Mythic Tarrasque's page

Click bait title? Not really; it's relevant.

I remember the early days of WoW, and it's less successful but vastly better in almost all ways competitor, Everquest II. During those early days (by which I mean the first 3 or 4 years, actually) there was a great deal of imbalance in both games. Really, in every MMO I've played.

By "imbalance", I mean when one class is vastly better than another, or when one skill or ability or spell is overpowered, or underpowered. Basically, anything that required the developers to fix it by balancing it against other game features.

What happened in all those MMOs, over and over again, was that the developers would make a change. For example, some Cleric spell that does way too much damage. So they fix that spell by making it do a lot less damage.

All too often, they fixed it too much. The new version doesn't do enough damage and nobody ever wants to use it.

The pendulum swung from "too powerful" to "not powerful enough".

Then they fixed it again, often swinging the pendulum back to "too powerful". And again, and sometimes again.

No big deal, they would just fix it again. And again. Eventually, they would get it right. Sometimes even on the first try, but often, it took two or three fixes until it worked right (balanced).

I mention this because I'm seeing some of these pendulum swings here.

The playtest rules had lots of things that didn't work quite right. The entire alchemist class. Ranger's Hunt Target. Some paladin stuff. Lots more.

Now at version 1.6 of the updates, with no more major updates coming in the playtest, we see that pendulum swinging the other way. Huge changes to the alchemist, but most of them cannot access mutagens now and their bombs are so underpowered as to make them want to just hit monsters with swords. Ranger's Hunt Target has been given more options, but they're all pretty weak and underpowered. Paladins got split into three classes, sort of, but clearly some are traps and some are not. Etc.

That pendulum is swinging wildly around, back and forth, to and fro.

Those MMOs had all the time in the world to fix stuff. They had the luxury of taking their best guess, throwing it to the players, then sitting back and seeing what happens. Because they can just patch and patch and patch until it works.

Paizo doesn't exactly have that luxury. It's very hard to patch a printed rulebook. They have just a few more months to get it all right. Whatever isn't right, we're going to have to live with it forever, or live with huge errata documents until they release a Pathfinder 2.1 rulebook.

I was hoping by now to see that pendulum sitting pretty still, but it isn't. Even the 1.6 update kicked it into new life, not that it had really slowed down much.

I am hoping that Paizo is taking stock. Considering the risk of missing a deadline vs. the risk of getting the rules only partially right (or partially good).

I want them to know that I can wait. If it's 2020 before I see a really really good Pathfinder 2.0 hit the shelves, I'm fine with that. What I'm not fine with is getting a mediocre Pathfinder 2e in 2019 and then I have to start houseruling everything or I have to wait for errata documents so that, a year later, the heavily errata'd 2020 version is finally fixed.

How does everybody else feel? Who, like me, can wait for a great product?

There are some big changes coming. Big enough that I wonder how much of the material we've been playtsting will actually end up in print.

In another thread, Jason said:

Will it be a game that the vast majority of our fanbase likes, I certainly hope so and all signs indicate that the changes we are in the process of making will lead us to that conclusion.

That's awesome. That's what I want to hear.

Now, will we get a chance to play test that game so we can help it be all that it can be?

Is there time, and is there a plan to get it in front of players for a while, before the final version is sent off to the printers?

I see some people making a blanket statement that Table 10-2 should be abolished. Banished. Disintegrated. Power Word Killed.

As for me, I happen to have found it useful.

This week in Mirrored Moon my PCs asked me several times to use some skill in some situation that wasn't immediately apparent in the rulebook or in the Doomsday Dawn book.

So I'd say "That sounds Easy/Moderate/Hard so the DC is 16/23/26. Roll".

Easy peasy.

For a brief time, we joked about everything being a 23. Seemed kinda boring for it to always be the same DC.

But by the end of the session, the players were fine with it, saying things like "I want to use skill X and I just rolled higher than 23, so what happens?".

In other words, it makes the rules really easy to understand and apply. It's the exceptions that will bog the game down a little when I need to apply some rule that causes the DC to NOT come from that table, such as stealthing past a guard's perception DC - now I need to look that value up. Unless it's not a specific NPC, in which case, I can say "He's pretty alert so this is hard. DC 26 please."

What do you guys think?

The playtest is nearing its end.

At this point, I'm fairly certain my group has no chance of finishing Doomsday Dawn before the playtest closes. We may not even finish chapter 6 in time. Some of you are moving faster, I hope.

Oh well.

I also fear that Paizo is running on such a short schedule with way too much to do, that there really won't be time to fix the things that people are talking about the most.

Which means that:
a) The game goes live very close to the way it is today. I won't buy that game.
b) They make radical changes at the last minute that won't be tested and the game goes live very different but possibly very broken. I'll wait to see if I buy that game.
c) The sweet spot: They make radical changes at the last minute, don't test them, but get everything perfect and the untested game is perfect. I would buy this dream game.

Unfortunately, given the huge missteps they had in the playtest version, my hope for sweeping untested first-draft revisions being perfect is not high.

My expectation is that it will be option b. Which doesn't mean it will be broken, just that it possibly can be broken. The devs have already stated that "all the math" is tuned to be extra hard in the playtest and they plan to "fix" that for the official version.

Yikes!

Anybody with even a few days of real education in actual testing methodology will immediately spot the flaw in that plan: we're all testing something that has core functionality which is VASTLY different than the game they plan to release.

In other words, we're wasting our time and Paizo's by testing one thing when they're already planning on selling us something else.

Given the waste of time, and the very wonky playtest rules, and the lack of time remaining to incorporate our feedback (for what it's worth) into the official version of the game, I wonder how high we should set our expectations?

Any thoughts? Hopefully, any thoughts that could help the developers at this point?

It was mentioned in another thread but I thought it might be higher profile if it got its own thread with a specific title.

The devs specifically changed the fighter dedication (from multiclass) to only give one bump in armor type, so wizards dipping fighter would only get light armor, not medium or heavy.

But now the Paladin dedication gives all three armor types like the fighter used to. And that CHA prerequisite isn't even all that hard for sorcerers or bards or anybody who loves Resonance points.

Maybe this is meant to only bump one level like fighters?

Let's rewrite a couple battle scenes from Lord of the Rings with PF2 combat (before the 1.3 update):

Weathertop:
The ringwraiths climb the steps to confront Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin. One steps forward and stabs Frodo who gets Dying 1. Sam bravely faces the ringwraiths. One of them stabs Sam and he goes down to Dying 1. Aragorn rushes in but is surrounded by ringwraiths who get about 18 actions and knock him down to Dying 1. Sam and Aragorn use Hero Points to get back up to 1 HP. Frodo stabilizes and remains unconscious.
On Aragorn's next turn he stands up and tries to burn a ringwraith with his torch. They all attack him and knock him to dying 2. He burns a second Hero Point and gets back up, swings, then is knocked down to Dying 3. Sam uses a magical healing herb to bring Aragorn back to 1 HP. Aragorn get up and, finally, drives off the ringwraiths.

How heroic was Aragorn? Knocked unconscious three times and basically just a punching bag for the ringwraiths. Spent as much time unconscious on the ground as he did trying to fight heroically.

How about the fight in Moria:
The orcs break into the tomb of Balin. Legolas shoots an orc in the face. It dies. An Orc hits Boromir in the face but he doesn't die, he merely falls unconscious at Dying 1. Aragorn hits an orc in the face with his sword. The orc dies. Another orc hits Aragorn in the face with its sword but he doesn't die, he just falls unconcious at Dying 1. Gimli kills an orc. Legolas rushes over to Aragorn and heals him. Boromir uses a hero point.
Next round Aragorn stands up, kills an orc, then is knocked unconscious again at Dying 2. Boromir decides not to waste an action and attacks from the ground, killing two orcs, but then is knocked out at Dying 2. Gimli kills an orc then he is also knocked unconscious at Dying 2. More orcs come in.
Next round, Gimil and Aragorn use hero points and Legolas heals Boromir. All the heroes stand up and kill an orc but then they are knocked unconscious again. This time, Legolas and Sam and Frodo all use healing herbs to bring their heroic friends back to 1 HP.
Next round, they all stand up and are knocked unconscious again. And again, and again, and again...

No author would write that. No director would film that. It's silly. It's terrible story telling. It's not heroic at all to spend half of the fight lying on your back unconscious.

But that's what I've been seeing at my table and I definitely DO NOT want a TPK. I have been avoiding fudging rolls because this is a TEST, not an actual game. Our agreement is that if there is a TPK, we'll retcon it and move on to the next room of the scenario because this is a TEST.

So I'm letting the dice fall where they will. No fudging. I'm using tactics described in the books and trying to win with the monsters I'm given. I want to find out if the combat works.

But combats at my TESTING table looks like those scenes I described above. Heroes being knocked unconscious over and over and over. It seems other GMs have had similar experiences.

Now with 1.3 factored in, they die the second time they go down if they blow the recovery roll, so there could be more deaths in upcoming sessions. We'll see.

I would much prefer a system that keeps the heroes ON THEIR FEET. HEROICALLY. You know, like the heroes they are supposed to be.

As far as I can tell, the latest version of the Dying rules as a fairly awkward gap:

If you are knocked out by a lethal attack (e.g. an axe to the head), you gain both the Dying and Unconscious conditions. While you are Dying, you can attempt saving throws and/or use Hero points to recover to 1 HP at which time you lose both conditions.

OK, good enough.

On the other hand, when you are ONLY Unconscious but not dying, like if you were knocked out by a non-lethal attack or if an ally uses the Stabilize spell, there is nothing you can do. You just lie there unconscious until the GM says you're not, which usually takes 10 minutes but could be hours.

So:

Unconscious: You're screwed. Just lie there and hope somebody heals you.
Unconscious AND ALSO DYING: No problem, just make your save or use a Hero point and get back into the fight next round.

So the awkward gap is, why is it relatively easy to self-recover when you're BOTH Unconscious and Dying but IMPOSSIBLE to self-recover when you are ONLY unconscious?

Proposed solution:
Allow the Recovery saving throws to continue when you're Unconscious even without the Dying condition. Same DC, no other changes to the process. A success counts exactly like you "removed the Dying condition" and fails will give you the Dying condition.

Of course, the player can decide that he doesn't want to roll a recovery save and simply remains unconscious.

Also of course, the Hero point rules still apply in case the Unconscious person fails a recovery save.

Is there a centralized rule for how to handle Persistent damage with saving throws?

For example:

Ankhrav:

Spray Acid (acid)
Frequency Once per hour
Effect The ankhrav spews acid in a 30-foot cone, dealing 3d6
acid damage and 1d4 persistent acid damage (Reflex DC 17
half, no damage on a critical success, double damage on a
critical failure).

Ways to interpret this on a successful save:
1. Take (3d6)/2 damage now and (1d4)/2 persistent damage every round
2. Take (3d6)/2 damage now and 1d4 persistent damage every round (applying "half" only to the initial damage)
3. Take (3d6)/2 damage now and no persistent damage every round (making a save avoids the persistent damage)

It seems like #1 is probably what is intended but #2 doesn't seem out of the question. #3 seems like the way we handled persistent damage (e.g. bleeding) in previous systems.

Ways to interpret this on a critical fail:
1. Take 6d6 damage now and 2d4 persistent damage every round
2. Take 6d6 damage now and 1d4 persistent damage every round (only double the damage, not the persistent damage)

It seems like #1 again is probably the intent, but since doubling the persistent damage is not mentioned, I could see a reasonable argument for #2.

No spoilers.

For Doomsday Dawn, second chapter (level 4 character).

Knowing it was subuoptimal, I still wanted to try a ranger with a long composite bow.

I struggled to find ANY class feats that interested me, so I wound up with Animal Companion and Favored Aim (even though it feels like a trap). I wanted an eagle AC for flavor but it looked mechanically unsound so I went with Bear. I really felt like I was forced into this option to have any chance to be combat capable.

So Bear it is. I named him Dipper. I named me Argren Algosel (don't anybody check for anagrams in my name).

I bought him barding and he wound up with an AC of 16 (which is 6 points lower than mine) and he has 36 HP (which is 12 lower than mine and I have a CON of 10 for no bonus; our monk has 64 HP).

Thoughts so far:
Lack of bow feats for Ranger. There is a crossbow feat but crossbows need to waste an action on reloading and our primary class feature (Hunt Target) also requires actions so a ranger who reloads a crossbow will NEVER, EVER, EVER use Hunt Target.

Animal Companions are weak. OK, they're supposed to be but the game mechanics and math make them unusable. More on that later.

Barding is a money-sink. Not getting it makes the Animal Companion even weaker, but getting it means spending cash on a class feature. I'm never a fan of spending cash on class features (it's unfair to these classes when other classes get ALL class features for free).

OK, so off to the adventure we go.

The first battle, I'm in Exploration Mode sneaking ahead of the group a little. My bear scents danger so I send him ahead a bit to see what's there. Three enemies attack him and mostly miss - he takes a little damage but not too bad so I command him to stay there while I move to line up a shot and put ONE arrow into an enemy. (note: didn't use Hunt Target). Next round, two of those three enemies clobber my bear. He has 6 HP left. The GM takes pity on me and has the one I shot ignore the bear and charge to me (even though the arrow did 4 points of damage and the Maul did 6).

Note. That was PITY. The GM should have had this enemy kill my bear. Three actions should have killed it. He knew it and I knew it and even my bear knew it.

The rest of the group catches up and we finish off those enemies.

My bear should have died. It only lived because of GM Pity. This means I should have spent the entire rest of the adventure without that class feature, which also means without half of my damage output.

Another note: My bear needed 3x more healing than the entire rest of the party. This makes him a drain on party healing resources.

Second encounter. Having learned from the first encounter, I am no longer scouting ahead. Forget that I'm a freaking ranger with a freaking SCOUT background. I can't afford to scout. So I am trying to be stealthy just 30 feet away from my party and my GM is pretending that the cleric in clunky metal armor only 30' away is not breaking my Stealth. I make a perception check and find the second encounter at the same time it finds me.

Now, if I were GMing, I might have considered making the encounter target my bear (we were side by side). He has this encounter focus all its attention on me because I have more HP and way more AC. I survive the initial attack and take my first round. I move my bear to be next to the target I want to hunt. Then I fire two arrows. (I did not use Hunt Target because then I would have only been able to fire one arrow). One hit and the bear gets to maul. Yay for a total of 8 damage (bad rolls). The monk runs up and attacks once for 15 damage (average roll).

Note: If my bear had died in the first encounter, I wouldn't have even done 8 damage.

In the next round, the encounter backs off for spoiler reasons so I move my bear and use Favored Aim to ignore screening. I got a hit and a maul for 10 total damage (average). The monk moved once and hit twice for about 30 damage ending the encounter.

For reasons not mentioned here (spoilers), my bear again took the most damage and required the most healing.

Final thoughts:

Two fights in, never had a chance to use Hunt Target. I may never use it. That means my one unique class feature is pretty close to worthless.
I used Favored Aim one time but, really, my damage probability might have been mathematically similar if I just fired two arrows. I still think it's a trap feat but there really wasn't anything else.
Our monk is reasonably able to triple my damage with average rolls compared to my average rolls.

Most Importantly:
The ranger has an almost mandatory class feature (Animal Companion) that costs money, drains ranger combat actions, drains daily party resources (healing) and can be removed very easily (by combat damage). I reiterate: to use this class feature, it must move into melee range but then it gets beat to death. It takes a week to replace it. While it's dead the ranger will be without this class feature and therefore doing much lower combat damage.

Sure, I could have chosen a different feat instead of Animal Companion. But there was nothing better and this is the ONLY way to have any chance to keep up with the damage output of the other characters. Not taking the Animal Companion would have gimped this class. With him, I did a total of 28 damage the whole day but would only have been 15 without the bear. (The monk did 30 damage in ONE round without a critical and with fairly average damage rolls).

My default class feature was unused (Hunt Target) and my optional but nearly mandatory class feature (Animal Companion) was more of a burden than a benefit.

Finally, I don't think any other class has a major class feature that can be removed by a lucky (or unlucky) roll of a die.

No, I'm not bashing 2e. Maybe this is what they're trying to do?

Every thread I read keeps comparing 2e to 1e classes. The 2e monk is weaker than the 1e monk, the 2e barbarian is weaker than the 1e barbarian, etc.

Maybe all these threads are true?

And maybe that's deliberate?

If every class is weaker by deliberate design, then we should stop comparing 2e to 1e.

Instead, we should be comparing 2e classes to each other (e.g., can the 2e barbarian dish out comparable damage with comparable survivability to the 2e fighter?), or comparing 2e classes to 2e playtest content (e.g. can the 2e druid contribute as much in the playtest scenarios as the 2e cleric can?).

Just wondering if this has been considered.

Jiggy's current post about the disparity is a good one, but it provides no solutions.

So, without fighting about what the disparity really is (please!?!?), how can it be fixed?

One common solution is to chop the top off of the game. E8 or E6, etc. Just stop leveling before casters get their ultra power. But that's only half a solution (many "disparity" spells fall within those levels, such as flight or invisibility). And, when you get down to it, you're no longer playing the same game. It's vastly different. A whole BUNCH of material becomes inaccessible and whole APs are impossible to finish.

Another common solution is to turn every martial into a wuxia superhero who farts fireballs and barfs acid, who flattens armies with the stamp of a boot and shrugs off every natural disaster like Superman shrugs off bullets. While that might be fine and dandy for an actual superhero game, or for a supernatural game where all the heroes are Greek gods or other immortals running around a mundane world, it's very much out of place in this game system as published. Wuxia martials is simply not Pathfinder.

A third common solution (the one I think the devs are trying to achieve) is to recognize and accept this disparity, work as a team with each guy doing his part (sometimes Aquaman just has to make the sandwiches for the real superheroes: "Meanwhile, back at the Hall of Justice, Aquaman uses his super powers to summon a can of tuna fish..."). Theoretically a good GM and/or a good campaign writer can create situations where the caster Superman types can do their awesome stuff and the martial Aquaman types can support that and not feel useless.

I personally think that many groups play mostly in line with this third solution (especially those guys who don't think the martial/caster disparity exists, or don't think it's a problem). And it seems that the material published by Paizo tries to achieve this, at least somewhat.

But obviously not everyone agrees. For some, this disparity is ruining the game. Some people are desperate to fix it.

So given the parameters already established by Paizo, how can we fix the disparity?

Those parameters are: this is NOT a superhero game, it's not a demigod game, it's not a vampires game, it's not an immortal game. It IS a game where normal people learn how to do cool stuff but magical people learn how to do cooler stuff than non-magical people. It is a game where a guy can walk off of his farm, grab a weapon of some kind, explore dungeons and kill monsters, gain power, become a figure of song and story and legend, regardless of whether his weapon of choice is a spellbook or a sword - but obviously it's easier to rock the world with the spellbook.

Is it possible to fix this disparity without rewriting the entire game? If not, can we rewrite it so it's the same game with the same feel and follow those parameters but with greatly reduced disparity?

And the most important question of all, can we even discuss it without degenerating into madness and mayhem?

(If you're old enough, the thread title might be funny...)

Here we go again, but maybe for the last time (from me). I'm mainly trying to take everyone's attention of the Tarrasque-killing thread...

Please don't read it and don't comment here if you only want to debate that we don't need to balance the classes. Save that for other threads. I would love to hear from anyone with suggestions on how to improve what I have here (including removing stuff you think I should not do - assuming your reason is balance and you're not just arguing that martials are fine).

The following list has some basic ideas for house rules that address the disparity between non-casters and casters. So far, I'm just spitballing here; these are not fully detailed out. In fact, the whole list is hypothetical. I'm still looking for feedback.

Note that I have three objectives:
1. Narrowing the gap between casters and non-casters,
2. Maintain party roles (tank, healer, mage, sneak, dpr, etc.) intact. I'm not trying to turn fighters into flying superheroes or turn spellcasters into adepts. When all is said and done, a fighter should feel like a fighter, but more badass. Like, so badass that he gains a couple tiers. Some casters, on the other hand, might slip down a tier or two with these house rules.
3. Keep the rules so simple that I can type them up in a weekend. I don't want to have to type up a hundred pages of house rules and then spend our first three gaming sessions reading them to the players. Better if it fits on a page or two.

It's a long list so I'll hide it and let you tackle it in chunks. Or don't read it at all if you're not at least somewhat invested in the idea of simple and easy tier rebalancing.

Yes, I know what's missing here. I haven't done anything to make martials fly through the air or divert rivers by stomping the ground or put the Midgard Serpent into a chokehold or have light sabers. I'm hoping that by pulling the rug out from under the casters and adding stuff to let martials do more of what they already do, with better ability scores and more feats and skills than ever before, as well as Mythic tiers - I'm hoping this leaves party roles and character niches as they currently are but catapults non-caster martials (and to a lesser extend the rest of the martials) into a more respectable tier.

If anyone has read this far, I'd love feedback.

Also, I'd love volunteers to tackle the class tier list, especially sliding them per MAD/SAD as mentioned in point 2 and 3 of that section. Yeah, I want you theorycrafters to do my work for me... ;)

Thanks in advance to all who post constructively!

Here's an idea to give martials nice things while using books and rules Paizo has already published:

What if we give martials, well, any weak-tier class, automatic Mythic Tiers as they progress?

Of course, we wouldn't do the same for the stronger tiers, but we might give a slower Mythic progression for some of the middle-tier classes.

I haven't played Mythic, just read through my book a bit (more like skimmed) so I can't even guess how well this would work. But it seems like it would actually give them nice things without requiring us to rewrite all those classes or make up a gazillion house rules.

Maybe we start with fighters getting a Mythic Tier at level 5 and ever three levels thereafter, ending up with 6 Mythic Tiers. Chained rogues (i.e. not-unchained) would maybe just get a Mythic Tier as early as level 2 and then every three levels thereafter.

It might take a little brainstorming to figure out the right amount of Mythic awesomeness to hand out, and I know we'll never agree (some people want 10th level fighter to be able to swallow the moon and arm-wrestle tarrasques and topple entire armies with the stomp of a foot, while other want to keep their martials a bit more grounded in pseudo-reality.

But, I'd love to hear everyone's discussion on this - would it fully balance those weak-tiered classes? Nearly balance them? Not really make enough difference to matter (but if not, would it be a good first step)?

(on a side note, it might give me a chance to incorporate a book I bought without ever expecting to actually use)

(on another side note, it probably would NOT work very well in a game where the players want to use the Mythic rules for everybody, such as playing the Wrath of the Righteous AP)

What do you guys think about eliminating all level 7-9 spells? I'm thinking of keeping the slots so if a caster gets 7th level slots, he can fill them with lower-level spells, with or without metamagic as he sees fit.

This way, casters' known spells and spells/day still improve after level 12, but the most game-breaking spells go away.

Does this seem like a good start on martial/caster disparity? Too much? What are your thoughts?

I'm not saying Pathfinder is broken. Far from it. I like the group dynamic and think a good GM can make wonderful challenges for a FULL PARTY even though there is power and/or utility "tier" disparity between the individuals of that party.

But, if we wanted to rig the system to smooth out that disparity, what changes would we make?

Can we do it without turning every martial class into into weird magus/jedi/ninja/wizards?

I mean, really, enough is enough.

In any world where there are non-martial ways to engage in combat, "martials" never, ever, ever, get "nice things"

In the X-men universe, how many martial "I punch you in the face" characters can stand up to to characters like Professor X or Magneto?

In the Marvel universe, the "martials" who are by far the most effective are the ones who can fly and have ranged attacks that are either magical (Thor's hammer and Captain America's always-returning shield) or super-technical (Iron Man). Sure, Hulk is nearly unstoppable, but he's almost just there to kick in doors, for comic relief, and/or to do ground combat with some nearly-unstoppable ground juggernaut the enemy might bring (but really could have been handled by the rest of the team if they didn't just ignore it entirely).

In Star Wars, Han Solo is a really good "martial", even with a ranged attack, but Luke could defeat him in the blink of an eye even after training with Ben Kenobi for only the length of a single trip from Tatooine to Alderaan (where Luke learned to deflect blasters with the Force).

In our own real world, you never see soldiers take the field of battle armed with swords and axes and trying to go all "martial" against enemy riflemen and machine guns. And you never see soldiers with just guns perform well against high-tech, long range artillery, air-support, and high-tech combat gear (see the true story of Blackhawk Down for what 100 modern soldiers with high tech equipment and air support can do to over a thousand gun-wielding Somali "martials").

In Boxing, or MMA, or other "martial" sports, they don't let one guy bring in a gun, or a crossbow, or any other ranged attack. They also don't let one guy bring in high-tech armor. They also don't let one guy bring in performance enhancing drugs. Why not? Any of those things would absolutely make the contest unfair for the non-ranged un-buffed "martial" guy.

In other words, that last example makes it pretty clear that even in the real world, we have to make artificial limitations just to make "martial" sports fair. Without those limitations, the "martial" contestants would always lose to the guys who bring "non-martial" advantages.

So, yeah, martials don't get nice things.

That's how it works.

Time to move on and quit complaining about it.

There is another thread running where people are disagreeing on how Hide in Plain Sight works. It's a complex question with lots of moving parts across several different classes and abilities. So I'm making this gigantic post in the hopes of figuring out exactly where the problem is.

Yeah, it's a big mega post, but I broke each rule down into a small bite-sized statement and numbered them all so if anyone disagrees with a statement, he can post his objection and refer to that statement by its number.

To start with, assume a normal guy named Andy who has no special abilities or class features related to Stealth; all he can do is what the skill says. He is in combat and has been in combat for a few rounds already.

1. Andy needs Cover or Concealment to attempt a Stealth check.
2. If Andy moves around and ends his turn without Cover or Concealment, he cannot use Stealth at all - he is totally visible and fully observed.
3. If Andy had successfully used Stealth last turn, and that remains unchanged at the start of this turn, he can make a Stealth check to actually move out into "plain sight" but remain hidden as long as he ends his turn with Cover or Concealment.
4. As with #3, if Andy had successfully used Stealth last turn, and that remains unchanged at the start of this turn, he can make a Stealth check to actually move out into "plain sight" but remain hidden up until the point that he makes an attack, after which he is totally visible and fully observed.
5. If Andy has not previously used Stealth and is therefore totally visible and fully observed, he cannot use Stealth without first finding Cover or Concealment.
6. As with number 5, if Andy does use a move action to find Cover or Concealment, he can attempt a Stealth check, but even if he succeeds, everybody knows where he went - they cannot observe him at this time (he succeeded so the observers failed their Perception checks), but they know where he went.
7. Doing #6 provokes unless the move can be made with a 5'Step.
8. As with number 5 and 6, if Andy first uses Bluff to create a diversion, he can then use a move action to find Cover or Concealment and he can attempt a Stealth check. If he succeeds, nobody knows where he went thanks to the diversion.
9. Doing #8 does not provoke.
10. The opposite of #3, if Andy had successfully used Stealth last turn, and that remains unchanged at the start of this turn, he is NOT allowed to make a Stealth check to actually move out into "plain sight" and use his full turn moving without finding Cover or Concealment, especially not ending his turn with Cover or Concealment - doing this means he is totally visible and fully observed throughout his whole movement, no Stealth check is allowed.

Admittedly, 7, 9, & 10 involve a bit of inference, but all the above should be RAW. Anyone disagree with the above?

Bob is just like Andy, and also in combat, but it's the first round and Bob goes first - everyone else is flat-footed.

11. Bob must have used Stealth before the combat. If he did not, then he cannot attempt #3 or #4 above. There is no assumed Stealth just because it's the start of combat.
12. Perception is reactive, so even flat-footed opponents get to make Perception checks when Bob attempts any Stealth check.

OK, breaking it off there. Please see upcoming posts for Carl, Dave, Ernesto, Fred, and Gomer.

Carl is a Rogue with the advanced talent Hide in Plain Sight and he IS in his favored terrain.

13. Carl can do everything Andy and Bob can do.
14. Rogue HiPS is an Extraordinary ability - no magic involved. It cannot be cannot be disrupted in combat, as spells can, using it does not provoke. Effects or areas that negate or disrupt magic have no effect on this ability. It is not subject to dispelling, and it functions normally in an antimagic field. Indeed, it does not qualify as magical, though it may break the laws of physics.
15. (Modified #5) If Carl has not previously used Stealth and is therefore totally visible and fully observed, he can use his HiPS talent to enable him to use Stealth without first finding Cover or Concealment. This is because HiPS modifies the conditions under which Carl is allowed to attempt his Stealth check.
16. (Modified #6) As with number 15, if Carl first uses HiPS and then uses a move action to find Cover or Concealment, he can attempt a Stealth check. If he succeeds, nobody knows where he went thanks to HiPS. This works just like #8, but using HiPS instead of a diversion.
17. Doing #16 does not provoke.
18. (Modified #2) If Carl uses HiPS and succeeds on a Stealth check and then moves around and ends his turn without Cover or Concealment, he was able to move unseen but at the end of his turn he becomes totally visible and fully observed because rule #2 still applies, even with HiPS. This is because HiPS modifies the conditions under which Carl is allowed to attempt his Stealth check but HiPS does not modify the conditions under which Carl becomes totally visible and fully observed if he fails to find Cover or Concealment.
-or-
19. Doing #18 does not provoke.
20. Doing #18 is identical to doing #16 - they are the same thing. The only difference between #16/#18 and #6 is that #6 uses a diversion which requires a Bluff check (that might fail) while #16/#18 uses HiPS which cannot fail (the Stealth check might fail, but HiPS can be used without any check at all).
21. (Alternate #18) If Carl uses HiPS and succeeds on a Stealth check and then moves around and ends his turn without Cover or Concealment, he cannot use Stealth at all - he is totally visible and fully observed because not only does rule #2 still apply, but if Carl makes no attempt to comply with it during his turn, then he cannot attempt the Stealth check in the first place.
22. Doing #21 does provoke because no Stealth check was actually made.
23. Doing #21 is identical to #2 - both involve ending their turns with no effort being made to find Cover or Concealment which negates the Stealth check (and in Carl's case, causes HiPS to provide no benefit).
-or-
24. (Alternate #18) If Carl uses HiPS and succeeds on a Stealth check and then moves around and ends his turn without Cover or Concealment, he remains hidden because he made his Stealth check and can ignore rule #2. This assumes that HiPS does indeed modify the conditions under which Carl becomes totally visible and fully observed if he fails to find Cover or Concealment even though the ability never says it does.
25. Doing #24 does not provoke.
26. Doing #24 is much like having a skill-based magical on/off switch for using Stealth while observed. It violates #1 and #2 almost like magic even though it is not magic.

Dave is a 17th level Ranger with the Hide in Plain Sight class feature and he IS in his favored terrain.

24. Really, this is exactly like Carl's example with no differences. Well, except that Dave does not actually need Cover or Concealment while he remains in his favored terrain because he also has Camouflage (see Ernesto's example below). It's probably easiest to treat this exactly as if Dave ALWAYS has Concealment in his favored terrain. With that one exception, this works exactly like Carl's example.

Ernesto is a 12th level Ranger with the Camouflage class feature and he IS in his favored terrain.

25. Ernesto can do everything Andy and Bob can do.
26. Camouflage is an Extraordinary ability - no magic involved. It cannot be cannot be disrupted in combat, as spells can, using it does not provoke. Effects or areas that negate or disrupt magic have no effect on this ability. It is not subject to dispelling, and it functions normally in an antimagic field. Indeed, it does not qualify as magical, though it may break the laws of physics.
27. (Modified #1) Ernesto does not need Cover or Concealment to attempt a Stealth check.
28. (Modified #2) If Ernesto moves around and ends his turn without Cover or Concealment, it really does not matter because he is in his favored terrain and therefore does not need Cover or Concealment to attempt a Stealth check - he is totally visible and fully observed unless he makes a Stealth check in which case he is unobserved.
29. (Modified #3) If Ernesto had successfully used Stealth last turn, and that remains unchanged at the start of this turn, he can make a Stealth check to actually move out into "plain sight" but remain hidden as long as he ends his turn with Cover or Concealment or in his favored terrain where he does not need Cover or Concealment.
30. (Unmodified #4) As with #29, if Ernesto had successfully used Stealth last turn, and that remains unchanged at the start of this turn, he can make a Stealth check to actually move out into "plain sight" but remain hidden up until the point that he makes an attack, after which he is totally visible and fully observed.
31. (Modified #5) If Ernesto has not previously used Stealth and is therefore totally visible and fully observed, he can use Stealth without first finding Cover or Concealment because Camouflage allows him to.
32. (Modified #6) As with number 31, if Ernesto does use a move action to find Cover or Concealment or to remain in his favored terrain where he does not need Cover or Concealment, he can attempt a Stealth check, but even if he succeeds, everybody knows where he went - they cannot observe him at this time (he succeeded so the observers failed their Perception checks), but they know where he went.
33. (Unmodified #7) Doing #32 provokes unless the move can be made with a 5'Step.
34. (Modified #8) As with number 31 and 32, if Ernesto first uses Bluff to create a diversion, he can then use a move action to find Cover or Concealment or to remain in his favored terrain where he does not need Cover or Concealment and he can attempt a Stealth check. If he succeeds, nobody knows where he went thanks to the diversion.
35. (Unmodified #9) Doing #34 does not provoke.
36. (Modified #10) The opposite of #29, if Ernesto had successfully used Stealth last turn, and that remains unchanged at the start of this turn, he is NOT allowed to make a Stealth check to actually move out into "plain sight" and use his full turn moving without finding Cover or Concealment or remaining in his favored terrain where he does not need Cover or Concealment, especially not ending his turn with either of those two requirements - doing this means he is totally visible and fully observed throughout his whole movement, no Stealth check is allowed.

Fred is an Assassin with the Hide in Plain Sight class feature. He is within 10' of a shadow.

37. Fred can do everything Andy and Bob can do.
38. Assassin HiPS is a Supernatural ability - that means it is magical. It can't be disrupted in combat and doesn't provoke. It isn't subject to spell resistance, counterspells, or dispel magic, but it doesn't function in antimagic areas.
39. In all other ways, Fred's HiPS is identical to Carl's - except for the requirement of using a shadow instead of using favored terrain. (If anyone disagrees with this statement, please identify which of Carl's rules works differently for Fred, and why).

Gomer is a Shadowdancer with the Hide in Plain Sight class feature. He is within 10' of dim light.
40. Gomer can do everything Andy and Bob can do.
41. Assassin HiPS is a Supernatural ability - that means it is magical. It can't be disrupted in combat and doesn't provoke. It isn't subject to spell resistance, counterspells, or dispel magic, but it doesn't function in antimagic areas.
42. In all other ways, Gomer's HiPS is identical to Carl's - except for the requirement of using dim light instead of using favored terrain. (If anyone disagrees with this statement, please identify which of Carl's rules works differently for Gomer, and why).

So, where do we all disagree?

Reading the intro and campaign summary, it seems quite interesting and I'm looking forward to running it, but I have noticed a lack of suggestions along the line of "The party should be about 3rd level", or any other such advice.

Which I suppose is the idea, leaving it up to me. And I have no problem figuring out just what my party can handle and what they can't.

The problem is, I am beginning to feel like I need to read hundreds of pages to figure out the best place to start and then analyze dozens of encounter CRs to estimate the correct levels for the party. And when they're done with that little corner of the sandbox, I need to read hundreds of pages again to figure out the next corner of the sandbox, and evaluate dozens of encounters to figure out if they're the right level here or should I give them a diversion to gain XP, etc.

Maybe I just missed it, but there doesn't seem to be a "best path, go here, then go here, at these suggested levels" guide anywhere in the book.

Again, it's a sandbox, I get it, but now I have a monumental book to read to just figure out where to start and at what level.

Does anyone have any familiarity/experience with this campaign and can offer advice on what worked or didn't work for you?

In conjunction with my other currently running thread, I'd like some advice for my players here.

Recap:

Level 12 group with no healer. The 5 characters are:
Fighter
Rogue
Monk
Arcane Archer (8th level caster)
Wizard

So my question is: please advise my players. What would YOU do if you were one of these players to increase your character's survival chances and the group's as well? What items, spells, feats, etc., would YOU bring if you were playing one or more of these characters?

Shackled City. We've reached level 12. Still lots of story to continue (this campaign reaches level 20).

We took a break and a couple players switched to new PCs, including the group's healer. Now we have:
Fighter
Arcane Archer
Monk
Rogue
Wizard

No healer.

So I threw a few test encounters at the group. I figure their APL is 13 (they're all 12th level but it's a 5-man group).

This is a good group of players who know what they're doing. I'm used to regularly throwing APL+3 or APL+4 encounters at these guys.

First encounter, 7 Mohrgs. CR 8 each, 33,600 XP puts this squarely between CR 13 and 14. I should have had a TPK. After 4 characters were paralyzed leaving only the monk unparalyzed with still 4 morghs alive, this fight should have been over - instead, I had the mohrgs spend their rounds eating the paralyzed characters with weak pathetic bite attacks rather than slamming/paralyzing the outnumbered monk.

Basically, I pulled my punches to let them survive an encounter that was basically APL+0.5. Not even APL+1.

Sad - it shouldn't be this hard.

They healed up with potions and wands. Next encounter was 4 Witchfires from Bestiary 2. CR 13 exactly. APL+0.

Again, I had to pull punches to keep them alive, having the witchfires scatter their attacks instead of ganging up (INT and WIS both above 16 so they should not be tactical idiots) and even then I had to tone down their damage (I started using 6d6 damage instead of 8d6) and still almost TPK'd the party, with an APL+0 fight.

Pathetic - it shouldn't be this hard.

TL;dr:

The group has no healer and now I am almost TPKing them with EVEN fights when the same group of players regularly handles much harder fights if they have a healer.

I need advice:

1. How do you keep a group alive when they have no healer?

2. How does such a group handle healing between fights? They took SO MUCH DAMAGE that they could easily burn through dozens of Cure Light Wounds after every fight. I don't think a fully charged wand would last more than two fights. Do they really need to carry a dozen wands to get through a dungeon? Are there better solutions?

I have a player creating a 10th level Qinggong monk to join an existing campaign. I don't know much about monks (nobody ever plays them long) and I especially know nothing about Qinggong monks.

So, what are the worst traps, pitfalls, rules loophols, or other swindles a player might try - either things that ruin his character or that overpower his character?

Or, assuming none of the above, what should I expect from this class as I run the game?

This won't fix everything everyone rants about with class imbalance, but I've been thinking a lot lately about MAD (Multiple Ability Dependent) classes and why they're harder to balance. I don't think it's justified.

In looking at which classes are the most MAD (Monk at the top of the list) and least MAD (Wizard), it strikes me that the most MAD classes are often considered to be at the low end of the power scale while the least MAD classes are often at the top end of that scale. That doesn't make sense, unless the problem IS that some are MAD and others are not.

But I don't think that's all of it - make a wizard more MAD and his WISH spells will still rattle the universe, and make a monk less MAD and he'll still just punch things in the face. (OK, a bit of an oversimplification there, but not that far from the point).

So I've been thinking about fixing the MAD. One quick fix that came to mind is to hit it right at the time ability scores are generated. To that end, I considered adding a varying number of "points" to ability scores, adding fewer, even 0, to the least MAD classes and adding more to the most MAD.

It's simple. If you're using point-buy, just add these values to your starting points, then buy your abilities as normal. If you're rolling dice, then roll them and assign them by whatever method you use, then add these "points" as individual +1 bonuses that cannot be used more than once on any ability score over 12 and no more than twice on any ability score of 12 or less.

Here's the list:

Alchemist +1
Barbarian +1
Bard +4
Cavalier +2
Cleric +1
Druid +3
Fighter +2
Gunslinger +0
Inquisitor +2
Magus +2
Monk +5
Oracle +1
Paladin +4
Ranger +3
Rogue +3
Sorcerer +0
Summoner +0
Witch +0
Wizard +0

So, first, what are your impressions? Good? Interesting? Stinky?

And second, comparing the classes to each other, does anyone feel that I've allotted too many or too few points to any classes? Again, the scale so far goes from 0 (very much NOT MAD0 to 5 (the most MAD class of all). Please let me know if you disagree with my assessment of which classes are more or less mad than others. Please, if so, offer your reason. For example, if you think fighters should get more because then he could be more useful out of combat, then make sure to include that as your reason - I'm just as interested in the "why" as I am in the "what".

Final note, this isn't intended to totally fix the whole concern with MAD. Maybe it does. Maybe not. Just toying with it to see if this could be a simple way to reduce the impact, then tweak/adjust/supplement from there.

Thanks in advance.

For those not familiar with it, the Enforcer from SGG is an Anachronistic Adventurer, a guy from the modern world somehow blasted into Golarion. They have several such adventurers, but the Enforcer is a core 20-level class typically representing a modern soldier, trained in guns and such, and comes with some interesting modern firearms.

So basically a gunslinger, but with modern weapons. To give SGG credit, their take on guns is very interesting and the class abilities look like lots of fun too).

My question is for DMs and players alike.

Would having a PC with this class in your worlds be weird? Would it break immersion or feel wrong or be too far out of place? Does it break the "fantasy" concept too much?

Or would you just look at it as one more kind of fighter and welcome him into the game?

Somewhere in between?

I guess this question is only for those who have this supplement from Super Genius Games. it's a base class from our world, a soldier who got magically transported to Golarion. He's supposed to have modern guns and his class abilities are "aimed" at using those guns.

I'm going to have to discuss all this with the DM, so I'm looking for ideas from the clever masses before I have that discussion.

1. I am thinking about playing an Enforcer from level 1. To be playable, he probably needs to begin with a gun valued at a minimum of 900gp which is quite a bit of starting cash. I'm looking for ideas to balance that; I'm pretty sure the other level 1 characters are going to have normal starting wealth. I also don't think I can simply wait until I have 900 GP and then go buy the gun; I will be trapped in this world and those weapons won't exist here so if I don't start with it, I will never have it.

2. Actually, I'd like to have two guns, a pistol sidearm and a more robust gun, such as an assault rifle, worth 2,400gp. By level 4-5, this won't be a big deal, but what about the super low levels when it seems to be somewhat game-breaking? How do I get these guns later if I don't start with them - the book suggests that I have some kind of trick to go back and forth to my world, but that creates different problems, like why don't I bring medicine, hand grenades, or even a tank back with me? In order to avoid those plot holes, I prefer to just not have access to this world anymore. Besides, I like the "I'm lost and I am trying to get back to my world" player concept - maybe it would evolve into being happy to remain, if and when the campaign gives me a RP reason for it. Either way, no going home for more guns.

3. What about ammunition? If I need to use these guns for 20 levels, my first level guy has to arrive with a truckload of ammo. Should a modern assault rifle fire the same bullets as a Gunslinger's alchemical firearm? If so, then I can probably find ammo in many markets. If not, how do I get ammo?

4. I'm also curious to find out if anyone has tried using the alternate Firearms rules form this book and if so, how well are they balanced against the APG?

(does this belong in the Compatible Products forum? That forum seems to be more for advertising than it is for advice.)

Looking for a dicussion here.

Recently I have been growing more and more disappointed with critical hits in general. As a player, sure, I like to land that powerful critical hit but sometimes I feel cheated when we finally encounter the BBEG and wham, a lucky crit takes him out in round two. Way too anticlimactic for me. It's almost like a random Deus Ex Machina.

And as a DM, I hate to spend hours carefully constructing a devastating arch villain only to see him dropped in round two by a lucky critical hit.

But I hate it even more as a DM to roll a critical hit for a monster and suddenly realize that I'm about to kill a PC. What to do? Announce the crit and let the players worry about raising him back in town? Pretend it was a normal hit so the poor PC can live through the fight? Heck, I'd rather just not roll any critical hits against PCs that are already badly wounded.

Sometimes as a DM I put out a CR-appropriate monster and it dies in a couple rounds because of a lucky critical hit or two. Then I put out another one, very similar, and it ends up killing a PC in a 10-round combat because the monster is the one with all the luck this time.

As a DM, this "swinginess" makes it very difficult to plan challenging, interesting encounters. All too often it's some trash encounter that ends up being challenging and the BBEG is too easy, even boring.

It's all too unpredicable, and it can be very anticlimactic when a battle that should be fun and challenging gets suddenly trivialized by a single lucky roll.

When my friends are all sitting around, months later, talking about their adventure in the necromancer's tower, I want them saying things like "Wow, that necromancer was awesome! I thought we were going to TPK for sure. I'm still not sure how we made it." But instead, far too often it goes more like this: "Man, that necomancer sure was a pushover. But do you remember those 4 sekeletons in the hallway? Wow, those skeletons were awesome! I thought we were going to TPK for sure..."

Does anyone else feel the same way?

Imagine if you will that somewhere in this world exists a Pathfinder group consisting of a bunch of grizzled old veteran D&D players. In this hypothetical group are several players who have been playing since the 70s, including three veteran DMs with about 90 years of collective DMing experience.

Now suppose this group is all of the opinion that a typical group of Pathfinder heroes has access to far more healing than any similar group of heroes in any previous iteration of D&D. So much so that all of these veteran DMs despair of finding suitable combat challenges for Pathfinder groups. To the point that they all throw impossible challenges at the players, challenges that would have surely resulted in a TPK in any of their previous game versions, only to see the players defeat these challenges easily.

So they begin discussion about Channel Energy, a class feature that can be used in Pathfinder, even as early as 3rd level, to restore well over 100 HP during a single combat. So when it really hits the fan, the cleric can pump out an extra 100+ HP of healing, which means the monsters need to pump out at least that much additional damage to keep pace and present a reasonable threat. Unless, of course, the cleric goes down, in which case suddenly we have these overwhelmingly powerful monsters without that fountain of nearly-endless healing to counteract it.

So what suggestions would the wise and creative community here offer to this hypothetical group to reduce the power of Channel Energy?

So what's up with liches lately?

We have three threads on the first page of these forums where 3 different players are playing or asking about playing characters whose goals are to become liches.

But we have no threads on the front page about playing ninjas.

Now, I would ask where all the ninjas went, but that would be pointless - nobody can find ninjas when they don't want to be found. But my real question is have liches become cool enough to replace ninjas for the number 1 spot of elite superbitshin character godliness?

[sic]

I think everyone agrees that the rules for Stealth and Perception and Sneak Attack are very vague and open to misinterpretation. My hope in this thread can be used to constructively reach a consensus on how to rephrase/rewrite these rules to make them clear, concise, and correct.

A grand experiment, if you will.

This is a huge post so I've buried the relevent discussions in the following spoilers:

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

So putting that all together, I arrive at the following new rules.

Note #1: These are not actuallynew rules. They are just clarifications of the existing rules, reworded to make the rules more clear.

Note #2: I am not listing everything here, like size modifiers, or movement speed, or many other things. This is usually because the rules I omitted are quite clear in the rulebook and needed no clarification from me so I see no reason to make this post even longer by including those rules.

Note #3: This probably isn't everything. Maybe I did miss stuff that really needs clarification. Hopefully some good discussion will ensue to bring such points to light.

Note #4: I may be wrong. Please feel free to discuss anything I've screwed up here, but please be nice about it. This took a few hours of research, not to mention a few hours of typing it all up and organizing it, so be gentle.

Note #5: Finally, if you do post anything supporting or disputing these clarification, please make sure you read both the proposed rule AND the discussion that explains that rule. I put a lot of time into writing this, and it would be fruitless to have posts that just restate, or fail to consider, what I've already covered.

Newly clarified rules:

During a move action in which you wish to enter Stealth, or remain in Stealth from the previous round, you must attempt a Stealth check (opposed by Perception) to successfully become Stealthed. You must have Cover (but not Soft Cover) or Concealment, or your observers must be incapable of observing you for some other reason, such as (but not limited to) blindness or a successful Diversion.

You are "observed" when you are in a location where at least one opponent can perceive you. Generally this perception requires vision, but some opponents may have other senses, including Blindsense, that they can use to locate you. Conversely, you are "unobserved" when you are in a position where your enemies cannot perceive you using any sense, which almost always means you have Cover or Concealment. It is possible to be observed by some enemies while being unobserved by other enemies, but those who do observe you can instantly alert those who cannot by speaking as a free action, even if it is not their turn.

If you end your move action in a position where you are being observed by your foes, then you are no longer Stealthed, even if you made a sucessful Stealth check during that action. This includes taking a "double move" which is really two separate move actions in the same round - both of which require a Stealth roll if you wish to be stealthy, and each of which requires you to end that specific move action unobserved.

Creating a Diversion to hide: If your observers' attention is momentarily diverted, you can attempt to use Stealth. As a Standard action, you can attempt a Bluff check to give you the momentary diversion you need to move insto Stealth, even while your observers would otherwise be aware of you. If your Bluff check (opposed by Sense Motive) is successful, during that moment when the observers' attention is diverted from you, you can take a Move action that includes a Stealth check, but only if you can get to an unobserved place of some kind by the end of your move - you must end your move action unobserved. This check, however, is made at a –10 penalty because you have to move fast.

If you begin an attack action while you are in a position of Flanking against your opponent, then you can Sneak Attack this opponent. All of your attacks this round can be Sneak Attacks.

If you begin an attack action while you are Unobserved, meaning you are already Invisible or Stealthed before you begin this attack, then your opponent is denied his DEX bonus to his Armor Class and you can Sneak Attack this opponent. Your first attack (if you have more than one) will reveal you to this opponent, automatically removing your Invisibility or Stealth benefits (this is not true of Improved Invisibility) which means that only your first attack gets the benefits of being Invisible or Stealthed; subsequent attacks in this round are treated as normal attacks.

Sniping: If you've already successfully used Stealth at least 10 feet from your target, you can, as a full-round action, make one ranged attack that denies your target his DEX bonus to his AC, and then immediately use Stealth again. You take a –20 penalty on your Stealth check to return to your previous unobserved location.

OK, this got a bit off topic in another thread, so I'm reformatting and posting it in its own thread.

Basically, as I read it, the Pathfinder RAW limits wizards to having just 100 levels of spells contained in one Spellbook. So, a 20th level wizard might have all 100 spell levels in his spellbook, and at the same time, a 20th level sorcerer has 162 spell levels carried around in her head.

It's really become quite frustrating for my 6th level wizard who has already filled up his spellbook with only one blank page remaining.

So, help me out please. Clarify for me where in the rulebook it says a wizard can have more than one spellbook, espcially if it explains how it works.

As I read the wizard class, it always refers to "spellbook" in the singular. Likewise, in the Spells section, all references to wizards spellbooks are also singular. I don't see anywhere that references a wizard having more than one spellbook.

Further, if he finds another spellbook, he must first study each spell until he throroughly understands it and then he must copy it into his own spellbook before he can prepare that spell. The simple fact that he cannot pick up a spellbook, study it, and carry it around and prepare spells from it corroborates the 1-spellbook limit imposed on wizards.

So the wizard's one true core class ability is even more limited, at higher levels, than the sorcerer.

What's worse, the wizard has to pay gold for the inks and such to write each of those spells into his spellbook. Money that a sorcerer could use to buy magic items, scrolls, wands, or just a bunch of tankards of ale.

The only way I see, per RAW, for the wizard to overcome this limitation is for him to acquire a Blessed Book, which increases his capacity 10x.

But that makes the wizard class dependent on finding one specific mandatory magic item in order to use his core class ability. No other class is this limited. All 10 other classes can use every ability on their list, all the way up to level 20, with just ordinary items found in every marketplace in every town in the world. But not so for wizards. They have to be lucky enough to stumble upon a Blessed Book in a treasure hoard somewhere (pure luck), or find one for sale in a village marketplace (expensive), or take a feat to craft one themselves (waste of a feat and still expensive).

So the poor wizards must spend additional coin, maybe even burn a feat, or rely on a whole lot of luck, just to use their core class ability.

That really seems quite wrong.

Before I shamble off into the realm of houserules, and simply rule that the wizard can own as many spellbooks as he wants, and that he can cast spells from any spellbook, his, borrowed books, found books, etc. (as long as he studies the spell as presented in the RAW) without having to waste time or money copying them to his own spellbooks, is there something I've missed?

Does anyone else know of something I've missed in the RAW that counters the issue I have presented here?

So we can all download free .pdf files of the AP Players' Guides (for example, the Council of Thieves Players Guide is a free .pdf download here at Paizo).

But a couple of my friends don't have computers. Yeah, I know, it's 2009 right? But it's true.

So, for those guys, I would like to print out my downloaded .pdf and give them a copy. I was hoping the .pdf might have text like "permission to copy this document is granted" or some such stuff, but I don't see anything like that anywhere in it.

I do see that it is copyrighted, and I see the usual stuff about Open Content and Product Identity.

So, do we or do we not have permission to print this file? Can we take it to a copy store and have them print and bind a couple copies for our gaming group? Will they object because of the copyright? If so, is there some place I can point them to that shows them it's OK to print this file?

Maybe I'm just losing my mind. In fact, I'm sure I am.

But I thought I found, somewhere recently, a small (official) list of substitute class features for the Paizo Core ruleset.

But now I can't find it.

Who knows, maybe it was just someone's houserules I was reading, or whatever. I could be completely misremembering what I think I saw.

But just in case, has Paizo put out any substitute class features somewhere? If so, where?

(searching this site is disabled)

The healing domain says:

At 6th level, all of your cure spells are treated as if they were empowered

And further it says:

increasing the amount of damage healed by half (+50%).

Now that seems to mean that the entire healing amount is increased. For example, if an 8th level cleric casts Cure Moderate Wounds and rolls 2d8 and gets 10, then addds +8 for his level for a total of 18 HP, do we add 50% to that and heal 27 HP?

I ask because the domain ability says it works like the Empower Spell feat which would only add 50% to the rolled amount, getting 15, then add the level, resulting in 23 HP healed.

By the wording, it seems that either interpretation is valid.

Have we had any previous clarification on this, or can we get some official clarification on it?

So, giving the assumptions in my first post in this thread, here's the flaw that I see:

That interpretation completely invalidates the idea of using "tanks" or "meatshields", etc., to protect the squishy mages (etc.) in the back.

So your barbarian, paladin, and fighter form a 3-man wall. There are 20 kobolds attacking, so they all just tumble past the "wall" and attack the mage in the back. Most of them (maybe all of them) fail their Acrobatics rolls, and your "wall" kills 3 of them with their AoOs, but the other 17 kobolds surround your mage and cut him to pieces.

DM's cannot protect their squishy wizard/sorcerer/cleric/warlock/necromancer/etc. villains any more because even the dwarf fighter in full plate with DEX 6 and ZERO points in Acrobatics can tumble right through the minions, even through the spaces they are standing in, and kill the villain - sure, he'll take a few AoOs, but if he has a good AC, maybe the Mobility feat, and lots of HP, a few AoOs won't matter.

The whole Roman phalanx mentality ceases to exist when the Visigoths just tumble past the shield wall and hack the legionnaires to bits from behind.

So, the Bard preview has people talking about what they like and dislike about little Lem and his preview. And some of it has devolved into how powerful fighters are, and how bad the monk preview will be, and the age-old "role" vs. "roll" debate.

So here's a thread to discuss not the bard as previewed, but rather, the bard as we wish them to be.

Let's assume, for this thread, that we won't roll the bard completely back to 3.5 - instead, we'll use the Pathfinder Core bard, or as much as we know from the preview.

And now let's add some houserules to fix the problems we perceive with that version of the bard.

I'll start.

I think the biggest concern I saw from the preview thread was the change to music by the round. I saw two concerns:

1. Not enough rounds to function throughout the day.
2. Some uses, especially Inspire Competence, require so many rounds (or minutes, or even hours) that the bard cannot possibly enhance these activites.

So I propose to fix that first.

1. What if we double the number of rounds the bard gets per level. So at first level, the number of rounds is 8 + CHA and each level after that is 4 additional rounds.

This would give Lem 46 rounds instead of 28. That should be enough for 4 combats with quite a bit left over for non-combat uses.

2. What if we modify the bardic music ability to allow for non-combat use that allows a bard to use two rounds worth of his daily allotment to give him one minute of effect, and then restrict this usage so that the bard cannot attack or cast spells while performing in this fashion. Further, he can use two minutes (four rounds) to give him 10 minutes of effect, and he can use two 10-minute effects (8 rounds) to grant a 1-hour effect, and lastly two hourly effects (16 rounds) to grant an 8-hour performance.

This would allow a bard, even with a CHA of 10, to assist in item creation by the time he's level 3. He could assist in climbing a 500' cliff (100 rounds in the worst case, not counting falling and starting over) using just 8 of his daily rounds of performance, so he can do this at level 1 if he must.

These are somewhat off the top of my head. Improvements welcome.

And please don't limit replies only to this houserule. Any suggestions about improving or houseruling the bard are very much welcome.

Let's face it. Almost nobody uses metamagic feats. Those who do use them almost always use them very sparsely for situational reasons.

I've tried many things over the last decade to make Metamagic work. By work, I mean make it appealing to all casters, all casting classes, without making it overpowered.

I want each and every spellcaster to be able to say "Hey, I just gained a feat. These Metamagic feats all look really good. But, so do some of the other feats. They're all good. So many choices, what shall I do."

Currently, I don't think Metamagic achieves this goal. Most casters say "Hey, I just gained a feat. I certainly don't want any of that metamagic, so let's find something that's actually useful for me to acquire instead."

Not all. But most.

So I have here a houserule. It is a little bit complex, but then so is metmagic in general. It uses rules for Concentration (I have updated the description to be consistent with the new rule presented in the Cleric preview) and for Spellcraft, so knowing those rules will help understand the metamagic houserule.

It's quite long, but half of the length are 8 examples I provide at the end that demonstrate various possibilities. Because it is so long, I've put it in a spoiler.

I can say, having worked out the math and devised the rule, that I would use this rule as both a player and as a DM. To me, this is balanced on all both sides of the DM screen.

My group is using this in playtest mode right now, though we just started and I don't have any playtest data yet.

I'm inviting the community at large to review and share your thoughts. Even better, give it a playtest and let me know how it works out at the game table.

Thanks,
Blake

I attended the BEA this last weekend.

There I met Erik Mona, which was cool.

But I must admit, cool as that was, it was eclipsed by the preview copy of the Pathfinder rulebook that he had in the booth with him.

Wow.

It was like finding the Holy Grail.

And it was fortunate for Mr. Mona that there were about 30,000 witnesses wandering around, or I may have been tempted to try a sneak attack to make off with the goods...

Come to think of it, when I wandered back that way a bit later, I didn't see him there. I wonder if someone else followed through on my plan while I was off trying to promote my novel?

Erik, here's to hoping you made it out of there in one piece!

This isn't really a playtest thread, since there are no action points in the Beta rules.

But...

There are some flaws in the 3.5/Pathfinder rules that could be conveniently solved with action points.

For example, the raging debate about fighters and their susceptibility to SoD spells.

Fixing fighters' will saves, or giving them class abilities to shrug off enchantment type spells, seems to overpower the class.

Wrecking the SoD spells to allow fighters to survive them just ends up writing those spells off as broken and unworthy of use in game play.

The middle ground solution may be to drop in an action point system. If everyone had a few "Get out of jail free" cards to play each level, the fighters will be able to resist a few of those SoD spells, mages might not die every time someone pings them with an arrow, etc.

The beauty of it is, with just a simple set of A.P. rules, every class will have many, most, or all of their concerns fixed at once, while game balance is preserved.

So, if it's not too late, I would like to suggest an A.P. system, even if it's just a sidebar in the rulebook.

So, sorcerers got bloodlines, wizards got nice school powers, clerics get cool domain powers, and everyone can cast a handful of cantrips all day long at-will.

Every primary spellcasting class has some way to use their magic constructively in combat round after round after round without running out, using at-will combat abilities.

Except druids.

They get nothing.

They don't even have any useful combat cantrips. Their best repeatable combat utility is Flare, to cause one enemy to be -1 on attack rolls for a round.

They are still limited to the old standard "I shoot the ogre with my sling, using my crappy BAB and my crappy DEX mod."

Sure, they can take one cleric domain if they want to permanently give up their animal companion.

Or they can keep their animal companion and let their little wolfie run around nipping at the ogre's heels, unti it gets squashed, while they bounce harmless sling bullets off the ogre's armor, or off of the trees and rocks and ground in the general vicinity of the ogre.

OK, I get it. 3.5 druids were powerhouses.

So the Pathfinder solution is to make every one of their 6 ability scores useful to them (the only class that doesn't really have at least 1 practical dump stat), then enhance all the other primary spellcasters to make them *always* useful in combat at low levels, then nerf druid's wildshape into a shade of its former glory?

Basically, druids got the shaft, and every other primary spellcaster got significantly enhanced.

Especially at low levels.

Sure, if a druid can survive his pathetic low-level uselessness and actually make it into double-digit levels, he finally evolves into something that might evoke a little fear on the battlefield, or in the dungeon.

But why did he get no love in the low-levels, when he needs it the most?

It seems to me to be too much.

Does anyone else share this opinion? Am I alone in my assessment that the low-level druids are pathetic compared to any other spellcasting class in Pathfinder Beta?

I posted this at the end of a long thread in the playtesting section, but then I felt that it deserved its own thread here.

Power attack defies logic, in either version (PFRPG or 3.5).

On the one hand, we have a rule that says you add your STR modifier to your attack and damage rolls. This means that the stronger you are, the more powerful your attack is, the easier it is to hit and damage your target.

On the other hand, PA says that your attack is so powerful that it makes it harder to hit but easier to damage your opponent, if you hit.

Why are these two rules in opposition.

If high strength, which can be re-worded to "lots of muscle power", uses a mechanic that increases your chance to hit and your damage, then why does PA, which can be re-worded to "using lots of muscle power" reverse the strength mechanic regarding your chance to hit?

This seems counterintuitive to me.

I am much in favor of PA reducing your own AC instead of your chance to hit.

That would fit very logically.

A strong fighter stands with his feet planted (well, he plants them momentarily when he lands his blow) and delivers powerful blows without over extending himself, thus his high strength contributes to his attack roll (blasting through his foe's defenses) and his damage (cutting deeply).

But when he uses PA, he is swinging for the bleachers, over extending himself, swinging so hard that he sacrifices his own balance and recovery time. The result is he still blasts through his foe's defenses about the same as always, but he cuts even deeper than he usually would, but in return he is off-balance and therefore it's much easier for his enemies to hit him.

But, as has been stated elsewhere, AC is a more important feature than Attack Mod, since melee characters generally receive more attacks against them in most fights, and over their careers, than the number of attacks they actually make.

This means a one-for-one ratio might underpower the feat if we base the penalty on AC rather than Attack Modifier. Therefore I propose a 3-for-4 compromise.

I also propose capping the amount, probably based on BAB, so low-level fighters can only gain a few points of damage and high level fighters can gain lots of damage.

Ergo, I would support changing PA as follows:

Power Attack
You swing so hard that you deliver devastating attacks to your enemies, but at the cost of your own defense.
Prerequisite: Base Attack Bonus 1+
Benefit: You may add any multiplier of 4 to your melee damage rolls for one full or standard melee attack. In return, you must subtract the same multiplier of 3 from your AC until the beginning of your next turn. However, your Base Attack Bonus must be equal to or higher than the amount you subtract from your AC, unless your BAB is less than 3, in which case you may still add +4 to your damage at the cost of -3 to your AC.
Special: If you are using a two-handed weapon, or a one-handed weapon with both hands, then the multiplier to your melee damage rolls is increased to +5 instead of +4. Also, you cannot reduce your AC below 1 by using this feat.

That wording might be a little awkward, but basically it means that anyone who has a BAB of 1 to 5 can get +4 damage to all attacks during their round at the cost of -3 AC until their next round. BAB 6 to 8 can go +4 DMG/-3 AC or +8 DMG/-6 AC. BAB 9 to 11 can go +4 DMG/-3 AC or +8 DMG/-6 AC or +12 DMG/ -9 AC. And BAB 18-20 can go as high as +24 DMG/ -18 AC if they want to be so suicidal. And if he's using a two handed sword, he would be able to do +30 damage at the cost of -18 AC.

This rewrite puts the feat back up into the realm of damage that could be inflicted in 3.5, but keeps the benefit of the Pathfinder version that it's much better at very low levels, while limiting the user's choices at the game table, and it solves the counterintuitive logic flaw I described above.

The only downside is that I see overzealous players, especially lightly-armored barbarians, getting chopped to pieces because they destroy their own AC to use PA on one enemy and the rest of the enemies then proceed to carve out their liver.

Is everyone OK with the level adjustments of metamagic feats? Do they work OK for you?

Some examples:
Maximzie a Cure Light Wounds, and you use a level 4 slot to heal 1d8(8) + 5 HP. Total 13 HP.
Cast a Cure Critical Wounds and you use a level 4 slot to heal 4d8 + 7 (or more). Total 11-39, averaging 25 HP.

OK, so not the best example.

Maximzie a Cure Serious Wounds, and you use a level 6 slot to heal 3d8(24) + 11 (minimum) HP. Total 35 HP.
Cast a Heal spell and you use a level 6 slot to heal up to 150 HP (or has the limit changed, no book on hand to check - but it's surely way more than 35 HP).

Maximize a Fireball and you use a level 6 slot to inflict 10d6(60) HP in a 20' spread.

How many other level 6 spells (or even level 5) can you find that offer more damage over a larger area than a maximized fireball in the same slot?

Empower is no different; the benefit you gain for the +2 level adjustment just doesn't compare to the actual spells of that level.

Sure, some other metamagic feats make a little more sense, like Quicken - it can be a complete life saver and/or a game breaker with the right spell in the right situation, but it is prohibitively expensive at +4 levels for the use of just dropping a second evocation spell duruing a single round of combat.

Without going into the whole list, my general feeling is that almost every metamagic feat not cost-effective. A spellcaster can get more bank for his spell-slot buck by simply preparing the appropriately leveled spells in that slot.

Anyone have any similar thoughts (or counterarguments)?

And no, don't bring up metamagic rods, because they circumvent the level adjustment no matter if the adjustment is +1 or +50.