Ahh, that's where I saw it ... in Gameplay. Well, at +21, Nub can handle all our breaking-and-entering on this first day. Billy and Slick can try to Aid.
I imagine the door handle being too high for either Billy or Nubnonk, so the 8-STR halfling suggests the goblin stand on his shoulders. Billy struggles under the weight, while Nubnonk begs for him to hold still. All the while, Slick, rolling his eyes at the sheer insanity of it all, grows weary of our antics, and just bashes down the door.
Yeah, the Thaum is a lot of fun, and each build is so unique. My 5th level Thaum, Mork the Ork, is completely different with Amulet/Chalice implements. Having Esoteric Lore and attacking the weaknesses is a lot of fun.
Shoot! I just noticed that Slick is already wearing a Cloak of Elvenkind and one can only wear one cloak at a time.
So switching to the Cape of the Mountebank comes at an additional cost now. The only benefit he gets from switching, over what he can do currently, is that he'll be able to cast Dimension Door once a day.
For this admitedly not-insignificant gain, he would have to give up:
1) A +1 item bonus to Stealth
2) The ability to cast Invisibility on himself once a day
And, if he gives up the Greater Ventriloquist's Ring (whose +2 item bonus to Deception would no longer stack with that of the Cape of the Mountebank), then:
3) The ability to cast Ventriloquism (Level 2) once a day
That's a lot to give up to be able to cast Dimension Door once a day. I'm now thinking that claiming the Cape of the Mountebank for Slick isn't that great a deal.
Thoughts?
Nubnonk has excellent Deception (+25) with only a +1 item bonus from his Ventriloquist's Ring. His Deception bonus would jump to an impressive +26 with the Cape of the Mountebank (the +1 of his Ring wouldn't stack with that of the Cape), but he would have to give up his own Cloak of Elvenkind, losing abilities 1 & 2 in the process.
I see Billy has pretty good Deception (+18) and doesn't have any item bonuses for it yet, but he's already wearing a Cloak of Repute, so would have to get himself a Diplomat's Badge to keep his +1 item bonus to Diplomacy (though to all such rolls, not just Make an Impression).
Dramiil isn't a Cha-based character and isn't even trained in Deception, so would see little benefit from the Cape of the Mountebank. He would similarly benefit little from the (presumably Greater?) Staff of Final Rest as the spells in question are mostly Divine/Primal.
At this point, it may not be worth it to claim one of the items for our personal use, but we could definitely claim the Cape for its resale value and cash it out for around 490gp. This might piss Erikanesh off if he found out though, but I doubt that'll affect us in the future anyway. Slick's morals in this situation (given his pecunious state) are pretty flexible and he'd be quite willing to take the Cape just to resell it 5 minutes later at a different stall in the Bazaar.
If no one else wants one of the items, then Slick will go ahead and do just that. Let me know what you think.
I agree the Cloak, while very interesting, probably isn't worth any of our PCs swapping out existing stuff to get.
As for the Staff of Final Rest, can our GM confirm if this is normal or Greater? The other items seemed to be level 9/10, so maybe.
Either way, if we think those Undead spells may come in useful, Billy can load up and cast from the Divine staff.
If Erikanesh provided this gift to us in good faith to promote his wares, then Billy would probably not vote to turn around and sell it. Having said that, if the rest of the group is okay with it, Billy can be convinced that it's for the good of the mission.
Nub currently has a regular Ventrlioquist's Ring, so he could take the Greater off Slick's hands and finish boosting all of his social skills sky high.
But the Cloak of Elvenkind is quite sweet, especially if you're also rocking the Boots of Elvenkind. Nub doesn't really want to give that up.
It's kind of a shame...these items are so cool and flavorful! But Thaumaturges can't get much use out of a shield, we've already got cloaks galore, and that Staff doesn't quite match our party composition either. Definitely not Thaum friendly, unless Trick Magic Item works with a staff. My quick glance through the rules for staves says no, but I'd be happy to be told otherwise.
Overall, I think the Staff is our best bet, as it has a definite potential use by someone in the party.
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For my money, I see two potential benefits beyond just the semi-negligible buy/resale value. First, from the metagaming perspective, these items might hold clues about some future encounters, such as dealing with demons and undead (though those are fair bets in most campaigns). Second, Erikanesh seems quite insistent about trying to give one of these items away. How would wearing these items, uncommon though they are, be a "great favour" to him or "act as rather excellent marketing"? While I can't say with any reliability that the items are cursed, I want Nubnonk to roll Perception to Sense Motive on our new Iruxi friend.
It is a greater staff. The items are all very distinctive and known as being the sort of thing he sells and therefore will give him grater exposure to the more discerning customer.
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Of the items, it seems the Staff, esp given that it's a Greater Staff of Final Rest, would be the most useful to the group. Also comes with some potential Heal spells, in addition to Disrupting Weapon spells.
You have had your check this round Billy. I am waiting on Draamil.
Ahh...my apologies. In your previous post, I thought you were opening it up for any of us to continue with a Society check. Then it looked like our posts crossed.
No worries. If we're allowed a Round 3 activity, maybe Billy's post can count towards that?
Along the way he casts Blood Vendetta on Slick. "Just to punish anyone who dares strike you, and I am sure they will," he says as an aside to the hearty half-elf.
Am I missing some Psychic twist on this, or is Blood Vendetta not a spell that you can cast on anyone but yourself, and even then, only as a reaction to taking any piercing, slashing, or persistent bleed damage?
Ah, I thought you could pre-cast it...does PF2E have a tag for target as "you" vs anyone else?
Looks like it doesn't, since True Strike doesn't have a tag either. Well, that won't work. Annoying!
Sorry for the silence, but I've been working on upgrading Slick to 12th level. In the end, I've come up with the following:
Class Feat: Flinging Shove (since he seems to be doing a lot of shoving people against things for damage)
Skill Feat: Rapid Mantel (instead of the original Wall Jump I mentioned)
Free Archetype Feat: Scout's Pounce (the best of an uninspiring set of choices)
I looked over all my lower level choices for feats and whatnot and couldn't find of anything I'd do differently.
I've updated Slick's profile and status line for Level 12. I'd update the rolls templates, but that seems to be something the GM is going to have to do.
Loot sheet updated.
Earlier, I'd added a row to the loot sheet shows that we bought Dramiil some +1 Explorer's Clothing for 160gp when we sold off the other loot. I don't see it on his profile and his AC does not reflect the +1, so apparently it didn't happen. I have removed that row.
If we sell off all the armor and weapons from the last encounter and add it to the gold we collected from selling off the loot from the earlier encounter, we end up with 2989gp. The question now is how we go about spending this gold. The usual approach is to split it evenly among the party members (747.25gp each) and let each PC decide what they want to do with their share. The option is available for loans or gifts between PCs if that results in a more efficient use of funds, where "efficient" is defined as maximizing the chances of the success of the group as a whole, rather than individually. The option also exists to buy an item from the loot pile (at the 50% resale cost) before it would otherwise get sold. There are other approaches for determining how the gold is spent, but something like the one I outlined above seems to be the most commonly used and is generally considered the most "fair".
In Slick's case, as a Fighter, the most important two items on his shopping list are:
1. Upgrading his Greatsword from a basic Striking rune to a Greater Striking rune (upgrade cost 1000gp).
2. Upgrading his Full Plate from an Armor Potency rune of +1 to +2 (upgrade cost 900gp).
Given the frequency of his crit attacks, that means the extra die of damage will quite often be doubled for a significant increase in the average amount of damage he can generate per Strike. The extra +1 on his armor will reduce the chances of him being hit by 5%, but more importantly, the chances of him being critically hit also drop 5%, resulting in him staying on his feet in battle a lot longer. Clearly, his 747.25gp share of the loot (plus his remaining 1sp) is insufficient to allow him to buy either of these upgrades, so he'll be sitting on this cash until his financial situation improves further or until he can convince someone to lend/give him the gold he's short.
A further unfortunate fact is that Slick is untrained in Crafting, any Lore, or Performance, so no Earn Income for him during downtime. That avenue is unavailable to him in bolstering his bank account balance.
As for epitomizing the harrow cards. Many of the epitomizations result in improvements to the castle in some fashion: A contingent of guards, improvements to the workshops to facilitate the Crafting of magical items, etc. Slick and Nubnonk are untrained in Crafting, but Dramiil is trained +18 and Billy is at +17, which means they could theoretically craft up to Level 8 items. Neither has the Magical Crafting feat, so magical items are off the menu. This therefore does not appear to be a viable avenue for obtaining the types of high-level magical items we're looking to obtain.
Anyone have any other ideas as to how to handle the loot distribution and harrow card epitomizing?
The realm is safe for you so dont worry about travelling about it. Everything in here is currently done using exploration and downtime activities. If you wanted to use a different skill for earn income you would generally need to find a relevant skill feat to do it. If you want to use other skills I might be inclined to allow it but at a lower level so as to preserve the value of investment into earn income skills and skill feats.
So we could theoretically each go out with a harrow card in hand and epitomize it separately during the 30 days of downtime.
We currently have the following cards with a summary of their epitome:
The Brass Dwarf: +2 Crafting Checks in Court
The Carnival: Potential peek at future foes
The Empty Throne: 1200+gp & DC 30 Diplomacy to reroll one failed saving throw
The Paladin: Guards for the Court
The Rabbit Prince: DC 30 Stealth for a +2 Striking Weapon or maybe +4 on next try
The Vision: Borrow/Learn Spell & Identify Alchemy/Magic in Court
So as Billy said, The Carnival is clearly a no-brainer. Only potential downside is Stupefied 3 on a crit fail, which looks like it sticks, so we'll need a Restoration spell casting or two to fix it. If that happens, and no one has it in their repertoire (which seems to be the case), then we can pay for the castings in Absalom, or buy a wand of Restoration for 160gp and do it ourselves. Since Billy's Perception at +23 is the best by at least 3 points, he should take care of this.
I'm also getting the feeling that the Harrow Court will eventually come under attack, so a contingent of Paladins might come in quite handy when that happens. Looks like it's worth epitomizing to me. Slick can take care of this one.
The Rabbit Prince is only worth it if we can crit succeed a DC 30 Stealth check. Nubnonk's Stealth is the best at +18, but even so, he'd need to roll a nat-20 to make it. Even with the +4 to the following attempt from a regular success, Nubnonk would still need to roll an 18+ to get us the weapon. Odds are not great, but as long as we leave a week to recover from the Clumsy of a crit fail, there is little downside. Looks like it's worth the try.
I also agree with Billy that The Brass Dwarf is not worth epitomizing. I think we've come to the conclusion that having one of our PCs invest heavily in advancing their Crafting skill and picking up sufficient crafting feats to make the Court workshop viable, is a waste of resources. Given that Absalom is a mere teleport away, we can get anything we want there, so all it would gain us is a possible slight reduction in the cost of magical items if a lot of downtime is spent on the crafting.
For similar reasons, The Vision is of limited use. None of us use a spellbook or is an alchemist, so the benefits are almost nil. I don't think it's worth epitomizing unless we have nothing better to do.
Spending 1200gp and having to succeed at a DC 30 Diplomacy roll just to allow one of us to reroll a failed save once is not worth it either. This is even more true when you take the crit fail downside into account.
I haven't updated the character sheet here on Paizo just yet, but here's an important factor: Nubnonk can become a temporary Master in any given skill because of his Tome implement. That means that he can start with a +23 in Stealth. He has a +1-item bonus, but if anyone can provide a status bonus or some other benefit, then we have a much better than 5% chance both times.
If there's anything that allows Following the Expert (I haven't fully looked just yet), then I can provide benefits there as well.
If you want to do any Magical Crafting, then since GM AndrewW gave us the go-ahead to re-spec, then I can switch skills around to make Crafting expert and pick up Magical Crafting this level instead of Terrified Retreat. It's not ideal, since I'd have to tank my social skills in order to do so, but it's possible.
I haven't updated the character sheet here on Paizo just yet, but here's an important factor: Nubnonk can become a temporary Master in any given skill because of his Tome implement. That means that he can start with a +23 in Stealth. He has a +1-item bonus, but if anyone can provide a status bonus or some other benefit, then we have a much better than 5% chance both times.
If there's anything that allows Following the Expert (I haven't fully looked just yet), then I can provide benefits there as well.
If you want to do any Magical Crafting, then since GM AndrewW gave us the go-ahead to re-spec, then I can switch skills around to make Crafting expert and pick up Magical Crafting this level instead of Terrified Retreat. It's not ideal, since I'd have to tank my social skills in order to do so, but it's possible.
The temporary master in Stealth might come in handy, depending on what "temporary" means. The Rabbit card states that A PC can travel to this location and attempt to spot the elusive Rabbit Prince by spending 8 hours stealthily scouting the woods and attempting a DC30 Stealth check, after which no one may search for the Rabbit Prince again for 1 week.
So if "temporary' means at least 8 hours, then Nubnonk is our man, uh, goblin for the job. But I expect that any other bonuses will also have to last the 8 hours. So though his item bonus will work, I'm not sure that any attempts to Aid or castings of Guidance will provide any additional bonuses.
If you want Nubnonk to become a Crafting wiz, then by all means go ahead and make it so. But as I outlined above, the mechanical benefits provided by doing so will be negligible to non-existent. From a strictly mechanical point of view, boosting Crafting as far as it will go and picking up the feats isn't worth it. Any sort of serious Crafting job will require maintaining a heightened Crafting proficiency for days, weeks and even months at a time to provide whatever meagre benefits in saved cost the Crafting will provide. You'll only be able to do it during downtime, which won't be all that often, and at 30 days at a time (not guaranteed), it won't be enough to do anything serious. Generally speaking, I've not been impressed with the whole magical item Crafting aspect of PF2; except for situations where access to the purchase of high level magical items is severely limited, I have never been able to justify the required investment.
Re: Money -- Maybe divide it 4 ways and then each of us makes a small donation to Slick so he can get a Greater Striking rune, which will benefit all of us. Other that, we each prob wanna save up for a +2 armor rune -- esp Billy if his autograph hounds keep trying to kill him.
Re: Epitomizing -- Def Paladin and Carnival. Then Rabbit Prince for Nubnonk to make a Stealth check (likely w/o Aid/Guidance?) so we can sell off the weapon. If it's easy-ish to do Brass Dwarf, maybe +2 in general crafting might come in handy? Really don't think we need Vision and Empty Throne.
Lastly, I agree that Nubnonk shouldn't feel compelled to change to a "less-ideal" build for such a negligible crafting gain. Unless of course you prefer the overall changes.
Most of that sound ok?
Apologies for the delay so far in getting my sheet together and updated. With the sanctioned delay last week, my wife returning from two weeks out of town, and a reunion with some friends I hadn't seen in about 5 months, I lost track of time and let things slide.
I was also taking a good hard look at the character sheet and trying to decide what if anything I wanted to change with the free offer of no-cost retrains. Features that didn't get used or didn't pan out the way I expected, that sort of thing. I've been keeping up with the conversation and just got slightly overwhelmed with the options. But I'm pleased with the state of the sheet now.
So, the changes :
Now, for rituals! Thaumaturgic Ritualist lets me gain four uncommon rituals: 2 at Lv3 or below, 1 at Lv4 or below, and 1 at Lv6 or below. I want to explain my reasoning below:
There are also three Religion (Master) rituals that he doesn't qualify for: Oblivious Expulsion, Portrait of Spite, and Commune.
So with those explanations out of the way, Nubnonk is grabbing Heartbond, Guardian's Aegis, Lucky Month, and Resurrect. If I can buy access to Call Spirit, I'll do that as well.
All of that is fine. You can buy Call Spirit.
@Nubnonk -- Totally understand about the overwhelming options with our character decisions! Here are a few comments based on your post above:
o Good call on Know-It-All. Thaums are doing Esoteric Lore all the time ... the more info the merrier!
o I still like Sympathetic Vulnerabilities, but another ritualist in this campaign seems like a solid choice.
o I'd personally vote for Inc Init over Home in Every Port. Since Nub is doing Esoteric Lore as part of his initial attack, the earlier we get good intel, the better. While HIEP seems interesting, it's probably not gonna be that expensive to pay for our own lodging. But might be worth it for flavor!
o 100% agree with you on Assurance. Even on med-checks (which is when it's best), it still fails to be useful at higher levels. Dump it.
Regarding rituals, great call with Resurrect! And Heartbond has nice flavor. Not a big fan of Guardian's Aegis -- seems like it'll take 6-10hp from one PC and give it to another. Unless Slick steps forward to be the guardian with his extra hp, I don't see it being much use. And again, we don't necessarily want Slick taking on extra damage because he's our primary damage dealer. But if you like it, sure!
Speaking of rituals ...
Billy took Harrow Ritualist at level 12 -- This gives him +2 on those Harrowing rolls, and also 2 rituals:
Call Spirit and Commune. (As you pointed out, Commune requires master at Religion, which he'll have at the next level-up.)
Regarding Billy's level 6 spells, I'm not 100% committed to the following. If anyone cares to take a look and/or comment, I'd welcome feedback.
Note that since Dramiil's Wall of Force was so very useful, Billy took it too, just in case. And while Teleport seems useful, I can't imagine the campaign will expect us to have it. But if you guys think it's a good just-in-case spell, I'll consider a swap.
6th Level Spells (3/day)
Shadow Blast: (Signature Spell) Area: 30' cone, 15' burst, or 50' line. 6d8, choose damage type to target weakness (basic will/reflex)
Spirit Blast: 16d6 force damage (basic fort), Range: 30'
Wall of Force: Range: 30', Wall: 50'x20'
Guardian's Aegis is a lot like the Life Oracle with Life Link from 1E, or a long-lasting Shield Other in this edition.
It would probably be better for Slick to be the Ward and Nubnonk to be the Guardian. Next level Nub will take Unbreakable-er Goblin and just continue to increase his hit points. Nub usually wants to stay back a bit so that he can throw his weapon. So as long as they're close enough to each other, Slick will be taking 6 fewer damage from every hit. It's not as good the Champion's reactions providing resistance to the triggering damage, or a shield absorbing damage with hardness, but it's not nothing either. Nub might also be closer to our dedicated healer.
Another fair option is that Billy is the Guardian and Nubnonk is the Ward. Billy absorbs a bit of damage whenever Nubnonk gets hit, and Billy can heal himself of the piddly damage coming his way as needed. I don't like this one as much, but there it is.
The only other qualifying ritual that I really liked enough was Lucky Month. If I don't take Guardian's Aegis (i.e., if Slick doesn't think it will come in handy), that might be what I pick up.
Scrolling through my notes on Rituals, I found another ritual that I can pick up: Concealment's Curtain. It doesn't specify a training level for the Primary Check of Occultism, which means that you're only required to be Trained in it. So Nub can be the primary caster for Occultism (with a Master proficiency of +18 vs a Very Hard Lv8 DC of 29 (50/50). If I can find an item to boost Occultism, that'll go up even more.
The secondary checks (Standard Lv8 DC of 24) are:
Arcana: Billy +18, Dramiil +21, Slick +14
Deception: Billy +19, Dramiil +0, Slick +20
Stealth: Billy +2, Dramiil +18, Slick +16
with my recommendations for who would take each check in bold. Low chances of failure for everyone and decent chances of crit succeeding to gain bonuses to the primary check.
This is a neat one. If we meet someone we want to sneak past, this will make it much easier.
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Since there is no critting or failing on initiative, I'm still not sold on the extra 10% probability boost in going sooner. For every other roll, even a +1 makes a big difference explicitly because of crit and crit fail conditions.
The other general feat I had considered at this level was Incredible Investiture. I'm very likely to invest a lot of items in this campaign. I'm already at 9 invested items (armor, backpack, cloak, mask, 2 rings, shoes, tattoo, and my harrow hand). So rather than Home in Every Port, I'll grab Incredible Investiture.
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I like Billy's 6th level spell choices. Very cool stuff.
Another fair option is that Billy is the Guardian and Nubnonk is the Ward. Billy absorbs a bit of damage whenever Nubnonk gets hit, and Billy can heal himself of the piddly damage coming his way as needed. I don't like this one as much, but there it is.
Um...maybe I'm not understanding, but Billy no doubt has the fewest hp of the entire group. I'll need to pass on Billy being anyone's guardian and taking on extra damage. But if Nub is willing to be Slick's guardian, then sure! And I know Slick would be ecstatic. Billy will take great joy in teasing Slick about needing a guardian. :)
The only other qualifying ritual that I really liked enough was Lucky Month. If I don't take Guardian's Aegis (i.e., if Slick doesn't think it will come in handy), that might be what I pick up.
From your original post, I thought Nub was already planning on Lucky Month. And yes, more stuff to give us free re-rolls fits right into this campaign!
And yes, if you have another ritual slot for Concealment's Curtain, it's interesting that exactly 4 of us can be casters, and that we all have a good chance at succeeding at the diff skills. So that one is def interesting.
You're right. So Heartbond, Lucky Month, Concealment's Curtain, and Resurrect, with an extra buy of Call Spirit so that we have two people who can do it.
I am going to say no to Concealment's Curtain. There are some limitations (mainly having had to be close to the target beforehand) but the effect combined with the complete lack of a save is a bit too much.
Totally fair.
I went ahead and sold ALL the loot we collected in the first chapter as well as the Rabbit Prince's +2 Striking Dagger. From the party proceeds, I bought a Level 2 and a Level 4 Restoration Scroll just in case. I've updated the loot sheet to reflect this.
The bottom line is that each PC now has 1072gp to spend.
Slick is going to spend 1000gp of his cut to upgrade the Striking rune on his Greatsword to a Greater Striking rune. Upgrading his Armor Potency rune will have to wait, but you guys now have enough cash to upgrade yours. The upgrade cost from +1 to +2 is a mere 900gp.
I suggest that each PC make their final purchasing decisions so that we can get back to the game as soon as possible.
If by chance there's enough leftover change in everyone's pockets after purchases to add up to 900gp, then Slick will be more than happy to borrow that from everyone to upgrade his armor and pay it all back from his cut of the upcoming loot.
Dramiil can get a Shadow Signet, which is pretty neato. There was a rune I could use for his robes, right? I forget which one it was.
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Billy's char sheet is updated with the following purchases:
+2 armor upgrade
Bracelet of Dashing
Infiltrator Thieves Tools
Lesser Healing (2)
Holy Water (4)
He has 348 left, which he's happy to loan to Slick.
Note: Billy can cast Augury 1/day. Basically, we can ask if a certain course of action will be good or bad. (And thanks to The Carnival, the DC 6 flat check is DC 4 instead.)
Performing ritual on Dramiil:
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Performing ritual for Nubnonk:
my very own bot!
Just a quick note. I will be away with work Thursday and Friday this week so wont be posting much.
Recommended Harrow cards for Dramiil:
Shields => Fort reroll
Keys => Reflex reroll
Stars => Will reroll
Books => Skill-Check reroll
Books (failure) => Skill-Check reroll at -4
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Recommended Harrow cards for Nubnonk:
Shields (crit) => Fort reroll at +4
Keys => Reflex reroll
Stars => Will reroll
Books => Skill-Check reroll
Books (failure) => Skill-Check reroll at -4
Imma take Shields.
Also hi, I haven't had to take painkillers all day (no idea why not :P)
Glad to hear you're feeling better.
Imma take Shields
What do you mean? The proposal gives you the 5 cards mentioned -- one of which was Shields. You get all 5 rerolls.
To be clear, if you go with my proposal, you have a reroll for EACH save (Fort, Ref, Will), and two additional rerolls for skill checks (with one of those skill checks at -4, but still useful)
And Nub essentially has the same -- except his Fort save gets a +4 on the new roll.
Doh! Gotcha.
Just a bit of advance warning. Next week I am attending Paizocon Europe between Thursday and Sunday and I will be travelling home Monday and sorting our related admin, washing etc when I get back. I wont have much time or ability to post until Tuesday 15th August.
re: Share Weakness Range
Share Weakness has the following traits:
The esoterica trait is present in many thaumaturge feats and class features that incorporate the various talismans, supernatural trinkets, and other objects you carry with you. Abilities that have the esoterica trait require you to be in possession of your esoterica to use them. Normally, you're assumed to always have your esoterica with you, but in some rare circumstances, you might either not have them on hand or have your gear stripped from you.
You must physically manipulate an item or make gestures to use an action with this trait. Creatures without a suitable appendage can’t perform actions with this trait. Manipulate actions often trigger reactions.
The Level 20 follow-up feat, ubiquitous weakness allows all allies within 30 feet at the time of Exploit Vulnerability to benefit from Mortal Weakness (with no action).
I'm not sure why we need to specify a range, but there are precedents for other Thaumaturge class features having range limitations:
Many of these features mimic features of other classes, and their ranges tend to correspond to the features they mimic.
Share Weakness is unique in the game in that, 1) if the thaumaturge succeeds on the Exploit Vulnerability check, 2) if the creature has a mortal weakness, and 3) if the thaumaturge then spends an action, they can allow a fellow PC to activate the weakness. It also ends when the Exploit Vulnerability ends, which you have ruled to be when the original target dies. (Although "This damage affects the target of your Exploit Vulnerability, as well as any other creatures of the exact same type, but not other creatures with the same weakness.") So if the target of the original Exploit Vulnerability dies, then Nubnonk has to start the process over again.
The closest sort of thing I'm aware of is when PCs have an ability to cause a specific target to gain a particular weakness, like vicious debilitations.
There are already a few conditions that need to be met, along with a two-action cost. Another follow-up feat, Trespass Teeportation suggests a 120 feet range for the esoteric magic still functioning for both the thaumaturge and their allies. So I would advocate remaining loose on adding a range restriction. I have been flavoring the "grant [an object] to your ally" as Nubnonk grabbing something and throwing it, but it could easily be something he gave to them previously that he simple activates.
Interesting info, Nubnonk. Thanks for putting that together.
Never spent time looking at the higher-level Thaum feats. but yeah, that level 20 feat, Ubiquitous Weakness is amazing. Not that my PFS Thaum will ever get to try it, but it's awesome.
You mentioned Share Weakness. I agree that the rulebook is very good about including ranges for everything. Since there's not one listed, I would think the designers did not intend one.
You mentioned that "if the target of the original Exploit Vulnerability dies, then Nubnonk has to start the process over again". That's true for many of the Thaum feats (ones which specifically state that, and others that require the target of Exploit). But for the record, it seems that Sympathetic Vulnerabilities specifically branches out so Mortal Weakness can affect any creatures with the same weakness. In that case, I don't believe the Thaum has to Exploit someone new to continue benefiting from the Weakness thing.
Of course, to use anything requiring the target of Exploit (Amulet, Weapon, etc.), then obviously, yes there would need to be a target.
Our GM had declared differently about Sympathetic Vulnerabilities at the beginning of this book--that the original target dying ended the magic--which is why I traded the feat out as it seemed less useful overall.
Our GM had declared differently about Sympathetic Vulnerabilities at the beginning of this book--that the original target dying ended the magic--which is why I traded the feat out as it seemed less useful overall.
I dont recall doing that but if I did I was wrong.
Mortal Weakness affects the target of your Exploit plus any identical creatures (I tend to base that on ancestry/type, so Human Cultist is the same creature as Human Mage).
Personal Antithesis affects only the target of your Exploit Vulnerability.
Sympathetic Vulnerabilities changes Mortal Weakness to affect all creatures with the same vulnerability. It changes Personal Antithesis to affect all non humanoid creatures of the same type.
Where you do run into issues is in two cases:
1. If the creature you used Exploit Vulnerability on dies nothing which requires the target of your exploit will work (for example, the Weapon implement reaction).
2. If you do use exploit again for whatever reason and previous exploit effects wont continue.
I think that should be clear. I do think Share Vulnerability should have a range. Paizo is notorious for its dodgy editing and missing stuff out (see some stuff in Rage of Elements which is completely missing key info). The text saying that you grant an object to an ally certainly makes me suspect it is supposed to be someone adjacent to you but I am happy to leave it as a ranged ability for now. I am inclined to stick a reasonable range on it, 30' or 60' maybe but open to views.
Thanks for the clarification, GMAndrew. Good to know I was understanding Sympathetic Vulnerabilities correctly.
Regarding Share Weakness range, I understand your point that the intention could have been to include a range.
The spell talks about selecting a piece of esoterica "such as a locket or treasured ring, and you grant it to an ally, establishing a personal link". Since no range is specified, it's possible this item has previously been granted, and the Thaum merely needs to activate it.
It just seems odd to grant something like this mid-battle to someone who may not have a free hand to accept it. I can't imagine the Thaum must be adjacent in order to do what? Slip the item in the target's pocket? That seems a bit awkward.
In either case (previously granted or granted mid-battle), if you feel a range is intended, maybe a more lenient range of 60' would be reasonable, given that there's no RAW requirement.
Ah, it looks like I misread what you said here:
I believe that my Sympathetic Vulnerabilities feat means that I don't need to use another action to exploit vulnerability (if the two creatures have the same weakness to Good damage). But I want to recall anyway, so I might as well.
You are right that you wouldnt need to spend another action to exploit to trigger a weakness however you wouldnt have a target of your exploit if you have anything that relies on that (such as the weapon implement opportunity attack)
So I was way in the wrong there. I agree with the above clarification and might end up picking it back up, since I woefully misunderstood what you meant.
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As for the Share Weakness range, I'll accept any ruling. That's why I listed out a few precedents above.
@Slick, the Harrowing Ritual and Soothe are both status bonuses so that gets you to 32, which is unfortunately, still a fail.
Ah, how unfortunate. I got my hopes up for nothing. I didn't check the type of bonus the harrow ritual provided, so my bad; it is clearly listed as a status bonus.
What are the results of a failure?
Comments on the Guardian's Aegis ritual:
The cost of the ritual will be 12*10gp = 120gp. For that cost, and assuming success (ie no nat-1s) the result is that as long as Nub is within 30ft of Slick (which from memory has been about half the time at best so far), 12/2 = 6hp of damage will be transferred to Nub whenever Slick takes damage.
Not a whole lot of benefit given that at our level, a successful hit against Slick usually generates 30-60 hp of damage. Far better to cast the occasional 2-action Heal/Soothe spell or a one-action Lay on Hands or Battle Medicine, if we want to give Slick some hp in combat.
I guess the bottom line is that overall, I don't see the benefits of the ritual being worth the 120gp cost.
Fair enough. I would probably like rituals better if they didn't cost so much.
Fair enough. I would probably like rituals better if they didn't cost so much.
Agreed. The Harrowing Ritual (which is giving us all the bonus rerolls) normally costs 200+ gp -- nearly twice as much as the Guardian one. But the Experienced Harrower feat is awesome. It says "If you use a fine harrow deck, the cost for the ritual is removed entirely."
Best 11gp Billy's ever spent! Otherwise, it would be equally hard to justify that one either.