Covent's page

So, as treat deadly wounds has been mentioned in several threads I thought I would check my assumptions on it as I have never seen it used at a table and remember thinking "Well, that is useless" after reading it.

So a couple of points.

1.) Using the heal skill or in PF2 the medicine skill for level appropriate healing is good in my opinion.

2.) The line

You must expend two uses from a healer’s kit to perform this task.You take a –2 penalty on your check for each use from a healer’s kit that you lack.

I always took to mean, you must use 2 uses of a healers kit to use treat deadly wounds and that if you did not have enough uses left in your kit, i.e. 1, or did not have a kit at all you took the -2 for each of the 2 uses you did not use. I had never read it as "your healers kit is at 6/10 uses so you take a -8".

3.) Treat deadly wounds in PF1 takes an hour.

4.) Treat deadly wounds heals either creatures level on a DC20 check or creatures level + your Wis mod on a DC25 check. This means with taking 10 you are able to use treat deadly wounds at DC20 at around level 1 if you invest skill ranks, have it as a class skill, and have a 4+ wisdom mod.

You can start taking 10 to beat the DC25 check at level 6, with the same investment.

5.) This means at you are taking an hour per patient to heal each patient for 1-5 damage, at levels 1-5, when you can make the DC20 check, and 10-32, at levels 6-20, when you can make the DC25 check.

6.) You may only do this once per day, per patient.

7.) At level six when you change over to the DC25 check you are at the greatest % total HP healed. It scales down from there as the scaling on TDW is very very slow. If this is on a D10 martial with average HP a two con mod and no con belt or level up bonuses spent in con, you are healing ~22 % of his/her 49 HP at 11 HP healed.

8.) Actual average % healed over all levels is 13%. This is assuming a user of TDW has a starting 4 Wis mod and uses all level ups for Wis along with buying a Wis headband and a Wis Tome +5. The D10 martial is buying a con belt starting at level 7, and keeping it upgraded but making no other concessions to con.

9.) The cost of TDW is the same as a CLW wand in HP/GP at level 4. It is more expensive before, and less expensive after, becoming much less expensive once you can make the DC25 check.

Conclusions:

A.) Treat deadly wounds is only a level appropriate amount of healing at ~levels 6-9, and then only with a specific and large investment.

B.) At once per patient per day the periodicity of TDW is punitive.

C.) At an hour per patient the use time of TDW is punitive.

So, I would argue that TDW is effectively useless in PF1 due to its low effective healing, long periodicity, investment required and use time.

If we change it to alleviate these issues I believe we should have it do the following.

I.) Heal 20%-25% of a D10 martial's HP, at every level, not just at its peak, with similar investment from the martial to what I described above.

II.) Have a periodicity of 1/encounter.

III.) Have a use time of from 3 actions to a maximum of 5 minutes. I personally prefer closer to the lower end.

IV.) Do not require any investment beyond Skill ranks and a healers kit, so that more classes can use it. Effectively lower the DC.

Tl;DR: TDW is a great thematic vehicle via the heal skill to defeat the "It's your turn to play the healer" syndrome, it just needs a complete rework, which hopefully we will get.

Math!: Yeah!

11.) Do you want to ride bikes?

Covent wrote:

KingOfAnything wrote:

Covent wrote:

the "But I don't want to use my cool powers to patch up Bob, I want to use them to be a raging engine of divine justice" problem

This, at least, is addressed by making healing a separate pool from other spells.

Just to be clear are you suggesting something like, Lvl 1 Cleric has 2 general spells and 1 healing spell?

If so I would say this still would leave some players asking, "Why do I have to have healing spells? Why can't I just have another Divine Favor?"

It would also still leave healing in the hands of a subset of casters which I feel would be bad. This is why I believe that we should have available, level appropriate, healing for all classes through means such as the heal skill, short rests, or some other form.

Have you listened to the playtest podcast? The cleric's healing pool is used for both single target and area healing/ channeled energy. You might prepare a healing spell on top of that, but I expect most healing will stem from the healing pool.

I was aware that channel could be used for healing spells. I was just unclear with what you meant, my apologies, if I came off as gruff or rude.

Now this still leaves the "Who's turn is it to play the cleric" issue.

Angel Hunter D wrote:

edduardco wrote:

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

And obviously people are right when they say that Resonance makes a healbot more necessary than ever. Unless, that is, we're going to see a 4E-style system of self-healing, or that system as adapted by 5e. Which, you know, they're totally not copying 5e so it can't be that.

I still think that the people saying that a healbot is going to be mandatory are getting ahead of themselves, we don't know what other changes magic items are getting, or what other abilities can affect Resonance.

We aren't getting ahead of ourselves. If we aren't supposed to analyze don't put it in front of us.

Instead of assuming a system is broken from our limited preview, let's predict which systems they came up with to make it work well in the game.

If the resonance system is as described, to combat the needed healer problem, the "Well I know the town is in danger but we are out of resonance and no one has any healing spells, as we all played martials/arcane casters so lets rest" issue, or the "But I don't want to use my cool powers to patch up Bob, I want to use them to be a raging engine of divine justice" problem I would recommend making healing more easily available via the heal skill, short rests, or meditation. Something like this, available to all classes, would be needed.

To combat the "sell all consumables as who has spare resonance for those" problem I would make resonance not apply to potions/scrolls and change wands and similar wondrous items to simply use one resonance per use but not have charges. This would mean the main difference between wands and staffs could be, due to the announced spell scaling changes, that wands use a DC based on the minimum DC for the wand and staves use your DC.

Also since HP is going up and apparently the amount healed from potions is going down, the ratio of damage to health to healing will need to be very tightly scrutinized.

This does create the issue that potions/scrolls become more desirable as they do not use resonance, but their cost would be GP and actions and could be tuned to the new PF2 WBL system. They are already changing costs of everything as shown by the iconic fighters purchases with his 15 starting GP.

When you get down to it however resonance actually makes the "Big 6/Best items only" issue worse. Now you do not have room for fun or fluff items or utility items until you have all of your +X items accounted for with resonance. Depending on how may they leave in the game this could be levels 5+ or levels 8+ for non charisma based characters.

This also makes martials more MAD as now you need Str, Dex, Con, Wis, Chr. Maybe things are different in PF2 and you don't need Dex for a Str martial at all or you don't need Wis for saves anymore, but at this point we do not know and it is a concern.

In short resonance needs substantial changes as does WBL, healing, HP, how all magic items work, MAD issues, and others I surely missed.

Covent wrote:

I just do not want to see any realism cause some concepts to be limited to only realistic things such that they get "cool powers" like jump an extra 10 feet or hold your breath for an extra few rounds, while others are getting the ability to instantly cause enemies to fall unconscious or create protective fields of force from level one.

While I can understand that, I must say that I'd probably immediately lose interest in the game, if there was no mundane class to play anymore. I love to play in highly magical worlds with relatively down-to-earth characters (relatively because even the mundane classes can do some amazing things ingame that a normal human being wouldn't be able to do), and I can happily accept that magic is stronger than the sword. As a point of comparison, in a Pathfinder MArvel game, I'd want to play street level characters like those from the Netflix series, but I'd probably not play one of the Avengers' powerhouses. I do not care so much if someone else does that, but if I'm forced to do this, as I said I lose interest pretty soon.

It's also why I don't like partaking in games with more than a small amount of optimizing. Because in order to keep up with my fellow co-players (especially when that's expected), I have to build a character that I'm not interested in and I'd rather not do that.

I can respect that is your preferred play style. In my preferred play style magic should = the sword and street level should = low level.

I understand that you want to make use of the Paizo AP's, however if PF2 and PF2 catered to a more E6 style game which in my opinion you are describing, I at least would simply not play them or PF2. I feel that most of my characters really start coming into their own levels 7-10 and are comfortably what I want to play around levels 11-15.

This is one of the reasons I tried 5th edition and immediately switched to a different game system, not enough growth for me. I personally would love if we could cut levels 1-5 out PF2 and start at about the power level of PF1 level 6, but I realize that there are quite a few people that like those levels so if I was making the design decisions about PF2 I would leave them in so those who like levels 1-5, or 3-12, or any other ranges still have available play space.

That is why I hope we can leave the level 1-20 range as a true level 1-20 range rather than a 1-6 or 1-10 in disguise, as it allows more people to find their comfortable range.

Now High level play in PF1 at 13+ has issues and I hope they address those, but most of high level plays problems in my opinion is based on either LFQW or math not working, so if they fix those two issues by hopefully bringing mundanes up and magic down I would like that.

I would also not mind having more level appropriate options for lower levels, but at no point, in my opinion, are options such as Hold Breath or Raging Leaper level appropriate.

Things like One of those faces or Auspicious mark are much more appropriate for low level and low power games in my opinion.

When it comes to realism and/or versmilitude, I think the real issue is firstly, the disjoint between what should happen based on expectations of what's possible in narrative milieu, much of which has a basis in real world experience that even the players will know first-hand, compared to the mechanical results, and secondly, self consistency not just with the direct effects, but with the the cause-effect chain implied by those direct effects.

In my opinion, the rules benefit from leaving many of the minor details and corner cases for the gm to handle, such as disallowing reflex saves while paralyzed. This is because there is no way for the designers to cover every possiblity, and attempting to do so would just bloat the rules to many times the size they are now just for small things that rarely come up and are gdnerally common sense anyway.

The problem is when you get rules lawyers who want to argue that a reflex save should be allowed because the rules while completely ignoring the narrative milieu.

I think a major help here would be to add in the rules some explicit jobs for the gm, such as "It is the gm's responsibility to use common sense and make adjustments for when the narrative milieu and the rules conflict or when strange or unusual circumstances occur in which the standard rules no longer make sense."

If that was actually in the rules as part of the gm's job, then rules lawyers woukd at least be hindered on ridiculous and obvious loopholes, while also allowing the designers to not worry so much about edge cases.

While I agree the rules will never cover every corner case and a GM will have to make some rulings on the fly, one of the main things I like is that PF1 has a large rule set that covers most cases.

I strongly disagree with the statement of your I bolded above. Unless a rule says something, I am of the opinion that realism or narrative milieu adjustments adjustments are bad for the game. I want the GM to be a narrator and facilitator, and only act as a referee in the most corner of cases.

If it is not clear I strongly feel that a player should be able to come in and say "these are the rules and they work this way" with confidence 99% of the time. I do not like games where you have to ask the GM "OK, how can I do X this time?". It is my opinion that a consistent and math based rule set is beneficial as it leads to less looking things up at the table or issues as since the rules just work one way people know what their abilities do.

Covent wrote:

Please no. In my opinion it is much more important for a game to have internally consistent rules that are balanced, rather than have anything based on realism. Realism is something that has been used to hold back lots of concepts and unbalance the game for far too long imo.

Depends on how you look at it: As an example, to me, CM/D is not a problem of the mundane/fighter classes being to weak by being restricted to a wrong sense of realism. The real problem is that the caster classes are way too strong and that characters basically become demigods at higher level. Someone really has to scale that level of power back. Only that I'm afraid that Paizo will never do that.

On mundane classes we will have to cordially agree to disagree.

On casters I agree they need to be lowered in top end and have some abuses reined in.

I think from the limited amount of info that we have been provided though that we are going to see mundanes come up and casters come down.

I just do not want to see any realism cause some concepts to be limited to only realistic things such that they get "cool powers" like jump an extra 10 feet or hold your breath for an extra few rounds, while others are getting the ability to instantly cause enemies to fall unconscious or create protective fields of force from level one.

Selective realism in a game is in my opinion crippling and causes chasms in ability between different concepts, and since this is a game with magic, all concepts should be able to compete regardless of how magical and mundane they are. Magic should not be a free pass to wear the "better than you" hat, and being mundane should not equal wearing the "only useful until you can get better summons" sign.

I would be fine with name changes to make history enthusiasts more pleased. That is a small and to me insignificant change, but all mechanics for classes/feats/spell/weapons/armor/everything, should be based on a balanced system grounded in a mathematical game framework that makes the game fun and flowing. In my opinion none of that should be constrained by any historical truth.

Tl;DR: Historical naming system = fine. Any constraints to realism that affect mechanics = bad, in my opinion.

Please no. In my opinion it is much more important for a game to have internally consistent rules that are balanced, rather than have anything based on realism. Realism is something that has been used to hold back lots of concepts and unbalance the game for far too long imo.

Just chiming in to say "Sorry OP you and I disagree."

I would very much like to see Champions of "X" alignment for each alignment, as a class. Calling the LG one "Paladin" as a nod to legacy would be great, in my opinion.

It should be one class with different options based on your alignment, and the portfolio of your deity. Any defining features like *Cough* Divine Grace *Cough* should be on all of the champions. Any other abilities should be part of a common pool you choose from. Having some be "X" alignment or "X,Y" alignment only would also be fine.

Please:

Make a game where the math is elegant, informs all things, and avoids things like characters easily making all situations deterministic, "Rocket-Tag", or LFQW. Basically the entire game should be built around the math and making it work first as a game.

Eliminate the need for the "Big Six". More power in the character less in the magical "Bling" that anyone could wear.

Let your game design mojo run free and truly change things for the better.

Include familiars as a valid, and useful thing. Rather than a wand buddy/item retrieval buddy, or a gimmick due to DR/Fast healing/Damage sharing.

Clarify mounted combat.

Clarify Hand Vs Hand and wield/hold.

Use tags/call outs to define things. Such as a spell could be [1rst Level], [Fire] and [Evocation]

Make Clerics different based on God/Religion. A base limited spell list and then gaining access to spells with certain keywords based on your deities domains would be great.

Fix mundane crafting so that it is useful for PC's.

Fix Magic item crafting/Purchasing/Spell casting services such that the right answer to all things is not to have an encyclopedic knowledge of items/spells so you can make/buy perfect magic bullets for any situation.

Make casters more narrow such that you are no longer a wizard, you are a master conjurer or a sage of abjuration. Basically beguiler.

Make spell schools equally desirable. No more Conjuration > everything.

Make Evocation viable and good as it is sometimes fun to just blow stuff up without having to jump through a bunch of weird hoops.

Give pure martials ways to have narrative power. Skills would be a good place to do this.

Eliminate long feat chains, and buff feats. No more +2 to two skills or +1 hit or AC feats.

Give a good solid explanation for all skills especially things like stealth, in the skills chapter. Do not make players hunt through the environment and other rules chapters.

Buff skills to grant more narrative power.

Give solid lists of Skill DC's that show appropriate tasks 1-20.

Make the system setting agnostic. Gods for clerics as examples are as setting informed as I at least desire, and I would prefer just having domain lists and example builds. Making setting specific feats/classes/spells or anything else is fine in a setting book, great even, just not in the core book.

Make alignment only required for those that draw their powers from being said alignment, and eliminate much of the alignment restrictions. Allow non-lawful monks, lawful barbarians, or Champion of "X" alignment in place of paladin for example.

Please Don't:

Make any concessions in the quality of the game for backwards compatibility.

Include anything for "realism", "feel's right", or "World building".

Use different systems to build PCs and NPCs/Monsters. All characters should use one coherent build system.

Padded Sumo. In other words inflate hit points and reduce damage, such that a fight lasts much longer than it should, and also long after it is clear who will win. Some hit point increase at lower levels to combat swinginess would be fine and some damage moderation to combat rocket tag is desired even. Just please do not go overboard.

Make healing ineffective/onerous, or have any class where what they are "good" or "The best" at healing.

Sliding Skill DC's, the same 10 foot wall should not have a higher DC just because a character leveled up.

Balance mechanical power with role playing restrictions.

Would be Nice, personally:

An eventual mythic book. I admit I love mythic, and this would be a perfect opportunity to include it in a form where the math for mythic is just an extension of the math for the core game.

Can we please please please not ask for more "nested sources" FAQ's? Honestly what is next, "Well a character only gets +1 to hit from Weapon focus and greater weapon focus, due to the fact that they are both feats/both possessed by one character/both target one weapon, so "Feats/the character/the weapon" is the source!"

Please, if you have a problem with something house-rule it. If you only play PFS I am sorry if someone is making the game un-fun for you, but please do not get more content nerfed or worse "Re-printed" so we get a weaker version of the same content rather than getting new and useful content.

Grr, I admit you kinda hit my berserk button as the nested sources FAQ is something I revile.

Hey guys, I keep trying to cast animate dead on this thread, but can't beat the SR.

Can someone point me towards the one use wondrous item that gives +5 to CL checks to beat SR so I can finally get one through? I've looked everywhere for it and can't find it.

This?

Xenocrat wrote:

Scott Wilhelm wrote:

It seems to me that there is a distinct possibility of it not happening. Not all the sections of Pathfinder Unchained were approved for Pathfinder Society play. It is possible that not all sections of Wilderness being adopted, either.

Moreover, in order to use a rule in PFS, you need to own the book. I don't own Ultimate Wilderness, and I intend not to! If they want to make it illegal for me to have a PFS Protector Familiar, it is necessary for them to update the rules somewhere else.

Meanwhile, This uncertainty certainly affects my willingness to purchase the Familiar Folio. They already blew their chance to get me to buy Inner Sea Gods with what they did with Potion Glutton. Now they are about to miss out on my money again with Familiar Folio!

No doubt much of UW won’t be approved for PFS, but this screams of a change made for and at the request of PFS.

then why didn't pfs just house rule it to work the way they wanted just like they do with everything else and not ruin things for the rest of us

*Mourns Crane Style and MoMS*

Authorative Vestaments?

Human Animist shaman with channel energy, a thrush familiar, the asmoden advocate feat and authorative vestaments = no combat pure diplomacy all the time unless the GM says "No diplomacy for reasons". Throw in silver tounged human racial and a diplomacy trait for giggles.

When that happens you are still a full nine level caster that can poach the cleric and sorcerer/wizard list for the best buffs, condition removals and heals.

Knight who says Meh wrote:

There is (at least) one person in my group that thinks the core monk is overpowered for a martial class. Again, balance is subjective. Complexity (in this case) is subjective.

People being wrong does not make a topic subjective.

+>9000

Hi folks, things we aren't doing in this thread include: discussion of if rape victims detect as evil. I removed some posts and a bunch of replies for that reason.

Thank you.

I agree with Chris that things have changed, and there are people I miss.

I am posting and lurking here much less.

Ah, well.

All good things...

P.S. Happy Holidays everyone.

Covent wrote:

Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:

Gisher wrote:

James Risner wrote:

Also general wisdom on 1/day items is that it should take up the slot and you cAn not swap it out to use the 1/day.

So you are saying that I can't use a Cloak of the Hedge Wizard (divination) to cast true strike, and then trade it for a Cloak of Resistance? Where is that rule written?

1/day items require 24 hours of attunement before they can be used. So if you do that switch, you won't be able to use the Hedge cloak's power until you wear it for a full 24 hours after you put it back on.

This is not a rule.

It is on my table. Paizo made it a convention for 1/use items specifically to bar shennningans such as passing them around or carrying a coat rack of cloaks and shirts. And it's pretty much the rule for PFS on items of this nature that the campaign hasn't simply banned out of existence.

It's a good convention, so I've made it universal in campaigns I run.

That's fine as a house rule. We are in the rules forum however and it is in no way a rule. I could be wrong but I do believe that even in PFS there is nothing preventing you from purchasing multiples of a x/day item and swapping them when they run out. Unless of course the item such as post errata Swift runners shirt has text to prevent it. Using the cloak of the hedge wizard as an example could you give me a quote or link that prevents this, please?

Anything by dreamscarred press.

If you ever play mythic then the legendary games mythic books.

I admit, I R Disappoint. This is one of the big events of my year. Not trying to rag on Paizo people, I understand about busy schedules. Just sad.

Hey everyone.

I am posting my house rules here for feedback and constructive criticism. Along with them I am posting a first draft of my slightly adjusted fighter.

I still have some fighter concerns such as lack of access to such things as dispel magic/spell sunder, lack of in class flight, and I am worried exactly how well he will scale. I do however think he will hold up better against a Paladin, Ranger, or Barbarian.

So please feel free to comment and criticize anything.

Just for clarity's sake my design goals are as follows:

• Keep Fighter a mundane based simple class.
  
• Make Fighter be able to perform at the level of a Paladin, Ranger, or Barbarian, both in and out of combat.
  
• Ensure the class is fun to play.
  
• Cut down on the system mastery required to make a "good" Fighter.
  
• Have Fighter scale with levels in all areas.
  

House Rules

Fighter

Covent wrote:

If you want to make up an institution where a person A pays a person B a fair wage and has no rights to their person aside from litigation if the agreed upon work is not completed for the agreed upon timeframe, call it something else, that is not slavery.

That sounds like a pretty basic contract.

Yep pretty much what I was getting at.

Kobold Cleaver wrote:

Cruel Illusion wrote:

I can't believe this thread is that long.

How did it go beyond:
OP: "Is hiring a slave considered an evil act ?"
Answer: "Heck yes, it is! There is no way owning someone like they're a vulgar object can be anything but evil!"

What if they own someone like they're a very nice object?

clearly there are many shades of gray

There is no good form of dehumanization. Some things are merely evil.

Slavery is one of those things, like torture and rape. No shades of gray here.

I read through this whole thread just so I could say this, and you beat me to it by less than an hour!

Ninja!

Also quite correct.

Slavery is oppression and strips the slave of its dignity therefore evil, full stop.

At no point is the fact that someone is reduced to the same status as a chair or a favorite painting, and can be killed/mistreated as such anything but evil. Even if the slave owners do not do such the institution allows for it and is therefore evil.

It will never be anything but evil to make a person into an object.

If you want to make up an institution where a person A pays a person B a fair wage and has no rights to their person aside from litigation if the agreed upon work is not completed for the agreed upon timeframe, call it something else, that is not slavery. Once person A has the legal right to person B outside of the defined work or has ownership of person B that is slavery and reduces person B to the status of a cart or a horse.

Slavery inherently removes the humanity from a person and makes them a thing, this is inherently evil even in pathfinder terms.

What is warriors spirit and training weapon? Not doubting just interested.

Valet Familar + Craft Wondrous Item is the most popular in my games for Amulet of Natural Armor, Cloak of Resistance, Pearls of Power, Belts/Headbands of Stats, tasty tasty ioun stones, wayfinders, and Handy Haversacks.

My players usually buy their rings of protection and rings of sustenance.

Sometimes I see craft arms and armor but it is more rare.

Clearly there are a lot of people on here unhappy. We are all the highly passionate readers.

The local pathfinder groups each had a post on the errata, and the GM's have handled helping the players sell back or modify their characters as a result. I'm a local GM.

• KY Pathfinder has 172 members
  
• Lexington PFS has 33 members
  
• Cincinnati Pathfinder has 173 members
  
• WV Pathfinder has 238 members
  
• East KY Pathfinder has 28 members

I followed all the discussion threads on those forums, and I don't recall many (any?) people unhappy.

I've played or GM's 2 games a week or more since the errata came out. I don't recall anyone unhappy at my table or the other simultaneously ran tables.

---

So back to my point, the people unhappy are us passionate lot on here. The vast majority of players just swapped out their items and moved on to more important things. Like killing goblins.

James,

I tried to be as polite as possible in my last post. You however are continuing to commit an error both in scientific method and in logic.

1.) Even if we assume that every member of the groups you mentioned was polled and agree with your "Vast Majority" point. They are not statistically significant. World population is 7.4 billion, if we assume that .005% of that number play pathfinder then we can see that the Pathfinder population is 370,000 world wide. 545/370,000 = .14729 repeating%. If we were talking about a community with close geographical and cultural ties than perhaps you would be approaching a 4% confidence interval. In trying to come to a "vast majority" of Pathfinder player we are not, and I guarantee you that there is some overlap, and some unhappiness in the groups you cite voiced or unvoiced. This means your sample is both not diverse enough and too small.

2.) You are also saying that the errata is an improvement because the vast majority of people like it/are not unhappy with it. This is an argumentum ad populum fallacy as people's approval or you citing their approval without any proof is not the same as an improvement in the game.

So please try to be more restrained in your sweeping generalizations, ok?

I do not believe I know the opinion of the "Vast Majority" either, just to be clear. I would just like to see good clean logical argument based on facts on both sides. Fallacies, and Ad-Hominem attacks are how productive discussion dies and threads get locked, so lets avoid them on both sides of this debate.

P.S. I am not saying you are using Ad-Hominem attacks they are simply worth mentioning as a notable debate and logic pitfall.

Insain Dragoon wrote:

Overall the errata was a failure.

To you maybe. To the vast majority of others, things got an improvement.

I also would like to point out you have no proof of the idea of "a vast majority" thinking errata up till now is an improvement. Before you say "in my anecdotal experience it is true" I will reply that in my ancedotal experience it is false so we are at loggerheads there.

Basically I do not believe that either of us knows how a majority of Pathfinder players feels about errata and say perhaps we should both avoid sweeping generalizations that attempt to marginalize others, ok?

I should have posted the build along with my initial post. I forgot, it was very late when I posted that.

Tengu Unchained Rogue (Swordmaster/Scout/Counterfeit Mage) 7/ Fighter (Drill Sergeant) 2/ Brawler (Snakebite Striker) 1.

Str 13
Dex 20 (16+2, +1 at lvl 4 and 8)
Con 16 (16-2, +2 belt)
Int 8
Wis 15 (13+2)
Cha 7

AC 33 (10 + 9 Armor + 5 Shield + 5 Dex + 1 Natural + 2 Deflection + 1 Insight). Touch 18 and Flatfooted 28
Fortitude 12, Reflex 13, Will 7

Lvl 1 - Rogue 1: Sneak Attack 1d6, Magical Expertise, Finesse Training (Weapon Finesse), Weapon Focus (Estoc)
Lvl 2 - Rogue 2: Evasion, Rogue Talent: Assault Leader
Lvl 3 - Rogue 3: Sneak Attack 2d6, Tiger Trance, Finesse Training (Dex to damage Estoc), Step Up
Lvl 4 - Rogue 4: Scout's Charge, Debilitating Injury, Signature Wand, (RETRAIN: Assault Leader into Combat trick: Press to the Wall)
Lvl 5 - Fighter 1: Improved Shield Bash, Two Weapon Fighting
Lvl 6 - Brawler 1: Sneak Attack 3d6, Unarmed Strike (1d6), Brawler's Cunning, Martial Training (Improved Unarmed Strike)
Lvl 7 - Fighter 2: Tactician: Overwhelm, Shield Snag, Improved Two Weapon Fighting
Lvl 8 - Rogue 5: Sneak Attack 4d6, Rogue's Edge (Disable Device)
Lvl 9 - Rogue 6: Dragon Trance, Wand Adept, Rogue Talent: Weapon Training (Spiked Heavy Shield), Following Step
Lvl 10 - Rogue 7: Sneak Attack 5d6
Lvl 11 - Rogue 8: Skirmisher, undefined Rogue Talent, Step up and Strike

Traits: Indomitable Faith (+1 Will) and Shield Trained (shields are light/simple weapons)
Vanity: Master of Trade

Notable Gear at lvl 10.2 (PFS): +1 Adamantine Estoc, +1/+3 Spiked Darkwood Heavy Shield, +3 Mithral Agile Breastplate, Ring of Protection +2, Amulet of Natural Armor +1, Dusty Rose Prism, Clear Spindle, Cloak of Resistence +2, Belt of Con +2, Composite Short Bow

As for the discussion, I'll admit I rolled well on some of the attacks, and the Estoc has a crit range of 18-20 which factored in as well. But the fights...

So with this info your DPR is 58.61125.

A 15 pb non-archetype'ed Fighter dual wielding kukri's does 63.18.

Your numbers are with flanking and sneak. The fighter does his without flanking.

With flanking the fighter jumps to 72.54.

Your build does have better defenses than the fighter build but he does more damage. It seems to me that you simply have a semi-well built martial here.

Now your will save is an issue unless you put that clear spindle in a wayfinder, and you need a method of flight, but other than that you look solid.

This is in no way overpowered.

To me this means that the issue is either the ease of pathfinder society modules, the way said modules are designed catering to your strengths, or the other players at the table rather than the feat in question or your build.

Please do not get more decent, not great just decent, martial options nerfed via PFS outcry.

Not trying to be mean, but this is nothing compared to say a focused evoker, which is widely regarded as the weakest caster build.

Not to say your build is bad it is not. It is just not overpowered in any way.

Your build above is say +14/+14/+9/+9/+4 with I am assuming maybe 1d8 + (4d6 sneak) + 11. (Hit: 8 BaB + 2 Weapon + 5 strength + 1 Weapon Focus) (1d8 spiked shield [4.5] + 4d6 sneak [14] + 5 strength + 2 weapon + 4 power attack)

So against a CR 10 monster with AC according to the bestiary table DPR is as follows.

PC: 54.2065

A 15 PB TWF fighter with Kukri has: 63.18

I understand that it feels strong to you but try switching out to a two hander build for a season or two and see if you still agree.

That feat is honestly just ok and I would hate to see even more things nerfed for PFS concerns.

I don't mean to be dismissive but if it is causing you issues I would say that is more an artifact of PFS than the feat needing a nerf.

A point on AC.

It looks like to me that without traits or magic the highest AC possible from a combination of special material (mithral, darkleaf cloth, etc...) Dex and armor, assuming a normal max dexterity mod of +13 (20 from pb, +5 levels, +5 Inherent, +6 Belt) is as follows:

Haramaki/Silken ceremonial: +14

Light: +10

Medium: +11

Heavy: +12

Now with the trait Defender of the Society medium and heavy go up by one, but still your best AC from armor comes from silken ceremonial/haramaki.

It is true that this is only useful for dex builds, however I just wanted to point out that it is perfectly viable to have a 7th level light armored character with great AC.

Compare a standard dex build of 20 starting +1 level +2 belt at 7th. You end up with a +6 which combined with a Mithral chain shirt yields a +10.

Now at the same level you could have Full Plate and the defender trait which would yield a +11. Mithral full plate at this level is prohibitively expensive. One AC does not really make a builds AC garbage. Also light armor does not slow so you need to spend less character resources on speeding back up. Basically the defender trait lets heavy armor builds be basically one AC ahead until you can afford mithral heavy armor, and then they are three ahead. I would assume mithral heavy armor is usually in play between 10-12, however that is just my experience.

If this was the advice forum, fine give advice, this is not. This is the rules forum and the OP posted here asking for rules to back up his position. Whether it is "dumb" or not ammunition being destroyed on a hit is the rules and there are no rules for blood trail. So without something like the aforementioned bag of flour, no the rules say you get nothing from hitting an invisible target besides the damage and special effects your attack deals, period.

Jiggy,

I normally agree with you but here I would remind you that this is the rules forum. In strict RAW the ammunition is destroyed after a hit. Not sticking out simply non-existent therefore granting no advantage and certainly not allowing for pinpointing or tracking an invisible target.

I think your Fifth edition is showing. :-)

Disclaimer: Last line is a gentle rib to Jiggy as he is a cool cat and in no way intended disparagingly.

Removed some heated posts and their responses. Please keep your feedback civil, and refrain from personal attacks. In addition, our players come from many different backgrounds, and the implication that their opinion is somehow less valid to Paizo because they only have a single PDF or use an online reference as opposed to someone who's been a customer for over a decade is flat-out wrong. You are all our customers, and you may express your opinions--positive or otherwise--on our forums. Just please follow the Community Guidelines when you do, thanks!

Liz,

Thank you!

As you may have seen from my previous posts I do not have positive feelings about the recent sets of errata, however statements like your second sentence onward truly impress me.

I appreciate the attitude that we are all customers.

It is as in fact an interaction with the Paizo support staff member Erik Keith that was so positive it made me a Paizo customer for years. It is good to see that positive helpful attitude continues.

Just to be clear, I am in no way disparaging the people at Paizo, they are most likely all just fine individuals, it is just that what my group and I perceive as the current design intent is not compatible with our desired play style. So, we choose not to pay for content that we find inconsistent unreliable and undesirable.

However Paizo as a company seems to be doing fine financially so I assume I am in the minority and thus choose to voice my opinion clearly but without vitriol or expectation of any change.

I wish it was different but it is not so I say "Good Luck, Paizo. I will no longer be paying for your products."

The "Errata things until I can't trust any of my books" issue is one the major things that drove me away from fourth. It has also stopped me from purchasing any Paizo product in the future. I get all of my Pathfinder content from third party now and my group just held a vote, due to the direction Paizo has chosen, after we finish our current game we are going to change to a different system.

It makes me sad.

Just to be clear I support errata to clarify unclear things like hunter using skirmisher tricks on their pets, or grammar/spelling fixes. I just strongly reject rewriting anything to change its functionality as I feel this invalidates written books and forces a certain play style.

Well this is why I vote with my wallet and no longer buy any Paizo products. "Errata" like this was one of the major negatives of 4th ed. It saddens me to see pathfinder continue on this disastrous route.

Battle Poi!

Arcanist with Quick Study is very versatile.

Morlaf,

I will try to be very clear and polite, and I hope constructive in the advice I give you here.

My one request is that you be clear, as complete as possible, and unambiguous in your responses.

If I understand correctly your current plan is to

Barb BAB = 3/4.

in my Caveman session only fighters have BAB = 1.

Barbarians will be at 3/4's BaB.

Barbarians get Rage for free which is a feat that any1 can have (Str and BAB pre-requisits exist).

Rage is a feat that Barbarians gain as a bonus feat at level 1.

Question 1.) What are the prerequisites for the rage feat?

Question 2.) Are Greater Rage and Mighty Rage available as feats in your game?

Question 3.) If the answer to Question 2 is yes what are their prerequisites?

Question 4.) If the answer to Question 2 is yes does the Barbarian get these feats for free at the same levels they got Greater and Mighty rage in pathfinder?

But as an option they can enter a Warp Spasm (which will be called something else, so as to not further offend the creators of Slaine). This will grant further bonuses in combat (the specifics I shall not bore you with). Some the player will choose so as to allow Character Customisation. Others will be rolled randomly, as the Gift of Mother Nature attempting to protect its Chosen One is, in part, uncontrollable.A round of Warp Spasm costs 2 (or more) rounds of Rage and at the end the Barbarian is left a lot worse off than simply "Fatigued".

A new mechanic called here "Warp Spasm" but with the name to be changed, will allow for use of powers that are not specified.

Question 5.) What exactly are the mechanics of "Warp Spasm"? Please include all details.

Question 6.) How many new "further bonuses" is Warp Spasm going to grant exactly? For example a normal barbarian gains 10 rage powers over his leveling career from 1-20. How many Warp Spasm powers will the new barbarian get?

Question 7.) You say some powers will be chosen by the player and some rolled randomly. What exactly do you mean? How many of each type does a player get, and when you say rolled randomly is that only to see what powers a character possesses or is this rolled each Warp Spasm?

Question 8.) You say the penalty for Warp Spasm will be greater than simply fatigued. What exactly will the penalty be?

As I have only recently decided on the path I wish to follow I do not have the full facts yet. But the Barbarian can enter a Warp Spasm, while in Rage and he will get boring things like:

Darkvision, increased speed.... Nice-ish things like: extra attacks, extra str, natural armour.... and Epic things like: increased size, area affects, Damage reduction, Fast healing etc. These will be level dependant and random.

Here we have examples of Warp Spasm powers.

Question 9.) You separate this into three types, "boring", "nice-ish", and "epic". How many of each and at what level are these granted?

Question 10.) Are all of these random or only the "epic" things?

The player will choose Path of Surrender in which case he gets more stuff but unpredictable or the Path of Reigns: where he attempts to harness mother nature and gets fewer stuff but has a better chance of controlling them.

Here we have the definition of two separate Warp Spasm paths.

Question 11.) You say Path of Surrender gives "more stuff but unpredictable". What exactly does this mean? More powers but a random number and type upon entering a warp spasm? Please give details.

Question 12.) You say Path of Reigns "gets fewer stuff but has a better chance of controlling them." Does this mean that all Warp Spasm powers are random and if so how? How do the paths work exactly?

---------------------------------------------------

So to be clear your design goals are:

A.) Reduce Barbarian to 3/4 BaB

Barb BAB = 3/4.

in my Caveman session only fighters have BAB = 1.

B.) Do not nerf barbarians.

I precisely want to avoid making them "ostensibly worse", which is why I asked for opinions/ideas........

C.) Make Barbarian a more Nova based Class.

To use a nomenclature I have only recently been aware of, they are becoming a more NOVA class.

D.) Introduce a more random element to Barbarians.

I feel Rage and the bonuses it grants should have a chaotic, unpredictable, uncontrollable element to them, not just the flat "+2 hit and damage" that we all quote. How would you introduce this to the class feature "Rage"?

------------------------------

To do this you are proposing the following:

1.) Reduce Barbarians to 3/4 BaB.

2.) Make Rage a non-class specific ability thus allowing other classes to gain rage and perhaps rage powers?

3.) Introduce a new super rage that you are calling "Warp Spasm" for now.

4.) Introduce new super rage powers that Warp Spasm grants you.

5.) Make these new powers random is some way.

6.) Introduce a new "Path" mechanic to Barbarians.

----------------------------

If you want this to be successful and if you want good feedback, I would say you need the following.

A.) A completed and detailed write up of Warp Surge.

B.) A completed and detailed write up of Warp Surge Powers.

C.) A completed and detailed write up of Warp Surge Paths.

D.) A completed and detailed write up of all changes to the barbarian you have planned.

It seems to me you have ideas, and now is the time to take the raw ore of those ideas and forge it into the steel of actual mechanics. It may not be perfect the first time, that is ok, my stuff never is, but by writing it out and getting feedback you will develop a more complete and fun system for your new barbarian.

I hope this helps!

What are your feats?

wraithstrike wrote:

@James: That is once per shirt, not once no matter what.

That's the old 3.5 night stick issue.

Items don't grant powers per item. Owning two night sticks doesn't grant more days.

I have never heard of this.

All groups and people I have ever played with read once per day as once per day per item.

So just to be clear in your games meta-magic rods can be used 3/day per type of rod correct? Even if a player has bought more than one of that type of rod?

If a player had say 2 sets of boots of speed the player would only get 10 total rounds of haste even if the player used up one set and then switched to another?

Do you have a citation for this?

I am not trying to be antagonistic but this just seems wrong to me. I may be incorrect and if so would you provide a Pathfinder link/page citation/quote to correct me? No 3.5, no random unofficial Dev posts, and no "this FAQ does not say that but I read it that way".

Not saying you are in the habit of doing any of that, I have just had all of that as answers when some people took some weird stances before and could not find a real rule to back them up.

Let's put it this way Covent: the GM puts all the effort and prep time, often sacrificing his own fun when he would prefer to be a player. Often, he's tired on Friday after a long week of work. The last thing he wants to do is pick fights on rules and argue over creative PC builds.

The best scenario for both GM and players: everyone comes to the table and play the game honestly, and take a conservative approach when the rule is ambiguous. The player with a genuine question on his build puts it simply and openly to the GM, and takes the GM's answer as the rule to go by for that game session.

In PFS a player may play the same character with many different GM's and having a character only being able to use his abilities when the GM agrees with you will drive people away from PFS. This would mean less revenue for Paizo, lost from that player and anyone he tells his negative experiences to. This is in the same way bad Yelp reviews hurt restaurants.

Further all PFS GM's are volunteers. IF GM'ing is a burden do not do it, full stop. No gaming > Bad Gaming. I am defining bad gaming as a game where at least one person is not having fun, including the GM.

I also feel the best approach is not to play "conservatively" but to say yes to almost anything unless it negatively affects the fun of someone at the table.

I do agree with you on open and honest communication.

James Risner wrote:

This is the part I have an issue. It is fundamentally unfair to everyone if someone can come to a table with their interpretation and force that upon the GM [snipped the rest for effect! ;) ]

...agreeeeed! GM is the king and his word is final.

If the player wants to be the king, he must become a GM! ;)

More players should try GMing. :)

I think this is the fundamental disconnect in ways of thinking between Mr. Wilhelm and some others here.

One way of thinking is as Purple Dragon Knight says and feels it is rude to argue for or insist on an interpretation of a rule that is different from how the GM interprets it.

The other way of thinking feels that all at the table are equal and the GM is a facilitator, not necessarily more important than any other person. This way of thinking feels it is rude for the GM to not allow a player to use a valid as I described above interpitation of a rule. Even more so in PFS where money is explicitly involved.

This all returns to GM Fiat vs Player agency. I am not going to argue for one camp or another, however I am as I said trying to foster a healthy dialogue.

TOZ wrote:

Scott Wilhelm wrote:

Sure, when it works, that's how.

When does it not work?

When the GM doesn't accept his interpretation of the rules, I'd assume.

Since he hasn't given any better explanation of what he means by "player can show that his interpretation is legal".

Arguing in good faith I assume that Mr. Wilhelm's phrase "player can show that his interpretation is legal". is equivalent to "player can show that his interpretation of an ambiguous rule such as potion glutton is just as valid using plain english or existing FAQ/errata/book text".

I further assumed Mr. Wilhelm meant that if a player did such he should be allowed to use his interpretation of the rules even if the GM usually interprets it differently.

This would apply to something like tiger pounce where the first sentence makes no mention of unarmed strikes and is very useful to a weapon user.

I believe Mr. Wilhelm would say that a PFS GM should if shown that feat allow a player to use it with a weapon to take the power attack penalty to AC instead of to hit, even though many GM's espouse that styles are unless called out differently just for unarmed strikes.

Obviously however the weapon user would not be able to use the second portion as a swift to gain movement unless using an unarmed strike or combat maneuver.

Now if I am incorrect I am sure Mr. Wilhelm will correct me as he should, I am just trying to hopefully get us to a point where we are not talking past one another.

Covent wrote:

So yes in my eyes pathfinder society is a "Pay-to-Play" game where most other games are freeware.

I would be interested to see these other games that don't require money to be spent. In my experience, it's like those mobile games. You can play for free, but you're going to be tempted to buy the premium content.

I apologize as I was unclear and looking at my statement I can see where I muddied the waters.

To be very clear.

Pathfinder society is in my opinion pay to play pathfinder in comparison to all other games of pathfinder where one does not have to pay for anything, due to the PRD, D20SRD, and Archives of Neyths.

I guess a case can be made that you are paying for the electronic device with which to access the internet, the electricity to power it, and some way to get a data channel.

However as most people who live in first world countries already have access to these three things, or can gain access via a library, and a very cheap electronic device, I considered these costs nominal.

Also games like Fate Core are available free online.

Now I do usually buy a book when I like the content such as Legendary Games's Mythic Mania books, or Dreamscarred Press's Ultimate Psionics. That however is a personal choice to support the companies I like so as to hopefully get more content from them. Having to shell out 10$ for a PDF just to be able to put one feat or ability on my character sheet, such as Armed Bravery, or Creed of Humility before I can even see it in play is to me the definition of pay-to-play.

It is incumbent on a company to make a paid experience more tempting than a free experience in my opinion if for no other reason than to maximize their customers and thus their revenue stream.

So yes I feel that PFS should offer a more concrete set of rules and less table variance than home games. In all honesty I believe they mostly do. I do not play or enjoy PFS even though my experiences with PFS GM's have been good but that is entirely due to me not liking to have to buy splatbooks I may use one thing from to play a character, and the fact that a major part of the RPG experience for me is the tactical and build game. I have been quoted as saying "If you are rolling dice in pathfinder you are already losing".

Having some players that have different enough play styles from mine so as to be almost completely disengaged from that side of pathfinder made it not fun for me. Since the players at a table vary every time I decided I would simply not participate so as to hopefully not hurt others fun via my playstyle difference from theirs and to maximize my fun via finding a home table that matched my desires.

Please be aware that I am not bashing anyone or anything it was simply not for me. I also find it self evident that, yes in PFS you must buy the books (Pay) to sit at a PFS table with anything in them on your sheet (Play).

P.S. Shout out to TOZ for being an awesome PFS GM. I enjoyed your game style very much, it is the other things I stated above that I do not like about PFS.

Just play APs without GMs, then. If the rules are that cut and dry as they don't need adjudication, then have at it bro.

Like nobody else buys books except PFS people...

Mr. Willhelm and I do not often see eye to eye, however I will say this.

Pathfinder Society is the only current venue that I have found that requires you to buy books. Now a days due to archives of nethys, the d20pfsrd, and the prd most rule content can be gotten free.

So yes in my eyes pathfinder society is a "Pay-to-Play" game where most other games are freeware.

Legendary Games,

You are all amazing individuals producing amazing content. You have enriched both the game and lives of myself and many others. Congratulations on your fifth anniversary and I hope you have many more.

Lemmy wrote:

That foes goes against the experience of literally everyone I've ever played with. Past 9th level or so, any dedicated combatant has accuracy high enough to hit pretty easily, to the point where there is basically no reason to not use PA most of the time. Even my friend who joined Pathfinder 6 months ago rarely turns it off, and he is far from being an optimizer.

Yes - on single attacks you rarely miss. Hence "when full-attacking". At level 12 you are gaining 12 damage per swing for -4 accuracy. It will rarely matter for that first swing, but it will often make your 3rd swing miss. And at 12+ most martial characters should have several Quick Runner's shirts to use once per fight.

And I'll run the level 12 #s (again - as I have before). I'll go with a samurai, because it's the martial I'm playing right now.

STR 26 (includes +4 belt) / +3 katana / Deliquescent Glove

versus AC 27 (standard level 12 - seems a bit low to me, but whatever)

Attack = +12 BAB / +8 STR / +3 enchantment / +2 focus = +25/+20/+15

Damage = 1d8 +3 enchantment / +12 STR / +12 challenge / +4 spec / +1d6 gloves = 1d8+31+1d6 (15-20/+2)

With PA = +21/+16/+11 & 1d8+43+1d6 (15-20/+2)

So without PA DPR = 101.7875

With PA DPR = 102.15

So - at level 12 you have spent a feat for statistically identical damage against AC 27 (still seems low to me). Which - as I said above - is about when PA is no longer nearly as valuable. Still situationally useful (low AC targets), but certainly shouldn't be a gimme for every attack.

As you level higher the benefits of PA will only drop, especially at 16 with the 3rd iterative, and as you get richer and put static damage rather than enchantment on your weapon. (Only very rarely useful at 16+)

Not to mention if you have any secondary benefit to hitting other than damage. (Ex: my samurai has Blade of Mercy/Enforcer combo. Not only would Blade of Mercy have shifted the damage to non-PA being marginally higher, but every time he hits...

Didn't we discuss this before?

Also did it not come out that samurai is a very different proposition from Barbarian/Fighter/Monk etc. due to challange granting it large amounts of static damage?

I found my post here.

It looks like yours was removed due to quoting someone I assume.

Try running your numbers with a barbarian or a fighter or you could just use the math I presented in my post.

If this was not you I apologize, but I could not tell for sure as the original post math I was replying to was removed.