Corvo Spiritwind's page

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

I assume that Core has been rushed due to WotC stuff about OGL before, will this be the case for Core 2 or is there now more time to QA stuff?

I'm a casual user at best, but I've heard people mention erratas being needed before the book is even out, so I'm a bit concerned about future books, especially with things like Inventor's Invent feat becoming essentially useless it seems, and Magus cascade's dependancy on magic school being just, not mentioned at all? Or the strap shield phrasing and the new swap action.

Wouldn't all errata technically be needed before the book has even come out? The only thing that makes Player Core unique jn that respect is that we've seen a lot more of the Player Core prior to its release than we usually do of a new book, and a lot of people have had reason to comb the text with an eye for details.

As for Magus, it was never going to be addressed in these books because it is not from any of the books that were part of the remaster. Presumably when SoM gets its regular errata pass, that would be the time to check if Magus got a patch. For now it doesn't really seem that difficult since the few Magus abilities that reference wchool either already default to damage type first, or can be trivially worked around in the meantime.

For your general question, since none of PC1, 2, GMC, or MC were planned by this point last year, and there's an ongoing schedule to maintain while shoving all these new books into production, it is likely they are as we speak being assembled as quickly as can be managed so that there is a complete ORC set of core rules. Though actually depending how much work needs to be done on the Monster Core, it may be that some elements were chosen specifically for PC2 and pushed back so that they would have more time to work on those while players enjoyed the first wave of content in PC1... it's conceivable.

Learning new stuff every day, I appreciate the info.

I assume that Core has been rushed due to WotC stuff about OGL before, will this be the case for Core 2 or is there now more time to QA stuff?

I'm a casual user at best, but I've heard people mention erratas being needed before the book is even out, so I'm a bit concerned about future books, especially with things like Inventor's Invent feat becoming essentially useless it seems, and Magus cascade's dependancy on magic school being just, not mentioned at all? Or the strap shield phrasing and the new swap action.

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

Secret Wizard wrote:

Hi team!

I think the Remastered is a great chance to address one of the salient aspects of PF2E that seems to be irregular across the board: proficiency scaling that's not granted by a Class.

Right now, we have:

• General feats that do not scale.
  
• Archetype feats that do not scale.
  
• Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class (like Butterfly Blade with butterfly swords.)
  
• Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class, but capped (like Sentinel with armor).
  
• Archetype feats that scale with level (like Acrobat with Acrobatics.)

Feels like, just like casting, this should be normalized somehow across the board because it creates needless complexity.

And background!

Imagine if the herbalist actually got better at Herbalism innately compared to someone who just took additional lore skill feat.

I'm gonna personally disagree on background lore automatically scaling proficiency. It's better off as something minor by default, with the option to scale it with the Additional Lore feat. Then you can play a former herbalist, or take a background because the skill feat is important to the character without winding up with Underworld Lore as one of your best skills despite the thematic discrepancy. I don't really want to run into a bunch of once-bitten wizards because scaling Undead Lore beats any magic-related skill feats on an Int class.

If your tables have issues of players min-maxing so hard that background lore skills become an issue, I think you have bigger troubles than scaling backgrounds, especially since said players can already get scaling version at level 2 for a skill feat.

Could always run less undead.
Generally concerning when the reason in this scenaro that a herbalist can't be better at picking herbs overtime is because a few people might gang up on a specific background for a specific campaign :(

Hi team!

I think the Remastered is a great chance to address one of the salient aspects of PF2E that seems to be irregular across the board: proficiency scaling that's not granted by a Class.

Right now, we have:

• General feats that do not scale.
  
• Archetype feats that do not scale.
  
• Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class (like Butterfly Blade with butterfly swords.)
  
• Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class, but capped (like Sentinel with armor).
  
• Archetype feats that scale with level (like Acrobat with Acrobatics.)

Feels like, just like casting, this should be normalized somehow across the board because it creates needless complexity.

And background!

Wish they gave background Lore skills scaling so we could easily pursue things like Will Turner blacksmith trope.

Just curious, is it intended that strap is no action, while unstrap is, and to use Lighting Swap one has to spend an action to unstrap first?

I think so far my biggest dislike is that it seems a little rushed, but I have a very casual experience with the book releases and whatnot.

There's just a few "How did this pass QA" moments, such as with shields and new swap rule, and unstrapping costing an action but strapping does not, but also the phrasing on the shield holding is just confusing to me (maybe because english is 3rd language)

Fort save is most likely a mistake, will surely be errata'd.

Wait, they need to errata the thing before it comes out but after it has been printed?

This is off to a great start.

Cyder wrote:

It feels the remaster was super rushed

That's because it was, for reasons entirely out of Paizo's control.

Kinda get it, but "entirely" is a bit...They did have a choice to go entirely away from dnd stuff with 2e, was there a big rush to put it out under ogl, no other alternative?

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

Still no love for dual wielding or throwing.

Two actions to pull out a weapon with each hand, unless you use two hands to grab one weapon, same for swapping, not to mention the tax of extra runes or gear to duplicate runes and returning tax on throwing.

It's already more effective to use big sword, no need to bully the duals.

LIGHTNING SWAP, 2nd level fighter feat: one Interact to stow

any number of items from your hands, then draw up to two
weapons or a shield and a weapon. So you can draw 2 weapons in 1 action, solves that. Thrower's Bandolier solves the duplicate runes for thrown and reurning and Blazons of Shared Power does for melee.

Gonna look a the swap, shame if only fighter got it. The others I mentioned with "gear tax"

Still no love for dual wielding or throwing.
Two actions to pull out a weapon with each hand, unless you use two hands to grab one weapon, same for swapping, not to mention the tax of extra runes or gear to duplicate runes and returning tax on throwing.

It's already more effective to use big sword, no need to bully the duals.

...

I have no interest in martial classes or damage dealers. I like roles that allow me to have options to take advantage of a given situation or buff/debuff in a support role. Unfortunately in PF2e most of these types of spells are pretty weak when compared to 1e or other systems. ... snipped

This is kind of interesting since the new flow of 5e players on subreddit has been going a lot on about how casters are THE controllers and there was disappointment the weren't world ending damage dealers.

Paizo really needs to partner with Path under.

It's just that good. Wouldn't recommend anything else.

Assuming it meant to say Pathbuilder?

To be fair, this seems less like a class and more like a psionic manual. A class usually has a theme and leans towards a role or playstyle. This is more all over the place and can't decide what role or class it wants to fullfill so it tries to do everything and anything.

Best advice as someone else mentioned would be to actually experience the system before you try a 1:1 attempt at throwing something like this when you're not really familiar with the system (just reading it isn't really enough).

Biggest hurdle is gonna be making a class that can fight as well as a fighter or cast spells as well as a wizard or sneak around and teleport in ways that makes a rogue jelous. You could always try taking one aspect of the class and make that first but it's still likely to end up a mess.

Many of these can already be mimicked to some degree. Eldritch rogue with psionic class, or just simpler homebrew like giving players psi cantrips regardless of class for utility like Warp Step.

I'm really curious about one thing.
Why?

Why is this a change that needs to be pushed on ohters instead of just a homerule in private games? The general consensus is that if that if the damage worries you, you should be looking at Fighter and Barbarian, so why nerf someone that barely does their damage every two turns or so?

Usually a rule change has a solid reason, but this seems lacking that.

Is it possible to wear the clothing for runes, and the basic bracers for talisman?

Why does every wizard on Golarion cast the exact same fireball, minus a very few meta magic effects? Do they all just copy ancient notes without innovation? Does magic just dictate that you can only evoke exactly x fire at between y and z distances and it takes tremendous effort to change that?

It seems lame that magic is so rigid and inflexible when that's just not what one sees in fiction. Would it be that hard to balance a Wizard who's made their fireball do less damage but over a larger area? Or the wizard that wants to fire a single big magic missile instead of a massive spam of them? Or for a sorcerer to put just a little more oomph into a big spell, by using an extra action or lower-level spell slot, when the chips are down?

Same reason every dual wielding fighter at level 1 can only do Double Slice. Game mechanics and balance. Players are notorious for finding loopholes and gimmicks, and opening all those options up without archetypes or feat costs is just a recipe for disaster.

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

Malk_Content wrote:

But darn I think we are getting off topic again. There is a divide that I cannot get my head around where "control someone through long standing threat of violence and a position of ownership" is Evil (it is and should be) but suppression of a beings will through the use of Magic isn't. That's the original crux of the thread I feel. It's also something that has come up in other areas, such as people's feelings about summons and how they must not be true creatures else all Summon spells.shoukd have the evil tag.

This is kinda interesting that things like a Summoner permanently enslaving a creature, not to mention Summon spells in general. Feels like Charm, Geas and other such spells should get the Evil trait just to keep things consistent. Not to mention Familiars, who are clearly sentient beings with no choice but to serve the player.

The summoner at least is framed as a mutual relationship. A summoner mechanically cannot sacrifice their Eidolon without peril to themselves. A Summon via the spell can be used as a suicide soldier. The only ethical way to view that relationship is if the summons are mere simulacrum.

Whether your eidolon is a friend, a servant, or even a personal god, your connection to it marks you as extraordinary, shaping the course of your life dramaticallyIt's a lil curious that if their stance on such things was already decided as a whole, that this slipped past. Familiars are probably in the worst situation since they solely exist to serve.

Summon spells are a bit special, but since they still get will saves and can actually be feared, they seem to be sentient enough, especially since they come with their original alignment and can be communicated with. It could have been solved really easily by a single line like "Summon a copy of a creature, while it seems like the real thing, it is essentially a magic construct." but then the wolves we summon might be fear immune.

But darn I think we are getting off topic again. There is a divide that I cannot get my head around where "control someone through long standing threat of violence and a position of ownership" is Evil (it is and should be) but suppression of a beings will through the use of Magic isn't. That's the original crux of the thread I feel. It's also something that has come up in other areas, such as people's feelings about summons and how they must not be true creatures else all Summon spells.shoukd have the evil tag.

This is kinda interesting that things like a Summoner permanently enslaving a creature is not considered evil, and Summon spells in general. Feels like Charm, Geas and other such spells should get the Evil trait just to keep things consistent. Not to mention Familiars, who are clearly sentient beings with no choice but to serve the player.

Inglorious Bastards wasn’t about being Nazis though, but killing them.

Deriven was responding to the option for PCs to own slaves.

English is my third language so I might have missed it, but where in the post he responded to does it bring up slave options for PCs?

See I never understood cheating at A table top RPG. There is literally nothing at stake but pride which shouldn’t be am issue in a game.

That has always been weird. It's not even pride since there's nothing to be proud of when cheating in a party game. It's really just a fragile ego sort of thing.

I'm in a PF2 west marches discord server. Search for "Into the portal." If you DM me your discord your discord name, I'll ask the mods to send you an invite.

Found my way into the server via reddit!

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

I'll look into the foundry VTT. Not familiar with it. I've still not tried roll20 so thanks for the heads up. Anything in particular with PF2 that made you dislike it for west marches style game?

PF2e is by default very power progression focused and has tight math for encounters which means drop in drop out are both harder to fill a world out with imo, and can get a bit skeevy treasure distribution. (Hence my supporting automatic bonus progression and no level to proficiency for any attempts)

It isn't unplayable, but I prefer something like the year zero system for westmarches style play (especially since exp advancement is per spend rather than per level)

Btw I am a huge PF2e shill, I just think it plays best with the default rules as a high fantasy system that embraces the scale innately.

That makes sense from what I heard. I'm just a huge nerd for persistent sort of theme, especially something simple like setting up a shop or trading items I don't need that I get during adventures.

I'm in a PF2 west marches discord server. Search for "Into the portal." If you DM me your discord your discord name, I'll ask the mods to send you an invite.

Took a peek at it but nothing came up. Maybe discord hates me :( Mostly I'm just curious how active these things can be since my last experience with PF1 based ones was that there was a lack of interest.

I do have one, although I don't think we're really recruiting at the moment since I don't have the bandwidth to run more and we haven't really seen enough other people actually running games, we're down a GM from where we thought we would be, and one of the remaining ones is perpetually overwhelmed, with the remaining one who isn't me only wants to run occasionally...snip

Pirate themed hexcrawl seems interesting, especially making it treasure based. Will keep this in mind if me and my buddies wanna try starting something. Sadly what you've described is my last experience with pf1 based servers, just a lack of DM's and often players.

The foundry VTT discord community might be a good place to look, roll20 is extremely bad to run PF2e on imo. Fantasygrounds automates more and is a better developed system than Foundry but isn't as cheap / accessible as foundry. Foundry's PF2e community have done a lot of good work on their ruleset and it seems to be where PF2e players are settling online atm...snip

I'll look into the foundry VTT. Not familiar with it. I've still not tried roll20 so thanks for the heads up. Anything in particular with PF2 that made you dislike it for west marches style game?

Now listen, this is gonna be more of a rant then anything and i have no delusion in thinking people are gonna agree with me on this right? But i feel i can confidently say that Paladins are the weakest of the 4th level casters to the point where i feel most full martials can outperform a paladin, where as they would likely struggle against the others(Assuming optimization of course) Let me explain why...snip

The biggest downside of a big claim such as "The worst of all X." is that you're trying to do something kind of impossible in this case. Very few things can be worst at something when there is as many scenarios for it as there are players and then some. There's some astounding ego here if you believe you can account for every metric a class can be based on in such an unbalanced eco system.

In a game where diseases are common and saves are important, a paladin shines a lot more than say a fighter. Hard to use all your feats when you're suffering leprosy. And sure, you could say that's a strawman or a nitpick scenario, but that's the point, you can't account for every situation out there.

It's a roleplay game after all, not rollplay. It makes sense the Paladin is behind bloodrager in damage. The bloodrager isn't as tanky and resilient as the Paladin is, the bloodrager can't assist the party in the same way either.

So what if magic equipment had some universal abilities/traits such as....?

All magic weapons increased in dice damage based on the enhancement bonus instead of a static bonus. Examples would be a +2 short sword would do 3d6 and a a +5 dagger would do 6d4.

All magic armor would grant DR/magic based on the enhancement bonus. I would say x2 or even x3 the enhancement bonus.

All magic shields would add it's enhancement bonus ether to all touch attacks(melee and ranged) or as an additional bonus against all ranged attacks(both regular and touch). Not sure wich I like better.

Of course you would have to make other changes to "balance things out" but I still like the idea.

Why though?

Hope this isn't a wrong place to post this, but was kind of curious if there's anything like the 5e west marches style discords around, but for PF2.

Been itchy to try PF2 properly, but finding games is a bit diffcult with EU timezone. Even on roll20 they seem scarce.

There are multiple ways to find games. As a matter of fact, there are probably enough different ways to do it that it's hard to make a complete list.

First, you'll need to decide how you want to play. There's F2F (face to face), VTT (virtual tabletop), PbP (play by post), and probably others.

Second, you'll need to decide what you're looking to play. There are (Paizo) Adventure Paths, Pathfinder Society scenarios, home games, and definitely others.

In general, a lot of organization happens on Discord. You'll need to register for Discord, and then find the appropriate channels. Besides the Pathfinder channel that Ediwir posted, various groups have their own channel - Roll for Combat and Cosmic Crittermanders come up an awful lot, and the Glass Cannon Podcast (a popular Pathfinder podcast) has their own channel as well. A lot of gaming stores have their own channels as well.

Warhorn is useful for organizing nightly games (but not longer AP-type runs). You'll need to register for Warhorn, and then you can use the search function to look for games. You'll need to request to join each group before being able to register for their games - different groups will have different criteria for joining.

Many PbP games are run here on the Paizo forums. From the main tree, go to Online Campaigns -> Recruitment. Pathfinder Society games tend to be centralized in the Cottonseed Lodge and AP recruitment is centralized in this thread. You can also browse through the individual recruitment threads. There's an online PbP convention that begins in February, Outpost IV.

Aside from my home game with my kids, I play mostly PFS PbP and PFS VTT, so if you have other questions about PFS (but not about the PFS Discord, I'm terrible with Discord), I'm happy to answer.

What's PFS PbP like by the way? I have never tried PFS due to location. I don't believe there is any in Norway.

Feels like Oholoko hit hit the nail on the head.

We're so used to comparing PF1 to it's predecessor, 3.5 and even 3e. And that habit doesn't translate well with 1e > 2e. They need to be considered entirely different systems in the same setting, not to each other. It's about as viable as basing how 5e dnd should be on 4e dnd.

For people with system mastery, PF1 was pretty much a breeze with a few exceptions, even more so when the CWL wand became meta and picking healer was effectively shooting yourself in the foot when you could be a godlike gish along with everyone else in the party.

Personally as a rogue player, I'm fine and expecting to be behind the barbarian in attacks. He will never get close to my skill usage mastery or utility.

TheGoofyGE3K wrote:

So I don't get why people get so obsessed over master proficiency. It's like BAB. Almost everyone gets at least 3/4 (expert) while some martials get full (master) and fighter has a bit of an edge (like the old weapon training for legendary).

Master is cool and all, but flank for the rogue and you're mathematically swinging at the same bonus to hit as a barbarian or fighter, which is way better than the PF1 multiclass fighter wizard had.

I think this is dice-feel WAY more than number crunching. As I've seen mentioned elsewhere, missing is the worst form of failure. This is difference from 1E as missing pretty much wasn't an issue, between MUCH higher success rates and far more attacks per round.

I've seen players at my table that internalize any failure and bottle up frustrations, and 2E's more even odds of success really plays an emotional trick on them. They feel like they are missing left and right and aren't being rewarded for their investments, and often they look to the Fighter and say 'if only I had that extra proficiency, I wouldn't feel this way.'

It is, in my opinion, a convenient thing to point at and blame when the real culprit is 2E math in general. The math is balanced around have a 50/50 chance to hit and wasting a non-zero amount of turns to missing, but it is one thing to say that and another to go through it. Just because it still works out and you can get through encounters that way doesn't change how people feel.

I think this dice-feel is coloring a decent amount of what people feel about gishes. We can't forget that the Magus was the class that did very little but pick up a keen scimitar and jam metamagic'd Shocking Graps out the wazzoo. How many people's preconceptions of what a gish does are colored by the nostalgia of that type of Magus critically hitting on a 15 and dealing hundreds of damage in huge bursts? That's an entirely different feeling than anything in 2E, and safe to say that isn't going to come back.

Ironically, the shocking grasp magus became a really boring version of fighters "I full attack"

I do think we need a few more weapon related focus spells.

Like...

Teleport slash. Level 3 focus spell.
2 actions.
Teleport up to half your speed and make a Strike. The surprise of your movement makes the enemy flat footed agaisnt the attack.
You can spend a third action to teleport back to your original location after the attack.

NOTHING PERSONEL KID

I feel like some people are missing the fact that on the martial side, you get magic weapons that give bonuses to-hit. Casters don't get that. It is only proficiency for them. I encourage you to consider the bonus difference at each level of casting and martial proficiencies and include the bonus from fundamental runes.

On the other hand, the enemies can't pick up a shield and an armor and take cover to increase their saves.

I've been gone a while, but has the meaning of Feat Tax changed?
A lot of people seem to be complaining that they have to take feats that will stay relevant or can be retrained out of later rather than focus on Feat Tax like PF1 had, where you had literally useless feats before the ones you wanted/needed, like someone mentioned Dazzling Display > Gun Twirling or Combat Expertise > Improved Feint/etc.

Taking Double Slice for a dual wield build then a feat that improves on it isn't really taxation is it?

Dedications don't really feel like a tax in most cases. Martial artist and monk MC both fully unlock unarmed attacks for anyone, it's no more tax than Improved Unarmed strikes was. Alchemist MC can be amazing because free daily potions that scale with level, heck. Not all of them are obviously amazing, but they seem to be on par with a class feat in most cases, granting the character an unique features that they can't get on their own.

Combat Expertise is especially bad since it's function was to actually REDUCE our checks to maneuvers...

I don't think double throwing was intended to be core to the archetype, and the fact that you can build a character around it is just gravy. I mostly think it's intended to be just an extra option for the narrow selection of characters who just happen to go about their adventuring day with a weapon that can be thrown in each hand.

It works really great for our low level warrior muse bard with Juggler. Just need to find a better way than returning two weapons :(

Rapid Mantel is in case you get thrown off a ledge or jump off I think.
You shouldn't need a feet to get up a ledge. Just add 5 ft of movement to move diagonally up one square and you're at the ledge?

I have to disagree. I have read the book before wasn't going to reread the entire thing to this rule. I find it surprising that anyone would think going to the section called Feats would not have this rule in it since it applies to almost nothing else but feats.

I initially look for the rule on Archives of Nethys, but their sections are in a lot of different places.

Did not try a Ctrl F because typing in Feats to control F in a book full of the word feat did not seem like a great idea. I already tried that in the Google machine and that didn't work.

Suffice to say thanks [b]thenobledrake[/i], glad your memory is better than mine on this topic.

It is before feats though, before the very first ones, aka before ancestry feats, then come class feats, then general and skill ones.

You can disagree if you want, but it doesn't change the fact that explanation of how a thing works does it's work just fine if it's presented at the intro. This is becoming into one of blowing things out of proportions. Everyone else has been doing just fine since release in finding this and not taking feats twice when they couldn't be taken twice or more.

I see your point about some of the built in loop holes manbearscientist. But I do think it was a mistake for Eldritch Archer to not have an alternate requirement for casters. To allow them to get it at roughly 9th level like they previously could. Specially considering many wizards were glad to give those fighter dip to get that Prestige Class at 9th without having to wait.

Corvo, the precedent I dont like is that a class that was clearly a Gish and supported both Full Martials and Full Casters about equally became something that heavily favors Martials.

Dragon Disciple was always a Sorcerer Bloodline thing, Magic Warrior was always a minor gish thing. Arcane Archer was always a heavy gish thing, martials became better casters and casters became better martials.

I get not liking an archetype not fitting for a concept. But the word you kinda put emphasis on is "Was". It's not really a fair or correct measurment to compare what it now IS to what it WAS when things worked so much differently.

A pf1 Wizard who dipped into AA without MC would have nearly full spellcasting, and higher "proficiencies/bab" than PF2 wizard who did. It was an entirely different foundation where wizard got not only full casting -1, but also full BAB, so to compare them isn't really fair anymore unless you think it's also wrong that an 2nd ed EA Wizard doesn't have higher weapon proficiency than a basic Wizard while being one level behind in casting.

Corvo thats just my point of arguement. The thread is about precedent in general.

But then it's not accurate either because there are archetypes which are open for some at 6 at no cost, and later for others, or that demand a cost like multiclassing before Eldritch Archer ever came out.

EA sets no specific requirment precedent because it came after other restricting archetypes. This is no different than a martial without focus trying to become a magic warrior or a lizardman trying to become a dragon disciple. They both can do it, albeit not as easy as say a caster or a kobold/sorcerer.

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

That's nice, though I don't think the topic was about how well they converted things based on PF1, but the accessability of this archetype or others like this. It seems to boil down to "Some 6+ archetypes are easier for some classes than others." and this falls into martial. Speaker falls into caster. Magic warrior is some martials who get their own Focus, and all casters, so kinda between?

I am speaking from what were this archetypes made for originally and roughly where were they gained.

Magic Warrior is fine because its a 2nd level archetype so its close enough to when Magus would start getting abilities.

Halcyon Speaker is fine because it was a very spell focus Prestige Class with a lot of lore connections.

Eldritch/Arcane Archer is not that fine because its honestly harder for spellcasters to gain access when it used to be relatively okay. Just 1 level later than most martials. Even Magus had to wait till 9th level to gain access to Arcane Archer.

Arrowsong Minstrel Bard and Child of Acavna were the only 2 classes to get access at level 7. A 4th level caster Fighter and a 6th level caster Bard.

Basing on whether an archetype is "fine" based on entry level of PF1 is beyond the scope of the thread for me, so I'm gonna duck out. That's not really interesting comparison anymore imho.

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

Feels like they're two sides of the same coin. A martial EA will have good Archery and struggle to hit with spells alone due to way Spell Attack works. A caster will have the reverse issue. Before, due to aoe spells working, it was probably better, especially since the math was also different and there were ways to cheese some pretty high attack numbers if you knew what you were doing. And it helped that your ranged attack was the same for both spells and bows, which just isn't the case anymore. For better or worse.

I don't think per se it's a /bad/ thing that this is an archetype oriented towards martials more than caster who want to pick up. The same way Magic Warrior or Halcyon Speaker is easier for casters and requires multiclassing or higher level for certain classes like monk/ranger.

Halcyon Speaker is based on Maangabyan Arcanist. That was a spellcasting prestige class requiring 3rd level arcane spells, lots of skills, and a spell feat.

Magic Warrior was a Magus Archetype that gave bonus to remain anonymous, a weak transformation, and ability to cast 7 druid spells.

****************

Reziburno25 wrote:

This is martial dedication similar in line to halycon speaker being more for casters.

Its too bad thats the case because it used to be a Gish Prestige Class.

That's nice, though I don't think the topic was about how well they converted things based on PF1, but the accessability of this archetype or others like this. It seems to boil down to "Some 6+ archetypes are easier for some classes than others." and this falls into martial. Speaker falls into caster. Magic warrior is some martials who get their own Focus, and all casters, so kinda between?

Feels like they're two sides of the same coin. A martial EA will have good Archery and struggle to hit with spells alone due to way Spell Attack works. A caster will have the reverse issue. Before, due to aoe spells working, it was probably better, especially since the math was also different and there were ways to cheese some pretty high attack numbers if you knew what you were doing. And it helped that your ranged attack was the same for both spells and bows, which just isn't the case anymore. For better or worse.

I don't think per se it's a /bad/ thing that this is an archetype oriented towards martials more than caster who want to pick up. The same way Magic Warrior or Halcyon Speaker is easier for casters and requires multiclassing or higher level for certain classes like monk/ranger.

I think the big difference might be because of the way "BAB" works now. Before a wizard would end up gaining full BAB and casting-1 from the prestige and that's why it felt viable probably. I don't think it can be replicated exactly in the new system which uses proficiency. It still seems like both cases are meant to augment a martial archer and the aoe flinging wizards were a happy accident.

On upside, this has some really sweet improvements and sets a nice precedent in that it allows all schools of casting, works with innate spells that can be gained in a few different ways, and doesn't force multiclassing before being able to enter it for either class.

It still feels likeboth martial and casters can benefit in their own way though, a caster who enters at higher level has a much broader spell selection, while a martial supplements hs strikes with magic and utility. Though again, because of the new system, a caster is often better off using his Spell Attack rolls, it's not like before where they had to be amazing acrobats to hit with a ray spell.

I have a player who likes Surveying Wildlife feat very much :3 - It opens a lot of cool character moments based on the ability to do that repeatedly.

I think most of these "unlocking basic results" skills, give players certainty that they CAN in fact do that reliably, without taking into account how the gm feels that evening. So I think they can have a nice niche in the game.

That's nice to hear, I have a player in my group who's the same. He's a face character, and was happy that there was a feat that let him use his pimped out Diplomacy to make money. Now his character is a merchant and thriving, both financially and aesthetically.

On the upside, this isn't like 1e. Everyone gets plenty of skill feats. Before we had to pick between stuff like Power Attack and being better at swimming.

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

Isn't page 18 basically intro? You should have seen it before heading into ancestry feats from a practical standpoint.

It is fair to assume that they might have seen it and forgotten it since first reading the section, or outright skipped the section like the vast majority of people I have asked who have started PF2e.

(which is a shame, as it is such a well designed section for giving people an intro as to how the system now works)

I understand that, I'm guilty of it a lot myself, why I always either google or search AoN or the book before asking, but it just felt a little too dramatic to imply that intro rule stuff at the start of the book before the actual rules/mechanics was "all over the place".

Man, why did they choose to put these rules all over the place rather than in the section on feats. I would really love to see someone at Paizo do a text clean up at some point. Put some of these stuff where it should be found.

Glad there are posters that know where to find these little rules. Just spent time reading the class feats and feats section. Nada.

Isn't page 18 basically intro? You should have seen it before heading into ancestry feats from a practical standpoint.

Kill the assistants after.
Or grab scrolls of Simulacrum maybe?

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

Squiggit wrote:

MaxAstro wrote:

As I said - I'm quite glad that higher level archetypes still exist, and I would be disappointed if everything were available at level 2.

I don't disagree. Higher level archetypes are important and good design space.

But magical archer isn't just a prestige idea, imo. It's sort of a character defining concept. Not being able to explore that design space at all until level 6 or level 12 feels unfortunate to me.

That's not entirely true though. Any fighter could for example grab Wizard at 2nd and 4th and use spellstoring arrows and magic arrows like vine arrows. Or as manbearscientist mentioned, cast a cantrip then follow up with a Strike.

Heck, a lot of humans and elves can do that with just ancestry feats at level 1. You're still a magical archer even if you don't use Eldritch Shot.

Magic arrows cost money. The fact that you can cast a cantrip and shoot a bow anyway is a part of the argument for letting you do them together before level 6.

So does alchemical items, but one class and it's MC give them for free. There's an archetype for that too. Even an archetype that gives talismans for free. The option is there, the eldritch archer improves on it the same way an alchemist or talismanarchetype does. It doesn't make it unfair that other classes who dabble in craft and alchemical crafting have to pay or pick an archetype to be better at it?

The 6+ classes tend to improve on something, if you can do it just as well at level two or without the archetype, it loses impact a lot of the time. And you're still a magic archer without eldritch archer's eldritch shot. Just like you can be a slave saving revolutionary before grabbing Bellflower before level six. Bellflower archetype doesn't make it somehow impossible to be a slave saver before 6, he's just better at it.

Also note that the cantrip + strike will fall behind since the martial won't have spell attack as proficient as his bow attack. Eldritch archer offers them a way to bypass the casting proficiency lag, while a caster who comes in later has an insanely bigger spell repetoir. There's ups and downs to all combinations and again, what you're complaining about eldritch archer has been happening since before APG.

MaxAstro wrote:

As I said - I'm quite glad that higher level archetypes still exist, and I would be disappointed if everything were available at level 2.

I don't disagree. Higher level archetypes are important and good design space.

But magical archer isn't just a prestige idea, imo. It's sort of a character defining concept. Not being able to explore that design space at all until level 6 or level 12 feels unfortunate to me.

That's not entirely true though. Any fighter could for example grab Wizard at 2nd and 4th and use spellstoring arrows and magic arrows like vine arrows. Or as manbearscientist mentioned, cast a cantrip then follow up with a Strike.

Heck, a lot of humans and elves can do that with just ancestry feats at level 1. You're still a magical archer even if you don't use Eldritch Shot.

Corvo Spiritwind wrote:

Stack wrote:

NemoNoName wrote:

I agree that preventing caster classes from becoming Eldritch Archers early is... questionable, but it does seem in line with the whole edition as being martial oriented and simply ignoring casters.

However, if you look to it from a martial perspective, I consider Enchanting Arrow to be the thing. You're not casting a specific spell to imbue the arrow, but instead you are firing a magic imbued arrow. To me, that is the core Feat of the class.

[Given some other stuff I've seen for casters, I would honestly not be surprised that whoever was writing the class didn't realise caster classes literally cannot take it earlier]

Enchanting arrow, its like power attack with stun on crit, but level 8 and useless against mindless creatures. Its not bad, but it doesn't seem worth taking an entire dedication for.

Seems like really odd cherry picking right here. If I take the class, I might of course enjoy one feat over another, but generally people take a dedication because of a mix of powers and aesthetics. For me, the main attraction is the Magic Arrow ability and viper arrows, but it'd be silly to claim that's the only reason.

I actually rather like a number of the feats, which is why I am here expressing my frustration. If I didn't like the archetype (and expected future archetypes that will use it as a benchmark), I wouldn't be annoyed that it is difficult to enter. There are plenty of dedications that aren't worth typing up a complaint over.

Not sure why other archetypes would use this as such, there's other archetypes in the same vein, some even before APG like the golem one. Not every class can meet the earliest possible proficiency for all archetypes, I don't think that's intended or good design either. Some classes have different options and access points and it adds variety to things I believe.

Sounds like rather than eldritch, your concern might be with prestige type archetypes, such as shadowdancer. Even hellknight is minimum level six and even requires another dedication before picking it up. There's actually a myriad of 6+ only archetypes even before Eldritch Archer came out. On the upside, eldritch archer does something great for non-casters. It actually gives them access to class features without having to multiclass like before, that alone is an amazing change and a great precedent.

@manbearscientist
Dang nice explanation, you covered it so much better than me.
Side note, do you think it might a viable/interesting tactic to pick up spellstoring ammunition with the Magic Arrow ability and shoot arrows that can use spells that don't use spell attack rolls (ie can't be cast with Eldritch Shot?)

NemoNoName wrote:

I agree that preventing caster classes from becoming Eldritch Archers early is... questionable, but it does seem in line with the whole edition as being martial oriented and simply ignoring casters.

However, if you look to it from a martial perspective, I consider Enchanting Arrow to be the thing. You're not casting a specific spell to imbue the arrow, but instead you are firing a magic imbued arrow. To me, that is the core Feat of the class.

[Given some other stuff I've seen for casters, I would honestly not be surprised that whoever was writing the class didn't realise caster classes literally cannot take it earlier]

Enchanting arrow, its like power attack with stun on crit, but level 8 and useless against mindless creatures. Its not bad, but it doesn't seem worth taking an entire dedication for.

Seems like really odd cherry picking right here. If I take the class, I might of course enjoy one feat over another, but generally people take a dedication because of a mix of powers and aesthetics. For me, the main attraction is the Magic Arrow ability and viper arrows, but it'd be silly to claim that's the only reason.

If you go Eldritch Archer, pay attention to level 8 feat, Magic Arrow.
I'm personally really loving it more than the shooting spells. I've picked Viper Arrow, Climbing Bolt and Vine Arrow. This lets me at any time, turn a basic arrow into either one that turns into a viper and poisons then harasses a target, an easy access to any ledge or higher surface (3 arrows spaced out could easily give rope up a 130ft wall.) and Vine has potential to immobilize and slows with no save until they remove it.

There's also antler arrow for pining targets to the ground. They could potentially work really well with Investigator. If you know your next roll is a crit, use vine arrow and immobilize a target until they remove the vines for example.