9mm's page

Loved: The customization; the crunch; a sense that nearly any hairbrained concept was in fact doable.

Wanted: Better Martial support, Actual Psionic casting, the promised end to feat taxes.

Hated: Paizo's "playtest" advertising and refusal to listen to any of the feedback of those so called playtests. the errata that always broke more than it fixed. the lack of understanding that if a character can't execute the concept well, people won't play that concept. The fact Feat Taxes got WORSE. Being forced to rebuild 2-3 of my society characters every errata drop.

Will miss: the sensibly laid out rules. It shouldn't take me 3 passes to figure out quick alchemy is part of the alchemy class feature.

In general where do you draw the line when allowing any class to take restricted things?

better question to be asking: "Why is this restricted?"

ie can a fighter get levels in spell casting without multi-classing?

there's an archtype for that.

Can Wizards get fighter only feats?

Can Wizards get druid only feats?

Do you need to worship a deity or have one empower you to cast divine spells?

Actually the rules are already clear here, you don't need a god to cast divene spells, see every cleric of an ideal.

So your actual request here is "Paizo, please stop including mechanics in the setting lines of books."?

no, it's more "remember these rules will be used somewhere other than Golarion" and "book theme doesn't need to be all encompassing" for example look at Heroes of the Streets feat Mud In Your Eye; because the book is urban theme, your character will forget how to throw goop in somethings eye if he leaves the city. wut?

Nunchucks, because there is no way Maxi is a monk. Sadly not supported in any way.

It is annoying, and the source of all sorts of problems. Think about it, if they hadn't tied precise strike to one-handed or light piercing weapons, we'd never had the "______ Grace" issues we've had ever since.

I honestly and unsarcastically wish you the best of luck with finding a play environment more to your tastes, then, as it's unlikely that PFS will change policies to suit your style in the near future.

after 3 in progress characters burned.. yeah, me too.

9mm wrote:

That is more a function of weapon focus being bad, not possessed hand being good.

True or not, I suspect that has very little effect on the decision. What matters is that Weapon Focus is the measuring stick being used. ^_^

And it's a crappy measuring stick; who's reliance on which continues to have organized play make bad decisions. Technarken almost certainly has the actual reason pinned down; and I, for one, am tired of having to throw interesting characters away because of nonsensical bannings, of which possessed hand is most definitely one.

Just by itself, Possessed Hand is pretty potent when compared to, say, Weapon Focus. +1 attack with all weapons, plus +1 damage with all weapons, plus several minor bonuses, with a drawback that only affects spellcasters. That's arguably the one I'd be most worried about - the others aren't that bad, especially since they have several prerequisites as a balancing factor.

That is more a function of weapon focus being bad, not possessed hand being good.

My Brawler tribute to Ric Flair took Mud in your eye. Thankfully my DM lets me not suddenly forget how to throw goop at someone's face when I leave the caves and cities.

As for the other point, the entire FAQ spawned from a thread asking about stacking shield spikes and bashing. IT was asked if non-magical size increases like shield spikes stacked with magical ones like bashing. We got the FAQ. That didn't solve the issue. So we are again asking for a second FAQ in this thread.

And a second FAQ will likely not solve the issue either; because cjtSparhawk has how spiked shields worked pre-FAQ correct and everyone answering 1d8 has how it works post FAQ. The problem is the "'as if' FAQ" is probably the most universally ignored FAQ in the whole damn game.

The issue isn't that the rules aren't clear, it's an issue of what rules you are playing with: a side-effect of the FAQ as Errata, and straight Errata system paizo has been using that has lead to the number one reaction to it being: "well we won't use that in our game."

Sundakan wrote:

Neither does the new Jingasa. Because you probably used it on the greataxe wielding cyclops a few levels back.

*shrugs*

Sell the old one, buy the new one. Do the same thing with scrolls and potions and other 1 use Wondrous Items.

sell what? the itty bitty pieces? there are no used scroll salesmen for a reason.

BigNorseWolf wrote:

but the problem with the magic items isn't that the items were decreasing diversity, they were increasing it. Now its going to drop.

I want clarification on this argument. How does removing a hat nearly every character had, and opening up the option for at least a dozen useful hats with different functions at or below the same price-point decrease diversity.

This argument keeps coming up and it so much doesn't make sense.

Of course it doesn't, you think the other hats are worth the gold. They aren't. oh look, it makes sense now.

Sundakan wrote:

All this talk about Fate's Favored and nobody stopped to think that maybe it's the trait that's the problem?

"10k is too cheap for the Jingasa because a trait can double its AC bonus!"

Lolwut?

I think this was said over at the other thread about the Jingasa, it seems like this thread is stuff calculating prices for magic items.

So yeah, all of this arguing over a trait that basically double a lot of the smaller luck bonuses in the game... and yet they nerf a item instead...

Honestly, i am starting to lose faith in Paizos decision making.

only starting?

oh honey.

also whoever said AC 36 is too high; LOL.

I keep seeing people ask:

• trying to balance
  
• discourage people from taking popular options
  
• nerfing for spite

Why can't it simply be "people are interpreting this doggedly than designed and we see how they got that impression. So let's align it to intent.

That has nothing to do with balance, spite, popularity or anything similar.

Because this isn't our first ride on the "what the hell are they doing!" train. We've had 7 years of illogical nonsense from this crew; and our patience is wearing thin. they, to be blunt, should know better by now.

Chess Pwn wrote:

Now if IN THE ERRATA FOR THE NEW BOOK THAT THEY JUST MISSED THE OPPORTUNITY TO DO SO

It makes it hard to get this addressed when some of the posts seem to question whether or not the "they stack" position is a serious question.

Which is understandable when you consider the history of said question. Most bonuses of the same type do not stack, while some do. Since 3.5 Size bonuses stacked. Because this is different than how most bonuses work it spawns questions of "wait it's different?" which leads to James complaining that a heavy spiked shield shouldn't hit as hard as a great sword, and that he personally doesn't let this one instance stack. Que people taking this as Word of God, leading to more questions leading to the FAQ that size bonuses no longer stack. That FAQ, like most of them honestly, is poorly received; and thrown into the pile of stupid, ignored FAQs. Add in how spiked shields get their separate lines on the weapon tables, which can lead players not even knowing that there is a double up in size bonuses. In short is a product of Typical WoTC Editing(TM) exasperated by Typical Paizo Editing(TM).

Well, you know, Pathfinder Society.

has the Additional Resources page filled with Rules changes to make it work. Any change made to the rules because of Society play should be there; not errata, faq, or new printings.

Society play is not a normal game, never has, never will; hence why we now have 7 years of PDT being told not to balance its game around it. And of course 7 years of PDT ignoring that advice to it's own detriment.

*Sigh* I really wish the PDT would stop reinforcing my terrible opinion of them.

Link it again?

Link it again.

it also has specific tips about the magus.

CryntheCrow wrote:

the stances as move actions go completely against the flavor of a raging mass of power. "Hold on guys, let me FOCUS MY ANGER INTO A STRICTLY DEFINED PURPOSE." Easily the worst.

"Stance" is the wrong name for whats happening; though how to describe when raging you get an addition X-buff that can't be stacked with the other similar X-buffs at a glance is truly a complicated wordsmithing problem. "Angry-accuracy" or "Angry-defense" doesn't really work; and something like "focusing anger" or "cold rage" doesn't at a glace state they can't be combined without lots of extra word count either. Stance mechanically, works and in fact builds on prior uses of the word; even if there is massive thematic dissonance. Only thing I can think of off the top of my head that would work similarly is either Totems, which is already used; or Ancestor Spirits, which brings in baggage that would not always be appropriate for a barbarian character.

I've said many times, you'll never get a real Fighter fix without a feat fix. They are too reliant on feats. And yes, the feat system is grossly imbalanced, mostly because it has no scaling mechanism in place internally, like, say, spellcasting does.

Paizo got the bones of this with the Stamina system - basically forcing them to do ad hoc add-ons to every combat feat there is. However, the system is clunky, not supported in base literature, and the sheer size of it discourages people from using it.

==Aelryinth

I'm afraid the fighters woes go far deeper than just feats. It's a class without an identity. Think about it Rangers are nature fighters, cavilers are mounted fighters, barbarians are angry fighters, paladins are holy fighters, brawlers/monks are Street Fighter II.

I love the game as much as the next person, and I'm not shy about pointing out flaws, but it's nothing to get angry over.

I can however be angry over the fact that after 15 years the developers still don't know better.

freedom of movement exists. Tetori can negate it.

there really is no contest.

I'd spring for it. It's a fighting man with actual reserves. he's not healing himself with "lay on hands" his body is healing itself through Sheer will. he's not smiting something, he's swinging his weapon with extra purpose. he isn't using "detect alignment", he's sizing the boy up. Also don't laugh around his mule, or the mule might think your laughing at it.

The whole idea that chassis must always be a LG P-Word is, was, and always will be b$~@#%+s.

Because of typical Paizo editing; there is no reason, only no fun allowed.

If you think it's a problem, just jettison the alignment restrictions. They serve very little purpose in game anyway; and as this thread is devolving into shows: more a source of arguments than anything else.

Eric Clingenpeel wrote:

So... you've got your gun in one hand and staff in the other... how are you reloading?

Oh yeah, how'd you afford your double barrel pistol too?

Magic. . Also there is a spell that gives you a magic hand that reloads for you.

So your nova machine must also wand in reloading hands (2nd level spell on the magus list) which can load your weapon once a round for you. also reloading hands is rounds per level, so it isn't a buff and forget spell.

for an all powerful build, I am underwhelmed, even with wrist sheaths this build has atrocious action economy. especially since you have to choose between using your rod, or a full hasted attack.

I think we can stick a fork in it, as this is no better than an inquisitor, you either got to buff and mow em down, or you have to slowly, painfully build up and are finished buffing at the end of the fight.

I admit I was all behind this archtype being legal when I found out about it ... but then I started thinking about the Arcane bond because I just got my Zen Archer a +5 bow

Should we also be banning arcane duelist bards as well? they get the same trick.

it is? I made one of the biggest rebuttals to the argument for unbanning the Eldritch Archer. Not once I ever mentioned it doing too much burst damage. Even the OP did not list damage output as a major argument.

As I said, there's no single reason why the Eldritch Archer should not see play in PFS. There's many of them.

and your aguements break down to... the arcane archer deals its damage to safely. so yes it is about damage; because the magus class is all about damage.

Wand wielder allows you to do just that. I don't think once in a blue moon chronicle purchases are too worrisome though.

fair enough. teach me to build in my head while trying to draw senario maps; does a dam really have to be that big?

9mm nope, everything is legal based upon fame. Just because you don't know how to make it happen doesn't make it illegal. But yes, with gear you can have 8 scorching Rays a day, and by 9th you can have 3 disintigrates.

Also, no. Spell strike doesn't change firearms from touch.

you can't use magic items to cast spells via spell combat so no you can't use your staff of many rays to cast disintegrate and shoot your bow, or gun in your case. If your getting it some where else my google fu isn't good enough; so you'll have to share.

scorching ray scales off level, not caster level, but for the sake of arguement lets say it did: you'd go from D8+6+4d6 + your single d8+6 to a whopping D8+6+4d6 + D8+6+4d6 and nothing else because multiple rays get attached to your basic attack.

again: LoL wut mate?

At fifth level with +9 touch to hit with a d8+6+4d6x2 for two scorching Rays -+ your single d8+6 attack. It's pretty darn stupid.

At 9th level your firing three shots at 1d8+14 with an extra attack having a 32d6 dc 21 disintegrate attached to it.

so lets first point out some math issues. 1st for a magus to have 2 scorching rays he'd need to be 7th level. second ranged spell strike makes the all spells to target normal AC. so your 5th level archer is doing D8+6+4d6 + your single d8+6. which is downright pedestrian.

And your 9th level magus is illegally casting disintigrate 7 levels ahead of when he gets access to 6th level spells.

lol wut mate?

9mm wrote:

Alot of the fear seems to be "omg teh damages." and are using levels at which Investigators are one-shotting monsters to back it up. Damage is damage, sorry guys but your mosters are gonna die, they're supposed to.

I don't understand why many folks say "It seems like most of the concerns are X," when people's concerns are X, Y, Z, A, B, etc. And many of these reasons individually are sufficient enough that the archetype should be banned.

There's no single reason why Eldritch Archer should not see play. There's many of them.

you say that but... the entire thread is about damage.

By 5th level you can have 8 scorching rays per day. At ranged with weapon damage. The vast increase in damage scaling for eldritch is too much. It just is. I'll post a 5th and a 10th level build later.

5th can do a ton of scorching Rays and 10th has the ability to chuck out disintegrates and eneverations with their ranged attacks. It just becomes insanely out of ability compared to other builds.

I have yet to see anyone post anything that out damages current known benchmarks, many of which I might add are PFS legal.

If anything this seems to be a good reminder to scenario designers that wind wall is a thing

Overpowered =/= "broken", but...

RAW and using a 3,000gp rod, a 12th level magus with these arcana could fire an Intensified Shocking Grasp (10d6, not counting weapon damage on top of that) at ~500 feet.

Or, with an 11,000gp rod, three Maximized Scorching Ray arrows (24 + weapon damage each) also at ~500 feet.

To me, at least, that's pretty powerful damage output at a range difficult to fight back from for a very minimal cost for a PC.

Plus, those are just two quick examples that I came up with within a few seconds of seeing these arcana for the first time. I'm sure someone who's more rules-savvy than I could exploit them to a far greater extent.

Name the last scenario you played that had an opening combat range of 500 feet.

Alot of the fear seems to be "omg teh damages." and are using levels at which Investigators are one-shotting monsters to back it up. Damage is damage, sorry guys but your mosters are gonna die, they're supposed to.

How about the fact that to be a nature mage you have to be part of a secret order with a secret language, you have to be neutral, and have to follow a code of conduct that doesn't actually make much sense.

an order that basicly never exists, a secret language that never comes up, and what code of conduct? the metal armor you won't be wearing? and oh no neutral meaning near guaranteed immunity to a whole host of effect?

If you're in PFS, please understand that their choices were to make a nerfed Summoner, or ban the damn thing entirely. It was that disruptive to the meta.

So let's review.

meaning exactly 0 effect on the meta in grand total. high-op summoners will run around throwing birds at yetis for years to come. everyone else who didn't want to high-op gets screwed.

You know, I'm surprised people are annoyed with Unchained Summoner's "restrictive flavour" but I haven't seen many threads complain about the restrictive flavour of druids....

you mean the utter lack of any?

My animal compainon doesn't change based on what flavor of neutral I am. nor what I can turn into, or summon, or cast.

the fact that building a "nature mage" outside of a druid is rather difficult helps to.

I hate the shear number of riders on combat maneuvers. "can't move an enemy into a dangerous square" then what's the bloody point? also the fact you can not hockey-check people with a bullrush is inane. Also fun, feats with use riders that the user could not possible fulfill by himself, like deadly stroke.

Mine whistles while she fights.

On the topic of Intrigue, I think that it's early yet to decide the result of the vigilante playtest. No one on the design team thinks that the things we put out for playtest are perfect; otherwise we wouldn't playtest them (in fact, they aren't perfect even after playtest, no RPG product is). Not to issue a guarantee about anyone in particular liking the final vigilante, but wait until it's out before deciding how much we changed the final version (once it's out, if you read it and don't like it, then that's totally fair).

Sorry Mark but when Jason pops into a thread and says "we aren't changing the #1 thing you are saying needs to be changed" I think it is quite resonable to say we know the result of the playtest.

Well the rule that frustrates me the most currently is the two hands free requirement for a kinetist gathering power.

I'm sure there are others but, it's almost always fiddly little details that hamper execution.

That's a very designer-centric way of looking at it. "This feature is hard to implement properly, so people shouldn't want it."

Less "shouldn't want it" more "understand the restrictions required to pull it off." This includes piercing the players defenses.

Boss fights are a staple of mythology. RPGs should be able to create satisfying fights of a party against a single monster.

and most boss fights have lackeys involved, yet so many ignore that they are there. except crushim

It's something I'm sure a lot of designers would like to invent.

and have, however d20 isn't where you'll find it easily.

9mm wrote:

Ascalaphus wrote:

The autodeflect for melee was kinda broken. It let a level 2 monk stymie a T-Rex, or just about any monster with only one natural attack, no matter how good the monster's to-hit.

Martials should have nice things, but this was way beyond.

meanwhile the level 1 monk with deflect arrows stymies a crossbowman, whats your point.

If a dm is dumb enough to throw a singleton monster with exactly one attack at an original crane wing user, they deserve to have their encounter cakewalked.

If the GM is runnning a PFS scenario, he can't just switch out a monster.

which has more to do with PFS scenarios having terrible encounter design. Granted, this is because PFS's structure makes good encounter design either next to impossible or extremely deadly. This is the number 1 reason why PFS is not a good indicator of balance.

Most things that have ranged attacks also have some other thing they can do, but the same doesn't go for (dumb) melee monsters. And most ranged things eventually develop iteratives, but that doesn't work for single-natural-attack monsters.

If the GM has to throw out 20% of the Bestiary because of one feat, that feat is probably not well-balanced.

They don't need to throw out anything, they need to respect the action economy of the party. also compared to a simple smokestick, deflect arrows is weaksause when it comes to ranged attacks.

Re: other things (slumber hex) are just as problematic: sure. I don't like how that thing can wreck scenarios either.

But just because I'm not solving problem B for some reason, doesn't mean I shouldn't solve A.

the problem is, the problem isn't slumber hex, or crane wing, it's that people insist that a single monster will somehow be a challenge against any properly played party.

The autodeflect for melee was kinda broken. It let a level 2 monk stymie a T-Rex, or just about any monster with only one natural attack, no matter how good the monster's to-hit.

Martials should have nice things, but this was way beyond.

meanwhile the level 1 monk with deflect arrows stymies a crossbowman, whats your point.

If a dm is dumb enough to throw a singleton monster with exactly one attack at an original crane wing user, they deserve to have their encounter cakewalked.

Fortunately my DEX fighter only took the one level dip for the IUS and meets the other prereqs.

unfortunately my swordlord is definitely dead in the water, RIP maneuver master monk.

well the UC errata just slammed rebuilds on two of my characters. great.

So this means Mark had to make a lot of special exemptions in the base class, or he has/had to issue clarifications on how things work. Either to prevent abuse, or because the original description got messed with in editing. For example, apparently the description he submitted to the editors for Metakinesis explicitly allowed for Gather Power/Supercharge to work, but the editors re-formated it and now it's unclear.

to be blunt, I don't think he had to make those excemptions, but a boss who's known for limiting player choice made him put them in.

That said out of all the things in this class, the fact you need two free hands to channel power makes me irrationally angry.

So doesn't look like there's a whole lot for may maneuver master/brawler. well on the bright side, it means I can level him before going to some specials.

graywulfe wrote:

Alexander Augunas wrote:

Mentathiel wrote:

Wait... Does this mean we can finally have a viable 'Improved-X' build without having to take Combat Expertise? My Bluff at +34 feinting rogue could have done with that...

Yes in most cases, not in yours. The feint action isn't a combat maneuver, its a use of the Bluff skill. As a result, this feat will not help you qualify for Improved Feint, nor will it give you any bonuses on feint checks.

I will have to take another look at my CRB, but isn't Feint listed with the Combat Maneuvers in the Combat chapter?

No, but it is right beneath the Combat Maneuvers section...I wonder if that's why so many people think it's a combat maneuver...

that and it has improved/greater feats as well, complete with combat expertise pre-req. Also when you think about what combat manuvers are/do, feinting not being a combat maneuver is a real surprise.

Come out already! My brawler is ready!

9mm wrote:

Quantity does not equal quality; and people have gotten really good at shifting through the junk to get to the gold. it isn't disingenuous at all to say " I found nothing, and you probably won't either"

That is false though... Look at the promethean alchemist, sensate fighter, psychic detective, mindblade, esoteric, ritual magic (magic even commoners can do), leylines, new spells, magic items, etc. If someone found nothing in this book, they likely didn't look at it for very long.

never said it was true, all I said is just because Brandon doesn't agree doesn't mean people can't be disappointed at a grand total of 9 class agnostic feats; and if that's what they think, they should say so. The by-line matters.

So with 24 feats, 22 archetypes, 56 spells, piles of rituals, pages worth of skill unlocks, chakra unlocks usuable by non-psychic classes right now, and nearly 100 new magic items, saying "very few feats and other options to consider for a character already built" is disingenuous at best, and at worst threatens to turn away those who are otherwise enthusiastic about the content but being giving the wrong impression that they won't find anything useful. Just because you didn't find anything useful doesn't mean someone else won't.

Quantity does not equal quality; and people have gotten really good at shifting through the junk to get to the gold. it isn't disingenuous at all to say " I found nothing, and you probably won't either"

Snowblind wrote:

b)Only giving system fixes to the fighter to boost them up, so the fighter is kinda half ok and all the other martials are still stuck with the same crappy full attack routine, meaning literally nothing has improved with the system from the players' point of view unless someone writes "Fighter" on their sheet

I see a lot of people complaining about the "full attack routine," or saying martials can only "full attack, full attack, full attack."

What are you expecting for martials? Are you looking for martials to be the same as casters? "I use Zen Blade Strike. Okay, I move ten feet then use Fortress of Steel and redirect any attacks at the nearest enemy. Okay, then I use Flurry of Throwing Axes?"

depends on the type of martial I'm playing. Issebella Jurdac doesn't fight like Gene of the Pits or Bu Lu the hidden blade; and none of them fights like Sir Fullattack. (ironically only Bu Lu would want to be a BoNS/PoW style character you're describing)

Though the only full attack problem is, unless it's a fight, they can rarely contribute to the party in a meaningful way, and that is just boring.

I hope we can at least get to see errata before its printed in books. Imagine an "Errat Playtest"!

It would make the game better, avoid senseless, overbearing nerds of something into something biring(the new Scarred Witch Docotor) or nearly not worth the resource spent(the new Divine Protection)!

that is assuming that the PDT listens to the feedback; and lets face it, if they did this thread wouldn't exist.

when it comes to alignment, I throw it out and replace it with the magic color pie, works awesome.