Goblin Gunslinger feat


Rules Questions


Good evening, fellow rule lawyers.

The feat goblin gunslinger reads:
You have learned how to fire the big guns.
Prerequisites: Goblin.
Benefit: You can wield Medium firearms without taking the penalty for an inappropriately sized weapon.
Normal: You take a –2 penalty when using an inappropriately sized weapon.

Now, I am aware that some exceedingly stupid people abused the paragraph of the firearms rule that said “The size of a firearm never affects how many hands you need to use to shoot it.”, by going around lugging large firearms on small characters and other such nonsense, which forced Paizo to produce the following errata:

The text of the rule is, “The size of a firearm never affects how many hands you need to use to shoot it.” The intent of that rule was to prevent a Medium character from using a Small rifle as a one-handed pistol; it wasn’t intended to let a Medium character use a Large, Huge, Gargantuan, or Colossal two-handed firearm as a two-handed weapon. Just like with non-firearms, a creature cannot wield a weapon that’s far too big or small for it. Specifically in the case of firearms, a Medium character can’t use a two-handed firearm sized for a Large or larger creature, and a Small character can’t use a two-handed firearm sized for a Medium or larger creature.

Now, my question is as follows (please read carefully before answering...)

Given the feat and the following errata, the goblin gunslinger feat is literally useless.

All it would do, as things stand, is to allow a small goblin to wield a medium sized pistol two handed, and fire it with no penalties.

The problem here is that a medium pistol deals 1d8 damage, whereas a small sized musket deals 1d10 (and also needs to be wielded two-handed).

Please take into account that although goblins are seen as "comical relief", the other goblin racial feats are not useless, quite far from it.

To me it seems like the original feat intended for goblins to be able to use medium sized firearms with no penalties - and thus be able to wield a medium sized musket (the increase in damage is 1d10 ---> 1d12, hardly anything to write home about) two-handed with no penalties, to emphasize their destructive nature. What do you think?

I would of course welcome an official errata of said feat. As it stands, I would really like to be able to keep my medium musket for the fun of it, but am prepared to give up that op extra 1d2 damage dice for other feats.

Thank you for your help.

Edit: I am aware of other board posts about this. I did, however, bring some more reasoning to the table.


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Estrosiath wrote:
Given the feat and the following errata, the goblin gunslinger feat is literally useless.

I disagree, for the reason you quoted.

Estrosiath wrote:

The feat goblin gunslinger reads:

You have learned how to fire the big guns.
Prerequisites: Goblin.
Benefit: You can wield Medium firearms without taking the penalty for an inappropriately sized weapon.
Normal: You take a –2 penalty when using an inappropriately sized weapon.

You don't take any penalty for using a Medium firearm. This includes not only the -2 for wielding a medium pistol, but also any handedness rules there might exist (even though these don't seem to apply to firearms).

So a goblin with this feat can use a medium firearm in the exact same number of hands he could have used a small firearm of the same type. So this feat grants him the flexibility to use medium-sized firearms he finds/purchases, and when he does so, he benefits from the greater damage dice (as small of a difference as that might be).


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No, you don't get it.

As the feat is written, as it stands, nowhere is it written that the feat overcomes the "handedness". All it says is that the goblin does not take penalties for using medium firearms. Nowhere is it stated he can actually WIELD the medium firearm with two hands, where by the rules it requires three since it is a medium musket.


Disagreed.

First, we have the rules about firearm handedness, specifically:

Firearms wrote:
You cannot make optimum use of a firearm that is not properly sized for you. A cumulative –2 penalty applies on attack rolls for each size category of difference between your size and the size of the firearm. If you are not proficient with the firearm, a –4 nonproficiency penalty also applies. The size of a firearm never affects how many hands you need to use to shoot it, the exception being siege firearms and Large or larger creatures. In most cases, a Large or larger creature can use a siege firearm as a two-handed firearm, but the creature takes a –4 penalty for using it this way because of its awkwardness.

A FAQ that was released clarifies that while this is limited and mentions a general inability for Small creatures to wield two-handed weapons sized for medium creatures, which brings me to my second point.

Equipment wrote:
The measure of how much effort it takes to use a weapon (whether the weapon is designated as a light, one-handed, or two-handed weapon for a particular wielder) is altered by one step for each size category of difference between the wielder’s size and the size of the creature for which the weapon was designed. For example, a Small creature would wield a Medium one-handed weapon as a two-handed weapon. If a weapon’s designation would be changed to something other than light, one-handed, or two-handed by this alteration, the creature can’t wield the weapon at all.

So, a medium-sized pistol would be a two-handed weapon in the hands of a goblin, so he can still wield it (and in one hand, due to the firearm rules and the related FAQ). A medium-sized musket would be something beyond two-handed and become unwieldable by the goblin, as clarified by the FAQ.

So the goblin cannot wield the medium weapon due to this rule about size differences.
This is a penalty. You are being penalized for using a Medium-sized weapon (by not only the -2 to attack rolls, but the handedness difference) when you are a goblin.
The feat says you can wield them without taking penalties for inappropriate-sized weapons. Of which this is included.

How is this not getting it?


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The game has a definition for what a penalty is. It isn't just anything bad.

Quote:
Penalty: Penalties are numerical values that are subtracted from a check or statistical score. Penalties do not have a type and most penalties stack with one another.

The number of hands a weapon requires may be a drawback or limitation, but as far as the rules are concerned it is not a penalty.


Point made, I was unaware of that formal definition.
The part regarding the absence of the -2 penalties still stands, however, making the feat not 'literally useless'.


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Don't be a stickler for RAW, because it's obvious what the feat was intended to do.

Goblins with that feat can use medium guns without penalty, including ignoring number of hands.


I agree with Claxon, sometimes things are just so obvious in RAI, it makes no sense to get hung up on RAW.


I'm not sure if we can discern the author intent with any certainty (a lot of firearm-related material is legitimately so bad that it's clear the author never thought it through), but as a practical matter agree with Claxon here. This feat is sub-par even with the most liberal of interpretations, and Gunslingers aren't exactly known for having the room to spend on flavorful but mechanically weak feats.

Scarab Sages

Estrosiath wrote:

Given the feat and the following errata, the goblin gunslinger feat is literally useless.

All it would do, as things stand, is to allow a small goblin to wield a medium sized pistol two handed, and fire it with no penalties.

The problem here is that a medium pistol deals 1d8 damage, whereas a small sized musket deals 1d10 (and also needs to be wielded two-handed).

If this is the case, still doesn't seem useless to me.

Been running a halfling lately in PFS. Often, I'm the one in the party that has planned ahead and has a spare weapon that bypasses the DR that the opponent has. That said, I have a SMALL version, so my party of (usually) medium characters can't use it or doesn't want to. It's come up enough, where I've started considering running Oversized weapons on my character.

A feat like this, which allows medium weapons to be wielded by a small creature without penalty, sounds really useful, if only for being equipped with weapons my allies can share (and that I can borrow from my allies).


Claxon wrote:

Don't be a stickler for RAW, because it's obvious what the feat was intended to do.

Goblins with that feat can use medium guns without penalty, including ignoring number of hands.

Sometimes the "obvious" answer is wrong. Before the arrow FAQ, the vast majority of people thought it was obvious that a magic bow granted it's enchantment bonus to arrows for bypassing DR...

As is, it just removes inappropriately sized weapon penalty. As to intent... I don't know, it's hard to say. It could be intended for goblins to have a big pistols for pistolero antics: for the pistolero the feat is just as good as it was before the errata.


I was thinking since the gun is larger than the goblin it would prove you can't use two - handed weapons, but the comical opportunity just seems to support it...


I remember seeing some artwork of a goblin in association with this feat who appeared to be carrying full sized guns, was that official or 3rd party?

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My assumption would be that much like Prone Shooter in its original format, or the Titan Mauler Archetype this feat was meant to do what it says on the box, which it would have when unchained released. Then however the FAQ hit and made it so that it did nothing. If your looking for a ruling for a home game and your the GM it's not gonna be broken, if your the player ask the GM. If its for PFS might check the Additional resources and ask over there if anything has been said on it.

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