Claxon's page

That's okay. I've already conceded that it's a RAI vs. RAW issue. (But the Paizo developers do seem to agree with me and fixed the poor wording of the spell.)

The changed how the spell function in PF2 because they also changed how concealed functions in PF2. It's now a 20% miss chance which is much less than it used to be.

I don't agree with your summarization that (for PF1) "the developers agree with you". It's a different edition of the game with lots of vary different mechanics compared to D&D 3.5 or PF1.

I feel like you came here to ask people a question, but in reality you were just looking for yes men to say we agree with your interpretation when the rest of us are saying we don't.

That last description says otherwise. "If a creature has its invisibility negated by this spell, it is concealed instead of invisible." I said that the creature was visible but still benefits from concealment and that latest iteration agrees.

Granted I've yet to play PF2 so I have no idea what "concealed" means it game terms.

Yeah, so concealed in PF2 means you have to make a DC 5 flat check (instead of a percentage miss chance). Which means you fail on a roll of 4 or less, meaning a 20% miss chance.

In any event, in PF1 glitterdust negates invisibility. And if you only had concealment because you were invisible, it will negate that concealment.

Oddly, in PF2 you still have some concealment. So I guess the glitterbomb is somewhat less effective in it's coverage in PF2 vs PF1.

Right, I agree. You can see someone affected by Glitterdust, but they still benefit from concealment.

The problem is, the rest of us disagree with your conclusion. In PF1 the rest of us agree you don't have any concealment.

PF2, which is obviously a different system, specifies you have concealment still but for the rest of us the reasonable interpretation of how PF1 glitterdust affects invisibility is complete negation including concealment.

It negates. An outlined creature is effectively visible. Its not like coating the floor in flour and pinpointing their location by their footprints. With glitter dust their entire form is outlined in glitter. You don't just know where they are, you know how big they are, their shape, posture, and limb position.

There is no defined game terminology for it because it is one of those things you are expected to understand through common sense.

Imagine glitter dust is a magical sack of flour being burst open in an 2 x 2 square area. That flour proceeds to coat everything in that 100 square ft of area.

Now imagine instead of flour is some maddening inducing glitter that is the consistency of flour.

And now imagine you get some in your eyes. That's why you have to save against blindness, as you fight through the urge to close your eyes because you have magical glitter in your eye.

Yeah, it'd be impossible to use the 10 minute cast version against an enemy.

I think you're suggestion of having a 2 action cast version for a 1 round benefit works out.

I suspect whoever wrote the golem's entry didn't realize endure elements had such a long cast time.

But now you speak my language. The idea is to find what is best dedication, best feats, archetypes etc. to take to support what I have in mind. Right now I really like idea of AoE Knockdown Fighter with Intimidation debuff, though I am open for any other good things. Like Trustrike you mentioned, but I am still not sure how to bite it so use it enough times to really have fun with it as Fighter.

So, with true strike you're going to want to get the enemy debuffed first if you can, trip them prone and get them frightened. Then you'll cast true strike as a single action spell (most enemies don't have attacks of opportunity so this isn't as risky as it sounds) and then power attack.

It is not something you use every turn, but maybe once a combat. Or saving it for very tough enemies. The goal is to help get critical hits, by giving you two chances on your attack rolls.

As for how to get access to the spell. Taking one of many spell casting dedications can get. Any arcane or occult spellcaster has it on their list. As well, clerics of certain deities. For your particular character I would probably go with the bard dedication, as you're already investing in charisma. After bard dedication, you'll need to sink a few class feats into the Basic Bard spellcasting, Expert Bard spellcasting, and Master Bard spellcasting. Strictly speaking you only need the first, but you'll have very limited spell slots. If you're going to pursue it, I would get all 3 spellcasting feats because at worst you can use true strike in all of them (by making it your signature spell, you wont get any extra benefit besides being able to use all your spell slots for it, but hey maybe that works for you). However, you may find that you also want to use those spell slot for other things. The occult spell list has lots of good spells.

Do note that True Strike only has verbal components, so you can use it with a two-handed weapon without trouble. Other spells you may not be so lucky.

It is worth keeping in mind, the usefulness of Hammer Quake will be very dependent on your GM. Why? Because they control how much enemies clump, and how many enemies there are. If there are relatively few enemies, they are unlikely to be adjacent to each other, making Hammer Quake less useful than it appears. However, some GMs might love having all the NPCs stick side by side.

How useful Hammer Quake is, will be very dependent on your GM. Also keep in mind it uses all 3 of your actions in a turn, so even if enemies are clumped together, if you need to move to them you still can't use Hammer Quake.

I have not played a character with Hammer Quake, but I suspect that it's not actually very easy to use, compared to Knockdown.

But on top of that basic you can build for higher damage by taking for example Barbarian archetype/dual class and add damage bonus from Giant Instinc or like someone mentioned trying to get Truestrike or going for Reach with Disrupting Stance + Lunge as also mentioned above too.

The basic of indentifying best Fighter strategy is also part of optimization. It would be very easy for new player to totally miss taking Knockdown feats or not realizing that Fighter can be very good at Intimidation. I constanty see stuff like that from new players in every system. Part of optimizing build is to learning that and build on top of it. You already need more than "one read of CBR" to identify what you have said.

So you mentioned above the same thing I mentioned in response to your first comment and we agree on that: Knockdown + Intimidation is great combo for 2-handed Fighter. Good, that's the base.

But now you can further optimize it by combining for example Giant Instinct Barbarian + Mauler to make it even better/stronger, identifying best feats to take, best archetype to take, best ancestry feats to take, best skill feats to take. That's all a direct bonus over just a base.

And that is direct numerical bonus. Knocking down 2-3 enemies instead of one combine better with Combat Reflex and opens more setups for rest of the party plus for more damage for multiple AoOs. +6 to damage from Giant Instinct is numerical more damage. And so on. Chosing right dual class/archetype feats is also optimization as clearly some options would be waaaaay weaker than others. That's numerical advantage.

Even if difference in effectiveness is 5% here, 5% there, 5% there, the end result can be 15%-20% better overall than without further optimizing the base by taking the best options. And that is optimization. Increasing WIS is also optimization as WILL is something I consider a little weakness in Fighter. Taking feats to increase particular ability score is also optimization.

So, I am by far not an expert, but I want to make sure we have the same understanding of how multiclassing in PF2 works and what you will get.

At no point in a character's career can you ever become a Fighter 4/Barbarian X, where those are levels. Your levels will always be in fighter. You can get the barbarian dedication, which will get you rage. While you choose an instinct, you don't actually get any of the additional abilities they would normally grant (this is for balance). Rage will get you a +2 to damage, but comes with an AC and action restriction penalty. It's not great. If you eventually grab the instinct ability feat you can get another damage bonus, but it again comes at a penalty with Clumsy 1.

True Strike and crit fishing is a much better plan honestly, even if more limited use. The penalties from rage and clumsy may not seem that bad, on paper but you will feel them more than you expect.

For reference at 20th level your fighter might deal something like 4d8+14. Depending on weapon it could be 4d12+14. That's an average of 40. Rage + Instinct Ability can make that 46. A 15% increase, but at the cost of restricted action usage an Ac penalty. Personally I think it's a wash.

Like if you get overly focused on damage numbers, you might think it's a good idea. But from an overall character stand point, that lower AC is going to punish you. And unlike the barbarian, you don't have extra hp to make up for it.

Claxon wrote:

Getting enemies prone and flat-footed so that your fighter can have a high chance to crit them thanks to their AC decreases is a very important tactic. Using abilities like Bon Mot to debuff an enemy's will save so your caster friend can inflict their spell on them is important too.

If you don't do...

Yes, well, that's why I am trying to build Fighter that can do that (knockdown enemies + freighten them to lower their AC and rolls) on top of delivering high damage and be tanky.

The problem is there isn't much options to build that. As a fighter, you get heavy armor. Wear full plate. The only real decisions to make is do you use a shield and one-handed weapon, or not. Based on your desire to knockdown enemies, I suggest using a two-handed weapon with the knockdown and improved knockdown feats. When using a two handed weapon with improved knockdown, hitting the enemy trips them. Grab intimidating strike and shatter defenses for inflicting frightened. There's not really a direct and easy way to grab additional damage beyond wielding a weapon with big damage dice, but using Power Attack with an enemy who is prone and frightened and hoping for a crit while power attacking is your best bet. nd that's basically it. There aren't a lot of little tricks for building damage or increasing AC, at least not once you start selecting things you want to do. You will find the list of options narrows considerably.

Actually, it's good because it makes it hard to build a character who is ineffective, but it also means even if you optimize as hard as you can you're not going to feel much more powerful than others. And the power is never in direct numerical bonuses. It almost always in combining multiple actions into a lesser number of required actions, or giving you more guaranteed results like automatically knocking someone prone instead of needing an athletics check that could result in prone.

Me and my group are heavy powergaming group and we like many are leaving DnD and trying PF2e for first time. Obviously it will take long time before we can start crafting power builds for PF2e as system is huge!

So I would like to start with something grounded like melee-focused character (Paladin or Cleric/Ranger too, doesn't have to be without magic) for our first campaign. So what kind of best melee focused builds you can recommend and I would be grateful if you could also give me breakdown of your build so I can start to see "patterns" and "syngergies" etc. and slowly build my understanding of optimization in this system.

Thank you very much for every single proposition! Go wild, I don't really have any race, class/mulitclass or alligment restricion :). Just want to deliver very high damage/DPR and hopefully still keep nice defenses up.

I just want to provide a warning. A someone who was way into optimization in PF1, there just aren't the same kind of ways to optimize in PF2. You don't win fights in PF2 by building a great and powerful character. In you try to be a one man army, and the rest of your party does too, you will die horrible deaths over and over again. The enemy is always numerically superior to you and if you just try to slug it out thinking you have numerically superiority to support you will be incredibly disappointed. I know I was when I first tried PF2.

I've never played 5th ed, so I don't know how it compares but I wanted to provide that warning as it's something that trips up a lot of people who played PF1 and are transitioning to PF2.

Fights in PF2 are one by debuffing your enemy and working as a team to knock them down to your level. Getting enemies prone and flat-footed so that your fighter can have a high chance to crit them thanks to their AC decreases is a very important tactic. Using abilities like Bon Mot to debuff an enemy's will save so your caster friend can inflict their spell on them is important too.

If you don't do these support activities you will fail.

If you try to spend 3 actions a turn trying to inflict 3 strikes, you will fail.

Just some warnings you should heed.

Good morning everyone,

I'm a pathfinder 1e GM starting a game of 2e. My group and I are building characters with pencil-and-paper in order to learn how character generation works and we had a question about how all these different feats get distributed.

If you guys ever get tired of pencil and paper character creation, I highly recommend the Pathbuilder 2e app for Android. They also have a website.

Makes character building a breeze.

To follow up on what RavingDork said, unlike D&D 3.5 or PF1, PF2 numbers are mostly driven by level and your proficiency rating (Untrained, Trained, Expert, Master, Legend) in that thing, and then you add the appropriate ability modifier. So character choices you make rarely change the numbers, meaning things are consistent in how they are calculated. And the options that do change how something is calculated usually still follow level and proficiency, they just let you change what ability modifier you use, or let you substitute one specific usage of a skill for a specific action with another skill.

So, using an app like Pathbuilder honestly doesn't hurt the way it could in PF1 where there were so many different things that change your stats in something that it was hard to keep track of and you couldn't figure out how the app arrived at the number it did. In PF2, it's all pretty transparent. At least IMO.

Perception/sense motive should allow other characters to notice if one if behaving differently due to illness, even if the character is not aware of it yet.

Medicine checks should definitely allow for it, if someone is prompted to look for it.

Knowledge checks about the creature that attacked can help to know if they normally cause disease, which might prompt your medicine person to check everyone out.

Claxon wrote:

As to what "striking down evil" means. In my mind, whatever form of justice you can bring that would prevent that person from perpetrating more evil. So, killing them would qualify for sure. But so would imprisoning them. For evil, but non-violent crimes (think financial crimes) making financial restitution and paying extra fines might be appropriate. Basically I just view it as "don't let evil go unpunished".

Yeah, these are violent and significant crimes like slavery, murder, raiding and pillaging, etc.

So the party is traveling through the wilderness and finds an ogre camp that's been preying on other travelers, what would be the party's obligation in regards to the last surviving ogre who surrendered out of fear but is otherwise an evil and unrepentant monster? Again assuming the party is level 3ish or something so Ogres are a serious threat to them.

Well, as you observe level plays an important role in the situation. A level 3 party doesn't have a lot of options. A higher level party might have followers or access to magic that can help them resolve this in a non-violent way. But at level 3 you don't have much options. Presumably you don't have time to back track to civilization with an ogre in tow in chains.

You could attempt to have an impartial trial, though it would be rather hard. Basically you would ask the ogre "Did you commit these crimes that we suspect you did based on the guts, arms, heads of the dead people we see laying here?" If the ogre admits to things, well you can punish them however the law would, which is probably death.

If someone in the party is particular lawful, and a trial doesn't seem reasonable you could make a deal with the ogre. "We cannot give you a fair and impartial trial, and you are too much a danger to us to keep around. Nor do we have the time to drag you back to society. So we are going to make a contract. The terms of the contract are that we are going to end your life as painlessly as possible, and we are in a position to do so we will resurrect/true resurrect you to face justice at an appropriate location with appropriate representation, defense, and legal proceedings. The outcome may again be your death, or imprisonment with hard labor, etc. Will you agree to this? The alternative is that we end your life as punishment for the crimes we suspect you committed, but we admit it would not be a punishment mete in a "fair" and "legal" way."

Claxon wrote:

I have no idea what WTS is, so I can't argue on that point.

Weretouched Shifter, which I assume is what the OP is inquiring about based on his other thread. Although I only now realize this thread doesn't specify. My entire answer was writen with WTS in mind, actually.

Four levels in Weretouched Shifter with Deinonychus aspect grant +2 strength, AC bonus that puts you ahead of medium armor users while using light armor, five primary natural attacks, and pounce, all without preventing you from using armor and equipment.

And, on the topic of "front loaded", what you gain afterwards is a joke, with DR/silver equal to half your level the best and only real notable class feature.

Claxon wrote:

I could have sworn there was a rule that you couldn't multiclass with parent classes, and that Shifter was a druid fighter hybrid but I doubled checked both and I am wrong.

It used to be a rule in the ACG playtest, but never made it into the finished product. And while almost all Shifter class features were lazily copy-pasted from other classes (Druid, Monk, and Hunter), only the ACG classes are classified as hybrid classes.

Claxon wrote:

However, you tone comes across a bit hostile, though perhaps I am reading something that isn't actually there.

I'm not bad, my avatar is just drawn that way!

Seriously, though, no hostility whatsoever was intended!

Thanks for clarifying, I figured there was a 50% chance I was reading something in that wasn't there. But with the influx on new people on the board I hope the board stays as welcoming as possible.

Regarding the rule about not multicalssing with parent class, I knew I didn't completely imagine it. I do remember back to the ACG playtest, it was one of the most exciting product playtests and I thought the rule of not multiclassing with parent class made sense, but yeah I guess it didn't make it to the final product. And you're right that the Shifter robbing class features from other classes must be what made me think it's a hybrid, though technically it isn't.

Focused Weapon is really over rated, IMO.

Like if I have the free feats/wepon training to spare and I'm (for some reason) using a weapon with a low damage die I'll consider it.

But like, you're going from at worst a d4 weapon to at best a 2d8 weapon.

That's 2.5 avg damage vs 9 avg damage. So it's an average of 6.5 more damage. Which isn't terrible, but it seems like more to people because of the dice rolling.

But most of the time people aren't using crappy d4 weapons. We're using like d8,d10, d12 weapons and so the value becomes less and less.

Armed Bravery (assuming you didn't trade away bravery in an archetype) and Warrior Spirit are my first two choices generally because they're both super powerful for the fighter chassis.

There other great choices, but mostly for making a combat style that doesn't work well into a good combat style.

Claxon wrote:

I would argue that 3 levels of Zen Archer monk is more front loaded than shifter

Considering how much archery stuff you still want, compared to how 4 levels in WTS grants you more than you can get from any other class, I would argue otherwise. Zen Archer also has (slightly) more reason to stay for a couple more levels, with ki pool granting another attack next elvel, and 6th level bringing Improved Precise Shot.

I mean, yes you still want more archery stuff than what 3 levels of Zen Archer gets you. But it's still a jam packed 3 levels. And I was simply comparing Zen Archer gains to base Shifter gains. I have no idea what WTS is, so I can't argue on that point. As to whether there are reasons to stay longer in Zen Archer, there certainly can be but at that point it stops being a front loaded dip and turns into multiclass.

Personally I like a 3 level "dip" into zen archer followed by level in Inquisitor. Even though you actually start life as a Zen archer, you end up with more levels in Inquisitor.

Claxon wrote:

If you follow the rules that you can't multiclass into the parent class of druid, I'm not sure there's anything worth multiclassing with.

Not only is there no such rule, Shifter is not a hybrid class.

I could have sworn there was a rule that you couldn't multiclass with parent classes, and that Shifter was a druid fighter hybrid but I doubled checked both and I am wrong.

However, you tone comes across a bit hostile, though perhaps I am reading something that isn't actually there. Anyways, I would ask/suggest perhaps wording things a bit differently in general so your posts come across in a better way. The world is difficult enough, I want the Paizo forums as a place for positive productive discussion and though we can't eliminate the difference between written and verbal expression, we can all improve our method of communication to be more welcoming and friendly.

Claxon wrote:

As a melee character, pick the strongest looking enemy on the field and set to work trying to kill them.

This doesn’t work out very often in my experience… you pick out the strongest enemy, you make your way into melee range with them and you hit them once… while you are waiting for your turn to come back around a hail of arrows fly past you and turn them into a pincushion, every enemy around you gets bathed in the embers of an empowered selective fireball, a large cat just pounced over your head and now has the big guy on the ground in a death grip, and a storm cloud just formed above him and struck him dead with a bolt of lightning… meanwhile the rogue who turned invisible with a ring of invisibility is now standing in front of you on the otherside of the corpse looking just as disappointed as you are that the tough guy died before you could wail on him in a full attack…

This sort of experience is exactly why every melee character I’ve made has either focused on standard action attack abilities or had some way to combine a full movement with a full attack (pounce, rolling flurry, circling mongoose, mobile fighter’s rapid attack)… speaking of… I’ve seen numerous posts claiming that pounce is easy to get… I have to ask… How? It has been my experience that pounce is very difficult to get access to…

That's absolutely possible. But my experience has been that by engaging the strongest looking enemy (often the boss if there is one) you draw aggro of the other enemies or you lockdown the boss so the archers and mages can do their job. While the pure s*$@storm of arrows and magic you're referring to can absolutely happen, I only see that happen when you have large (6+) person groups such that you end up with like 3 full spell casters, an archer, a bomber alchemist, and your character that can't pounce or otherwise get a full attack while moving.

Anyway, if the BBEG dies before your next turn and you didn't need to full-attack, then the combat is basically over and your team did a good job, even if you didn't get to win the DPR Olympics.

But honestly to Mark Hoover's point, it depends on a lot of things, mostly outside your control.

I would argue that 3 levels of Zen Archer monk is more front loaded than shifter but anyways...

Shifter only works well if you want to play a natural attack polymorphing build.

If you follow the rules that you can't multiclass into the parent class of druid, I'm not sure there's anything worth multiclassing with.

Claxon wrote:

TxSam88 wrote:

In my experience usually about 50%-75% of attack rounds are made at full attack. Our GM pool has recognized that good players with optimized characters can deal insane amounts of damage. So we normally play with CR=APL+4 (or more), and with max hit points on the bad guys. So very seldom can a maxed out fighter one shot kill a bad guy. This allows for fun combats and Allows things like Pounce, haste, multi attack, etc to all still have meaningful impact on the game.

Also, even with that, the mooks tend to outnumber the party, so the fighter (who's typically out in front) winds up with multiple bad guys trying to attack him, so he will have plenty of targets for his multi-attack.

Yeah, if you start deviating from the base rules you can end up like this. When my group was still playing PF1 that was the case, we also ended up with something around CR+4 for an average fight and usually a whole host of enemies that didn't have HP but rather just a "hit me twice and I die" rule. It was specifically introduced just to slow us optimizers down some. Still combats were over pretty quickly.

The problem is, that Pathfinder is built for 4, 20 point buy, non-optimized characters, with somewhat inexperienced players. Once you get past any of these limitations, you have to start making changes to the game to make it enjoyable. I've been playing with the same group for over 35 years, we have the experience, and optimization just comes naturally - So yeah we had to make some "adjustments"

Oh yeah, very similar boat. Although I will note I think most written adventures are actually based on 15 point buy, but I absolutely hate such a low point buy, and even feel 20 points can chafe if you're trying to play a character to do things that your class doesn't already reinforce. Like if you want to play an archer fighter, but also want to be face your class doesn't give you many skill points per level, and you don't have use for charisma. So you have to spread points between strength, dex, con, wis, int and cha. You want int for more skill points so you can bluff, be perceptive, be diplomatic, sense motive. You need charisma to do some of your skills decently. You want wisdom for saves. You want con for hp and saves. Dex is your main attack stat, and strength for your damage bonus.

I feel on 20 point buy you really have to sacrifice and you don't end up with a satisfying character. Even if you're not trying to be the best ever, you end up so mediocre that it's discouraging to try.

I much prefer giving an ability score array that's very generous, but honestly for SAD characters doesn't do much but for a build like the above it's a godsend to help make your concept more viable.

No, this isn't trying to trap a player of mine or anything, if anything it's the reverse.

Say the party captures an extremely unrepentant, I dunno, Orc who has definitely done Evil things.

What would quality as failing to strike down evil in this circumstance? The Orc might have surrendered (just to try to save his skin) or been knocked unconscious by the party.

Obviously if the party woke the orc up and healed it and said "Go have fun killing more people" then that wouldn't fly.

However, if the party agreed to let the orc go in exchange for valuable information then Sarenrae really doesn't seem to be the type to go "No, you failed to strike down evil by not killing the orc." But if the party just decided to execute the (unrepentant) orc for his crimes I don't think that would bother Sarenrae either.

I realize part of the whole point is that edicts/anathema establish boundaries of behavior rather than The One True Path, I'm just trying to get more opinions on what boundaries the "Fail to Strike Down Evil" sets.

P.S. Also obviously if an ancient red dragon landed and said it was taking the orc with him as his new warleader the party wouldn't be required to try to fight the dragon in a suicidal battle.

So it's important to remember that edicts and anathema are set up in order of importance.

Failing to strike down evil is the least important of Sarenrae's anathema, though still anathema. I would consider giving her minor curse for a bit. Though I'm assuming the champion did whatever they could to "strike down evil" in whatever the appropriate form is.

As to what "striking down evil" means. In my mind, whatever form of justice you can bring that would prevent that person from perpetrating more evil. So, killing them would qualify for sure. But so would imprisoning them. For evil, but non-violent crimes (think financial crimes) making financial restitution and paying extra fines might be appropriate. Basically I just view it as "don't let evil go unpunished".

Also, you don't need to go fighting battles that are above your league. Sarenrae doesn't demand you get yourself killed pursuing someone that you can't defeat. That would mean she loses a champion and get's nothing out of it.

so if nothing else, Set is neutral evil which would mean (in theory) he has Daemon servitors and he is also associated with undead.

To be honest I'm not sure what kind of winged animal would associate with that.

It is largely flavor, so you don't have to be concerned about "getting it right" but it's nice to see someone care.

Unfortunately I don't have anything that states more specifics.

If I had to throw out some guesses, maybe scarab wings (associated with Egypt and as such the Osirion pantheon) or maybe bat wings.

Azothath, at first I was going to disagree but as a GM I wont let a player sit for a long time looking up feats at the table wasting everyone's time. So I would be likely to say they delay, and if they take too long they simply skip their turn.

With that in mind, telling the player to create a list of feats they qualify for and would like to use does seem like a good idea, though I don't know that I'd absolutely restrict them to that list, I would tell them that not being able to quickly decide on a feat would see their character delay or possibly lose their turn.

Magic arrows/quarrels/sling bullets are a fairly common kind of loot, and often they are for a weapon that no one in the group uses. Even if someone uses the right weapon, he often has a magical version of it, so he would have no use for a +1 arrow.

It's worth noting under errata (IIRC) a +3 ranged weapon doesn't get through DR/cold iron or silver, nor a +4 weapon through adamantine, nor a +5 through DR/alignment. I think most groups either aren't aware or don't use that rule because it was a relatively late change to the rules and unintuitive after years of being played otherwise. And in the case of bows you simply bought some durable arrows of the appropriate material for when it came up. Maybe grab clustered shots.

I mean your options are:
barbarian
fighter
monk
rogue
cavalier
gunslinger
vigilante
brawler
slayer

While martial flexibility does indeed make you flexible, you actually have to be very knowledgeable about feats and the situation you're in to make use of it. It's actually hard to play.

Probably 80% of people use it to get the same set of feats each combat.

As to the value of the different combinations you pointed out...to be honest I don't know. Probably I don't need them most of the time. You can probably play a raging pouncing barbarian and get your job done 95% of the time, and the other 5% you ask the wizard to cast fly on you first.

In my experience usually about 50%-75% of attack rounds are made at full attack. Our GM pool has recognized that good players with optimized characters can deal insane amounts of damage. So we normally play with CR=APL+4 (or more), and with max hit points on the bad guys. So very seldom can a maxed out fighter one shot kill a bad guy. This allows for fun combats and Allows things like Pounce, haste, multi attack, etc to all still have meaningful impact on the game.

Also, even with that, the mooks tend to outnumber the party, so the fighter (who's typically out in front) winds up with multiple bad guys trying to attack him, so he will have plenty of targets for his multi-attack.

Yeah, if you start deviating from the base rules you can end up like this. When my group was still playing PF1 that was the case, we also ended up with something around CR+4 for an average fight and usually a whole host of enemies that didn't have HP but rather just a "hit me twice and I die" rule. It was specifically introduced just to slow us optimizers down some. Still combats were over pretty quickly.

Yeah, the depiction of Drow started changing prior to PF2, it just wasn't as apparent to some people until PF2.

Paizo hs attempted to change them to differentiate them more from WotC and to break the association between evil and skin color, as it is a very damaging stereotype.

So yes the lore changed, for good reason.

Please don't react so negatively when people tell you the lore has changed, because it's usually to make the game more inclusive and friendly to all people and it is deliberate changes by Paizo (at least in this case). Not some accidental change.

My experience when I played melee characters without pounce was that I'd move to an enemy, make one attack, next round full attack (they would die) and then repeat. Sometimes an ally would attack the same enemy and it wouldn't even require a full attack on my turn to kill them, or they'd already be dead.

So I'd say less than 50% of the time would I get a full attack.

However at medium levels and above combat tends to last at most 4 turns.

As a melee character, pick the strongest looking enemy on the field and set to work trying to kill them.

I think the big problem here is you've confused the terms outsider with extraplanar.

So first scneario, no you're not an outsider but you gain the extraplanar subtype.

Second scenario, no. Doesn't gain extraplanar as you didn't leave the plane.

Third scenario, as far as I'm aware there isn't any cannon ability that allows for travel to parallel universes. Ignoring that part, I would say that if you're from the material plane and end up on the alternate material plane your not treated as extraplanar.

So the multiverse is what I normal use to describe all the planes (including material) but will sometimes refer to it as simple "the universe".

Plane are like heaven, hell, material, etc. Travelling to something other than your home plane makes you extraplanar.

Travelling between planets isn't common, but it's not a different plane so nothing changes.

I think what you need to look at is the extraplanar trait and to remember that the rules are written with a focus on adventures on material plane and from the perspective of the PCs.

But when a character leaves their normal plane of residence, they do gain the extraplanar trait. Which allows them to be subject to spells like Dismissal.

Extraplanar Subtype

This subtype is applied to any creature when it is on a plane other than its native plane. A creature that travels the planes can gain or lose this subtype as it goes from plane to plane. Monster entries assume that encounters with creatures take place on the Material Plane, and every creature whose native plane is not the Material Plane has the extraplanar subtype (but would not have it when on its home plane). Every extraplanar creature in this book has a home plane mentioned in its description. creatures not labeled as extraplanar are natives of the Material Plane, and they gain the extraplanar subtype if they leave the Material Plane. No creature has the extraplanar subtype when it is on a transitive plane, such as the Astral Plane, the Ethereal Plane, or the Plane of Shadow.

So outsider specifically refers to things like Devils, Archons, etc. Being made from the essence of their home planes. But you can be extraplanar without being an outsider.

So no, your human character never becomes an outsider (unless they have some special class feature that says so) but they can become extraplanar by leaving the material plane.

Claxon wrote:

I believe you only land prone from a fall if you take damage. If the flier successfully arrests their fall they will land gently, taking no damage, and not be prone. However they will be on the ground.

If you are given Prone condition and are flying, you fall. You aren't falling "instead," you are knocked prone and falling now.

Arrest a Fall says you take no damage on a success. It doesn't say anything about changing whether you would become prone or not. Falling Damage does it for sure, but a creature falling from a Trip is falling and receiving the prone condition from the Trip.

I'd argue that a flier knocked prone using Trip falls prone no matter what, but might mitigate their damage from the fall itself.

I definitely don't agree with your take. The rules for prone tell you that if you were knocked prone while flying you need to look at the rules for falling. Falling says you only land prone if you take damage from the fall.

If a flier successfully arrest their fall (easy check, but maybe you get lucky and they've already used their reaction) then they wont take any damage and will land on their feat.

I think the biggest reasons should be "why waste your limited resource of versatile evocation on an enemy that doesn't have fire/resistance immunity" coupled with knowing that some of the best spells are fire based. People love fireball.

Like sure, if you need to get around an energy type it makes sense but otherwise the default would be to not bother changing the energy type.

I would advise you not to assume a GM would allow you truefrost elixirs, since those are an AP specific item. It's not to say you wont be allowed to have some, but I wouldn't build around that expectation.

But to your point, in PF1 there is little reason to build around fire if you get an ability that lets you change the energy type. Excepting that there is a limit to how often you can use Versatile Evocation. And depending on build, there are more ways to enhance fire damage (that I'm aware of) than other energy types.

Not as an admixture wizard necessarily. But blaster focused characters will sometimes dip sorcerer and grab the bloodline that grants extra fire damage*.

I'm blanking on which one that is, I thought orc but it Orc works on any energy type.

There's the experiemental weapons mechanic, they get some more custom job/tinkerinig flavor.

Yes, but it's still uses existing published weapons as a base and you customize them some, but to me the customization isn't even that impressive.

Deriven Firelion wrote:

In the mythological version of demons, devils, and the like in fantasy types of games, evil is a real thing just like gravity or heat. It is an integral part of overall fabric of the fantasy universe manifested in creatures like devil and demons whose purpose is cause evil in some fashion which often manifests as murder, corruption, unnecessary conflict including war and feuds, and the like.

So a Tiefling being imbued with this mythological idea of evil as an existing force in the fabric of fantasy reality, then that force that is a part of their being pushes them to do things that align with the universal force of evil.

May be voices in their head, a conflicting conscience, a natural violent impulse, whatever you come up with to make it fun and interesting.

Simple stupid evil can be pretty boring with some guy that randomly murders people to be the strongest. But conflicted, complex evil can be fun to roleplay where you fight against the impulses of your nature to become something else.

There is no hard answer to your question. In these fantasy games, you can take it in a lot of different directions.

I want to build off this in a weird direction. In a world with an evil that is a force of nature, a Tiefling could be schmuck bait to lure people to evil through no fault of their own. Create an evil Tiefling, get one evil person. Create a tiefling in a society conditioned to fear things like tieflings, get a whole bunch of people do give into their worst selves and do a bunch of evil. If that Tiefling isn't evil, all the better. People love to dig in when forced to justify their bad actions. Cause more division and discord.

Thanks for holding a mirror up to society and life on this planet.

Tieflings can represent whatever common scape goat is used in your neck of the woods to create division and other-ing people.

Yes sorry for typo. Meant wmd. The mechanic dosent seem to be very inventive, just built for improving already built items =MEH....the next question is can anyone built drones and starships?

Im thinking of just building one or buying one. Havent found anything about the cost.

It's not the mechanic specifically though, it's just the system limits. No one gets to design weapons from scratch. Like you could play any class with engineering as a skill (not even a class skill, just take the skill) and you can build weapons. It's just the benefits are very minimal to doing so. If you want to pretend like you designed your own weapon that's fine, but mechanically you'll have to use something on this list.

I should note also that the class is called Mechanic, not Inventor.

And really what the mechanic class does is let you use a drone as a combat buddy (and your drone is better than what other people can buy) or have an computer in your brain that let's you be better than you could on your own physically.

They can't let you design weapons willy nilly, they'd end up mechanically broken and be a problem for game play. Or they would be so limited that they'd be worse than other options.

@ Claxon

You know I wanted an Axe but I feel using a terbutje would just be wicked.

I'd even be willing to Drop the Shield and work on a Shattter defense build

But could use some suggestions

1 The terbutjecan, can it be made of things like mithral , cold iron, Adamantine (The Material I choose woukd likely Depend on the Game)

2 it has the fragile quality. Is there any thing I should now about this, is it just a down side or is there any benefit

Well, it's worth noting that once you get a magical version of the weapon, the fragile quality goes away. So a +1 terbutje is no longer fragile. And there's also a steel terbutje which is the same weapon, but made out of steel instead of wood and rocks, and lacks the fragile quality. Fragile also only comes up when you roll a nat 1, so hopefully not that often. You might make it far enough that you can get a magical one without it being an issue. The steel terbujte could end up being made of any of the special materials that any normally steel weapon could.

You wouldn't have to drop the shield as the terbutje is a one handed weapon, but it you will have a competing need of feats for Unhindering Shield and then working into shatter defenses but you totally can do it.

I would suggest at early levels use the terbutje two-handed, pick up power attack, use slayer talents to grab ranger combat style for menacing style grabbing dazzling display and shatter defenses. Pick up cornugon smash as well. Later on you can grab shield focus and unhindering shield if you want to. I'd also grab the hurtful feat, which will let you make an extra attack when you successfully intimidate.

So you walk up to an enemy and attack with power attack, cornugon smash let's you make a free intimidate check to demoralize. If successful you have shatter defenses which makes them flat-footed next time you hit, until the end of your next turn. You can use a swift action for hurtful which will let you hit them again, invoking Shatter Defenses. Next turn all your attacks will benefit from flat-footed, including allow you to sneak attack.

It's a lot of feats, but it'll come together beautifully afterwards.

I'm going to assume you meant WMD (weapon of mass destruction) not WND which I have no idea what that would be an acronym for.

As far as what you can create...well not a lot to be honest.

You see, the rules for Starfinder don't cover trying to create "custom" weapons of any sort beyond using the table of already stated up weapons, applying weapon mods/augments (which also already have stats) and at most crafting those items yourself. But crafting items yourself has very little value in Starfinder. You can see the rules for crafting items here.

So, you can make weapons with mods/augments that already stated. If you choose to make heavy weapons, some of them are line, cone, or other area of effect weapons which could be called "WMDs".

But I get the sense that's not what you're after. I think you're after making a completely custom item that would have better stats than the items in books/SRD. And there are simply no rules to do that, nothing that even comes close. And if you did it wouldn't be balanced. So it's going to be completely up to a GM what they would allow you to do.

I don't know the mechanics of whatever rules your talking about, likely because they're specific to the AP.

But you're not really going to calculate a pattern of what I'm assuming are random dice rolls, not if they're truly random. Now physical dice are unlikely to be 100% purely random, but they're close enough that you're not going to gain much useful information trying to calculate the probabilities.

If the question is about whether your character calculating the chances counts as cheating with the context of the story...well I'll tell you Vegas doesn't like it when you count cards, but it's not technically cheating and they can't refuse to pay you your winnings for it. They will, once they figure it out, politely ask you to leave and tell you that you are no longer allowed to gamble at their establishment and refuse you service which they are within their right to do.

If this were to be a less reputable establishment they might harm you for doing it, though they wouldn't be within their rights to do so (normally speaking) and there if they did this kind of thing I would presume they would do it to any winners (of high enough value) regardless of calculating probabilities or not.

Quick question..

Can a drone use starship weapons as heavy weapons? I didnt see this anywhere....
Thoughts...

I don't understand your question.

Heavy weapons are for PCs/NPCs to use in regular "person to person" combat.

Starship weapon aren't intended to be used in that kind of combat at all.

There is a sidebar someplace that says if a starship is involved in "person to person" combat it's weapons deal 10 times the damage against characters as they do against other starships, because they're different scales of weapons.

So I guess the answer as I understand the question is, no your drone cannot even physically wield starship weapons.

Also, for what it's worth the formula for calculating your chance to hit is: 1 - [(AC - attack bonus -1)/20]

So if you have a +5 to attack vs an AC of 20 you have to roll a 15 or better to hit. Since rolls of 15 to 20 all hit, you have a 30% chance to hit (each number on a d20 has a 5% chance of appearing, 6 values in this example succeed). So 20-5-1 = 14. 14/20 = 0.7. 1 -0.7 = 0.3 *100% = 30%.

There other ways to write the equation but they all work out the same way.

I think the magus issue is that they start with light armor, so without going dex they are a little squishy for a melee class.

In the beginning they can be for sure, although mage armor does help reduce the issue until they can get medium armor.

@ DeathlessOne

Ok if I was to go with slayer what is the biggest axe I could wield one hand , maybe taking EWP for a war-Axe or could I get by with a battle Axe ?

"Biggest" as in "in game the physically largest" or has the largest damage die?

In either case I would say that neither of those things end up actually making an effective character. Weapon damage dice make up a very small portion of your damage after a certain level.

Consider my earlier example, at level 1 the greataxe made up about 52% of your damage. But for the scimitar build (which did more damage) the weapon only made up 26% of the damage. And as you level up and get any bonuses weapon damage dice becomes increasingly less relevant.

As for imagery of a large weapon...I've always personally felt just describing my weapon the way I want to the GM and players was enough, even if the weapons stats didn't quite fall in line with that. You shouldn't have to play something mechanically inferior just to be able to describe your character as having a big weapon, something with no mechanical impact.

@ Claxon. I get it's more cool than Effective .

Perhaps Sword and Board as a slayer ?

I have the Image of My character wielding massive stone Axe and a wooden shield

There Dress in light armor , and she has several Battle scars on arms and legs

You can make an effective combatant wielding a axe and shield, I was simply pointing out that the method of using Jotun grip to wield a two-handed weapon in one hand is mathematically worse than just using a regular one-handed weapon.

May I suggest you play a Slayer with a steel terbutje (it's like an axe, a saw and a club had a baby) and I'm suggesting it again because I'm a sucker for increased critical threat ranges. You could also wield a battle axe. Pick up a buckler as well. Eventually pick up Unhindering Shield which will let you wield a two-handed weapon and buckler.

If your open to not using an axe you could take Shield Brace which allows you to use a two-handed weapon from the polearm or spear weapon group while also using the shield (but you do take the shield armor check penalty to your attack rolls so you want a light shield or buckler until you can make it mithral, which allows you to use a mithral heavy shield. The difference is only 1 point of AC. However this style allows you to use your two-handed weapon well two-handed. Which means improved strength scaling (1.5 strength to damage) and power attack scaling. And after picking up Shield Focus/Shield Brace your feats are open to build however you like, though Power Attack is an obvious choice.

I have to tell you, that other than for "cool" factor, Jotun Grip is pretty bad. Especially as you increase in level.

A greataxe deals 1d12 with a x3 crit modifier, and is a two-handed weapon but you're using it one handed with jotun grip at -2.
I'm a fan of weapons with big crit ranges, so let's go with the scimitar which is a d6 18-20 x2 weapon. No attack penalty.

Let keep in mind power attack gives you a -1 penalty for +2 damage on one handed weapons.

So our scimitar will deal 1d6+6 (22 str) damage for an average of 9.5 damage. But we aren't using power attack and have +2 to hit. If we activate power attack, we gain +4 damage, for 13.5.

Our greataxe is 1d12 + 6 damage, average is 12.5 damage. Now you could activate power attack for more damage, but you're to hit is going to decrease by 2.

As you continue to level you will get more bonuses to attack and damage that will make the difference not so apparent.

But keep in mind ultimately the difference in raw damage between a scimitar and greataxe is 3.5 average damage vs 6.5 average damage. Based on the 1 point of attack for 2 points of damage of power attack, this basically always a bad trade to use jotungrip.

Now, if you took 3 level of titan mauler barbarian for oversized weapons, and got the orc butchering axe (3d6 damage for medium) and instead use a large size one which you can wield thanks to massive weapon ability (although the penalties are bad) and the math can lean in favor of such shenanigans. Especially if you add in other size change stuff, such as being enlarged.

I think there is a rule about 1 effective and 1 actual size change so wield a large size butchering axe, while enlarged, with one of the various effective size change affects your weapon can do some crazy damage.

Malik Gyan Daumantas wrote:

Unless you're a magus on a tight budget, the entire idea of a strength based duelist is kind of redundant and a waste of time isnt it?

A Magus on not such a tight budget will also often come out as a Strength-based one-hander -- you actually have to go to some really serious tradeoffs to be not a one-hander as a Magus (whether Strength-based or Dexterity-based).

Yeah, good point. People play dex magi primarily because of point buy or bad rolls.

But if you had a stat array (I give a generous one in PF1 of 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 11) it's a lot easier to put 16/15 in strength and int, 14 in dex, and go about your business. It just takes a significant effort/cost to get dex to damage for magus (or most anyone), and without it your damage takes a significant hit. It's mostly a problem at lower levels (say before level 7) but that's still a significant portion of play.

Of course, getting to a point where you can ignore strength with dex to damage is going to be more optimized than needing both strength and dex, but I think it makes the lower level play experience much more challenging.

And if your GM doesn't let you get agile weapons (already a significant cost) then you get shoehorned into very specific builds.

Claxon wrote:

The lore also says that the reject elixirs are given to the failed bidders as a partial compensation because they don't get their money back from the bid. So presumably there isn't a "infinite" supply.

I was thinking of something the PCs can make by themselves, rather than something so closely related to the original Sun Orchid Elixir.

Claxon wrote:

However, this should really mean that it shouldn't have a fixed price. It should still be rare and though there are more than 6 per year, it's probably not enough that anyone with 10,000 gp can get it. Although it is worth noting that PCs wouldn't have that kind of cash until between 14th and 15th level (in PF2).

And PCs wouldn't want spend all their wealth on this item (probably).

And you have competition from merchants and other wealthy people (presumably).

Rather than players buying it, I was thinking of using it as a plot device.

I would say that's impossible. Not impossible to create an alchemical consumable elixir that affects a person's lifespan in general, but impossible for the PCs to figure out the Sun Orchid Elixir recipe, even the "reject" version.

The lore around the elixir is that it's a closely guarded secret, and if it could be replicated probably other people would have done so in the 3000 years it's been a thing.

However, I do like saying yes to players when it's reasonable and an elixir of "extend my life from 1 to infinite years" has minimal actual bearing on the game. I would allow, as a 20th level alchemist feat, something that worked like the philosopher's stone feat which would grant you a recipe for an a special elixir that would work like the sun orchid elixir (but only for you) and work like the reject elixir for others.

I realize it's functional not very different, but from a lore stand point the alchemist is creating their own formula not duplicating sun orchid formula. And they tune it to their physiology so it doesn't work as well for others. Oh, and probably add a restriction to only create 1 a year.

Edit: Rereading your statement you may have intended essentially what I just suggested and I misunderstood your post in my original statement, but I'm just going to let it ride as is.

To me "when" vs "whenever" doesn't make a difference.

The process plays out like this:
Did you successfully demoralize the enemy? No, then nothing happens.
Yes, good now they can't decrease their frightened condition unless:
1) They use a hostile action against you or
2) Can't observe/sense you for 1 whole round

As for the question of "it is always on" yes in the sense that it doesn't take an action to activate and affects any enemy that meets the condition of you having successfully demoralized.

No, it's not "always on" in the sense that they must first be demoralized by you.

Personally I disregard such notions.

If you have your own brain and the ability to make your own choices you are able to shape your own morality.
There is nothing biological that pushes you towards evil.

Quite frankly I do not even assign evil impulses to full bred demons.
Demons traditionally and culturally chose to maintain the evil and chaotic ways they are born and raised into but they are not irremediably hardwired to be chaotic evil.
Is just simpler for them given their circumstances, also those who do not exhibit a chaotic and evil mindset tend to not make it far in the abyss but they are as morally independent as any other thinking being.

The real thing that risk pushing Tiefling towards evil is prejudice and societal expectations

I mostly agree with you, but do disagree about evil aligned outsiders. I do believe they are naturally going to be evil, however like any creature, with effort they can change so they are not irredeemably evil. However, I also believe the amount of effort is incredibly high, because the souls that created the devil/demon/daemon in the first place were evil. They are made from the essence of evil.

But tieflings, no. I do not believe one wit that they are predispositioned innately to evil, but do think that the societies they tend to grow up in will make them like resented outsiders and it is easy for them to fall down an evil path.

Yeah, I don't mean the question just as "why aren't rich people immortal?", but rather as "why hasn't their demand forced it out of the PCs' price range?" Even if Inevitables inevitably drop by, an extra century or few isn't bad. It sounds like you have that covered.

You might even add in that the two elixirs do not play nicely together at all, so drinking the weaker one also means you'll never be able to get any younger. (Well, excluding some very unpleasant rituals or reincarnation.)

The lore also says that the reject elixirs are given to the failed bidders as a partial compensation because they don't get their money back from the bid. So presumably there isn't a "infinite" supply.

However, this should really mean that it shouldn't have a fixed price. It should still be rare and though there are more than 6 per year, it's probably not enough that anyone with 10,000 gp can get it. Although it is worth noting that PCs wouldn't have that kind of cash until between 14th and 15th level (in PF2).

And PCs wouldn't want spend all their wealth on this item (probably).

And you have competition from merchants and other wealthy people (presumably).

Yeah, I would rule you definitely lose the effect of the mask/feat when you change shape. But assuming your new form has a head item slot, you could take the mask off and put it back on.

You lose the effect because normally the mask melds into your new form.