Since there is no "strike" trait, I believe a "strike attack" is any attack which involves an attack roll
Strike is just Strike. Why would there be a Strike trait? It's an action.
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Under this interpretation, Flurry of Blows would be disallowed
Nothing about what you quoted is relevant to Flurry of Blows. Flurry isn't an attack, it's just an ability that lets you Strike twice.
As long as the Strikes you make are legal (i.e. an eligible attack per the rules of wild shape, you must use your Jaws if you turned into a Tyrannosaurus with Dinosaur Form) there's no reason you can't use Flurry, or any other similar ability that allows you to Strike (like Knockdown or Certain Strike, etc. etc.).
Like I'm not even sure where your position is coming from because nothing in the errata even touches upon flurry of blows or anything like it.
My line of thought went as follows:
- I thought an "attack you can Strike with" was any "attack" action that involved making a "strike" against the enemy (many attack actions explicitly say "make a strike" or something similar in the description). I thought this was intended to target abilities such as Power Attack.
- The last line used the "grapple" and "trip" actions as examples of attacks that could still be used. Notably, both of these attacks lack any reference to "strike" in their descriptions, which I took as support for the above interpretation.
Rereading the errata, though, you're totally right. The capitalization of "Strike" makes it clear that the Strike action and not some broader category is what's being referred to.
As others have said, RAW, the rules are clear. As for overruling the RAW, to those who think spell casting in dragon form would break the game, consider the following:
Long version:
1. The attack bonus for dragon form is +28, which is bad at very high levels.
2. Because of (1), for melee combat, you'll need to take the option to use your own unarmed attack modifier. This entails heavy investment into strength or dexterity and specific archetype choices to make your (true form) unarmed attack modifier high.
3. However, if you invest heavily into strength, you can actually reach a much higher average damage roll by staying in your true form and using a melee weapon (which, of course, lets you cast spells anyways).
The other advantages (e.g. fly speed) can be approximated in a character's true form with the right feats and spells.
Short version: Making dragon form melee-viable near level 20 requires significant investment, and with that investment, a caster may be better at melee combat in their true form anyways.
Returning to the question of GM ruling, the power level of casting spells in dragon form depends on the PC's level. Specifically, have they passed the point where dragon form's default attack modifier is close to a martial character's attack modifier? A safe approach could be to let the player cast spells in dragon form only if it's heightened to a 10th level. You could explain this as the 6th and 8th level versions of the spell being imperfect, but the 10th level version corrected these imperfections.
About the only out of druid class ability that there is near universal agreement that it DOES apply is Flurry of Blows from monk.
I'm a little late to the discussion, but is this still true after the 3rd errata?
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In aerial form, animal form, avatar, dinosaur form, dragon form, elemental form, insect form, monstrosity form, nature incarnate, plant form, change "only attacks you can use" to "only attacks you can Strike with." You can still use non-Strike attacks like Grapple and Trip as normal.
This implies an attack is either a "strike attack" or a "non-strike attack", and that a druid in wild shape can only use the latter (in addition to a basic strike). Since there is no "strike" trait, I believe a "strike attack" is any attack which involves an attack roll, whereas a "non-strike attack" does not (and usually requires a skill check instead). Under this interpretation, Flurry of Blows would be disallowed, but I'm afraid I don't see any alternative interpretation.
Each time you Command your companion, both your companion and its duplicate gain 2 actions.
How does this interact with feats such as lead the pack or companion's cry which change the number of actions an animal companion may take when commanded?
It seems to me that the most internally consistent resolution is for the duplicate to gain the same number of actions as the animal companion
(i.e. one with lead the pack and three with companion's cry).
Seems it works ( resources traded for a limited time effect).
Your only concern might be its accessibility, which is uncommon and requires the character to be a half orc or orc ( if I am not mistaking, there's no other way to get them).
As for the feat meant to ride flying animal companions, it would somehow invalidate the champion divine ally mount, which is a lvl 20 feat ( you may consider lowering the champion feat too).
Keep in mind that, for balance purposes, paizo seems to go with:
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Common ancestry : no fly/size increase
Uncommon ancestry: fly/size increase by lvl 17
Rare ancestry: fly/size increase by lvl 13
Generic classes flying (champion) : by lvl 18
Generic classes flying mount (champion) : fly by lvl 20
Specific classes flying (engineer) : by lvl 14
Specific classes flying mount (summoner) : by lvl 14
Archetypes, though they do not exist when it comes down to fly, tend to be "at least" one level higher compared to base classes, for common perks, and even 4 or 6 level higher for core/specific ones.
Just to say it would definitely be way too generous to give it almost for free by lvl 14.
I think you're right that a single level 14 feat would be objectively ahead of the curve. I don't want to digress too much, although I don't think there's much more to add regarding RAW, but I could imagine a series of feats (akin to trained, expert, master, legendary) that progress from limited ability to ride a flying mount (i.e. only at very reduced speed, very low altitude, and with sever penalties to "maneuver in flight") to unrestricted flight. I imagine there's some way to implement this idea so that it would be balanced, but still let the player do some cool things at mid levels.
This could work for Blackmill's character: a trained non-companion...
This is a good idea and maybe the best approach. I'm also thinking about using a riding drake animal companion. As you've mentioned, a level 13 caster can cast fly with a 1-hour duration. So while the riding drake doesn't have flight, it can be given flight, and it has the "mount" special ability. This solution is a bit clunky, I'd much prefer an archetype or series of feats that achieves the same end result, but it otherwise works RAW unless I've missed something. Alternatively, there is Barding of the Zephyr as Onkonk mentioned, which has a 10 minute duration but is available earlier.
Ultimately, it looks like there are several ways to have a flying mount, but an animal companion roc by itself doesn't work without GM approval. For the future, I wouldn't mind a level 14+ feat that allows a character to ride a flying animal companion (without needing spells or items). If made into an archetype, it could even have its own thematic mechanics, like requiring the rider to make athletics or acrobatics checks when the mount flies at high speeds or performs a maneuver (on a critical failure, the rider falls off).
The Roc statblock has no bearing on the animal companion version so it's not a good place to look for rules advice for them.
Oh is that where the quotes were from? Now I feel mislead.
No, the important quotes are all from the mammoth lord archetype page. The fluff quote is what Onkonk is referring to, which I included to indicate there's no lore preventing a roc from flying with a rider, provided it's large enough.
Onkonk wrote:
Also your animal can't become Gargantuan either so doesn't seem like you can get an adult roc regardless.
I think this is very unlikely. The definition of "mature" is "fully grown". Moreover, the mammoth lord archetype says "an adult megafauna is always Large or bigger", which wouldn't make sense if there was no way to have an adult animal companion. And as you yourself mentioned, animal companion stat blocks are different from their corresponding creature stat blocks.
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You can also use Trampling Charge with fly speed by using the companion item Barding of the Zephyr.
This is a very good point. Perhaps non-land movement during trampling charge is only intended for animal companions that have the "mount" ability, or a similar exception to their movement rules? It's possible this is the intention. That said, two things make it unclear to me.
First, the trampling charge rules allow for alternate modes of movement if the animal companion "has" those movement types. The restrictions from riding an animal companion don't change what movement types the animal "has", rather they limit what movement types can be "used", with certain exceptions. I think a strict interpretation of the RAW implies that any creature which has a fly, burrow, climb, or swim speed can use that movement type during trampling charge if in the appropriate environment. If that's not the intention, trampling charge should replace "if it has the corresponding movement type" with "if it [may use] the corresponding movement type [while ridden]".
Second, the trampling charge feat mentions burrowing and climbing. If one does not take a strict interpretation of the RAW, as stated above, then the mention of these movement types would be irrelevant to the feat (to my knowledge, there are no animal companions that can climb or burrow and and have the "mount" feat, or special barding that provides an exception). A reasonable rebuttal to this second point is that Paizo may just be future-proofing the feat. But the first point remains.
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No flying animal companion has the mount ability for a reason and that is because PF2 is very averse to give you flying speeds at low levels and permanent flying speed is even harder to get.
I'm afraid this might be true. I kept looking through the rules, and the only RAW method I found that allows a ridden animal companion to fly with a standard stride action is via certain level 20 champion feats.
The rules for riding animal companions limits the animal companion to grounded movement unless it has the "mount" ability.
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You or an ally can ride your animal companion as long as it is at least one size larger than the rider. If it is carrying a rider, the animal companion can use only its land Speed, and it can't move and Support you on the same turn. However, if your companion has the mount special ability, it's especially suited for riding and ignores both of these restrictions.
However, to my knowledge not all megafuana companions have stats. In the case of the roc, we are told that a young roc has the stats of a bird, but we are not told the stats for a mature roc. Thus, we don't know if a mature roc has the "mount" ability.
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Roc: Use bird statistics for a young roc.
Now, there are several reasons to think that an adult roc should have the "mount" trait, or otherwise be able to fly with a rider. This is not only logical, given the size of an adult roc, but even stated in the fluff
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Particularly skilled druids or rangers might capture and train a roc to serve as a flying mount
From a RAI perspective, though, what is most relevant is the wording for the mammoth lord's trampling charge feat. This action requires that the mammoth lord is riding their mount, and clearly indicates that the animal companion can use special modes of movement, such as flying.
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You urge your mount forward, trampling enemies in your path. You command your mount to Stride up to its Speed (or to Burrow, Climb, Fly, or Swim, if it has the corresponding movement type)
This leads me to my question. Seeing as everything seems to points towards an adult roc being capable of flight while ridden, is there anything RAW that undeniably leads to this conclusion?
You won't be able to use material components anyway as everything your character has merges with the new form.
Ah, good catch. I hadn't thought of that.
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25% chances to fail any spell, as well as -1 to all int wish char checks and the cost of a lvl 14 feat, is a pretty low disadvantage compared to the action efficiency and the unique possibility ( we have 1/2 of the classes that can use battleforms. Just giving it to wild shape makes imo not much sense).
I have to disagree with this. A 25% chance to lose a spell slot and waste two actions is huge drawback. Remember that the caster has already wasted a full turn to use the homebrew metamagic (1 action) and wild shape (2 actions). Moreover, this can't be used with form control (also metamagic), which is another meaningful downside.
Compared to level 16+ druid feats, I honestly think this is a pretty bad feat, since it's narrow, unreliable, and has potentially disastrous consequences if the druid rolls poorly. Even low level feats like form control (level 4) probably add more to a shapeshifting druid.
If you're wondering why I would homebrew a feat that I consider bad, it's because it's because I don't mind taking a bad feat, so long as it's not too bad (such as if the stupefied value were 5).
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Maybe some lvl 20 feat allowing the druid to cast one single spell per transformation ( at least 3 levels lower than the transformation spell level) could be a thing. Maybe.
I think this is fair, but funnily, I also think this is stronger than what I suggested.
Then perhaps it would make sense to place the new mechanics behind a metamagic feat. For instance,
Feat Level: 14
Prerequisites: wild shape
Actions: 1
Description: If your next action is to cast wild shape, you gain the ability to speak while transformed, and the ability to cast spells even in a battle form. However, you also become stupefied 1, and this condition cannot be removed by any means except by returning to your normal form. If you are immune to the stupefied condition, you cannot use wild shape. This does not allow you to cast spells with material or somatic components in forms that are incapable of performing manipulate actions.
You may cast spells while in wild shape, even when in a battle form. However, you are stupefied 2 while in wild shape, and this condition cannot be removed by any means except by returning to your normal form. If you are immune to the stupefied condition, you cannot use wild shape. This does not allow you to cast spells with verbal components while in forms that lack speech. Similarly, you cannot cast spells with material or somatic components in forms that are incapable of performing manipulate actions.
Additionally, add the following line to Dragon Shape:
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While using wild shape to polymorph into a dragon battle form, you gain the ability to speak.
For reference, the stupefied condition reads
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You take a status penalty equal to this value on Intelligence-, Wisdom-, and Charisma-based checks and DCs, including Will saving throws, spell attack rolls, spell DCs, and skill checks that use these ability scores. Any time you attempt to Cast a Spell while stupefied, the spell is disrupted unless you succeed at a flat check with a DC equal to 5 + your stupefied value.
Essentially, this homebrew allows a druid in dragon form (via wild shape) to take a high risk gamble to cast a spell, and otherwise weakens all forms. I also like this change thematically, since one can interpret the druid failing to cast their spell as them not being able to control their inner beast.
1. What do you think?
2. Is the value for stupefied reasonable?
3. Would it be better to replace the stupefied condition with something less punishing, such as "to cast a spell while in wild shape, you must pass a DC 5 flat check"?
idk, it's set for the spells of each level. it's not like you roll a die or depend on things like caster level that changes.
if you have deadly aim and cast the stone discus spell (ranged attack. no touch) with spell perfection i think most gm would let you double the deadly aim damage
Sadly no
By its very definition, with Furious Spell its a variable..... its effect varies depending on which spell level its applied to.
Spell focus, Spell penetration, Weapon focus (Ray)... etc all have effects that do NOT vary, they are constants, and thus why they fit the description...
"In addition, if you have other feats which allow you to apply a set numerical bonus to any aspect of this spell (such as Spell Focus, Spell Penetration, Weapon Focus [ray], and so on."
Its not a coincedence!
You are right, Furious Spell does not benefit from Spell Perfection. I mentioned Furious Spell because it allows a sorcerer to use Raging Blood (or the Rage spell) and still cast spells. And while raging, the benefit from Flumefire Rage increases by 1 (to total of +2). That said, Spell Perfection does benefit Flumefire Rage (for up to a +4 bonus).
If one doesn't want to spend a feat on Raging Blood, they can always use the Rage spell, provided it's known. I don't know why this last fact passed by my earlier. It means that non-bloodline classes can benefit fully from Flumefire Rage without paying a three feat tax. So maybe the gap between an optimized sorcerer and the field is less than I thought, but I think they still have a sizable advantage.
Here's a brief overview of some aspects of sorcerer blasting. I'm not an expert, but I think this is all correct.
A crossblooded (arcane / orc) sorcerer can achieve (spells = damaging evocation spells)
+2 damage per die rolled with all spells
+3 damage per die rolled with all fire spells *
+4 damage per die rolled with a single fire spell *
+4 damage per die rolled with all fire spells, for 8 rounds per day *
+6 damage per die rolled with a single fire spell, for 8 rounds per day *
The relevant feats are blood havoc, flumefire rage, raging blood (see furious spell), and spell perfection. Swapping the arcane bloodline for a draconic one, a sorcerer could add a further +1 damage per die rolled with all spells of a particular energy descriptor. Other (non-multiclassed **) builds can benefit from a fraction of these bonuses and generally don't come close in terms of raw damage.
To further increase damage, a sorcerer can use blood intensity. I won't list all the ways to increase CL, but see this thread for ideas. Also, battering blast benefits immensely from this ability.
I hope it's becoming clear that the blasting potential of a sorcerer compared to other classes just isn't close. When needed, a sorcerer will easily be doing double the usual damage with their blasting spells. Without using day-limited resources, the sorcerer is still doing 30-40% more damage. A class that has all the spells of a sorcerer, but deals regular amounts of damage, would likely be a 6-7 if that means being 60-70% as effective (i.e. dealing 60-70% as much damage with blasting spells). It wouldn't be crazy for only the sorcerer and (blood) arcanist to score above a 7 in blasting.
* It's worth noting that flumefire rage only cares about the damage type, not the energy descriptor. Using the elemental spell metamagic feat, flumefire rage can benefit a spell such as cone of cold.
** It's rather cheap, but technically you can take one level as a crossblooded sorcerer.
To my mind the comparison should 100% be focused on being useful to a player (or even DM) who's choosing among these classes. What are their comparative strengths & weaknesses?
In mind of this, I'll make a small suggestion. Rather than have one table, which includes ranges of values (e.g. a druid is 8-10 in combat), have one table for each category plus a final table for the "balanced" build.
Using the debuffing category as an example, the table's rows and columns would be the same as what you currently have, but the scores would assume each class was optimized for debuffing at the expense of other categories.
Currently, a reader could not see what a druid loses by being as best it can at combat. This approach could fix that. It's more more work to do this, maybe too much work, but I think having one table with ranges muddies the waters.
Regarding the cleric class, I think a 9 is too generous, since an optimal crossblooded sorcerer (i.e. the benchmark for a 10) is just that much better at blasting in my opinion. But an evil cleric with spontaneous inflict wounds and hellfire ray is deserving of an 8 (i.e. "very good").
I think you need to go back and have another read at the document. In particular how I define 'Minimum' and 'Maximum' ratings, how all the class factors contribute and what makes a good blaster over the entire level ranges.
Where you see a ? or TBC that is referring to minimum levels. There were originally ratings there but since there is no current consensus on what defines a "Minimum" in a role, I took them out.
When its finished, I will get it uploaded as a separate document and a new Cleric guide and that will have the minimum values in that I define.
'Arkham's Guide to the Cleric - Putting the Puzzle Together.'
I did carefully read your writeup on blasting. You go into great detail about how to expand the cleric's blasting spells with race choices and explicitly give a recommendation for archetype and domain. You certainly succeeded at convincing me that a cleric can be a better blaster than I initially thought.
Perhaps I should expand on what I was saying in my previous reply. Forget about the cleric class for the moment. Just focusing on the sorcerer, I would say there's two degrees of separation between an optimal blasting sorcerer, and one that only makes modest efforts to be good at blasting (beyond taking the best blasting spells). I would still consider the latter to be a better blaster than the Samsaran Ecclesithuerge of Yamatsumi you've described.
Now, maybe you disagree that there are two degrees of separation between the best blasting sorcerer and an unoptimized blasting sorcerer, but then we really shouldn't be using a ten point scale in my opinion. And maybe that's at the heart of most disagreements in this thread. Is the scale linear? Does a 1 represent a non-caster or something else? Etc. The answers that one assumes will greatly impact the scores they give.
Implosion is a very interesting one - on the surface it seems very similar to Wail of the Banshee and could be seen as slightly worse due to the fact that is not an AOE spell, even though due to its long duration can affect many creatures over time. However, it is in fact better for several reasons - WOTB only affects living creatures, is both a Death and Sonic spell (by mid-high level many enemies will be immune or at the minimum have significant resistances) and although AOE, it can only affect any creature once. Implosion, can if the Cleric desires, continue to concentrate on one target and so potentially inflict a minimum 170-200 hp per round for the cost of only 1 spell.
I didn't know this until today, but the implosion spell cannot target the same creature multiple times with a single cast. From aonprd (emphasis mine),
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You can target a particular creature only once with each casting of the spell.
Blasting is interesting, since many of the best blasting spells are actually level six and under spells that have been made stronger through metamagic. For this reason, I'd say that the following is highly desirable for a blaster
1. spontaneous casting, ideally with a way to avoid the increased casting time
2. ways to have free metamagic, or otherwise reduce metamagic costs
3. bonus magic feats or class skills that emulate metamagic
Regarding the cleric class, I think a 9 is too generous, since an optimal crossblooded sorcerer (i.e. the benchmark for a 10) is just that much better at blasting in my opinion. But an evil cleric with spontaneous inflict wounds and hellfire ray is deserving of an 8 (i.e. "very good").
This is just in theory, and probably not relevant to any campaign, but I do think a sorcerer is better if we consider caster beyond level 20. I say that because the sorcerer has a much better primary attribute for multiclassing with divine casters. Between a level 40 wizard and a level 20 sorcerer / 10 oracle / 10 mystic theurge, I would have to take the latter.
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Mysterious Stranger wrote:
Since a wizard has to memorize each spell, he wants to cast they have to either memorize multiple of the same spell which cuts down on their versatility.
It's worth noting that a wizard does have ways around this. Feats like preferred spell and greater spell specialization let a wizard cast spontaneously. A pact wizard can cast their patron spells spontaneously. Now, whether or not the feat investment is worthwhile is a different matter, but the opportunity is there for those who want to spontaneously cast a few crucial spells as a wizard.
Don't get me wrong, there are some nice cleric & druid spells on her list. But I would give them up for the full wizard spell list in a heartbeat.
I'm also trying to...
I totally agree that the full wizard spell list is decidedly better than the witch spell list. I settled on an 8 mostly because I thought the witch has a better spell list than a druid. What you describe the witch missing out on, so does a druid for the most part. But I'd argue the witch has much better high level spells, especially once you factor in patrons. I think swapping the druid (7) and witch (6) would be fair if you think an 8 is too high. Or at the very least, giving both a 7. But that's just my two cents, and if you want to keep your list as is, that's no problem to me.
Having spent some time looking at the witch spell list, I think the rating of 6 is maybe undeserved.
Roughly 50% of the wizard spell list is on the witch spell list. For context, druid's have about 20% of the wizard spell list. But the numbers don't say anything about the quality and impact of the wizard spells that a witch has access to. Generally, I think the witch gets many of the best wizard spells.
A witch gets most of the strongest "save-or-die" / "save-or-do-nothing" spells with the exception of icy prison. They have suffocation, feeblemind, baleful polymorph, hold monster, most debilitating enchantment spells, etc...
The witch loses access to a few very good evocation spells such as fireball and freezing sphere. But if that's really a sticking point, these can be obtained through the elements patron. Or a witch can take the shadow patron, and use shadow spells to fill in gaps in their spell list.
I won't keep going, but if we take the whole wizard spell list to be a 10, then I think just the wizard spells that any witch can use would warrant a 7.
Now add spells like heal, resurrection, restoration spells (if you choose the healing patron), and the entire cure wounds line of spells, and you have a very strong spell list.
Basically, I think the witch trades wizard spells for cleric spells at a decent exchange rate, and the right choice of patron really helps. I would give their spell list an 8.
In a campaign, it depends in part on the DM. For instance, a DM can make encounters and objectives that reward the wizard's knowledge of more spells. Or they can choose not to. The DM's decisions regarding scroll, wand, and wondrous item scarcity also matter as people have mentioned.
Regarding actual mechanics and builds, beyond what's been said, it's worth noting that the Pact Wizard and Exploiter Wizard archetypes are both fairly powerful. Counterspelling as an immediate action is potentially very strong, and I don't know of any way for a sorcerer to do this.
In the abstract, I view high level wizards as stronger because they know more spells, and therefore can do more (my headcannon is high level scrolls are very rare). So if I wanted to feel like I was playing a powerful character, I would probably choose a wizard, regardless of whether a sorcerer would be mechanically stronger for the actual campaign.
