Just for rules clarification as there is a potential feat that they can take (Powerful Poisoner) which has the rider poisoned weapon. Does their bite attack count as a poisoned weapon?
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Hmm, I agree, it could go either way. "Weapon" is a general term, so strictly speaking it could work. One could easily argue that the author of the dirty tactics toolbox meant "manufactures weapons" instead of just "weapons".
Ask your GM.
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Hmm, I agree, it could go either way. "Weapon" is a general term, so strictly speaking it could work. One could easily argue that the author of the dirty tactics toolbox meant "manufactures weapons" instead of just "weapons".
Ask your GM.
Balance wise my main problem is that a manufactured weapon normally has only 1 dose of poison, then you must reapply it or switch to another weapon.
A creature with a poisonous attack can use it an unlimited number of times, so the effect of the feat is greatly enhanced.
You can add that manufactured poison that is applied to a weapon has a production cost and a set DC.
A poisonous attack no cost and its DC can be increased; most poison DC is constitution based and a simple enhancement to constitution can augment it.
As usual piling up bonuses can turn something that seem reasonable into something very powerful.
For those reasons I think that the RAI is manufactured weapons.
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You've convinced me Diego, that's a very good point. I would rule it as only working for manufactured weapons. Or at least only on applied poisons that only work once per dose.
You've convinced me Diego, that's a very good point. I would rule it as only working for manufactured weapons. Or at least only on applied poisons that only work once per dose.
I agree, my first reaction was that it worked but Diego makes a really good point.
Perhaps the first bite attack could make use of the feat. Pseudo-simulating the creature spending time essentially milking it's poison glands and building up a lot of poison in its mouth before the first bite. GM call of course but it does address Diego's main game balance concern of only allowing the feat to count once. It could be a full round action to rebuild the poison, same as reapplying poison onto a blade. (If the action economy is out as an equivalent to get vial of poison and apply adjust accordingly)
I wouldn't mind a houserule along the lines of what Hugo suggests, although I would make the recovery time for it significantly longer, basically making it a "once per combat" ability.
Perhaps the first bite attack could make use of the feat. Pseudo-simulating the creature spending time essentially milking it's poison glands and building up a lot of poison in its mouth before the first bite. GM call of course but it does address Diego's main game balance concern of only allowing the feat to count once. It could be a full round action to rebuild the poison, same as reapplying poison onto a blade. (If the action economy is out as an equivalent to get vial of poison and apply adjust accordingly)
The only problem I would have with that house rule is that they are basically getting around having to purchase the poison while always getting the feats benefit. I don't think it would necessarily break the game if you wanted to do that but in my game I would disallow it just to avoid possible unforeseen shenanigans.
P.S. I would like to thank everyone in this thread for making it possible for me to use the word shenanigans. That is incredibly fun to type and to say. Shenanigans.
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Just for rules clarification as there is a potential feat that they can take (Powerful Poisoner) which has the rider poisoned weapon. Does their bite attack count as a poisoned weapon?
It's "Powerful Poisoning."
Prerequisites are: "Power Attack; Craft (poison) 3 ranks or poison use class feature."
Homonculous would need to have Power Attack, and have it's own Craft (poison) to three ranks (as opposed to using it's master's ranks in the skill, so sage archetype) or it would require it's own poison use class feature. That's how I read it.
I otherwise don't think it applies natural poison attacks, but I think the homonculous doesn't meet the prerequisites for the feat, so it's a moot point.
I think if you managed to meet the other prerequisites, you could let this one slide (houserule) and allow the natural poison to qualify for a homonculous in a non-PFS game. Seems reasonable given that the homonculous isn't a natural creature and is actually manufactured, so their natural attacks aren't really natural from the normal standpoint.
I otherwise agree that it is intended to only function with manufactured weapons.
I would have considerable difficulty justifying how a creature with a natural poison attack doesn't implicitly have craft (poison) or poison use, at least as far as their own poison is concerned. I agree that the Power Attack prerequisite would need to be satisfied though.
While I doubt it was written with poisonous natural weapons in mind, I do think that the feat could apply to them as written.
Qualifying for it would usually be difficult with a homonculus, but the Promethean Alchemist would do it easily enough.
I think that the question, in general, in important though. The viper, scorpion, and spider familiars out there may have an easier time qualifying with the Mauler archetype.
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Weapon and natural weapons are different. I am not convinced it work but it can be interpreted differently.
Aspect table variations and ask your GM are the only possible replies.
Actually you are incorrect here, Natural attacks ARE weapons. This question was answered awhile ago and the Devs (SKR specifically had this to say):
Thorns: You should say "creatures striking with manufactured weapons" rather than "creatures striking with melee weapons," because natural attacks and unarmed strikes are melee weapons, and you're actually wanting to exclude manufactured weapon attacks from being affected by this ability.
Here's the link to the dev clarification: Dev Clarification
As for the homonculus qualifying for it please remember that this specific creature can be custom created by it's master, so with a bit of gold and a few skill checks it can easily hit the requirements for the feats and skills necessary to qualify for it.
Yes, we are agreed that a very strict reading of the ability would allow it to work because natural weapons are weapons, but we believe the intent to be for applied poisons to manufactured weapons because the feat is ridiculously powerful if it can be applied to natural poisons.
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Yes, we are agreed that a very strict reading of the ability would allow it to work because natural weapons are weapons, but we believe the intent to be for applied poisons to manufactured weapons because the feat is ridiculously powerful if it can be applied to natural poisons.
It's really not that powerful of an ability, it has built in restrictions that keep it from ever being viable for what the OP is wanting to do.
Remember that:This can't cause the save DC to exceed 15 + 1/2 your character level.
Since homonculi and all familiars/critters don't have character levels this feat doesn't actually benefit them very much since it just lets them get a DC 15 poison which is negligible return on this investment.
Now if the OP REALLY wanted to max out the Homonculi's DC on this poison he can just spend extra gold to give it more HD which automatically increase the DC of the poison beyond this feat's limit (8,000GP equals what this feat does and 10,000+ exceeds it) with the added benefit of more HP's, a better attack bonus, better saves, etc.
This feat works for natural attack poisoners but it's not worth the cost, especially when there are MUCH better options of getting superior results.
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Yes, we are agreed that a very strict reading of the ability would allow it to work because natural weapons are weapons, but we believe the intent to be for applied poisons to manufactured weapons because the feat is ridiculously powerful if it can be applied to natural poisons.It's really not that powerful of an ability, it has built in restrictions that keep it from ever being viable for what the OP is wanting to do.
Remember that:
This can't cause the save DC to exceed 15 + 1/2 your character level.Since homonculi and all familiars/critters don't have character levels this feat doesn't actually benefit them very much since it just lets them get a DC 15 poison which is negligible return on this investment.
Now if the OP REALLY wanted to max out the Homonculi's DC on this poison he can just spend extra gold to give it more HD which automatically increase the DC of the poison beyond this feat's limit (8,000GP equals what this feat does and 10,000+ exceeds it) with the added benefit of more HP's, a better attack bonus, better saves, etc.
This feat works for natural attack poisoners but it's not worth the cost, especially when there are MUCH better options of getting superior results.
Take it with a poisonous animal companion or edidolon and we will see if it is "really not that powerful of an ability".
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Yes, we are agreed that a very strict reading of the ability would allow it to work because natural weapons are weapons, but we believe the intent to be for applied poisons to manufactured weapons because the feat is ridiculously powerful if it can be applied to natural poisons.It's really not that powerful of an ability, it has built in restrictions that keep it from ever being viable for what the OP is wanting to do.
Remember that:
This can't cause the save DC to exceed 15 + 1/2 your character level.Since homonculi and all familiars/critters don't have character levels this feat doesn't actually benefit them very much since it just lets them get a DC 15 poison which is negligible return on this investment.
Now if the OP REALLY wanted to max out the Homonculi's DC on this poison he can just spend extra gold to give it more HD which automatically increase the DC of the poison beyond this feat's limit (8,000GP equals what this feat does and 10,000+ exceeds it) with the added benefit of more HP's, a better attack bonus, better saves, etc.
This feat works for natural attack poisoners but it's not worth the cost, especially when there are MUCH better options of getting superior results.
Take it with a poisonous animal companion or edidolon and we will see if it is "really not that powerful of an ability".
Ok, go ahead and run the math on it then, you'll see it at MOST increases the DC to 15, that's it. As I said before
This can't cause the save DC to exceed 15 + 1/2 your character level.
Animal Companions and eidolon's DON'T HAVE CHARACTER LEVELS!!!
This feat as written simply max's the DC for the poison to 15, that's it.Now if you can find a way to do multiple attacks to inflict the poison and ruin the targets saves that's better but if you can already do that then this feat wasn't really needed in the first place.
It's not that big of a deal.
I would have considerable difficulty justifying how a creature with a natural poison attack doesn't implicitly have craft (poison) or poison use, at least as far as their own poison is concerned. I agree that the Power Attack prerequisite would need to be satisfied though.Actually, the fact that a poison ability (as opposed to the poison use ability) isn't included as an option in the prerequisites rather suggests that it isn't meant to work with a creature's natural poison
You are certainly entitled to that opinion. Wearing my GM hat, I try to look at whether the player is going for a powergaming option or something that is cool and flavourful. I think in this case it is reasonable - and probably actually a bad idea. Bear in mind the player has to find 5 extra strength points to qualify for Power Attack and then spend 2 feats to get this ability even without the debateable craft(poison)/poison use qualifier.
Character levels lol. You're really splitting hairs now.
You are certainly entitled to that opinion. Wearing my GM hat, I try to look at whether the player is going for a powergaming option or something that is cool and flavourful. I think in this case it is reasonable - and probably actually a bad idea. Bear in mind the player has to find 5 extra strength points to qualify for Power Attack and then spend 2 feats to get this ability even without the debateable craft(poison)/poison use qualifier.I would have considerable difficulty justifying how a creature with a natural poison attack doesn't implicitly have craft (poison) or poison use, at least as far as their own poison is concerned. I agree that the Power Attack prerequisite would need to be satisfied though.Actually, the fact that a poison ability (as opposed to the poison use ability) isn't included as an option in the prerequisites rather suggests that it isn't meant to work with a creature's natural poison
Someone figured out what I was doing early on in the thread. In order to qualify as a Promethean Alchemist I need a Belt of Giant's Strength +2. Admittedly, I asked this before I read through the spell list for Alchemists at higher levels which is a lot more useful way to deliver poisons. Thanks.
Character levels lol. You're really splitting hairs now.If you don't want to use the rules as they are written for your games that's entirely your call but then you are playing a different game then the rest of us.
"Character" levels are defined that way for a reason.
Not being a pedantic rules lawyer is not the same thing as ignoring the RAW.
Not only that, you're flat out wrong as the quote from Ranata proves.
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Bear in mind the player has to find 5 extra strength points to qualify for Power Attack and then spend 2 feats to get this ability even without the debateable craft(poison)/poison use qualifier.Someone figured out what I was doing early on in the thread. In order to qualify as a Promethean Alchemist I need a Belt of Giant's Strength +2. Admittedly, I asked this before I read through the spell list for Alchemists at higher levels which is a lot more useful way to deliver poisons. Thanks.
I could be wrong, but I don't think magical enhancements to strength qualify you for feats that require a certain strength.