Andrew McMenemy's page

Seconding all of these.

Inclusivity is really nice to see in TRPGs, I feel that it gives our hobby a bit of extra class, especially when contrasted against some parts of the video game community that have been a bit toxic in recent times. I don't have to be embarrassed to call myself a tabletop gamer. I'm proud to show off my Pathfinder books that have art of strong characters of many types and backgrounds.

Continuity, both in the "Paizo hasn't rebooted their game" and the "Paizo is continuing 3.5 rules" senses are important to my group because we're still playing Eberron and Planescape storylines with the 3.5 mechanical material. Nobody has to rebuild their character for a new edition and suddenly realize that they're missing a key ability that was designed out of the class. No suspension of disbelief issues when the spell that worked a few years ago doesn't exist in the world anymore because it got cut from the new core book. And no negation of all of the books I've been buying since 2003. D20 has some issues and break points but PF fixed what we saw as the worst of them (Polymorph & Wild Shape, Animal Companions > Fighters, multi-class builds being superior, spells like Knock negating entire classes) and we'll just live with the rest. Newer editions of other fantasy games haven't innovated that much compared to all of the rules light narrative control type games, and my group isn't really into the fate point, narrative control, fail forward story gaming stuff.

I do have a new thing to add to the praise pile though:

PDF Support and continuation of the OGL is a big deal for me. I don't want to carry around a stack of books,and I frequently check rules on my phone. That I can carry around all of the books on my phone and laptop, reference the SRD site when I just need to quickly pull up a specific feat or spell on the spot (like, say, right in the middle of a game), and that I can buy an inexpensive PDF of a book I'm on the fence about before committing to a $40-60 tome are big quality of life boosts that mean I don't have to actually stress out about the logistics of gaming - all my time and energy goes to rules and story rather than struggling to make the game convenient to play.

I'd remove multiclassing.

Hmm. Come to think of it, with all of the classes and archetypes out there that represent nearly any combination of the major class flavors, it does seem less and less necessary for preserving flavor. Once upon a time, someone wanting to play a Fighter/Wizard would have to actually multiclass Fighter and Wizard, but now they could play a Magus. If someone wants to play a Cleric/Rogue, there's the Inquisitor. For a Fighter/Rogue, they could be an Urban Ranger, or when the final form of the ACG classes are revealed, Slayer, Swashbuckler, etc, the list goes on.

Face_P0lluti0n wrote:

in-play, high-level nonmagical characters often see the score early enough to load up on magic items, UMD checks, and caster friends.

The issue for me is that a small group of caster friends can have all the magic in the form of spells, and then have just as much magic as any martial, on top of that, in the form of magic items (or even twice as much, since they get easier access to crafting). So that a team of 4 casters ends up with 150% as much magic as a team of 2 casters and 2 martials. At very low levels, the difference in skills evens that out, but at higher levels, +50% magic is worth way, way, way more than the +3 bonus for class skills. As much as everyone hated the 1/2 ranks for x-class skills in 3e, it definitely was more conducive to the style of play you're describing.

I agree, though the 2+INT skill ranks classes are still going to fall way behind on skills as compared to the 6 or 8 + INT classes. But I do find that skills are narrative power, even at the level of high magic that is typical beginning at the upper single digit levels.

I think part of the problem is that Pathfinder and all of the games that it is based on put a heavy emphasis on skill at arms as a means of narrative control, so many prominent character classes have "good at fighting" as a primary function, and "good at fighting" basically forces you to give up more than "good at sneaking" or "good at telling convincing lies". Being good at fighting has a way higher opportunity cost that you must pay in order to have that skill. But that possibly falls apart when skill-based characters can linearly scale up in 6-12 different areas of expertise, and casters can quadratically increase their options for altering reality at some fundamental level, but full BAB classes often increase in combat competence and *possibly* a handful of other areas of skill. Even more so in any campaign that doesn't follow an action-adventure dungeon crawl model.

From the GM's perspective, I try to even the score a little by being totally uncompromising with skill checks, so as to reward characters with skill quantity as well as skill quality. Essentially Knowledge and a lot of the Wisdom skills spell out what sort of information I give to the players. If they ask questions, I don't volunteer anything that Jeo-bob the farmer wouldn't know unless they have skill ranks. And I take advantage of the risk-free, cause-and-effect rules of magic by allowing any NPCs who have more than a player class level or two to be wise to most common player tricks and plan for them. Everyone above the first few levels knows that if you make an enemy of the adventurers, they'll try to scry and fry you, so you prepare ambushes or hide yourself behind Nondetections, etc. With so many counters out there and all enemies with decent Int/Wis scores and experience with the adventurer's life having already prepared for all of the typical magical-win-button approaches, brute-forcing everything with magic often just fails.

But then there are classes like Bard, or 3.5's Beguiler, that can do it all when properly optimized. Some of the scariest NPCs in my campaign are the Bards, especially after factoring in Versatile Performance and 3.5's Sublime Chord PrC.

Other than allow ToB/PoW (my current solution), I wonder if it would be worth increasing the "opportunity cost" of magic by limiting all full caster classes to 2+INT skill ranks per level, and partial casters to 4+INT skill ranks/level or less, and increasing the skill ranks/level for all martials that are currently below 6+INT/level. That would cut down on the Bard's ability to be a full competency skill user with 2/3 casting and moderate combat skill on top, and allow martials other than the Slayer, Ranger, and Rogue to have a lot to do out of combat.

There is, of course, the GM-dependent semi-nerf of *ruthlessly* requiring the casters to engage fully with the fluff and minor mechanical requirements of their classes. Which is to say, Wizards are stuck adding a measly two spells to their spellbook at each level-up unless they pay time and money to research new spells, but require them to play out seeking new spells for their books - they can't just walk into spell-mart and hand over the gold, they have to go to a Wizard's guild, and if they haven't kept up with office politics, they might find that nobody's willing to give them 5th level spells until they help the instructors with under-the-table guild favors. Or maybe they have to apply for a license in order to get any of the good combat or deception spells. Same with Magi and Alchemists. No wonder adventuring Wizards are so keen on lost knowledge and spell scrolls - it might be the only way to learn "Enervation" without signing up for five years in the King's service or asking permission from Wizard-Lumbergh who will ask you to go ahead and work Sundays at the guild for the next few decades. And Clerics have priestly duties that eat up a lot of free time. If they don't tend to the flock, either the god in question pulls its support, or if they're on a truly holy mission, they have to deal with temple politics, since the rest of the clergy isn't that happy about being shown up by some unattached miracle-worker who didn't have to put in the ten miserable years of being an altar boy or cleaning the elder priest's chamber pot to get their spellcasting ability.

Often times in fantasy fiction, the cost of magic is all of the hoops you have to jump through to get and keep that power. The rules support it a little, but in d20-based games it's mostly left to fluff and completely GM-dependent, but it ruffles my feathers a little bit because then gameplay doesn't match fiction and verisimilitude suffers.

That's a really unusual combination. I'm sure somebody has, but E6 tables and mythic tables probably don't overlap often...

I'm genuinely curious what sort of campaign concept you have that requires the use of level limits and yet requires mythic rank advancement.

I've actually considered the same thing. While I haven't actually tried it out in play yet, the reason I considered it is that Mythic rules appear to advance the characters in mathematical power level for the equivalent of about another 5 or six character levels, allowing the PCs to fight classic mid and high level monsters, without introducing spell levels or other abilities that completely break the "heroic fantasy" paradigm and/or obsolete non-casters.

Plus it provides a fun explanation for the zero-to-hero climb - if the characters are gaining in mythic power rather than skill and experience, it explains why only a few months of practice can turn a decent swordsman into a breaker-of-armies.

To add to the confusion, the RAW descriptions of spell trigger/completion items make a lot of references to "casting spells from" that item.

So I ran my game last night, and my 15th level/Mythic Rank 1 PCs tangled with a CR "16 and change" encounter made up of angry Warforged. I had three in the encounter that used Path of War material - specifically, one Magus 7/Bladecaster 5 who used Martial Training I & II to qualify for Bladecaster, another Magus who picked up one level of Warder for a total of Magus 7/Warder 1/Bladecaster 4, and finally a 14th level leader who had Magus 7/Warder 1/Bladecaster 6.

This was in addition to a Warforged Crusader/Warblade/Fighter, an Alchemist, and a Wizard.

The Magi/Bladecasters had time to buff but couldn't surprise the party because the Wizard had to cast passwall in order to make it possible to attack. The two Magi who dipped Warder to get Bladecaster ruled the combat. Having access to a second discipline (Primal Fury in this case) and a larger selection of maneuvers known gave them significantly more power and more versatility than the Magus who just dipped into maneuvering with feats.

The Bladecasters outperformed the Crusader/Warblade by a good amount. The main assistance that he provided was giving free turns by leapfrogging delay actions and then using White Raven Tactics to basically grant extra turns to the Magi for the low, low cost of dropping by 2 initiative points each turn. His maneuvers and boosts did not stand up to the burst damage factor that the Magi/Warders were capable of.

The synergy between Magus and Scarlet Throne turned out to be everything that it promised to be, though it ended up being very heavy on burst damage. Both Magi/Warders managed to get a single round in which they performed a Hasted full-attack with Spell Combat & Spellstrike while using their swift action to boost with Noble Blade while delivering Intensified Shocking Grasps through their melee attacks. This took each unlucky recipient of such an attack from triple-digit HP all the way down to single-digit and they only survived because of immediate action abilities.

It was highly impressive, even more so because they could have kept blending Shocking Grasps into maneuver attacks for a few more rounds with the Bladecaster class abilities, but at that point the PCs were feeling like participants in a game of rocket tag so they started burning the nitro fuel to end the encounter ASAP.

Eberron's one of my favorite pregen worlds, absolutely dripping with style, class, and things to do. I adore the whole "deepest, darkest Africa" vibe that Xen'drink gets, coupled with the ruins of the ancient giants... fantastic. I love your idea!

Total agreement here. I run all of my home games exclusively in Eberron or Planescape. Eberron has more hooks than a bait shop (did I really just say that?) and IMO does a very good job of justifying or simply cooperating with all of the mechanics and tropes of d20 that become head-scratchers or game-breakers in a lot of other settings.

That is to say, Wealth-by-level is justified by the existence of magic shops as a core component of the setting, and Xen'drik takes the idea that "murderhobo" is a day job for thousands and causes it to make perfect sense because the continent is packed to the brim with enough mystery and danger to last professional adventurers for centuries. PCs are demigods and game balance fails once levels are in the mid-teens? Okay, that's the new epic level. Your new opponents are Cthulhu's neighbors.

And then it's also a dark and gritty world of dungeon-noir where good and evil are no longer absolute. I couldn't be happier. I've run Eberron campaigns where people optimized their builds for politics or infiltration instead of combat because they knew how many layers of intrigue existed in the game world.

Eberron is half of why I didn't quit d20 and the ToB is the other half, so thank you for bringing more martial maneuver goodness to Pathfinder!

The Monk synergies are melting my brain a little. MAD thought it may be, I can't help but think that there's room in the world for a few Monk1/Swashbuckler X's.

Specifically, a Maneuver Master who picks up Improved Dirty Trick, Disarm, or Trip, and then goes "all in" to Swashbuckler. Every full attack includes a bonus maneuver, which is very in-theme.

Or for the Swashbuckler who doesn't mind using Monk weapons, there's always the option of picking up one or two levels of Monk and then going all Swashbuckler, in order to flurry with a light piercing Monk weapon.

So now a swashbuckler can use a javelin better than he can use most swords by default. Still, at least you can actually take a feat to let you use swords other than rapiers and short swords with this class (only counting core books). Parry is better, but until higher level it's still a waste of an attack of opportunity and a panache point - odds are your AC is high enough that you'll only rarely block an attack that wouldn't have missed anyway. Not to mention that most GM's roll while declaring the attack, leaving very little room to mention that you're parrying. I'd still suggest that for a panache point and an attack of opportunity, you should at least get to pick after knowing whether it'll hit you rather than before.

Avoiding the hit isn't the only bonus though. I can think of plenty of scenarios in which I would parry an attack that probably wouldn't hit me anyway, just to get the free Riposte.

Plus, it really punishes anyone who decides to try to send all of their iterative or TWF attacks at the Swashbuckler, which seems to me to be very theme-appropriate - some hulking Barbarian or Fighter sort tries to go toe-to-toe and full attack the Swashbuckler, they get one hit in, and then the Swash blocks the next attack and pokes them with Precise Strike.

Once you've got Combat Reflexes and Weapon Training, if you're using a high-crit weapon like Rapier or Scimitar, you could be generating a LOT of Panache - I can see mid or high-level Swashbucklers generating 1 Panache a round semi-consistently, which means that Parry/Riposte inches closer and closer to being an additional attack per round at your highest BAB with full Precise damage added in.

I like all of the new the Charisma synergy, though I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a "Disciplined Duelist" archetype or somesuch that changes all of the CHA-based abilities to INT or WIS.

Specifically, in TVTropes language, for the finesse duelists who favor "The Technician" over "The Performer".

I think I might create a couple different stat blocks for the Bladecaster NPCs in my game. It looks like this Prestige Class could work really well with Magus or full progression casters, but in completely different ways, which is interesting.

Looks like the earliest it's possible to take this class would be as the 8th character level with Wizard 5/Warlord or Warder 2, or Wizard or Sorc 6/Warlord or Warder 1, or Magus or Bard 7 with the Martial Training. Magus 7/Warlord or Warder 1 is the runner up and probably provides the most return in the long run because of the ability to Battlecaster's Strike and Spellstrike at the same time, which basically means being able to "Spell Combat" and Spellstrike with maneuvers and touch spells.

Still, I can see a few different optimal ways to take Battlecaster. There could be a buffer Magus build that cares more about stances and boosts and using Spell Combat from the Magus class, and then there could also be a burst-damage Magus who wants Battlecaster's strike in order to be able to Maneuver and Spellstrike in the same action. I want to try them all! ( : So I think I will with NPCs in the next session of my campaign. That's tomorrow night, I will post with my results. This looks exciting though.

Prestige classes updated! Get em here!

-X

Sweet!

The PCs in my game are about to face off against a bunch of angry, ancient Warforged battle-mages in Xen'drik (they killed the leader because he was plotting to declare war on non-constructs). After the last fight, they're expecting many of the Warforged to have the Magus class or be straight Wizards, but I think instead I will have them find an ancient tome called "The Path of War" detailing ancient martial styles which will foreshadow their encounter with a group of Bladecasters seeking revenge for the death of their master and using martial maneuvers long forgotten...

Can't wait to give it a shot!

I'm waiting until all of them are out, but then integrating the Warlord, Stalker, and Warder alongside the Crusader, Swordsage, and Warblade is definitely a top priority. I just want to have all the PoW styles in one place to look at before I try picking and choosing who should get what.

Perfectly timed too, as my PF-only Kingmaker game is about halfway through, and my next game will be going back to my old group's standard 3.5/PF hybrid. (Though we've been slowly incorporating 3.5 stuff into the KM game over time - I pull out 3.5 monsters all the time, and after some time of frustration ended up falling back on the Magic Item Compendium for interesting magical loot, and we just yesterday converted the Warmage to PF for the blaster-mage who couldn't get Wizard or Magus to give him what he wanted for his character's combat style. He loves it BTW.)

My 3.5/PF game just had its first session after a multi-year hiatus a few nights ago so time's not on my side for this one. :p

However, I and my most system-competent player are both looking over the two completed classes from PoW with the intent of blending them into the campaign world, which already includes ToB, as "recently re-discovered ancient martial disciplines from the ruins of Xen'drik" (its an Eberron game). The PCs are already established, so the most I think I'm going to be dealing with on the PC side of things is a player with a ToB class asking to incorporate a single new style.

I'm going to create some antagonists that use the new styles and classes and see how it goes, and then try blending them as the newly discovered ancient arts get incorporated into society, and see gradually if doing so causes OP PCs or NPCs.

I just discovered yesterday that DSP was publishing this and bought a subscription on the spot.

The original ToB is a lot of the reason that my group still plays d20 3.5/PF at all. Back in the waning days of 3.5, I (the GM) and my group's most optimized player were rather dismayed about the vast melee/caster gap and the brain-crunching difficulty of making any melee work aside from "Falchion Fred" the strength THF warrior until we found the ToB. It definitely narrows the gap in the commonly played level brackets. I'm really happy to see that there's enough ToB love to support new ToB-compatible material. I'm already incorporating the Path of War into my 3.5/PF hybrid home game.

Has anybody had any luck blending the original 3.5 Martial Discipline material with Path of War? I love all of the new classes and styles, but they definitely do not just substitute for original ToB material on a 1-for-1 basis - everything I've read so far out of Stalker and Warlord seems to be blazing completely new trails with the maneuver system, so to me the only thing that seems more exciting than having a maneuver system in Pathfinder is blending the two and having five or six maneuver classes choosing from almost twenty styles. I'm thinking about allowing ToB classes in my game to learn appropriately-themed Path of War styles and vice versa, and allowing the Martial Training feat chain to apply to a ToB style if desired by the player.

Also, Deadly Agility makes all of my dreams come true! : D

Maybe some of these concepts can be better built mechanically via multi-classing, but not everybody wants to plan out a complex multi-class using early entry SLAs and retraining Feat swaps. Some people just want something that gets angry and casts spells and works out of the box.

IMO, the importance of this cannot be understated. It's going to be way easier to get new or intermediate RPGers interested in the game if they can come to the table and have a one-stop shop for their specific character concept, as opposed to being told that they need to research five sourcebooks and/or copy a very narrow, optimized build from the boards/guides/etc just to be able to make a street fighter or duelist or battle cleric that won't get looked down upon for having non-optimal DPR or something like that.

I do want my roleplaying games to have a "game" component, and reward system mastery with additional character effectiveness, but I'm against requiring system mastery just to make your character concept survivable and playable. I've seen people get turned off to the game because they realized that their character concept was not supported by the "optimal" versions of the core 11 classes and they would have to attain system mastery just to be able to make their concept as effective as the typical or pregen builds of the core 11 character classes when yhey were built to match the stereotype (Fighters/Barbs using STR and Two-Handed Weapons, Clerics buffing up and wading into combat, etc)

And some ideas didn't even really work with multiclassing. I think there's a place for a "Cleric-Rogue" in the fantasy narrative of PF and other game worlds I have used the PFRPG to explore (Eberron and Planescape in my own home games) but multiclassing Cleric and Rogue was going to lead to some serious disappointment. I applauded the introduction of the Inquisitor in the APG for that reason - Cleric-Rogue was not only a rules-supported idea now, but it had a strong in-world justification and concept. As a GM, I went back and revised old NPCs with that class because it was *perfect* to their concept, which was previously more flavor then mechanics. I'm going to do the same thing with Swashbuckler and Slayer, because there are Rogues, Rangers, Fighters, and others in my home campaign that will be expressed with mechanics that more closely match the flavor of those NPCs in my mind.

The classes add to the total complexity of the game, but they don't create more complexity per player - there aren't any more decisions during chargen than there already were. They just give more granular choices to one specific decision point so that, much like the Magus, if you have a very specific idea of what you want your character to be, you can be that exact idea from first level onward.

And then there are actual rules holes that needed to be filled, like a Dex-based fighter that didn't rely on twinking specific, non-core game elements (Dervish Dance or Lore Warden). Even though I've been playing PF since the day the core released and study CharOp boards/guides more obsessively than I probably should, the very fact that I can make a playable, even if not 100.00% optimized, Rapier Fighter is something I'm extremely exited about. I've been waiting for that since the days of 3.5.

It helps me as a GM, too, since when I'm writing a session for my home game, working out builds that can challenge my PCs (many of whom are at least moderately optimized because players like it when their characters win and there's nothing wrong with that) takes a long time. I remember spending hours writing an early PF game just because one of the NPCs was a Brawler in concept, but there was no easy way for the system to support it, so I played with builds for a couple of hours before I settled on something that still didn't stand up to a typical martial PC build. If I, as a GM, can make NPC characters by just deciding upon a level and a single class that encompasses everything that character is supposed to do, my prep time is going to drop by a lot.

If I have to choose between preserving the depth of multiclassing or having extra classes in order to give a greater range of "out-of-the-box" options, I'm personally going to choose the out-of-the-box options. Multiclassing is important to the complete-ness of the rules and 3.5 compatibility, but IME it's a feel-bad experience more often than it isn't.

Nunspa wrote:

Grey Lensman wrote:

I'd remove precision, change it to either dex or cha to damage (with a cap equal to level) and add support for the classic rapier/daggar and sword/buckler styles. The big thing people don't seem to get about fencing is that the off-hand is supposed to be doing something, swatting the sword away, or holding something to defend yourself with (and possibly attack!).

yes!

Swashbucklers should not be limited to "one weapon, one handed"

Rapier/ Main-gauche or fighting case (duel rapiers) should be an option...

of course they could end up becoming unique Archetypes

The only problem is that some people will WANT to fight with only a single weapon in one hand. That is part of the image of a 'swashbuckler'. Its not the only way for sure, but it is a common one. If you balance the class for that style (the weakest form of fighting in the game) then also allowing other styles with no other changes would make them (potentially) too strong.

What I would like to see is a class that works as a 1handed only dex based combat assuming only the options available in the rpg line (no dervish dance or agile weapons unless they get printed in this book), and have archetypes that allow things like 2handed finese weapons (elven curve blade) or a 2haned style or a rapier and buckler. Make it work for the basic style first, then add seperate options to make it work for the other things.

I'm among those that really want to see a one-handed or one-handed plus buckler finesse style pass the "Is this character good when measured against quadratic casters and Falchion Fred?" test. Generally in 3.5 and PF up to this point, that character is only possible with a lot of CharOp/Theorycrafting/wacky builds, such as Dervish Magus and similarly narrow builds.

I agree that archetypes would be a good way to enable different styles with the Swashbuckler, possibly nerfing or changing the numeric effects of the most powerful of the class's abilities in return for enabling them to be used with combat styles that the game's rules already have better support for?

But I think picking on Agile weapons is a bit much - sacrificing an entire +1 bonus on a weapon and the late acquisition in most campaigns, including PFS, balances it out - AFAIK the DPR math really takes a beating from losing +1 to hit and to damage that you give up when you drop +1 of the enhancement bonus to a weapon. It's still a net positive when an Agile weapon is wielded by a character that maxed out Dex, but I don't think it breaks the game because it comes at a serious cost and requires surviving 5-7 levels before you can have it, and by that time, Dex-based Swashbucklers probably need some sort of damage boost to not sit out of any combat involving crit-immune monsters.

Dervish is easier to access earlier *if* the Swashbuckler gains actual Weapon Finesse as a feat, or if the wording on the current ability is changed to include "The Swashbuckler is counter as having the Weapon Finesse feats for the purpose of qualifying for feats and prestige classes that require it."

Otherwise, if Swashbuckler Finesse can't be subbed in for the actual Weapon Finesse feat, the feat tax on having to take Weapon Finesse when you already have it as a class ability seems like it's painful enough that Dervish doesn't need to be punished any more than that.

Face_P0lluti0n wrote:

Caedwyr wrote:

All of the Swashbuckler's class features, aside from the 4 skill points, are related to combat. This leaves this class with very little narrative power and ability to engage in the story in a meaningful fashion outside of the "kills things" scope. The class is a hammer and every problem is going to look like a nail.

That's not terribly different from the predicament that several full BAB progression classes find themselves in, especially the Fighter.

To me the Swashbuckler seems ahead of several of the full BAB classes in engaging with the story because of the 4 skill points and some very story-relevant class skills, which include the big 3 social interaction skills (Bluff, Intimidate, Diplomacy)

The question for me is: "Is having the same predicament of other full bab class related to interaction with the story/narrative power a good idea?" Several of the other martial classes have been given abilities to interact with the story beyond "I hit it with my sword", so it's obviously not a mutually exclusive thing.

In an interaction/RP heavy campaign, I would rather be a Swashbuckler than most of the other full BAB classes, because as compared to most of the full BAB classes, the Swashbuckler wins at talking.

The Ranger gets more skill points and a lot of outdoorsy skills, but lacks the social skills as class skills and lacks CharOp/Combat reasons to max out Charisma, so the Ranger is not going to be doing much talking.

Even the Paladin, which is supposed to be a more "social" full BAB class, does not get all of the social interaction skills as class skills, and then there are also the stringent conduct requirements. I'm pretty sure just using the Bluff skill to do anything other than feint is probably a breach of a typical Paladin's vows.

Other than the Cavalier, I don't see any other full BAB classes that have the skills to let them open their mouth in *any* given social situation without ever risking placing their foot in it.

In most "Swashbuckler" media that I am aware of, the Swashbuckler types of character generally do solve all of their problems by fighting them, climbing them, jumping over them, or talking to them, and with all of the social skills, the Swashbuckler is capable of engaging socially with other creatures in every possible way.

Plus, they have Perception and Sleight of Hand as class skills, which open up a lot of doors as far as ways to use their wits and trickery to overcome problems.

One thing I haven't seen anyone bring up yet (and please forgive me if someone did mention it and I just missed it) is the 1st level Deed Recovery. The way I read it, it's possible for the Swashbuckler to use Recovery to 5-foot step away from an enemy during the first attack of their full attack sequence, and after getting +2 against their first attack, deny them the rest of their full attack if the Swashbuckler has moved outside of their reach.

If that is the correct way to read that ability, it seems pretty powerful, not to mention matching the flavor of the Flynn-style Swashbuckler - "Full Attack, will you?! Your DPR and flurry of attacks means nothing to me, brute, I've dodged the first and it seems you canont reach me now! Ha ha!" or somesuch.

Face_p0lluti0n's Guide to Weapon Finesse

It's still a work in progress. Continued from this thread

Taking advice, critiques, builds I haven't mentioned, basically anything you think needs added or changed!

Before this turns into a class war....

There's one thing about the race boon that is really helpful, and if race boons are replaced, I want to submit this for consideration:

One of the nice things about the race boons is that it limits the number of non-core race characters in the game. If we're going to open up other races, we need some sort of other requirement to keep numbers down. One thing some people feel very strongly about in their fantasy is keeping the old school flavor of the core races, and preventing the "zoo effect" of having more exotic characters in a part than core races from old school standard fantasy.

My suggestion is that non-core races and other big mechanical rewards be some sort of achievement that is easier to accomplish at cons but not impossible - like playing X sessions, getting a core race character to level X, completing certain scenarios that are con specials to be released to the public at a later date, like the high ranking GM special mods.

That way the races still feel special, and cons are an easy ticket to those races, but not the only ticket.

Disclaimer: I am NOT a grognard. I love Aasimar and Tieflings to death, Planescape is one of my favorite settings ever. However, it gets hard to take the game seriously when I sit down at the table with a Tiefling, a half-golem, a Kitsune, a Dhampir, and a redeemed Intellect Devourer. IMO, a line must be drawn, even if it's a more forgiving line than con boons.

Slightly off topic. I am curious what other people's experience with this is. 99.99% of the optimizers I have gamed with focus on combat. What percentage of the optimizers you have gamed with focused on combat as opposed to non-combat?

I played with an optimizer who focused on Stealth and Infiltration.

The 3.5 Tome of Battle is WAY better for this than one might think.

The resulting Rogue/Assassin/Swordsage could get into anywhere on the same plane of existence by the time her level hit the double digits. I ended up having to rule that most important NPCs and rulers have court wizards that make rope tricks or magnificent mansions for the people of import to sleep in, because it was the only remaining way to protect an NPC from getting a Coup de Grace in their sleep.

EDIT: I am guilty of having a Wizard who optimized for stopping combats before they started. I killed a huge combat encounter by using Major Image to make it look like I summoned a Balor. I used Invisibility, Fly, and Gaseous Form to skip a lot of combats the party didn't want to put up with...and that was before I wrote Passwall into my spell book.

BigNorseWolf wrote:

Such as? What role playing choices are limited by min maxing?

I recently found myself making a character for a game that I knew was dominated by min/maxers. I came up with an idea of a bard character, that I really wanted to be a heavy drinking, smart alec, flirtatious, put-up-your-dukes kind of guy.

Except to be good at fist-fighting, which was kind of central to my character, I had to make a less than optimal character. Unarmed combat sucks unless you're a monk. I had to make a choice to either follow my character concept and make the kind of character that I wanted to roleplay, or let min/maxing dictate my character concept.

I chose my concept. And playing with these min/maxers meant that I was sub-optimal in a typical armed dungeon battle, because the GM was also min/maxy, so the battles were often pretty tough. That bard sucked at fighting. More than a bard needed to. Because my character's concept, and the way I wanted to roleplay, meant that I needed to take Unarmed feats, even though I only used them occasionally in town.

That's how min/maxing and roleplaying choices overlap and limit each other. For me, it's first a story. Then the numbers describe the story. My story usually limits my numbers options.

Now, that's just how I prefer to play. Sometimes I do make optimal characters and skew my story to fit the numbers. That's also very fun and totally legit, but personally, it's not my favourite.

But to suggest that min/maxing playstyles have no effect on stories is false. Those playstyles do sometimes limit roleplaying options. And that's fine. You don't need to defend it, you're not doing anything wrong. Just don't try to deny it.

That issue is not inherent to min/maxing. It's a problem with the system.

I have been having a similar issue with optimizing a finesse fighter. The character concept is a nigh-unbeatable expert duelist who uses brains, grace, and discipline rather than brawn. I've yet to find a melee class which can be 100% DPR optimized using Dex, Int, and Wis. If I go with the concept, my "genius master duelist" will lose a duel to a dumb barbarian with 20 Str and a falchion.

That's not true of every crunchy system though. That same Duelist would hand the Barbarian his or her head in 7th Sea, True20, or even 3.5, with the right option books (I can make him pretty mean using the Swashbuckler class in combination with Tome of Battle).

One of my players argues in favor of more books and more crunch, justifying it by saying that more books means more chances that a high-powered feat or class will be introduced that brings an underpowered character type into parity. Her proof is the "Shadow Blade" feat in the Tome of Battle finally making high Dex low Str meleers competitive with Str fighters.

BigNorseWolf wrote:

There is no vs.

There is no reason you cannot both minmax your character into a four armed dual greatsword wielding quizinart of death and destruction and make him a fully three dimensional character with heart, soul, and depth.

This is so very true.

I think, Nosreme, that you just found a group that suck at RP. That's OK, though - put on the DM's mantle and show them!

In my group, the best roleplayers are also the best tactical gamers. They're the ones that think through the implications of actions - both story implications and tactical implications - and show their love of and attachment to characters by trying to make those characters effective and survivable.

So the general idea I've seen floating around the boards over the past few years is that melee characters that rely on Dexterity and the Weapon Finesse feat are still vastly inferior to Strength-based warriors, usually using two-handed weapons to max out their theorycrafted DPR. On the other hand, finesse combat is a popular fantasy archetype and I see lots of people who like to play characters who fight with brains and/or grace rather than brawn.

Yet with all of the Treantmonk-style guides out there and the popularity of fencers, duelists, ninjas, assassins, and other speedy/tricky archetypes of the fantasy genre, I haven't seen any that are dedicated to making finesse builds usable, either within the bounds of accepted theorycraft (damage > defense, combat healing is not useful, etc) or by challenging the established way of doing things.

TL;DR, finesse is really popular but there are no guides. Is anybody interested in collaborating on a guide to all of the ways to optimize finesse builds and listing the advantages that finesse styles have over straight strength builds?

If they're using their computers to keep track of their characters and any sources they may be using for them, that's fine. If they're using them to nitpick other characters and players, or worse, surfing Youtube, that shouldn't be happening.

Oh, very much agreed. I find that computers are least disruptive when they are present but an internet connection is not. Without computers, there's too much waiting for that one book everybody needs to be passed around, but I've dealt with my fair share of problem players messing around on the web.

I asked nicely for that behavior to stop, and it's mostly toned down, but I seriously considered turning the router off, or changing the password so only I (the GM) could use it during the game.

EDIT: I'm surprised. I really thought it was just assumed, at this point, that everyone brings their own "happy stick" (wand of CLW) and gets healed off of their own charges when spells/channels are not available. Every one of my PCs spent their first two Prestige on a happy stick so nobody else would be burdened with using resources to heal me. Many GMs and players I have spoken to believe that it's not even a matter of politeness or carrying your own weight - it's survival because low and mid level clerics will not have enough cure spells to heal the damage a party can take. Of course, someone being a huge jerk about it is still way out of line. You don't do that as a favor to the cleric - you buy a happy stick for your own good and by extension the whole party.

Double edit: The original edit came off a bit meaner than I really intended so I toned it down. I just meant to compare my own experience, which is that most people I know take the wand thing as a given, but they've been really nice about it.

Another laptop issue is that some people legitimately don't like or can't afford paper everything. I would rather pay $10 a book to use on the laptop I already paid a grand for, and laptops are way better for my back than a pile of books. This year's Origins was the first one in which I did not have to bring books, and it saved me a good deal of back pain because all I needed was my computer bag, dice, and character sheets.

Though this may not be an issue for long - I saw a lot of iPads and android tablets at Origins (mine included!). I personally feel that tablets are the best of both worlds, as they allow for e-books to be used, but they don't take up nearly as much table space, nor do they create such a prominent physical wall between the players.

EDIT: I should shoot myself for the blatant misuse of an apostrophe. : P

I am contemplating creating a Magus for PFS soon, and I have been reading on some of the other posts on the boards that there's some disagreement about whether Arcane Mark, as a touch spell, can be used with Spellstrike and Spell Combat to gain a second attack. Is there a "rules as written" consensus on the issue for the purpose of sanctioned play?

I don't want to annoy any GMs if most PFS GMs consider using Arcane Mark for the extra attack to be going too far, but if it's generally seen as allowable, not factoring it into my build would let my fellow Pathfinders down.

Thanks everyone!

Part of the problem is the erosion of the skill monkey role and the fact that almost every other class has some sort of combat ability that you have to intentionally sabotage to be of low or no usefulness in combat. Spellcasters of any stripe need only wake up today and prepare a combat buff or SoS spell, and they're useful, in addition to all of the other utility that they will provide by being able to bypass the laws of mundane reality several times a day. Classes designed for combat will have lots of abilities that make them constantly useful. However, Rogues have class abilities that are fixed when chosen, and there are many noncombat abilities to choose from. Unlike a spellcaster, a Rogue can't wake up and pick a new talent.

In the old days, Rogues didn't need to be good at combat. their stranglehold over the skill monkey role, as well as the view that combat was not a whole-group activity, meant that Rogues were one of the best classes - in a game about exploration, the classes that could overcome terrain and environmental conditions - like Rogues and Rangers - were the most valued. Wizards and Clerics couldn't negate environmental hazards with any reliability or repetition until much later - without bonus spells, domains, or arcane bond, you might get one 5th level spell a day and feel lucky that you were forced to choose between a damage spell, a utility spell, and a SoD spell. It was a huge deal that you got one of those.

Another issue about Rogues' usefulness in combat, IMO, comes from the Medieval paradigm of the game Pathfinder's rules are based on. Dex, as a stat, is not as important in combat as it will be in another few centuries of real world historical development. The original campaign worlds were very much based on the idea of "Dark Ages with magic". The best equipment in d20 games is the stuff that would have won you victories on the Medieval battlefield - plate armor and big weapons. It wasn't until action moved into urban and aquatic environments and involved guns, where wearing fifty pounds of metal was a really bad idea, that massive melee damage output became less important than being adaptable, maneuverable, versatile, and able to defend with dodges and parries as opposed to letting your armor take the blow. For an example of a game that works off of the opposite paradigm, look at AEG's 7th Sea. The Dex stat (Finesse) always determines accuracy in melee, and there is no strength version of weapon finesse. High-str, low-dex characters will always lose fights to high-dex characters, who have better dodge AND accuracy. It's a Renaissance paradigm.

Here's another for ToB love and 4E dislike. I don't really see how ToB=4E. 3.5 with ToB still has all the things that make 3.5 great, without melee sucking compared to casters.

I just wanted to brainstorm with other PFRPG GMs - How do you deal with the party that has figured out how to milk utility spells for all they are worth?

I have ten years of experience playing and GMing for sub-10th level characters in d20, but only a handful of times have I played a character above 10th level, and recently was my first time GMing for a high-level party, specifically, a party of 14th level Eberron characters.

I've kept the story interesting by raising the stakes and the importance and power level of their opponents, but it's actually high level utility spells that continually throw me for a loop. It's easy for a role-balanced group of characters, as a group, to be invisible, flying, scentless, and able to pass through walls (all spells they'll have by 9th-10th level in a casting class), making the typical "dungeon" adventure pretty short (invisible-flying-passwall to the room the big bad is in, kill it, win) and even intrigue adventures are pretty tough when characters can be anywhere they want, for spying or assassination, anytime they want, and frequently have the drop of enemies that do not have the ability to completely cancel out PC abilities, like blindsense, or see invisibility.

It seems to me that any character worth their position is going to be hiding in a fortress of counter-divination spells and surrounding themselves with Wizards, Clerics, and monsters capable of cancelling out anything that the PCs might try, as well as lurking under a large number of false identities and conspiracies.

Are there any other solutions or considerations that have affected your high-level games?

I don't know how well it would work mechanically, but it sounds like a really sweet idea.

I think I'd make Geralt be 2/3 Alchemist levels, 1/3 either Fighter or Ranger (with the Two-Handed Weapon combat style) levels, in order to keep his Alchemist progression strong, and of course, focus heavily on Mutagens over bombs. As a monster hunter, he would have monster knowledge not unlike the favored enemy class feature, most likely in Magical Beast or Aberration.

I would assume most other Witchers would follow this pattern as well. Alchemist/Ranger sounds like a Witcher to me.