Dragorine's page

I'm not a fan of locked doors or traps because there isn't always someone in the party that can take care of them. If there is then it's a great time for them to shine but I don't want to penalize a party because no one wanted to invest in thievery.

I personally wouldn't let a special sense detect someone with the foil senses feat. Instead if I thought it was necessary I'd boost a bosses perception. But as I want my players to win so they have more fun (especially using the trick they built their character on) I'd probably not do that often.

The real meta gaming is keeping a member in your party who uses substandard tactics with no interest ever listening to his teammates because you want to play PF and have little choice. I'm pretty sure most adventures would have little interest forming a party with such a person.

I feel like the fortification rune is enough for medium armor users that don't want to spend a feat for heavy armor or want to move at full speed. Even with dex at +4 you lose nothing wearing medium armor other than 1 bulk.

The Monk stances, such as Crane Stance should only limit the Strike actions you can take. It wouldn't prevent you from using spell attack roll spells. I haven't checked all of them for that though.

There may be a case for some spells like the Legacy Spiritual Weapon, but even then it is the spell making the Strike, not you. There may be some other spells that I am not thinking of that have you make a Strike directly.

Ah yes. I stand corrected. I didn't read the feat description before posting.

Martial Artist can get you the monk stances without all those stat reqs. You wouldn't be able to make spell attack rolls though which I guess wouldn't be that big of a loss.

Would be interesting to druid sorc archtype. Nature demoralize would be great.

If I were playing a str monk I wouldn't even bother with the +5 dex. Then the feat would be useful all 20 levels

I'm... anxious. What I'm getting out of this post is that the cool part of Oracle was ripped out and tossed overboard, and now it has a feat price-tag attached if you want it back.

I don't like this. The cursebound actions sound cool insofar as having a specific array of actions to use is something I like (kineticist, commander and thaumaturge are pretty much the best classes in the game), but it comes at the price of curse benefits no longer being tied to the base class, preventing mysteries from being designed to cater to a specific playstyle. This takes away a lot of Oracle's identity, in my eyes.

Remastered Oracle looks like it's not for me. Which frustrates me, because it used to be *very much* for me.

From my reading since the warriors are making the strike it would use their map even though it's using your spell attack mod. Also, while the descriptor text says makes a strike and disappear it doesn't say when they disappears so the last line clarifies that after making a strike when you use the power they disappear at the start of your next turn. This lets your allies gain flanking buddies for a turn.

Mystic Armor is another. It was only arcane and occult and now it is on all the lists.

Personally I'd be fine with the Ruffian non simple d6 restriction if all rogues had a non simple d6 restriction.

Webster gives 3 definitions
1: showing disregard for what is holy : WICKED
2: deserving of censure (an unholy alliance)
3: very unpleasant : GOD-AWFUL (an unholy mess)

Druid taking earth and getting armor in earth or for any caster that wants heavy armor.

I would be fine with the game removing all spell attack rolls.

On true strike-If true strike is meant to be part of the balancing of spell attack rolls then druids and all clerics need to have access to the spell without wasting racial feats.

A thought I had was that when you gain panache you gain a pool equal to your cha or str mod(depending on your style).

Personally, I'd like to see holy/unholy tied to each deity like heal/harm is. I'd like to see champion codes and causes tied first and foremost to deity anathema and edicts. I'd like to see the old "law/chaos/good/evil" codes and causes made into oaths that give small bonus if taken but are optional at level 1 and with True Neutral being similar to the wizard Universalist School.

Anyway that's my 2 cents.

stance savant is also a fighter feat.

Ah so it is. Though 2 levels later.

One point I see brought up is the extra AC fighters can get from heavy armor, however MC monk requires both a 14 str and 14 dex. If one were to wear heavy armor that 14 dex seems a waste of stat allotment. Plus one would be locked into just a couple of stances. A fighter that is unarmored to qualify for wolf/tiger/ect would be in a much worse place for AC. Plus Metal Strikes isn't nothing. Stance Savant is also something a fighter can't get.

I've always thought that producing berries would be a nice familiar ability to have available for a leshy. But that'd be a homebrew ability and fall under GM approval.

Because it's an impulse and has the manipulate trait.

"Impulse: The primary magical actions kineticists use are
called impulses. To use an impulse action, you must have an
element gathered, which is typically done with the Gather
Element kineticist action. The element must be appropriate
to the element trait of the impulse you use; for example,
you must have water gathered to use an impulse that has
the water trait. Using an impulse requires gesturing and
focusing on your powers. The impulse trait also means the
action has the concentrate and manipulate traits unless
another ability changes this"

Thanks. I guess I didn't read that section closely enough. I wish they would more clearly mark traits in those sections similar to abilities. I really hope that this doesn't make it through the playtest or at least a melee blast would be one of those abilities that changed it.

Tonight I'll be trying out a Dedicated Gate Earth Kineticist. They're a level 1 half-orc with General Training-Armor Proficiency. I'll be sure to leave feedback later.

anyway enough arguing semantics, onto solutions,

first idea, make them a functionaly 2 handed class, we have had tons of classes that are funneled into 1 hand+free or 1 hand+ shield, or even 1 hand because 2 handed finesse and agile weapons are really hard to get. let us use both hands and bolster the base damage of blasts accordingly.
Secondly, allow melee blasts not to proc aoo, i know most creatures dont have aoo, but for the ones that do, having your basic auto attack proc when you are specced into melee is just needlessly suck.
three, make overflow its own action that boosts the damage/dc of your next impulse but calls for a scaling tough fort save, on a fail the strain of channeling that much element overwelms you and your gathered element dissipates after your next impulse, with damaging impulses scaled to account for a spammier lower dc mode and a riskier higher damage higher dc mode.

I'm sorry for my ignorance but why does a melee blast provoke and AoO?

Dragorine wrote:

keftiu wrote:

The Raven Black wrote:

Neutral champions first and foremost. Their absence makes absolutely zero sense. Doubly so for Champions of Neutral deities.

Got a pitch for True Neutral and CN?

When I think True Neutral Champion I think of Peacemaker from Suicide Squad. Peace at all cost not matter what it takes.

That's LN.

Short of devolving this thread to an argument about alignment my argument is that he doesn't have a code other than peace at any cost. He doesn't care about social structures. He'll break everything down if it gets him what he wants. To me he's N. He's just devoted to his ideal.

The Raven Black wrote:

Neutral champions first and foremost. Their absence makes absolutely zero sense. Doubly so for Champions of Neutral deities.

Got a pitch for True Neutral and CN?

When I think True Neutral Champion I think of Peacemaker from Suicide Squad. Peace at all cost not matter what it takes.

Wild Shape also uses a status bonus when the druid uses their own attack bonus.

They way I see it is you can draw the Jezail with ten paces but only in the 1h grip. Then you'd have to spend an action to 2h grip it like one would do for a weapon with two handed trait(dwarven axe/bastard sword).

I'd say the same thing for pistol twirl. You'd spend a free action to drop to 1h grip than you can use the feat but you'd be stuck in 1h grip until you spent an action to grip 2h.

Anyway that's my 2 cents.

I was thinking of beast. Cast Summon animal/elemental with Ostentation Arrival. Have the summon attack. Beast's Charge to flanking with the summon.

Is that a Dex-focused champion then? 'Cause he could totally get doubling rings to pump up his shield bashing capabilities. Might be great if you're fighting something like an ooze where bludgeoning damage would prevent it from splitting. Sure you could just use any number of other weapons from your loot pile, but then you'd have to waste actions dropping the shield and drawing out the new weapon.

Ring seems pretty valuable to me in that case.

I ran a campaign where the paladin did that exact same thing. He put a boss on his shield and used a doubling ring so all he needed for s, p and b damage was his longsword and shield.

On topic, I can understand why people don't like the mandatory items as presented in the game. For me, I guess I like my character to gain power from more than just leveling up. I know what feat I'm taking when I level up. It's planned. I don't know when I'm getting that new rune. It can be assumed I get a mandatory rune at level x but not at what point at level x. By giving it out automatically it feels less organic to me than finding one as treasure or by earning enough gold to buy one that happens to be available at the level I just attained. For me it adds another power dimension separate from what is completely within my control as a player. I may have to go through some of level x without that bonus or I may get it a level early. Not having that complete control adds some flavor to the game.

That being said I wouldn't mind being in a game that used the automatic progression or even running one if my players preferred.

I also ran a session with a Magus play test. There were 4 combats that didn't last long due to the barbarian critting all night. The magus was a level 5 arctic elf and used sustaining steel with a +1 striking scythe(Crono Trigger...). Stats were 19 12 12 18 14 10. Truthfully at level 5 the chance to hit with a spell was equal to our wizards. We fought 3 wasp swarms, 2 level 5 drow fighters, 2 Ettins and a Hill Giant.

Melee the magus was fine. He had low HP due to being an elf. Sustaining Steel helped off set this. He hit with all but one melee attacks. No crits. The one miss was a spellstike. He hit on the next round but still missed with the spell anyway. The other 2 spellstikes used he hit with both attack and spell. Against the swarms he used electric arc. One made their save the other failed.

Overall he felt competent in battle. I was surprised that he didn't have any level 1 spells. I didn't notice it until character creation. For feats he had Combat assessment and spell parry. While playing I was wondering if attacking at -5 would have been better than spellstrike. 2d10+4 (16 average) vs 3d4+4 (11.5 average) at really a minus 2 as spell casting had a worse chance to hit. Though the magus didn't crit I think that would have made up for that relative -2 for hitting with a spell. Also the 6 temp HP from sustaining steel was necessary due to low HP. So it wasn't all about raw damage. I'd like to have a chance to play him more but I don't want to disrupt the campaign further.

EDIT-Sorry spell attack was +11 and melee was +16. It's a difference of 4.

EDIT 2-Wow my math is good. A difference of 5.

I don't think it's a big deal for warpriests to be better healers than druids. I was just making a reference to another class that has a battle type order that has a built in pseudo master proficiency.

I don't think expert in all weapons is that great. As a cleric I'd use my deities weapon anyway this ability would be unused. The warpriest should be able to be a warpriest without having to take an archetype which was my goal.

Also if warpriests are unable to take advantage of divine font due to MAD then it'd be just as well to take it away. Give them a nice focus spell that gives them a +2 status attack bonus for one action that lasts 1 minute. This way they can cast heroism on the fighter instead of themselves and actually have a chance of being competent in battle.

They would still be 1 behind on attack stats and not be able to take advantage of bard attack buff so I don't think this would step on any warrior class toes. Anyway this was just my idea. It's cool if it's not liked.

EDIT:Well the post I was replying to was deleted. Oh well.

I don't think warpriests need to be great healers. They still have all those divine spells. They wouldn't be any worse off than any none plant druid as a party healer. Balance wise they really need to give up something good to get something good as a striker IMO. Plus this would help set them up better to distinguish themselves from CCs.

I like the snake that takes away reactions.

I'd be cool with warpriests losing divine font for more melee power.

I agree with thenobledrake's interpretation of RAW. However I find it weird that the Wall of Force seems to be the only wall that doesn't say if it can or can't be place horizontally. That being said, I'd allow for it to be place horizontally in my game if only because walls of stone and ice both can and are lower level than force despite the RAW. Also I like to reward my players for coming up with interesting strategies as it makes it more fun for them.

My daughter is going to take the Eldritch Archer at level 6 (next level now). She's an archer fighter who wants to have more of a divine influence from Iomedae. She plans on taking Divine Lance. This choice is due to the Paladin of Iomedae in our group converting her religious beliefs.

That actually would help, if bonus would be circumstance, not status.

Of course that wouldn't help other spellscasters who use battleform (and who is not main archetype of fighter, monk or barbarian).
But that's better than nothing.

I'm fine with the bonus being a status bonus since PF2 has defined magical bonuses as status bonuses. I think my fix would be to inspire courage where I would state that it can stack with another status bonus (possibly to a maximum of +3 if one were worried about level 9 heroism). This would help for future classes like oracles that use similar mechanics.

I also thought of some way of wording the Wild Shape status bonus to instead increase a druid's unarmed proficiency by 1 stage while being in use, but this wouldn't help oracles.

There's literally nothing in the text for any of the abilities in question that suggests Wild Shape allows a druid to ignore the mechanics for determining your attack bonus while polymorphed. I've quoted all the relevant sections. If you're aware of something I've missed please post it here.

The mechanics aren't that complex.

Is your attack bonus higher than the bonus provided by the spell's battle form?

* If yes, use your own unarmed attack bonus. Also, gain a +2 status bonus to attack.

* If no, use the battle form's attack bonus.

That's it.

I agree it's a bit intuitive that a strength-based druid almost never benefits from the extra +2 bonus. It could be a design oversight in need of some errata. Or, as Castilliano pointed out earlier, that perk might be intended for druids that are using Form Control. It could also be intended to help out druids that don't have access to the more powerful wild shapes or ones that are being forced to down-rank due to space limitations.

At the end of the day is it any weirder than battle medicine or 18 strength goblins?

I have nothing to quote to you. I just believe you're reading more into it than you should. I believe it's worded the way it is in the animal form spell because no one would use their own attack bonus if it were lower. It makes no sense for a druid using wild shape to go from a +16 attack bonus for levels 7, 8 and 9 but suddenly at level 10 they can have a +19 attack bonus. It's clunky and illogical and shows no progression for leveling up. Anyway this is the last I will say on this subject.

Sorry, I wanted to add that if a Wild Shape druid were unable to use their +2 status bonus to qualify for being able to use their own attack bonus then a player would find themselves, at level 20, with a higher attack bonus for every form spell than their level 20 feat Nature Incarnate (+34) as a level 20 wild shape druid would have +24 prof +6 Str +3 item and +2 status for a total of 35. This also would make no sense to me.

The ability to use your own attack bonus from animal form isn't the same as wild shape's. Wild shape is a much more powerful version. It's a bonus for wild druids and they most certainly are able to add that +2 status bonus to qualify to use their own attack bonus. Wild shape's rules overrides animal form's rules. It makes no sense otherwise.

If it worked they way you proposed one could end up with cases where a druid, in the middle of combat, would gain a status bonus that would put their attack bonus over this supposed threshold and would allow them to use their own attack bonus. This would, in turn, let them gain the +2 status bonus from Wild Shape (which could be up to a net +1 bonus). If then then lost the first status bonus would they then lose their wild shape status bonus or would they keep it until they left wild shape. Would my druid then have to keep potions of bless to drink so they can use their Wild Shape status bonus at certain levels.

The way I read the rules is that Wild Shape grants you a +2 status bonus to determine if your attack bonus is higher than the form spell. This is RAI imo if not RAW.

It's worth noting that a baseline druid will almost never get that +2 status bonus to attacks so there's not a lot to worry about.

* The +2 only comes online if you're using your own attack bonus instead of the base animal form's.

* You can only use your own attack bonus if yours is better than the base animal form's.

A strength optimized wild druid can usually have a higher attack bonus at one level higher than the level a druid can memorize the form spell.

EG

So truthfully a wild druid that maxes str will almost always use it's own attack bonus with wild shape.

Edit
I did point out in both my other 2 posts that when casting the form spell or using wild shape and using the form spells stats a druid does gain the status bonus from other sources.

Ancestor Oracles are the same way with their Strike buff being a status bonus.

It's definitely a little bit awkward the way some classes get their combat bonuses in a 'slotless' fashion while others rely on already defined bonus types in the way it creates some unfortunate anti-synergy, but since Paizo keeps doing it it's clearly something they think is good for the game.

Wildshape druids can still be reasonably accurate though when using their own attack bonus and the +2, so it's not really the end of the world that they don't.

Certainly not the end of the world and I wasn't trying to say it was. They do still gain the other bonuses from inspire courage and heroism. I just hadn't read any discussion on this topic. I didn't even really notice this till recently and wasn't sure how many others had.

Also as I said earlier that I find it weird that they gain the bonus when using the form spell's innate attack modifier but not when using their own.

I'm was away from the forums for a while and I haven't been able to find if this has been brought up before but I'm wondering if it's been noticed that Druids using their own attack bonus while using Wild Shape don't gain the extra +1 to hit from the inspire courage status bonus or would only gain a net +1 status bonus from level 9 heroism and no bonus at all from the lower levels of it (Truthfully bless and heroism doesn't bother me as much).

I have a few issues with this.

1)I find it unfair to druids. They're already behind master proficiency classes due to their max stat being stuck at wisdom. This puts them even further behind if there is a bard in the group and hurts class synergy.

2)I find it weird that a druid using the attack bonus given in the spell would gain the benefit of these other status bonuses but not when using their own attack bonus.

3)There have been those in the magus chats who have advocated for a similar bonus to the magus in place of a master weapon proficiency and I would like to point out the issues with going that route.

That wild shaped druids gain a +2 status bonus for free is really nice and maybe I want to have my cake and eat it too. Wild Druids are, after all, still full spell casters. It's just losing out on the potential +1 attack bonus from inspire courage seems painful to a class that is already not as good as other classes at doing what it's trying to do.

Dragorine wrote:

Martialmasters wrote:

how does one get the mounted trait for their animal companion is my thought

The horse animal companion has it under special.

is that it? i have a player playing a small character (leshy druid) that wants to ride a medium creature.

i guess i could just fudge it and give his companion the mounted trait for the hell of it, but i wanted to know if there were other ways

There's nothing saying you can't ride another Animal Companion (as long as it's one size category larger than you) but the animal in question can only move. No attack or support while you're riding it. It is the horse AC's reason for existing really.

EDIT
On a side note as it's your game you could rule that your player could use the train animal feat to train an animal companion have the mounted trait.

how does one get the mounted trait for their animal companion is my thought

The horse animal companion has it under special.

What are you talking about? You invest your items every day, the apex item +2 to stat is not only for the day you first invest it.

"You reset the limit during your daily preparations, at which point you Invest your Items anew"

Even without it max stat would be 22 for a PC, 24 with apex.

Or for a druid str score 20 and 22 respectively as druids can't start with an 18 str. Assuming one didn't increase str at level 20 as it wouldn't help of course.

2) You can't benefit from item bonuses while in Battle Form. Period.

There are a lot of general rules broken by specific rules. When something tells me I use my attack bonus i assume it is my attack bonus. My attack bonus includes an item bonus. It would be the same attack bonus as if i punched the monster. If you don't agree that's fine. I wouldn't ever play a druid at your table though.

Martialmasters wrote:

It would be nice if battle forms worked different in 2e as opposed to how they've always worked.

The forms offering different utility instead of degrees of power.

Small form, medium form, large form, etc. Getting some basic universal bonuses for each size.

Then you have the specialty features of says forms like flying, swimming, imprecise sense, etc.

And there can be some overlap in these bonuses and features between exact creatures, let the specific creature form be a bit malleable to be more about flavor and area.

But that's just my thoughts and would require massive changes I think.

Lower level battle form just can't be as good as higher level, even if there would be a rule to scale them to any level. As of you might get bear form with higher armor class, higher attack... maybe even higher plain damage bonuses. But by you still would be a bear. So no extra tricks like breath attacks, flaming auras and such.

Secondly, Wild Shape's +2 status bonus still doesn't really helps much.
As an example, lets say as a level 20 (can be of any lower level as example) you still tries to use heightened dragon form. Base +28 to attack against level 20+ creatures obviously very low. So yeah, lets try and see what we can get on our own.
20+4 (proficiency as a druid) + 5 (possible strength or dexterity modifier on level 20) + 2 status bonus from wildshape = 31. Status bonus practically can be increased to +3 from heroic spell. But that something you can't do on your own. And so far there are only two circumstance bonuses to attack exist. And as a druid you can't benefit from neither.
+31 to attack certainly better than +28. But that still lower than +34 provided by level-10 Nature Incarnate. So practically still not very viable.

+24 prof, +6 str with belt of str, +3 item with handwraps, +2 WS status = 35. While Form spells say you can't gain item bonuses wild shape does allow for the item bonus due to being able to use your own stats bypassing that restriction.

I would point out that druid's can't wear metal armor as your rune priest is.

Mr Jade wrote:

Luckily, we are in the Bronze Age, and as such, Alchemists aren't a thing. Pathfinder by default is set way too late in history for me, early to mid Renaissance at the earliest is just too late.

That’s interesting. I associate Alchemy with Hellenistic Egypt and Greece.

We even see in the movie 300 Persian alchemists trying to bomb Gerard Butler

I'll probably be happy and fine with whatever they end up with. But I do think it loses a lot of actual purpose within the game to focus more on having deep spellcasting tied to a choice of tradition instead of thinner, more specific spellcasting tied to a theme. Right now, an arcane witch looks like a worse, weird wizard. A primal witch is like a druid without the excellent animal shape/companion features. An occult witch is a more precise but less versatile bard. All of them are just awkward sorcerers.

Not to nitpick but there are plenty of druids that don't wild shape or have an animal companion and both other druid choices are more of a caster option like the witch and the witch gets more spells per day.

I'm in the choose your list group.

Oh, and another benefit of this is how it helps the Witch Dedication feat. If all witch casting traditions use Int, then it makes it very easy for a high Int character like a Wizard to say "I always wanted to add Primal or Occult spells, but my Wisdom and Charisma are not high enough.

Never mind the bard can already do this with the sorcerer dedication.