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Was helping a gent in a related thread, and came up with the following. Relevant rules are:
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FoeHammer: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/races/core-races/dwarf/foehammer-fighter-dwarf
Ki Throw: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/ki-throw-combat
Improved Ki Throw: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/improved-ki-throw-combat
Bull Rush: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/combat#TOC-Bull-Rush
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Simple Idea: What if I'm fighting two opponents?

Improved Ki Throw lets me bull rush Target 2 every time I trip Target 1.

By Bull Rush RAW, I can move with Target 2 as he gets knocked back.

FoeHammer's Hammer to the Ground let's me trip Target 2 (Even if he's already prone - it doesn't apply any new penalties, but it does...)

Allow me to Improved Ki Throw Target 1. And we're back to the beginning.

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Eventually, I'll run out of movement to follow these throws, but that will be after like 6-ish cycles, I think. By that time, I can probably have put these two sorry bastards up against a wall.

Does this work by RAW?

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Note: Obviously, this is a stupid thing to do in a game (though, tbh, the idea of repeatedly smashing Mook 1 into Mook 2 until they bleed out is freaking awesome). This is not a "LOL I BROKE TEH GAMEZ" post, just a "Hey, this is neat, does it work?" post.

-Cross


http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/combat-feats/roll-with-it-combat-goblin

Put it on an archer. Every time somebody moves up to you, if they hit you, you take 0 damage (trivial acrobatics check), get to move 10 or 15 feet away from them. You get a standard action next round.

...nobody can ever full attack you. You will never actually be hit. Eventually, you will kill any melee combatant.

Am I missing something here?

Is Vital Strike Goblin Archer with a juiced acrobatics roll the ultimate 1v1 non-caster duelist?

-Cross


The Raging Vitality (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/raging-vitality) feat is viewed as sort of a feat tax for barbarians. Because, sans-raging-vitality, if you drop below 0 HP, you stop raging, lose your constitution bonus, and promptly die.

The rest of the bonus (+2 con while raging) sort of sucks. The hit points aren't super worth it, and barbarians have a million amazing rage powers to pick from.

So, the question: Is there a (cheap) item out there that will save you from dying when you go below 0 HP and out of rage?

-Cross


So, halfing dual-wielders do a truckload of damage. With Risky Strikes, Power Attack, and some ability to be as small as is humanly possible, the opportunity to move into your opponent's square (size: tiny after reduce person) and turn him into a fine cloud of mist is realistic.

The problem: As a tiny character, I have to move into my opponent's square to attack. I don't _really_ want to take an AOO every round.

The best way I can find around this is Lunge, which I can get a sixth level, and basically gives me back 5 foot reach.

However, this is thematically unappealing (I don't get to explode people from within), and comes late (level 6).

Does anybody have a better way to make tiny attackers work?

-Cross


I was looking over feat selection, and was wondering whether or not it was worth it to invest in one of the combat maneuver lines. I am relatively low-level at the moment, but was looking at the campaign-long impact it would have. I want to be clear if I'm understanding the math right.

As a full-BAB class, your CMB bonus is identical to your attack bonus...plus size modifiers and feat bonuses for improved trip, etc. It's BAB + Str + All your normal attack modifiers like magic weapons, bless, etc + Improved/Greater Trip + Size.

A monster's CMD is basically it's AC + size modifiers + strength, minus armor, minus shield, minus natural armor.

In PF, after a bit, your first hit (iterative attacks) is almost guaranteed to beat a monster's AC. Given that your CMB is -higher- than your AB, and the CMD you're attacking is probably -lower- than the creature's AC...

...how do you ever miss a combat maneuver at mid-high levels? Wouldn't you pretty much trip/sunder/disarm somebody every single time you tried?

What am I missing here?

-Cross


Hi - I've playtested a wizard in an ongoing campaign. I will define "Overpowered" as "Options that are much better than the other options available".

1.) Arcane Bond. Being able to spontaneously pull up a spell from your book trumps any familiar bonus. Further:

1b.) Arcane Bond: Wand seems ridiculous. Inform me if I am reading this wrong: You get the ability to use the item creation feat as if you had it, for the purpose of enchanting this item. Every single other bit of item creation has prohibitive restrictions on caster levels, in addition to having the feat.

Craft Wand has no such restrictions. This means that, if you want, you can spend your first 175 gold crafting yourself a 50-charge wand of grease. Or Enlarge Person, Burning Hands, whatever you like. Basically, you will always have something excellent to do during combat. Finally, when the wand runs out, you can always re-enchant on the cheap.

While I realize that this denies you certain high level options, like crafting yourself a metamagic rod of quicken, wizards don't particularly need help at high levels. They need help at low levels, and this -really- makes them kick ass.

2.) Universalist School of Magic. You get to cherry pick the best spells for your bonus spells, and your 1st and 8th level abilities are the best in the game.

2a.) Hand of the Apprentice. Spares you from memorizing mage hand (no big deal), but lets you do d8+4 or d8+5 damage every attack, with a good attack bonus. Keeps you almost on par with meleers...when you're meleeing...except that there's no threat of you actually being in melee. Fantastic.

2b.) Universalist Metamagic. Far and away the most useful. Free quickens, extends, etc...but people have already talked about this.

Anyhow, that's my short list of wizard abilities that leap above the pack in terms of usefulness.

-Cross


So, as I was thinking about all of this, I asked myself: Movies, books, etc, are all filled with great warriors. It's a way more popular hero archetype than the great wizard. Why have we been unable to translate that to D&D? I think the issue is that, ultimate, whereas warriors in fiction are -incredibly- difficult to kill, warriors in D&D are trivial to kill. That persistence and stubbornness just isn't there, mechanically. I mean, they're tough to kill with swords. But so many monsters and characters can attack saves where the fighters are just weak that it's almost pointless for them to have that nice, huge fort save. So I set off to do an overhaul with the following vague ideas:

1.) Offensive spells basically break down into 3 categories - Damage, Debuff, Disable. As Crusader of Logic, Squirrelloid, and other good wizard players have pointed out, that is generally in increasing order of utility. Because there is very little advantage to choosing a damaging spell over a disabling spell (note that I include killing something instantly as "disabling"), good wizard players choose their spells almost entirely in terms of disabling spells. Once you get to a certain level (about 7), you can cast almost entirely disabling spells. For other slots, they take Debuffing spells (Ray of Enfeeblement, etc). The system I create should have incentives that make each of these types the best at some point.

2.) Save-or-die spells are cool. It is cinematically neat to have the evil arch-wizard be able to vaporize a poor guard who stands between him and the princess. They should still be in the game.

3.) Wizards have more problem-solving options that fighters. Way, way more. Most suggestions to remedy this involve giving the fighter more mechanical problem-solving options, allowing him to do super-hero stuff. This is unappealing to me - I don't want people jumping 95 feet in the air and throwing greatswords. I would, however, like to recreate the cinematic warrior-hero of classic fantasy.

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Those are my design goals. I then refined them, into this set of ideas.

1.) If you want higher reward, there should be higher risk. In d20, this is quantified by having a lower DC. A simple proposal would be that, at each level, Damage spells get +3 DC, Debuffs get +0, and Disables get -3 DC.

2.) The reason it's OK for that arch-wizard to vaporize the guard is because he's -way, way higher level-. Think about a 12th level fighter vs. a 4th level fighter. Their will saves, before equipment, are +1 and +4. That means that, when you're storming the evil wizard's tower, the relative neophyte and the battle-scarred veteran of demon-slaying have a 15% difference in their chance to not get their mind blown up. That's just silly.

The solution to this is pretty simple - the level difference between caster and defender should matter. And not in a linear way. Let's try a penalty of +1, +2, +3, +5, +8, +13 for whoever is lower level.

3.) Finally - a fighter can't solve problems with magic, and can't avoid them. Therefore, he should be the least affected by them, in the mean. Rogues and clerics have some ways to get around being targetted, and ultimately wizards have the best ways to get around being targeted. Apply a flat +3 bonus to any full-BAB class and a +1 bonus to any 3/4-BAB class to saves. Finally, all saves scale at the same rate - +1 per 2 levels after level 1...the same rate that spell DCs increase at.

...so, that's some math. Let's see how it works on the data points. We'll start with an 18-intelligence wizard, and assume our defenders have 14s in their defense stats. All saves scale linearly, so we can pretty much pick any level to do this at.

At any level, our wizard has an advantage of 2 (from stat) to his DC over a fighter...but the fighter has a +3 flat bonus, as well as basically a +2 to his favored save. Let's assume that our wizard, not being an idiot, will target weak saves. Therefore, the wizard has a 60% chance to land direct damage, 45% chance to land a debuff, and a 30% chance to land a disable...assuming he targets a weak save.

Try it, then, against a rogue of equal. 70%, 55%, 40%...but rogues can be tricky sorts, and tough to fight.

Against another wizard? 75%, 60%, 45%. But wizards have a number of ways of countering spells, or being untargettable by spells entirely.

So...1 looks pretty good. Let's see how these probabilities scale when you're fighting people of higher level.

Wizard vs. a higher level fighter (4 levels higher): Not only does the fighter have an additional +2 to all saves from being 4 levels higher, he gets the level differential bonus. The result is probabilities of 10%, 5%, 5% - owch. Probably best to be helping your friends at this point...or not fight people vastly higher.

However...wizard vs. a fighter 2 levels lower? 75%, 60%, 45%. Pretty good odds to disable him in 2 shots.

And if the fighter is genuinely lower level (5?): 95%, 95%, 80%. Easy to disable.

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So, what are the cons of this? Here's how I see them:

CON: More math. I'd say that the wizard has to keep track of his base DCs, and that the DM should adjust monsters' saves for level differential, as he knows the PC and monster level. My group wouldn't find this a pain, but we're fine with math.

PRO/CON?: Some classes become clearly harder to play than others. Fighters are solid, good offense, good defense, limited ways to problem solve. As you progress along the class spectrum towards wizard, things become much, much, harder to play - your defenses aren't that good, and your attacks will frequently fail...but you have tons of options and interesting ways to affect the battlespace/world.

PRO/CON?: Wizards having people auto-fail their saves is a thing of the past. Smart wizards try to use spells that don't grant saves (walls, etc.).

Anyhow - that's about all I have. Keep in mind that this is a proposal in its infancy, and I'm interested in any commentary.

Thanks!

-Cross


I'm having trouble finding the answer to this in the PFRPG book:

If I gain a point of intelligence at level 4 (from 17 to 18), do I gain 4 more skill points (for levels 1, 2, 3 and 4), or just the skill point for 4?

I am curious - all other stat increases affect previous levels (con gives hit points, for instance). Is this consistent for intelligence in PRPG too?

-Cross