Aestolia's page

Doe stonesinger apply to the geokineticist

I was just thinking about this too. Unfortunately no i don't think so, based on this:

A kinetic blast that deals energy damage of any type (including force) has the corresponding descriptor.

Unfortunately, all of the earth blasts do physical damage. If there were an 'acid blast' which did acid energy damage, then it would theoretically work with that. (as acid is traditionally an earth element and would therefor be a Kinetic blast with the earth descriptor.)

Mikaze, I'll see if I can't find that thread.

A Dev post is good enough for me, as I know will settle the lawyer as well.

"Each dog has an owner" <-- There are many dogs (in the park, in the world, etc). Each individual one has at least one owner.

"Each dog has one of three owners" <-- There are many dogs. Each individual has only a single owner out of the three possible owners.

I'm going to try approaching it to him this way. As I said he's being seriously pedantic about it. Hopefully he'll stop being an idiot about it.

But I guess what everyone's saying is: it doesn't actually say it specifically anywhere in the book, just implies it through people who play-tested and the intended meaning of what's written.

I just explained his argument, you're focusing on the 'A' when the problem is the 'each'. It changes the sentence, as I explained into the possible meaning of a multiple, even though it still uses single pronouns.

as for the single part as I said, he agree's it's one eidolon, just that it can be summoned in any of the three forums because of the distributive construction of the sentences.

I get that, and I get that the fluff points out it's singular.

I wish you were correct Okugi, but those phrases aren't in the singular. they're written in a distributive construction which uses singular words which are typically applied to a multiple.

A common example of this is the saying: 'Every dog has his day.' Singular reflecting the plural. Also 'Each dog has his day.' also does this, Each is one of those words which frequently trigger a distributive construction.

This is one of those tricky wibbly wobbly parts of English that sadly has exceptions to seemingly every rule. But in terms of the English language these sentences can be taken as either:

'Each summoners eidolon has one of three...'
or
'Each of the summoners eidolon has one of three...'

The guy works in a justice department so is seriously hung up on the use of the English. Which by the wording actually is a bit ambiguous. This is why I'm looking for some passage that with out a doubt says One form one eidolon, don't be an idiot.

As for the use where it is clearly singular. 'his eidolon' the way he's arguing it is that is is a singular eidolon with 3 forms: Feats and skills don't change, evolutions do. With each base form being a separate aspect of the same creature.

He's literally driving me mad.. I've never contemplated killing another pc before... but lately...

Hi everyone,

I'm sure most of you are all sick of this topic, and I honestly did try and find an already existing post about it, but to no avail.

Base forms.

So I'm in a game with a rather pedantic rules lawyer. They are of the opinion that a summoner can summon their Eidolon in any of the 3 different base forums. His reasoning for this is the following:

APG P.55: "...each eidolon receives a pool of evolution points, based on the summoner's class level..."

APG P.58: "Each eidolon possesses a base form that modifies these base statistics."

APG P.59: "Each eidolon has one of three base forms that determine..."

Well you get the picture.

It's that darned word 'each'. Now I went looking for the 'cannot be changed once selected' forgetting that that specific line had been removed since the play testing versions. Now I'm looking for some scrap of text that definitively says Don't be an idiot, you're eidolon only has one form. However, I can't actually find it. Logic says one thing, The weaknesses of the English language say another. Sadly I'm not the GM otherwise I'd just say 'cause I say so'.

Can anyone point out what I'm missing here? Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi you're my only hope!

Edited: A typo I noticed

This came up in our game recently as well, we housed ruled it to the following:

As long as the summoner get their 8 hours rest (for summoners natural healing), then the eidolon also gets ability back.

So basically TeShen's second scenario, with the proviso that the summoner did get uninterrupted rest.

I dont' think the wording has made it in anyway unreasonable. Note they say they prepare vials of the catalyst for the day, and one created they're good for years.

it's like saying that I, ahead of time, set up a vial of Bleach, and a Vial of ammonia. then on the round take a move action to pour them together, shake them, then toss the home made mustard gas bome at the enemy.

mixing 2 unamed 'catalysts' to form an active short lived bomb doesn't need to bring in a suspicion of disbelief, since it can be done in reality. If you add in the fact that the alchemist also mixes 'magic aura' into their concotions, it should be doubly reasonable.

From a mechanics point of view, no it's not a huge draw back unless your chuging back your Mr. hyde muts all day.

But that's just it; Jekyll wasn't, shall we say, a 'people person' when Mr. Hyde was about. Leave the talking to the dashing party members and keep your think knoby skined ass outta it ;p

Or you could just make Restoration extracts

Lesser is 2nd level, Restoration is 4th

I'd like to point out that really, i don't care either way weather the Inquisiter gets firearms or not. My initial point was agreeing with someone else that they are in the world. That's all.

As for weather they're going to be in the APG or not. Yes, it's not looking good, but if I recall, James didn't say 'no way' just, 'not likely, but we should do it eventually' (paraphrased)

Master Craftsman only applies to Craft Arms and Armour, and Craft Wonderous Item (P.130)

I just don't think it's right to just toss aside the hard work that Paizo put into fleshing out their world just because it came out before their own system. Especially since they're both based on OGL and d20.

Paizo does not include setting specific material in their core rulebooks, of which the APG is part of.

P.43 Core rules: Table 3-6: Deities of the Pathfinder Chronicles

Because of the nature of certain base clases there is always some setting specific material.

Aestolia wrote:

*snip*

Since firearms are already cannon *snip*

Couldn't resist.

~smirks and shrugs~ I am what I am. How could I resist?

Well my turn for snark, and it's the last I'll say on it because it's really not actually worth arguing over.

The APG is a rules book not one of the setting line and not tired to the setting

Right, because WotC, NEVER put out anything that was campaign specific in any of the splat books. Like feats dependant on Greyhawk deities (Races of Destiny), or base classes that gained abilities tied to specific deities (Complete Psionics), or anything else like that (countless prestige classes that are deity dependant).

All said and told, way I see it is they're making things FOR Pathfinder. If all of WotC's books tend to default to what exists in Greyhawk, why shouldn't Paizo default to what exists in Golarion.

Alchemists don't have a caster level.

Ah but firearms do not exist in the current rules. Seems kinda odd to add something they have no plan to put in the book, or have in the rules as of yet

I'd say this is point of view.. Rules for Firearms do exist in a pathfinder book already.. it just happens to be a book they released before releasing the system as it's own entity.

Since firearms are already cannon it stands to reason that there are plans to put them in a future book. Also, weapon-wise, damage and rules haven't really changed between 3.5 and pathfinder so there's no reason you can't just use them as is from the Pathfinder Campaign Setting book.

I might recommend looking at Wall of Iron again, it specifies that the iron is unsuitable for...anything else, really.

Caveat emptor, ~smirks and taps the side of her nose~ we can just keep that little tidbit between you me and the wall.

A better melee/ranged mix is a feat that allows the ranged attacker to ignore firing into melee penalties from melee allies with the same feat. So if the only people in melee combat with the archers/ranged touch person's (with this feat) target has the same feat. no Melee penalty is assessed.

Most ranged characters will usually have Point blank / precise shot, so I don't see this as really being a benefit. Why make all the melee take a feat when you only need to take one yourself?

I'd say allow the range to ignore any concealment or partial cover that melee is involved with, but that's also similar to Improved precise shot.

Perhaps allow flanking if the archer is within 30'?

As Piper says,

They already are a part of Golarion history. They came, people blew off their own arms becasue they didn't know how to use them, so scrapped them in favour of crosbows and magic. From a 'technology and science' standpoint this makes sense. Why mess with something dangerous that you can kill yourself with, when there's already more powerful, safer, established forces available.

As a side note, firearms are more common in the Mana Wastes where magic doesn't work.

Which reminds me (as a further tangent); I hope there are plans to either re-release, or at least release a conversion update for the Campaign Setting. Lots of it is easy enough to bring over, but there are small things, like the expanded domains, which are written in 3.5 style rather than Pathfinder Domain style.

Actually, think of a t-rex, it can't even reach his nose...he just has those small arms, the poor guy.

Yes but his bite / tailwhip probably have more than the current maximum of 10' (one reach Evo)

Damn those City Guards... Magic Wand, Make my Monster GROW!!!

Summoner is a new class with fewer associated tropes.

This is more what I was trying to say, that it's more limited. I just wasn't really at one with my words. I can't agree that it's 'just as open as wizards'. On the very basic level 'City Protector, Adventurer, Enterteiner, Hermit....' sure, There are lots of ways to do put the Summoner forward (though a lot of the utility for such things was lost with the duration cut to the SLA).

By the flavour what I meant was; regardless what role you play, the mechanism will always be pretty much the same 'I'll help by getting creatures to help and buffing.' Thier own spell and skill list is far too limited to really diversify on that effectivly.

You can, however, always use your Eidolon to help support any role you take quite easily. Through the Skilled, and SLA evolutions, you can reinforce different roles,even passing such things onto yourself with aspect.

I find the summoner plays really well into some roleplay flavour. While no it's not as general as some of the other classes, it does lend it's self really well to Chelaxians. I wouldn't say it has 'no' roleplay flavour, it's just... Overly seasoned so only one flavour comes through strong. ^.^

I'd say so, the wording is pretty much the same "With X spell get Y".

As for the link, It would be nice to see a more generic type of summoning spell. Something similar CR based but different spells for different types:
Humanoids (Hunanoid, mons. Humanoid)
Animals (Animals, Magic beast, Vermin)
Nature (Plants, Fey)
Alien (Abberations, Outsiders)
Imbued (Constructs, Undead)

I only partially agree.

Many of the standard spells play perfectly well into how I've view the Summoner (not just the pet part) like the Teleports, Planar Binding, Dimensional travel related spells.

as for the DC largely their spells aren't offensive. Really on the offense side the only real 'big' DC hit is 'Dominate monster' Most of their selection is defensive/buff (where someone won't 'try' to save against it) or doesn't apply to saves. There are a few conjuring spells that are below level (such as the planar binding spells) but I have a feeling most summoners are going to be taking a focus in conj. anyways for Aug'd summoning. This puts such spells back on level playing fields.

This does however somewhat relate to another post I made because of the 'lower level' of spell, how does this affect the creation (or recharging) of magic items such as staves. What 'level' spell is their SLA? is Summon Monster IX a 6th level SLA or 9th? what about Summon Monster VI, which isn't on their list?

Because SLA's function "just like the spell of that name" (p.221 Pathfinder Core)

Augment summoning affects "Each creature you conjure with any summon spell" (p. 118 Pathfinder Core)

The ability to call your Eidolon is not a summon spell, nor is it a SLA.

Actually if they are large based on page 195 of the players handbook then they would have a natural reach of 10 for size large and 15 for size huge. Unless you are building a snake or a horse.

Most quardropeds / serpentine creatures would fall under large (long) and giving them Large - 5' and Huge 10' not 10/15

This difference of tall/long is why (I assume) they didn't include reach numbers in the large/huge Evo. nothing is listed as being tall or long.

The enlarge spell spcifically dictates: "A humanoid creature whose size increases to Large.....a natural reach of 10 feet."

Ceteris paribus, precidence shows us that the reach increase is listed with the effects of the size increase. Since it's not listed in the case of the Evo, there's no reason to assume we should get one.

Having said this, as powerful as the size increase evo's are, even without the reach buff, i think it's kind of silly to be able to have a Huge 15/15 foot creature that cant' reach past it's own nose.

Yes I require that VoP requires DM sayso which was the point of my example.

As i said 'an extreem example' but an example none the less. It illustrates quite well that some things should be juged by the DM in regards to balance for the campaign they're running.

Wishes / Tomes / permanant effects, I feel would fall into the same category.

one could also argue 'no' because the creature isn't actually here, but yes if you 'call' the creature rather than summon it.. apply the effects, then banish it back to it's home.

I would agree that the Eidolon does have a predisposition towards being the center stage, but the rules do allow for someone to build otherwise. I would like to see a bit more choice in the base form / evo's to facilitate this (perhaps a base form with better mental vs physical stats).

I haven't posted my own testing eidolon, largely because I'm lazy. I basicly let it act as a spell / skill suppliment with enough combat to hold it's own and act as support to both the party and myself.

Someone in another thread made mention of letting the Summoner make a staff with Summon monster IX and it only being a '6th' level spell so it could be recharged at a 'discount' when handed off to wizard (6th level slot instead of a 9th).

This brought up an interesting question regarding the Summoners spell list and SLA.

Would the staff be recharged at a discount because of the "lower" spell level of the Summoner.

Also, what level is the Summoners Summon monster IX SLA? 6th? 9th? A summoner could take 'Empower Spell-Like ability' if SMIX counts as 6th level, but not if it counts as 9th

Does magic item creation/Feats assume spells to be based on the standard wiz/sorc progression?

Anyway, anybody else find that while they are making up Eidola of various shapes and forms that some of your creations would make just proper creatures to inhabit a dungeon/world/campaign?

Very much so, oddly enough my own concept was similar to yours, (flying serpent with arms) not as focused on combat but made to help suppliment the Summoner in her 'primary' profession as a ~cough~ dealer of contracts.

Eidolon helps with the magic circle / protection while I call in the planar binding and help... facilitate deals with otherworldy powers.

Being unsure of how transmogrify actually works, I'm somewhat banking on at least being able to modify the minimum 3 points needed to change the Magic Circle VS X as a SLA.

Too be fair, I can see both sides of this:

No there's no reason any of these things should be limited, but for the sake of balance yes some of them should. In the end, really, it should be up to both the PC and the DM to come to a concensus on what's reasonable and what's game breaking.

as a kind of extreem example: I could see taking 'Sacred Vow' make sense for an Eidolon depending on back story, why do you think he's serving the summoner? But to allow a creature who spends most of it's time on another plane, and can't really own equipment (it falls to the ground) Vow of Poverty just kind of breaks it.

Granted i'm using an example of a feat that's often case by case ruled, but that's also the point.

from a multiclassing perspective, Rogue would work well. Summoners Cha lends it's self well to the new social skill aspects available. In combat, it opens up flanking /sneak attack opportunities with your Eidolon and SLA creatures.

In a pure summoner build, you could always see about dropping some feats into ranged combat, rapid reload, point blank shot? Not necessarily the best solution but from a 'pure' class perspective there are limited choices.

One question I do have about his spell list, does he have to take the Summon Monster spells? Since he gets all of them as a Spell-like ability, it would make more sense to automatically add the to his list at the correct level. It seems like a "spell tax" to an already limited choice to make a Summoner have to choose "Summon Monster" spells.

Not necessarily, given the fact that (s)he does have it as a SLA I view it as something I can suppliment with my spell selection. This was a bit easier to justify / manage when the longer duration was present, but is still how I do run the summoner. having 6/day (minimum you'd have to have to have access to all spell levels 16Cha) is in most cases plenty.

I would also add the "Summon Nature's Ally" spells to his list, if he is going to be a Summoner, he should be able to summon anything.

The fluff does say that the summoner is most skilled at "beckoning monsters from the farthest reaches of the planes" too me this kind of says they specialize more with outsiders / extraplanar creaturs, not just all summons. Otherwise you could argue summon undead as well.

I may have done a 'family' origin but keep in mind, I still do 'summon' the eidolon.

The big difference between a regular summon and the Eidolon summon is that you are summoning an aspect of a specific creature instead of the aspect of a general creature.

To this means that the summoner needs to be in some way familiar with the actual outsider.

I plan to play test with Jasons amendments as that's what he's asked for. Really I don't see the need to scale back the duration when you consider the 1 SLA cap anyhow.

Given the number of uses a day if you do need to resummon in combat, odds are still good you won't run out, plus it opens up different kinds of utilitarian use of summons like I mentioned earlier.

Conjurors are good at a whole school,

Summoners are good at one aspect of that school, in that one aspect they should probably outshine a conjuror.

...deletion of the standard action doesn't actually make the Summon Monster SLA take a whole round. See page 221 of the PRPG.

Yes it does

P221 prpg "1 standard action unless noted otherwise in the ability or spell description."

Summon monster spell description says Casting time: 1 round

so your solution is to take away an ability that any summoner can use, and replace it with half abilities for your Eido, and half abilities that the summoner may not even be able to use, unless he chooses the very limited spells on his list that actully benefit from those abilities?

IMO a class ability should be able to be used out of the box. Every ability for every base class is like this. You decide on limitations based on the ability, the ability doesn't decide upon limitations for you.

Malagfein,

The major problem with this is given the extreemly limited spell list and spell selection (only 5 or 6 spells per spell level), a build like this would pretty much force the summoner to take the summon monster spells as chosen spells on their spell list, further reducing an already limited selection.

Indeed its not a guarantee. For instnace there are some large animals without reach. It depends on the creature, and the attacks.

That's one of the 3.0 -> 3.5 changes I questioned, it was easier to know if something had reach Large-long and Large-tall

...just encourages the summoner to send their summoned creatures to scout ahead, search for traps, and make sandwiches... All things the rogue should be doing for you.

My rogue never makes me sammiches... POWERS BE DAMNED

~storms off to hunt the rogue~

Honestly though, I do disagree with one part; I do feel that there IS room for a summoner to make use of summons outside of combat, besides scouting. All be them situational, it just promotes 'outside the box' thinking. Stopped by a cliff-side? Summon some Pteranodons to fly the party up (higher level / handle animal) or a small air elemental to fly a rope up and tie it to something. Need the rogue to steal that amulet without the guards noticing? Look! a pack of wild dogs is causing ruckus in the streets. Little girl crying cause she scrapped her knee? Look! Free pony rides!!

ok so that last one was a bit sillier, but there are situations where it doesn't hurt to have friends.

a couple of other mechanics reasons:

Summoned monsters cant: Use summon spells, use spells/sla's with costly material components, teleport or use planar travel

This prevents your Eidolon casting things like wish, or more summon spells of it's own, or any kind of 'super travel'

Summoned monster, and as such your Eidolon, can not enter an antimagic field, but if it were called, it would be able to.

I hope to get some tests done to these changes soon but my first impression is Similar to Zurai's

The Eidolon changes look good, but taking away the fast/long sla AND limiting it to one active at a time i think is too far a shift. one or the other would probably be fine.

Then nova all but one summon, whatever. Three to four summons pre-summoned wreck one fight a day, and no summoner is going to have less than five a day.

Bear in mind, at level five, the summoner can completely wreck one encounter a day with four leopards, and still have one summon per fight left over for the remainder of a typical day.

It must be nice to have a DM who only ever gives you one encounter a day >.> cause you know that's how it always happens...

He's exceedingly hard to actually kill, since you can unsummon a dying eido as a standard action.

This still leaves the summoner with no Eidolon for 1 minute, IE: a good time i'd want to at least have a summon in reserve.

Personally I say You're Eidolon will be back tomorrow.. deal, and I hope you didn't blow all your summon monsters on a mass summoning >.>