Chief Sharky's page

For the purposes of the Raging Throw feat would a Skald count as having the rage class feature? Could he spend a round of raging song for inspired rage instead of a round of rage to activate the feat's ability? I know Skalds can't share rage powers which require spending rounds of rage, but Raging Throw is a feat rather than a rage power and wouldn't be shared.

I think that by RAW it looks like this probably wouldn't work, but I'm not sure if some rulings might have been made about Skalds and rage which might let it work after all.

I thought there was a rule that aquatic creatures could do normal damage with their natural weapons while underwater even if those weapons deal bludgeoning or slashing damage. This seems sensible to me since otherwise a giant octopus might only do half damage with its tentacles. Then again, maybe the fact that you get to do full bludgeoning damage while grappling is why an octopus likes grappling so much.

A lot of aquatic creatures use Bites, and those would do full damage due to the piercing component. It is the tentacles and claws I'm worried about though it was a draugr's slam which made me think of all this. With Improved Natural Attack it does 2d8 base damage, which might still be pretty decent even after it gets halved.

Now it makes me wonder about Water Elementals too though. They only have slam attacks and don't seem to concentrate on grappling, so do they inflict half damage in their native environment? Should creatures with the Water subtype do full damage underwater? Are there rules on any of this anywhere?

I'm wondering what abilities an Imp Consular would or wouldn't gain when using Change Shape to assume the form of a Tiny or Small animal. The rules for Change Shape say that you gain "any other abilities of the creature it mimics", but I'm not 100% sure whether that means you get all of the creature's physical abilities or just whatever the spell equivalent power you're using would normally entitle you to. For the Imp Consular that's Beast Shape II and the list of abilities is: climb 60 feet, fly 60 feet (good maneuverability), swim 60 feet, darkvision 60 feet, low-light vision, scent, grab, pounce, and trip.

I'm guessing that the latter interpretation is what's intended, but the former would be pretty cool since it would let an Imp who turns into a skunk use Musk. This would make the roleplaying angle of turning my PC's skunk familiar into an Imp work a little better. If that won't pan out I can probably figure out a way for him to cast Drunkard's Breath (only not "breath" exactly). This doesn't need to be effective. I just figure that a skunk should be able to stink. This particular skunk just died and needs to come back from Hell better this time though ("Ah! Smell the brimstone! Mr. Stinkums has returned!")

Anyhow, here are the rules for Change Shape...

Change Shape (Su)
A creature with this special quality has the ability to assume the appearance of a specific creature or type of creature (usually a humanoid), but retains most of its own physical qualities. A creature cannot change shape to a form more than one size category smaller or larger than its original form. This ability functions as a polymorph spell, the type of which is listed in the creature’s description, but the creature does not adjust its ability scores (although it gains any other abilities of the creature it mimics). Unless otherwise stated, it can remain in an alternate form indefinitely. Some creatures, such as lycanthropes, can transform into unique forms with special modifiers and abilities. These creatures do adjust their ability scores, as noted in their descriptions.
Format: change shape (wolf, beast shape I); Location: SQ, and in Special Abilities for creatures with a unique listing.

My PC can wear a Cruel+Keen amulet of mighty fists to make his Bite Keen and his Bite and unarmed strikes Cruel. He can also wear a Bodywrap of Mighty Strikes to make his Bite or unarmed strikes +2 for several attacks per round. What I'm not sure about is whether those attacks would still be Cruel (and possibly Keen) as well as +2. If so that would be a nice combo. I think that combining the AoMF with Greater Magic Fang would clearly work, so I'm hoping that the bodywrap can function in a similar manner.

I just noticed that the Ultimate Combat errata removed Superstition as a prerequisite for Ghost Rager. That makes Ghost Rager kind of interesting for my Feral Gnasher. The fact he's focused on grappling and intimidation have traditionally made incorporeal undead one of his least favorite types of foes, and getting hit by them usually sucks a lot too.

One thing which isn't entirely clear to me is whether dealing "normal damage to incorporeal creatures even when using nonmagical weapons" means that he'll deal FULL damage to incorporeal creatures regardless of what weapon he uses or just that he'll be able to deal half damage even if the weapon isn't magical. I expect the former, and that's how I've seen it played in the past, but I just figured I'd double check before selecting this Rage Power and later regretting it. Ghost Touch weapons aren't very expensive, after all, and the Guarded Stance rage power could give me more AC against all types of foes (though I don't particularly want to stand around spending a Move action to get it)

#1 - The "Aberian's Folly" section of page 32 reads," Doors are of heavy oak and carved with images of capering devils (DC 30 Disable Device to open when locked; DC 26 Strength check to break down)"
#2 - The description for "Crosael's Chambers" (room A9 on page 34) states, "Although she keeps both doors locked at all times, she knows better than to keep evidence of her tiefling heritage here. A small cabinet at the foot of her bed is also locked (DC30 Disable Device to open)". Since there's no specific DC given for Crosael's doors the statement in #1 would cause me to assume that they're probably supposed to be DC30.
#3 - The DC30 locked cabinet in Crosael's DC30 locked room contains an iron key to open the locked door in the Main Attic (A45 on page 36). Per the description for room A45 that door is also DC30 though the description for the adjacent room (North Attic A51 on page 37) says that the lock if DC35.

Assuming the DC30 values are correct there's little point infiltrating Crosael's DC30 room to get into her DC30 cabinet and obtain the key to the DC30 lock in the attic. I guess if the attic lock is really DC35 like room A51 says then there's a point if your PCs can hit DC30 but not DC35 on Disable Device. My PCs couldn't even hit DC30 though, so the entire adventure almost fell apart. On the fly I ruled that the locks on Crosael's room were only DC25, and the PCs had a little adventure stealthily hauling the "small cabinet" out of Crosael's room through the nearby Servant Entrance to an area behind the stables. Out there they smashed their way in though they were nearly caught by the improvised stable boy NPC and his improvised dog before sneaking back into the mansion and finally, finally making their way into the North Attic to find the Asmodean Knot.

Overall I think the players had fun and might not even know that I fudged things a little to make the adventure work. I wonder how things are "supposed" to work when the party doesn't have anybody who can hit DC30 on Disable Device though. I mean, maybe the players should have invested more heavily in that skill since the AP is called "Council of THIEVES", but apparently +7 is the best anybody could come up with (+9 with masterwork tools still wouldn't be quite enough)

I read over last night's section of the adventure again, and I didn't see anything where NPCs give the party a magic item which might help or maybe a key that I might have missed. I guess I could have made Calseinica suddenly and inexplicably good at opening locks or perhaps had one of the other NPCs offer to help, but the fact that the adventure only seemed to offer one obvious path to success (make a DC30 Disable Device check) seemed surprising to me.

It sounds like once a Weasel attaches it automatically maintains the grapple and inflicts Bite damage each round. That's rather different from the Stirge, which makes a CMB check each round to maintain the grapple but gets a +8 on it. Of course the stirge also attaches with a touch attack and does Con damage, so that's not the only difference.

Is it correct to assume that once a Weasel Bites somebody it keeps on doing 1d3-4 damage each round until killed or removed with a successful CMB check? It doesn't seem like that should be tough given the Weasel's CMD of 6, but since somebody is taking a Weasel familiar I'm guessing this will come up at some point.

I might need to start running a new campaign as soon as Sunday (tomorrow). The first session will likely consist of little besides character generation, but it might be nice to give folks some background on what sort of adventure they're generating characters for. Since I've just purchased some Hell's Rebels PDFs from the Humble charity sale I'm thinking of using that Adventure Path as the basis of the campaign.

I'm hoping folks can give me some impressions on whether Hell's Rebels is a fun AP as well as whether it would be good for players who aren’t very experienced with Pathfinder. Everybody involved has played RPGs before though one guy hasn’t played in around 20 years and another two haven’t played Pathfinder before though they have some experience with AD&D and possibly 3e (not sure how much of the latter). The fourth player is very experienced with the Pathfinder ruleset.

I have Crimson Throne and Legacy of Fire available as backup options. The experienced player is currently in a Council of Thieves game and has been through Kingmaker, Rise of the Runelords, Savage Tide, and Second Darkness. I’m looking for something I can run with minimal preparation away from home though, so the fact that Hell’s Rebels seems to have a Pathfinder Pawn set seems like it could be pretty helpful.

Are there any potential gotchas I should worry about here? Maybe this is the hardest AP ever and inexperienced players could have a tough time? Maybe the adventure is boring, tough to run, etc? There aren't a lot of reviews out there yet, so I'm seeking input from those who might have played, run, or at least read the AP. I'll probably check out the Player's Guide here shortly.

The Duck and Cover feat says that "you receive a +2 cover bonus to your AC against ranged attacks as long as your ally is wielding a shield". Per its description, a buckler is a "small metal shield". Is it "wielded" though?

If a creature is killed and then made into a Juju Zombie does it retain any special abilities the original creature had which aren't incompatible with the undead type?

For instance, if there's an outsider which has Regeneration 5 it would lose that when it becomes a Juju Zombie since you need to have a Constitution score to have Regeneration and undead don't have one. What if the same creature had Scorching Ray as a spell-like ability though? Would the Juju Zombie still have that SLA?

The description says that the Juju Zombie "retains the skills and abilities it possessed in life", but I'm not sure if that's just flavor text or really means it. The actual rules for the template don't seem to say one way or the other.

I play a Feral Gnasher who is going to get a feat next level. I was considering Pinning Knockout since he has the prerequisites. It seems clear that he could maintain the grapple and inflict double his unarmed strike damage. I think he'd also get to apply Constrict damage from his Belt of Anaconda's Coils. What I'm not sure about is whether he could take a -4 on his CMB check to inflict non-lethal damage with his Bite, which is a light weapon, and then double that.

If so that would be really impressive damage though explaining how it looks in roleplaying terms might be a little tricky (maybe he beats you against the floor or something). Anyhow, before deciding if this is a good idea I'd like to verify whether it is a legal one.

How should the Quicken Spell Like Ability feat interact with the Divine Source universal path ability? I can imagine this working a few different ways:
#1 - The QSLA feat would allow the PC to cast any of the spells gained from Divine Source as a swift action 3 times per day.
#2 - The QSLA feat would allow the PC to pick one daily "spell slot" of a certain level and use an SLA with it as a swift action 3 times per day (though since each slot can only be used once per day the PC would have to recharge the slot's uses somehow - which there are probably ways to do)
#3 - The QSLA feat would allow the PC to cast one particular spell granted by Divine Source as a swift action 3 times per day (once again possibly requiring a recharge)

I think that #1 seems unlikely since QSLA has level limits for the spells which can be used. In my mind #2 seems pretty reasonable, but I could imagine #3 being right too. I suppose that there could be other possible interpretations which I haven't imagined yet or that these two abilities might just be incompatible. I think Divine Source looks like it could be fun for one of my PCs from a roleplaying perspective, but he'd probably be a lot more likely to use the SLAs if they could be used as swift actions.

Web searches have turned up several discussions about stacking the bloody and burning skeleton templates. Most folks seem to think that stacking them is legal. Most folks also seem to think that the Hit Dice cost to animate such a creature should be tripled though FrankTheDM feels it should be quadrupled (and maybe he’s right for all I know)

I’d be interested to know if there’s a general consensus on the HD cost, but there’s also another question which I haven’t seen addressed. What Charisma score would a skeleton which was both bloody and burning have? Since skeletons usually have 10 Charisma but adding these variants can increase that to 12 or 14 I’d guess that the highest value is the one which counts. Maybe that’s just the viewpoint of a self-serving necromancer though. What do folks think?

Given the season I'm kind of imagining explosive undead turkeys and "flaming turkey wings".

Click here to see our scary jack-o-lanterns, one of which was based on my goblin PC, Chief Sharky. I doubt that many of our trick or treaters were familiar with Paizo style goblins, but they seemed to really like how it looked.

Here's another photo which is less artistic (because I'm a terrible photographer) but shows a little more detail. As might be obvious, I made the "ears" with the pieces of pumpkin I cut out to form the mouth. Hopefully folks might find the idea amusing, and maybe there will be more "goblins" next Halloween. I figure that Paizo goblins would appreciate the fact that jack-o-lanterns are scary and on fire.

If you gain a familiar or animal companion from variant multiclassing what spells can you share with it? You don't gain spells from the secondary class, so I'm afraid that the answer might be "None". I guess the answer also might be that you can share any spells you gain from other classes which are also on the spell list of your secondary class.

For instance, could a Cleric with the Luck domain could cast True Strike on a familiar gained from a Wizard VMC, or would only actual Wizard spells work? (which seems like kind of a shame since the PC will probably never have any of those besides a single level 0)

My Dirty Fighter recently got the Dirty Trick Master feat, and a bunch of questions have come up. One which will probably get asked a lot is...

#1 - What happens when a flying creature is pinned with a Dirty Trick?
A - It falls to the ground immediately
B - It falls to the ground on its next turn
C - It stays where it is and can keep on flying if it uses a standard action to remove the pinned condition on its next turn
D - You tell me

On a related note, we’re assuming that if a flying creature falls 10 or more feet it takes falling damage and therefore ends up prone. This leads into another question, which is whether creatures which fly with wings need to stand up from being prone before flying. If not would the transition out of the prone position still trigger an AoO, or does starting to fly remove the prone condition with no penalty?

Another question likely to come up is whether a creature falling out of your threatened area triggers an AoO. I’d think that the answer should be yes. If I made that AoO with a natural weapon which has Grab and managed to grapple the falling foe I guess I’d probably also be able to finish my full attack. That would be a weird situation since the enemy would be pinned by the Dirty Trick condition but grappled by the PC. Usually the Pinned condition supersedes the Grappled condition, so I’m not sure what should happen here.

#2 - If you’re grappled by a creature while you’re pinned by a Dirty Trick
A - You can use a standard action to end the pinned condition, and since the pinned condition supersedes the grappled condition you’re free
B - You can make a CMB check to break the grapple, and if it succeeds you break both the grapple and the pin
C - You can use a standard action to end the pinned condition, but you’re still grappled until you make a CMB check to break the grapple
D - You can make a CMB check to break the grapple, but if it succeeds you’re still pinned until you use a standard action to remove the pinned condition
E - Both options C and D are valid
F - You tell me

A more general question is what's supposed happen when one creature which flies with wings grapples another. Do they both fall? Do they fall unless the grappler can carry the victim while flying? Does falling break the grapple?

In a recent game one of my PCs grappled a foe but then got Repositioned into flank by him. The resulting full attack worth of sneak attacks from the grappled enemy's buddy was way more effective than just breaking free from my PC's grapple. I guess it was a pretty clever move on the DM’s part, and it got me thinking about what other combat maneuvers might or might not work while you’re grappled and whether or not any of them should be able to break the grapple.

- Bull Rush: It doesn’t seem like being grappled would stop you from pushing somebody. I wonder if pushing them away would break the grapple though. If a Bull Rush would break a grapple it seems like a potentially superior method compared to just making a CMB check to escape the grapple since you’d also create some distance. If Bull Rush wouldn't break the grapple could you move with the foe even though you normally wouldn't be allowed to move while grappled?
- Drag: Once again, can you move while grappled if you’re making a CMB check to move somebody? It certainly works if you're the one controlling the grapple and you make a Grapple check to move the foe. I'm not sure if other maneuvers should work too.
- Reposition: If you used the last 5 feet of movement to force the enemy into a space which isn’t adjacent to you would that break the grapple? (if not guess you just wouldn’t be able to move the enemy away)
- Trip: I guess you could attempt to Trip an enemy who is grappling you. Even if this didn’t break the grapple it would make it tougher to maintain and easier to escape later.

Anyhow, since most creatures can’t make AoOs while grappling it seems like the grappled foe is free to attempt just about any maneuver without suffering an AoO even without the right feats. If you had feats which grant a bonus to a specific sort of check it might be to your advantage to use the maneuver if possible though. I wonder if other folks have run into similar situations in their games and how they might have ruled on them.

I saw a magic item recently which grants a +5 bonus on Intimidate checks, boosts the DC of any fear effects you create by +1, and allows you to reduce the severity of a fear effect affecting you up to 3 times per day. The only problem is now that my PC is about to get some treasure I can't seem to find any record of such an item either in a book or on the web. I think it was for the headband or possibly head slot, but I can't remember the name.

Does such an item exist? If so can somebody tell me what it is called and where it comes from?

Last night our party had the misfortune of meeting what I've concluded were probably Advanced Movanic Deva Nightmare Lords. It was a misfortune not so much because of the difficulty of the encounter, which almost killed at least 2 of the PCs, but because of the difficulty of figuring out how stuff interacted with the antimagic fields which 2 of the 3 tainted angels created.

Stuff like magic weapons and my Viking's +4 Str belt not working in the AMF was easy enough to figure out and agree on if not so easy to remember. As my PC moved in and out of AMF he also had Haste, Inspire Courage, and Bless flickering off and back on. Everybody agreed that if the Inquisitor shot her +1 bane arrows into the AMF they wouldn't be +1 or bane by the time they hit the enemy, but I thought that maybe certain other bonuses on ranged attacks should still help. For example...

- Inspire Courage: You can't get the bonuses from Inspire Courage when you're in an AMF, but would the bonus to attack rolls and damage (or at least attack rolls) still apply when you're outside the AMF but making ranged attacks into it?
- Diviner's Fortune: Basically the same question as Inspire Courage except this is an insight bonus to attacks rolls instead of competence (which probably doesn't matter except that they stack)

I'm assuming that a magic belt of +4 Dex would still add to your ranged attack bonuses from outside the AMF since the Dex bonus is part of your PC, not part of the weapon you're attacking with. Similarly, I'm guessing I'd still get +2 damage from a belt of +4 Str when I'm throwing a weapon from outside the AMF since the bonus damage comes from the PC rather than being a magical effect on the weapon. Does that all make sense, or am I missing something?

I feel less sure about the bonus damage from Inspire Courage. I mean, is it a bonus to the weapon's damage, or would it be a bonus to the attacker's damage like having a higher Str? Is it magical damage of some sort, or does it just magically allow you to do more damage? As far as the bonus to the attack roll goes, I can understand people deciding that wouldn't count anymore once the thrown weapon flies into the AMF, but to me it seems like you aren't aiming the weapon anymore after you throw it, so the chance to hit shouldn't change after the weapon enters the AMF unless there's some magical bonus to hit on the weapon itself.

I’m about to begin running a Council of Thieves AP based game for just 2 PCs. I’ve decided to start them at 3rd level on the assumption that the APL to CR should work out. Half the PCs means double the XP, so they should stay around 2 levels ahead for the rest of the campaign. One PC is taking a familiar, and they’ll both have the option to get cohorts, so I’m not really worried that they’ll find the AP too difficult. What I am a little worried about is that they’ll find the AP irrelevant for their PCs.

One of the players is my girlfriend, and my girlfriend likes rats. Her family used to keep them as pets, and she really liked the cover of the 3.5 Complete Mage book with the albino mage who has white rats crawling on her shoulders. It was only a matter of time before she chose to play a rat based PC, and she selected ratfolk as her PC’s race. That in itself might have been OK, but when she announced this to the group the other player decided to play a ratfolk too so they could use the Swarming ability. Flanking brings to mind sneak attacking, and soon my girlfriend noticed that the Vivisectionist archetype for Alchemists not only has sneak attack but can be combined with the ratfolk specific Plague Bringer archetype. The other player thought the party should have a divine caster and noticed that the Cult Leader archetype of Warpriest gets sneak attack. This led to a decision that the other PC should be a Cult Leader of Ghlaunder. For some reason these PCs have listed alignments of Neutral and Chaotic Neutral instead of Crazy Evil, but it is a little tough for me to see how the disease obsessed servants of a CE deity will fit into the campaign.

Another idea which just struck me is how cults of Ghlaunder are often pretty secretive and even masquerade as religions devoted to other deities real or imagined. I'm not sure if "tricking" the campaign's NPCs into Ghlaunder worship would work out well or just implode. I'm kind of imagining what a Ghlaunder cult masquerading as a cult of "the ghost of Aroden" might be like and can't quite put the pieces together yet. Of course whatever cult the PC is leading should probably be mostly the player's creation. Maybe I could offer some hints about how to fit in a little better though, possibly some ways to make it a little like the scary version of Masonry often implied in Jack the Ripper movies or the Sleepy Hollow TV show, an organization that seems harmless or even beneficial at the edges but gets more and more rotten and dangerous as your approach the secret core.

I think there's probably some way I could spin this to make the AP work for the PCs who the players want to play. Reading the rest of the AP will probably help, and I'm hoping some folks here will have ideas for me too. I can't imagine that some of that advice won't come with pretty bad spoilers in it, so I'll beg anybody who doesn't want to accidentally see some Council of Thieves secrets not to visit this thread again since hiding the entire thread with spoiler buttons seems impractical. I did consider posting this to the Council of Thieves forum, but I figured Advice probably gets way more traffic and there might be plenty of people who have already played CoT or don't plan to who might be able to offer some advice or ideas here.

Can you use the intimidate skill to demoralize a foe who is already demoralized? It seems that you can based on the fact that the description of the intimidate skill specifically mentions: “Using demoralize on the same creature only extends the duration; it does not create a stronger fear condition.” What I’m a little less sure of is whether demoralizing an already demoralized foe with the intimidate skill would “count” as demoralizing the foe so that you could trigger trigger another swift action attack from the Hurtful feat. This could come up when multiple creatures with the Hurtful feat attempt to use it against a single foe or when a single creature with the Hurtful feat attempts to use it against a particular foe repeatedly over the course of multiple rounds. Hurtful says that you get to make the swift action attack, “When you successfully demoralize an opponent within your melee reach with an Intimidate check”.

The case for - I successfully “used demoralize” against a foe (possibly with a +5 to the DC), so I should get my free attack. I’m assuming that “using demoralize” successfully means basically the same thing as “successfully demoralize”.

The case against - Since the foe is already demoralized I can’t demoralize it again, kind of like I can’t trip an already tripped foe. Extending the duration of the shaken effect from demoralize by “using demoralize on the same creature” doesn’t actually count as successfully demoralizing the creature. Instead it counts “only” as extending the duration of an existing shaken effect and can't trigger anything else since it "only" does that.

I'll admit that the case against might be kind of a strawman since I'm basically arguing against myself here, but it is honestly the best idea I could come up with regarding why this shouldn't work. I wonder what other folks think though. Is “using demoralize” on an already demoralized foe a legal way to trigger the swift action attack from the Hurtful feat? If so is it a fair and balanced use, or would you call it abusing a loophole? Also, does anybody understand whether the durations are supposed to stack or overlap? Based on the language I'd guess that they stack, but I wouldn't say that I feel sure.

I have a Feral Gnasher with the Grab ability. He's also the Intimidating Glare rage power and is very excited about the change in Unchained which allows you to use Str rather than Cha for intimidate while you're raging. Since he'll be much more likely to succeed at demoralizing foes now it seems like Hurtful might be a good feat for him to take. Getting an extra attack as a swift action seems nice since this PC usually just makes 1 bite attack per round and nobody in our party knows the Haste spell. I wonder how all of this would interact with Grab and subsequent grapple checks though.

After intimidating an adjacent foe as a move action the PC could make a melee attack as a swift action. He'd choose to use his bite, and that has Grab. Assuming that the PC succeeded on his CMB check he'd now be grappling the foe. At that point he could use a standard action to attack the same foe or another one with an unarmed strike, but I'm not sure whether or not he could use a standard action to grapple the grappled foe again without letting it go first.

I know that if you grapple a foe with a standard action you need to wait until the next round to "maintain" the grapple with a Move action using Greater Grapple. This is even pointed out again in the Combat Trick for Greater Grapple in Unchained. In this case I'd be using a standard action to perform the grapple maneuver as normal. I'd just be doing it against a foe I've already got grappled. I'm not sure if that's legal. I'd assume that it would be legal to perform other maneuvers like disarm on the foe without releasing him from the grapple, but using the grapple maneuver against somebody who is already grappled might be an exception I suppose (like you can't Trip somebody who is already prone)

What do folks think? Can you grapple a grappled foe? If so would you be able to use options like damaging or pinning the foe, or would you just get Constrict damage? (assuming you have that ability)

I have a few questions for folks to consider and comment on:
1 - Does falling on water while under the effects of Water Walk cause damage?
2 - Can somebody under the effects of Water Walk be pulled underwater, perhaps by a submerged octopus?
3 - How do you stop using the effects of a Ring of Water Walking?

This is all stuff which came up during a recent session. I don't really know what to think about the first two questions. For the third I'm guessing that either you'd need to deactivate the ring with a standard action (kind of like dismissing a spell) or maybe take it off as a move action but then be left holding a ring.

I was making a custom monster to go with a mini I have when I realized that I'm not sure how the "hybrid" classes should interact with the rules for advancing monsters with class levels. The "chassis" I decided to build on was an Aboleth with the Young template (since the mini is Large rather than Huge)

The Aboleth has pretty good Charisma, and it seemed fun for this monster to be able to act in a support role before it moves into combat directly. I figured that a Bard might be fun. The Aboleth (perhaps somewhat oddly) is classified as a "Combat Role" monster, so Bard would be a non-key class. Then I thought about Skald. It is mostly like Bard and gets roughly similar combat bonuses (+4 Str/Con vs +2 or +3 to attacks and damage at the levels I'm looking at) along with a few Rage Powers. Are those enough to turn a non-key class Bard into a key class Barbarian though?

I'm inclined to say yes since I'd rather be a little conservative with CR, but I wonder if anybody has seen guidelines on hybrid classes for monsters somewhere.

I have a few mapping questions. The first is whether there's any free and easy to use dungeon mapping tool out there which produces decent looking full color dungeon maps and allows you to use custom tiles. I'm looking for something like the defunct Dungeon Crafter III with the added ability to open previously saved maps to work on them again (a feature which I guess never quite got developed in DC3). Some more advanced features might be nice too, but if I need a map to be extra fancy I can haul it into something like Paint.Net or GIMP and add some layers. I'm mostly just looking for something to whip up quick maps with the ability to use some custom tiles. Some of the online mapping tools seem to have pretty limited tile sets...maybe I just don't know the best tools to use or how to use them though...assistance would be appreciated!

The second question is whether anybody out there has some good "jungle" maps they could share with me or links to sites which have them. At the moment I'm looking for encounter sized maps of jungle locations such as a ruined temple, a makeshift village, and if possible a mansion/inn/villa type building with balconies. I'll be running some adventures starting tomorrow evening, and I'd like to offer the players something nicer than my modest and rather slow wet erase marker drawings on a vinyl mat. Obviously I'm a little short on prep time at this point, and DC3 isn't particularly good for outdoor scenes anyhow since everything is drawn with square tiles.

I'm just looking to print maps out for now and have found that the Poster Razor app is helpful for that. A friend of mine has been using a projector lately though, and I might switch to that or a table with an LCD TV in it at some point. Does anybody have some experience with tables which incorporate a TV and what the challenges are?

As frequently happens my Orc PC fell under the influence of an enemy spellcaster last night, failing his save against Dominate Person despite a high d20 roll due to negative levels. While dominated the orc was commanded to do some things against his nature, and the DM granted an additional saving throw at +2 per the spell description. I spent a hero point for +8 but still failed the save since I was adjacent to an Anti-Paladin with Aura of Despair, which gives enemies within 10' a -2 on all saves. My primary question here is whether I should still qualify as an enemy when I've been Dominated by the Anti-Paladin's ally and master.

I ask not only to find out if I "should have" made that second save but in case such situations come up again in the future. That doesn't seem unlikely since Will saves are a notable weakness of this PC and while I'll be taking some steps to shore that up I'd expect to keep on getting Charmed, Confused, and Dominated pretty regularly since the PC has high AC and generally does pretty well in melee.

Is there any reason why you can't use the familiar archetypes from Familiar Folio on an Improved Familiar? I wonder how the Mauler's Increased Strength and Battle Form would interact with the Change Shape ability of imps and quasits. Since Change Shape doesn't change Str I'm guessing that the boost from the Increased Strength ability would stay intact. I'm not sure if you could use the extra +2 from Battle Form though or if it would let you move smaller forms up to Medium size. I'm kind of guessing not though it might be fun to fly around on a man-sized "Bat out of Hell" with 20+ Str.

The Ride skill includes this potentially divisive capability.

Cover: You can react instantly to drop down and hang alongside your mount, using it as cover. You can't attack or cast spells while using your mount as cover. If you fail your Ride check, you don't get the cover benefit. Using this option is an immediate action, but recovering from this position is a move action (no check required).

Since the Ride check is made as an immediate action I'm pretty confident that you can choose to make it when an enemy attacks you on their turn. I'd assume that the cover you gain is soft cover since it is being provided by another creature (your mount). This often leads to the question of whether an attack aimed at you which misses because of this soft cover should hit the mount instead or at least be resolved against the mount's AC. It seems to me that the RAW are silent on whether there's a chance for an attack which misses because of soft cover to hit the cover instead (barring some specific circumstances such as the Body Shield feat). Would folks agree that by RAW there's no chance of the mount getting hit by the attack instead of the rider?

Of course the enemy could direct any further attacks at the mount, and since using Mounted Combat to protect the mount is also an immediate action using one would usually preclude the other. In this manner at least there's some potential "cost" to using the Cover option beyond the Move action you have to spend to get back to normal (which itself can be a pretty big cost)

I'm primarily interested in making sure the RAW work the way I think though I'd also be interested in knowing how people feel about the Cover trick in general.

You can typically use Grab on creatures of up to your own Size category unless your specific Grab ability text says otherwise. The Feral Gnasher archetype for Goblin Barbarians gains the ability to use Grab on increasingly larger creatures as the character gains levels. Nowhere in the Pathfinder rules though can I find any information regarding a size limit for using Grapple. I'm guessing that either:
A) There is no size limit. You can try to Grapple whatever you'd like, but the CMD of big, strong creatures might make it difficult
B) Although the rules don't say it, the expectation is that you can only Grapple creatures of up to one Size category larger than yourself.

If situation B is (or "should be") the case I wonder how the Feral Gnasher's ability to Grab larger creatures would interact with that. I'd guess that maybe it should allow the FG to use Grapple on larger creatures as well. For instance, it would be kind of silly if a 9th level FG could use Grab on Large creatures but couldn't actually grapple them. A few older threads I dredged up seemed to favor interpretation A, but I never saw an official ruling or developer comment. I'd expect to experience some table variation either way as DMs might decide that even if a goblin rolls a nat 20 to grapple he can't stop Cthulhu from moving.

I was wondering if Spell Kenning allows the Skald to write scrolls of the spells he casts with it. The rules for item creation say:
"Note that all items have prerequisites in their descriptions. These prerequisites must be met for the item to be created. Most of the time, they take the form of spells that must be known by the item's creator (although access through another magic item or spellcaster is allowed). The DC to create a magic item increases by +5 for each prerequisite the caster does not meet. The only exception to this is the requisite item creation feat, which is mandatory. In addition, you cannot create potions, spell-trigger, or spell-completion magic items without meeting their spell prerequisites."

Scrolls are spell completion items, so you have to meet the spell prerequisite. The rules say you can meet the prerequisite via a magic item or another spellcaster. It sounds like casting the spell from a scroll would work fine for that since a scroll would fall under "another magic item". I'm not sure if a Skald casting the spell via Spell Kenning would count though since it isn't clear if it is the spellcaster casting the spell which meets the prerequisite or the spellcaster knowing the spell (though he or she would still need to cast it too)

If casting a spell via scroll without knowing it works then maybe casting a spell via Spell Kenning without knowing it would work too. On the other hand, maybe it wouldn't since Spell Kenning isn't a "magic item"...not sure...

I'm a little confused about how the Skald's Inspired Rage song works for allies. In particular, I'm concerned that by RAW the allies might lose the benefits of the song in between turns. The rules say:
"If a raging song affects allies, when the skald begins a raging song and at the start of each ally's turn in which they can hear the raging song, the skald's allies must decide whether to accept or refuse its effects. This is not an action. Unconscious allies automatically accept the song. If accepted, the raging song's effects last for that ally's turn or until the song ends, whichever comes first."

It seems like this might mean an ally drops out of rage when his turn ends. That would be kind of disappointing since you wouldn't get bonuses on AoOs. It could also be dangerous if the bonus hit points suddenly disappear. Even worse, it would make a lot of the Rage Powers a Skald could grant to allies kind of useless. For instance, Beast Totem's natural armor bonus would be a nice buff, but it wouldn't help much if it only applies during the ally's turn, not outside of his turn when enemies are actually attacking him.

Am I reading this rule too strictly RAW and missing the RAI, or is this stuff all intentional? Have there been any rulings or developer comments on this? I tried a few searches, but I couldn't come up with anything.

Would you allow a PC to take an Awakened animal as a cohort? If so how would you generate that cohort’s ability scores?

My concept is to get one of Odin's ravens to assist my Viking on his adventures. It would be easy enough to acquire a raven familiar via Eldritch Heritage, and that had been my original plan. A familiar with the same skill ranks as the Viking wouldn't be very good at Knowledge skills though, and those are one of the primary areas our party needs help in.

I recently took Shield Slam with my rather shield focused Viking. If you knock somebody into a wall or other solid surface with Shield Slam they fall prone. In my first session with the feat a few situations came up where I knocked flying foes into walls. Since you can't trip flying foes we sort of assumed that you just can't knock them prone in general. I'm not sure if that's 100% true though, and I wonder what other folks think.

I've decided to take a level of Monk with my Dirty Fighter so that he can qualify for Vicious Stomp more easily. Upon reviewing my options it looks like the Flowing Monk archetype would give me some nice chances to trip and debuff my foes. I have two questions though:
#1 - If you use Reposition and succeed on the CMB check to trip the opponent does the opponent actually fall prone, or is he just sickened?
#2 - Making the saving throw against the sickened effect halves the duration. What happens if the opponent makes the saving throw when the duration is only 1 round?

After some searching I've seen questions similar to the first one answered "Yes" numerous times in other threads, but I want to check and make sure there haven't been any official updates (especially to the contrary). The second question seems trickier. It would be weird if the duration were half a round, so I figure it probably either drops to 0 rounds or stays at 1 round.

I have a PC who will be taking a level of Monk to get Combat Reflexes and qualify for Vicious Stomp more easily. He likes using a flail to trip people, so I want to verify that his unarmed AoO from Vicious Stomp would still get his full Str mod as a bonus to damage. In other words, since his Str is 20 I think his Vicious Stomp will do 1d6+5 damage. If so that's pretty cool. I don't see any reason why this shouldn't work. I just figure that it seems like the sort of thing which other players are likely to question since they haven't seen it in action before.

I started describing the final battle of our Second Darkness game in one of the healing threads, and it seems like people had some questions and assertions they might want to discuss. I figured it might be more polite to start a separate thread than to hijack that one.

As a basic synopsis, we’ve spent several sessions fighting a couple of 18th level casters who are guarded by what appear to be CR19 golems with True Seeing (possibly advanced advanced giant giant shield guardian iron golems based on their Gargarntuan size and +36 attack bonus). There were also at least four 13th level drow Clerics along with half a dozen “bodyguards” and 3-4 “archers” (maybe around 11th level Fighters?). There was also a 14th level drow Sorcerer who apparently used a readied action to hit us all with Waves of Exhaustion the moment we got the double doors to the temple open. It turns out that teleporting and summoning are both impossible in the temple. There’s also a layer of poisonous smoke 20 feet up which offers access to an extradimensional or extraplanar space of some sort which the boss monsters use to move around. Being exhausted has made it a little tough to keep up with them.

Anyhow, when I said in the other thread that we couldn’t beat DR15 I didn't mean none of us can do more than 15 damage, just that we can't beat DR15/adamantine. Our weapons are as such (kind of weak for our level mostly but the best we could find...)
Barbarian2/Summoner13: furious bardiche with some other enchantments (It beats all metallic DR if she's raging. Unfortunately she just regained the ability to rage this round and hasn't had a turn yet)
Eidolon 1: +2 furious amulet (B/S makes the eidolon rage...when she's not exhausted...)
Monk1/Summoner14: GMF +3 or +1 glove (enchants improvised weapons - just for fun really)
Eidolon 2: GMF+1 and elf bane amulet (usually holy amulet instead)
Barbarian 15: +2 elf bane greataxe
Mystic Theurge: staff +1 (not that he'd try to hit a golem anyhow)

We've been taking a tremendous beating, and even sometimes ridiculed damage spells like Polar Ray and Meteor Storm can make it tough to keep your hit point totals up. It might be worth noting that we only have access to Core+APG (minus Alchemist, which the DM banned), so energy resistance/protection is a little tougher than in some other games. After about 7 rounds of absolute carnage the DM is injecting some plot stuff (Deus ex Backstory?) which might ultimately save our bacon, but we've probably been through >600hp of healing already.

Last round my PC was the only PC conscious. My eidolon and I spent our turns using wands of CMW to get the Mystic Theurge and his faerie dragon familiar conscious so that they could help heal the party. The other eidolon also spent its turn pouring a potion of CMW down the MT's throat since the 13hp from my wand wasn't enough to get him up again. I know that folks say offense is almost always better than healing, but in cases like this I think it is better to have all the PCs conscious.

If the MT agrees to Heal my eidolon I'll put DR10/chaotic on him and get ready to Pounce. There hasn't been a lot of time for buffs so far though. Folks understandably dislike spending 6th level spells to heal somebody else's class feature though, so the MT might try to Heal the Superstitious Barbarian instead though he's already not exhausted and my eidolon can take one hit per round for him (with better DR and a Summoner healbot riding on it)

This wasn't really meant as a rant about the encounter we're having (which does seem a bit over the top) but as an example of in combat healing coming in handy. We've also had PCs down recently in a low level game with a different group and DM, and only the fact that somebody was able to cast CLW and get the 2nd level Barbarian up on his feet allowed us all to escape the dungeon alive. My PC is in that game is quite strong but couldn't carry a Barbarian and his gear at a speed fast enough to actually get away from the monsters.

Tonight we'll play in a 17th level game where 2 of 3 PCs along with an animal companion and a familiar are currently blind. We should be able to fix that, but we'll probably have to Teleport back to town for it, which costs a couple of 5th level spell slots. Granted, we probably could have bought scrolls of Remove Blindness before, but nobody thought of it. Clerics just know it by default, which seems convenient.

If you make a Bull Rush while charging can you use any remaining movement you had left to move with your target? For instance, if you have a Speed of 30, charge 10 feet, and beat the opponent’s CMB by 15 with a Bull Rush could you push the opponent back 20 feet and follow him?

Once you give a grappled opponent the Pinned condition do you need to use the "Pin" option each round to keep them pinned, or can you use other options like "Move" or "Damage" without the opponent losing the Pinned condition so long as you successfully maintain the grapple?

Being able to maintain the pin as part of maintaining the grapple would make a lot of monsters with Grab far more threatening. A Gargantuan flying creature with Grab but without Constrict established a grapple against our Inquisitor last session. Each round it used the Damage option to do around 20 damage to him, but he responded by putting Greater Bane on his armor spikes and beating on it for about 80 damage per round. It might have been nice for the monster to stop that damage with a pin, but it might have been a little pointless if it didn't have an ally to help damage the PC (it did, but for whatever reason the DM didn't seem to think of teaming up for the win)

I'm not sure if grapple really needs to be any stronger, and being able to maintain a pin "for free" would make stuff with Constrict even nastier, but I'm curious about how this is "supposed" to work.

Our kingdom in Kingmaker has some sawmills. This got me thinking that it might be fun (for the DM if not the PCs) to have a fight in a running sawmill. If the Kingmaker DM doesn't go with this idea I think I'll have to add it to some future adventure myself.

We had a gristmill fight in one game where the DM ruled that you couldn't use fire or lightning spells without the risk of an explosion. I guess there could be similar concerns at a sawmill. What's more interesting to me is the idea of saws, log splitters, conveyor belts, etc. I'm thinking that folks might need to make various Acrobatics checks and Reflex saves to avoid getting chopped up, hit with logs and boards, etc.

Any ideas on hazards and checks to use in such a combat would be appreciated. I'm especially wondering what kind of damage the circular saws should do. I guess there might be a wood chipper type device where the scraps go to get turned into mulch. In case higher level PCs are present it also might be nice to have machinery which might affect flying creatures so they can join the fun. I suppose that some of this stuff could be magical, animated, or operated by enemies in some fashion.

The Black Tentacles spell is described as reaching for, targeting, and attacking a "creature" or "creatures". Spectral Hand doesn't seem to be a "creature" though, especially since its description states, "The hand cannot flank targets like a creature can."

Nevertheless, since BT is a magical effect the idea came up that it might be able to affect the incorporeal hand. I suppose there are two questions here:
#1 - Can Black Tentacles grapple incorporeal foes?
#2 - Would Black Tentacles attack a Spectral Hand even though it isn't technically a creature?

The bardic performance Dance of the Dead says that it functions like Animate Dead. I'd imagine that you can create (temporary) Burning Skeletons with this ability if you're willing to pay double the HD cost per skeleton created. I wonder if casting Haste would allow you to create Fast Zombies though.

Honestly, I wonder how Fast Zombies get created in general using Animate Dead. Do you need to cast Haste right before Animate Dead? Right after? In the same round, which might require Quicken Spell for most casters? Can the Haste come from a wand? Can a team of two casters use the spells at the same time?

The Dirge Bard can use Dance of the Dead as a move action when it becomes available and as a swift action a few levels later, so Haste could be cast the same round with minimum fuss. Would Haste have its normal benefits as well as improving the zombies, or would those benefits get subsumed into the Animate Dead effect? I guess the same question applies to the Animate Dead spell itself.

The Menacing weapon property says that you grant an extra +2 bonus to allies flanking a creature you are adjacent to. It never says that you have to threaten the creature, but perhaps that's just an oversight. It also never says that you actually need to attack the creature before the +2 increase becomes active like you'd need to attack with a weapon to activate the Defending property.

If you don't need to threaten then Tiny creatures such as familiars could grant the +2 bonus just by being in an adjacent square. That seems like it might be unexpected in terms of RAI. If you don't need to attack then a spellcaster holding a menacing dagger could grant allies a +2. If you do need to attack then double moving into position wouldn't benefit your allies until you got a chance to attack the next round, and even then I'd wonder just how long the bonus lasts - presumably until your next turn?

If merely threatening a foe with the weapon would be sufficient then what about a PC who carries a Menacing weapon in one hand while attacking with another weapon, perhaps a Monk with some Menacing nunchaku who flurries with unarmed strikes instead. I guess maybe Flurry of Blows could confuse that question, so how about a Sorcerer who attacks with Shocking Grasp while holding a Menacing dagger. Would he and a flanking ally get the +2 bonus or not? Does using one weapon without the TWF penalty prevent you from threatening with others?

Could a PC with 11 or more Bard levels and the Eldritch Heritage (Arcane) feat take Improved Eldritch Heritage to gain the New Arcana ability and add a spell from the Sor/Wiz list to his spells known?

This doesn't seem that crazy to me since there's a Ring of Spell Knowledge which explicitly lets arcane casters learn spells from another list. Maybe it is unintended though? What do folks think?

When we first started building our kingdom in Kingmaker there was a rule that a hex needed to have a Road before it could have a Farm. I was double checking to see if Mines and Sawmills had any similar prerequisites, but I couldn't even find the rule regarding Farms requiring Roads. Has this rule been dropped, or am I just missing it?

It might be nice from an aesthetic if the rule was dropped since the map is getting really clogged with way more Roads than it would normally take to connect our cities. It isn't a big deal either way, but it makes me curious.

This question came up in the explosive Crane Wing thread, but I thought that maybe a separate thread to discuss it would be better than just adding to the madness in that one. I guess the title pretty much sums it up, but to give an example, if a Barbarian took the Brawler rage power at 4th level would he qualify to take Improved Grapple at 5th?

My initial opinion is that gaining IUS from Brawler should let you qualify for feats like Improved Grapple which have IUS as a prereq but you'd only be able to benefit from those feats while raging. It was mentioned in the other thread that you'd need to wear a belt which grants an ability score bonus for 24 hours before you could qualify for a feat with it. For the first 24 hours the +2 Str would be a temporary ability score bonus which doesn't affect access to feats. I'm not sure that those rules would apply to this situation though since Brawler gains temporary access to the IUS feat, not a temporary bonus to some attribute.

A question came up in a game earlier about whether the Mystic Theurge could use his Lesser Metamagic Rod of Empower Spell to Empower an Intensified Fireball he was casting from one of his 4th level spell slots. Our thought at the table was that it wouldn't work since Intensified Fireball counts as a 4th level spell. Is that the correct ruling?

One of my PCs is considering whether to take Sonic Thrust as a spell known when he gains a level, which I hope will happen next session. As evidenced by the Weird Words thread and others, there seems to be a lot of confusion regarding buffs and ranged attacks, especially those granted by spells. I’d rather handle questions about how the spell should work now than during gaming sessions or after it has been used a few times and potentially changed the outcomes of battles.

Here are some conclusions I've drawn about Sonic Thrust after a little research along with some questions I can’t quite settle on the answers to.

Conclusions:
C#1 - Casting Sonic Thrust will allow my PC who casts as a 10th level Bard to make up to 10 attacks with hurled objects.
C#2 - All 10 attacks can be against the same “particular” target.
C#3 - These attacks require attack rolls and therefore would benefit from Good Hope and Inspire Courage.
C#4 - Within 30’ these attacks would benefit from Discordant Voice. Apparently Weird Words can, so why not hurled items?

Questions:
Q#1 - Would hurling magic weapons provide a bonus to the attack rolls?
Q#2 - Would hurling magic weapons provide a bonus to the damage rolls?
Q#3 - Can you hurl objects which are carried on your person such as arrows from a quiver (possibly stored points up), or do the objects need to be unattended?
Q#4 - Pursuant to question 3, what sort of action would it be for a monkey familiar to dump a quiver of arrows or bag of rocks?
Q#5 - Could Flame Arrow add +1d6 fire damage to each attack? (assuming the attacks were made with the enchanted arrows, stones, shurikens, etc)

The Conclusions are based on my reading of the spell along with various threads and FAQs. They're certainly open to challenge though. The Questions are stuff I'm particularly uncertain about. I'm also interested in knowing whether folks think I'm trying to make the spell serve an unintended purpose by using it to hurl weapons. Since the spell description gives specific details on hurling weapons it seems to me like that must be an expected use of the spell.

We had our first experience with the Mass Combat rules last session, and I was left with a lot of questions and complaints. Since we’re still learning the rules I’m not quite sure which are which yet.

Resources and Consumption seem wildly off somehow. Improved Armor and Improved Weapons in particular provide relatively little benefit at what seems like a prohibitively high cost. If giving an army of 500 warriors a +1 with Improved Armor or Improved Weapons really costs 16BP per month that seems like 64,000gp which could probably be better spent. I can understand the high cost of healing potions, but do our 500 warriors shoot crossbow bolts of pure gold? Obviously there's training and upkeep, but I'm not sure why guys in better armor would cost literally 5 times as much. Maybe the intent is that only smaller armies should generally use special resources, but one of the enemy armies which attacked us was Colossal and had ranged weapons, which would have cost 80BP per month. I wonder if there's any way to plunder the resources of defeated armies.

The damage bonuses and penalties based on the Strategy Track also seem a little extreme. I guess this is more likely to be a complaint than a question since there’s nothing which seems ambiguous here, just a big bonus for being Reckless which every NPC army seems to use constantly. I’d think that since +4 OM is already +4 damage the extra +6 shouldn’t be necessary. Either way it seems likely to lead to very short, swingy battles even during siege warfare. We ended up winning the battle, but the +12 defense from our city didn't help up nearly as much as we thought it would. I guess we should focus on building up our defense bonuses a bit and maybe invest in some healing potions since at least you don't have to pay for those month to month unless you actually use them.