AvalonXQ's page

I'm putting together a one-shot adventure where the players are pregen monsters without any equipment. The monsters are getting tweaked from their native stat blocks, but the biggest change is probably in their feats.

What feats would people recommend I trade out on the following monsters, and for what feats should I look at instead?

Marilith
Bleeding Critical, Combat Expertise, Combat Reflexes, Critical Focus, Improved Critical (longsword), Improved Disarm, Power Attack, Weapon Focus (longsword)

Elder Air Elemental

Blind-Fight, Cleave, Combat Reflexes, Dodge, Flyby Attack, Improved InitiativeB, Iron Will, Mobility, Power Attack, Weapon FinesseB

Adult Silver Dragon
Flyby Attack, Hover, Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Lighting Reflexes, Multiattack, Power Attack, Vital Strike, Weapon Focus (bite)

Noble Efreeti
Combat Casting, Combat Reflexes, Deceitful, Dodge, Improved Initiative, Power Attack, Quicken Spell-Like Ability (scorching ray), Toughness

Beholder
Flyby Attack, Great Fortitude, Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Weapon Focus (ray)

It's pretty clear that the purpose of the surprise round is to give a benefit to alert creatures and allow for ambushes outside of the initiative system.

It's also pretty clear that the initiative system is supposed to represent your primary method of gaining priority in combat, and that catching your opponent by surprise is only supposed to give you the advantage of a free standard action, no more.

There's not any straightforward way to "game" combat timing in order to get a full round of sneak attacks from stealth and surprise, and this is clearly intentional.

If you harvest only female vestiges, would that make you a "binder full of women"?

Essentially, when both are surprised they end up just standing there. So they guy who is light on his feet doesn't dodge out of the way. The clumsy oaf just stands there--he doesn't suddenly get clumsier and throw himself on the enemy's weapons.

This is it exactly. The guy who doesn't dodge at all (+0 to AC) has the same AC whether he knows about the threat or not because he responds the same way -- by just standing there.

So, based on William Senn's analysis, all fighters should actually carry a dragonbane bow.

Stay 10 feet away from everyone.

Let's be honest, blight druids are supposed to be horribly evil beings that stay far away from everyone else. Not being able to rub elbows with your normal citizenry isn't a bug; it's a flavorful feature.

I totally understand it from a mechanical/game balance perspective, I just don't get it from an in-character perspective. If it's just a word, and speaking is a free action, why does it take the better part of six seconds to say? Especially since you can theoretically trigger it by accident if the command word is a common word?

I've always justified it as the concentration and precision required to say the word clearly and correctly. Think of it like speaking to a voice recognition customer service program -- you don't just let the words tumble out of your mouth like normal speech; you say them slowly and deliberately.

Triggering the item by accident is something that happens some of the time if you happen to say the word just right. The standard action for a command word item means you're giving the item your attention to make certain that the item activates.

A Clr3/Wiz3/MT2 would qualify for things requiring:
Caster level 5
Arcane caster level 5
Divine caster level 5

She would not qualify for things requiring:
Wizard level 4
Cleric level 4
Caster level 6

I hope that's clear.

Sorry, but the term "enhancement bonus" in the Magic Weapons section only refers to the term as used near the beginning of the chapter:

A magic weapon is enhanced to strike more truly and deliver more damage. Magic weapons have enhancement bonuses ranging from +1 to +5. They apply these bonuses to both attack and damage rolls when used in combat. All magic weapons are also masterwork weapons, but their masterwork bonuses on attack rolls do not stack with their enhancement bonuses on attack rolls.

Again, from this paragraph alone, we know that the enhancement bonuses discussed in this chapter, that is, the magic weapon's enhancement bonuses, are in reference to the enchantment granting between +1 and +5 that all magic weapons possess.

But if you insist on your RAW interpretation, recognize that you'll get no benefit out of it, because by the same RAW interpretation a masterwork flaming weapon still costs 8,000 gp:

Some magic weapons have special abilities. Special abilities count as additional bonuses for determining the market value of the item, but do not modify attack or damage bonuses (except where specifically noted). A single weapon cannot have a modified bonus (enhancement bonus plus special ability bonus equivalents, including those from character abilities and spells) higher than +10. A weapon with a special ability must also have at least a +1 enhancement bonus. Weapons cannot possess the same special ability more than once.

This is verified on the table:

Add to the enhancement bonus on Table: Weapons to determine total market price.

A masterwork weapon has a +1 enhancement bonus, right? That's your argument?

So I'm not sure what you were trying to get to by twisting the rules for the magic weapon enhancement bonus out of recognition, but using it to get a weapon priced too cheaply doesn't work.

Yet again, the inability of rule-makers to use a fricking thesaurus trips everybody up.

Since we have a set of options you can add to your character called "traits", why don't we call the things that you automatically get as part of choose a race something else? How about "racial qualities"? Is that unambiguous?

So we have "standard racial qualities" and "alternate racial qualities," and we no longer confuse racial traits with race traits.

To tell you the truth, I would probably adjudicate it the same as shallowsoul.

Polymorph spells don't generally heal wounds, cure diseases, or eliminate afflictions. If a rogue hit you with a bleeding attack, I wouldn't let you stop bleeding because you cast Alter Self; neither would I allow you to ignore deafness/blindness or a dose of poison just because you'd shifted your form.

So, in my game, I would probably rule that getting your limb chopped off is a "wound" or "affliction" that you will carry with you into whatever form you polymorph into, until you find some way to heal it. The same if you get your eye gouged out or whatnot.

That's right. Otherwise you get into some confusing situations.

For example, what if you've had your arm chopped off and you turn into a dragon? Are you missing a wing or a claw or both?

And apparently if a zero-legged merfolk uses Alter Self he gets two legs, but if a one-legged creature uses it he only gets one leg.

Burning Wheel is a system where you get better in any particular skill by using that skill.

In fact, I think Burning Wheel addresses many of the problems with the D&D engine mentioned here and elsewhere.

So theoretically a level 1 character could kill a a level 20 one given the bounded accuracy?

Not in practice, because damage and HP will still scale with level.

Think of it like Final Fantasy games -- the main difference between levels is how much damage you deal and how much damage you can take. If you try to take on enemies 30 levels higher than you, you're going to lose because they can 1-hit you and they have 100x your damage output in HP... but your hit still connects and deals damage, just not enough damage.

AvalonXQ wrote:

Adamantine Dragon wrote:

"Quadratic" is actually a poor choice of mathematical analogy. "Exponential" would be better. The idea is that a level 4 fighter is roughly four times as powerful as a level 1 fighter (linear progression) but a level 4 wizard is 16 times as powerful as a level 1 wizard (exponential progression).

What you just described is a quadratic progression (x^2), not an exponential progression (e^x). So "quadratic" actually is the right choice of analogy if we're saying the wizard increases in power as the square of his level; specifically, the power W of a wizard expressed as a function of his level L is:

W(L) = W(1)*L^2

This equation is quadratic in terms of L, not exponential in terms of L.

Heh, too long since my math classes... My recollection is that any function which raises a value by any exponent is "exponential", while "quadratic" means functions restricted to a degree of 2. In other words "quadratic" is a subset of "exponential" where the degree is specifically "2".

That's incorrect. "Quadratic" is a subset of "polynomial". "Exponential" means including the variable as an exponent, which is a different thing altogether.

Unless the wizard is exactly degree 2 more powerful (as opposed to, say degree 1.4, or degree 5) then "quadratic" seems a very specific way to describe the power curve.

Limiting our claim to degree 2 is not as limiting as you would think, but it's true that we're making a specific claim (just as we are when we call fighters "linear").

"Quadratic" is actually a poor choice of mathematical analogy. "Exponential" would be better. The idea is that a level 4 fighter is roughly four times as powerful as a level 1 fighter (linear progression) but a level 4 wizard is 16 times as powerful as a level 1 wizard (exponential progression).

What you just described is a quadratic progression (x^2), not an exponential progression (e^x). So "quadratic" actually is the right choice of analogy if we're saying the wizard increases in power as the square of his level; specifically, the power W of a wizard expressed as a function of his level L is:

W(L) = W(1)*L^2

This equation is quadratic in terms of L, not exponential in terms of L.

Darkness is a pretty common spell; temples really should sell "better everburning torches" at the higher cleric price, with the tag line that they work in magical darkness.

I took a closer look, and now I disagree with my earlier post. From the mounted combat rules:

When you attack a creature smaller than your mount that is on foot, you get the +1 bonus on melee attacks for being on higher ground. If your mount moves more than 5 feet, you can only make a single melee attack. Essentially, you have to wait until the mount gets to your enemy before attacking, so you can't make a full attack. Even at your mount's full speed, you don't take any penalty on melee attacks while mounted.

If your mount charges, you also take the AC penalty associated with a charge. If you make an attack at the end of the charge, you receive the bonus gained from the charge. When charging on horseback, you deal double damage with a lance (see Charge).

So, technically the rider isn't taking a charge action -- he's taking an attack action at the end of the mount's charge. Which means Vital Strike applies.

BTW, here's my house rule solution:

Add the creature's Constitution score to the amount of nonlethal damage necessary to knock her unconscious.

This essentially means that punching an orc in the negatives won't drop him unconscious unless the same amount of lethal damage would have killed him.

That's a pretty ridiculous nerf for Diehard. Even one point of nonlethal damage completely eliminates the benefit of the Diehard feat.

When a sword swing won't take an orc down, but dropping the sword and just punching it in the face will take it down, something's amiss.

You know there ARE reasons why vampires like Dracula have mortal servants such as the gypsies and Renfield.

In Dracula's case, it certainly wasn't because he died if exposed to sunlight, because he didn't. He just lost the ability to change shape.

The first time the main characters of the novel encounter him en masse, he's been walking around in broad daylight.

Geeks and gamers are often very bad at airing their greivances in a timely and proportional fashion.

I, myself, have certainly dealt with situations where a minor problem became a major problem because people were unwilling to talk to me about it. If anyone had just came up to me and explained the issue, I would have corrected my behavior or we would have agreed to some other resolution.

As surprised as the OP sounds, my guess is that there was a serious communication barrier here. The hosts were talking to the GM about the problems the player was causing, but neither the hosts nor the GM were communicating with the player about their issues with his behavior.

For the stealth rules, monk rules, and anything else that gets a bunch of extra text, why not put a significantly abbreviated form in the appropriate section and then refer to a new appendix?

So the appropriate page of the core rulebook says, under the flurry of blows ability, something like: "The monk can get more attacks than normal with her flurry. For a full description of this ability, see the Core Appendix page A-3."

Cheapy wrote:

Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.

Is Tom Selleck a witch then?

Does he weigh the same as a duck?

Male witches have the totally unfair, to female witches, option of punching things with their mustaches.

What stops female witches from punching things with their mustaches?

See, it my table, game rules/mechanics debates are part of the fun.

The paladin cannot lie, and neither can he betray his companions.

Which leaves... resisting the torture and saying nothing. Sounds like a heroic action to me.

Being invisible or being blind are the only two ways. Closing your eyes does not qualify as being blind.

Read again.

"The foe cannot see the creature at all "

"An attacker must be able to see the figments to be fooled."

I don't know how much more clear this could be.

Blahpers, you are basing your argument on a distinction between the "grappler" and the "grapplee" and that the only person "grappling" is the "grappler".

Please cite the rules to support your distinction.

Wearing a Blindfold: The foe cannot see the creature at all (also possible to achieve by turning one’s back on the creature or shutting one’s eyes).

An attacker must be able to see the figments to be fooled. If you are invisible or the attacker is blind, the spell has no effect (although the normal miss chances still apply).

The spell has no effect in any case where the attacker can't see the wizard.

Closing your eyes causes you to not be able to see the wizard.

Therefore, closing your eyes causes the spell to have no effect on you.

Without the Still Spell feat, you can't cast the spell at all while grappled.

The only spells you can cast while grappling or pinned are those without somatic components and whose material components (if any) you have in hand. Even so, you must make a concentration check (DC 10 + the grappler's CMB + the level of the spell you're casting) or lose the spell.

So, if you want the ability to even try to cast the spell, you need to have it Stilled.

Usually taking an item off is a move action, and putting an item on is a move action.

I don't have any problem with a character being able to re-activate a ring of invisibility with two consecutive move actions; does anyone else?

Heh... as I said, you try this in my party and you'll be paying for your heals.

Great, so nobody takes the crafting feats and you all pay 45% more than you would have if you knew how to be reasonable.

This is a fair punishment for being bad at math, in my opinion.

Touch spells, when used against unwilling targets, follow the rules for touch attacks, including inflict light wounds.

You have to roll to hit with the spell.

Taking one of Dal's ideas...

Trait: Familial bond
You and one of your adventuring companions were raised together, and are particularly close.
Benefit: You and another character both take this trait. You bestow an additional +1 trait bonus when providing a flanking bonus or aid another bonus to the bonded character.
In addition, you automatically succeed your Bluff check to successfully deliver a secret message to the bonded character, regardless of your actual roll, although others may still attempt to decipher the message with an opposed Sense Motive check as normal.

People who have a problem with it are asking the wrong question.

They're saying, "Why would you choose to have a DR that is only weak against the one thing you will want to fight the most?"

But DR isn't something you choose; it's a part of the nature of the world around you.

Just like a fire creature has vulnerability to cold, so a celestial creature is vulnerable to evil-aligned attacks, and vice versa. Those are the attacks that are most designed to hurt them, that they are in strongest opposition to. This makes perfect sense.

one,if that Is true would that allow for a standard action to be used after you sucessfully maintain a grapple?

Yes. Your standard action can be anything you'd like, as long as you can do it while you have the grappled condition.

and 2, since grappeling only allows for auto damage no attack roll im 99% sure you cannot turn that into a stunning fist.

You can't use Stunning Fist with your action to maintain the grapple, but you could then make an unarmed attack as a standard action and use Stunning Fist with that.

If the RAW argument is that flaming and flaming burst are independent enchantments, then can't I have a +1 flaming flaming burst weapon that deals +2d6 fire damage per hit?

Fixing the crafting rules.

Also fixing the trapmaking rules.

Optional rules creating custom weapons. Something that gives standard guidelines, like "a simple weapon should not be better than X, a martial weapon can have up to Y special properties, and exotic weapon is balanced if Z".

The last time I played a wizard (back in 3.5), Spell Mastery was an important part of his preparations.

Then, as soon as he was high enough level, he spent the XP to enchant his spellbook with invisibility and himself with see invisibility, both permanent.

How the above got favorited, multiple times, is surprising.

If you're that surprised by what is clearly a somewhat popular reaction to your posts, you might want to continue taking a step back and seeing if you're not coming off quite as you intended.

Anime are blatantly non-realistic and escapist, but most (well, shounen, anyway) are on a totally different tangent than any game system I've seen.

Again, this appears to be because you evaluate game systems according to your requirements for a tactical simulation that requires balanced play.

Neither of these are actually requirements for an RPG. You just have no experience with any other sort of RPG.

Again, you can very easily have a balanced system that is not tactical, or a tactical system where balance is unimportant, and simulate cinematic events in a perfectly reasonable way.

In fact, you're reinforcing my very sentiments, saying that game systems like PF are simply not fit for the sandbox kind of gameplay which would be required to model anime.

If that's what your "sentiments" were, then that's what you should have said.

PF is presented as, and written to be played as, a tactical combat simulation game where balance is important, because challenges are made to be faced on the level of tactical combat. And I would agree with you that attempting to adapt many cinematic characters for this style of play is likely to have the problems you indicate.

But what you're missing is that many, many games are not played this way. The constraints that you see as essential to even playing a game aren't actually necessary, even within the context of using Pathfinder rules.

To be blunt, you are entirely wrong. It's as though you grew up only playing baseball, and now find yourself condemning someone who brings a soccer ball to the field because you don't see how this giant ball could possibly fit into a glove or be properly hit with a bat. You need to take a step back and understand there are other ways to play.

AvalonXQ wrote:

[ Pretending like all of the excellent clarifications shouldn't apply, just because the edition changed, is silly.

So then you would be ok with using 4e edition clarifications in a Pathfinder game or vice versa? Cause thats basically the same thing your saying.

No, it's not. Read my explanation again.

Paizo took the 3.5 rules and changed them. In many placed, Paizo left the 3.5 rules exactly as written. Anywhere where Paizo did not change the rules, 3.5 clarifications also clarify the PF rules.

The opposite position would require you to assume that Paizo would use the same wording as a 3.5 rule, but expect the actual rule to be different.

How can you possibly justify this assumption?

So either the statement in the description of Neutral about it being possible to be convicted to neutrality is wrong, or it just doesn't apply to Golarion.

... or it is possible to be strongly convicted to NOT being evil or good, just as the description you quoted actually says. The statement isn't wrong; you're reading it to mean more than it actually says.

I find it hard to imagine being strongly tied to an alignment without it being an alignment.

Many people find it hard for someone to be strongly-opinioned athiest and still claim to not have a religion. And yet, it's true.

weird , I disagree with your interpretation and only the amazing james jacobs can change my mind.

It's not a matter of interpretation. It's just a matter of reading the rules and understanding how English words form sentences.

I think some classes have two or three things that are basic to them, and I think you can get rid of ANY of these, but not ALL of them, and still have the base class.

A bard can give up bardic performance OR bard spells, but giving up BOTH would make it no longer a bard archetype. Similar for a ranger -- any one feature can be given up / replaced by each archetype, and it's still a ranger in total.

My reply is usually: "Don't play a character that, when played properly, will spoil the game for the other players at the table. Play a character that will be fun for ALL of us when you play him properly."

Condensed List:

Drunken Master/Master of Many Styles/Monk of the Lotus/Qinggong Monk
Drunken Master/Master of Many Styles/Monk of the Sacred Mountain/Qinggong Monk
Drunken Master/Monk of the Four Winds/Monk of the Sacred Mountain/Qinggong Monk
Drunken Master/Monk of the Four Winds/Qinggong Monk/Sensei
Drunken Master/Monk of the Lotus/Qinggong Monk/Sensei
Drunken Master/Qinggong Monk/Weapon Adept
Flowing Monk/Monk of the Sacred Mountain/Qinggong Monk
Hungry Ghost Monk/Master of Many Styles/Monk of the Sacred Mountain/Qinggong Monk
Hungry Ghost Monk/Qinggong Monk/Sensei
Ki Mystic/Master of Many Styles/Monk of the Lotus/Qinggong Monk
Ki Mystic/Master of Many Styles/Monk of the Sacred Mountain/Qinggong Monk
Ki Mystic/Monk of the Four Winds/Monk of the Sacred Mountain/Qinggong Monk
Ki Mystic/Monk of the Four Winds/Qinggong Monk/Sensei
Ki Mystic/Monk of the Lotus/Qinggong Monk/Sensei
Ki Mystic/Qinggong Monk/Weapon Adept
Maneuver Master/Monk of the Four Winds/Qinggong Monk
Maneuver Master/Qinggong Monk/Weapon Adept
Martial Artist/Qinggong Monk/Sensei
Master of Many Styles/Qinggong Monk/Sohei
Monk of the Empty Hand/Monk of the Four Winds/Monk of the Sacred Mountain/Qinggong Monk
Monk of the Empty Hand/Monk of the Lotus/Qinggong Monk
Monk of the Empty Hand/Qinggong Monk/Weapon Adept
Monk of the Healing Hand/Monk of the Sacred Mountain/Qinggong Monk
Monk of the Healing Hand/Qinggong Monk/Sensei
Monk of the Healing Hand/Tetori
Qinggong Monk/Sensei/Sohei
Qinggong Monk/Tetori
Qinggong Monk/Zen Archer

The crafting rules allow joe the untrained peasant to work on something indefinitely until its worth 100, 1,000, or even 1,000,000 gold peices.

I don't think that's true. You still have to actually role a Craft check at least equal to the Craft DC in order to make progress at all.

If you think the ability to make a masterpiece painting worth 1,000 gp should require a truly masterful painter, then set the DC high enough -- say, 30 or higher. Someone with a +10 to their check could still create a masterpiece after years of work and many discarded canvases, but a master painter with a +20 could make them reliably given enough time.

And, honestly, I personally would rather see THIS:

"Single-Attack Action

The single-attack action allows a player to take a single attack during her turn. The single-attack action is a standard action.

When using a single-attack action, a player makes only a single attack, and does not get extra attacks due to wielding multiple weapons, having a high base attack bonus, the Haste spell, or any other ability unless that ability specifically works with the single-attack action. To gain extra attacks, a player normally must use the full-attack action rather than the single-attack action."

The term "single-attack action" is abundantly clear and would not be confused with "an attack", the way "attack action" so often is. It also contrasts logically with "full-attack action".