Allia Thren's page

It is rumored that there are many in Ustalav who practice necromancy, ranging from minor experiments to occult ceremonies. How do you feel about such practices? Could you ever work along side such individuals?

Here's my submission for Eskela, half-elven druid.

Posting from this avatar since I haven't created a new one yet, but I think everything you need is here.

I'll post something tomorrow, it's a bit to late already now.
Possibly a druid, but that may change if I find a better idea or can't come up with a fitting concept.

Hi GMT, glad to see you're back.

Also *waves to Kalis and Dragolan*

I'm already playing in a JR game (we're just past the first major encounter), and while I love it, the game is still in full swing and I'd prefer not to jinx it by applying for another JR game :)
I think I'd actually prefer Runelords or Kingmaker but Carrion Crown also could be interesting.

Actually Ultimate Combat introduced a couple of "Quick CM" feats for those standard action CMs, like bull rush or dirty trick that allow you to do one of them in place of a melee attack. However you need to use your highest attack for it, so you can only do it once per round, and it has alot of requirements for those feats.

So, just to be clear, there's nothing that actually specifics what this means, just "common" sense?

Well most likely because it simply makes no sense to say "Ok, I rolled a dice. It's somewhere between 1 and 20. Do you want me to reroll and take the second one?"

If the ability is "takes the worst of the two" (i dunno how the revelation is worded), then yes, it might work like that though, then you trigger that revelation whenever you need something to succeed.

I'd agree with Jiggy as well on this. There's no indication that a +4 per person is intended.

Combat Maneuvers can still be situationally useful. But they won't be useful against the most dangerous physical types you face. CMDs get really high for combat maneuvers to be useful to less than +20 BAB classes and monks in my opinion.

Even a rogue with Dirty Trick has an extreme problem trying to hit a fighter. Another thing the game designers should have corrected for rogues: CMB for maneuvers that fit the rogue class.

I guess if you can convince your GM that you perform your Dirty Trick with oyur weapon, you'd get the Finesse bonus on it and use Dex for your CMB.

Problem with Combat maneuvers is theytake a lot of feats to just be good at 1.

Eg Trip- Combat Exp
Imp Trip
Gtr Trip

Sure you are good at tripping but that's not always the best option.
A fighter may have enough feats to master 2 of them.

Really Barbarians are by far the best at maneuvers because they only need 2 things. Strength Surge and Lunge means any Barb can land any maneuver without suffering the AOO.

a) Combat Expertise is the prerequisite for a whole host of CM feats. So is Power Attack. Most people will have one or the other anyway, and usually build their CMs towards that feat. So for Str-based fighters the PA doesn't really count.

A bard using a whip and having the trip feats to be a better supporter/battlefield controller is not a waste.
However, yeah, it's probably not so awesome for most classes.

Wolf animal companions are really awesome trippers too :)

I'm onboard for those saying that a cleric of Pharasma wouldn't even get those spells in the first place, even though by RAW they could. Just doesn't make any sense.
They get replaced in the Death domain spell list for non-animating spells for example.

I can't really think of any circumstances where a cleric of Pharasma would even consider creating an undead even if only for a few minutes. It simply goes against all their teachings, trainings and core beliefs.

@SRM:

You said it yourself the base races are only somewhat balanced.
None of them is a 22 while another is a 6.
But one of them could be an 8 and the other a 12, and the rest inbetween and they're still "somewhat balanced".

That way if a GM comes up with a new race at 11 he knows, that it's in the same area as the rest of them.

The problem is that you take "all core races" as baseline, but they already are of different power levels to each other.
Take humans as baseline at 10 RP for example, and THEN build it around that. If a race comes out at 8 RP in the end, ok, if at 12, ok...

And if a core race actually comes out at 4 then, you probably should give it a boost instead of finding ways to justify why some other things they have cost 6 RP to get it to 10.

Well I'm not sure they made all touch spells available as a communal version, so the GM should be ready and rule some spells as excluded from the feat, even though I can't really put my finger on one that would be overpowered by it.

Probably add that it can only affect allies, not enemies, at least I don't think there's a communal spell that targets enemies already.

But I guess the they made it this way soy ou don't have to learn another feat, but new spells instead. That's cool for wizards, druids and clerics, but not so much for sorcerers, oracles and bards.

Maybe it's just because I'm so used to the term, but "Saving Throw" sounds better to me than "Saving Roll". Rolls off the tongue better, so to speak. 8^)

I think that's most likely just habbit, because we're used to that term and not Saving Roll.

Since all three have different names, attack roll, skill check and saving throw, that was maybe intentional, so it's harder to confuse them or so?

Allia Thren wrote:

In one of the 3.5 books, I believe Complete Scoundrel, they have a weapon modification called Wand Chamber, which allows you to store a wand inside a weapon and it counts as readied as long as you hold the weapon. Not sure about the price right now.

Do you have the stats for the Wand Chamber? That sounds like pretty much what I want.

Actually it's from Dungeonscape, p 34. Still a 3.5 book so you should check with your DM first if it's allowed. I would totally allow it, because it was written by The Giant, but that's maybe just me :)

In one of the 3.5 books, I believe Complete Scoundrel, they have a weapon modification called Wand Chamber, which allows you to store a wand inside a weapon and it counts as readied as long as you hold the weapon. Not sure about the price right now.

Disguise self can be beaten easier than glamored.
Glamored specifically says only true seeing can penetrate it, and it actually changes shape and all.
So I would say, that glamored armor actually feels like clothing as well and can't be seen through just by disbelieving the illusion. Disguise self can.

Also an important thing is this:
Do your other PLAYERS know? Not their characters, the players themselves.
Or is he doing it secretly even from them, by note, text message, secret meeting in advance ("Listen, each time, I'm going to steal a bit of it"), or PbP game where it can be kept secret?

Because if the players know what he's doing, and don't really seem to care then you as GM should defnitely not get invovled. Apperently all is good.
If your other players since that started suddenly make sure they're nearby when the rogue finds the treasure when they've never done it before, then you can assume they're not actually ok with it. Then you might bring it up in private with the rogue, to maybe cut it down a bit, or stop entirely.

If the players do not know, make sure to give characters that have a realistic chance of seeing it a perception check. (That part also counts it they know of course)
If the rogue player is really going out of his way to keep the other PLAYERS from finding out in the first place, you can assume he knows what he does is wrong, and you should talk to him.

Trust IC is something you can lose easily, and that can be just part of the game. If the players lose trust to each other OOC, then your game will begin breaking apart.

Maybe it's not just silver plated, but massive silver? That would obviousy be more expensive?

Not sure why they couldn't just use a normal bullet and put a bit of silver around it, seems to work for the other weapons.

Depends what he's skimming.
Do they find bag with 1000 gp in it and he takes 10 or 20 for himself? No problem
Do they find a bunch of magic items and he graps the dagger, armor amulet, sneaky cloak before the rest of the group enters the room, then he's pushing it too far.

I would think for the caster to determine the effect he wants to target, he needs to know first what buffs are on the target in the first place.

A wall of fire is a pretty obvious effect, most buffs aren't.

Also note that the effect for targeting a specific spell clearly states it doesn't trickle down to lower DC spells if it fails. So your idea of "letting him choose then" is basicly giving him the best of both worlds, which is not really fair.

Usually in such cases it's "roll a die and choose randomly".

I know we had a couple of such threats lately, but haven't found this question answered (it has probably been in there but I really didn't feel like reading 300 pages).

NPCs usually have the same dying rules as PCs, from what I know at least. That means they have to reach negative Con to die. Which means usually they're not dead but simply unconcious and dying/stabilized when combat is over, especially at low levels where your hits don't do 100 damage yet.
Or the last enemy tosses his weapon away and yells "Stop! I surrender!"

This is assuming they're evil people, bandits and the like that started the fight, or evil races like goblins, etc. Animals and undead etc are easy, but sometimes you fight actual humanoids.

What do you do with them as a good character, probably even as a Paladin? Let them lie there and possibly die/get eaten by animals? Tie them up, take them with you? Execute them?
Is it a difference if you're inside a city, near a city or far out in the wilderness days away from any civilisation?

I mean that's a serious dilema as long as there's any survivors in a fight. I'm always glad when the DM handwaves it and assumes the NPCs are all dead, but sometimes it comes up.

50 ft of string/twine. Never know when that comes in handy.
And a fishing hook.
chalk or coal
Belt pouch
map/scroll case - unless it's totally out of character to carry paper.
small steel mirror is often useful

Spell comp pouch only if I'm playing a caster
Same for holy symbols etc.

It's still effective druid level 7 then. Boon Companion won't allow you to go over the CL limit.
It can go over the class level limit though.

A druid 4/fighter 3 would be effective druid level 7 for the AC.

There's a FAQ on it, I think

I agree, this would allow him to have a ranger with a druid style AC, which in itself already is an advantage, as well as some druid only spells which he can use wands for. Also gets a bonus to will and fort save, which isn't a bad thing either.

But he wouldn't get 2 level 7 ACs.

Zmar wrote:

Maybe I overlooked it, but did anyone also mention that the older you get the better whore you are (age categories improve WIS and give additional skill points via INT upgrades in case you sloggedin your studies while younger)? My my... profession (prostitute) hopefully involves operating your own establishment in later creer...

The age granted improvements to ability scores are a bad rule in every way. Thankfully, they are easy to remove.

Well it's not so insane, to portrait life experience and all that. However the problem with that is that too many skills are tied to them, that simply wouldn't get better just with age.

Probably would have been better to give fixed skill bonus and penalties with age instead of ability.
But thats a different topic

I always kinda assumed that Bluff would handle the seduction part.

Just make sure you keep a peace of him, so you can resurrect him later again :)

But yeah, it depends on why. If you're starving, then your AC might actually be willing to sacrifice itself for you (especially if it got Int 3). However it would be the last resort and not "Oh man, I haven't eaten anything since breakfast. I'M STARVING!"

Otherwise, that is just killing it for fun, well I'm not sure it would be evil, but it would most certainly upset your nature patron, and result in you not getting a new AC till you atoned for your sin or something.

Well you can put slashing and piercing weapons inside, they just need to be sheashed or otherwise protected.

Also the haversack says the different pieces are "like a bag of holding" so i'd actually guess that rule applies here too.

One thing you should remember: Bag of holding is large even from the outside. 2x4 feet, that's not your normal belt-pouch :)
So it's not exactly easy to carry.

What I wonder:
It says putting a bag of holding is put into a portable hole, then both vanish.
If a portable hole is put into a BoH then it sucks everything in a 10ft radius in, which is really bad.

So that means the effect of PH and BoH while similar are not the same, since it matters which is put into which.

What happens if you put a Bag of Holding into another Bag of Holding, or into a Haversack? (the largest BoH fits pretty much perfectly inside a HH, which would make it alot easier to carry, increases the size by alot, but you lose the "find stuff easy" property. And then you could store your other BoHs inside that BoH - of course now you need 3 full round actions to find something or so :) )

Yeah it's silly.
95% of the armor pieces for arms and legs are totally obsolete.

Unless you can only wear light armor, you won't ever wear one of the +0 arm pieces. Anyone else is stupid to wear anything but a Lamellar, horn one, because it's obviously better than everything else.
Legs: Studded armor is nearly the same as Hide and it's light. All other except o-yoroi is for the trash bin again.

While you might argue that "it looks stupid, I want my character to look nice", you can argue that when everyone buys a certain combination, then armorsmiths start making them in sets already.
I mean, what armorsmith would make a full suit of plate armor, if the legs and gauntlets NEVER get sold. Might make one or two then realises it.
So he'll build suits containing a breastplate, o-yoroi legs and horn lamellar arms, and build it in such a way that it actually looks like they were meant to be worn together.

For your first extradiminsional storage buy a haversack, after that it's usually bag of holdings or portable holes.

Unless there are extreme circumstances, where you know that you require a BoH and a haversack won't be enough. Like, you have a huge dragon hoard to carry around, and no storage to put it. But then again you probably don't have the moneytary problem and could buy both :)

While it could technically make sense to say "One side is cold iron, the other is silver" it has some problems.

a) The fighting styles for the different weapons don't work anymore. They're meant for hitting with either side, or stabbing etc. So you'd take a penalty on attacks.

b) Weapons are usually made out of a single piece. Well ok, thats not true, they're often using different materials, but usually they're not split in the middle into two totally different ones. It would definitely not work in the favor of the weapon's stability

c) Same reason, it would also make the weapon unbalanced, since cold iron is probably heavier than silver (or the other way around), so another penalty on hit

You can make double weapons out of different materials on each side though.

UC lists the scorpion whip as a light weapon with performance special qualitiy.

AA has it listed as one handed and trip, disarm, reach.

Paraxis wrote:

In the case of sword and shield, why would you want to? The sword will be more effective unless you have a very magical shield then just hit twice with the shield.

I understand if the second weapon is thrown, a whip, or something but no warrior would choose to make a less effective attack.

There are some feats and abilities that function off a shield attack, so even though it has a lower hit, that activation would probably be worth it.

Exactly.

One example is the Defending Weapon quality you can enchant on the weapon-part of a shield. However to take advantage of the Defending mechanism you need to make an attack roll with it.
So... if you use your lowest attack for it, you still get the bonus, you don't lose much because the chance to hit even with the weapon wasn't very high to start with, and if you hit, well you do at least a bit of damage still.

Or if you have the Shield Slam feat. You might want to hit him twice with your sword and then Shield Slam + Bullrush the guy away from the squishy. (ok since TWF is a prereq for Shield Slam, you'd probably be TWF here, so not the best example)

From a DPR point of view it makes no sense, you're right about that, but if that was the only criterion you wouldn't fight with a shield in the first place.

Saving throws and spell resistance are against spells. AC and DR are the equivalent for attacks.

Before you get me wrong, please read.

Let's say I have a BAB of +6/+1.

Can I use the +6 to hit with my sword, and do the +1 attack with my shield in the offhand for example?

It's obviously not TWF since I don't get an additional attack, but I'm not sure you can switch weapons like that.

Lowering the DC actually causes it to take even longer! Yes that's right. Making it easier means you spend more time on it.
Instead of 4.62 years it now takes 4.83 (about 2 months longer)

Aid another gives a lousy +2 to your skillcheck. So having 5 people aid you adds a +10 to your check, but at the same time you can increase the DC voluntarily by +10 as well.
Lets see... even then it takes a bit longer than 2 years still. Alot faster, I admit, but still totally out of proportion.

And you somehow have to pay 5 people as well for those 2 years. Assuming you can use untrained hirelings for that, they get 1 sp per day for 2 years, thats about 365 gp. Pay 100 more and you can hire that wizard. If you actually need trained helpers, the price is at least 3 times that.

Ok, I went completely silly now and hired 20 people to aid me for a +40 on my skillcheck. Not even sure that works, but assuming it does.
I can only increase the DC by +10 once, so can't do it again. It still takes me over a year now.
And 730 gp in wages.

Damn, even assuming I can do the +10 DC multiple times... it still takes about 6 months, with 20 people helping.

No, it really doesn't matter how you turn it, mundane crafting as written just doesn't work.

Thanks, I might check it out.

Ok, I knew the mundane crafting skills are way way way way way broken. I've read about it and all that, but it wasn't till I just made some math about it, till I realised just how much.

Ok, I was considering having my paladin craft her own Mithral Full Plate at some point, because its quite expensive and I thought I might save some money. I almost expected that it would be a silly attempt, but it got even sillier than I had thought.

I was hoping I could maybe do it by level 6.
So 6 (ranks) + 3 (class skill) + 1 (int) + 2 (MW tools) = 12 total.
With a take 10 I get a check result of 22.

Now Full plate base has a DC of 19, the MW part 20. It doesn't say anything about the mithral part, but lets give it the DC 20 as well and have it be part of the MW process.
I'll spare you the math, but it would take me over 4 and a half years! Working every day!

Even at level 10 it would still over 3.5 years.

Then I looked at the Fabricate spell.
It takes the same amount of raw material as the craft check, 10500/3 = 3500 gp.
It's a 5th level wizard spell, aka min 9th level.
It requires a craft check too. So lets see. 9th level wizard: 1 rank + 3 class + 4 int + 2 MW tools = 10. Enough for a DC 20 on a take 10. If he doesn't have 18 int (which he should have) he might need 2 ranks.

Hiring a level 9 spellcaster to cast a level 5 spell costs laughable 450 gp.

Total cost 3950 gp.
Time: probably a day, since he has to prepare the spell.

I mean why would anyone
a) craft something with the craft skill
b) buy the armor at full price
if hiring a wizard to snap a finger is alot easier and faster and only marginally more expensive. (I bet even using Profession or Craft for 4 years you make alot more than those 450 gp to pay him - not to mention what you make for killing 2 level apropriate enemies)

Actually an armorsmith that gets the order to make a Mithral Full Plate would be stupid not to run to the next wizard, have him cast it, and then sell it.

Heck if all else fails, and you don't find a high enough spellcaster buy a scroll of Fabricate for 1125 gp and have the party wizard cast it. Or the rogue with UMD.

Yeah, I know it's totally old news for most of you, I'm just sort of ranting here and needed to get it out.

if you read the section on binding outsiders

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/outsider-categories

you'll see that several of the listed outsiders are okay with having planar binding being cast to summon them, provided certain conditions are met.

That site also states something that might be relevant for the OP:

I'm confused a bit about this item.

Does it do anything, if you don't have the Quick Draw feat?

It says:
"If you have a base attack bonus of +1 or higher, you may don or put away a quickdraw shield as a swift action combined with a regular move."

Now the normal rules for readying a shield include this:
"If you have a base attack bonus of +1 or higher, you can ready or drop a shield as a free action combined with a regular move."

So... is a quickdraw shield suddenly slower to equip than a normal regular shield? (swift is a tiny bit slower than free action)

I know quickdraw can be put away as swift too, and normal shield just dropped, but lets assume I really only care about putting it on.

I'm sure that I'm missing something really simple again, but what?

You could interpret that as:
If someone died due to negative levels, for example from energy drain, he can't be brought back, unless he receives a restoration the round after.

Reason:
The way that is written it sounds like the creature needs HD = NL before the raise dead is even attempted.

But I guess that's a silly explanation :) Otherwise just raise them, give them the 2 more neg levels, so now the condition is met, and raise them again and use Restoration.

So I guess that's the way out.

However what happens to people with more negative levels than HD?

Level 3 character dies.
Gets raised and gains 2 negative levels.
Dies again.
Gets raised and gains 2 more negative levels.

4 negative levels > 3 HD

Perma dead?

Or would he count as a 1st level char on the 2nd rezz and only lose Con?

Possible, but that means characters with Odd levels have an easier time to get ressed than people with even levels, and that's just about as silly.

By extension that would apply to anyone above 3 too if they get raised more than once without receiving Restoration inbetween.

I'm pretty sure it's an oversight, because I doubt it's intented. Maybe I'm missing something.

I would agree that splitting it, or applying the Con drain to level 2 as well would seem the most logical way to go.

I was just reading through the Negative Level and Raise Dead rules, and something struck me as odd:

You can raise a level 1 character. It gets 2 Con drained.
You can raise a level 3 or higher character. They get 2 negative levels.

A level 2 character however:
It's not a 1st level character, so the Con drain part does not apply to it, so it gains the default of 2 negative levels.
Now this part of the negative level rules come into play:
"If a creature's negative levels equal or exceed its total Hit Dice, it dies."

Level 2 = 2 HD which equals the 2 negative levels. Aka he's dead.

Allia Thren wrote:

ratlord wrote:

Allia Thren wrote:

Also rogues might find alot of the ninja tricks not so great because they need ki to work.

However rogues can take a ki pool as a talent which lets them use any ninja tricks they then want to pick up later. Personally I'm not too bothered that ninjas can take advanced rogue talents but not vis versa as there is no feat that lets ninjas take more tricks but rogues can.

True about the ki pool, however let's be honest, the amount of ki rogues get with that talent is sad... Usually 1, some (with 14 wis) maybe 2.

Since the Extra Ki feat requires the "ki pool class feature" which rogues still don't get even with that talent they can't take that feat.

How is the rogue's Ki Pool not a class feature?

Because strictly speaking they gain a ki pool, but it's not a class feature.

It's really the same logic. If you say Ninjas can't take the Extra Talent feat, because their talents are called tricks and the rogue talent trick doesn't count as a class feature, you can't suddenly have the ki talent count as a class feature.

Mind you, that's the strictest interpretation of RAW, and I don't think it's RAI, nor that it's the only interpretation of RAW. If it was my game I'd let them take Extra Ki and the ninjas can take extra trick/talent feats too.

Also, thanks for the link to James' post

Allia Thren wrote:

Also rogues might find alot of the ninja tricks not so great because they need ki to work.

However rogues can take a ki pool as a talent which lets them use any ninja tricks they then want to pick up later. Personally I'm not too bothered that ninjas can take advanced rogue talents but not vis versa as there is no feat that lets ninjas take more tricks but rogues can.

True about the ki pool, however let's be honest, the amount of ki rogues get with that talent is sad... Usually 1, some (with 14 wis) maybe 2.

Since the Extra Ki feat requires the "ki pool class feature" which rogues still don't get even with that talent they can't take that feat.

cfalcon wrote:

Ninjas and Rogues are both "the main class now". Rogues have benefits that Ninjas do not.

Not quite true. Alternate classes (ninja, samurai, antipaladin) aren't quite full classes - for instance, you can't take a level in rogue and a different level in ninja. Just one or the other.

True but that also makes getting Trapfinding for example a bit harder for ninjas.

But yeah, I'd say that Ninja is a bit superior to rogues

I really wish all of you affected by Irene the best of luck and hope you're getting through it well and healthy and with your homes intact.

Forget it guys, Janzir has proven by now that you can say whatever you want, he's not willing to accept that his initial view on the matter could have been wrong, and obviously he's the only one seeing the truth and all of us are blinded by rogue propaganda.

Best just ban the entire rogue class from your game and be done with it, if you hate it so much, because frankly with that houserule noone will play it anyway.

Do sorcerer's only get their bloodline if they take the Eldritch Heritage feat line too in your games? I mean if my cleric wants some of those bloodline powers, he has to take a feat, that's so unfair Sorcerer's get it for free. And they can cast spells without preparing them already. So unfair.
Or hey, the ranger. Why can he ignore feat prerequisites for his combat style feats? Noone else can do that. Except the monk, who's overpowered too. I mean he gets TWF without spending a feat, and can do lethal damage with his fists without taking IUS. And have you seen how much? 2d10, with one hit! Away with all that, let them take the feats! That will just be fair to those other classes that need feats for that too.