Goblin Squad Member. RPG Superstar 6 Season Marathon Voter, 7 Season Marathon Voter, 8 Season Marathon Voter, 9 Season Marathon Voter. Organized Play Member. 1,562 posts (1,587 including aliases). No reviews. No lists. No wishlists. 2 Organized Play characters. 3 aliases.
I'd really like to see a barbarian with a reaction option to retaliate with a powerful attack after being hit with a critical hit. I think that would be an interesting mechanic for the lower AC "naked" barbarian.
Sounds like a good idea until you realize it's a nerfed version of Come And Get Me. >.>
That's my biggest worry for the Barbarian: the Unchained Barbarian was a pretty obvious "weh weh this class is too strong and makes the fighter feel bad" type of rework with key powers like Strength Surge and Spell Sunder either nerfed or removed. I hope whoever was responsible for the UBarb isn't allowed anywhere near the PF2 iteration.
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
D20PFSRD wrote:
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
I voted Cavalier, to hopefully get some Samurai love. I admit though I was torn as seeing Cleric get some domain work and some actual class features would be amazing.
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.
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
So, I am curious what exactly is the change to the Wolf Style feats? They did something to Wolf Savage right?
Savaging now does d4 Cha or Con damage or becomes fatigued (attacker's choice of the three) instead of a bestow curse. Oh, and you can't reduce an ability score to zero this way.
Thank you for the reply, I appreciate the info. However, wow that is terrible. *Shrug* Another reason not to buy Paizo stuff.
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Coming into the Holiday season, best wishes to all who have gathered here to warm besides the fire of shared joy and brilliance. While the hearth is banked this season, rember the good times, hold cheer in your hearts, and perhaps we will all meet again somewhere for revelry and rivalry in bittersweet mixture.
1.) Is this how my various crafting abilities work? Say I am crafting a a wondrous item. This item costs say 40,000 GP so requires 20,000 gp of crafting materials. However due to spark of creation the cost is 38,000 gp so requires 19,000 gp in crafting materials. Normally I would be able to craft 1,000 gp per 8 hours but due to the resourceful trait I craft 1,500 gp in 8 hours or if I take +5 to the DC and hurry 3,000 gp per 8 hours. If I have the full 10 dwarven favored class bonuses I am planning on taking that would be 3,500 gp per 8 hours or 7,000 gp while hurrying. These numbers are then doubled by my valet familiar meaning 7,000 gp normal and 14,000 gp hurrying. Then I craft 25% faster due to Arcane builder which means 8,750 gp normal or 17,500 gp hurrying. This means that instead of the normal 20 days it would take to make this item while hurrying I instead take 3 days, correct?
2.) Any recommendations for any other magic item crafting, feats/items/stuff etc? I know about the amazing tools of manufacture but do not plan on using them due to the fact that they are for crafting with the craft skill and seem to only be for normal items I do not plan on using them.
So I am just coming back after taking a little Pathfinder break. I have decided that I want to try my hand at making a theme I like work, so as to shake off the build-fu rust.
Build Theme: A character that eschews the crutches of external power and seeks enlightenment via perfection of self. A Ki using martial artist.
Build Must haves:
A.) No weapons
B.) No armor
C.) No magic items (We will be using an intrinsic bonus system similar but tweaked to the one published in the Mythic Hero's Handbook)
D.) At least 80% of the damage of a Two Hand Full BaB Weapon User
E.) At least 15 + level AC.
F.) At least 60% chance to resist attacks against any save with DC's equal to those of an at level wizard who started with an 18 int and is using their highest level spell.
G.) Not a Caster. (Refluffing some buff spells as Ki use is fine, I just do not want to play a primary caster whose main focus is spells or a ranged character like a blast based Kinetisist.)
H.) Has ways to address common threats such as Incorporeal foes, Flying foes, ETC...
Build Nice things to have but not absolutely necessary.
1.) 90+% of the damage of a Two Hand Full BaB Weapon User
2.) 20 + level AC
3.) At least 75% chance to resist attacks against any save with DC's equal to those of an at level wizard who started with an 18 int and is using their highest level spell.
4.) Wis Based
5.) More than 4 Skill points per level (All classes except int based primary casters are 4+Int in our game)
6.) Some narrative power besides "Punch Good"
7.) Human
Feel free to offer any and all advice I am off to ruminate on this. Thanks!
So I have some questions about the Absorb Blow ability from the Guradian path in mythic adventures.
Absorb Blow:
Absorb Blow (Su): As an immediate action, whenever you take hit point damage from a single source (such as a dragon's breath, a spell, or a weapon), you can expend one use of mythic power to reduce the damage you take from that source by 5 per tier (to a minimum of 0 points of damage taken). If you have another ability or effect that reduces damage (such as protection from energy), reduce the damage with the absorb blow ability before applying any other damage-reducing effects. For every 10 points of damage that this ability prevents, for 1 minute you gain DR 1/epic and 5 points of resistance against acid, cold, electricity, fire, and sonic damage. The DR and resistances stack with any other DR and resistances that you have.
1.) When I designate a source I assume it is meaning on one attack from that source, so if say an NPC strikes a mythic character with this ability for 20 damage and he is at tier 4 then all 20 damage would be prevented if the player choose to expend a mythic power. However if the same enemy struck again with the same weapon for again 20 damage, the only benefit the mythic character would receive would be the DR2/epic and Resistance 10 granted by the second part of absorb blow and thus would take 18 damage if the damage can be reduced by DR or 10 damage if it can be reduced by the resistances or even the full 20 if none of these apply, say in the case of force damage, correct?
2.) Multiple hit spells such as say magic missile or scorching ray, does absorb blow apply against the total damage from the spell or just against the damage from one hit?
3.) DR stacking, well it is obvious it stacks with itself but what happens if say a character is wearing adamantine heavy armor and thus has DR3/- and gains DR2/epic from absorb blow? Does he have DR5 against any non-epic weapon and DR3 against epic weapons? What if the original DR was say DR5/evil from a level 17 paladin's aura of righteousness ability? Does he have say DR7 against all non-evil, non-epic weapons, DR2 against evil non-epic weapons, and DR5 against non-evil epic weapons?
I find this confusing so some help is appreciated.
So, I really dislike your "Improvisation" rule. To me it feels like it would be very easy for a convincing player to get a whole ton of benefit from it and punishes anyone who really likes playing the build game.
I would nix that.
I do not like the adjusting skills rule for the same reasons as above.
For races I would be specific, with what is allowed and add the caveat of if a concept requires a certain race you would work with the player on it as long as it is not disruptive.
When spending vigor to get back Ki or Lay on Hands, how many uses do I get back per point of vigor? Is it one point per one use or one point for all uses?
Death saves are unclear to me. Is it a fort save, an unmodified D20 roll, or what?
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.
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Arbore Vitae Aura moderate transmutation; CL 7th
Slot none; Price 7,000 gp; Weight 1 lb.
Description
This translucent shimmering oil is contained in an irregularly shaped rough ceramic cup. When, over a period of ten minutes, the pungent unguent is applied to a dead body that is a valid target for the reincarnate spell the body will slowly dissolve leaving behind a patch of brilliant living growth.
On the next sunrise the dead creature is returned to life, arising from the small patch of the first world into which their prior body transformed. The returned creature flush with life, color and vitality gains the fey creature type in addition to its original type, DR/2 cold iron, vulnerability cold iron, and two permanent negative levels.
A creature with only one or two hit die is subject to four points of constitution drain instead of the negative levels. If this drain would reduce the creature to zero constitution the arbore vitae is wasted and fails to function. All conditions and unconsumed spells or abilities of the returned creature are handled as reincarnate. Arbore vitae is consumed upon use.
Construction
Requirements Craft Wondrous Item, haunted fey aspect, reincarnate; Cost 3,500 gp
I put together a war priest build that was a good "tank". In the link above. Just trade out weapon specialization or Swift Aid for additional traits.
Hope it helps.
Could work with other classes too, you need phalanx fighter, combat reflexes, bodyguard, shield brace, and additional traits to get the half lung racial trait helpful via adopted and fool for friends.
Basically hand out around +9 or +10 AC via Bodyguard along with being a reach blender and getting to use a shield.
Stats (20 PB, or just use what you have)
Str: 10
Dex: 12
Con: 14
Wis: 10
Int: 18 point buy + 2 Racial + 2 headband (I saw you said you had this already) + 1 level = 23
Chr: 7
Traits
Wayang Spell Hunter (Fire Ball)
Magical Lineage (Fire Ball)
So you can throw out 3 {[(9d6 + 18)*1.5]+3} = 77.25 damage on a failed save or 38.625 damage on a successful save acid balls a day + what ever pearls of power you buy. Next level you get another due to int increase. The DC for these will be nice too at 20.
If you are a human you can have both spell penetration and improved initiative.
Use you 2nds for "easier" fights, and save the big ka-boom for when you need to win.
Legendary Kineticists didn't have an open playtest itself, as I only started to do open playtests for projects with Legendary Vigilantes, although after having ran a few, I've found that I enjoy the interaction with those who enjoy my products (and those who don't) enough to the point where they're a valuable resource. Community interaction and input is a large part of what helped make a lot of things in LV and LVV really shine, and so I welcome feedback from everyone.
Thanks for the link.
*Urge to treat self to kineticist focused PDF binge rising*
For this one, we're going to dole things out as the playtest rolls along (which is scheduled for 4 weeks), as there's some things we'd like to give more time to incubate. But we have quite a few things that we'd like to go over for you all!
Nihilcist: We've done so much with elements that this time we're making a non element; something that fights with pure nothingness.
Onslaught Sniper: People have been talking about a DBZ level blaster for a while, and the onslaught sniper should give them exactly what they want here with a flurry of blasts!
Bestial Kineticist: Now it's not only players who can get on the kinetic fun, it's their animal companions too!
Elemental Bomber: Know what's about as fun as bombs? Stuffing kinetic energy into them and chucking them at people!
Legendary Kineticists: Consider this your unchained kineticists, with the edits that Team KOP would make to the class to make it a more dynamic experience as well as solve issues with which we've had with the class since the inception.
Kinetic VMC: We enjoy VMC over here, and this should hopefully let other players get involved with the kinetic fun even if they're not willing to take the class (pro tip: use this with the legendary kineticist in regards to burn for best results).
Kinetic Mystic: Finally a theurge style prestige class for magic and kinetics!
All that and a ton more in the new Legendary Vigilantes II playtest, and be sure to comment either on the doc or in the thread about issues and such you have so we can address them ASAPossible! Thanks, and have a great playtest!
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.
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.
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.
selfish whining:
Can we please please please have RPG superstar back? Even without prizes, please? I miss that spirit of competition and camaraderie that those parts of the boards had along with cheering and kibitzing, in a respectful way of course, for your favorites. It always re-energized me to get back on the boards as my interest was waning.
I know, it is a busy year and no time, I just miss it. Thanks nice Paizo people for the constant positive interaction. Best of luck and happy holidays to you too of course.
WOW! Your sorcerers are going to be blowing stuff up big time. I feel like sorcerers are balanced as is. They cast loads of spells, that is why they are behind wizards in spell progression. I really wouldn't mess with them too much or they will start steamrolling your game. On the bright side I really like your custom bloodline.
Thank you for your feedback!
Did you see that I had reduced the sorcerers spells per day?
A sorcerer and wizard should now be just about even at every level in total amounts of spells castable per day.
Thank you as well for the praise on the bloodline, is there anything you would change?
Wheldrake wrote:
IMHO, spellcasting classes already have enough advantages in PF, and really don't need any extra handholding. Your sorcerer buffs are too extreme. They don't need them. Really.
The sorcerer class is already very, very powerful, compared to almost any other class that isn't a full wizard. And they even have some cool advantages over wizards. Plus oodles of ways to use clever items to get out of the limitations of spells known.
This said, have fun with it if it works for you.
Thank you for your time and feedback!
I would agree that most casters are already very very powerful.
Would you be willing to give me examples of ways that my changes would be unbalancing? I am not trying to be confrontational I really am just looking for honest and constructive criticism so I can improve.
Anecdotally, I give sorcerers their bonus spells when a wizard would normally get a spell of that level (1st, 3rd, 5th, etc.), and also give them the eldritch blast stuff from the 3.5e warlock, and also amped up their bloodline powers... and they're still not quite as good as wizards and clerics.
Thank you Kirth! I appreciate the feedback, especially from someone who wrote something like Kirthfinder.
I did in return for the extra two feat, extra bloodline power, and earlier spell access change their spells per day to start at 2 rather than 3 and end at 5 rather than 6.
This puts the sorcerer at most 2 spells per day ahead of a wizard without a bonded item, and at most 1 spell ahead of a wizard with a bonded item.
Do you feel this is too much of a weakening of the class?
My thoughts were that a sorcerer would have the advantage of metamagic on the fly and the ability to mix and match from his limited spells know, while the wizard would have the advantage of being able to use any spell from his spell book meaning he would if given time to prepare or retreat be much more likely to have a "silver bullet" spell.
The Chort wrote:
Too each their own. Are there other full casters in the party she'll be comparing herself too? If not, then I'd say leave it alone. It's an enjoyable class that contributes a lot to a party.
But is she standing next to a wizard, a cleric and a druid? Then sure, I'd be more inclined to let her have spell levels early, just because of the disappointment of being behind others.
Thank you again for taking the time to comment and share your opinion. I do appreciate it.
There will be other full casters in the game yes.
Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:
I definitely would not bother playing a wizard in your game.
I respect your opinion, but may I have a more thorough breakdown of why you feel this way?
I am very open to feedback and willing to consider multiple viewpoints.
Amanuensis wrote:
1) For bloodline spells, I'd go with a selection of spells that a player would want to use on a regular basis. Maybe spells with druidic flavor that can be used to buff the familiar?
The 12th level power is too powerful.
If a class feature improves a feat, that feat should be a set bonus feat.
While using existing rules is generally good design, I think you would be well-advised to move away from all those familiar feats and spells and come up with some unique features that don't exist yet. For example, I'd expect a power that allows the caster to take control of his familiar's body. Maybe they could also share teamwork feats, similar to the hunter and her animal companion?
I'm not convinced that 2) is really necessary. Applying metamagic on the fly is a big advantage spontaneous casters have over prepared casters and the opportunity cost of having to cast as a full-round action seems reasonable to me. Maybe restrict it to bloodline spells or spells that target the familiar? (By the way, I tried to implement metamagic feats in a way that feels more organic when I created my alternate version of the sorcerer, the maniac).
Regarding 3) and 4), I think the delayed casting progression opens up design space for more interesting abilities. I don't know if bloodline powers (at least in part) are supposed to make up for the delayed casting progression, but I think that is what I would focus on. However, most bloodline bonus feats don't make a lot of sense for spellcasters, so I'm not sure that having more of these feats is really that helpful.
I agree with 5)
Thank you for your detailed feedback!
May I ask why you feel the 12th level power is too much? I based it on the 15th level power from the arcane bloodline, but bumped to 12th as I would reduce the level of that power if I rewrote the arcane bloodline.
Full disclosure: The last time my player played this character she was arcane.
I see what you mean about the bonuses to familiar spell the possibility of a player not taking it. I did deliberately give benefits besides the boost to familiar spell at those levels so a player who took other things would not be "punished" for not taking it. I was trying to leave it flexible enough to allow several builds, but I do see what you mean.
For the familiar body sharing the theme was more of a collaboration rather than a one over the other, but I did include both of the share skin spells.
I did avoid teamwork feats due to them being more geared towards martial activities, while there are some decent teamwork feats for casters they are mostly martial focused. Standouts would be Allied spell caster, shake it off, and possibly spell chain. I did not feel this was enough to make it an integral part of the bloodline.
Thanks again.
Shikaku Kyouryuu wrote:
I feel like your familiar being treated as four levels higher is a bit too much, considering what else the arcana gives. Other arcana give a +1 bonus to damage per damage dice if a spell does a certain energy type, or a +1 to the save DC of a spell you use a metamagic feat on. The arcana does way too much.
First thank you for your feedback. I see what you mean. I am slightly worried about this and may end up stripping it out, however all of my players are extremely good natured and have no problem with the fact that any homebrew may need to be adjusted in between sessions if there are issues.
It was mainly to allow a familiar to be smarter so that my player always had a cognizant companion.
Second I am eliminating the increase in casting time for sorcerers using metamagic.
Third I am toying with the idea of giving sorcerers wizard progression in spells. While also adjusting spells per day. Table is here.
Fourth I am adjusting the rate at which sorcerers gain bloodline powers and feats. This will result in sorcerers getting two more feats and one more power over the course of their career.
Lastly I am going to give sorcerers their bloodline spells at the level where they gain the ability to cast that spell level.
Looks good. Glad to see people taking steps to not screw the sorcerers.
I hope you'll take similar steps for Oracles regarding their casting progression.
First, thank you for your feedback!
I will of course change Oracles to something similar if not identical when and if someone at my table wants to play one.
Do you feel the sorcerer is a viable option to wizard with these changes even with the reduced spells per day?
1. The bloodline seems reasonably balanced, although it doesn't seem like a bloodline in the traditional sense.
2. That seems fine.
3. I'd leave this alone. Casting 1 level behind a wizard is the biggest handicap to playing a sorcerer, and that's okay. Sorcerer is still one of the strongest classes and you're giving lots of other nice benefits.
4. This is strong, but probably okay. I like extra feats.
5. I like this change and have made the same houserule. (Why should Oracles be the only one to get their extra spells on time?)
Oh, and if you want to go further in showering this sorcerer player with a bunch of nice things, might I suggest bumping up their skills per level to 4+ Int? Or maybe make a trait available that grants an extra skill point at every level.
Thank you for your feedback!
So, you feel that even with reduced spells per day a sorcerer should not get the same spell progression as a wizard?
For skills we have a house rule that as long as you are not an int based full caster you get 4 + skills minimum, however we leave int based casters at 2 + skills.
Second I am eliminating the increase in casting time for sorcerers using metamagic.
Third I am toying with the idea of giving sorcerers wizard progression in spells. While also adjusting spells per day. Table is here.
Fourth I am adjusting the rate at which sorcerers gain bloodline powers and feats. This will result in sorcerers getting two more feats and one more power over the course of their career.
Lastly I am going to give sorcerers their bloodline spells at the level where they gain the ability to cast that spell level.
Please check out at least the table under the "new sorcerer" tab and feel free to give me feedback, as it is both welcome and wanted.
