Ice's Island of Relative Order

Game Master icehawk333

Should we be worried? :D

Always

Should we be worried? :D

Only if you need your lungs to breathe.

(This is just a quip, don't take it too seriously)

Lwazi wrote:

Should we be worried? :D

Only if you need your lungs to breathe.

(This is just a quip, don't take it too seriously)

Ya know, the last iteration of Midioto DIDN'T need his lungs to breathe... Or speak... He should be FINE. :)

Hey folks. My character is all set, so I'll be joining up once you guys get to where you need to be.

Anyways, Hi! As you can see, my username is either impossible or tedious to pronounce depending on whether you attempt to enterprate those symbols as letters or words respectively, so most folks on the boards just call Magic. I've been on the paizo boards for about 4 and half years and playing pathfinder for about 5 and a half. I've been told I'm a good deal better at role play than optimization, so I hope to make this fun for you guys if not any easier.

As far as IRL goes, I'm a Junior in college, so I may have slightly busier times than others, but when I stay in the swing of things, I'm usually pretty good about posting.

I hope to get to know you guys better as the game goes on. :)

First purple fruit eaten...
Also, pity I didn't think of it earlier, but I am a teleporter! I have Warp Stones! I could have just opened a portal back home and had our new friend come through :/
Pity :,(

Also, Hello!! A little belated but nice to meat you :)
My names Cameron. I'm unemployed, but I have a disability that prevents me from working, so I usually have a lot of time to post. However, it also sometimes makes posting difficult, so I can be a bit inconsistent.
Still! I love my character, Midioto, him and my old pal Claptrap are my favorite characters :) One is Freedom in Movement (and hyperactive!) and the other is machine-like brilliance (and crazy). Both are socially awkward :)
They are fun ^_^

Nah, it's ok. More fun this way. :)

Plus I'm not sure you guys are IC aware of your previous Miner's disappearance yet, or if he's actually gone yet.

Nice to meet you too. :)

As far as we know, hes right beside us (if a little catatonic and silent). We havn't really figured out how we are getting rid of him yet...
...Unless the GM has already offed him and we just don't know it yet XD

Maybe someone should check in on him? @-@

The spider bat could have eaten him, and you find the new guy in a web pod?

We've already established how he shows up.

I've got plans for thorak.

It was mostly a joke

Midioto, if you don't post by tonight, i'm moving on.

Thanks for the nudge, it helped.

Surprisingly I do not get a Spellcraft check to identify the spell if you suppress the display :/

Identify a power being manifested. (You must sense the power’s display, or see some visible effect, to identify a power.)

That is a surprise to me, I have to first see your display (or effect of your spell) and then I get a Spellcraft check.

Huh, someone at Dreamscarred Press must have disliked that particular change in PF. Fine by me. I'll post nicking your apple in a mo, forum dice roller permitting.

Here's the details on psionic focus & expending it to take 15.

Gain Psionic Focus: Merely having the ability to hold a reservoir of psionic power points in mind gives psionic characters a special energy. Psionic characters can put that energy to work without actually paying a power point cost—they can become psionically focused.

If you have a power point pool or the ability to manifest psi-like abilities, you can meditate to become psionically focused. Meditating is a full-round action that provokes attacks of opportunity.

When you are psionically focused, you can expend your focus on any single concentration check you make thereafter. When you expend your focus in this manner, your concentration check is treated as if you rolled a 15. It’s like taking 10, except that the number you add to your concentration modifier is 15. You can also expend your focus to gain the benefit of a psionic feat—many psionic feats are activated in this way.

Cool. You know, if I had known about that, I could have probably prevented myself from getting half eaten :/

That also means I could probably make a completely undetectable Psion Mentalist, mind-muking everyone around me without them realizing that I am the one doing it :p
Being unable to see the effects of a spell, or use Spellcraft to identify it seems highly abusable and powerful, probably overpowered if your clever enough.
Edit: and Elans get bonuses to concentration checks :/

Learn something new every day!

I didn't even know that about Psionic foucs.

They do make it a bit hard to find. It's part of the description of Psionic Feats. Unless you have something that uses Psionic Focus either dispelled or active, it's really the only thing Psionic Focus actually does.
If you're an upclose caster and you have an extra feat, Wild Talent might even be worth taking just for that one shot fairly-sure spell you can get cast when concentration checks are necessary.

Psionic Focus is mainly a mechanic used to limit your action economy.
Metamagic expends your focus (each feat expends seperately) and it takes a full-round action to regain your focus normally. Powers out of combat like casting a Persistant Inertial Armor at the begining of the day are basically unaffected, but you are generally limited to 1 metamagic power in combat unless you are willing to spend a full-round action doing nothing.

You can dump your feats into ways of getting around this but they can be a large investment.
Psionic Meditation reduces it to a move action to refocus, allowing you to metamagic multiple powers in a combat by effectively increasing your casting times to a full-round action.
Deep Focus gives you 2 sepperate focuses at once.
Psicrystal Containment lets your psicrystal (familiar) focus for you.
Metapsionic Mastery lets you stack multiple metamagic feats together for a specific, single power, but each feat costs an additional 2pp, reducing the amount you can augment it.

Aside from that, regaining your psionic focus also allows you to change your "Active Energy Type" wich simply determines what damage type certain spells like Energy Push does.

Certain spells, like Untouchable Aura give you an additional option if you expend your focus, this one lets you cast it as an immediate action.
Cantrips can be cast for free if you expend your focus.

Some class features also work off of your focus, like my Psions ability to teleport can only be used if I am Psionically Focused. This is the main reason I dont use Metamagic feats. I can't teleport if I use metamagic :)
A Wilder can Surge for free if he expends his focus, but at greater risk. It can be very powerful, at 19th a Chaotic Wilder can cast a spell at a +31 caster level for free! That can be any power augmented/metamagiced up to lvl 31, like a 31d10 Mind Thrust.
Ect.

There are also feats that only apply when you are Psionically Focused, like Speed of Thought, which grants you +10ft speed while you are focused, or you can expend your focus to get +40ft speed for a round.

TLDR: Psionic Focus is a limiting factor for some of your powers' enhanced effects and Metamagic, but there are other effects (like feats) that may ride on the limitation. Sometimes some class abilities may lean heavily on this mechanic.
Generally effects can either, a: work only while you are focused, or b:work by expending your focus.
You can only power 1 effect each time you expend your focus.

I meant that more in that expending it to use a 15 concentration check is the only thing you can do with it just on virtue of having it. You have to have other, separate feats and abilities to do anything with it other than that. Just like you need to have other feats and abilities to use the two power points from Wild Talent.

I didn't even know that about Psionic foucs.

My response was more towards this, and my own desire to simply create lists :)

As for Wild Talent... That may just be an excelent use of that feat.
Spending a feat to gain the ability to essentially autopass* one concentration check is a HUGE benefit, especially since it only takes 1 round to recharge the effect.
Cast teleportation while grappled? Autopass.
On fire? Cast Energy Adaption. Autopass.
Archer delaying until you cast? Autopass.
Somehow standing next to a freaking dragon? Autopass.
GM throws Fiat at you? Auto-freakin-pass!!

Ya I am convinced that that is an excelent use of the feat and should probably taken by any wizard who has it available to him :)
It would be a lifesaver!
I'll be using that more often.

*And if you cant pass the Concentration check on a 15, you are F#&ked anyways.

Hmm.

*adds to list of things to check for balance in homebrew games- the use of Psionic foucs on magic concentration checks.*

Decided to move things along.

Y'all can debate the name later ^_^

That's fine, we were all agreed on going back anyway.

Surprisingly I do not get a Spellcraft check to identify the spell if you suppress the display :/

Psionic Spellcraft wrote:

Identify a power being manifested. (You must sense the power’s display, or see some visible effect, to identify a power.)

That is a surprise to me, I have to first see your display (or effect of your spell) and then I get a Spellcraft check.

Thats weird.

Found this Faq.

What exactly do I identify when I’m using Spellcraft to identify a spell? Is it the components, since spell-like abilities, for instance, don’t have any? If I can only identify components, would that mean that I can’t take an attack of opportunity against someone using a spell-like ability (or spell with no verbal, somatic, or material components) or ready an action to shoot an arrow to disrupt a spell-like ability? If there’s something else, how do I know what it is?

Although this isn’t directly stated in the Core Rulebook, many elements of the game system work assuming that all spells have their own manifestations, regardless of whether or not they also produce an obvious visual effect, like fireball. You can see some examples to give you ideas of how to describe a spell’s manifestation in various pieces of art from Pathfinder products, but ultimately, the choice is up to your group, or perhaps even to the aesthetics of an individual spellcaster, to decide the exact details. Whatever the case, these manifestations are obviously magic of some kind, even to the uninitiated; this prevents spellcasters that use spell-like abilities, psychic magic, and the like from running completely amok against non-spellcasters in a non-combat situation. Special abilities exist (and more are likely to appear in Ultimate Intrigue) that specifically facilitate a spellcaster using chicanery to misdirect people from those manifestations and allow them to go unnoticed, but they will always provide an onlooker some sort of chance to detect the ruse.

Thats interesting. I would also assume that this would apply to the text in the Psionic Spellcraft skill (they don't actually contradict).

That would mean I couldn't build an undetectable Psion mindmucker :(

I never really liked that faq.

I promise I don't usually write small novels when I post. It's just been fun finally getting to play this character.

And here's the time for us to discover we can't go home...

Yup :) looking forward to it!
Another thought that crossed my/Midiotos mind is that if I AM right on the multiple dimensions thing, then whos to say that we connect back with OUR dimension?
We may be able to return "home" but not necessarily OUR "home" :S

Oh, Roy, would you mind using [b]Bold text for your speaking? It makes it significantly easier to find if I need to go back and find something you said a while ago.

Side note, we aren't from Golarion. Though I've forgotten what the world we are from is called... XD

Otune. Thanks :) Having the correct spelling made looking it up using the search feature significantly easier ^_^

I post almost exclusively from my phone, so formatting isn't super easy, but I'll try. Generally I set all my speech and text apart in a different line, if I forget that.

Psychologists Circle says it doesn't work if you try to send someone to another plane. Or is that why it's going to fail?

That's why it's a *modified* one, and it's going to fail because the Island says so, I believe. :D

Ah, ok.

I also just realized that autocorrected to psychologists circle, which is hilarious.

The idea that I just summoned a psychologists circle to my location seems... Baad.
Lets see: I have ADHD.
Bouts of Mania.
Delusions of Grandeur.
Delusions that I can fly.
Delusions that I can alter reality with just my mind.
Delusions that I can talk to people "Telepathically".
Unfounded belief that the concepts of "Momentum" and "Location" are subjective, and that I can alter them at will.
Unusual belief that wearing this "Special Headband" makes me smarter.
Belief that I can "borrow" anothers skills, abilities and actual knowledge for a time, simply by looking at them.
Belief that I can heal physical wounds simply by poking my tattoo.
And he believes that someting is living in his hand, and it encourages him to do bad things... Ya THAT will go over well >_>

Ya.. Somehow I anticipate that summoning a circle of psychologists to a game world would be realllly bad for me :)

Actually, it sounds like a good way to get to know each other! What would a circle of psychologists have to say about you?

As for the modified Psychoportation Circle, Psionics does not really have a good planar travel power, and I wanted something that could sit there for at least a little bit, allowing multiple people to cross.

Then I found out that there IS a power called.... Planar Travel that I somehow missed seeing for a looong time, a few years at least.
Previously, the only method I knew about was Astral Caravan, which required everyone else to manifest a 1st lvl power, and then took weeks to reach our destination, which would not work here.

So I just modified the Psychoportation Circle power to include planar travel for the simplest effect.
Since its doomed to fail anyways, it doesn't really matter.

BUUUT the idea of a 2 hour long portal sitting right in the middle of our camp that juuuusst miight spew forth monsters and horrors of the Maelstrom into our living room hasn't been lost on me XD

Gin still hasn't set up the alchemy lab yet.

It can be set up just by placing the item it's contained in on the ground, but it might be abit of a pain to move after it's set up.

I'll Probobly have to get to what the paper actually says later, I need to sleep before I write it up.

Sorry the page took so long, I was trying to do it some justice because it's story important.

Ah, I should have checked the discussion before asking in gameplay. XD

So is everyone sharing their findings?

Lwazi would, at least.

Yup. Its going to be a lot to type out so I have procastinated on the task. I'll do so today, and probably in the next few hours.

Lwazi, you may, or may not remember the first time I tried to teleport into the Warp, and came back. At the time I had said that I think there might be something Cosmic watching us, and your conversation with Roy might jog that memory.
This is kinda metagamey so feel free to ignore :)

And to everyone:
We are starting to amass some resources, which is cool :)
Any thoughts on what you would like to do with it? Just wishlisting here.
For me, crafting an Agile Amulet of Mighty Fists would be my first pick. In the future I intend to transition more into a melee focused caster and this would help me actually hit, which is good. 4k usually, 2k to craft :)
Edit: Just remembered that I can't craft it :( Does anyone have Craft Wounderous Item?

What about you guys?

On crafting, I have CWI, Scribe Tattoo, and Arcane Craft - that last lets me try to create items for which I don't have the relevant crafting feat. I think Animal Affinity should be able to substitute for Cat's Grace so that amulet looks very doable, DC 17 total with a +15 skill.

There's nothing I need immediately and Rivet's instinct will be to put resources he gets into fortifying anyway.

You have Tattoo creation? That's great. I found an item that for 500 each crafting price can make you automatically aware when a spell of a given school is cast within 60 feet. So for 1000 we can have someone in the group know if we've been hit with an illusion or enchantment.

They're called Runeward Tattoos. They also give bonuses to saves and Detect Magic for the school you choose. And they're Slotless so it's legal to have more than 1.

OK, Rivet wants those. All of those. Technically Dreamscarred's Scribe Tattoo feat isn't Inscribe Magical Tattoo, but since those are just CL 1 and he's got Arcane Craft, no problem.

Now I'm picturing Rivet with 6/7 main schools finished and looking for anywhere on his body with enough space to put the last one. XD

Mirrors! I need more mirrors to see all of my back!