Andarion's page

Can we get an official order of operations for rules interactions?

Hear me out. I know that general is overridden by specific. Simple enough in theory, but some rules debates make you wonder.

But what about when specific contradicts specific?

In the Smash from the air and disintegrate thread we see an example of this. Now it is not a great example, but it works for my purposes. Disintegrate says it effects the first object/being it touches and Smash From the Air allows you to deflect spells using an object.

I am not going into the debate here, that is what that thread is for, but if we had an official order of operations for rules interactions, we could nip these things in the bud quick fast and in a hurry...in theory because this is the internet.

So what exactly am I talking about by order of operations?

So instead of the very vague specific trumps general I am looking for something like this:

1. General Rules (ie. Environment, Combat, Magic (not spells just Magic), Equipment, and anything else I forgot
2. Spells
3. Classes
4. Feats

*Please do not debate the priority levels of each, this is just for explanation purposes.

So we start at level 1 and it is overridden by anything from level 2-4, and level 2 is overridden by anything from level 3-4.

With this, if we ever have a rules contradiction we can just look at what section the two contradicting/interacting rules come from and if they are from different priority levels, whichever is higher wins. End of discussion, again in theory.

Now I know this is not something that we can have thrown together in a day or two since the design philosophy of 3e to Pathfinder probably did not have this, but it would help immensely.

Society would run smoother by table because you could have an issue arise that would be solved very quickly. Let's use the SFtA and Disintegrate topic with the above priority listing.

Disintegrate says it effects the first object/being it touches and Smash From the Air allows you to deflect spells using an object. Player 1 argues that the object used to deflect the spell is damaged since it is an object, and Player 2 says it does not since the feat says the attack is deflected.

If we look at the priority levels, Spells are level 2, but Feats are level 4. Therefore, feat overrides spells, and player 2 is correct.

Is it a perfect system? No. But it would help.

So, I couldn't find anything with my admittedly weak Search-Fu, but what are the best classes for altruism?

More specifically, classes that will not be incredibly crippled by use of "large" sums of money for the welfare of others.

I know that there are the 9-level casters who look at gear and mostly laugh, and I know there are supplementary rules in the Unchained book that gets rid of gear dependency, but DM will not want to put the extra work in to adapt a campaign to them.

I also know that wealth was built into the CR system for 3.5/Pathfinder which casically actively discourages helping others with money.

But, I need some options for two upcoming urban campaigns (Hell's Rebels and CotCT).

In Hell's Rebels I am stuck being whatever I need to be to cover the weaknesses to a party of a Bard (Demagogue), Cleric (party buffing focused), and U-Rogue (will probably end up as a kamikaze play style).

In CotCT it is a bit more flexible, since that one is a ways off.

Anyways, I looking for classes that can cover the shortcomings of the party, do his job, and not have to hoard money to keep from joining the dead in the later parts of the campaign.

All Paizo book are options, DM does not do 3rd party stuff, hasn't for years so I am not going to try to bring it up.

****I should add that the members of my group often make very poor decisions on character build options, optimization wise. I don't fault them for it, just like to actually get through a campaign every now and again. We TPKed in RR, CotC (sort of, long story), SD, LoF, S&S.****

Every arcane caster in this group from 3.5 days to through WotR has been evocation focused. EVERY SINGLE ONE. I have seen haste cast in only one campaign I can think of, and even then it was rare.

I don't enjoy combat much, so I tend to build reasonably powerful characters to end combat as quickly as possible to get back to the RP.

Working on character backstory for this campaign and have a few questions regarding the three above topics.

Player so obviously no spoilers please.

1. Are there any dedicated orphanages or should it be assumed that the Good aligned temples, like Shelyn's, run their own?

2. What exactly is the Alabaster Academy? Is it a bardic college, wizard academy, or something else?

3. Where can I find some background on Shensen? Is she a native of Kintargo or a transplant from somewhere else? If the Alabaster Academy is a bardic college, did she attend there? Things like that.

If I could get some places to look this information up with no fear of spoilers that would also be great.

All help is appreciated, Thank you.

*Edit

Guess I should add what I am planning thus far barring inaccuracies of assumptions.

1/2 Elf Bard (Chelish Diva) 22 years NG Following Shelyn

Raised in Temple of Shelyn as orphan (maybe)
Apprenticed at a Blacksmith
Voice was discovered and was recommended to attend Alabaster Academy
Had to save own money to attend so started as an older student
May or may not have had some run ins with Shensen

Okay, first things first. I am finding a hard time getting into the idea of this campaign because I find that Pathfinder is doing every genre but the kitchen sink on one world. I don't mind sci-fi in fantasy (I love the idea of Star Wars). I have a problem with it being paired with French Revolution, Colonial USA, Horror, Standard Fantasy, Egypt, Pirates, and Vikings as neighbors.

That being said, my group has a subscription and has the entire path and I have said I was not going to participate in a couple of the paths already. I do not want to be the reason that this one is not played.

So, I am looking at ideas for a character for this path. I enjoy story and creating a character to influence said story.

I have no clue where to even begin fitting a character into this campaign. What are you trying to accomplish? How does the story progress? What are goals that actually work for this path?

I do not want to experience the blindside that many people (not me thankfully) got hit with in Council of Thieves.

I don't even need to get class or race suggestions, just some ideas to work with to make an enjoyable character for this path.

Thanks for the help.

Maybe wrong section, but oh well.

Was feeling goofy a few days ago and started thinking of songs that made sense as religious hymns for the gods of Golarion. I will post what I thought of and let you guys contribute.

Rules: Any genre, any artist, any time, any god; the song itself needs to work, not just the title; needs to match the gods portfolio (eg All About the Benjamins may work for Abadar; White and Nerdy would not work for Nethys; do not get me wrong, Weird Al is fine)

List:

Cayden Cailean: Andrew WK- Party Hard
Calistra: In This Moment- Whore
Torag: 3 Inches of Blood- Kill the Orcs
Besmara: Alestorm- You are a Pirate

I will post more as I think of them.

Guybrush Threepwood, and I'm a Mighty Pirate!

If you thought I was doing a Princess Bride Character, you are not a film philistine, congratulations.

Anyways, I am looking at possibly making a character based off Guybrush Threepwood, of Monkey Island fame, for this campaign. I am looking for suggested classes/archetypes and builds for this idea.

Simple rules really:
Viable but not min/maxed (1 negative stat with a max of -1)
20 pt buy
Half Elf, Human or possibly some other Human-esque race (no Half Orcs)
2 non campaign traits

I am looking at Bard Arcane Duelist maybe sprinkle in Rogue/Ninja for Improved Feint (Insult Sword Fighting) but i am undecided.

Any help or ideas would be much appreciatted.

Let me be honest first, I hate alignment past good/neutral/evil, I can work with it though.

Here is my suggestion about paladins and their alignment. I define paladin as a servant of their god. In another thread, it was discussed changing smite evil to smite evil/chaos. Interesting idea, got shot down. This got me thinking, if a paladin cannot smite chaos, and only evil, why do they HAVE to be lawful good?

My suggestion, change the paladin alignment requirements. Instead of just LG, change it to similar to the clerics, any good, but must be of the same alignment as their god. This way, the alignment is still extremely strict, but not as strict. Now they are better servants of their gods, even more so than clerics who can be one step away, and they are now able to uphold their gods code of conduct and strive for their god's goals.

So there are probably post similar to this thread but none that I have found which are quite the same.

Here has been my general all around beef against class skill/cross class skill set up. The game rule designer decides what skills are your class skills. Now this may not seem like to big of a deal until you sit back and look at how the system does not require you to play your fighter as the idiot of the group shouting foolishly at the dragon.

Since DnD/PFRPG are good systems for role playing, I do not see a reason for your class skills to be selected before the game starts. I say, the rules should be each character gets to chose X number of skills as their "class skills" based upon what class they take. For example, a fighter chooses 10 skills to be class skills (that is just current number in book already), or say a rogue gets 22 skills as class skills.

In this way, your characters are no longer pigeon holed into an out of combat role just like they are not confined to a certain role completely in combat. I know there is still some tweaking needed on such a system, such as say, fighters cannot choose knowledge arcana, or spellcraft as a class skill, unless they have multiclassed to a casting class, but I think it is a good idea.

To some people what I am going to say here may be considered blasphemy.

First, Monks.
So, due to my groups make up (3 people plus DM) I have never really been able to play a monk past something like level 4, so when people talk about flurry of whiffs, I haven't experienced it. However, most of the suggestions for fixing this that I have seen all involve increasing the Monk BAB to +1 per lvl, great. This seems to be a problem though because that would mean at lvl 20, instead of having +15/+15/+15/+10/+5 they would have a +20/+20/+20/+15/+10+/+5. Is it just me or is that a bit much? So by going to the fast BAB advancement we create a new problem, Flurry of Blows. Well easy fix there, one extra attack only, the penalties last longer something like -2 through 9th lvl, -1 through 14th and none at 15th. Boom, we have a viable fix, still get 2 attacks at highest bonus, and if for some odd reason that isn't enough, let the extra attack stack with haste, though I am against that.

Next, the every fourth level ability score advancement. For that one, let's just steal a page from 4e, add +1 to two different scores. The reason I am for this is because there is not a single class that relies on just one ability score, even more so in pathfinder. Fighter in 3.5 could get away with increasing just Str and Barbarian could get away with just Con, now since fighters are getting armor training abilities that increase max Dex for AC it wold be insane to not have a high Dex even as a plate fighter. Melee generally needed at least 2 good stats, Casters need at least 3, and poor monks needed 5. Allow 2 points for adjustment every 4 lvls and you have more viable PCs that won't break the game.

Was not sure where to put this thread so thought this was a safe bet.

Here is a list of spells that are missing descriptions,
Animate Rope, Magic Mouth, Magic Aura (special note, on the bard's spell list Magic Mouth and Magic Aura are listed out of alphabetical order), Illusory Script, Phantom Steed, Secret Page, Sepia Snake Sigil, Tiny Hut, Rainbow Pattern, Repel Vermin, Secure Shelter, Shadow Conjuration, Dream, Mind Fog, Nightmare, Shadow Evocation, Animate Objects, Sympathetic Vibration, Veil, Transformation, Consecrate, Desecrate, Glyph of Warding, Helping Hand, Control Water, Giant Vermin, Planar Ally (all versions), Atonement, Hallow, Unhallow, Animate Objects, Create Undead, Forbiddance, Glyph of Warding,Greater, Symbol of Fear, Symbol of Persuasion, Blasphemy, Dictum, Ethereal Jaunt, Holy Word, Word of Chaos, Anti magic Field, Create Greater Undead, Earthquake, Astral Projection, Etherealness, Gate, Symbol (all versions)

This is a list from Bard all the way through Cleric.

Please double check my work. Sorry for it not being in alphabetical order, I just went down the spell listing by class/level. I will post more later, unless someone feels it unnecessary.

If there has been an explanation of this or another post already, I apologize.