Baarogue's page

I'm p sure there are a few places in the books that refer to creatures in an area effect as targets. I want to say one was en example using the fireball spell, but I can't look for it right now. I'll post any I can find if I find time to pore over the book again

Well then I would probably rule that a crit on the shove roll would double the distance like it used to. Hopefully Monster Core gets errata that clarifies this

I would probably also run the demi-lich's "enervated" condition as drained, but I do own the printed Pathfinder playtest book for 2e, and Enervated is in the conditions. I'll just post what it says for the curious

Enervation makes you less competent, as though your hard-earned experience had drained away. Enervated always includes a value. You take a conditional penalty equal to your enervated value on checks that include a proficiency modifier. The penalty can't exceed your level, even if the enervated value is greater. For example, if you become enervated 4 and were level 3, you'd take only a -3 penalty.

In addition, you treat your level as though it were lowered by your enervated value (to a minimum of 1st level) when determining which spells you can cast and which abilities you can use. This applies only to actions, activities, free actions, and reactions you gained from feats and class features, and only those that have a level prerequisite. You don't lose your prepared spells, but you can't cast those that are higher level than the enervated condition allows. You regain access to them if your enervated value is sufficiently reduced.

Every day you can attempt a Fortitude save to reduce your enervated value by 1 (or 2 on a critical success). The DC is the same as that of the effect that enervated you. If multiple effects enervated you, use the highest DC for your daily checks to recover from enervated. You can also spend a day of downtime training to reduce your enervated value by 1 automatically (in addition to attempting one save for that day to reduce your enervated value).

So basically it was a complicated "level drain" condition and was probably dropped because it looks like a PITA. Drained did exist in the playtest practically identical to how it is now. BTW, a "conditional penalty" appears to be what we now call a "status penalty", or at least that's my guess based on Drained, Enfeebled, Frightened, etc. also referring to their penalty being a "conditional" one in the playtest book

2r Push only says what happens wrt success, not critical success, so I would guess that critical success is unchanged from base shove. If that leads to the distance shoved on a success and critical success being the same, ehh. That might be a little unsatisfying, but not a big deal. Now, what would put that ruling in question and might require further judgement is if there is a creature with a Push value higher than 10'. Is there one?

I don't feel like the OP is asking the full question here

1. if you cast or sustain a spell that is not a hex, then the familiar does not get to do their trick

2. the familiar doesn't extend the duration of a debuff. They extend the duration of negative conditions affecting a creature. Saying "debuff" is a simplification that breeds misunderstandings, such as believing that the familiar extends the duration of the hex or spell that caused the negative conditions

which leads me to

3. the conditions extended by your familiar need not be caused by the hex you cast or sustained to trigger your familiar's trick. They are not related. All you need are two things: a creature with one or more negative conditions with a qualifying duration w/i 15' of your familiar, and a hex to cast or sustain even if on a different target altogether

Yeah I don't know what the guide's author is thinking, unless they're counting on crit failures against multiple targets. That wouldn't be unheard-of against many lower level monsters, but obviously impossible against anything high enough to trigger the Incapacitation trait

When you Cast or Sustain a hex, your familiar can curse a creature within 15 feet of it, prolonging the duration of any negative conditions affecting it by 1 round. This is a curse effect. This prolongs only conditions with a timed duration (such as “1 round” or “until the end of your next turn”) and doesn't prevent conditions from being removed by other means.

That doesn't mean the familiar prolongs the spell's duration, only the duration of negative conditions on one creature each time the witch casts or sustains a hex. The paralyzed condition from the paralyze spell has a base duration of 4 rounds on a crit failure, but only 1 round on a failure, so there won't be many opportunities to prolong it on anyone who just fails. If the witch lucks out and several targets crit fail they might be able to rotate prolonging the condition on several of them, but that wouldn't keep them from potentially reducing the duration with the Will save at the end of each of their turns, or ending it entirely on a crit success

So it's not a bad strategy, but not as broken as some might believe

It would work with heightened slow but again only against a single target each time the witch casts or sustains a hex. But then again, slow lasts a full minute on a failure or crit failure, which might as well be the entire fight most of the time. And it's not an incapacitation effect either. This is where I would put my money, if I played witches

Sibelius Eos Owm wrote:

I'm inclined to think that, technically no elemental blast cast from the bonfire can trigger the fire junction since that attack is just a ranged wood blast that happens to be on fire, and happens to originate from a different location than usual. While the bonfire itself definitely is a fire impulse, it doesn't seem like anything says that the wood blast launched from the bonfire gains the trait--albeit it probably should considering it will deal fire damage on arrival.

Of course, I have a feeling the discussion of what is or isn't technically correct may be about to get quite contentious and I'm not about to defend this reading considering that I would probably allow the bonfire bonus to go up to d8 for the fire junction, albeit at the stated maximum of one impulse junction per round.

Hi!

Some of your thoughts makes me believe that you're of the opinion that a junction can only affect an impulse of their own element. Am I understanding you wrong?

As far as I can see (and I may be missing something, feel free to point it out to me!), fire junction may affect any fire damage die of any impulse. My only question is if we have any way to define "other impulse effects" to conclude if the additional damage die from Living Bonfire should be able to be upgraded by the fire junction, or if the fire junction is attempted to be applied before the fire die is added.

I read it the way Sibelius does too because of the lines, "In addition, you gain an impulse junction, a benefit that occurs when you use an impulse of the chosen element that takes 2 actions or more."

So if you want to benefit from the fire impulse junction, you need to be using a fire impulse. That's why I said in my last post that you would need to fire infuse the wood blast to increase the Living Bonfire's damage die size. You pointed out, correctly, that Living Bonfire doesn't do the damage, but says the wood blast does the additional damage with the lines, "When you make a wood ranged Elemental Blast, you can have it come from the bonfire instead of you, flinging burning logs. This blast deals an additional 1d6 fire damage."

@Sasha If your point is that Living Bonfire doesn't do any damage on its own, and that's why it doesn't qualify for the fire impulse junction, then I accept that interpretation. That just means you need to fire infuse to use the fire impulse junction each time you use a wood blast with Living Bonfire to upgrade the additional damage die from d6 to d8

Living Bonfire is the most straightforward answer. It is a fire impulse that takes 2 actions, so qualifies for the fire impulse junction. When you use Living Bonfire, you increase the damage die size of fire damage dealt by the impulse by one step. "This blast deals an additional 1d6 fire damage." So increase that die to 1d8

If you use two-element infusion on a wood elemental blast to combine it with fire and activate your fire impulse junction, "The blast gains the traits of both elements and uses the highest range and damage die among the two elements." The highest range among the two elements is 60' from fire, and the dice are tied between 1d8 bludgeoning or vitality and 1d8 fire due to fire junction raising the damage die size of fire damage by one step. Regardless of which die you choose, you roll the dice, add modifiers, AND THEN split the total equally between bludgeoning or vitality damage and fire damage with any remainder from an odd total going to the type of your choice. You do not split the DICE before rolling, you split the DAMAGE after rolling and totalling. "Half the blast's damage is the damage type of one element, and the other half is the damage type of the other element. If the total damage is an odd number, you choose which element deals the higher damage."

If you emit that blast through the Living Bonfire from my first paragraph, it would do an additional 1d8 fire damage, which is not increased again by your fire impulse junction because you're not "using" the Living Bonfire impulse again, you're just benefiting from its existing effect

So, as a practical example, if your kineticist was level 5 and used a 2-action ranged elemental blast through a Living Bonfire which they used on the previous turn, the blast would have a range of 60' and it would do 2d8+status_bonus_equal_to_your_Con_bonus damage split between bludgeoning or vitality and fire, and an additional 1d8 fire damage because of the Living Bonfire

>Is the intention of the fire junction to only work with the base fire Elemental Blast, then?

No? Every 2-or-more-action fire impulse that does damage qualifies to have its fire damage dice increased by your fire impulse junction

I'm new to Pathfinder 2e and very much want to make a Shadow Sorcerer.

Has anyone had any luck addressing the issue with "Dim the Lights".

TLDR: Since there are no level one or level two spells with darkness or shadow in the Players Guide, its is impossible to cast "Dim the Lights" at early levels because there is no way to trigger the reaction.

The Shadow Sorcerer subclass gets their focus spell at level one but has no way to use their focus spell until level five.

While I enjoy playing challanging classes, this is a class feature that is completely unusable for a long time after you get it.

Was this an oversight or is this intentional?

Has anyone gotten a response from Paizo, or have they made any statements about it?

You are not restricted to spells from the APG. Even if you don't own the books they're from, you can use them from Archives of Nethys. There are few qualifying spells a low level shadow sorcerer can access printed now, but they are:

Rank 1:
-Penumbral Shroud from Lost Omens: Gods & Magic. The blurb at the beginning of the spells section says they're "often associated with the deities of the Inner Sea region" but they're not Uncommon so should be accessible to all
Rank 2:
-technically Darkness, but the OP addressed its impracticality
-Umbral Extraction from Secrets of Magic, and any stolen spell you cast from its temporary spell slot gains the shadow trait and so qualifies as well

Clever spambot, replacing breith's name in the quoted text with a link

I did actually choose the feat for one of my characters, and much amusement and education has followed his near-encyclopedic revelations of all monsters. He never lacks for comment on any topic, in fact

You're saying that the weapon's damage die is 1. That I understand, but am I to interpret that as 1 of any die or of 1d1? If my PFS Cleric of Picoperi who takes the Deadly Simplicity feat, how does my blowgun's damage dice change? If the RAW states, as you say, that its weapon dice is simply 1, then shouldn't I be able to refer to the rules to adjudicate this without interpretation?

I read it as simply a value of 1. No rolling. Its "damage die" is simply 1. Paizo expressed that as 1 instead of "d1" in 1e. Apparently they didn't see any reason to change that now. If you slap a striking rune on, it does 2 damage

If you're playing with a strict, absolutely by-the-books drill-GM, then the fact it doesn't fall on the Increasing Die Size progression list is unfortunate because they're justified in not increasing its die from 1. As I said above, a generous GM might increase it, but that's their call. At PFS I would defer to my venture-captain, who is usually at the game with me. I suspect he would increase it to d4 because that is the "next larger die" even if 1 is not mentioned in the examples, since that is what the text of the rule says to do. Any time an example doesn't account for every situation, go with the text of the rule. The templates for area effects don't account for many situations, such as the widen spell feat, but the text tells us what to do so we can work it out

I agree that it would be grape if they put 1 in the Increasing Die Size progression list below d4 to account for the blowgun. But maybe they left it off on purpose and they truly intend for it to be stuck at 1. I'm not saying some clarification or other mention wouldn't be welcome, especially for anyone wanting to play that cleric. I just believe it's clear the way it is for purposes of striking runes, gravity weapon, the ranged weapon damage calculation formula posted upthread, and anything else that refers to a "weapon damage die"

There is no need to attack other posters in general, but if you are responding to my posts, it's rather distracting for you to hold this conversation with me as the middle man. I have said my piece on this. I own both the book and PDF but linked it to make it easier to access for others in the thread.

Rules As Written has a very different meaning than you are implying. You are asking for us to interpret rules in a way that makes things easier to understand. I think it's fine to do so, but this falls under RAI, not RAW.

No, I'm asking you to read the rule that is written on page 276. It says plainly that the entry in the damage column is the "weapon's damage die", and that's it. No interpretation needed. Not RAI, but as actually written

Also lol at me pointing out Darksol's bullying as attacking him. Nah, he knows what he's doing and I'm just one of the people who isn't cowed by it. But yeah I should have stuck to responding to your points instead of getting distracted. My bad

Baarogue wrote:

No, it is RAW in this case of the blowgun because it occurs in the damage column on the weapon chart, which is what PC1 p. 276 is referring to. It doesn't follow that ALL cases of flat damage are a "damage die."

I wanted to link the sidebar you're referring to and provide some context to this as to why I still would say that this is not RAW and is certainly open to GM interpretation.

You're saying that under the "Damage" heading for weapons, what follows is its damage die. It would then stand to reason that since "1" is in the blowgun's Damage heading, that its damage die is 1. However, this still exists as an anomaly in the system as if we're taking that idea at face value, someone needs to define what that damage dice actually is.

Further down, damage dice are defined as the dice from 1d4 through to 1d12. This even makes certain not to include 1d20 or 2d6 as damage dice because of how they would interact strangely with the rules. I would say that "1 damage equals 1 damage dice" is incompatible with the idea that "The rules support this."

Now, I fully agree that peopel can and should rule as they want at their tables, but I strongly oppose the idea that "1 damage is 1 damage dice is a statement supported by RAW." It is, to the best of my reading, RAI.

Darksol is just repeating himself now and not making much sense so I'll respond to you

1. That's not a sidebar. It is a rules entry. Do you own the book or have access to it, because I feel like you're getting the wrong impression by reading it from AoN. This applies to the blowgun's entry on the weapon tables as well
2. The "further down" you're referring to isn't defining damage dice. That's already defined with the initial sentence under "Damage", "This entry lists the weapon’s damage die and the type of damage it deals"
What you're referring to further down is the Increasing Die Size progression, which as I answered Darksol, doesn't have any bearing on the rule. Just because "1" doesn't fall on that progression doesn't invalidate it as the blowgun's "damage die." That just means it doesn't fall on the die progression, which could mean its die doesn't increase. I don't know where Darksol is pulling a decrease to 0 from instead, but w/e. It's best to ignore him when he starts posting nonsense like that in desperation
3. Nobody is stating "1 damage is 1 damage die." We're stating that since the "1" occurs in THAT column on THAT table, which the rules state: "This entry lists the weapon’s damage die and the type of damage it deals", then THAT is why "1" is the blowgun's "damage die." This has no bearing on any other flat damage from any other source, let alone some random 75 that Darksol is pulling from who-knows-where, unless it is published in a future book for a future WEAPON in the same format on its weapon table. There are no further implications from ruling 1 as the blowgun's damage die. Spells and Weapon Specialization aren't on the weapon tables, so their damage doesn't qualify as "damage die" under that rule

And the thing is, Darksol KNOWS how ridiculous his arguments are getting at this point. He's grasping at nonsensical straws to "win" this argument now that he's entrenched himself. I haven't seen a lot of your arguments yet but from what I've seen you seem like a more rational sort. Look in the BOOK - not AoN, READ the rule, look at the tables, and SEE why we're ruling it this way for the blowgun, and ONLY the blowgun

> It doesn’t have drain life or wraith spawn

How does a wraith spawn (the creature created by a wraith using wraith spawn, the ability) go about making other wraith spawns (the creature created by a wraith using wraith spawn, the ability) when it doesn't have wraith spawn (the ability used by wraiths to create wraith spawns, the creature)

Baarogue wrote:

it is literally the RAW. Blowhard all you want, but that's the way it is

Unfortunately, stating that damage (i.e. 1=1) equates to weapon die does not mean that it is RAW. That would then mean that any other case of flat damage would also mean that they function in a nebulous realm of dice

No, it is RAW in this case of the blowgun because it occurs in the damage column on the weapon chart, which is what PC1 p. 276 is referring to. It doesn't follow that ALL cases of flat damage are a "damage die." Though maybe that's what Darksol meant when he made what I thought was a non sequitur about Weapon Specialization ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And I don't mind how acidic he gets. That's just his way, especially when he's cornered. I've been salty sometimes here too, so I should be able to take it

"Did you also accept the Daikyu being Reload '-'? Sounds like you did because this is basically the same thing."

lol, you claim I used a strawman in the same post you throw that out there? Hilarious

"Then what happens when it is subject to damage dice increases? Can it even be subject to damage dice decreases, making it do 0? And what makes "nothing happens because there is no dice value involved" an invalid interpretation?"

Since it isn't in the Increasing Die Size progression list, if you want to be a stickler then its die size simply doesn't increase, staying at 1. Where is your 0 even coming from? More generous GMs might raise it, but that's their call and not in the book nor something I'm arguing for or against. It is irrelevant

"it's not RAW"

>This entry lists the weapon’s damage die and the type of damage it deals
>Blowgun Damage 1 P

it is literally the RAW. Blowhard all you want, but that's the way it is

If it wasn't reprinted with the same name it's still usable as it was, especially if you're playing at your own game. But if you're worried about PFS it's spelled out even more clearly there. "The nephilim trait is interchangeable with either the aasimar or tiefling trait and vice versa, but aasimar characters may not treat that trait as interchangeable with the tiefling trait (or vice versa)."

If your character was created as a "tiefling" then it is STILL a tiefling and qualifies for tiefling AND nephilim (but NOT aasimar) feats. If you can't rebuild it in Pathbuilder then that's a Pathbuilder problem, not a game system problem. All "legacy" 2e content is still compatible with 2r content. As a tiefling, due to that line I quoted above, you can take "nephilim" remastered feats you qualify for or legacy tiefling feats like Fiend's Door, since you only technically don't qualify for Slip Sideways

And it all works with RAW/RAI since Paizo have said it over and over

Or... the simplest and most logical solution is you just accept that the "1" in blowgun's damage column is its "damage die" even if it isn't expressed as usual, as the rules quoted upthread by graystone state that's what that column means

Not falling on the progression listed under "Increasing Die Size" doesn't invalidate that, it just means it doesn't fall on the increasing die size progression list

Frankly this is a pretty weird hill to die on, since it's nowhere near OP or broken to read it that way. What are you even imagining could occur? That's the only thing that could convince me to see things your way btw. No amount of hot air is going to make a difference unless you can make a case for some unforeseen abuse to spring from interpreting "1" as blowgun's "die size", because THAT is what is "airtight RAW"

I'm putting together all your recent questions and ending up with an image of some sort of goblin trash ninja

This might be better asked in the Organized Play board, but if I were asked to make a call on this I would say that as long as the legacy version of the spell had the qualifying traits they're good to go. If you had built a ghost hunter character before the remaster it's not like anyone would audit it now and say, "welp, you need to delete these spells since they no longer qualify"

Again, ask in Organized Play and run it past your GM before the game to be sure it's cool

Most likely they'll errata this archetype and others like it to have curated lists of specific spells you can choose from, much like how they changed wizard spell schools

"with its light ray" seems pretty clear it's an exception since that's a ranged attack but I would still enforce the "both w/I 15'" req of Retributive Strike

k.

"The DC is usually a standard-difficulty DC of a level equal to the highest-level target of your composition"

They do sometimes use the word "target" when referring to those affected by area effects. Whoever has the highest level in the effect sets the DC

Yes, you can pull some minor shinanigans like cast it out of reach of the higher level PCs for a lower DC then move to get them too but who really cares

The adventure I'm planning to run has crocodiles in it, which have the Aquatic Ambush action. A monster with this action can move towards its target quickly and make a Strike against it (against which it is off-guard), but this requires the monster to be undetected by the target.

How does the monster know that this requirement has been met? Avoid Notice is not a secret roll, but Hide and Sneak are. How does the monster know if it has succeeded on both Hide and Sneak? Does it just guess? What happens if it's wrong? Does Aquatic Ambush fail? Does the movement still happen but the Strike fails? Is the target simply not off-guard against the Strike?

(As an aside, I noticed that this action doesn't have the move trait, and it technically doesn't rely on subordinate actions like Stride or Swim which do have the move trait. I'm pretty sure this is unintentional and the action still uses Swim and Stride. That way it still provokes Reactive Strike, is unusable while immobilized, etc.)

1. If you're running the adventure, then presumably you're the GM and will know if the crocs are undetected by anyone in range. There's no need to agonize over it. If there are no valid targets... don't use that action. If you absolutely have to justify it to yourself, chalk it up to animal instinct. They just know

2. You can run it how you want, like if you want to add in subordinate actions, etc. But the aside about it not having the move trait nor subordinate move actions simply means it doesn't provoke. Since it's supposed to be used against foes it's undetected by it's a moot point, since they wouldn't know which square it's in anyway. Maybe they'll change it in Monster Core (I haven't looked at any previews, in case it's already out there), but for now it is what it is

>I honestly have not seen...
>There isn't.

ffs. It's the first sentence. Yeah, that second sentence is verrry convincing... when it's quoted without context 9_9

If you attack with something that wasn’t built to be a weapon, such as a chair or a vase, you’re making an attack with an improvised weapon. Improvised weapons are simple weapons. You take a –2 item penalty to attack rolls with an improvised weapon. The GM determines the amount and type of damage the attack deals, if any, as well as any weapon traits that the improvised weapon should have.

Gortle wrote:

Get a Ghost Touch rune or you probably can't deal with it. Legacy PF2 can be very tough , especially with the wrong GM like myself who reads the rules literally.

Would the ghost touch property apply to the 2 persistent good damage from the divine smite? The wording seems like it could go either way. The champion has blade ally, so could easily have a ghost touch weapon.

only the paladin's divine smite involves a strike, so some GMs might rule that's the only flavor that can benefit from ghost touch

til that aon is updated to the remaster

But apparently they haven't linked all the legacy spells that have been consolidated into fewer remaster spells, like how faerie fire and glitterdust were both rolled into revealing light. Only glitterdust is linked as the "legacy" version. I guess stone to flesh did do more than heightened sure footing but it would be nice if old stone to flesh pointed to sure footing in some way, for people like the OP looking for the remastered spells intended to fit those roles

What I assume the intent is is that having the shield strapped means that you don't drop it on the ground if you release it to use your hand for something. That also implies that you would have to use an action to grab and wield the shield with that hand again in order to use the shield.

So in the specific case you are mentioning:

Quote:

if I have a shield strapped to my arm, but I am not actively using it to get the benefit of the AC bonus via Raise a Shield, can I use that hand as a Free Hand for certain feats that require a free hand?

I would let you release the shield as a free action where it would remain strapped to your arm. Then you could consider that hand free for whatever else you want to use it for. Afterwards, you would need to use an Interact action to regrip your shield in order to use Raise Shield again.

This is my take as well and that would be how I would rule it too. One action to regrip the shield, and another to Raise it.

Isn't the damage for ten feet only 5?

Yes, my bad math

So there's two methods you can try to reason this out, both with their own problems

First method: Hardness is not an immunity, a weakness, nor a resistance despite using terms very similar to resistances so it doesn't belong in Step 3. That makes it a penalty, which is in Step 1. BUT, penalties can't reduce damage below 1 so there would be no complete blocking of damage, and you can only Shield Block one attack so you wouldn't be able to Shield Block the second attack of multiple attack feats like Double Slice unless you had extra reactions in a turn usable for Shield Block. This means chipping attacks like Flurry of Blows become more effective against a Shield Block user, but it gives you the answer you're fishing for. I would not argue against this if a GM told me this was how it worked because it makes sense of a sort and is fair

Second method: what everyone here has been saying, which is that YOU would not take damage until step 4, which is Shield Block's trigger, but that means your shield suffers if you have a weakness or is buffed if you have a resistance. It doesn't "make sense" in that respect but it's nice and neat and fits tidily in the damage calculation routine

Pick one unless you're playing a PFS game, in which case ask your chain of command and accept their answer

and HPs are lost after Shield Block happens. Whether they are temporary or not is irrelevant. Shield Block is a choice. If you have enough temp HPs to soak a hit, don't Block it

I would apply "treat falls as X feet shorter" effects first since they create the baseline for the damage taken and are an effective penalty to the damage. Unless something I'm overlooking says snow drifts, etc. and Cat Fall can't stack, I would allow them to stack. I would then apply Unbreakable Goblin since it effectively halves the damage, which is done after applying bonuses and penalties during Step 1: Roll Damage Dice, NOT during Step 3, Apply immunities, weaknesses, and resistances

So from your example, 30'-10' from Cat Fall makes the fall 20'. Reduce the damage as if you fell half the distance, so 20'/2 = 10' = 10 dmg

If you fell into a snow drift, it would be 30'-20'-10' = 0' = 0 dmg

Nelzy wrote:

If they wanted Shield block to trigger before Resistance and Weakness they would have said so, or had another trigger on it.

They could have easily have it say

" Trigger While you have your shield raised, you are hit from a physical attack."

Cause if its before resistance there is no distinction on a hit and taking damage, since nothing can reduce the hit to 0 damage.

to me its clear that the devs want it to happen after resistance and weakness, and have prob balanced shields with that in mind.

Yes some instances might feel wierd that the hard bones on a skeleton helps the shield, but its also the other way around.
buff spells that give resistance would reasonably also protect your gear, but would in that case not since the shield would take damage before resistance.

but sometimes you have to paint with broad strokes else we would have gotten tons of special cases on how mutch damage a shield takes,
and this way they dont have to bother with resistance runes and material for shields.

So, if I hit with a sword a zombie (weakness Slashing 5) who can block with its shield, I will inflict 5 more damage to the shield than if I hit the zombie with a staff.

inb4 "um ackchually zombies can't use reactions"

but yes, that is fundamentally correct

Use a staff charged by other is not normal too.

Yes, TMI is the specific rule that allows you to "activate the item as if you could normally use it." Normally you could not use it because, second sentence under Staves on GMC p.278: "A staff is tied to a person during a preparation process, after which the preparer, and only the preparer, can use the staff to produce magic." If some want to claim this general rule is what prevents a TMI user to use charges, it also prevents them from casting cantrips from the staff. I've seen a lot of the anti-charge-use faction chime in in favor of using it for cantrips. But you can't have it both ways, and I'm not in favor of giving staves a blanket immunity from TMI when their use is not OP. It is a simple transfer of power from one player to another at the cost of the TMI feat, at least one skill investment plus optionally its Assurance feat, and one action every turn it is used

(replacing your quote with the GMC version) "You can Cast a Spell from a staff only if you have that spell on your spell list, are able to cast spells of the appropriate rank or higher, and expend a number of charges from the staff equal to the spell's rank."

>This is all one sentence. One that makes no distinction between which are a 'restriction' and which are a 'resource'.

If TMI said anything about bypassing restrictions or resource costs, such a hyperbolic argument might have merit. But it doesn't say that. TMI's power and limits are all in one succinct line

"For the rest of the current turn, you can spend actions to activate the item as if you could normally use it."

So all you need to do is simply compare what you want to do with a normal use-case for the item. If they match, go ahead. I would not rule casting spells from a staff without expending charges normal use

My take is that "as if you could normally use it" means the TMI user can use charges from the staff because that is the normal use case for staves

There are some exploits that could be made using a transferred staff with charges.

For example a Staff of Divination could be charge by a caster and transferred to a martial to it make multiple uses of True Strike specially if this staff was prepared with extra charges by a prepared caster (and even more if is a wizard with staff nexus).

Maybe you can say that this is already possible with scrolls and wands but it won't work so well because with these items this martial needs to draw another scroll or wand every time while with the staff it could easily used dozen of times every turn.

I'm not seeing how this is an exploit. Trick Magic Item costs a feat investment, and an action on the turn you want to use the item. Then it costs one action to cast True Strike from the staff, and still costs a charge from the staff. That's leaves only one action to benefit from the spell. Hardly an OP situation IMO and certainly not usable "dozen(s) of times every turn." Even if you meant "fight" instead of "turn", I doubt any fighter would be willing to risk wasting an action every turn to TMI just to get a 1-action attack with advantage (to use a D&D term). The DC of the 6th level staff would be 22, which means the fighter would need to wait until 7th level to be able to use Assurance - assuming any fighter would waste Assurance on a casting skill. But it's possible. Still, yet another feat investment for a marginal advantage

TheFinish wrote:

You could have an argument if you said "Well, you could have a Druid prepare a staff and give it to a Wizard who has prepared their own staff, and the Wizard could use TMI to use two staves!" And...yeah, so what? The Wizard's going to be much worse at using the staff than the Druid...

Well.. Not exactly. If this variant of using TMI is allowed, wizard could be as good using TMI on druid's staff as casting their own spells. If the wizard is casting a spell from the druid's staff which exists also in arcane tradition (and there are a lot), they would be using their own spell DCs and spell attacks, not TMI's. While spending the druid's charges.

And again, this situation - while possible - does not appear OP to me. It still costs the druid's charges from their prepared staff, and one action to TMI on the druid's staff. Again, a lot of investment and costs for the marginal advantage of having access to another staff

All this fiddling with the definition of "instances" wrt reducing someone to dying or taking damage while dying is pointless and will only cause confusion and delay. Guntermench posted the correct answer in one of the first replies, but I will elaborate

"Instances of damage" are only important in the immunities, resistances, and weaknesses step (step 3 of 4) of Damage Rolls. Step 4 is "If any damage remains, reduce Hit Points the target has by that amount." It happens once, and it happens ALL at once - not per instance of damage

Full text for Step 4: Reduce Hit Points on PC1 p.407 are: "Any remaining damage reduces the target's Hit Points on a 1-to-1 basis. More information can be found in the Hit Points, Healing, and Dying section on page 410." The phrase "instance of damage" does not appear in that section

Wraith is from the first bestiary. Spectre is from bestiary 2, so I imagine they added that verbiage because hindsight taught them it was necessary. Otherwise someone would argue the conditions were permanent after exposure to sunlight "because there's no expiration"

We'll see what they do with wraith in the remastered bestiary soon, maybe

Since the staff is a 1h weapon, how would one go about holding it w/o wielding it?

No

Thread Necromancy, engage. Apologies if it's bad form.

The GM of my PFS group, as well as his mentor, is absolutely positively convinced that you can 'attack' someone with the Kineticist's Wood Elemental Blast and heal them with it. I know this doesn't work, if for no other reason that it's RIDICULOUSLY stupidly overpowered.

I understand 'healing doesn't damage and damage doesn't heal', but I am apparently incapable of explaining that to someone else. Could I pretty please get some specific rule quotes, or something from the devs, that *absolutely* dispels this misconception?

just report them in the PFS board. Let their heirarchy handle it. Don't name names in public though. Get in touch with one of their higher ups in PM

Chatgpt is not a source. The books and Archive of Nethys, the official prd, are sources. Chatgpt is wrong. Raise a Shield is not an interact action, and lacks the manipulate trait and anything that would give it that

If they're using a hero point to reroll a dying check, you might want to remind them that if they would die due to dying value they can spend all their hero points to automatically stabilize without raising their wounded value. Feelsbad to fail the dying flat check on a hero point reroll when that was your last hero point

If you have to use the word "technically" to describe how something has been "worked", such as a random rock you've chipped out of the wall with a pick, it's not "durable, crafted goods like a stone statue"

They literally included objects made out of three different elements: stone, metal, and wood, as examples of "durable, crafted goods"

Did this come up in a game you played with an unreasonable GM or is this just another one of your implausible hypotheticals?

Okay, well have fun explaining to all the rogues they can't Twist the Knife after Twin Feint, Underhanded Assault, Head Stomp, etc.

I admit I had a little fun with my bard, cleric, fighter examples post a little bit above. Not the summoner Blood Frenzy one, that was legit. But this one is 100% sincere, and I think it's pretty damning to your cause. Insisting that several feats for a class that are clearly synergistic are unusable together because of the interpretation you guys are stuck on will not fly with its players. I'm tempted to run it past the Reddit crowd but I'm p sure it'll get downvoted to oblivion. Besides, they're all too busy simping for which god is going to die right now

@Finoan
>The name collision of 'action', 'action', and 'action' (yes, three different game mechanics meanings) is one of the worst things about PF2.

I agree it does cause confusion and delay

>"Using an activity is not the same as using any of its subordinate actions" is not the same as "subordinate actions don't happen".

This is exactly the point I'm trying to make. If you try to say that the Strike you made after the Stride you made after the Stride you made after you used Sudden Charge ISN'T your last action, you're denying that it was its own action

Act Together is a tandem action, which means you and your eidolon act... together during it. Act Together IS your action, but the subordinate actions it allows your eidolon to take are still subordinate to Act Together. They don't qualify since "Using an activity is not the same as using any of its subordinate actions."

I did not include any reactions or free actions with triggers in my examples (or at least I didn't mean to - if I missed removing any let me know which they are), and none of the feats which modify Strikes say they modify activities which include a Strike so, sorry. "Using an activity is not the same as using any of its subordinate actions." According to your model you can't use them together

If you're going to go with a restrictive, non-intuitive, not supported by the examples interpretation then go ALL IN on it. OWN it

I got curious and decided to look into how many feats would be crippled by the "container" paradigm for activities. This is a "non-exhaustive list" of feats I've found that refer to other actions