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I find that giving a 1 point level based bonus to AC at every even level and +1 to all saves at 4,8,12,16, and 20 to be roughly balanced with the effects of magic items.

I broke down a couple of suggested levels and it came out slightly in favor of defense which was fine with me.

You can even do away with the save bonus if you use action points.

Do this and if you assume any magic items are a power up rather than a necessity and it should work well enough.

The easiest way to deal with casters is to allow a maximum of 1 caster, full or 3/4 and 1 (or 2 if there are no full or 3/4 casters) 4 level caster per party of 5.

5 Stone Games wrote:

Even an caster with both traits is limited to a few extra L1 spell scrolls or potions. Not that big a deal.

Actually, 900 gold is 72 self scribed scrolls. If they also have the trait that reduces the cost of crafting by 5%, then we are looking at 75 scrolls. You can easily take 1/3 of that money, buy a bunch of other spells you can cast, and still scribe 30+ scrolls. Not having a limitation on how many spells you can cast per day is significant and improves your chances of survival greatly.

Well true.

If balance is a serious a concern with your group, I'd suggest Pathfinder Society rules for game. They are as close to balanced as possible.

This really nerfs several classes though.

Another option is to disallow rich parents as a trait.

This works well and not having the PC tuck away an extra wand (L1 bought retail is 750) or that pile of scrolls can make a DM feel better.

Assuming average rolls and you use my standard "load out" (on my webpage) for 20GP and save 25GP for bed and board, a standard wizard will only be able to scribe 2 L1 scrolls of spells he knows which is negligible in balance terms.

Otherwise I wouldn't sweat it but thats just my game. YGMV

Caelesti wrote:

If the player is going to [all the trouble of investing in crafting skills, item creation feats, etc, then I see absolutely no reason to bar said player from a reasonable amount of items created with said skills/feats. If the fighter with Craft: Armoursmithing shows up with a Masterwork Breastplate she crafted herself, then good for her.

Answer this hypothetical for me, would you please?

A player puts together a halfling rogue and places skill ranks into disable device, stealth, knowledge local, perception and bluff, and takes skill focus (disable device) as their feat.

This player then rolls their starting wealth and finds that they have enough for the gear they wanted, except they only have exactly half the cost of the masterwork armor they were hoping for - so they say "Hey DM, I stole this masterwork armor before the game started."

Do you A) say no, B) allow them to have the armor but take the gold they have left (equal to half the price), C) allow them to have the armor and not spend any gold on it at all, or D) some other less obvious response.?

I have to ask because I get the impression from you, and others sharing the position that crafting be allowed to provide a discount on goods, that the answer would be A despite the fact that B is exactly the justification used for allowing crafting discounts - that the player put points in the skill needed or took the feat needed and should get something out of that besides having that skill or feat for later use.

There is a difference between an "adventuring task" like stealing stuff and a non adventuring task like crafting.

Adventuring tasks have the potential for conflict of some kind, you could get caught stealing, make a new enemy or just have a bad barter sessions and not get what you want.

Non adventuring tasks are automatic with little to no potential for conflict, I take 10 on my craft roll and make some arrows. Done.

Its not reasonable to have adventuring tasks in the background, non adventuring tasks, OTOH are fine.

And as a note, yes, some care needs to be taken. A crafter with the rich parents trait could possibly have a lot of gear. However assuming level 1, its really only a few points extra to AC (he makes extra MW plate or something ) or +1 to hit. Not much in the grand scheme of things especially when the DM can just too in another orc archer, give the goblins a shield or give the kobolds each an extra hit point or something.

Even an caster with both traits is limited to a few extra L1 spell scrolls or potions. Not that big a deal.

Pathfinder is well balanced, true but its not brittle and a few small bonuses won't matter long run.

I was wondering how most people would think about using leftover starting gold to scribe scrolls to have as starting equipment for new characters. Would most people allow that or say no you gotta do it in game? Just curious.

I'd allow it just the same as I'd allow crafting before play. Its not like low level guys have that much gold.

However if you as a DM are uncomfortable with the idea, its simple enough to ask your players not to do that.

Most times,the players, not being jerks are fine with such a request.

No Magic items eh?

Assuming you want the same power level (roughly) I would suggest the following

Use 25 point buy

A Bonus to AC roughly equal to BAB. This puts AC on par with expected defenses, maybe a bit lower.

A bonus to saves at 1 per 4 levels to cover for cloaks of resistance.

Treat attacks as magic when second attack is gained.

Grant additional stat bonuses at 1 per 3 levels, this and the higher point buy cover the expected +4 (or so) from books and the +6 from items. Its a bit faster (the +2 item bonus is not usual to L6) buts its close enough.

Give 2 extra skill points per level to help with tasks that would normally be aided by magic.

Allow some kind of breach incorporateness and "material" DR ability or items.

Graft on action points from the D20 SRD

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/actionPoints.htm

Since you have magic, healing won't be an issue but if you do not try reserve points also from the SRD as well

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/reservePoints.htm

http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/adventuring/actionPoints.htm

So long as everyone has a missile weapon to handle fliers it should be roughly the same power level and abilities.

Optionally you can also take a long look at Iron Heroes, its a D20 game designed bottom up for no magic. Its fairly different than standard Pathfinder but its interesting and adaptable.

Somewhere Sean mentioned that he and Jason were discussing releasing some changes to core classes.

Which of course could lead to the discussion of what changes could/should be made to classes, short of a full revision.

My suggestions (feel free to add your own)

(

I am pretty happy with Pathfinder as is though I might like some minor changes for example treating the Rogue's minor magic as an actual spell slot and giving Fighters a few more options (maybe)

Broadly I'd like to see low magic item support built in (as an option of course for those of us who do not want the Christmas Tree effect) maybe some variant of the WOTC Archivist class for Pathfinder (a Wizard with all divine lists)

Also I'd like to see hybrid classes ala the multi-class archetypes on this very sub-board and like the Genius Guide options. 4e D&D did this pretty well I think as do both of the above sources.

Oh and off topic a tad, get rid of the 50 charge wands and make them either like staffs, rune-wands from Genius Guide again or dailys ala WOTC's Eberron Eternal Wands. They just are mechanically dull and of questionable balance as written, IMO anyway.

Lastly I think the 5 foot step should be seperate. Pimping my house rules for a moment I do this

Take

1 minor action

1 5 foot step

1 standard action

1 move action

If you have multiple attacks combine move and standard action to make them. You may also run (see run rules) by combining standard and move actions.

This system flows a bit better IMNSHO

Interesting. I am going to stew on this for a while.

This thread is liable to get absurd, or at least wacky. Avert your eyes, Keepers of Canon Purity!

So you say, "The dragon's hoard also includes a tire iron," and all your players stop talking about last night's TV shows and are suddenly paying strict attention. Now admittedly you wouldn't want to see that sort of thing pop up in a straightforward high-drama epic campaign - but I can't help wondering what other GMs think of such a brain-jarring anachronism.

SNIP

Tire Iron however is a simple weapon, treat as a light mace. Optionally you can treat it as a martial weapon and allow it to do blunt or slash damage with the pry bar end

The 4 way irons (shaped like a cross) ought to be treated as Starknife doing 1d6x2 blunt damage instead

And to what Valkir said, I agree it can disrupt more purist games but this kind of crossover stuff has been part of D&D since the earliest days, Blackmoor has high tech stuff , Expedition to the Barrier Peaks is a much loved module and a cowboy turned Quasi-Deity Murlynd is the creator of the canon magic item Murlynds Spoon now called the Sustaining Spoon

Just throwing it out there. This thread could serve as ideas for Paizo to shore up things people think could have been done better in future books, or Pathfinder 2.0, as well as a source of inspiration for houserules.

You can include possible changes if you have any ideas or to explain what you mean. But the main purpose isnt to share houserules you use, instead to point out the things you wish were different in PF, so for complex things just summarize what you mean.

SNIP

Built in support for lower magic games would not be amiss. D&D 4e does this beautifully and its worth looking into.

I have found an altered action sequence also lifted from D& 4e to useful.Its simple and comprehensive.

Basically each round everybody gets

1 Move Action
1 Attack or Standard Action
1 Swift Action
1 Five Foot Step
Any # of Free Actions

The Standard and Move can be combined to make a Double Move or if BAB allows Multiple Attacks. This is logical and simple and flows a bit better IMO.

lastly, this is more a flaw of Ultimate Combat than anything else but I'd like to see some basic support for Swashbuckling beyond one Rogue archetype.

I feel the same way vis a vis armed Combat and Western styles. Nothing wrong with Crane Style or any of that but Things like Ringen and Longsword combat ought to have been touched upon.

Lastly, had I my way fractional saves and BAB from the D20 SRD would be standard for reasons of sanity and game balance. It a few seconds of 3rd grade math (or decimals if desired) and well worth the time inputs.

Would a multi-classed sorcerer/wizard wearing a ring of wizardry have a level of spells doubled for both classes?

Yep.

As for Sean FitzSimon's question, the only reason to multi class like that is if the DM is allowing the Ultimate Magus Prestige Class in Pathfinder.

Ya know, not everything has to translate to "awesome for your character."

Us GMs like to have flavorful, interesting characters that just might not be optimized for combat. In fact, some NPCs might never ever see combat.

As a GM I concur with you on the not needing to be optimized for combat part. However if an NPC will never see combat or conflict there is no need to stat it up unless its really fun for you to do this.

Also archetypes that are defacto NPC and won't likely be used against the PC's only are a waste of space for the most part, ymmv

As for the class at hand, its pretty easy to fix,

two ways

#1 restore the class feature and give them Celestial free

#2 make the communication telepathic

My gaming group is entering the second phase of our homebrew campaign, a setting in which after a cataclysmic battle brought on by an attempted freeing of Rovagug, magic has been lost in the world.

Essentially, there are no spells, older wizards are only just now figuring out how to cast Cantrips, there are no magical items, item creation, or creatures, and even (Su) and (Sp) abilities do not currently work until they are somehow mysteriously unlocked.

I am not trying to bash the concept, I am just wondering what the consensus would be among other PF players as far as interest in this type of game.

(NOTE: I am not the GM for this...)

I'd play a game like that, no problem so long as the healing rules and AC scaling via level were tweaked a bit.