Alec Colasante's page

Isabelle Lee wrote:

Benjamin Medrano wrote:

As an aside, Isabelle? Do you mind if I ask if you were involved in writing the Skirmisher Fighter Archetype, or the Flamewarden or Stormwalker Ranger Archetypes? Because I have to say, of the character options to come out of this book they are my absolute favorites.

There are a ton of rules that I like, too, but those are standouts for me.

I wasn't, I'm afraid. ^_^ My only contributions were the cavalier archetypes (green knight and saurian champion) and the following feats:

** spoiler omitted **

I think many of the feats you listed were the best part of the book.

Also the green knight is, IMO, the single greatest cavalier archetype in the game, and honestly the only thing that could get me to play one.

That's not true. We had Druid and Beastmorph Alchemists. Also spells.

So... yeah, there are a lot of ways to play a satisfactory shapeshifter. First and Third Party.

Also Feral Hunters.

There is no contest. There is no discussion. There is an aberration which needs to be stamped out, and a glorious truth where water freezes at 0, boils at 100 and your armpits start to smell at 30.

Seriously, stop resisting, wayward colonials.

As one of the wayward colonials that uses fahrenheit, I don't get why there wouldn't just be both fahrenheit and celsius in the book.

If you "remove the WoW Hunter from the Druid" the Shifter would very much come out ahead, and be far more interesting to play than that.

I disagree, a class that only had druids full wildshape would still be a more interesting to play class than base shifter. It *might* not be as strong, but it would be more interesting.

I’m starting to notice the difference between people who don’t mind the Shifter versus those who don’t like it. The people who dislike it want to be able to play something as it’s written in the book, whereas its defenders are the people who don’t mind houseruling certain aspects and extrapolate past RAW to actually make something usable....

I have no problem with houseruling things, my problem with the shifter is that in order to make it a class worth taking, you need to houserule to the point of practically making a new class. If I'm making a character I intend to play for a full campaign, the shifter offers nothing new flavor wise or mechanically, and on top of that it isn't even particularly good at what it does.

So meaningless question that it may, it may be of use in the long run....

To be comfortable in the direction they chose to take the Shifter, what are your minimum fixes, and what would you need to see to make you willing to play a character of this class...what are the minimum changes you would need to see ?

I don't think there is anything other than a complete rework that could get me to play the base version of the class. The ooze and lycanthrope archetypes on the other hand I could definitely see myself playing. I'm not sure what changes I would want from the ooze one exactly, but for the lycanthrope I would like to see better scaling on their claws as well as some bonus feats, and maybe more uses of the hybrid form.

I expected at-will Wild Shape at least, considering that's the one gimmick the class does and it's only limited to certain forms.

Yeah that was bare-minimum for me. And what I was REALLY hoping for was something similar to evolution points to customize it.

Personally...I think it's a bad call.....that said it's the call they have made. I'm not going to speak on the product page, as I don't actually like being dictated what my opinion can be on a product....and actually aside from a handful of comments the disappointed majority were far more civil than is being portrayed.

Yeah, it honestly wasn't even that bad. Most of the posters were civil, they were just negative about one aspect of the book, which I guess people took as them being toxic? It makes the lockdown even more concerning imo.

So, is it just me or does the gag order in the product thread for Ultimate Wilderness feel like damage control so that the book's first-week sales don't get hurt? Sure, people were getting a little salty, but what with the sandbagging reviews and the general discontent, it feels like a band-aid on a sword wound.

Yeah, it is certainly concerning that they simply said to stop talking about what for many is the main draw of a product on it's own product thread. It would have been okay imo if they at least addressed the feedback with their post, whether that be by saying they would try and change it to meet expectations or by saying that they have no plans to atm, but just saying to not talk about it sounds 100% like pr damage control to keep sales up.

I haven't read through this entire thread yet, but from what I did read, I saw several people mentioning that they didn't want to be pigeonholed into a Dex-based build. I personally can't see any reason why the Dex-based build shouldn't be the optimal build. It's a Dex-based class. I don't expect a Wis-based Wizard to be as good as an Int-based one, so why should a Str-based Swashbuckler be as good as a Dex-based one?

In an upcoming campaign, I am going to be playing as a drow noble who was born without the ability to use magic (either just his spell-like abilities or any spells, I haven't decided yet). Because of that, he was exiled at an early age, and wishes to, as he would say "set things straight". In order to do this, he is going to retrieve the Sceptre of the ages, which he believes is in the vault of Abadar (the vault with one copy of everything, name might be wrong). He believes the vault is locked with the Impossible Lock (the one that can't be opened except by the Perfect Key). So he is going to get the key, and open the vault, to get the Sceptre. Using the Sceptre he is going to go back to the beginning of time, slay Asmodeus right after Asmodeus kills Ithys (thinks that's how it's spelled), in order to be the only godlike being left. He is then going to convince the life forms that evolve on the material plane that he is a god, so that they worship him. He believes that their worship will grant him divine power, which is equal to magic (at least in his mind). The only problem is, I have no idea why he wouldn't have magic, because I have no idea why magic is accessible to anyone (except gods, because, well there gods).

Sorry for the wall of text. Long story short, where does magic come from?