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My favorite had to be my Elven Wizard (who was good friends with the good natured but narrow-minded Elven Paladin) speaking to an important NPC who happened to be dressed in grey clothing. He said to the NPC:

"I see you're dressed in grey. I'm surprised my Paladin friend can even see you".

I'm posting a reply to a quote from another thread so that thread doesn't get derailed anymore than it already is.

I love how people are fine with their character falling from 200 ft. and simply brushing off and walking away,but they call a difference between sword A and sword B a gross violation of realism.

Or being fine with the fact that you can shoot a longbow 4 times in 6 seconds. This is D&D, this game was never meant to be realistic.

If realism has no place in D&D, why not throw out any semblance of realism at all? PCs can do whatever they want, right? Physics be damned! To claim otherwise wouldn't be realistic, right? Right?

/facetiousness

Realism has it's place in games and you know it. The argument is not "D&D was never meant to be realistic". It's "how much realism should be adhered to in D&D?"... and thus we seem to have several distinct camps; those that believe that basic physics/realism should be adhered to at all times unless a power, feat or class ability says otherwise and those that believe that basic physics/realism should be adhered to unless ignoring it would benefit a PC in a way that enhances their enjoyment of the game.

These are two similar (more similar than either camp realizes, I'd wager) viewpoints, but so different at the same time. Camp A thinks Camp B doesn't care about immersion and Camp B thinks Camp A is overthinking things and should lighten up. Personally, I'm more Camp A. Both sides have valid arguments, but what frustrates me the most is Camp B's tendency to make arguments that "Pathfinder/D&D isn't supposed to be realistic. It has magic and dragons and stuff"... I hate that argument because it seems to imply that because magic and dragons are an element of the game, realism, even at it's most basic levels should be totally ignored. I do not agree with that.

Incidentally, as a DM I wouldn't allow a high level character to just walk away from a 200 foot drop without a broken leg or something. That's going to mess -anyone- up.

So I'll be playing a Succubus in a PF only game soon and her main combat shtick will be to grapple and energy drain plus auto Suggestion to accept another kiss. For the level we're at and her racial hit dice, she gets 5 feats as far as I can tell.

I took Agile Maneuvers, Improved Grapple (since the character has an natural attack and Imp Unarmed Strike would be a completely redundant feat, my DM is being nice and waving that pre-req), Greater Grapple, Weapon Finesse (Natural Attack or Scorpion Whip, haven't decided yet)... and for the last feat it's a toss up between Ability Focus: Energy Drain (from the Bestiary) and a feat the DM and I made up called Improved Bardic Song which gives an additional +1/+1 to a Bard's Inspire Courage.

Which would you go with? Is there anything else that would make her grappling more effective? She has one class level (Bard) so far.

Thanks in advance.

Considering I've heard folks on these boards claim that level 6 to 7 characters are borderline superhuman, it makes me wonder how you all handle levels and how common given ranges of levels are in your games.

Do people run Golarian or other worlds where a group of 10th level PCs can singlehandedly take over a whole city? Are 20th level NPCs unheard of in your settings, or are tales of epic level Wizards commonplace? ((Forgotten Realms, I'm looking at you))

Level 6 to 12 NPCs don't seem to be terribly uncommon in the Gamemastery Guide, where even the beggar is a level 2 character and a King is level 16. The Captain of the City Watch is what, level 8? It would seem that Paizo's "official" stance is that Golarian has plenty of characters anywhere from level 1 to 20 as NPCs and a group of 20th level PCs wouldn't be as rare as some might play.

I've always played it that the truly important characters of a given setting are likely to be at least level 10 to 12 and PCs aren't likely to be movers and shakers until they reach these levels.

This has got to be one of the most confusing rules in the game, so I'd love to get some clarification here.

Say a character with a 10 Con has 7 Hit Points and takes 6 points of nonlethal damage but no lethal damage... this effectively puts him at 1 hp, right?

Now say that same character now takes 13 lethal damage on top of the initial 6 points of nonlethal damage... does the character immediately die (at -12 hp) or is he at -6 hp and dying but still alive?

In other words, do the two different damages (lethal and nonlethal) directly stack? If so, this would seem to mean that it's far more desirable to take lethal damage that puts you near 0 hp followed by nonlethal damage than to take nonlethal damage that puts you near 0 hp followed by lethal damage.

How does this work? The RAW doesn't seem all that clear and resulted in some serious frustrations at a recent PFS game I was in.

Thanks in advance.

What would folks say their ideal ratio is? How much of the game should be combat and how much should be RP or other non-combat play? Myself, I like about 60-70% combat and 40-30% non-combat. I do like to have the chance to use my combat feats fairly frequently, after all.

Does anyone else play up the Wizard arrogance that Sorcerers are "inferior" and not "real spellcasters" in game with their Wizard characters?

I tend to have my Wizard PCs take this stance out of arrogance and maybe a bit of jealousy. After all, they had to study for years to attain the mastery of magic they have achieved, and here comes along this upstart pretty boy who never had to open a book in his life but somehow is able to effortlessly do most of the things the Wizard has had to devote his entire life to do. "Yeah, it must be nice to have magic you didn't earn" was a quote one Wizard I played said to a fellow PC Sorcerer. I love this kind of RP, personally. Really smart people tend to look down on the "morons" around them in real life and I imagine it'd be the same in Golarian. How much does it sting to see the "moron" do what it took you with your logic and intellect with nothing but force of personality. From the Wizard's standpoint, it looks like the Sorcerer got a free ride in life. Sorcerers in turn look at Wizards as pretentious bastards who look down on them for living their birthright.

So I have a few questions about rays, such as those created via the spell Scorching Ray. Let's assume you are CL 12 and have 3 rays when you cast the spell. Can you take Weapon Focus: Ray and get a +1 to hit with all three rays? Furthermore, do you get a bonus to attack and damage on each ray via a Bard's song of Inspire Courage? What about other buffs like Prayer? Could a Wizard with a 4 level dip into Fighter pick up Weapon Specialization: Ray and get +2 to damage on each ray?

I just picked up my APG today and was thrilled to see the elemental specialist section for Wizards. I anxiously read the abilities the Fire specialist got and I'm left scratching my head. They couldn't have even given a +1 damage per damage die rolled for fire spells like the Fire-based Dragon Sorcerers get? The abilities they do get sound.... nice, I guess. Fireshaping? Gosh, I can't wait to get that one.

Am I not reading into the abilities enough? At first glance they seem pretty pathetic compared to what other Specialty Schools give as perks.

If not, why? This has been a point of contention in my games that I've run with my players of the opinion that you should get shield bonus under the Flat-Footed condition, while I say it only makes sense that if you're unable to react, you are unable to move your shield in the way of an oncoming attack. My players don't like that idea, though. What do you guys and gals think?

This came up in another thread and I thought it deserved it's own topic (even if it's been discussed before, I didn't get to take part in the previous one, if any). I want to know how many people use riddles and puzzles in their dungeons and other scenarios in game...

Personally I can't stand the very idea of it. One time a DM decided to put puzzles into her game so it would be less about "hack and slash" and more about "thinking" and honestly, it ended in disaster. When -none- of us could figure out her first puzzle (which sbhe wouldn't allow us to roll to solve, mind you... it had to be solved by the -players-), she was so perplexed that she started going on about how she "couldn't believe we weren't getting this" because it's "so easy" and her other friends "got it right away"... all of which did nothing but alienate the players. We felt dumb. We felt embarrassed. We felt anger toward our DM. We quit the game shortly after. All because of a stupid puzzle. Nevermind that one of the PCs had an 18 Intelligence... nope, we couldn't roll. I don't know a thing about Engineering or Fletching in real life but my DMs have never had me actually come up with such knowledge by myself... no, they let me roll for it because my -character- does know it.

If anyone has had experience with puzzles and riddles working well in their games, awesome... but in my experience they're a bad idea. What do you all think?

It occurs to me that monks (generally being a Kung Fu Bruce Lee martial artist kind of character) don't really belong in a high fantasy setting in a way if you really look at the genre, High Fantasy having it's origins from Tolkien's books (at least it appears that way)... and as kick butt as it would have been to see Frodo trying in vain to outrun a squad of high flying orc monks shouting kiais as they tried to take the ring back to the east (Mordor is in the east... get it? *crickets chirp* Nothing? Huh.), I just couldn't really see it fitting the genre.

Monks exist because folks in 2nd ed liked playing Oriental Adventures characters so much that they integrated it into 3.0 D&D as a core class. In hindsight, and I know many people who play monks may disagree, but was that a good choice thematically? I know it's tough for my players to play monks in my games due to the repetitiveness of the whole "oh, he came from the east with no quantifiable backstory there because the party will never go there so it's irrelevant" thing.

I'd love to know what other folks think. Are martial arts too "eastern" for a sword and sorcery/high fantasy genre game?

As a side note, I remember back in 2nd ed when per the Oriental Adventures book -everyone- wanted to have somehow gotten ahold of a katana for their character because statistically (by that book) it was a superior weapon. Yes I know that was not the case in real life, but man do I remember "katana fever" in D&D...

Shouldn't the Minimum Caster Level for any Wand be 5 since you must be 5th level to take Craft Wand? The book says otherwise (there are wands with CLs of 1), but that really makes little sense to me.

Apologies if someone already did a thread like this one before, but I never saw it if there was one and I really want to discuss this.

I'm sure we've all seen it... the player who thinks Chaotic Neutral is the best alignment because they don't have to do good things but they don't register as evil to Paladins and they can pretty much do whatever they want whenever they want without that pesky alignment system really bothering them, right? Right? I hate Chaotic Neutral to the extent that when a player wants to play a character as CN I immediately begin to suspect that they want to take it to avoid the alignment restrictions. I've seen everything from "I'm Chaotic Neutral because I'm insane!" to "I must be the embodiment of Chaos itself so you never know if I'm going to jump off a cliff, attack the party or dance a jig while the party is trying to do a stealth mission... because I have to do -everything- completely at random". It's enough to drive a (semi) sane gamer insane!

What restrictions are there for a CN character? I'd like to hear what folks think Chaotic Neutral should truly be all about.

I was wondering what folks think of the idea of glossing over things like sexism in D&D/Pathfinder. I like a certain amount of realism in my games and so sexism will be something that a female warrior may run into. Perhaps an NPC male may assume that the female warrior doesn't really know how to use a sword and the player of that character may have to show him exactly what she can do to prove him wrong. It's a role-playing opportunity imo. In real life males have a tendency to instinctively want to protect women... I would imagine this instinct exists in a high fantasy setting as well, and so you would have men that don't like the idea of women putting themselves in danger. Is it wrong to have sexist attitudes in an RPG? Should we pretend the fantasy societies in Golarian are so socially enlightened that things like sexism and racism don't exist just to avoid potentially offending our female gamers? It's a very touchy subject, believe me. My wife thinks we shouldn't ignore it... she enjoys RPing in situations where sexism may be present. It's a challenge to be overcome in her opinion. Other women I've talked to think the opposite, that they have to deal with sexism in real life, so why should they have to encounter it in a role-playing-game, something they play to temporarily escape from real life?

Is Pathfinder/D&D a "lighter" form of RPG where such things don't necessarily need to be taken into account as opposed to say a World of Darkness game that's more RP intensive? If that's the case should we then take out such things as Drow society where sexism against men is taken to the extreme? If sexism against women is glossed over, sexism against men should be glossed over as well, right? I'd like to know what some of the women gamers on these boards think as well as the men.

I ran into this in 3.5 and it hasn't changed in Pathfinder. Players put max ranks into Spot (now Perception) and trip over themselves to have the higher Perception score. Heck, I admit even I've done it. Why do we do this? Logically, only one character needs an ungodly Perception skill (usually the Rogue). If the DM says "everyone make a Perception check", regardless of who makes it, the ones who made the check will let the other oblivious characters know what they saw, so the whole thing seems kind of silly... like having multiple characters with Knowledge: Arcana. I dunno, does what I'm saying make any sense?

A lot of folks on these boards have voiced that Barbarians are the weakest or one of the weakest classes in the game and that the Rage Powers are a bit of a joke. I agree to an extent and have long thought that the bloodlines for Sorcerers, while a cool idea would be even sweeter on a non-spellcaster. Barbarians seem the prime candidates for this, and I think you could justify it with the fluff for them as well. Obviously the Barbarian Bloodlines would do different things for a melee character than for a spellcaster and I think a few new bloodlines would even be feasible. What do you guys and gals think and if it seems viable, do any of you have any ideas for new bloodlines or abilities that existing bloodlines could give to a Barbarian?

A few Bloodline ideas:

Berserker: You are descended from the legendary Berserkers and your fury is beyond the rage of normal Barbarians.

Golem: Your bloodline has been magically infused with that of a magical construct. Your blows strike as though infused with iron or stone.

When I first got introduced to RPGs, it was love at first sight. I got to pick everything about a custom made character that I got to act out and make decisions that directly changed the story! I was 15 or 16 and every aspect of gaming had me enthralled. Like playing a new video game, everything was new and enchanting... there was actual magic in the air every time I played. I liked to sit around and make character after character just to make them, even if they'd never actually get played. I didn't know a lot about rules and didn't bother learning more than I needed to know to play the game on a basic level. I never worried about how powerful my character was... I played a given concept because I thought it sounded neat. Now, a few years shy of 20 years later I find myself far more blase about RPGs in general. Am I outgrowing them, or is it that because I immerse myself in the rules so much in any system I play in, I've become detached from the very thing I fell in love with about RPGs in the first place? I just don't get -excited- about games in the same way I did when I was younger. Has this happened to anyone else? If so, why do you think it happens?

I don't care for a lot of things about 4th edition D&D, but they did one thing that I absolutely love and will be implementing as a house rule for all the Pathfinder games that I run. At 1st level, your hitpoints in 4th ed aren't so low that an orc with a lucky hit can drop you in one swing. Everyone starts out with enough initial hitpoints to -survive-... even casters. My idea could work one of two ways...

One: You roll your starting hitpoints as normal and then tack on an additional -permanent- 20 hp.

Or

Two: You roll your hitpoints normally and then add on an additional 20 temporary hp that you essentially "grow out of" as you level and reach that level of hitpoints normally.

I hate playing 1st level characters... I absolutely abhor it. Think about this... when you level up from level 1 to 2, your hitpoints roughly -double- on average assuming an above average roll, or actually double if your DM allows 2nd level hp at max (Many do as I've seen). From 1st to 2nd level, your hp can double... at no other point will one level ever double your hp. What this says to me is that 1st level characters are -way- too fragile. So even your 1st level Barbarian with the 18 Con can take what... maybe 2-3 solid hits before he goes down from even CR baddies? Call me crazy, but I like the idea of surviving my first encounters to -reach- level 2. With the extra 20 hp, I'd be far more willing to play 1st level characters, personally.

What do the rest of you think?

I realize that a GM always has the option of figuring out the stats for that 5th level NPC human bandit, but honestly, it would help -immensely- if there were a book with official templates for them along with gear and CR listings. It would make the game a lot easier for GMs to run and avoid the "PCs always encounter monsters" problem which isn't all that realistic for a fantasy world. I want to see a book or series of books where a GM can say "well, I need a 15th level human Wizard for one of the baddies" and be able to go "ah. Here we go. Already statted out, with gear and everything". They started to do this (sort of) with the later Monster Manuals in 3.5, but it would be really cool to see Paizo pick up the dropped ball and put out something official. What do you guys and gals think? Would you buy such a book?

So in some of my games I've instituted variants on these feats to allow them higher bonuses at higher levels... basically the feat gets better the more you level. I totally got rid of Greater Weapon Focus, incidentally. Dodge gives a Dodge bonus to AC at level 1 and an additional point at levels 4, 8, 12, 16 and 20. The same applies for Weapon Focus.

What do you guys think? Too much? Should the bonuses be only every 5 levels? 6 levels?

I just always thought a stinking +1 to attack or AC was a waste of a feat, considering what other feats are capable of. Plus which, I like the idea of feats and abilities not becoming moot once you reach a certain level. I mean, who cares about +1 at level 15? Personally, I don't. By the same token, I could see low level buffing spells becoming more potent as the spellcaster levels. IMO, Prayer (for example) cast by a level 18 Cleric should give more of a buff than the same spell cast by a level 3 Cleric.

So my question is this... will True Seeing make the entire Illusion School inert against that person? Say an illusion specialist Gnome is about to get into an epic battle vs a Divination specialist Wizard. The Wizard (of course) wins the initiative and casts True Seeing. Is the Gnome screwed?

I'm curious how many folks out there are like me in that the majority of my characters always make it abundantly clear to the party that should they die, do NOT reincarnate them. They'll come back through raise dead or resurrection, but not reincarnate. It may be metagaming to an extent, but if I wanted to play a Bugbear or an Orc I would have made one in the first place. The guy in our games who always plays the Druid is baffled as to why myself and several other players in our group always take this stance. I think it's an interesting spell that could offer some interesting RP but I'd not allow it to be cast on a good 80% of my characters.

In my games, if you're flat footed, you don't get your shield bonus. This makes sense to me as when flat footed you are unprepared and can't raise your shield arm up to block the attack. Some of my players like this rule, and some of them cried foul. I just want to verify what the RAW say on the matter. If the RAW say you do get your shield bonus when flat footed, was this an oversight on WotC/Paizo's part?

I've noticed something. Every base class gets something really good at level 20 except for a few. Universalist Wizards get the same bonus feat they did in 3.5, Barbarians get Mighty Rage (ooooh) and Clerics get... absolutely nothing.

Look at what Specialist Wizards, Druids, Paladins, Rangers, Sorcerers, Fighters... well, everyone else gets at level 20.

As an example, Paladins at level 20 get, in addition to some other perks the ability to maximize their Lay on Hands and Channel Positive Energy abilities at will. Clerics don't get that. So Paladins end up being better at channeling positive energy than the Clerics? What is up with that?

At the -very- least, I feel a 20th level Cleric should have his Channel Positive Energy maximized. How do you guys feel?

It was suggested that I ask in this forum if anyone feels they may be up to creating or brainstorming for ideas for a Pathfinder Bladesinger class.

The one thing we know is it'd have to be Elf and Half Elf only.

Should it be a base class or a prestige class?

What special abilities and spell progression should they get?

Is it even possible to make a balanced Bladesinger, or is a Bladesinger simply too much of a "best of both worlds" class with not enough drawbacks?

Have the Animal Companion rules changed significantly from 3.5? I seem to recall our party's Druid in 3.5 sending his Animal Companion into battle a lot and said Animal Companion died in every encounter. We had a running joke that no animal wanted to be this guy's companion because it would mean certain death for it. Basically, I got the impression that in 3.5 an animal companion was mostly for role-play and had no business being in combat past level 4 or so. Am I understanding things correctly that Druid and Ranger Animal Companions now scale with the level of the PC?

A friend of mine joined a 3.5 game of ours late in levels (around 16-18 I think) and the GM let him make a character in line with the party level. He said he was taking absolutely nothing that would boost his AC since as he put it "the monsters are going to hit you regardless at this level unless you buy every single piece of AC boosting magic and max out your armor's +... at that point you've got nothing left to buy other items or weapons so why bother? The key is to outlast your opponent with your hitpoints and the Cleric's ability to heal. You're going to get hit. Every time... and it's even worse at epic levels".

Is he right? Thoughts?

So what's the consensus? How many DMs out there feel the feats from that book were just too much to allow into their 3.5 or Pathfinder games? As a side note, how many DMs out there limit their Pathfinder games to Pathfinder feats only?

How would you rule this?

Transmute Rock to Mud underneath a couple monsters you're fighting, followed up with a Quickened Transmute Mud to Rock. Would it effectively trap the monsters in solid rock? How would you guys rule the system for that would work?

Is there a reason why the summoning spells summon such weak waste of time monsters? I never did get that even in 3.5. In fiction, a Wizard is able to summon a monster that actually helps, or in most cases a monster that's actually as powerful (if not more so) as he is. I've even looked at the Summon Monster IX list and found what you can summon to be pretty disappointing. Summoning a CR 14 at level 17-20? Necomantic Summoning is even worse. What good is summoning 1 HD skeletons at level 7? The things you're fighting will mow through your "army" like a hot knife through butter. The only thing I can think of is that Summoner types are meant to be NPC threats rather than PCs, but even then a DM would have to boost the power of the summoned critters to throw against the party. Maybe I'm looking at this all wrong but shouldn't a level 7 be able to to summon a CR 7 monster and shouldn't a level 17-20 be able to summon a CR 17-20 monster? The only Summoning spell I have ever seen that seems worthwhile is Gate.

I know it's probably already been answered but I did a search and couldn't find the answer I was looking for. My question is if you already have a +10 weapon (bought and paid for), is there any point to having the Divine Weapon class feature aspect on a Paladin? I take it that the effects won't stack at that point, so really if that's the case, aside from saving you money on your weapon, is it really worth giving up your special mount for?

How do folks understand how this spell works? If taken literally a 20th level Cleric or Druid can deal 20d6 fire damage to a 400'x400' square area, and can break that area down into 10 foot squares, therefore selectively dealing 20d6 damage to 40 separate 10 foot squares that they can pick and choose where to place. Such a spell would devastate entire armies, a feat that arcane spellcasters (that I can see) seem to be incapable of, which in and of itself makes little sense to me. Is this spell truly the end-all be-all of damaging AoE spells as it seems or am I looking at it wrong? I mean the range of the spell at level 20 is only 300 feet. A 6400 square AoE? The spell wasn't imho worded very well in 3.5 and it doesn't seem to have changed.