear effect
No one is disagreeing with you on that. It is definitely a fear effect. We have a FAQ for that already.
What makes something a fear effect? What about a morale effect?
Fear effects include spells with the fear descriptor, anything explicitly called out as a fear effect, anything that causes the shaken, frightened, or panicked condition, and all uses of the Intimidate skill. Intimidate, in particular, is a mind-affecting fear effect, so fearless and mindless creatures are immune to all uses of Intimidate.
Morale effects, unlike fear effects, so far have not had a descriptor or a call-out. Anything that grants a morale bonus is a morale effect. For example, the rage spell grants a morale bonus, so a creature immune to morale effects would be immune to the entire spell, including the –2 penalty to AC.
That's pretty much an emotional fear descriptor to me. It's an "effect" just as much a spell is.
That is where we are going to disagree. The term "descriptor" has a technical meaning in Pathfinder.
[Descriptor]
Appearing on the same line as the school and subschool, when applicable, is a descriptor that further categorizes the spell in some way. Some spells have more than one descriptor.
The Intimidate Skill does not have a descriptor. I think it is worth noting how the FAQ I quoted above uses the phrase "fear descriptor" only for spells and not for any other causes of fear effects.
But you're right, clearly an FAQ is in order.
Oh, yes.
Yeah... The "components' of psychic magic are not very well designed. They are either unstoppable (thought component) or way-too-easily stopped (emotional component).
I'll just houserule these classes so they stick to verbal and somatic components.
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Yeah... The "components' of psychic magic are not very well designed. They are either unstoppable (thought component) or way-too-easily stopped (emotional component).
I'll just houserule these classes so they stick to verbal and somatic components.
Thought components are easily stopped by being in melee range of the caster. Did you not see the +10 DC to any concentration check on thought components?
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Thought components are easily stopped by being in melee range of the caster. Did you not see the +10 DC to any concentration check on thought components?
Unless you don't use a move action. Then it's a normal concentration check.
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Unless you don't use a move action. Then it's a normal concentration check.
Thought components are easily stopped by being in melee range of the caster. Did you not see the +10 DC to any concentration check on thought components?
And then you can't apply metamagic or cast a full round spell.
Thought components are easily stopped by being in melee range of the caster. Did you not see the +10 DC to any concentration check on thought components?Yeah... The "components' of psychic magic are not very well designed. They are either unstoppable (thought component) or way-too-easily stopped (emotional component).
I'll just houserule these classes so they stick to verbal and somatic components.
Ah, so they changed that? Good to know... Then it's not as bad as I thought. My mistake.
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I dislike balance via hard cc. Yes it does seem like psychics get shut down by a scary face. Which just puts them on par with martials who get shut down far before they get within 30ft of the caster
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Yeah... The "components' of psychic magic are not very well designed. They are either unstoppable (thought component) or way-too-easily stopped (emotional component).
I'll just houserule these classes so they stick to verbal and somatic components.
By the way, I liked your idea about emotion/fear descriptors forcing some sort of concentration check over complete shut-down.
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The component penalties are pretty severe, but against that you can wear armor and there's (apparently) no way to identify the spell with a Spellcraft check, so you're not subject to counterspelling and can get away with mental manipulation in social situations. I think it's a fair trade off. You're potentially more survivable but easier to shut down in combat, and you're going to excel at puppet master shenanigans. At the same time your limited spell list makes you a lot less useful than an arcane/divine spell caster in other situations.