That's mostly true. I'll add a caveat that there are a couple bosses that are genuinely pretty nasty, in ways that levelling and improving your equipment aren't going to help much with (one boss in particular, really, though they are optional). Late game spoiler: Malenia, Blade of Miquella. She heals every time she hits you, so you really have to learn her attacks and how to dodge them.
From what I recall of GoT, In general, the combat is more arcade-y than Elden Ring (especially in the later parts of Tsushima). There’s a similar emphasis on blocks, parries, and dodges, but in Tsushima there wasn’t a stamina bar to worry about, and the parry windows were pretty generous. Elden Ring (and souls games in general) are less forgiving. If you attack when you shouldn’t, expect to get punished for it, and with stamina you can’t just roll all the time. The one-on-one duel segments of Tsushima felt more Souls-y though—you had to learn the boss’s moves and pick the right time to attack. Elden Ring doesn’t have the different stance mechanics, but it does give you a lot more options for combat styles, with tons of weapons and magic to choose from, so combat is also a lot more varied. A tanky sword-and-board character is going to feel very different from Jin, as will an astrologer shooting magic missiles. Ultimately, the combat is pretty similar to prior souls games. When it clicks for you, it feels incredibly intuitive and rewarding. I’ve revisited DS3 several times, trying different builds and styles of play, but I haven’t felt the same urge to go back to Tsushima.
Perpdepog wrote:
Yeah, but expanded to weapons that don't normally have the Monk trait, or don't qualify for ancestral weaponry. Like, a spear monk style would be cool. A katana monk style would be cool, maybe something like iajutsu/building off quick draw.
I played him as being unwilling to part with any information until he could be absolutely assured of his safety--he thinks he only has value to the PCs for as long as they need to know what he knows, which means he's not going to give anything up while he still needs them for protection. I left my players with the implication that, once they get him sent away to secure holdings, they'd have the opportunity to visit and interrogate him at that point. Then, of course, the PCs and Wynsal got framed, and while they were dealing with that business, Olansa saw to Flakfatter.
Deriven Firelion wrote:
Benchak the Nightstalker wrote:
As to the encounter, yeah, it feels underwhelming. I ended up skipping this entire area, but if I were to run it, I’d probably jack up the number of reinforcements pretty significantly.
One of the ways I nudged my players toward rescuing Starborn early in book 5 was having the Skinner get sent to the same prison at the end of book 2, and then having word get back to them that she was murdered in her cell. Then in book 5, I was able to suggest through friendly NPCs that Wynsal probably wouldn’t survive long in prison, especially once the Grand Council elects a new primarch. I made the political debate happening in the background a source of rising tension.
Graeme Lewis wrote:
Literally the inspiration for this monster, back when I wrote it up for 1e. Psyched to see them finally show up in 2e!
Temperans wrote:
If the party faces 3-6 encounters per day, and ~30% of encounters have an enemy with AoO, on average, you won't need more than 1-2 spells to deal with AoO. You're by no means done for the day. And sure, those spells aren't foolproof, but if you're an enemy, are you going to spend your one reaction per round on the invisible magus, or save it for someone you don't have less than a coin-flip chance of hitting? Defensive buffs are often as much about disincentivizing attacks as they are negating them. I'm not arguing that spellcasting is a cure-all for AoOs, merely that spellcasting is a valuable piece of the magus's toolkit that's not meant to be used purely for hp damage. I am arguing in response to the claims that the only way for the magus to deal with AoO is building around it/using starlit span, or that the magus's limited spell slots are useless for anything but attack spells.
It’s not schrodinger’s magus to suggest that a magus can spend one or two of their 6 spell slots a day prepping some of the broadly useful buff and defensive spells they have access to, which aside from their intrinsic benefits, can also be used to overcome situations like enemies with AoO. Mirror Image is a great spell. It’s a fantastic defensive buff, and particularly good for laughing shadow maguses who get it as a studious spell. It also negates a lot of AoOs. Invisibility is a great spell, useful in-combat and out-of-combat. It also negates a lot of AoOs. Enlarge is a great spell, which grants reach and a hefty status bonus to damage. It also negates a lot of AoOs. Etc. The point isn’t that the magus always has a solution to every situation—it’s that the magus suffers very little opportunity cost when preparing solutions for AoO. The solutions are all things that benefit the magus in other ways, or can solve other problems.
Golurkcanfly wrote:
I said the options and versatility of spellcasting, not spellstrike. I think you're really undervaluing access to the arcane spell list here by treating it as just another source of hp damage.
Golurkcanfly wrote:
beowulf99 wrote: Accounting for accuracy, the Two Hand Magus w/cascade doing 2 strikes deals about 10 damage less on average than a fighter (Greatswod, 2 strikes specifically). That seems pretty fair, given that accuracy is the Fighters schtick. Bolded for emphasis. 10 less damage per turn, when not using spellstrike at all, seems pretty reasonable to me when you consider the options and versatility spellcasting opens up. I'd also like to see how Swashbucklers, Champions, and Monks compare. Are maguses middle of the pack, like Deriven suggested?
Golurkcanfly wrote:
And the other hybrid studies have hands free for scrolls, and/or easy access to staves, and/or their own studious spells to deal with the situation. Is a round where the magus buffs themselves a wasted round? Are they not contributing to the combat by doing so? I kind of feel like that's the crux of the disagreement here. Golurkcanfly wrote:
I personally disagree with a lot of what you're saying here. Spellstrike provoking doesn't work against the flavor of the class for me, and it doesn't disservice the fantasy of the magus in my eyes. I am open to the possibility that it makes the experience of the class worse at higher levels--I haven't played a magus at high levels yet, so I can't share my perspective. Is that your actual experience playing the class so far? As to the "you can work around it" comments, for my part, those are mostly in response to the people saying "the only way to deal with AoO is to build around it/play starlit span." If folks are going to argue that spellstrike shouldn't provoke because stock-standard magus can't get around AoO, I think it's fair to point out that that isn't true.
Golurkcanfly wrote: A 2H Magus activating a scroll needs to stow his weapon, draw the scroll, cast the scroll, and then redraw the weapon, and the scroll only mitigates AoOs. The 2H magus gets enlarge as a studious spell, so they don't need to use a scroll. And aside from putting them out of AoO reach, enlarge is also, you know, a genuinely helpful buff. It's extra reach (on a class that can also make AoOs), and gives a status bonus to damage.
Aristophanes wrote:
Do I think the magus would be too strong? Probably not. I mean, that's the thing--70% of the time, a magus who doesn't provoke is exactly as powerful as a magus who does. I just think it engenders a certain amount of tactical passivity. Like, the early posts talked about spellstrike being part of a magus's rotation. You spellstrike, you recharge, rinse and repeat. But if all you're doing as a magus is walking up and hitting the enemy in melee for high damage every round, you're just playing a fighter with extra steps and more ribbons. I like that the current magus has some limitations, because it encourages you to play to it's strengths (spellcasting)--just like the rogue has to think about positioning. To put it another way, to me, personally, a magus who kicks on mirror image to avoid AoO is just so much cooler than one who never provokes at all. But, obviously, other people feel differently. I wouldn't be upset if they decided to make some changes to the class. I just hope that if they do, it remains limited in some ways--making a cantrip or cantrips that don't provoke for spellstrike, or giving maguses a bonus to AC against AoOs provoked by spellcasting.
OCEANSHIELDWOLPF 2.0 wrote:
It sounds like a fun thing to happen once.
Temperans wrote: @Benchak if Magus had more spell slots I would agree. But they only have 4. So those 4 spells better be worth the effort otherwise there is no point in bothering. 6, which is why I pointed out Studious Spells has options. Also, several of those spells are just good buff options, which can kick off your arcane cascade, so it’s not like you’re wasting slots.
Golurkcanfly wrote: Also note that the Rogue Flat-Footed restriction is encouraging them to be sneaky and tricky, enhancing the flavor. Meanwhile, the Magus restriction is encouraging them to pick the subclass that changes the entire concept from melee magic user to a magic Archer. I'd argue it encourages them to be tricky with their spells. Off the top of my head (not including invisibility, which has already been mentioned): Mirror image
Even debuffs that aren't foolproof, like fear, dazzled, or concealment, can swing things in the magus's favor. All those are available to any hybrid study--a lot of them are even available as studious spells.
I also love this, and I’m excited to see how you tweak Olansa. I was also planning on dropping the madness angle, and having her retain her human form when they start the fight. Then, when her hit points hit a certain threshold, the power of the cane overwhelms her, and she gets transformed into the drider-esque version.
Sporkedup wrote: Not to be dense, but every allegation from both Jessica and Crystal is about something from three or more years ago. What allegations of sexism, transphobia, or racism are current enough to not have been part of what the listed changes were done to address? The issue is, we (the customer base) often don't hear about bad stuff until three or four years down the road, when ex-employees have enough distance from the situation to talk freely about it. Hell, Jessica started her thread saying she'd been holding off airing some of this dirty laundry because she was worried folks at Paizo might retaliate against her friends still with the company. The point of dredging up these issues from years ago is to provide context for the problems that are happening now, behind the scenes, that we don't have any details on. Sara Marie got fired, and Diego quit in solidarity, alleging a lack of integrity from some of the management. What happened there? No clue! But four years ago Jeff told Jessica that cleaning the floors was too expensive, and it took an organized email campaign to HR to get them to vacuum the place. So the question I have to ask is, what issue(s) is Jeff ignoring right now? Because good folks are getting fired/quitting. Some figurative floor there is still dirty.
Zombkat wrote: Ugh. One of my players saw the "Ethersight Ring" in Archive of Nethys, and is annoyed he never found it. I've been scouring the adventure and I can't find it in there! Where was this treasure? I don’t think it’s in the adventure anywhere. Not everything in the toolbox shows up as treasure. Frex, the swarmeater’s clasp doesn’t show up either.
Kyrone wrote:
Gloaming Shard gives you the Noctis move without spending a feat/spellstrike on it.
I’m for sure taking it with my Magus for Strength of Thousands. Thanks to the free wizard mc archetype, I have plenty of spell slots to work with, and debuffs have a lot longer longevity in low-level slots than attack spells. Plus, I’m using a scythe, so I’ve gotta grab cone of cold so I can do the Sister Freide move :)
Shield Archon seems like an outlier too. 33 is an Extreme AC for a 10th level creature, and 15 for a save is Low-to-Terrible. I’ll be interested to see how Shadow Signet plays in actual game conditions. Two of my Edgewatch players bought them, and so far, it hasn’t felt unbalanced or overpowered (and both players said that they enjoyed being able to play the ‘what save to target’ game)
beowulf99 wrote:
I see, so you’re treating the overhang as doubling back, only reoriented 90 degrees. Does that mean ‘down’ is now the plane of the extant wall? Can the overhang be up to 20 ft. long, without using any additional ‘material’?
beowulf99 wrote:
So then how do horizontal panels factor in to the wall’s dimensions? Could I make a wall 20 ft tall, 120 ft long, with a 5 ft horizontal overhang along the entire length? What about a 20 ft overhang? Both would still be 20 ft tall, relative to ‘down’
In one of the games I’m playing in, one of the other players is running a dhampir playtest summoner. I really appreciate being able to Battle Medicine the summoner to keep the Eidolon hp up, without having to rush into melee range. On the flip side, if I need to drop a real deal spell, I don’t need to prep a Harm to cover the dhampir—I can just target the Eidolon.
Kyrone wrote:
They’re all 1 action, and recharge your spellstrike, so I think they all seem pretty decent in that context. Also, I don’t think Cascade Countermeasures replaces your normal cascade bonuses, I think you get the resistance to spell damage in addition to the normal stuff.
67) Sharra, a scythe-wielding gnoll Magus with the Inexorable Iron Hybrid Study. She grew up in Osirion, as part of a growing cult of Pharasmin gnolls inspired by my Mummy's Mask character, a gnoll cleric named Inanna. She joined the Magaambya both to develop her talents in arcane magic, and to learn more about the gnolls of the Mwangi Expanse.
That's a valid approach, but my concern is: do you actually give them a chance to prove it? Or do you shut them down and say "Sorry, come back in X levels, this guy is a book 5 villain. " One requires going way off book (which sounds like a lot of fun, but sort of negates the convenience of running a pre-written adventure). The other just seems really unsatisfying as a player. Personally, I'm OK with my party not making the connection between The Reaper and Vancaskerkin ahead of time; it made the betrayal at the end of book 4 sting more. The important part is, it makes sense in hindsight--they knew The Reaper was a reference to the blackmail and rumormongering aspect of Norgorber, and in retrospect the newspaper man was an obvious suspect.
Zandu the Devourer wrote:
I changed it to "The Reaper" for my game.
The infiltration rules are actually pretty forgiving. As a player, it's easy to get stuck in the mindset that if you fail a check, it's going to ruin the whole heist and maybe start a big fight--that's largely not the case though. The way infiltrations work is, failing checks gives you Awareness Points. Hitting certain AP thresholds will have negative consequences, and eventually cause the heist to fail, but a single check is not going to make or break things. You also have ways to reduce your AP total, if you feel like you're catching too much heat.
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