Rogue

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I am excited to have a new edition and there are numerous aspects that I like. I want to love this game.

Now that I have the book in my hands I’m finding the proficiency system to be a bigger challenge than expected.

I’m looking for different perspectives for how I can make this system work for my play style. So I’ll offer a few points where it doesn’t work for me, and hopefully someone can help me out.

I was hoping that the Tiers and gating system would keep character archetypes and support story-telling based on the novels and movies I’ve loved. I was very disappointed to see that being trained is a gate for remarkably few things and higher tiers unlock nothing. [I appreciate the access to feats, and note the general guidance for GM imposition of other gates].

For example, according to Table 10-3 that walking a tightrope is DC17. (Let’s ignore that looking up a single value that points you to a single value in a second table is really bad presentation). Balance attempts are allowed “untrained”. A level 7, Dex 14 wizard, untrained has a +7 acrobatics. So a 1 is an auto crit fail here. Ok, it’s a 1. A 2 to 9 is a failure, which results in “must stay stationary”, so my wizard is swaying but stable on a wire, with no magic, no nothing just sheer untrained acrobatic mojo. On a 10 to 19 he succeeds, allowing him to move his normal speed (though really at half speed for the difficult terrain). On a 20 he crits and moves his speed. Walking across a tightrope is really no big deal at all for a completely unoptimized character.

IMO, walking a tightrope should be gated behind Expert. The stories I like don’t feature untrained characters scampering across wires. Expert characters of the correct archetype scampering freely? Sure thing. Even without gating, +7 acrobatics makes no sense here.
How do I fix this? I understand the game solution offered. But story trumps game for me every time. How do I use this system and stay story first?

Sneaking past the guards is a rally cry for some. In games going back close to two decades now, my groups have faced this kind of challenge numerous times. Sometimes they just attack. That is fine. But sometimes, as with others, they want to avoid the fight. Usually there is a really sneaky character who can go scout the situation despite the complete lack of sneakiness for the fighter and cleric. Then, with information gathered, maybe they cast some silence and invisibility. Maybe they use disguises or illusions. Maybe they go for diplomacy. Maybe they chart out some good dimension doors. Maybe they go back to Plan A and frontal assault. Figuring out the options and picking one is FUN. Now the fighter and cleric can just sneak by. I guess we could just *not*. But not using a system has never been a good defense of that system.

How do I fix this? Can the system support the story telling and challenge solving I want? I want enough gap in stealth bonuses so that the rogue CAN sneak around in way that blow the socks off of the fighter. I want him to be at least reasonably confident so he can go shine at something the fighter knows is hopeless. That, to me, is not just a feature, but a core required function. Can I do that?

In my current game my wife plays a L13 Bard (AC20). There are a couple front line tanks that are AC27. She knows that she needs to not have things swinging at her. They all really like the value her character brings to the team. And they work together. Adding level to AC and making that the largest factor removes the tension and thus removes some fun they we want.

How do I fix this?

Does 2E support my story first play style that 1E does? Or am I just too old school and need to get out of the way.
Am I missing something?
I'd love to have a different perspective change my mind.

Thanks


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Of all the things I've griped about over the previews, this seems to be the one that I don't see a reasonable solution for.

Why is being a naked 10 DEX level 8 wizard with no spells up better for avoiding the axe swing of an orc than being a 10 Dex level 1 fighter in full plate?

Is this purely an absolute gamist surrender of narrative sense?

How does it make the storytelling game better?


So the "ready shield" action seems to cry out for parry mechanics, main gauche, etc...

Anything about such leaked so far?


I've played through Skinsaw with Valeros and Seoni and after some learning curve it wasn't too hard.

I then played through with Amiri, Sajan, Kyra, and Seoni. I expected this to be kinda tricky, but turned out to be pretty smooth and fun.

So now I'm trying Harsk, Merisiel, Valeros, Ezren. It's been tough going. I find that Harsk sucks at closing locations and the team just doesn't have the card turning power to get through. I can generally overcome whatever banes they hit (with the normal bad rolls aside). But I run out of time as often as not.

With Harsk's top card ability there is always at least one card a round that I can hit with the perfect character. And that is actually a fun different approach to the game.

But then the clock runs out. Just not enough blessings and allies to keep the extras explores running.

Any suggestions or insights?

Thanks

(Great fun, just finding this combo tricky)


Are there any official rulings or clarification on this?

RAW seems clear that the swarm is a monster just like any other and heal normally.

It makes sense that single target spells are useless.
It makes sense that burst spells do more damage. By this reasoning, one could argue that channel should heal +50%, but the wording clearly states "damage".

However, it also makes sense that damage to a swarm represents the killing of individuals within the swarm. Thus healing should have no effect whatsoever.

You could even rule that some are killed and some are badly hurt and out of the swarm, thus the +50% effect and the can't heal dead effect cancel out and you get back to RAW....

I'm not hung up on any of these being right or wrong, but I am curious as to any existing ruling or clarification.

Thanks


Any chance we will see some Cavalier Orders for Hellknight Orders?

Obviously the APG orders will do just fine. But specific Hellknight orders just sounds cool to me.


I didn't see anything in the casting time section either way.

My specific example is Water Breathing, though other spells could apply.

Water Breathing has a casting time of 1 action, a range of touch and allows the duration to be distributed amongst living creatures touched. Range specifies that you can touch up to 6 willing targets during the casting of a 1 action spell.

I'm pretty certain this means that one casting of Water Breathing is limited to 6 targets.

Is there anything to suggest that a caster could drag out the casting time so that more targets could be included?

Thanks


I understand +1/2 duration and +2 DC. Good rules.

My question is: how does a second dose interact with progress on a cure?

Example:
I'm stung by a wyvern and fail the DC17 save and take Con damage.
On the wyvern's next turn I roll another save, but this time I make it.
But, the cure is 2 saves, so I'm still poisoned. I need another save.
The wyvern promptly stings me again and I fail the (now DC19) save, so I take Con damage again and I'm now looking at 7 more saves instead of 4.
Does this also reset the two saves needed?
If yes, what if I had made the save? I would have made two saves in a row. Am I cured?

I believe that the correct answer is: don't get poisoned.
If you make the save the second time then you were not poisoned again, therefore it has no bearing on curing the poison. Whereas if you are double poisoned any progress on curing the initial poison is lost.

This makes sense, but it is not spelled out, so I'm curious if there is any other ruling.


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These questions may very well have been asked before. If someone can just point me to relevant answers, that would be great.

Are there any areas of the Inner Sea region that Paizo plans to avoid detailing, or at least will not be touching on in the next few years? There certainly seems to be more geography than can be covered any time soon. I'd like to know where I can have the most free hand without creating inconsistency down the road.

Also, what is Paizo's presumption on high level npcs? Looking through the books, typical npcs "of note" are in the 7 to 12 range, maybe up to 14. Even the leaders of Hellknight orders and the like do not exceed this. Is it Paizo's presumption that higher level Hell knights are off doing the real work while these guys keep the papers straight? Or is it Paizo's presumption that this is the standard for top level npcs? I infer the later to be the case, but it isn't clear.

I'm not in the least trying to suggest that there is a right or wrong answer. Nor am I complaining that either alternative would be limiting. Having the right level npcs show up as needed is easy enough either way.

But, I'm both enamored with Golarion and a heavy home brewer. So in this case I want to work inside the setting, but I also want to work with the grain that is established.

Is it correct that even amongst wizards, another wizard able to cast limited wish would be awe-inspiring and one capable of casting Astral Projection is a person of legend only mentioned in fables?


Threw a witch npc at the party last night.

A 6th level goblin witch with 8 goblin War1 support against 6 L3 PCs.

Party is exploring sewers below Westcrown looking for a BBEG (homemade side adventure in CoT)
Witch started out using Beast Shape I (toad fam) in the shape of a small frog, support goblins were hiding in ambush further down the tunnel.
The party's forward scout skirted around the frog, which seemed to ignore him. He spotted the hidden goblins and backed up to discuss. The frog/goblin witch sees him retreat so acted spooked and darted down a side drain. A few moments later, while the party plotted, the witch disguise hexed into a kobold, and came crawling out amidst a lot of dramatic banging. As he came out of the pipe he feigned horror at the site of an adventuring party and begged that a frog had just tried to eat him as he tried to escape the horrid goblins. He led on that he knew where the BBEG was and could lead them there if the party would leave him be. (He even got 2 gold out of them).

The party moved to counter ambush the hidden goblins and the kobold/goblin witch moved in behind the party. As the party attacked the witch reached up and misfortune hexed one of the two melee PCs. I threw in a free action end of the disguise on the witch as he used his single move toward the other goblins. Unfortunately, tandom Sleeps from the Sorcerer and Bard took out 6 of the 8 goblins. The other melee PC (dwarf fighter) ran up and smacked the witch pretty hard and a ranged attack (magic missile maybe) also added some damage, putting the witch in bad shape.

The remaining two goblins engaged the misfortuned PC while the witch cackled to keep that going and Deep Slumbered the Dwarf and bard out of the fight. Unfortunately, this left the seriously wounded witch unable to move away from the remaining party members, who did him in in the next round.

Under normal circumstances I would have run away rather than cackle, but my whole objective was to see if I could keep a misfortune hex going.

In the end the witch was just too squishy to use a touch attack and then give up a move every round just to keep one PC hindered.

I think a 30 foot range would have made a big difference. Also, misfortune gives up a full half action of the witch's in exchange for maybe messing up the opponent's action. It does not come out as a positive trade. In order to be worth taking the cost (standard action) should be worth benefit. It didn't seem to be. And even the cackle, that reduced the cost for extra rounds down to just a Move action, still didn't provide the bang needed for the buck demanded. Bumping up the duration to two rounds (initial and per cackle) might make a good improvement. The witch still has to keep the ball spinning, but still has a chance to do something else to benefit from the trick.

The nature of the build was fun and it was a good little encounter. But the players would have been really surprised if I had told them that they had just taken out a L6 NPC. I'd say it was CR3, 4 tops.


Please remove the Bonus Bestiary from this order.

Thanks


Please split

The order contains the following items:

1 x Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Bestiary (OGL) Hardcover (preorder) @ 33.99 = $33.99
1 x Pathfinder Chronicles: Seekers of Secrets -- A Guide to the Pathfinder Society (PFRPG) (preorder) @ 16.99 = $16.99
1 x Pathfinder Chronicles: Princes of Darkness -- Book of the Damned Volume 1 (PFRPG) Print Edition (preorder) @ 16.99 = $16.99

thanks


I get the reasoning behind why APs stop at around level 15.
But I'd also really like to see the new and improved PF worked all the way through to level 20.

It seems to me it should be reasonable tp have our cake and eat it too on this one.

Leave the APs as they are. Council of Thieves will end after #30 at around level 13, and obviously that is not going to change.

But why not release a new L14 module set in or around Westcrown that assumes the CoT AP has happened. It could stand alone or be easily run as "the further adventures of..." This could extend all the way to L20, with disrupting the core AP structure.

please?


I read somewhere that the core book would *possibly* be shipped ahead of the true release date so that subscribers would not be stuck waiting until after everyone else has one to get their own.

I'm not at all certain if this was accurate. I don't recall where I read it.

Is there any truth to it?

I am leaving on a trip early on Saturday the 15th and would LOVE to take the book with me. But it has to be in my hands by Friday the 14th. Is there any way I can assure this? Can I make separate shipping arrangements for this one item? Or what are my options?

Thanks

(It really would suck for a subscription to mean you are still looking in your mail box two weeks after non-subscribers bought theirs)


I think that the new system has done a great thing in getting rid of 1/2 ranks and I like the direction it has taken.

However, in the games I have played so far the class niche system has shown to be overly gutted by the rules as they stand. With the only difference between a class skill and a non-class skill being a rather trivial 3 point bonus.

My proposed solution is to limit the number of skill points which may be spent in non class skills at a given level. This allows character to still splash into any side skills they want, but tends to keep the fighter in the fighter realm and the rogue in the rogue realm, etc...

I understand that some people prefer the anything goes approach. But I think it is vastly better to have a well defined base system and encourage DMs to offer more choices to players as they see fit than to leave the core overly open and expect DMs to set their own limitations.

Letting a player choose extra skills is a "nice DM" thing, but if the rules remain as they are now and yet you want to keep with the idea of niches, then you are forced to take away from the players.

I've played with limiting cross class skills to 1 point per level. I also allow Rogues 2 points and give Bards an ability to spend as they see fit (which hardly matters anyway). It has been an improvement for me.


So, the party got to the Graul's place last night.
The rogue walks up to the porch and says...
"These guys are too dumb to have any traps."

LOL Fun quickly followed.


Hey Guys,

Congrats on a particularly sweet issue.

And the little magic item illos in The Death of Lashmire were an extra nice touch.