Strange Aeons

Game Master Whack-a-Rogue

Awesome! I'll do the level up later today! I'm thinking of maybe broaching into another Sphere to have a bit more to do. Time is very cool, though, so who knows.

@Tassa: That's correct. No Backgrounds until you find out more about your former lives.

I think I'm done! I've got:

- +1 in Reflex and Fortitude, plus the +1 resistance;
- +1 BAB;
- +6 Hp, +6 skill points, +1 spell point;
- Feat: Combat Casting.
- Revelation: Time Flicker (Standard Action for Blur up to caster level minutes per day, can be used in 1-minute increments)
- Talent: After Image, so I finally have another buff to give. In the future, I might go for Fate sphere for the numerical buffs, but one step at a time.

LVL Up

+8 hp
+1 BAB
+1 Ref, +1 Will; +1 resistance to all
+5 skill points: (athletics, influence, k. dungeoneering, k. martial, survival)
Armor Training 1, Second Wind
Feat: Net Adept
Talent: Dual Wielding Sphere

OK, I'm on the road for work but grabbed some time to level up...and it's a nice level for her.

New
Bestial trait: Bestial Speed (and Bite+Grab are bonus traits now)
Magic Talent: Protean Body,
Feat: Extra Combat Talent --> Clinch Strike

+1 BAB, Will, Resistance to all saves

Ephra'im: Scout is a Swift action unless being used with Advisory Scout - which makes it a Standard action and shares the benefits with allies.

Can't Ephra'im make a Knowledge check as a free action whenever he sees a new enemy? :) And doesn't making a Knowledge check against an enemy give him the benefits of Scout? I had thought it did because of this line: "Once you have succeeded at a scout attempt or Knowledge check (emphasis mine) against a target, any talents or effects that require you to scout a target may be used against the target for the next 24 hours; after this period you must successfully use the scout ability against the target again to continue benefiting from related effects."

I'll offer my read of the rules.

Using the knowledge skill normally doesn't take an action (it is not even a free action, so can be done outside of the character's turn) and it's done as a "reaction" to any input that could prompt the character to recall such knowledge.

The scout ability, however, let's you use Perception instead of the knowledge skill, but costs a swift action.

The ability also let's you USE talents and effects against a creature that have been IDed for 24 hours, either because you used scout or made a knowledge check. The important part is the word USE. You still need to activate the abilities if they cost actions to do so.

This way, Advisory Scout still takes a standard action, no matter if you had already IDed it with a swift action Scout or with a non-action knowledge, or if you are using Scout as part of the standard action.

This all sounds correct to me, though I think Ephra'im can also use his Knowledge skills when Scouting as a swift action or as part of Advisory Scout as a standard action, without the -5 penalty for using Perception. Like if he fails the initial Knowledge check, he can try again and roll Knowledge to Scout as a swift action, but would only learn the creature's weaknesses.

Now I'm a bit torn.

I believe you can use Knowledge instead of Perception-5 for the Scout ability (since the ability says "you MAY use Perception..."), but I'm not sure you can do so IF you've already failed a previous Knowledge check.

The knowledge skill has the following rule: "The check represents what you know, and thinking about a topic a second time doesn’t let you know something that you never learned in the first place."

On the other hand, this excerpt from the rules are about "trying again" and you are not effectively trying again and are instead using another ability that also uses the same skill.

I believe the scout ability is not about you IDing the monster, but instead figuring out its weaknesses and resistances through observation, and so the reason why it allows Perception. In this sense, another a second knowledge could be explained as you not know the creature per se, but you know enough of related subjects to reach the conclusion of which are its weaknesses and resistances.

I think this ends up as a GM call. I can see rules arguments for both sides tbh.

Good discussion. The real issue is that the Scout ability is poorly worded, so it can be read a couple different ways. Honestly, as cool as Spheres of Might is, it would really benefit from an "Ultimate" version that consolidates the various system expansions and clears up rules language. I do remember that we had a similar discussion about the Scout ability very early in the campaign, but I haven't taken the time to reread the Discussion thread in search of the posts, so it's possible that I may end up contradicting myself here. I think my previous read would have been pretty comparable, though.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------- -
My understanding of the Scout ability is that it's always a Swift action (except for the Standard action of Advisory Scout), but you can use either Knowledge or Perception-5 to do so. This is supported by the text of the Calibrating Wriggle talent - which specifically mentions the Swift action. Several other talents also use the wording "when you use the scout ability against a creature," which implies it's something that requires conscious action.

As Baldrek said, the Scout ability is meant to represent you using what you know or see to figure out how best to fight an enemy. A non-Spheres parallel would be the "Know Thy Enemy" class feature of the Lore Warden Fighter. That ability has an action cost and a Knowledge check as well. :-)

There's also a logistical issue that arises if Scout-via-Knowledge doesn't have an action cost: it targets a specific creature. To use the encounter we just finished, your successful Knowledge (divine) check let you identify the creatures as ghouls and remember the risks of disease and paralysis. Which ghoul do the bonuses apply to? And if more ghouls jump out from around the next corner, would you automatically get bonuses against them as well because they're mechanically identical to the ones you just encountered? Things would get complicated very quickly, as we'd have to track each individual creature you encounter for the rest of the campaign - or you'll just automatically gain a bunch of bonuses, making Scout a must-take Sphere for every character to exist because there's zero downside to taking it. ;-)

A much more reasonable reading (in my opinion) is to treat Scout like a Slayer's Studied Target: spend an action to gain various scaling bonuses against a specific creature until 24hrs have passed or it's dead, whichever comes first. Using Knowledge is probably easier as your bonus will generally be higher, but unless you spend a bunch of skill ranks, you run the risk of not being able to identify certain creatures. Using Perception is more difficult, but it'll work on everything you encounter with zero investment necessary.

A last interesting feature - which also supports the argument that Scout isn't a passive Knowledge check - is that the DC is explicitly set to 10+CR. Monster Lore has a varying DC depending on how common or rare a creature is, with ranges between 5+CR to 15+CR. The Scout ability ignores this, so using it on a Goblin is slightly more difficult but using it on a mysterious obscure creature is slightly easier. This makes sense, as you aren't identifying a creature with Scout; you're analyzing its fighting style and finding weaknesses. :-)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------- -
If I were rewriting the Scout ability, my fix would be changing the ending bit to: "Once you have successfully used Perception or Knowledge to scout a target, any talents or effects that require you to scout a target may be used against the target for the next 24 hours; after this period you must successfully use the scout ability against the target again to continue benefiting from related effects."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------- -
In regards to trying again: yes, because the Scout ability and identifying a creature using Knowledge are two different things. Since this is a PbP, you'll notice that I generally handle the "creature identification" part on my end to save time, which in hindsight is probably adding to some of the confusion.

The broken stairwell requires a DC 10 to ascend, so I'm holding off on updating until I see what Mya's plan is due to the penalty from her Oracle curse.

Could I carry her?

---EDIT---

BTW, I forgot to reply about the Scout thread. Your ruling seems perfectly balanced, but I wanted to mention that the official word from the developers at DDS is that one can use a no-action Knowledge check to scout. See this post from Ssalarn, the original author of Scout.

100% Your call on how you want to play in your campaign, and there are a bunch of weird interactions that could use better definition, but I figured it's worth sharing.

Tassa's quite strong, and Mya's a Small character, so I think that'll work. :-)
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for the link. There's so much happening in the DDS Discord, that it's impossible for one person to keep track of everything. I disagree with Ssalarn's ruling, but as they're the author, I'll abide by it - especially since you took the time to find it. :-) It's definitely a bit weird, though, as it's usually easier to boost your Knowledge modifier than your Perception modifier, so when you factor in the -5 penalty, there's almost zero reason to ever use the "scout with Perception" option, but it's all good. :-)

For non-Int based characters, I guess? If you're a ranger who doesn't have a lot of Knowledge skills, using Perception instead is pretty nice. Especially with the Trait that gets rid of the -5 penalty!

I believe the major thing about using Perception vs. Knowledge is the opportunity cost.

Perception is widely considered the most important skill in the game, so you can never go wrong about boosting it as much as you can, and you are spending a single skill point each level and with that you are good against all creatures.

With Knowledge, to cover everything you need 6-7 skill points each level on them, which could be spent on many other useful skills. Some classes are so skill starved that without the perception option they'd be virtually locked out of the Scout sphere.

That's fair. I always forget that vanilla PF has multiple classes that only gain 2+INT skill ranks, and Perception doesn't automatically scale with your level.

I think it's totally fine to rule it how you want here, I just wanted to point out the author's intent.

For what it's worth, I've used the Scout sphere on multiple INT-based characters and personally not on a WIS-based character. Saving that Swift for something else is very sweet, esp in Spheres (which has many ways to use it)...but I think Ephra'im is right that the ability to be great at identifying weaknesses of every type of creature as a low-int character is also quite strong, and even many moderately high INT classes struggle to keep all the important knowledge checks maxxed. (So I basically read it as a sphere ability that lets WIS-folk do something they couldn't normally, and with many fewer skill points...but still lets INT-folk do identification the best.)

I think I'm probably a bit biased as well, as I've never seen a non-INT-focused character take the Sphere. :-)

There's sickness going around work, and it's my turn to catch it. I blame the Kindergartner who sneezed in my face the other day. Hopefully I'll be back in the saddle in a day or two.

Take care! And thanks for the heads up.

Welp, this was the sickest I've been in years, but I'm finally on the mend. I'll try to resume posting tomorrow.

I'm glad you're on the mend now!