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When we played through this, the player running Zurnzal did not understand that the faction mission was "kidnap someone and replace them": he focused on planting incriminating evidence on different Pathfinders. Now I'm prepping it, and when I read through Zurnzal's mission, it seems really, really vague. Did all of your players figure it out? Did you have to give them any hints?
I have to run a PFS scenario with a chase scene soon, and this question came up:
You're technically not in combat, because chases are a different mechanic from the combat rules. It seems like it might fall under the "increase drama" rules, but those are tricky in PFS. Also, since a lot of players hate chase scenes, I think anything that makes them less onerous to the players would be an improvement. Any thoughts? I'm not finding anything in the rules that even hints on this.
The Deathwatch spell (ported up from 3.5) says:
It sounds like it would be a free action ("instantly know"), but the spell doesn't specify. Since you can already use move action to do a Heal check, I'd say a 1st level spell should be faster than that. Has anyone ever used this spell in their games? If so, how did you rule?
I just wanted to point out to people who are considering rebuilds to unchained rogues that they will have to retrain ki pool and any ki-based rogue talents: "The unchained rogue qualifies for all existing rogue archetypes, but she is limited to any rogue talents listed in Chapter 1 (including the sidebar on page 24)." Ki pool and ki-pool-based talents do not appear in either of those lists. (If you use Hero Lab, there are some ki pool-based rogue talents that are still showing as valid choices; I've already submitted the bug report, but I wanted to give people a heads-up.)
So it's been almost a year since I last ran the Disappeared, and while rereading my notes, I came across something odd in the description of the evidence: Evidence Description:
The evidence that Tancred used to indict Zarta consists of a series of letters written in a halting hand that resembles the paracountess’s. Upon closer examination, however, the letters’ writing differs significantly from the note found in Zarta’s study. The forged letters are addressed to a prominent House Thrune enemy, and in them “Zarta” discusses selling privileged Chelish information supposedly meant to foment political insurrection. Zarta’s personal travel logs, written in her natural hand, are also included. While the first entry—a trip to Absalom’s Ivy District—does indeed match with the letters’ indication of Zarta’s supposed treasonous activities, the second entry proves the paracountess was away from Absalom during a time the letters claim she met with her conspirators in the Petal District. Both documents are in “Evidence Locker #A23” as described in Zarta’s prisoner receipt document, and the PCs must acquire the prisoner receipt document and the evidence to meet the success conditions of the scenario. (Emphasis mine) On first read, I thought the travel log was in a separate cabinet and a separate thing the PCs need to find. But the scenario clearly says they are both in the same place, and the travel log is included in the description of the evidence used to indict Zarta. But if the submitted evidence directly contradicts itself, how did she get indicted in the first place? That just seems very...un-Chelaxian. Is finding the travel log supposed to require a separate search pass in the same cabinet?
How do you balance the desire to keep the players guessing about what's going on vs. giving the players enough information to use any special abilities they have? I used to collect saving throws on initiative cards so I could make saves against surprise attacks without the players knowing what's coming. However, with bonuses to saves against specific effects, under specific circumstances, or against specific creatures are getting very common, and there's no way I can collect all of them on the card. Add to that the fact that players also have situational boons or uses/day options that they can choose to use, and I don't think I can justify making saving throws behind the scenes, without giving players the chance to use these abilities. But...
That really slows the game down. And newer players don't always know to ask all the right questions, and I don't think it's fair to punish them just for being new. My other option is:
That really spoils the surprise. Does anybody have any suggestions for different ways to deal with situations like this?
So the party killed a bad guy in an NPC's bedroom, which brought up an interesting question: Do we leave this corpse here? Toss it in the street? Thinking of the number of scenarios with combat in fancy houses, temples, embassies, and the like, I can't believe this hadn't come up before. What happens to all these bodies, anyway? The inedible ones, I mean. Does Absalom have a corpse unit as part of its regular trash pickup, but you can only put large or bigger corpses on the curb on the last week of the month? Is there a drop-off in back of the temple of Pharasma? Can you chop a corpse into really small pieces and use Prestidigitation to clean it off the ground? How many rounds of Acid Splash would it take to make the evidence disappear? Any thoughts?
We have some table variation in our area regarding the combination of Gravity Bow or Lead Blades with the Zen Archer Ki Arrows class feature. There's no agreement on the forums, so I wanted to get your opinions. Gravity Bow:
Gravity bow significantly increases the weight and density of arrows or bolts fired from your bow or crossbow the instant before they strike their target and then return them to normal a few moments later. Any arrow fired from a bow or crossbow you are carrying when the spell is cast deals damage as if one size larger than it actually is. For instance, an arrow fired from a Medium longbow normally deals 1d8 points of damage, but it would instead deal 2d6 points of damage if fired from a gravity bow. Only you can benefit from this spell. If anyone else uses your bow to make an attack the arrows deal damage as normal for their size Lead Blades:
Lead blades increases the momentum and density of your melee weapons just as they strike a foe. All melee weapons you are carrying when the spell is cast deal damage as if one size category larger than they actually are. For instance, a Medium longsword normally deals 1d8 points of damage, but it would instead deal 2d6 points of damage if benefiting from lead blades. Only you can benefit from this spell. If anyone else uses one of your weapons to make an attack it deals damage as normal for its size. Ki Arrows (Su):
At 5th level, a zen archer may spend 1 point from his ki pool as a swift action to change the damage dice of arrows he shoots to that of his unarmed strikes. This lasts until the start of his next turn. For example, a Medium zen archer's short bow normally deals 1d6 damage; using this ability, his arrows deal 1d8 damage until the start of his next turn. This ability replaces purity of body. So here are a couple of scenarios, and I'd like to know how you would rule:
2) A 5th level Zen Archer casts Lead Blades (from a wand/UMD), thereby increasing his unarmed strike damage from 1d8 to 2d6. He then spends a ki point to make his arrows do the same damage as his unarmed strike. Do these stack, making his arrows do 2d6? 3) If you ruled that Scenario 1 stacks, what about combining the two? Can a Zen Archer benefit from both Lead Blades and Gravity Bow at the same time? So a 5th Level Zen Archer casts Lead Blades so his unarmed strike does 2d6, then casts Gravity Bow, so his arrows do damage at one size category larger. Do these stack, making his arrows do 3d6?
I'm playing a Sea Reaver Barbarian archetype (from Ultimate Combat) in Skull and Shackles, and I'm trying to get some clarification on the Eyes of the Storm ability: Eyes of the Storm (Ex):
At 2nd level, a sea reaver ignores any concealment provided by fog, rain, sleet, mist, wind, or other weather effects that is less than total concealment, and any penalties weather applies on Perception checks are halved. This ability replaces uncanny dodge. Now, the description of fog under weather effects says "Whether in the form of a low-lying cloud or a mist rising from the ground, fog obscures all sight beyond 5 feet, including darkvision. Creatures 5 feet away have concealment (attacks by or against them have a 20% miss chance)." So I have two questions:
2) How do you think this ability would interact with spells like Fog Cloud, Obscuring Mist, etc.? Fog Cloud:
A bank of fog billows out from the point you designate. The fog obscures all sight, including darkvision, beyond 5 feet. A creature within 5 feet has concealment (attacks have a 20% miss chance). Creatures farther away have total concealment (50% miss chance, and the attacker can't use sight to locate the target). Obscuring Mist:
A misty vapor arises around you. It is stationary. The vapor obscures all sight, including darkvision, beyond 5 feet. A creature 5 feet away has concealment (attacks have a 20% miss chance). Creatures farther away have total concealment (50% miss chance, and the attacker cannot use sight to locate the target).
A moderate wind (11+ mph), such as from a gust of wind spell, disperses the fog in 4 rounds. A strong wind (21+ mph) disperses the fog in 1 round. A fireball, flame strike, or similar spell burns away the fog in the explosive or fiery spell's area. A wall of fire burns away the fog in the area into which it deals damage. I'm thinking of these two spells in particular because the effect is described as "a bank or fog" and "a misty vapor" rather than "a magical fog" or "a magical mist". I don't think Eyes of the Storm would provide any benefit against magical weather-like effects, but I'm not sure if these two spells are just magical control of a natural weather effect. For comparison, I thinking of the difference between Control Winds (magical control of a natural weather effect) and Wind Wall (magical effect that mimics a weather effect), and I'm wondering if a similar distinction applies to these spells.
The "slow burn arrow" description from the Elves of Golarion book states: Slow burn arrow:
Behind the head of this arrow is a small receptacle of alchemical material that heats up when exposed to air and eventually bursts into flame; barbs on the arrowhead pierce the pouch when it hits a target.
Benefit: On your turn, 1 round after impact, the burst of flame deals 1d6 points of fire damage to the target. I have two questions on this:
2) Can the slow burn arrow catch things on fire? In Skull and Shackles, my pirate archer wants to fire flaming arrows onto other ships and catch them on fire. I don't have access to the Flame Arrow spell, so I'm trying to figure out how else to do this. (Since I can't find an in-game mechanism for soaking arrows in oil and lighting them on fire.)
Here's a summary of the arguments I've seen in different threads: In the Core Rulebook, the "Seeking" weapon property states
Only ranged weapons can have the seeking ability. The weapon veers toward its target, negating any miss chances that would otherwise apply, such as from concealment. The wielder still has to aim the weapon at the right square. Arrows mistakenly shot into an empty space, for example, do not veer and hit invisible enemies, even if they are nearby. At first read, this weapon property seems to clearly apply to bows, crossbows, and other projectile weapons. However, someone pointed out that the table entry is missing the footnote (#2) that say "Bows, crossbows, and slings crafted with this ability bestow this power upon their ammunition." However, since arrows are explicitly given as an example, and arrows are not considered a "weapon" that is "wielded", it seems obvious to me that it applies to bows and that the footnote was either left off by mistake or the authors assumed it didn't need the footnote in the first place. In Ultimate Equipment's Ranged weapon properties table (3-10, p. 139), Seeking still doesn't have the footnote (#3) indicating that projectiles weapons convey this property to ammunition, and I've seen some people arguing that this indicates that Seeking would not work on projectile weapons. The addition of the Ammunition table (3-11, p. 141), which includes Seeking as an available ammunition property, is used as support for this argument. On the other hand, there is also a Footnote 7, which states "Only thrown ranged weapons can have this special ability." This footnote doesn't appear on Seeking, but if projectile weapons don't confer the Seeking property to ammunition, then by implication, that means that "only thrown ranged weapons" can have Seeking. If this is the case, shouldn't footnote #7 appear on Seeking? (I doubt the authors are intentionally trying to trick players into purchasing useless weapon properties.) To make matters worse, there are several other ranged weapon properties in Table 3-10 that also don't include Footnote #3, and these items also appear in the Table 3-11. By the same logic used against Seeking, none of the following properties would apply to projectile weapons, either: Cruel, Cunning, Limning and Planar. (The Huntsman property also lacks footnote #3, which brings up the question of whether a projectile weapon does the additional 1d6 damage cited in the property.) Before I drop 8,000 gp on a bow, I'd like to hear what other people think. Until Ultimate Equipment came out, it honestly never occurred to me to question whether Seeking could be used on a bow. (The fact that there are multiple NPCs walking around with +1 Seeking longbows might have a lot to do with that, too.)
(I apologize if this has already been answered: I didn't find it on a search, but I didn't try all the possible search terms.) We had a question come up about dumping stats that have a racial bonus. The applicable section of the PFS character creation rules reads as follows:
The way I read that, if a player has a Halfling who wants to dump Charisma, the player could buy down the stat to 7, then the racial bonus puts it back up to 9. So a character could never start play with a racially-boosted stat below 9. Is this the standard interpretation? We had a player who wanted to start with their Halfling's Charisma score at 8, and wanted to know what the bonus be (since the ability score table stops at 7). The GM said it had to be 9, and I agreed with that. I want to verify the decision before I post a notice on our regional message boards.
We have an official answer on the Warslinger racial trait (http://paizo.com/paizo/faq/v5748nruor1gh#v5748eaic9qus):
Before I go rebuild my warslinger, I wanted to confirm how this affects the following feats: Ammo Drop
Juggle Load
Based on the wording of these feats and the clarification in the FAQ, I'd have to say that these two feats would also not apply to the Halfling sling staff. If the general consensus agrees with this interpretation, I won't bother asking for further clarification.
(I think this is a bug in Hero Lab, but I want to confirm before I submit it.) The text for the monk's robe says (bold annotations are mine): This simple brown robe, when worn, confers great ability in unarmed combat. (A)If the wearer has levels in monk, her AC and unarmed damage is treated as a monk of five levels higher. (B)If donned by a character with the Stunning Fist feat, the robe lets her make one additional stunning attack per day. (C)If the character is not a monk, she gains the AC and unarmed damage of a 5th-level monk (although she does not add her Wisdom bonus to her AC). This AC bonus functions just like the monk's AC bonus. This could be read two different ways. The first reading assumes that A, B, and C are three unrelated conditions, and the robe has multiple effects if more than one condition is true. For example, if A and B are true, then the robe both increases AC and unarmed damage AND gives an additional stunning fist per day.The second reading assumes that A, B, and C are three exclusive conditions, and the robe has only one of these three effects based on which condition is true. This is how Hero Lab implemented it, with condition B overriding condition A. Which of these two versions is correct? Since A and C are actually exclusive conditions (one can't both be a monk and not be a monk), I can see how Lone Wolf came up with the "three exclusive conditions" reading. Also, since many other items use the transitional phrase "in addition" when discussing separate, unrelated effects, the lack of the transition in the monk's robe description made me wonder. On the other hand, there's nothing on the message boards or in the FAQ to indicate the "three exclusive conditions" reading is common. And if the three conditions are intended to be exclusive, it seems odd that a character would not be able to choose which effect the item provide when both conditions are true. Has anyone else ever run into this interpretation of this item?
I was reading the Cavalier Order of the Dragon this morning, and I saw something I hadn't noticed before: Aid Allies (Ex): At 2nd level, whenever an order of the dragon cavalier uses the aid another action to assist one of his allies, the ally receives a +3 bonus to his Armor Class, attack roll, saving throw, or skill check. At 8th level, and every six levels thereafter, this bonus increases by an additional +1. I was not familiar with using aid another on saving throws, so I looked up aid another in the "actions in combat" section: You can also use this standard action to help a friend in other ways, such as when he is affected by a spell, or to assist another character's skill check. I'm confused as to exactly how this would work. I can see some cases where a character could aid on a Will save ("Don't listen to her! She's lying!"), but that's about it. I did a search on the message boards for more information on the mechanics of this. I found this old thread arguing about whether it was possible, with no resolution. On this more recent thread, Chris Mortika made the following comment: Aid Another can assist in combat, for saving throws, or skill checks. I'd be hesitant to allow it for class abilities. But I could be convinced to allow it in some circumstances. Can someone clarify how this mechanic works? Would the aiding character use their own saving throw modifier or would it be a melee attack? Would you always allow aid another to assist a saving throw, or only under particular circumstances? Thanks in advance for the help!
So the description of sawtooth sabre says
Would weapon focus and weapon specialization (Longsword) apply to sawtooth sabre, too? Or am I just being too hopeful, here?
I have a question on the Adaptive ability. If I have an adaptive bow, can I use it with a higher str than it's rated for and get the additional bonus damage? The text reads: "An adaptive bow responds to the strength of its wielder, acting as a bow with a strength rating equal to its wielder's Strength bonus. The wielder can fire it with a lesser Strength bonus (and cause less damage) if desired." Based on the first sentence, I think I could buy a Composite Bow with the minimum str rating (+0). If I have a +4 strength bonus, I'd still get the full +4 to damage. However, based on the second sentence, I think I need to buy the bow with the maximum str rating I'd ever want to use, say +6 (+4 for Str and +2 for Bull's Strength). All the adaptive quality does is let me use the bow with my normal +4 str bonus without the -2 penalty. Which is the correct interpretation?
On the messageboards, I've seen comments that indicate the game designers and scenario authors expect parties to have different abilities by certain levels. (For example, comments like "the party should have dimension door or fly by 7th level" or "well, if your sixth level party had fly like they should, you wouldn't have had 3 character deaths.") Is there a list somewhere of what abilities are expected at each level or what items GMs or scenarios authors would assume your party has?
I'm building a Halfling slinger in Hero Lab, and I've run into an apparent contradiction. The Close-Quarters Thrower feat applies to a single "thrown" weapon:
In Hero Lab, the list of available weapons for Close-Quarters Thrower includes the double sling and the sling glove, but no other types of slings. The double-sling is categorized as "Projectile, Thrown" and the sling glove is categorized as "Thrown." All other variations of slings are listed as "Projectile". The only place I see ranged weapons separated into Thrown and Projectile categories is in the Core Rulebook, and none of the slings introduced after that include this distinction. So how do we distinguish between Thrown and Projectile weapons? It is clearly not "can you add your strength to the damage" or "can you use the item in melee". Is the difference "assisted" throwing, some kind of apparatus that helps throw the ammunition? If this is the case, then can you still use Close-Quarters Thrower if you are using a spear thrower (Adventurer's Armory, p. 8) or a flask thrower (Gnomes of Golarian)? |
