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What is a GM screen? Is Chevy making computers now? Surely GMs don't bother hiding stuff from the players anymore - "Come and see!"
I don't think that giving a guideline about how many actions it might take to shift somebody's alignment is terrible in and of itself even if aligned spells being aligned acts is somewhat controversial in the gaming community. The idea that you could somehow atone for casting Evil spells by casting Good ones seems somewhat odd, but the idea that somebody could start "slipping into darkness" by summoning devils or creating undead seems thematically appropriate for a lot of stories (at least to me) I sometimes wonder if maybe a lot of people secretly or not so secretly dislike Paladins and therefore want to make up reasons for them to fall and be ridiculed. The DM who had an Evil NPC give the Paladin a coin could be in that camp. I guess he could also just be the Jerkmaster General or somebody who feels very clever and wanted to provide an "interesting" quest for the Paladin to regain his powers.
Out of game, I used to kind of hate Buffy, a show I never watched, because at least an hour or two of most game sessions would be devoted to people discussing it. Later on the same happened to a lesser extent with Firefly, which I eventually watched and enjoyed. Finally I got in on the conversation with Game of Thrones, but honestly I’d rather play if possible. Several people mentioning sensitivity to the smell of foods makes me wonder what foul smelling foods other players are bringing. I personally don’t mind most foods, but I hate it when people fart, especially when they fart during meals in groups which eat together. Some of the time they use excuses like, “It’s natural!”, but others they clearly fart just to offend me. I guess it is my fault for letting people learn that I don’t like public farting much, and here I’ve just posted it for the whole Internet to see - alas! In game there are lots of things to hate though most of them are minor enough that maybe I just “dislike” them instead. As a DM I hate how quickly encounters can end since it means I’m never sure whether I’ve prepared enough of them or if the time spent preparing them will be close to wasted. As a player I kind of hate Will saves since they can often lead to sitting around bored or even worse fighting the other PCs. Touch attacks can be a pain on either side of the table since most PCs and monsters are highly susceptible to them.
If the prophecy can be stopped by a 1st level PC deciding to kill a baby it seems like a pretty weak prophecy. Prophet: "Oh no, the world will end unless you kill that bunny!"
A Summoner (unchained or otherwise) could use Charisma for spells and certain abilities plus help maintain an "extra-planar" feel. A "party girl" Evangelist of Cayden Cailean could summon extra-planar help too and maybe keep everybody alive with tons of Channel Energy. Depending on the game a Mysterious Stranger Gunslinger could be fun too. With super high Charisma the Swift Aim + Dead Shot combo could become a pretty impressive signature move. Killing somebody with a single shot from a lady's derringer could be fun, and maybe you could have a special demon slaying double hackbut with a humorous name. Even firing it with a -4 and falling prone afterwards seems like it could be amusing somehow.
My fun is usually based more on the personality of the PC rather than the class. I'd say that the class I've liked least so far was Cleric, but that particular PC had a (rolled) Str of 7 and was discouraged from summoning due to another player who asked me not to play a summoner (and then when his 1st PC in the campaign died made a summoning PC to replace him) I had a lot of fun playing a Fighter recently since he had a lot of options in combat. In the past I've also enjoyed the Druid, largely due to mobility options.
Barding Stitches seem cruel, so I'd rather just see the magic armor work.
I want the recipe for Splatty Stew! I wonder what owlbear stew would taste like though. I've never eaten an owl or a bear, but I've read online that bears taste a bit like like venison, which tastes a lot like beef. Depending on how owl tastes maybe you'd end up with something around like goose or more like veal. We haven't decided what to have for dinner at today's game, and a big pot of Mystery Stew might be fun...maybe next time... I seem to recall that the "plus" you can put on a weapon is limited by your caster level. If so then a Ranger would ironically kind of suck at making magic bows and arrows. If he'll just have one item creation feat then he could take the Master Craftsman feat to get it at full caster level and whether or not he has any spellcasting ability. It doesn't look like the Hunter class has a reduced caster level, so you could get him as a 5th level cohort at 7th level. That seems like a significant improvement to me though you should probably discuss with the DM what role the cohort will play in the game (some are mostly "off camera" and only rarely help out on adventures)
I guess you could mix up eras a bit and have Vikings arrive to start raiding the northern reaches of the colonies (like Boston Tea Party + Vikings). Vikings in the North, pirates in the South, trouble all around... Since you're in America I guess you could also think about stuff like "skinwalkers" and other native american mythology. I guess there could also be native Druids opposed to the colonies bringing "civilization". If you change some of the native tribes to less sympathetic creatures like orcs or drow it might help with setting them up as adversaries to be killed (if that's what you're aiming for) If the adventures will eventually range further afield you could consider what fantastical horrors could wait for the adventurers in Alaska, Mexico, and even further south to the jungles of South America. The wendigo and a human sacrifice cult with step pyramids come to mind. The cult could have some were-jaguars or jaguar themed rakshasas or maybe be a bunch of ghouls and or vampires (I'm guessing you've seen From Dusk Til Dawn) I'm thinking of a "Tour of America" or even "Tour of the Americas" for a group of Lewis & Clark adventurers. I guess you could end up in the Grand Canyon even, maybe searching for the 7 Cities of Gold (with theme music from the old C64 video game of the same name). I wonder if Fantasy Las Vegas might already be booming out in the desert, kind of a planar hub of debauchery.
@Ozy - I'd guess that using the spell to multiply the number of higher level summons you could get by bringing in lower level monsters and promoting them might have been an unexpected function. Sometimes it is fun to see developer comments on stuff like this though I'm aware that they don't change the RAW for organized gaming unless there's a FAQ/errata.
Perhaps it would be "cleaner" if ASM targeted the spell being altered rather than the creature and turned it into a Summon Monster or Summon Nature's Ally of the same level. Some potentially interesting options would be lost, but some arguments could be avoided too. I guess that would just be for the realm of "house rules" though since the RAW is clearly rather different. @Ozy - Actually, your trick to summon 1d4+1 monsters from a lower level list and then transform them to monsters from the higher level list seems pretty significant to me.
I can see where somebody interested in having the Conjure Black Pudding spell might enjoy having some options to transform the BP into something else. Depending on how much "re-skinning" your group tolerates it could even be sort of cool thematically to reshape the BP into the new monster (but maybe still all black)
There are so many buffs and debuffs which can be applied during combat that it could be tough to decide what AC is "unhittable". When my Orc was around levels 8-10 an "average" level appropriate foe might have had around a 35% chance to hit him - until my PC tripped and or demoralized the foe and maybe the Witch used Evil Eye. Then we could easily end up in the "nat 20" range. On the flip side, if he got caught flat-footed and flanked he could potentially get hurt pretty bad. Anyhow, I'm not sure if I'd walk around with an AC 2-10 points lower because I'm worried that when we fight enemies who aren't mindless and can't fly I might end up becoming "unhittable". I also wouldn't like to forego the use of debuffs and combat maneuvers so I can make sure that foes always have "a fair chance" to hit me though. In fact, I really like the use of teamwork and tactics to change the chances in a battle. The monsters can do a lot of the same stuff from their side. I say keep your defenses strong and beware of crafty monsters!
My Kingmaker PC wanted to wear stripey pants and build a Brothel in every city. He accomplished both goals (though Brothels got changed to Dance Halls about halfway through the campaign) My Viking wanted to own a ship and now owns several. He also wants to have the official title of “Jarl” though it always seems to elude him somehow. He paints all of his armor red (partially due to the old SNL “Big Red” skit), and he brags incessantly. Chief Sharky the goblin wants to “give glory to Lamashtu” by creating animal headed humanoids and humanoid headed animals through the practice of “animal husbandry” using the Demon Mother’s Mask. He also likes converting humans and similar races into cannibals “for the glory of Venkelvore”. Those who won’t adopt these practices willingly are given to the tribe’s Cleric and Witch to be turned into ghouls. In semi-related news, my orc PC in another game theoretically enjoys creating “half-orcs who will never be as strong as their father” (though always in an “offscreen” sort of way - nothing specific) I think the old Planescape setting was interesting since it could help give your PCs some roleplaying goals. For instance, a Sensate was likely to take some risks for the chance to have new experiences.
My players would be sad if I hid my rolls behind a screen. They take glee in both the low and the high rolls. To rob them of my nat 1's and 20's would be a crime against fun. I think Hero Points can work pretty well for helping players with different expectations get along in the same group. I'm probably more in the "magic tea party" camp with Mrs. Gersen and consider "challenge" to be kind of optional as long as I can talk with a silly accent and maybe have some imaginary pets. Another guy I play with is infamous for saying, "It's no fun if you're not bleeding out!" I hoard my Hero Points in case of emergency, but folks who like to die are free to spend them willy nilly re-rolling whatever they'd like.
Certain "Monster Feats" are listed as options for animal companions in the CRB. Others are listed as options for Rangers with certain combat styles in the APG. Pretty much all games include at least some of the Bestiaries, and those have some options for players besides feats, stuff like different animal companions and of course things to wildshape into. I wonder how many people won't allow a PC who reaches Dex 19 by wearing a magic item to take Greater Two Weapon Fighting.
I wasn't aware of the Devolutionist before. It seems almost like a reverse Dr. Moreau. Besides classes and archetypes there are a lot of feats and spells which might be pretty cool in specific situations. Teamwork feats come to mind. Facing kobolds with a bunch of teamwork feats who live in caves full of traps and curse you when they die sounds like a fun adventure to me. If they've got some draconic heritage which allows them to resist certain types of energy damage that could also set up some interesting options for AoE spells and traps. It occurs to me that light shields can be used with Weapon Finesse, small creatures get a bonus on attack rolls, and using Shield Slam to deftly knock PCs into diabolical death traps could be lots of fun. Chaotic black or red draconic kobold Rangers who worship Gorum, can use heavy shields as light weapons, take the Shield Wall feat, and have common PC races as favored enemies might be pretty tough. I guess that's almost diverging into a different thread, but I'll have to check back on this one for more NPC archetype ideas...maybe I'll even come up with a few...
@Jader7777 - I've seen several PCs who don't wear pants, but all of them wore magic belts. In a game which I DM I had "Gobar the Half-Orc Tailor" create Cargo Pants which work like the side pockets of a Handy Haversack. Like the Haversack, the Pants are "slotless".
Brutal honesty seems good. Unfunny jokes could figure into it too. Last weekend my girlfriend's Cha 7 Mountain Druid told the party, "Mountains aren't just funny. They're hill-arious!"
I think I'm at least borderline infamous for using Plants and Undead. I use Demons quite a lot too though. I probably run them a little more than Devils, especially since the Succubus is a Demon in Pathfinder (though I think she got moved to the Devil team in 4e, not sure about 5e) A pretty typical monster for me might be a myconid grown in demon dung and transformed to Evil or a variant Yellow Musk Zombie which keeps its original class and abilities more like a Juju Zombie. Treants corrupted by Evil extra-planar fungus are popular too. Dr. Moreau style "manimals" and other hybrid creatures created by experiments show up too. If owlbears didn't already exist I'd probably create them. I also like to run adventures in and around water including lots of maritime stuff, so aquatic monsters feature strongly too. I like Dragons, but I rarely use them in games I run. Perhaps keeping them rare makes them seem more special. They can certainly be tough foes relative to their CR, especially if you play them to their strengths and or the party lacks Resist Energy or similar spells. I like it when a campaign features dragons in remote areas who you hear about long before you'd ever encounter them. It is particularly cool if the dragon is on the map, perhaps as a red dragon on top of a mountain or with an arrow labeled with "Beyond to the lair of Dragotha, the undead dragon, where fabulous riches and hideous death await".
I guess that "get more players" might not be the advice you're looking for. A Wizard in a one player party might as well "go nuts" with stuff like familiars and cohorts though. It would be kind of cool if he were actually a 1 PC party in technical terms. Anyhow, it looks like there are plenty more "1 on 1" adventures by the same publisher. Check this link. One of them is even called "The Pleasure Prison of the B'thuvian Demon Whore". Whether that's a good or bad thing is up to you! Regardless of which adventures you play some things you could consider are:
I like the idea of letting enemies come to the party, potentially suffering AoOs and generally getting in just single melee attacks before PCs get full attacks on them. There's almost always another PC who wants to charge in and attack though. Not infrequently that PC has a low AC and ends up needing some healing to stay alive. I'm told that's what "fun" is.
In the past I've often started out my homebrew adventures with too much focus on a small area like a town and the surrounding countryside. I then tended to let them wander too much until the crisscrossing plot lines and sidequests had thoroughly confused us all. Finally the whole thing would tend to run out of steam as the higher level sessions became too tough to consistently prepare during a week when I might unexpectedly need to work 60+ hours and play in another game or two. One step I'm considering to remedy that would be to write the high level portion of the adventure first. I could also try to write the entire campaign in advance though I'm concerned that might make my adventure railroad a little too restrictive. Folks don't seem to mind with APs, but when they know it is homebrew I think they like to challenge the DM a little and poke around to see what you are or aren't prepped for. Another way to implement that might be to use an AP for the early part of an adventure and then cap it off with some homebrewed stuff or just bastardize an AP so that worst case you'll always have something to run when game time comes. I've had some experience with "winging it", but while it can sometimes be fun it can also easily go wrong. We had one DM who would delay our progress with random wilderness encounters and then kind of apologize for it. The funny thing was that we actually enjoyed those mindless battles. Maybe they would have grown dull at some point, but it wasn't a bad way to spend a session once in a while. @Bwang - I started an online project similar to your notes a while back for a campaign where the DM offered us way too many adventure hooks. The main document has grown to 17 pages and also uses color coding:
When I arrived for the last session the other players had printed out the document and were poring over it to determine which quest the party should go on next. That made me feel like maybe it wasn't a wasted effort!
The fact you have to be threatening the enemy isn't my favorite ruling, but I actually like the clarification that Paired Opportunists won't work since I'd seen some proposed builds of that sort popping up and didn't think "Come and Get Me Plus" should be that easy to achieve. If there were balance problems with Bodyguard I think they were mostly around bonus boosters such as the Benevolent enchantment for armor, which Paizo nerfed slightly a while back. I guess Paizo could have felt that something which gives you a bonus against melee attacks shouldn't work against ranged attacks too though. That's unfortunate since I think stopping ranged attacks seems very thematic for a "Bodyguard". My PC with Bodyguard rode an eidolon who had it too, so generally they were both threatening the same stuff. My Viking will be pretty sad that the shieldmaiden he travels with can no longer block ranged attacks for him though. Still, I agree with DM Livgin that it is better to have a firm answer here.
The Kineticist isn't a Sorcerer, Wizard, or Alchemist but can do AoE. With average BAB, light armor, and high Con you might be able to step up and do some fighting too.
Folks have already done quite a lot of work on E6/P6. I'd think if you use that with very slow XP you should get something close to what you're looking for with a lot less work. On the other hand, maybe I don't understand what it is you're looking for...
Since I don't see any rules for determining the size category of the Whirlwind I'm guessing that it has the same size category as the creature which created it. If that's not correct I'd be interested in a link to whatever chart is used to calculate this so I can use it in the future. If you get pushed or pulled through two different Walls of Fire I'd think that you'd take damage twice. Since standing in a Wall of Fire all round would only do 2d6+15 damage I wouldn't be inclined to award extra damage for moving somebody in and out of the same WoF repeatedly though.
I didn't know Troll was on the SNA list.
Oddly enough I’d say that several of the more troublesome items I’ve come across are all in one current campaign. - Demon Skull: gave the Barbarian +10 Stealth and some other powers, but also made him fight babau demons in a nightmare to maintain control - Daemon Skull: My Viking wore this as a helmet for a while. It disguised itself as a horned helm, but it also tempted him with Evil powers like the ability to use Fear once per day or exhale a swarm of flies to devour enemies. He only ever used the fly power once, but Fear synergized too well with his Terrifying Howl for him to ignore it completely. The “helm” also began forcing him to make Will saves to avoid killing NPCs who annoyed him or even turning on the party when they ended up fighting daemons. Luckily he was finally able to remove it recently. - Magic Rod: That same party’s Bard is currently carrying a magic rod which transforms into any type of melee weapon the user desires. At first it seemed pretty cool since it is highly enchanted, holy, disruptive, and bane against undead and evil outsiders. Lately it hasn’t been quite as beneficial though since the item has been forcing her to make Will saves to avoid spending mythic power to destroy undead foes faster (surging to turn misses into hits, spending a point on Amazing Initiative to get into melee range or make an extra attack, etc). We’re on a quest to return the rod to the tomb of its rightful owner (some ancient servant of a Pharaoh), and by this point the Bard can hardly wait to be rid of it. The Deck of Many Things is pretty infamous, but I’ve got kind of a “teaser” method to get folks hooked on it. A fortune teller with a name like “Madame Fortuna” shows up in town (usually at a festival or circus). She offers a PC the chance to draw 3 cards from her Deck. If the PC accepts only the “best” result applies, as picked by the PC. Later on in the campaign the fortune teller can show up again to offer more draws, but at that point the “best result only” rule won’t be in place. The fortune teller or other wagons in her caravan can offer similar games with lower stakes, and there’s usually a guy named Sergei who sells discounted magic jewelry which may or may not be cursed.
Healing between combats in parties without Clerics should probably be handled primarily with wands. Our goblin party uses mostly potions of Infernal Healing, but that's only practical because the DM gave the Witch a Blackwick Cauldron as kind of a low level gift. As Dave Justus mentioned, condition removal is important. Here are a few favorite condition removal spells which came to mind along with who can cast them:
Alchemist has a few spells from that list along with Cure spells and Brew Potion...might not be too bad... Bards or Skalds can make Cure and other wands cheap if you take Craft Wand at 5th level - no deity required (plus some archetypes potentially expand your spell list) Cleric looks like the winner for condition removal. Cayden Cailean or a similar deity might fit a Chaotic group as long as they're not downright Evil. If they are there are LOTS of options for deities... Witch could be nice especially if the familiar can act as a wand jockey to apply a little wand based curing and buffing to PCs during combat without wasting your PC's action on it.
I like shrimp. Shrimp is the fruit of the sea. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. There's shrimp-kabobs, shrimp creole, shrimp gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There's pineapple shrimp, lemon shrimp, coconut shrimp, pepper shrimp, shrimp soup, shrimp stew, shrimp salad, shrimp and potatoes, shrimp burger, shrimp sandwich. I'm not as sure about PFS since I've only played it a couple of times. It didn't make me sick though. Shrimp makes my aunt sick, but sometimes she eats it anyhow.
A Barbarian isn't going to kill anything in one hit with Greater Vital Strike unless you're using the Mythic rules and Mythic Greater Vital Strike. A Druid should have plenty of ways to remain relevant. If you want combats to be tough use good tactics for the monsters and have some of them "go for the kill" if appropriate. In a homebrew game you can also customize the monsters a little if you want. With a few extra levels and feats a lot of monsters can become a deadly threat. Something as simple as giving the monster a level of Fighter, having it wear armor to boost AC, and giving it the Cleave feat so it can Bite two PCs per round can make a dramatic difference. My players pretty much freaked out over that, like, "His AC is so high!" (ironically the "high" AC was the same AC one of the PCs had) and "How did he Bite twice?" (that's Cleave) There could still be stuff which "breaks the game", but it probably won't be a high stat unless that's due to it setting a high DC on an overpowered spell. I'd put Greater Forbid Action or any damaging area effect cast as a Dazing Spell onto that list since they don't offer a new save each round like Greater Command, which is a reasonably powerful spell even though it does.
In one of the many recent "extend the adventuring day" threads lately I suggested upping the damage on these abilities to 1d6 plus 1 per level (like 1d6+10 at 10th level). This obviously wouldn't satisfy swoosh, who feels that 5d6+5 would be insufficient at 10th level, but I feel like it might provide a little more incentive to use your caster's built in crossbow substitute. If you want these abilities to be bottom of the barrel stuff folks use when they want to conserve spells (which seems to be the original intent) I think 1d6 plus 1 per level would make them a little better than they currently are without changing game balance measurably. If you want these abilities to compete with low level attack spells and stand out as noticeable aspects of the PC's arsenal then you'd probably need to amp them up to 1d6/level. I guess the power level would be somewhere around Ring of Wizardry II if you assume that the PC wanted the ring to cast more low level attack spells (possibly not a bad assumption if that PC is a blaster?) To me that seems like a power up casters probably don't need. I suppose it might make some casters more willing to participate in another fight before resting though.
I feel that every competent PC can be fun if you love to roleplay. I enjoy it so much that sometimes I roleplay in board games. My PCs generally have a unique personality and some quirks. Even as a caster I don't always find that I need a wide variety of actions to take in combat to have some fun. One of my more infamous PCs relied almost exclusively on casting Fireball to deal with nearly every threat, and that was a fun part of his roleplaying. Against golems immune to Fireball he'd basically flip out, buff a little, and chop them up with an adamantine construct bane guisarme (which could also be used to trip) The worst thing I've found about martials while playing 3 of them to 15th level concurrently in different campaigns is that having a low Will save too often means that you can't participate in the game or become a detriment to your party. Sure, DMs might be able to target low Fort svaes to kill arcane casters, but it seems like they rarely do, perhaps since "The Wizard is dead!" might seem less funny to DMs than, "The martial goes crazy and babbles/attacks himself/tries to kill the party/thinks he's a vampire named Count Sharkula again". If you don't invest in mobility there can also be some frustrating moments when a melee focused PC can't get into the action. Once you're in melee it can also be entertaining to have different options and active defenses like Body Shield which is hilarious for making enemies hit each other. I've also been having fun debuffing via intimidate, something which isn't strictly limited to martials but can often be mixed into your attack routine.
I'm not sure if there's a formula which works well across all levels, but based on some quick calculations with a suboptimal but competent Warrior build (Power Attack + Weapon Focus + Furious Focus with greatsword) I'd say that even the NPC stand in should be able to inflict around 3*level Damage Per Round against an "average" AC (based on the "Monster Statistics by CR" table) In games like APs with standard difficulty I'd expect that a PC who inflicts 5*level DPR will seem pretty decent and somebody who gets to 10*level DPR consistently will seem powerful. Of course this could vary by the group and game, and I'm not accounting for DR or incorporeal foes.
I'm not very into just obscuring things from the players, but I’ve often re-skinned monsters to get something which looked and worked the way I want with less work and a better chance of ending up balanced (at least compared to when I go overboard putting class levels on stuff). Pretty frequently I’ll change a few mechanical aspects of the monster along with the appearance. Back in 3.5 I made a “Styx Serpent” by taking away a Dragon Turtle’s Claws, increasing its Bite damage (Str*1.5, improved Power Attack), changing the breath weapon to acid damage and adding some Int damage to it. I think my real inspiration here was the serpents from Robin Hobb’s liveship traders series. I collect a lot of miniatures from other games (Mage Knight, Star Wars, Horror Clix, Dreamblade, etc) and often stat up monsters to go with them. A really simple one was re-skinning the Clockwork Leviathan into a Mechanical Crab (that’s a Star Wars crab droid mini, but I thought it looked like a pretty cool Construct). Just take away the Bite, change the Slams to Claws or Pincers, and maybe reflavor Grind to a regular Constrict. The Breath Weapon still fits since the crab droid mini has what look like a couple of guns on it. Clearly those are flamethrowers which spit a 60’ line of fire. Another weird mini I had was a ”Bloodscale Wavecaller” WoW mini. I don’t play WoW, so I wasn’t too sure what the monster “should” be like, but since she’s a “wavecaller” I thought that Bard might work well. I picked an Aboleth for the “base creature”, changed the Tentacles to Claws,exchanged Slime for Rend. and ended up with the Sea Mother. I went with Skald levels instead of Bard since I decided it might be fun to make her Ulat-Kini (aka Skum) allies Rage. Her Fiend Totem powers also seems like a good way to represent her spiky frills harming PCs who engage with her (while the Skum sort of turn into spiky pufferfish dudes) I also had a weird D&D 3.5 mini which I wanted to use as a monster in the lab of a mad Vivisectionist. Since I knew around the CR I was aiming for I started out with a Glabrezu and ended up with The Big Mistake I’ve been running APs lately and haven’t had the creative DMing mood for a while. Perhaps I'll try re-skinning something from the random list to see if I can spark some creativity...tomorrow though...or maybe Sunday. I'm done work now, and there's lots of gaming to do this weekend!
Magic raps? Word up, DM MC!
If you really a “hater” when it come to Detect Magic and think it ruin all yo magic raps you can just kick it back up to a 1st level spell and watch people not use it much til they get a cheap wand later on. Then I guess you can ban the wands and stuff. The game still got Green Slime, and it still ain’t magic.
I hold the extremely unpopular opinion that your gear melds into your new form partially because the designers don't really want you to use it on top of whatever bonuses you gain from being in the new form. The high price of Wild armor helps convince me that this is likely true. The Polymoprhic Pouch Imbicatus mentioned also seems like a magic item specifically for bypassing such limitations. I think it would be interesting to get some feedback from the developers like, "Yep, we figure the bonuses from X Shape are pretty much good enough on their own" or "Devilkiller has it all wrong. Wildshaping and then donning your equipment is 100% A-OK. We just don't want people to have the flexibility of shifting in between forms during combat and still being fully equipped" I suppose that you "should" be able to drop the gear, polymorph, and then pick it up again in PFS since I don't see any RAW prohibiting it. I wouldn't be shocked if you ran into table variation, but in general it should probably work.
If only James Risner hadn’t bragged about his awesome PC online maybe PDT never would have known how great the Jingasa was (just kidding, folks...) More seriously, I wonder if it would have caused less acrimony if the crit negation feature of the Jingasa were changed to work like light fortification. On the one hand, being certain of avoiding one particular crit (at least if you're not flat-footed) can provide some situational value that avoiding 25% of crits might not. On the other, it would still be a cheap alternative to light fortification for folks who have highly enchanted armor. I think the Jingasa's deflection bonus would be a tough sell in PFS but might still have some appeal for folks with Craft Wondrous Items in the party if DMs can be convinced that additional deflection bonus can be added to the Jingasa for 150% of the cost of adding it to a Ring of Protection (as usual for alternate slot items). CWI is a much more popular feat than Forge Ring, so you'd still be getting the bonus at a 25% discount relative to market prices while freeing up a slot for a Ring Freedom of Movement (speaking of items which might frustrate DMs)
Taking an "easy death" the first time you get wounded when you could rise and fight again with a little help from a 1st level spell seems kind of like wimping out somehow. Anyhow, since there's lots of magic in Pathfinder the NPC could already be dead when he tells the PCs his story:
I guess any of those could include a request for a proper funeral, pyre, "rune stone to my memory", etc, perhaps waiting until that's completed before telling the PCs a secret, revealing a treasure which might otherwise be missed, etc.
I'd guess that Mithral Breastplate is probably the most popular armor in the game.
I'll quote myself on this...
After some of the initial firearm FAQs I've become convinced that any attempt to invoke the limit on free actions seems bound to end in disaster, misery, and people claiming that longbows will stop working.
@RedDogMT - If the players can trust you then why would you hide the glory of your dice rolls from them? Let them gaze upon the nat 20s and despair! Thou shalt not fudge! @Saldiven - There's certainly a difference between players having metagame knowledge and using metagame knowledge. Sometimes it is tough to figure out what a character "should" know though, and sometimes it might be tough to judge whether people are using player knowledge in character or the PC just happened to cast an appropriate spell. I mean, if you have 0 ranks in Knowledge (Planes) you probably shouldn't feel compelled to always cast Lightning Bolt at demons and Fireball at devils, but you also probably shouldn't always do the reverse. That said, different groups feel differently about players who perform actions which they know to be useless or counterproductive.
I have a few minis of giants with dwarves manning gun turrets on their backs and shoulders, and this kind of inspires me to find a use for them in a game soon. I also play a Viking who sometimes has an awakened raven hiding under the wolf fur he wears. Sometimes the raven speaks through the wolf's head and threatens or taunts people. Neither of those really compare to a ferret infested ogre samurai though. I'm not sure whether something like this would be better adjudicated with the mounted combat rules or the vehicle rules though I think maybe the latter would end up making more sense. I'd guess the ferrets might gain some AC bonuses for being "inside the vehicle", but if the DM knows this is coming in advance it might be possible to think of some disadvantages too. I guess swimming could be a problem, for instance, and maybe clever, very small, or incorporeal enemies could get at the ferrets better while also gaining cover from the ogre in his own armor.
Has anybody seen players attempting the infinite free action attack loop in PFS? Short of that I don't think that being able to draw and throw as many throwing shields each round as you could daggers, javelins, etc would be broken even if it might seem a little silly to some folks. As an aside, I feel like better single attack options than non-mythic Vital Strike might help make thrown weapon builds more fun and viable. @Darksol - I think that PDT generally likes FAQ requests to include a specific question, maybe something like, "Can a PC make an attack with a throwing shield as a free action, or does the free action to unclasp the shield simply prepare the shield to be thrown as one of the PC's attacks?" (that could probably be rewritten a bit more clearly, and perhaps your primary concern is something slightly different) @Scott Wilhelm - After some of the initial firearm FAQs I've become convinced that any attempt to invoke the limit on free actions seems bound to end in disaster, misery, and people claiming that longbows will stop working.
If Paizo asks, "Do you think we should nerf the super item your super build relies on?" I'd imagine that they might get a lot of negative responses. There's practically nothing in the game which "everybody" agrees is overpowered. I did see a few items get buffed too like the belt which used to call Unseen Servant but now calls Spiritual Ally (though I suppose somebody who really liked the Unseen Servant ability for some reason might wish that they had just added Spiritual Ally rather than taking Unseen Servant away)
@Hazrond - Since people often have a hard time being serious in RPGs I suspect it might end up more like "Gilligan's Island" than "Robinson Crusoe" "Hell in the Pacific", but I think it could be fun either way.
Sharky find that if goblin chief talk with silly Beavis-like accent and keep bringing up Evil Plans soon even players who had bad week at work start thinking about what tortures to inflict on human prisoners, what ways to murder gnomes, etc. Maybe DM have tougher time inspiring people, but even lowly NPCs can get in character and drive story forward (until they get eaten by goblins)
Scientific Answer: This probably isn't really happening, but if you come to suspect that the player might be rolling the dice in some special way so as to influence the outcome I guess you could try a dice rolling tower. Superstitious Answer: Have people touch the lucky player's dice and then call out low numbers as he rolls. Spiteful Answer: Have all the monsters focus on killing the amazing PC who never misses before he can attack them.
Unless the goblins have Plane Shift I'd assume that the party could probably get the bag back though it might require some work or perhaps some concessions - "Roofus hide bag and not give it back unless you bring him cake! Magic cake with explosive candles! You also call him King Roofus now!" I guess Locate Object might be useful in those situations. It was one of the first 2nd level spells I took with my first 3e PC - "Kazaan Dhal never loses his keys!" |