Christina Morris's page

In one of the games I'm playing in right now, I've been the party healer, and won't be likely to get out of that role anytime soon. I've had two characters each specialized to varying degrees in healing and control, but I'm a bit tired of playing a dedicated healer and would like to try out something different.

It's somewhat popular wisdom that a dedicated healer isn't necessary, and the power of cure light wounds wands seems to be well-known 'round these parts. My experience with wand-based healing is all tied up in 3.5, however, and I can't speak much as to how effective it is in Pathfinder.

Due to certain temporary campaign restrictions, I'm unable to play a Cleric, Inquisitor, or Paladin. I'm definitely not keen on playing another witch (both of the previous healers were hedge witches), and I'm a bit weary of playing a druid (as I played one as a healer in 3.5 and would prefer not to repeat that).

That leaves me with Alchemist, Bard, and Ranger as characters with some healing capability (with both Bard and Ranger being able to easily use wands). Off the wall options might include any character with a high Use Magic Device modifier, I suppose.

But I'd hate to doom the rest of the group because I want to play something different. While I should play what I want, if the group dies, I may not get to play at all (as it would likely mean a break in gametime for this group).

So, my questions, essentially, are these: In your experience, how much healing is really required? Have wands historically been enough for you? How much in-combat healing is enough?

A few days ago, a group of my friends had a paladin lose his powers in their game, and it prompted a pretty big discussion on how strict the code was between all of us. For reference, here's the relevant info from Pathfinder:

A paladin who ceases to be lawful good, who willfully commits an evil act, or who violates the code of conduct loses all paladin spells and abilities (including the service of the paladin’s mount, but not weapon, armor, and shield proficiencies).

I personally hadn't read the section until we got into the discussion, as I assumed I knew what it took to lose paladin-hood. I found many of their complaints strange, as I didn't remember the code having been so strict. That prompted me to take a look at 3.5, as that's what I was probably remembering.

Here's the relevant info from the 3.5 SRD (emphasis mine):

A paladin who ceases to be lawful good, who willfully commits an evil act, or who grossly violates the code of conduct loses all paladin spells and abilities (including the service of the paladin’s mount, but not weapon, armor, and shield proficiencies).

The section in Pathfinder removes the word "grossly," which really changes the meaning of the passage. Even a minor fib causes a violation of the code of conduct in Pathfinder, which is a bit different from 3.5, where it required a "gross" violation (a lie on par with using poison, for instance).

It's also interesting to note that the ex-clerics section in both Pathfinder and 3.5 has the "grossly" language as well.

Has there been any commentary on the change? Was it due to human error or was this a deliberate means by which to make the paladin's code more strict?

A race can gain the ability to use, once per day, a spell-like ability of 2nd level or lower by spending RP equal to its level (with 0-level spells costing 1 point).

Races that have spell-like abilities seem to get off pretty cheap. Gnome magic (for example) only costs 1 RP, and it grants one 1st-level spell, three 0-level spells, and an increase to saving throw DCs for illusion spells.

I wasn't a math major, but something's off here.

I'd prefer that traits like gnome magic were instead written up as generic "magic" packages, or something, so it's a bit easier to create custom "magic" traits for races.

Has there been any sort of official clarification on this feat? It's unclear whether the feat intends for you to be able to make any magic item you could make with Craft Magic Arms & Armor or Craft Wondrous Item using your chosen skill, or if you can only make items appropriate for your chosen skill.

The feat says that "You must use the chosen skill for the check to create the item," but this is somewhat ambiguous. On one reading, you can take it to mean you need to create items appropriate to your chosen skill (using the guidelines detailed in the section on Magic Item Creation, this would mean Craft (weapons) for a sword, for instance). On another, it could mean that the Craft skill replaces the Spellcraft check normally used to create the item, thus allowing you to craft a sword with Craft (trapmaking).

I have a player that's interested in using the feat and we have differing interpretations of it. If anyone can point to official clarification on the matter, that'd be great. If one of the developers could pop in to give their two cents, that'd be even greater.

I've just started playing an Alchemist using the Final Playtest version. I want to make a ranged, bomb-focused character, but I'm actually having a lot of trouble finding feats that are worthwhile for that kind of character. I was planning on taking the Two-Weapon Fighting line and Rapid Shot for bomb novas with Fast Bombs; however, the wording is slightly ambiguous, and I have an inkling that combo isn't going to work once the actual book comes out(as it's really quite overpowered).

With that in mind, I've decided I would rather choose feats assuming that Two-Weapon Fighting and Rapid Shot will not work with bombs.

The game is a core-only affair, for the most part. We're using the OGL feats presented at http://www.d20pfsrd.com/ though.

Currently, the character is an elf and level 3. I have one extra feat (we're using flaws from 3.5 Unearthed Arcana), giving me Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, and Improved Initiative. Stats were rolled and overall very good: Str 8, Dex 20, Con 14, Int 20, Wis 10, Cha 13.

I've been looking at Weapon Focus and Skill Focus (Craft (alchemy)), but I see very little else that really works well with the Alchemist's abilities. What feats would others recommend?

After our very first session last night, our group got into a bit of a heated discussion regarding the XP awards we received.

Over the course of the session, we faced 3 orcs, which are CR 1/3. The DM gave us the XP for them individually (135 x 3, and then split five ways four our party size).

One player maintains that the three orcs should have counted as a CR 3 encounter, though, because of the CR Equivalencies table (12-3, I think).

I'm pretty sure that he's incorrect and that table isn't meant to apply directly to creatures with fractional CR because, just as in 3.5 D&D, you add fractional creatures up to create a "full" CR to determine difficulty of the encounter.

However, Pathfinder says this nowhere explicitly, and the process of determining XP is different enough that I can't be sure I'm correct.

Can anyone point out where this is stated or otherwise clarify what's going on here?