Arguecat's page

I wanted to share something from our GM, who is already worried about the power creep in Pathfinder:

One thing to consider in powering up martials is the inevitable backlash: Everything you give to a martial character in Pathfinder will inevitably find itself in Pathfinder monsters and intelligent enemies.

On this logic PF should never publish another decent spell (or anything else good for casters) either, because it can also be used by intelligent NPC enemies.

But maybe this is just a rationale that's used with respect to martials, not meant to apply to anything else, as a reason to keep powering up casters (no inevitable backlash there, I suppose), but exclude martials. I hope it's not that kind of double-standard rationale, but I have to allow for the possibility.

If such a Wayfinder existed, nobody would pay for the other ones. There would be no reason to, since you lose all other magical abilities. People would choose the cheaper, non-descript one every time. The reason the ones we have exist is to keep the price exorbitant and deter everyone from walking around with the same item.

And people say it is bad when players metagame.

Faced with a castle that an elven army might need to besiege, they likely wouldn't resort to catapults and rams like humanity would, but might instead just wait out the castle... maybe use slowly-growing ivy to creep up and weaken the castle walls or let erosion be their ally.

They're like Professor Chaos!

*meanwhile the shorter-lived inhabitants are bringing in supplies, pruning or carefully cultivating the ivy to get that 'ivy-covered halls' look - or simply pruning it if it would cause problems, conducting normal maintenance on walls, and generally going about their daily lives rather than being passive in the face of this*

Lumiere has tropes of Lumiere's own but I bet at the typical table Dawnbringer's character is the most distinctive (particularly at 1st level. Lots of people barely put much thought into their characters at first, they only gradually grow them over time expediently or on the fly) or at worst among the most distinctive.

Plus, lots of people have their favorite characteristics that which show up in their characters (I'd say every person does, but I don't want to be an extremist; I'm sure there are a few valiant exceptions, none of which are me when it comes to this). It's also just that a lot of these favorite/common PC characteristics are common among a plurality of role players, so it's less noticed. (Cadyden Cailean is the patron personification of many of these - and don't think little girls aren't involved. Ug, getting drunk & then wenching lolis is all too common with those who live this vicarious trope...)

Most of these suggestions come with connotations and are better suited for prestige classes or archetypes, though interesting they may be. If you're going to rename them for your game, call them what they are. Soldiers. Fighters are part of the history of the game, so for better or for worse the name is going to stick.

Well I don't disagree but then we have people popping into the thread to say "Fighter can't do X, all they can do is hit things, to do X you need [name Y]."

Which is also why I had the parenthetical "renamed (even if just in their own minds)." Then maybe people won't get hung up on the name and use it as an objection to otherwise interesting ideas. Because apparently Fighter comes with connotations of its own that produce this mindset that they're a rabble-in-arms, an inferior sort of golem.

Ilja wrote:

Professional soldier can be a lot. Fighters cannot. They are just jarheads, regardless of level. It works at level 1, not at 15.

False. I don't know what fighters you have played with, but by level 15 most fighters are the love child of Goku and Tywin Lannister.

EDIT: This is off topic anyways. The thread is about "improving martials", not "which martial classes should we just remove from the game".

Or "rename." I mean, "Fighter" is iconic to the game, but perhaps it would help shift people's mindset toward the class if it was renamed (even if just in their own minds) something that smacked more of "professional soldier/badass" to them rather than "random peon who smacks things, more or less ably, but is otherwise useless and could easily be replaced with a suitable mindless construct, like a golem which can at least resist most magic while it slams enemies and breaks stuff."

I'd suggest something like "Champion,' but while that is somewhat reflective of a certain role (originally, being a Champion or Peer was to be someone of great renown), but I doubt I'd even get myself to rally around that as a substitute name.

Another solution...move the bulk of non-combat spells into a ritual system akin to 4e's, where ANY class can perform the ritual.

I did like the ritual system and thought not nearly enough of its potential was explored. Doing this would also give something to the people who want to move to a "skill-based" magic system and away from the D&D magic system.

I suppose that would fit with "helping martials" as it would give them potential access (at the cost of a Feat) to a lot of thematic, out-of-combat, world-affecting capabilities. I don't think it fits the "theme" of every martial though. So there should also be ways for stright martials to affect the world on a similar scale as casters, without becoming casters (even "ritual casters").

I.E. it should be possible to be "Badass Normal." But that doesn't mean the ritual magic idea is bad.

Any chance we could stop arguing the RAW minutia of a spell and get back on the topic of making martials better?

None. Many have tried, all have failed.

This thread is why we can't have nice things.

*Nails a sign up over the thread saying "Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate"*

They are both plenty powerful, so I don't feel a need to 'win' that endless debate.

But. . .but. . .this is the internet. *worried face*

*cascading failure causes engine parts to loose from the out-of-control thread, as steam erupts from its carriage. Bolts and other random parts fly about with a whiz and a pop-zip-bang. The crew continues to bicker, grasping the steering mechanism, no longer attached to the thread, back and forth between themselves, as the world tumbles by*

*the wheels of the thread pop off again and tumble and rage in all directions, while the thread itself, rudderless, careens violently out of control, as the crew struggles and squabbles among themselves over the now loosed steering mechanism*

My cat feels very strongly that the keyboard is interfering with her ability to cuddle with me, and it's a little awkward to type at the moment.

Arguecat and Factcat both agree that cats should be deferred to in all matters.

4E got rid of Vancian magic. ^_^

Calm down, . .Don't pick a fight when it isn't needed or called for.

Too true; this is the internet, after all.

Blood Money is a really cool spell, both conceptually and mechanically, if it works exactly as the Dev says it does.

But because Anzyr reads it differently...

He's not alone in reading it that way. RavingDork reads it that way and has made and posted builds (including quite thematically interesting ones) based around using it that way.

I'm sure those two aren't alone, and RD has linked in the past to posts where the same J.J. who said Blood Money can't be used that way, said, in effect, that it can be (and not just "well, you can do that in your campaign, but I wouldn't" - but rather in how J.J. described how components are used up in the casting of a spell). Now I wish I had saved that specific link (I think it was linked to earlier).

Anyhow I really, really, really don't want to get too deep into the debate over Blood Money. Nor am I suggesting that this interpretation is correct and yours(ciretose) is incorrect.

I'm just pointing out that more than one person has had that interpretation, and they have been able to find the Devs making rules judgements that support this interpretation, and there really does need to be a FAQ issued by them adjudicating it once and for all (even if 90% of people will never see it, at least it will allow people to make a definitive statement in threads like this one that eliminates all doubt as to what RAW is, so there won't be 47 pages of back-and-forth on how one spell works).

Btw, for the record: if and when they do issue a FAQ, they should rule the way ciretose is saying.

58) Debating Alignment with a duped pawn/catspaw who just cast Know Alignment on the BBEG and is now questioning their allegiance to said BBEG.

ed 209. why did you post repeats?

He didn't.

I also note that people who can't afford plane tickets don't get on planes, and therefore don't die in plane crashes -- but again, that doesn't mean the laws of physics prevent plane crashes. It means those people will never see them.

You forgot the people who say "you got your pilot's license and sit in the pilot's seat and turn the plane on, but the plane won't take off for you because it's got some other agenda [asspull fiat]."

Of course, a good DM is one who will use asspull fiat to nerf obviously broken or abusable abilities in order to keep the campaign from nosediving into the dirt. So, naturally, in a good campaign with a good DM and mature players you won't see the obvious problems. Which doesn't mean RAW is perfect.

Absolutely NOT true. ANYONE can use the second half of the book with UMD. There is already a way to make martials less terrible...it's the UMD skill and scrolls.

So the solution is to make him into a third-rate caster? Why not just give everyone spells, then? (or spell-equivalents, which was 4E's solution, and too many people - especially people who preferred casters - didn't like that).

This proposal, which others also have made, reads to me as: "Too bad you rolled a martial, sucks to be you. But since you did, you can take your piddling skill points and put them into UMD (which is, yes, one of the two best skills in the game) and be my backup/scroll caddy."

That's not why people play martials; if they wanted to cast spells, they'd play a caster (which I do more often than I play a martial), or a half-caster.

That said, since I'm dipping into this thread: I do agree with Marthkus (my "hated nemesis" in another thread)* that any "fix" to martials shouldn't be a "nerf" to casters. At least not a nerf just so martials can be relatively better. There are spells that need fixing, for their own sake, and other tweeks maybe need to be made, for their own sake (broken is broken, regardless of class or the affect on other classes - things that are broken in the game as a whole can and should be fixed). Fixes for Fighters or Rogues or Monks or Cavaliers should be fixes for those classes, not nerfings of other classes so that they'll all be in the dogpile together. Same with other martials (Barbs & Rangers are less hurting, but may also need help).

I'll get you, Markthus, and your little familiar, too...

*Casts extraction from thread and poofs away to another thread*

gustavo iglesias wrote:

Curiously, I think all classes should had been designed like those. Rogues should have had ki points (with anotger name) since the begining. Fighters should have grit/resolve.

You're looking for Iron Heroes, where everyone is a muscle wizard with pools of tokens to use for awesome.

Like some Barb builds, you mean?

P.S. What happened to Journ-O-LST-1 and Journ-O-LST-2? Food vats?

So if a fighter want to be good a climbing he have to wait until level 8 and be forced to take a combat feat he might not want?

They've transitioned to trying to shove too much into Feat-form.

Fighter has a decent amount of Feats, but not enough to do that and continue to keep up with other Martial classes in combat. Siphoning off the Feats instead of giving a class ability is useless. Probably it is just generating a new multiplicity of Feats that won't be taken because there's something more necessary.

Or create a new Fighter Template, "Schrodinger's Fighter," the Fighter who has just the right feat at every specific moment he needs to have it (and swaps them out the way Schrodinger's Wizard swaps out spells, so he always has the right spell selection for any given encounter, no more and no less).

Or give Fighters a bonus feat every level, instead of every other level, but with the new 10 being ones that can only be spent on these type of Feats.

Sorry, I haven't had the chance to read through all the posts from the beginning. Could someone summarize for me - what have you guys figured out over the last 2500 posts?

There's this post by Kirth that sumarizes much of what went before, at least for one "side" of the discussion (I'll let those who advocate for the other "side" summarize their take. To do it myself would probably come off snide).

Also this one by Kirth as well.

bugleyman wrote:

Arguecat wrote:

He's just asking out of curiousity.

So far I haven't seen many people say others are objectively wrong for disagreeing with their take. They've calmly given their reasons for their preferences, and discussed it like reasonable people.

Which is unbelievable for the interbutts.

The implication is that it is irrational to like anything beyond the three original classes if one objects to the APG classes on the basis that they are redundant.

Huh? Who implied that?

He inferred it; which is different.

Is it that time again? I didn't hear the "argue that other people's opinions are objectively wrong" bell.

He's just asking out of curiousity.

So far I haven't seen many people say others are objectively wrong for disagreeing with their take. They've calmly given their reasons for their preferences, and discussed it like reasonable people.

Which is unbelievable for the interbutts.

That reminds me of why I like Cacodaemons either as a familiar or through the spell Summon Cacodaemon.

Do not pass Go. Do not collect 200 dollars. Go directly to Abaddon.

Yes, that DC 12 caster level check is tough for anyone with the ability to revive to beat.

>_<

giving a fighter 4 skill points per level is bad and you should feel bad.

I feel that way all the time anyhow so I have no problem supporting this fix. It's well overdo for classes that aren't INT-based.

That said Kirth is right that many skills get obsoleted by 5th level, anyhow. Perhaps we need a "The Main Problem with Skills" thread?

Except that will make Lamontius lament, because he wants more threads about things that are good (and tons of things are good. IMO the Devs can each have a cookie, because the game is really good overall and a lot of its features just shine and we forumites can and should share the nifty things we find, even if it's been said before. After all, there are no new threads on the internet. Just necro and topic recycle).

so paizo just needs to hire kirth, expand and build upon his alterations, and become even more awesome than they already are. This...probably isn't going to happen(crosses fingers for pathfinder 2.0)

Stranger things have happened in the history of gaming. :p

It' true nevertheless that he's participating in the thread beyond just saying "look at Kirthfinder."

to fix fighters use kirthfinder feats, done

I posted a possible solution to this issue a couple of pages back. My players have been using my homebrew tweak for nearly a year now, and it has had a hugely positive impact on how they play their fighters.

I also use many of Kirth's scaling feats, as well as many of my own, and since I introduced these changes to my players, there as been at least one fighter in every game we've played in the past year. Before that, I saw maybe one fighter out of 3-4 games that were played.

All worthy steps and I don't disparage them, but one reason I think Kirth himself is interested in this thread is to promote getting beyond homebrew patches.

Of course, he can confirm or deny that or expound upon it or whatever.

I would disagree here. The ranger is able to explore certain weapon styles with greater versatility (like being able to skip dex prereqs on TWF feats taken via their combat style feats) but they don't have the sheer number of feats a fighter does.

The point was: Fighter may have "more feats" but they often have to take rubbish just to qualify for the good stuff or shore up deficiencies those other classes don't have, while other classes can ignore the rubbish and just get at the good stuff straight away. Or the Fighter uses their Feats just to get close(r) to what other Classes get as straight class-abilities, ones that frequently scale with level much better than most Feats do (some Feats do scale with level, but even those don't scale as well as class abilities).

Once you take all that into consideration, the Fighter's advantage in Feat quantity pales in comparison to the quality of what other classes get (something that has been demonstrated with examples only like half a dozen times in this thread alone).

Quote:

Tell me more about what a great positive contribution he made there in replacing Kirth's post with that.

well considering they are on the same side of the argument, I took that as humor.

They aren't; Kirth believes Fighters should be improved, Markthus has opposed him throughout the thread.

If didn't catch that, you might want to re-read the last several pages (I do not mean this sarcastically or snidely. I mean: I think you got confused. Though perhaps I might be the confused one and Markthus has just been pretending to be completely opposed to beefing up Fighters, in the name of preserving caster advantage (in which case he's trolling the other side making deliberately lame counter-arguments against Kirth et al in order to discredit Kirth's opponents by association).

ED-209 on the other hand seemed to not be kidding. though maybe he was playing along too, and if so I apologize for my comment.

ED-209 is always kidding. He exists for lame jokes and lightheartedness.

Unfortunately he got too carried along with the moment for about a page, though, and is taking a break.

ED-209 doesn't exist to lock threads or derail them. He overstepped his bounds and is taking a "time out."

ED-209 wrote:

Marthkus wrote:

Kirth Gersen wrote:

Lies. Filthy filthy lies

I'm a troll, trolling the thread for attention and topic-derailment.

I'm a troll, too!

But I do it for the only good reason to do anything: idiftl.

so we have established that you have no idea what's going on and who your even talking to. thanks now i'll just skim over your posts to make this a quicker read.

so we have established that you have no idea what's going on and who your even talking to. thanks now i'll just skim over your posts to make this a quicker read.

Marthkus, on the other hand, was making a great positive contribution there, wasn't he?

Tell me more about what a great positive contribution he made there in replacing Kirth's post with that.

ujjjjjjjjjj wrote:

Obvious issue is Spellcasting.

Casters Uber Alles! Everything else can suxorz, for all I care! In fact, I want to dominate them, and if I can't I'll baww and rage-quit!

There, fixed it for you.

has minimal resource management, and has the ability to explore weapon styles and combinations much earlier than other classes.

This is one section I'd quibble with you on though:

Fighters may have "minimal resource management," if only because they have little resources of their own. But they often increase the resource management demands on fellow party members, who must account for how to help the Fighter when various effects affect him, how to keep him up since he has no innate ability to keep himself up (or he can get items and use a standard action himself to inferiority do that, but then his "minimal resource management" goes away, and he's investing limited resources - Fighter doesn't have the skill points to devote to UMD, for example, without costing him out on something else he should be putting skill points into; like Perception, another non-class-skill).

Fighters also don't really explore weapon styles faster than Ranger. They might switch-hit, exploring multiple styles, but there are only so many good weapons they can invest in. Usually they should do one melee and one ranged weapon (especially since they have no other way at getting at critters who can, say, fly, or otherwise stay out of their melee range). But it's hard for them to be better archers than some other classes, for example.

Which may be fine, other classes should have their niche, too. But then what is the Fighter's niche? Valerios-like buttmonkey? (Except if anything Rogue and Monk are worse, so Fighter doesn't even have the distinction of being the worst class, so people can always say "why are we talking about fixing Fighter, when X is worse?" - well, at least those classes can make a mechanical role for themselves out of combat).

5) Is the same true for the Runelords themselves, or at least the first seven? The visions shown in PF #66 seem to demonstrate jealousy and the signs of corruption, but were they always all-out-nasty from when Xin first took them with him from Azlant (or they followed him), or was it something that happened over time? If it's the former, then Xin probably isn't a very good judge of character. As in, at all.

He forgot to take any ranks in Sense Motive. And he dumped WIS. So he never even considered casting the spells that surely someone is going to say he could have cast to achieve some insight.

His is a tragic tale.

. . .PLus fighters used to have some of the best saves in the games. . .

This one is lulz, because 1) it's true and 2) so many people say "fighters shouldn't have better saves because: tradition. Why, they've had crap saves ever since third edition! Giving fighters better saves can't be justified."

*bangs head against the wall repeatedly*

*carries in a box from another thread*

I'm just going to leave this here

*sets it down in this thread*

. . .It's comparing a guy with a bicycle with someone who can summon angels

Versatile Spontaneity

Oh ho ho, he meant an additional good feat that gives spontaneous casters versatility approximating that of the only benefit of being a prepared caster (a Feat I'm sure the game needed and was well-thought-through).

I take back my post. By all means, no reason not to discuss the impact of this as well.

Yeah, the impact of that Feat (along with several magic items that provide versatility) was mentioned in numerous posts over about three pages with people bickering back and forth on whether it was sufficient to move them to Tier 1 or if even with it they were relegated to "only" Tier 2, which led to further bickering over whether the Tiers were defined properly or how they should be interpreted and whether the versatility added by Paragon Surge + page scraps + robe was enough for Tier 1 or if it wasn't and they stayed in lowly Tier 2 status.

i can honestly say if warrior was brought up to 4 skill poitns a level, other classes would need to be increased to 6 accordingly.

Well, if Warrior were, that might be true. But if Fighter were. . .it's not axiomatically the case that Fighters should have fewer base skill points (INT not included) than typical, non-skill-monkey, classes.

Not that I'm saying Fighters axiomatically deserve an increase. But it's a reasonable argument for an otherwise lagging class. After all, Barbarian has 4, and while there are good reasons a Barbarian *might* excel in different skills than a Fighter, there aren't really good reasons they would necessarily have more skills.

It's just a legacy thing. I suppose one can make the argument that if it's the way it's been, it's the way it should be; "if it ain't broke, don't fix it." But the point of the thread seems to be that Fighters are comparatively weaker.

if it pushes rogues negatively all the more reason not to give it to warriors.

It might *also* be the case that Rogues, along with Fighters, need a boost to catch them up with other classes.

But it's not a good argument to say that fixing the Fighter would make the Rogue feel all lonely there at the bottom of the ant heap.

I think everybody agrees that 3.5 CoDzillas were in another league than Summoners, and even in a different league than Wizards.

Then why are people beating a horse repeatedly on a subject they're not going to agree on (Tiers and the Theorycraft Wizard Problem)?

It might be best to just agree to disagree and stumble off to bicker in whole new threads on other topics. Or not. Far be it from me to dispense useful advice.

Ok, let's do this.

Somebody please write a list of problems a Tier 1 need to be able to solve. Including defeating magic inmune/high SR monsters, Spy, move around, convince someone or whatever.

Things Tier 1 needs to be able to solve:

• All the things
  
• All the other things
  
• Yes, those too
  
• Yes, even that

I haven't see a, say, 11th level wizard that has every single 6th lvl spell. Ever.

THey do in all Forums, though. Especially when fighting non-casters in theorycraft PvP threads.

Yeah, martials in published products are almost invariably (no matter which publisher - it's far from just Paizo) overshadowed by casters (there's no caster-martial disparity, though!)

It's pronounced "Fury"

(Not "Furries," that's something else, sicko).

ALSO:

** spoiler omitted **

The cunning hat was many things, but huge was not one of them.

But the guy who wore it had a big head.

(big head, fathead, tomato, tahamto. Ok lets call the whole thing off).

This is Rules as Written so it's legal (which I personally think is the worst part about all of this), but only in Pathfinder (as opposed to 3.5).

What makes him think that?

Anthropomorphic Animal Template is from Savage Species, not 3.5, and Legendary Creatures, that's 3.0 not PF, and not meant to be applied to the Anthropomorphic Animal Template anyhow (one would apply Eagle, but not Legendary Eagle, to the Template).

While Pathfinder is "Backwards Compatible," it is fair for any DM to recognize the design-decisions in PF that exclude certain options, especially breakable/interpreted-the-rules-to-maximum-player-advantage options from 3.5.

Pathfinder is mainly "backwards compatible" when it comes to adventures, (some, with tweeks) monsters, and the like.

It is not axiomatically-backwards-compatible with every outlandish "option" a player might want to bring into the game, especially ones where the player is giving every question the interpretation most advantageous to him and declaring it "RAW."

Now, that said, if the DM, and the campaign as a whole, wants to play with all that stuff and have fun as a group, I certainly wouldn't say "you're doing it wrong." Far from it.

The only thing I'm saying is: if he brings that to the table and plops it down and says "surprise! that's Pathfinder RAW," he is. . .stretching things more than a bit. Savage Species isn't in Pathfinder unless the DM specifically ok's it. Legendary Animals aren't in Pathfinder unless the DM specifically ok's it, and it's not a Savage Species option unless the DM specifically says "yup, that sounds like a good combo for you to play in our campaign!"

The guy may as well just bring Pun-Pun to the table and declare it "Pathfinder legit per RAW."

Using Teller for a low level position sounds really good to me.

And they probably call their Inquisitors "Auditors."

"The Auditors of Abadar are coming!"

I think physical skills should be based on CMB, like PF did with Use Rope. Mostly I'm arguing that PF should continue moving in the direction they're already moving.

That might work, hopefully they'll play around with the idea. I'd prolly have to play around with it to see if I liked it. :p

CMB was new when they started PF and they might not have wanted to tie it to too many things early on.

I think the skill system works fairly well but it could use some tweeking, especially to improve the capabilities of what used to be 'low-skill classes" but which prolly should be good at these physical skills, and which are hardly "overpowered classes" right now.

As for CMB/CMD themselves, it might be fun to playtest around with the whole Combat Maneuver system and make it more, I dunno; useful isn't the right word. But, you know. Anyhow it would be fun to tweek.

Fireballs thing, why? It's not an emanation, it's a burst, plus, that would be bothersome to calculate.

Lightning, the same. Who would want to bother calculating forking and deflections?

It's old-school. People used to get singed all the time for miscalculating.

I'm not saying it should be that way. I'm just saying it was. And it was lulz.

Bill Kirsch wrote:

Alignment is useful to define how a character/monster/NPC will act in broad strokes. It is fairly subjective, but I still consider it useful as a guideline, not a straitjacket.

I would think its hard to do a lot of things in a straightjacket. Rolling D20s would be really hard,

but I guess you could get someone else to do it for you.

They'd have to touch my dice then. >_<

(Or roll theirs for me. Either way, no wai!)

Icyshadow wrote:

Savages is a politically incorrect term >_>

As the orcs and ogres come down from the hills to pillage and terrorise, political correctness towards the savages has not developed in my worlds.

The "Savage" Tide AP should be reframed as The Demonized Other Tide, with Demogorgon and his followers recast as victims of persecution by so-called "heroes" who refused to understand the perspective of Demogorgon and his supporters.

Added plot twists:

Demogorgon is leader of the Demon Liberation Front, while Orcus is in charge of the Liberation Front of Demonkind (splitters!)