Bidmaron's page

Adventure 1B has two dangers. So, when you encounter a danger, do you get to pick or is it random which of the two you encounter?

Is it just me or is the store for the spell cards broken. I pre-ordered the Arcane cards a long time ago, but when I try to click on 'Add to Cart' all day today for the other spell decks, I get a Paizo error page saying I don't have access to the page.

Ambiguous Rules

Sometimes a rule could be interpreted multiple ways. If one version is too good to be true, it probably is. If a rule seems to have wording with problematic repercussions or doesn’t work as intended, work with your group to find a good solution, rather than just playing with the rule as printed.

beowulf99, as someone else just said, house rule it if you'd like, but there is no reason to believe that a feat is intended to amplify a magic item. It already has its advantage of giving you a great climb speed, and there is no reason, IMO, to expect it to amplify a magic item in addition to its already nice benefits. But, do as you will...

Craft for ADVENTURERS should not be profitable. This is an adventure game, not a merchandizing game. The actual craftsmen in the world who aren't adventurers clearly make a profit (or at least a living), and they don't observe the same restrictions that part-time crafters like PCs have to observe. That is the RAI, anyway, in my opinion. As to the PFS, well, can't speak to that.... Sounds like a screw-up.

You know, you are right. Forgive me. I didn’t understand the point. Now I do agree there is room for improvement, as I did not realize those spells gave you the option to sustain even though sustain is unnecessary from a duration standpoint. I respectfully retract my previous statement.

The first line of the flat-footed condition states
“You’re distracted or otherwise unable to focus your full attention on defense.”
The other poster took care of blinded but the stunned condition implicitly invoked flat-footed from this statement IMO and there is no need to house rule it. The sidebar a page or two later talks in more detail about stunned and related conditions and states you cannot act, which clearly means you are unable to focus your full attention on defense and would be flat-footed.

This is where common sense needs to come in. Sustaining a spell makes it last until the end of your turn. There is no need to sustain a spell again the same round because it doesn’t need it. They could have worded the action a little more carefully so people wouldn’t be asking this question but good grief there are enough real issues with the rules that we shouldn’t be wasting our time on something like this that should be obvious.

Nor does it make a difference to new GMs. Most new GMs are going to use published material (most old ones do), so what does it matter? Few people launch into RPGs straight-away as a GM, so what value is this kind of recommendation? As has been pointed out, the # drastically depends upon the challenge of the encounters. So, if there were to be one, it would need to be along the lines of X number of easy+Y number of moderate....

Bottom line is that a recommendation is either so trivial as to be useless or so complex as to be a straight-jacket (and therefore also useless). If a GM can't develop their own sense for encounters/day, they should probably not be GMs. Additionally, how would a GM enforce it? If the players decide to take a break (maybe because they believe the big baddie is two rooms over?), what is the GM going to do? "I'm sorry, you can't take a break right now, you still have one encounter left before you reach the recommended number of encounters per day."

I agree having a guideline won't ruin storytelling ... but only if the storyteller ignores the guideline.

Driving is hardly hazardous compared to fighting to the death. I don't see how you can even draw a comparison between those activities. If there were real adventurers, there wouldn't be a GM who ensured that the encounters they will face are balanced. In a real world where people would adventure, they have no guarantee that what is around the next corner isn't a red dragon. So, if people were to live in a world where adventuring occurred, for the most part, they would be very cautious. Those who aren't would be dead quickly.

The GM is at liberty to go into encounter mode at any point he wishes. While the new rules don't provide formal rules for surprise situations, the GM should take into account the circumstances of exploration when transitioning to encounter.
For example, if the players are staging a surprise attack on a campsite of goblins, where the goblins have no stationed guards and are asleep, it makes no sense to start combat with an initiative roll unaltered if the players succeed at their stealth checks. How each GM handles it is up to them, but I'd enter encounter mode with initiative by dex or perception according to their best roll, but in the monsters' turns, I'd give them at least a two action penalty (reflex save for 2 actions, fail for 3 actions). Thus a goblin who saves can take an action to stand up and those who fail don't even get to do that.
It was always stupid the way older editions of D&D and PF basically eliminated players' ability to plan by giving hard-n-fast surprise round rules.

Think about it a second without metagaming. If you are a character your very life is in jeopardy. Without knowing what you may face around the next corner/bend in the river, without other constraints, would you want to face possible death without maximum readiness?

If the GM isn’t pleased with the party’s risk aversion, he can handle it in several ways:
1. Have wandering monsters attack during the rest interval
2. Let them continue and run out of rations
3. Add a reason that time matters and the players have to weigh recharging vs spending time to recharge

Tower shield seems I’ll conceived. If you actually have it equipped, it would seem it should auto-raise. Just think about it a minute: if you have it equipped how could you not have it raised? If you didn’t it would be dragging the ground. To make them even viable I would probably rule they are always raised when equipped. Then you have to spend an action to gain the additional benefit.

It makes sense. If it requires concentration to speak then surely it requires concentration to play an instrument. I'm not sure why that should surprise anyone....

Does anyone know how we we ever get any of this actually fixed? On most of these threads, we have conspicuous absence of anyone from Paizo stepping in with the answer. At first, you could say, "well, everyone's busy with GenCon," but that excuse is wearing thin....

Don’t forget the reactive attack he (might) draws as he goes to get his pack.

Going in encumbered is not something I ever recall doing, however. It sure seems the system is broken....

Yes, I see it now. Boy, they could hardly confuse things worse. When you specialize you get an extra spell slot and an extra known spell in your school. This is not to be confused with a school spell, which is just another name for a focus spell, that you cast using your focus point pool. I sure wish they had stayed with the power terminology. This focus spell crap is confusing for those of us who grew up playing RPGs. It will really confuse someone new to RPGs.

You can't both be right, pit wizard and Lord_B. Time to hit the rulebook....

Well, if you did it, you would be doing it for short-term gain. Later, as you get all the ability plus-ups, you are better off getting a new trained skill at first level because you get to add an ability modifier that will be higher than +2 later in the character's life. So, I am almost certainly going to house rule that you can take a choice of either making something you are trained in expert for the short-term gain with the proviso that you cannot retrain it later if you make that choice.

Well, that is why I am saying it was a big mistake to change Powers to Focus Spells. All it did was confuse the terminology. And the only real motive was because they put the blooming powers in the spells chapter in the playtest. What an idiot thing. I am not necessarily opposed to borrowing the spell mechanic for powers, but they really confused things by calling them focus spells. They also limited their design space because it's hard to see a fighter or barbarian archetype ever getting anything called a focus spell.

I am away from my book and pdf but I thought metamagic fears were tied to spellcaster classes and not accessible to anyone but spellcasters. But I am not an expert on the new rules yet.

That p 302 statement specifically says you must be a spellcaster to use metamagic.
This is why I said we would regret calling powers focus spells, as most would believe it makes you a spellcaster, and focus spells only ABSOLUTELY DO NOT MAKE YOU A SPELL ASTER

Except that if you are not a spellcaster you don’t have access to metamagic, and having a focus spell doesn’t make you a spellcaster. This is part of the wonkiness we created when insisting that powers be called some type of spell

I suspect we will regret that. Part of the issue in the play test was that powers were in the spell list. Now they aren’t. They don’t take normal spell slots and having at least one of them without having a spellcaster level doesn’t get you anything that requires you to be a spellcaster.
Just because the power works similar to a spell doesn’t mean it should be called a spell.
Can you metamagic a focus spell if you are a spellcaster?

Anyone know why they went away from the term power? I like that better and it risks less confusion from those new to RPGs

The DM is free to go into encounter mode when (s)he deems appropriate. If there is a situation where the PCs (or bad guys for that matter) are doing something in an effort to guarantee surprise, start the encounter mode early, and then, yes, if the bad guy won initiative, he would simply do nothing until the PCs went. You might narrate it by describing that the guard pauses in his step for a moment but then moves on.

It seems like the consensus is that you should be able to do what the OP wants in terms of the way real-world shields and slings were built, but that the rules leave significant doubt that the RAW would allow it. Well, don't forget rule one:

"The first rule of Pathfinder is that this game is yours. Use
it to tell the stories you want to tell, be the character you want to be, and share exciting adventures with friends. If any other rule gets in the way of your fun, as long as your group agrees, you can alter or ignore it to fit your story. The true goal of Pathfinder is for everyone to enjoy themselves."

So, if the consensus is that it should be do-able, then make it so! I'm not saying I'm opposed to getting the rules fixed to clarify, but in the interim, no one should be in doubt about doing what seems to be the right thing.

What are the consequences? If it doesn't have the trait of unarmed, then any rules applicable to unarmed wouldn't apply, right? The trait has to be there?

I'm saying they should skip to a PDF if the hard copy is prohibitive. That would be unusual (maybe unprecedented) for them though.

Then there are guys like us who will buy anything Paizo puts out related to PF. At least a PDF would be great. I agree, for what it's worth.

It could be they are letting third party publishers do some of them, witness this from an e-mail I got form Rising Pheonix:
That means it's Pathfinder Second Edition Day, and we can finally reveal our newest little gem.

Written by the talented Kim Frandsen, with classical artwork by Bob Greyvenstein, Heaven & Hell: Aasimar & Tiefling Ancestries presents two popular races (or ancestries), fully compatible with the second edition of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.

Heaven & Hell

Inside you'll find:

- Everything you need to create an aasimar or tiefling character.
- Aasimar and tiefling heritages, including the lawbringer archon heritage and gobmaw barghest heritage
- Ancestry feats for both ancestries, for 1st, 5th, 9th, and 13th level
- 50 random ancestry features for each ancestry
- Ancestry equipment

A new adventure has begun, choose your side.

OK, so when will someone from Paizo acknowledge these and give us some guidance on the more substantive errors?

p. 479 "Exploration Activities": ...If you to do nothing more than make steady progress toward your goal,... I believe the word 'to' needs to be removed.

Hew definition:
Well, I'll be danged. Who knew (obviously not me)?

Core Rulebook errors:
P. 26 Step 7 Character Sheet box 4th sentence “Likewise, record your character’s their armor proficiencies in the …” I believe 'their' should be deleted.
Pl 489 “Planning a Session” P2 “Plan a time for everybody will arrive, …” Change for to when?
p. 491 Adjudicating the Rules bullet 2: (page XXX) is in parentheses. I think they may be referring to the "Other Actions" section on p.462?
p. 496 “Exploration Activities” While players usually hew close to these default activities,… Really not sure what the word 'hew' was supposed to be.
P. 680 “HIDDEN” A creature you’re hidden from is flat-footed to you, and it must succeed at a DC 11 flat check when targeting you with an attack, spell, or other effect or it fails affect you. Need to insert 'to' between affect and you
p. 462 "Other Actions" When this happens, the rules tell you how many actions you need to sped, as well any traits your action might have. The word 'as' needs to be inserted between 'well' and 'any'.

Thank you, sir!

I'm with you but this, after all, a new edition

Why can't we have honest-to-God psionics made by Paizo instead of a 3rd party? Because a 3rd party won't be able to do the Golarion-specific stuff.

I don't think I missed it, but the new accessories subscription: do any of the old subscriptions automatically convert over to that one? I subscribe to the cards and pawns, do those convert over to the accessories automatically?

Thanks Postal

So as I understand it, if we are subscribers to the accessory line , we will get the GM screen, combat pad, and character sheets in August. But the GM screen comes n two layouts. Do both layouts come on subscription or how does that work?

Well, I guess I was visualizing the classic side-by-side defender, where it would be hard for an opponent to achieve an opposite position. Or, in a dungeon the paladin and other melee guy are in front and the casters in back. Thanks for explaining the ranged part.

Earlier in this thread, someone made the assertion that enemies will simply step away to prevent the Paladin's Retributive Strike. Do I have a gross conceptual error? I thought that reactions were triggered immediately upon the occurrence of the trigger and not on the player's turn. So, if something attacks from a square you threaten against one of your enemies, you could immediately attack that enemy, as the trigger occurred before that enemy had a chance to step out of your reach.

The new Retributive Strike also basically gives your ally/friend an invisible three point hardness (at Paladin first level) shield that prevents the first three points of damage. I think the retributive strike is actually now pretty good.

The Ranged Reprisal class feat, however, confuses me a little bit. For the use of a ranged weapon part of things, I am having trouble imagining when you could use that. When would you be in a fight where an opponent within you reach attacked an ally and you were wielding a ranged weapon? (I am assuming you have to be wielding a ranged weapon to use this aspect since it doesn't give you a free manipulate action to draw a ranged weapon).

As for the step portion of the reaction, it is hard to envision a scenario where you could step without entering the square of another ally or enemy to hit the triggering enemy. I haven't read anything that leads me to believe you are allowed to share squares with an ally or enemy as a medium sized creature. Anyway, I am having trouble seeing a scenario where you could use the step and attack an enemy. What am I missing here?

OK, my player built a Human Fighter and took Versatile Heritage. From there, he took Natural Ambition, which gave him a 1st Level Figher Feat. He chose Double Slice. As a fighter, he gained access to another level 1 Fighter Feat, and he chose Sudden Charge. So, the question becomes if he uses Sudden Charge to stride 2x speed and strike, can the strike be a Double Slice?

Vic Wertz wrote:

4. I'm sure some of our other Aussie friends will be along soon to chime in with their own experiences on that.

Like Steve Geddes! Tell him, Steve!

Steve Geddes wrote:

I'm in Australia too and get monthly subscriptions. It varies from month to month, but in general if i choose USPS priority I get them about the same time as street date, UPS is generally up to a week early (but very pricey!) Note that international orders over a certain limit have to go international priority and you might be surprised by the shipping charges, so be warned!

If you like PDFs and opt for a subscription (when such becomes available and presuming free PDFs are a subscription perk) you'll get access to those as soon as your book ships - usually before street date (sometimes as much as two weeks before). FWIW, the subscriptions usually offer a discount too, which mitigates some of the freight cost (the free PDF likely to cover a lot of it too).

P.S. The linked thread is a great place to read what has been officially stated about the logistics of Starfinder's release.

A month after your "almost there" post. Can you tell us a little of what you are thinking?

Recently, I had a large order including the revised Crimson setting. It was a very expensive order and also contained all my monthly materials. When it didn't arrive with several days of shipping, I contacted Paizo. They checked and said that the post office showed it 'In Transit,' and I would have to contact them to initiate a case to find the package.

I did so (hard to do since you can only do it during business hours - who does that any more in this day - only the Post office). They opened a case, and an agent called two days later. She basically said that the status was the status, denied they ever received the package, and said I had to contact the shipper.

I did so, and Paizo immediately sent out a replacement.

Now, I've had over 162 orders with Paizo, and this is the first time I can remember having a problem. In this case, since the post office showed it 'in transit,' to me that seems they implicitly acknowledged the package was in their system. I hope Paizo pursues this with those rascals because I don't see how this can be Paizo's fault.

Anyway, Paizo is the best!

I have been with FG for a long time, and I hail this decision!

Yes and I love the changes they added! (Just on the first box though because i only have one group done with rotr)
How about you? Seems you were real active too

Thanks hm!

Thanks hawk!
By the way that was fun play testing s&s but I couldn't do the next one with monthly releases