Betwixt's page

I thought this as well the first time I read it, that your familiar only received a single ability but I find it interesting that the text for the reduction species "one less FAMILIAR ability", which to me highlights the intent is to remove the bonus familiar ability a witch's familiar would normally receive.

I think it's also not entirely clear, does a familiar gained from this dedication return when you next prepare spells? Or do you need to spend a week of downtime as per a normal familiar to revive it. If it's the latter, that makes the witch dedication spellcasting exceptionally fragile.

I think there comes a point when you have to accept that an awesome and diverse fighter who can deal with unique and novel situations, can't be the same fighter who is the totally mundane guy with no access to supernatural power.

The Tome of Battle in 3.5 was, in my opinion, an amazing book which gave 'martial' characters access to a lot of unique and interesting options. But they weren't fighters.

You could give a fighter all good saves, you could give them improved iron will, and the like as bonus feats. You can also give him access to 4/6 skill points per level. But if you really want them to be able to compete with magic, you have to either make them significantly less mundane and thus, lose some of the 'flavour' of a fighter or you have to stomp magic into the dust. You could limit all spellcasters to being 6th level casters, but they're still going to be better than a fighter at solving problems.

As it stands though, a fighter may as well be an NPC class, when you compare it with every other full BAB class on the market.

Maybe I'm just not looking closely enough at the class but for the amount of utility the fire lacks, it really doesn't have all THAT much offense as it is claimed to.

Sure, blue fire is a touch attack, while all other composite blasts are not. But until 16th level it still has to contend with SR, it will still have to contend with the most common type of energy resistance and assuming you're not running up against something with crazy DR your actual hits really don't do all that much more damage than any other composite blast...

In the meantime, you lose out on a great deal of the utility that say water brings (I feel water will be by far the most commonly chosen element) for some super awesome gains at level 16+? When a wizard is about 2 steps away from stopping time, gating in devils and jumping on the wish train?

A part of me honestly expected fire to use d8's for its damage dice, and was surprised when it didn't. I feel that giving it a "physical" damage side is a poor solution and very unflavourful though. I also think giving earth acid damage would be equally distasteful.

I really feel like fire needs a few more talents to drive home the FIRESTORM! aspect of the element (which maybe the expanded book will do) and possibly a way to produce fire so hot it partially penetrates energy resistance.

Alternatively, give Fire the ability to exhaust/fatigue/drain people due to heatstroke and the like, maybe sicken due to burns/pain?

Like a lot of other people have said as well, the class is in desperate need of a little more to do outside of combat, at least from my PoV. It has a lot of fun tricks in combat but in between it does look quite lacking. If the fighter has taught us anything it's that it's all well and good to throw damage at faces, but maybe some skills, a few more thematic utility abilities or some such may go a ways to filling out this void.

To steal a fun concept from, as everyone has compared it to, Avatar: The Last Airbender, giving a tremorsensing geokineticist a sense motive bonus would be fun and explainable. Likewise, giving aerokinesis the ability to manipulate sounds, perhaps enhancing stealth? A milder silence effect?

Oh and of course, I really hope that hydrokinesis will have some way of "bloodbending". :)

Overall, I gosh darn LOVE! this class, it more so than any other really fills a niche that I think needed to be filled. I just think it feels very barebones at the moment. But from reading the forums, I see a lot of the classes do, possibly the playtest showing through.

Hopefully I can convince my GM to let me change my witch in Kingmaker to a kineticist, and I'll be able to get some actual playtesting done. Looking forward to perfecting this wonderful little gem with you all!

AP #80: Empty Graves has what I would consider a fairly "sexy" pose; along with his full (well muscled) chest exposed for our viewing pleasure.

I think the cover in question gives a greater sense of being regal/disdainful than "come and get me"; though I guess the most sexualised aspect of the image would be the way he outfit actually falls against her body.

Opinions will be opinions; I like sexy heroes and villains - as long as it doesn't detract from their character and they aren't TOO prolific (both of any one gender/sex and also in general)

Scavion wrote:

Betwixt wrote:

Scavion wrote:

Betwixt wrote:

Spellcasting Available

It's basically just this re-iterated.

Buying a Spellbook is easier than finding a spellcaster.

I was just saying there are 'core' rules for the level of spellcasting you can find in each settlement.

The Gamemastery guide is in the Core rules line.

But is not required for play.

Only the CRB is required.

And the rules for what level of spells spellcasters you can hire have access to is detailed on page 163 of the core rulebook...

Spellcasting Available

It's basically just this re-iterated.

Yeah, that's a great guideline you just posted.

Comes straight from the Core Guideline Book?

Does any GM who excessively limits a wizard's ability to buy new spells also limit a fighter's ability to buy new weapons? I mean, letting them go beyond what is on their chart could get out of hand... Better play a monk so you don't have to worry.

Collecting spells, is to me, the defining trait of the wizard. It's what makes a wizard fun and unique.

Most of the others have covered the maaaany benefits of a wizard very well.

As a matter of opinion though; wizards are by far and away the "best" arcane casting class, closely followed by sorcerers, then closely (possibly) followed by arcanists. Being able to leave spell slots open to prepare that, "What if." spell is a huge advantage for an arcane caster, who is essentially meant to play the role of a toolbox.

I wasn't making a point yet, I was seeking out information to understand your position.

See, when I'm playing a wizard or a sorcerer and I use magic to solve encounters my average number of spells cast per issue is...one.

Just one...

...If you burn through spells faster of course you're going to see Arcanist as weaker, but from my end of things Arcanist is insane. Added bonus: since they're Int-reliant no one gets to complain that using my resources intelligently is out of character.

From your end of things, the Arcanist seems extremely weak. If I only had to cast a single spell to solve any problem, I'd FAR prefer to be playing a Wizard where I could have, for example in the level 8 comparison earlier, 4 different problems accounted for at my highest spell level. While in contrast the Arcanist can "solve" the same problem, 3 times. Keeping in mind the Wizard can choose to leave 1 or 2 of these utility "problem solvers" available for when the problem arises, while maintaining 2 combat "problem solvers" at the ready. While the Arcanist lacks this luxury with its single, earth shattering spell prepared.

I really like the new playtest version of the Arcanist, I found when trying to build the older version, on paper my character felt bland. The customizable talent options are a really fun addition.