Easl's page

Yeah, this is a 'normal English' problem. Signal all squadmates; each can Step as a reaction. doesn't really communicate if the step is 'must to get the benefit' or a 'may, but you get the benefit regardless'. Though upon rereading I am getting more positive about Unicore's reading. 'Can' in plain English is closer to 'may' than 'must.'

Update for my SMN and thoughts after another session...

A huge help for a remaster would be to change this spell [Summoner's Precaution] NOT require the PC to hit 0. Right now, you are only allowed to use that reaction if the damage would knock you unconscious.

Yes that would be nice. But I think better would be to make Reactive Dismissal a L2 feat. As a wave caster you have very limited slots, I'd personally rather have this take a feat than take a slot. It's already a decent feat, but at L4 it competes with tandem movement which in most builds is too good to pass up.

But AoE damage is such a kryptonite, that my PC's combat contribution was more or less over after half the foes had a turn within cone range...Even if this setup allows my PC to contribute, they are actually a glass cannon support.

I have the exact same problem. We do big contribution early, but the double target issue often greatly reduces my capabilities by round 3, when HP are low and we're still everyone's primary target.

But I'm not sure I would try and "fix" this in the class itself. It's kinda part and parcel with the two-bodies-one-HP-pool thing, and the problem can vary wildly depending on AP and party composition. Tiny combat spaces, this is a big problem. Outdoorsy encounters, not so much. Similarly, you've got a fighter, champion, or other tank standing in the hot zone, summoner has fewer problems. When the eidolon is considered a primary martial, summoner can go down fast.

So I would pocket this in the "tactics" category; if your party is using the eidolon as a primary martial, yep, the summoner could easily go down quickly. That's not a summoner class problem, that's a player expectation problem.

Then Enemy 1 is now off-guard to the Commander and the Squadmate block until the start of the Commander's next turn, but Ally 1 gets no benefit.

Hmmm. I read that sentence as:

IOW no ranged attacks at all. But I guess the grammar supports either.

Cave worms unintelligibly undermining a city with tunnels just right so that the whole thing is on the knife-edge of collapse, PCs exploring the tunnels, with the big end of story scene being some underground confrontation with a worm as the entire city collapses down on the caves does sound like a cool story. And something that might happen in a movie. So I don't think I'd worry too much about a cave worms' architectural and structural engineering knowledge if, as a GM, that's the story I wanted to tell. In my mind that's a much cooler use of a cave worm than as a "with no warning it pops out of the ground and kills you" machine.

Oof. The "ally" word. So if that had been "squadmates" it would be different? Squadmates includes yourself, right?

So the Commander's own Step doesn't trigger the effect, but he can still benefit from others taking the reation?

'Squadmates' doesn't include the commander (see 'Tactic' in AoN or Battlecry! p23), but this tactic says "you and your squadmates" so seems pretty clear that for this feat's effect they include the commander in the benefit.

For a scenario outlined above, to get full flanking I'd suggest looking at my sidebar comment. PC2 and PC3 can step away from the enemy to make themselves 'squadmates who responded to pincer attack.' Then during their turn they can use their first action to step back into melee range of Enemy1 and Enemy2 and everyone gets flanking. It's a bit clunky and it means the commander must target Enemy1 (not 2) in the round they gave the order (because there is no squadmate adjacent to 2), but I think that's RAW.

I'm not sure about the RAI here. It seems counterintuitive to demand PCs move away and then back in to get the benefit. As a GM it would be a reasonable handwave I think to say as long as you've designated them squadmates, they don't have to move if they're already next to the targets. But on the other hand, an argument could be made that the benefit is coming from the enemy not expecting the pincer, so in that respect if the squadmates all just stay exactly where they are, there's no surprise or lack of expectation on the enemy's part. Thus a GM could reasonably interpret the tactic as requiring some actual movement in order to get an opponent off-guard. It's up to your table; I don't think handwaving it would be OP but I think you're correct about that scenario and the RAW not giving OG to Enemy3 if PCs 2 and 3 don't move.

It's not likely to be a story that players enjoy being a part of and certainly won't feel like a collaborative storytelling effort.

Not in the traditional fantasy setting, no. If my group ever gets a hankering for a Paranoia-style session where we each create 5 PCs with the expectation that maybe one of them gets through the evening alive, and the joy is in all the various grisly death scenes along the way, well then I will definitely suggest "being spat 600' through the air by a cave worm" to the GM as one of the encounters to include.

What happens if it meets the rupture damage while the worm is underground, leaving no tunnel?

Then the GM has told a pretty poor story?

Really, at some point all these hypotheticals come up against that wall. I.e. there are many ways the GM can make the game far deadlier than normal. Double tap downed foes, swallow and burrow away, etc. They should be choosing NPC behavior with one eye on what makes story sense, one eye on what makes NPC sense...and one eye on what makes for a fun game. :) What you describe may not be a very a fun game. OTOH, if I want the PCs to discover an unknown underground cavern system that doesn't connect to above ground, maybe 'swallow then burrow' is a great way to do that.

If you the player are informed that you’ll be traveling through cave worm territory and cave worms often like to ambush and eat people like the worms in dune, burden’s on you to look for counters to that.

Well for starters, there's nothing in the cave worm's stat block or description that gives it any sort of surprise or ambush attack. It rolls initiative, goes in turn order, and is placed on the battlemap before it's turn starts, available to be attacked or avoided by moving out of range like anything else. If some GM is having it blast out of the ground and eat a PC before the PCs know what's happening, the burden is not on the PCs to come up with a defense against that, the burden is on the GM to explain to them why the GM is breaking the rules in a way that gives the PCs a massive disadvantage. IMO. Again, by focusing on Dune you are missing the difference between a game (has fair combat rules) and a movie/book (has no rules at all; author decides what happens and fairness simply isn't an issue). You can, of course, create your own monster variant that has that ability added to the cave worms regular stats and abilities. But then it should probably be higher level and thus an enemy for a higher level party.

Every fighter being just as strong as the next fighter is clearly unrealistic, but every fighter being near enough equally as effective as the next fighter is desirable from a balance point of view.

But what do stats actually do for the game and what could you replace them with? No one really seems to be getting at that.

The issue you and OP bring up is not necessarily stats per se, but the problem that every single +1 is so important that it drives out a lot of build variation - at least in high difficulty games.

But part of that "every +1 is critical" is caused by the flat distribution of the d20 roll. Make it 2d10 or 3d6 instead, being 1 point behind the other guy in the stat doesn't matter at much since you're both rolling something close to 11 most of the time. Paizo would have to go back and rework all the difficulties to account for a more normal distribution, but that might free up some design space by reducing the relative value of the next +1.

They could also go with a more Mutants and Monsters kind of thing, where your total modifier is level capped and the cap is well within reach of many different builds. So one PC may have high strength and low proficiency, another may have high proficiency and lower strength, someone else may have lower on both but some magic doodad that adds a big item bonus, and ALL of them end up with the same attack roll. But to stop every PC from feeling the same, those different options would have to carry different benefits other than attack roll. I.e. maybe strength gets you more damage while proficiency adds some specialty effect while the doodad gives some extra non-combat benefit.

As I've already stated, the forced movement rules shut down this no-tunnel default kill. Forced Movement cannot bring a target to a space it cannot normally occupy. That includes solid ground. The worm can't bring the target along unless there is a tunnel, since the target can occupy a tunnel.

That seems really odd.

I'd probably rule instead that the cave worm can of course travel through the ground with the PC in it's gut, because the PC is not being force moved anywhere "it cannot normally occupy" so long as it remains in the cave worm's gut. I'd then rule however that without a tunnel or open space in front of the worm's maw, the worm cannot expel the PC. What happens if you try to throw up but someone's got their hand over your mouth? It stays in you. Same thing here: the "cannot normally occupy" limitation is applied to the solid rockface in front of the worm's maw, not the worm's stomach in motion vs. worm's stomach motionless.

If 'remaining in gut while worm moves' counts as against-the-rules forced movement, you get ridiculous situations like a haycart being unable to roll down a road because there's an unwilling person tied up in the back of it.

I still maintain that it {adamantine dragon} would need to leave tunnels to bring a PC underground,

Again, that seems a really odd way to read the rules. I'd say the dragon can go underground with the PC swallowed whole. What it cannot do is expel the PC without some open space in which to expel them.

In any event, I don't see why a good GM would use either. "Aha, I found a way to kill you within the rules and there's practically nothing you can do about it!" is not an interesting story to tell, and I doubt many players would come back to such a GM's table for a second game.

Interesting sidebar, this scenario also seems covered by the text:
1. Commander's turn. Calls pincer attack. Squadmate Alice steps adjacent to Enemy1, squadmate Bob steps elsewhere i.e. not adjacent to enemy1.
2. Bob's turn. Bob steps or strides so that he's adjacent to enemy1. Enemy1 is off-guard to Bob because all Pincer Attack conditions are fulfilled: Alice ended her Pincer Attack step adjacent to enemy1, and Bob responded to Pincer Attack (by stepping).

This provides some flexibility, as only one squadmate has to reach the enemy with the initial step in order for that enemy to be placed off-guard against all other squadmates who stepped, but won't reach the enemy until they move during their turn.

I think it works like this.

1. It's the commander's turn. Calls pincer attack. Each squadmate steps.
2. It's now your turn, but all party squadmates got that step during the commander's turn too, so several squadmates should've gotten into a new position. If you are the sole party member next to an enemy, it's not off-guard against you. If there's another party member next to that enemy because you both stepped next to the same enemy, then it's off-guard against both of you (against you because of party member #2, against party member #2 because of you).

Which also makes descriptive sense (though that's not controlling): kinda hard to pinch anything with only one side of a claw.

“Giant worm swallows you and tunnels away, never to be seen again” -> reasonably anticipatable by player for a giant worm to do. Like from dune.

Yeah, but one of the distinguishing differences between a movie/book and a game is the concept of fairness as applied to the characters. Authors and screenplay writers often treat characters unfairly as part of the plot. Heck, that can make for a great plot. GMs should not treat players unfairly merely because it makes some plot sense. In that case, modify the plot so that the game remains fun. Yes this means when playing the game there is some level of 'suspension of disbelief' needed when a game rule intended to keep the game fun and even doesn't make plot- or physics- sense. I'm sure we've all encountered that. But should the GM kill a PC no-save-no-choice because the plot warrants it? Mostly no.

Taking armor proficiency via general training is a joke use, you’d never actually do that.

I guess if you're starting at a high level. But it would be a bit of a slog to start at L1 with a low-dex build because you anticipate wearing heavy armor, and then intentionally not taking heavy armor proficiency for your entire L1-L12 play through because you're waiting for your L13 "R6 slot + R7 wand" trick to kick in. That's a lot of hours of play at suboptimal AC. I'd just take the proficiency early and if the trick seemed worth it to me, retrain out of it at L13.

How useful recall legacy is depends on build specifics of you and your party, since the only ancestry feats you can give them are ones they’d have have the opportunity to take already anyways - so you’re either giving them their 6th best ancestry feat (subject to limitations on how high level that can be by RL’s rank), one that normally wouldn’t make the cut,

Yeah that's where I get skeptical. Particularly with humans getting to use their ancestries for generals, it is hard for me to envision a build in which trading away a daily R6 spell and a R7 wand use for your 5th best ancestry feat is a good trade.

This also ignores the two points of failure: both trick magic item and the fort save must be rolled, and thus have a chance of failing. Even if its only 25% chance of failure on each, combined that means the trick is failing 44% of days. Heck even if each has only a 10% chance of failure on each, you'd still be walking around not proficient in your armor because your trick failed about 1 out of every 5 adventuring days. That's way too risky for me.

By the level you can use the wand, every PC regardless of ancestry has had 3 general feat pickups. I don't see how using a R6 spell + R7 wand on a daily basis is a worthwhile alternative to simply taking the L1 general feat you want.

Yes a higher level caster controlling the worm in some way would be a good thematic way to get around the problem of the worm's choice of action not making any sense. It also makes for an interesting long-term villain. But now you have another problem: the encounter you just built for a L11-13 party now has a L17 caster in it, making a worm throw probably the least of their worries.

Still, some sort of magical remote control could work, where the caster isnt in the encounter and shows up much later in the campaign. The villain throwing minion monsters at the party and them getting harder and harder as the party gets closer and closer to the villain is a pretty classic adventure story. And in that case the fact of the worm behaving so strangely could be itself a hint to the party that the worm is not the story villain or big bad.

I mean, yes-ish. It's also just called "don't be a dick" as a GM.

If you have a GM that abuses circumstances to kill a character and pretending it's "fair" that's simply a bad GM.

Mostly agree. Though I think the main problem here is the GM having the worm behave in a way which is not worm-like, PCs have no way to predict, and makes no sense in the context. It's that nonsensicalness that really kills it (for me). This worm is behaving like a bond villain bent on revenge instead of a big dumb worm.

But it's kinda a cool visual, and certainly a Conan story where he gets spat across the sky would fit easily within the genre. So I think if Super wants this to be part of his campaign, the thing needed here is to make it part of the story, the cannon. Make it normal for worms to behave this way. As long as the PCs have a rationale to expect it and they understand what normal worm behavior is, then I think that really re-levels the playing field. Yes it's a massive amount of damage for the level. But also pretty easily addressed with tactics and equipment available at that level.

It's common for birds to drop turtles from the sky to break their shells open, so I don't think it's not too strange for a -5 INT creature to deliberately use fall damage against a regurgitated creature. But this worm likely isn't capable of ambushes, seeing as it's untrained in Stealth.

The bird is already X feet off the ground, so it makes complete sense that the drop causes a X feet fall. Birds are also pretty smart, and often do this to crack shells so they can eat the turtle.

Let's contrast this with the worm. The worm, if it just ate a PC, has it's maw at ground level (because that's where the PC it just ate was). So your scenario requires that either the worm rear up 300+ feet in zero actions (because there's no 'rear up' in your action calculus) and then spit the PC out targeting 'a spot in the air,' or that it angles its maw up (away from the threatening enemies around it) and then spits as hard as it physically can, again targeting nothing at all. It doesn't need to do this to crack a shell or otherwise make it's food edible, it's not as smart as a bird to figure out why this might be useful to it (hint: it isn't), it has to ignore the threats on the ground around it to do it, and nowhere in the cannon is either 'launch' action discussed or shown as an instinctive response. So even if it's physically possible, it's kinda like the GM deciding the a giant spider dances the two step - physically possible sure, but why would it do that?

IMO, the plain meaning of Paizo's description of it's attack behavior is pretty obvious; the worm eats things on the ground (or the 2D 'plane of battle', if you're underground), and also regurgitates rocks at them from this same basic attack position...where it's maw is close to the enemy.

Now, if your PCs are flying 375' off the ground, then your scenario would make a lot more sense. The worm rears up very high to try and snag them. It succeeds. It eats a PC, then regurgitates that PC targeting another PC. So the first PC then falls down from that same height. But other than that, it seems to me to require the GM actively wanting to have this specific event to happen for it to happen, because unlike a bird dropping a turtle, there's no animal motivation or cannon justification for this behavior.

(Now, you could make it cannonical behavior for your campaign. That's kinda cool and interesting. But that would probably then lead to my #3 idea - i.e., people who have a 'worm problem' generally know that worms do this because they see them do it, so the PCs would have a chance to figure it out and prepare for it...at L11-15, flight and levitation is cheap, so falling damage isn't that threatening.)

If you're looking for a GM position about why not to do such an instadeath thing, here are a few.

Idea 1: The way PF2E works, effects that target spaces instead of objects are dealt with via saves rather than AC attacks. I would say a reasonable approach to this would be to convert it into a PC save, with a successful save doing half damage (i.e. 87ish) and a crit success doing none. You're able to guide yourself into a bush or something.

Idea 2: that's 7 range increments away; I might decide that for the worm to successfully regurgitate something that far, it has to make some sort of level based check at -12 and if it fails, the effect is that the regurgitated person falls way short of the mark - i.e. much lower. (Think of this like a watermelon seed spitting competition; you wouldn't just allow a PC to say "I spit it 7 range increments" and succeed at achieving that distance without a roll, would you? So why should you let the worm do it?)

Idea 3: if you want to introduce this possibility but want your players to have fun with it, find a way to hint to them that this is a possibility. "Farmer Bob was once swallowed by a Cave Worm, and then spit out. Flew right over the castle he did. That thing's still out there - you here to kill it?" At L11-15 there are plenty of ways the PCs can nullify the threat of a long fall...if they suspect it's coming. So rather than trying to find some rules reason not to do it, you could just give the PCs a reason to prepare for it as a possible threat.

Idea 4: let it happen, let it be the threat that it is, but give the unaffected characters a chance to do some responsive action before the regurgitated character goes splat. "Okay folks, the Worm has finished it's actions. Wizard Alice is now flying through the air. Looks like if she hits the ground at that speed, it's going to be really bad. But she won't hit until the end of the round. So Chuck, you're up in initiative order next - what do you do?"

Idea 5: no fix needed. A PC at level 13 could have 180+ HP. Particularly martials. So they bump, then they get healed, and life goes on. Obviously this is more instadeath if the PC is level 10 or 11...but why are you doing that to them? As a GM, what is your motive for creating an encounter where you've intentionally created a BBEG one-shot-one-kill-any-PC possibility? OTOH, if the PCs are L15 or more and this is an easy encounter, this could be a really fun thing to do, without a threat of death.

Spells do not function like attacks.

Most good spells are not single target spells.

Spells are extremely accurate. They have an effect even on a successful saving throw. This makes them MORE accurate.

Spells also do not have single targets. A fireball, thrown at four PL+0 enemies, will deal half damage to two of them, and full damage to two of them, assuming they have average reflex saves.

I don't disagree, however you may want to go back and reread the OP's situation. Their GM focuses almost solely - or a least primarily - on fights against single individual, higher-level enemies. BBEGs. For every fight. Multiple fights between rests. This certainly should affect caster spell loadouts and strategy.

IOW, they're not complaining "casters do less/are less fun," they're complaining "casters in my specific GM's style of campaign do less/are less fun."
This is why I recommended RK (and was surprised to see 30+ messages of blast back). It is certainly not strong in many encounters, however in this GM's preferred encounters where the enemies' saves are likely ALL above 50% and some may be crit-success-on-average high, and it likely has one or more immunities, it's probably a decent use of 1 action in the 1st round to try and suss out the low save, or find the immunity (i.e. to avoid it). This doesn't have to be RK of course - if you have some sort of single-action cantrip that does damage, you could probe the target that way. Or even delay until one of the martials go and see what happens.

The point is, to enjoy your caster when you're battling L+2 bosses, don't blow your highest slot when you don't know how effective it will be, because in this particular encounter type your evergreen top slot spell might do nothing. Which could lead to far less enjoyment and a lot of frustration. On the other hand, figuring out 'best cast' and then using it could lead to a lot of enjoyment.

it looks like the class balance is finely tuned to work with a specific encounter design. One where fighting several severe fights one after another against fewer, stronger enemies should not be the norm.

Correct. Your GM's choices is giving higher weight to 'repeatable' classes, which includes martials, kineticists, and magus and summoner (since those two classes can contribute effectively by using cantrips in combination with a martial attack).

A martial swinging for 3 rounds and hitting nothing is bad luck, but nothing of importance is lost. A caster using his highest spell slots and seeing the enemy save 3 times feels real bad, because now your strongest resources barely did anything and you don’t get them back.

Given the big severe threat issue, someone should be doing RK checks the first round of every fight, so the party learns the BBEG's weakest save or trait weaknesses. If I were playing a caster in your game, I would likely hold off casting my max rank offensive spells until I had that info and could select the 'right' spell i.e. that either matches up with lowest save to give me a better chance of landing it, or one that triggers a weakness and thus does better damage.

Another option is to focus on sustainable spells. They maybe aren't as sexy as the one-shot big burst damage spells, but they can allow you to cast one big spell per combat and then just sustain it for continuing damage. This is one way to shepherd your slot resources through many fights.

I'd also second an earlier comment about items. Specifically, wands and staves. If you need more daily casts, these can help.

But I might also consider a kineticist, since all-day blasting "use my best cast with no regrets" is pretty much their niche.

At best my GM might come to realize that his current encounter design will not work well once we play a party that is less optimized for brutal combat.

How do the other players feel about this encounter design? Maybe the simplest solution is to just talk about it. See if the other players would like more moderate encounters, or encounters with several Level-type enemies instead of one L+2. Or simply talk to the GM and ask them to throw in some different encounters, mix it up.

The actual problem might not even be the class balancing, but the encounter design our GM prefers...Almost every combat is atleast a severe difficulty encounter with a few enemies of party level or fewer enemies above party level. Enemies of party level -1 we see rarely. Party level -2 enemies I have never seen in any serious encounter.

As far as I understand, these are exactly the conditions where casters feel weak. Spell success rates will be ~50% at best.

Well, sorta. Yes casters are better in an AoE encounter. However weaknesses and resistances also enter into it, as does level. If your casters are picking spells or even cantrips that allow them to hit weaknesses more than the martials, then even cantrips are good. And level matters because obviously spell selection gets bigger as you level up (and even lower rank spells can be cool against the right foe), so casters may feel more constrained at lower levels, but 'it gets better' as you level up.

I would also not discount save spells. Martials...for an at-level opponent they're going to do full damage 50% of the time, 0 damage the other 50%. Casters using the right save spells, they're going to do something approximately 95% of the time, but it will be smaller. Design your caster for that. Get spells that can still finish off the weak enemies with a save, or do persistent damage. An enemy with 1 hp does full damage; killing them before they act is a worthwhile action, even if you do it via 2hp damage.

Several folks mentioned magus. I would add summoner. Same magus spell power (which is much less than a full caster), but you get to strike and spell almost each round. Don't take many AC spells though, they MAP with your eidolon's attacks. :)

I see 1, 3, and somewhat 6 in our games (somewhat 6 = not necessarily the "absurdly high" issue, but yes the "2 party members stand around doing nothing while the members with the skill do the checks" issue). I am mostly okay with all of these issues...so long as completing the hazard is not critical to the plot. When a party's most rational course of action is to 'go around,' doing so shouldn't plot-punish them.

I will add a #7, which is "is an annoying puzzle that requires a linear playthrough". Whether your players like puzzles and riddles and such is going to vary by table, and I get that some folk really like it. But personally I and my players find most of them more annoying than fun. In "roll vs. role" playing I like role for many things, but in this area I prefer roll, as it seems unfair to make party success depend on player ability to figure out some puzzle. The worst offenders are puzzles that are solved by going through some earlier specific encounter; unless designed very well, these have the effect of railroading the party into a linear plot and doing exactly what the GM or AP wanted them to do if they want to succeed later on. Metaplot has it's place, but in general, I would try to avoid "must have completed encounter A the exact way I envisioned/the book states you should've, in order to succeed at encounter B" plot devices.

For all of the above, IMO most hazards should be stand-alone, be solvable by multiple different skill checks rather than player knowledge, and if there is a puzzle aspect to it, sufficient 'clues' should be within the encounter itself so that reasonable character actions such as searching etc. can uncover them.

I would guess Illusory Creature has the Auditory trait because a completely silent creature is typically not going to fool anyone, particularly if the illusion is pretending to make a sound yet nothing comes out (dragon roaring etc.). Thus as per the "Auditory" trait description, it is "A spell or effect with the auditory trait has its effect only if the target can hear it." The effect that needs auditory here is 'believable'. Note the next sentence in the trait description though: "This applies only to sound-based parts of the effect, as determined by the GM." So a GM can rule that the visual part of the spell is still visual, and in relevant cases could even rule it's believable without the sound - the auditory trait rules themselves already give the GM that leeway, so it doesn't need to be repeated in the spell description.

On the replacement of components with traits, yeah I seem to recall they specifically said the old component->trait was unnecessarily complex and redundant when they could just give spells the trait. I think there's something about that in the remaster faq, but I'm getting a 'bad gateway' error trying to bring it up to check. The point being that this has nothing to do with spells requiring loud speaking or chanting etc., that's still there. This remaster change was more about streamlining existing rules, not changing the rules on how spells work.

I would agree with a Gate Attenuator for your L3 item; it's the kineticist equivalent of a martial's runed weapon. +1 on all your impulses.

For 1st and 2nd level items you should look at AoN. It's easy enough to filter on L1 and L2 common items and just look at the list. Let your character concept guide you as there's really nothing that stands out as a must-have. If you have the ability to wear heavy armor you can get a nice one of those. If you plan on wielding a weapon, a silver or cold iron chunk or a +1 weapon might be good. If neither using weapons or heavy armor are part of your concept, there are lots of consumable items that would be useful. Or you could go with something like an onyx dog figurine.

Easl wrote:

Oh great! Show me that rotation. I'd love to see it.

Sure thing:

Turn 1: Cycle of Souls -> Channeler's Stance -> earth's bile -> Apparition's Quickening -> 9th-rank hungry depths.

Turn 2: Elf Step (Sustaining earth's bile and hungry depths) -> 8th-rank invoke spirits from your apparition slots.

Turn 3: Elf Step (Sustaining two vessel/apparition spells) -> Maneuvering Spell (Sustaining the third spell) -> execute.

Thank you. So the animist's ability to sustain 3 and cast a fourth comes in at L18. I appreciate the info. I'm going to drop this line for now though because while it's a cool trick, I pretty much never play games to that level. Not criticising. Not disagreeing. Just moving on.

I have already provided you the comparison of the earth's bile + fireball Animist versus the ancestral memories + fireball Imperial Sorcerer

Okay so the animist strategy you want to compare to other builds is:

??

Or is it just skipping my round 2, and every round after the first is
RX A1 sustain earth's bile (probably with elf step). A2-3 Slot spell.

Gotta say, while the second option probably does better dpr, it's kinda less interesting because it doesn't really leverage the special tricks the animist can do. Many caster builds at L9 can do 1a focus + 2a slot though a 3 round combat.

Just to help you undesntand why I'm pushing on the focus spells, it's because in our first exchange (lately) roughly 6 hours ago, I responded to your comment to Deriven about Circle of Spirits providing access to two focus spells. So I naturally wanted to think through a build that uses circle of spirits to get out a second such spell, and see how effective that rotation could be. It sounds like we both agree that if the animist wants to go for high burst damage and is willing to drop slots spells on it, then that circle of spirits rotation is not the way to go - there are better ways the animist can pump out fast damage. Is that fair?

the {animist} class does end up able to outperform even an Elementalist thanks to their ability to Sustain three spells on the same turn that they cast a fourth,

Oh great! Show me that rotation. I'd love to see it.

What I am specifically referencing is that elemental toss only does something on two degrees of success, whereas save spells do something on three. There is very clearly a double standard at play when you cite differences in accuracy in order to downgrade the Animist's Strike damage, but are perfectly willing to ignore major differences in accuracy between spell attacks and save spells when listing the Elemental Sorcerer's damage,

Earth's bile and Fireball are both save spells. So whatever white room damage comparison we decide to do, we should do the same for both. Likewise, the animist's melee strike and elemental toss are both AC targeting, and do nothing on a miss, so we should treat those equivalently too. If you want to discount both the strikes and the elemental toss in the above calculation because they are AC targeting, we can do that. However you would still need to discount the animist's second strike by MAP to get an apples to apples comparison of expected damage.

I don't mean it as an insult, but I am certainly calling out dishonest argumentation here

it is an insult to continue to insist I'm being dishonest and saying my post is telling about my personal character when I'm just trying to figure out what this rotation specifically is and put numbers to it.

Lets try it this way instead: tell me what your depiction of this really cool elf step multi-sustain rotation is. R1 A1 is what. R1 A2 is what. etc... You tell me which vessel spells it uses. Then we can discuss that. Maybe it's the same as the three sustain, cast-a-fourth rotation you mention above, in which case we have only one case to discuss. But maybe it's not, and we have two cases. And that would be interesting too.

Oh, I'm sorry, was one of the most blast-oriented Sorcerer builds not enough for you? Why switch to the Elemental Sorcerer when the Imperial Sorcerer with a buffed focus spell was an equally valid comparison for level 9?

Fair to say, then, that the animist build you're dicussing does less than both types of sorcerer when no slots are used, compares nicely to the imperial when slots are used instead of strikes, but can't blast as well as a built-for-blasting caster?

Easl wrote:

The second strike has MAP. You're not factoring that into your calculation, you're instead treating it has having the same damage average as the first attack.

Hold up, that's not what I'm challenging here. I am specifically challenging your claim that I counted three attacks,

Then I probably just misspoke, saying 3 attacks when I should have said 3 actions. I agree, your build and rotation in the second round comprises 1 action for elf step/sustain and 2 strikes. No pivot intended.

Your concerns about MAP also appear to be greatly exaggerated when you've explicitly chosen not to factor in accuracy at all in your above Elemental Sorcerer math.

The elemental sorcerer uses one save spell and then one attack spell per round, so MAP is not a factor for them. Your animist does one save spell and two strikes in round 2, so MAP factors in to the damage estimate for their 2nd round total.

The fact that you have to resort to the most extreme example of a blaster caster in order to make the argument against the Animist's blasting power when another notorious blaster caster fell short is telling.

Well it sounds like you mean that to be an insult, but yes I will agree that the comparison is telling us something useful about the two builds. I'm not even implying the sorc is better here; no-slot 76 is fine, and I think many players would like that over 2-slot 127. Other players won't. [shrug] Personally, I don't draw 'animist = best caster' from that comparison. I don't draw elemental sorc = best caster' from it either. Instead, I draw something more like "there is no best, there are different flavors with different pros and cons." But if you do (draw 'best caster' from the comparison), so be it.

I think the fundamental tension in this whole discussion rests on two things:

1) The Animist is one of the most powerful casters in the game.
2) The Animist is one of the most complex classes in the game.

With the valdity of point 1 being contingent on your capacity to handle point 2.

The way I think of it is like Magus. You have Starspan Magus with Psychic dedication, using IW starting at L6. This is a very specific build. it is a very offensively powerful build. If someone were to argue that this build does more damage than Paizo wanted the power curve to do, I think that argument holds some water. OTOH if someone were to say that Magus is hands-down the best martial at all things martialing because this build exists, I think I'd have to disagree on that. Teridax has found a animist build that does good damage without slot resources, but it requires a specific ancestry selection, then a specific animist practice selection, at least two specific feat selections, and then a specific daily prep routine. And like starspan+IW it doesn't come online at all until mid level play (3 levels after starspan does). So if someone wants to argue that Paizo didn't anticipate the elf step etc. animist combo pumping out as much non-slot damage as it does, then like the Starspan, I'd say that argument holds water. But if someone were to argue that this combo means the animist class is the best caster at things casty...well, like a claim that this combo makes the magus the best martial at martialy, that seems a lot less credible to me.

I fully agree, which is why I produced a much more straightforward example of an Animist and Imperial Sorcerer both using three actions to blast across two turns, with the former using earth's bile and the latter using ancestral memories.

Ancestral memories is roughly +5% for the second round. A more direct comparison for L9 would be elemental toss. Using that and fireball would be: R1 (10d6+5)+(5d8+5) + R2 (8d6+4)+(5d8+5) = 127.

This compares to your own calculations for your animist build, which were 76 for non-slot use, and 99 with slot use.

Slight aside, but "76 no slot use" can be accomplished by a fire kineticist with just impulse junction blazing wave + d6 EB. Hail of splinters + wood EB, same. Retch Rust + metal EB, same. But the kin can do that all at 30', without melee involved. And they can do that through wave encounters where there's no time to recover focus points. So IMO Teridax's animist build isn't even OP in the "ahhh, but what can you do with no slot resources??" department - there it's just on par with several different not-the-maximized-fire-build kineticsts. But with the need for 20 minute recoveries between encounters which the kin doesn't have. :)

You're going to have to explain that rationale to me, because I'm only counting two attacks here. Elf Step to Sustain both spells and deal earth's bile damage in the process leaves you with two actions to make two Strikes. Because each Strike deals 2d10+9 damage, the total is 4d10+18.

The second strike has MAP. You're not factoring that into your calculation, you're instead treating it has having the same damage average as the first attack.

This whole calculation has a ton of simplifying assumptions, most notably that we are assuming AC and all saves are basically the same in each case and we are comparing average damage. Which is fine. But even with that simplifying assumption, you should generally count a MAP -5 attack as 25% less damage than the initial no-MAP attack. The sorc uses only one attack per round, so elemental toss doesn't suffer from MAP in either round while the Animist's second strike in the second round will average less than their first.

Could you please explain the reasoning that led you to combine the blast spell with the shifting spell, as opposed to, say, embodiment of battle and devouring dark form?

That's the spell I thought you were talking about. Feel free to chonge it to devouring dark form or embodiment of battle and recalculate.

Well, for starters, your math is completely wrong. You don't seem to have included elemental form's damage bonus

Fair. +9. And fair about the persistent, so +3 more there. It's still not as much.

and appear to have only included a single Strike

Second strike has MAP, so it counts less, and obviously the Animist may not choose to do that. If you want to count third action attacks for the animist, then we should add in witch hexes and things like force bolt on the other side. IOW, to do a fair comparison, you should compare 3a of animist attacks to 3a of alternative attacks not 2a.

+ 4d10 + 18

No that's assuming a 3rd action MAP attack hits, which both has a lower chance and is now comparing an animist's 3 actions all focused on damage dealing to a different caster's 2 actions focused on damage dealing. To give a fair comparison, you need to (1) *0.75 that 2d10+9 from the third action and (2) add in some expected damage from the alternative caster using their third action for some sort of attack (not necessarily a strike). Or, if you prefer, you can say for the second round you're going to compare animist 2a sustain and one strike vs. the generic caster's cast of a single 2a spell. Either is reasonable; "what my animist can do in 3a vs what some other class could do in 2a" is not.

I would like to thank you for this example, by the way, as it also helps debunk the notion that the Animist needs to be hyper-optimized around a specific playstyle to start getting too strong: as this shows, even a player who doesn't know what they're doing can easily end up outperforming alternatives.

YW, but IMO it shows no such thing. It shows that a very specific build played to a very specific tactic can do okay in a very specific context. A non-liturgist animist can't do your rotation. A non-elf animist can't do your rotation. A liturgist elf animist who didn't take elf step can't do your rotation. An animist that doesn't take Circle can't do your rotation. An animist below L9 can't do your rotation. An animist who doesn't walk around with Steward of Stone and Fire "up" can't do your rotation. So it's not the animist class in general that has any OPness. It is, at best, this one specific build that has OPness. And I'm not even sold on that because it gives away the first round in cantrip damage for the promise of better damage in later rounds, which is often a bad trade.

Circle of Spirits lets you easily use multiple vessel spells in the same encounter, so in fact you get two to four focus spells for free.

Teridax just so I understand the rotation you are suggesting, it is (premise: must be L9 or above for this to work. For this example, we will go with L9, rank 5 spells):

R1: A1 cast earth's bile for 3d4+3d4+3 (aoe) A2: Circle of Spirits to switch. A3: cast Darkened forest form.

R2: A1 elf step to sustain both (and get in melee range for strikes). Earth's bile does its damage. A2: strike in melee using darkened forest form. Wood elemental form, for instance, does 2d10 (single target). A3: MAP strike or other 1a action.

I'm failing to see how this is unbalanced. Any one of several full casters can R1: 2A 10d6 fireball, R2 8d6 fireball* = 18d6 (aoe) across the same two rounds the animist has done 12d4+3 (aoe) +2d10 (single target). The standard caster has almost doubled the animist's damage. What am I missing? Now, I get the idea that the Animist can do this strategy BUT ALSO defer it in favor of casting top rank spells instead. But that doesn't make them more powerful, because the standard caster could also 'flip the script' and use lower rank and focus spell casts to match the animist's ~33dpr rotation. Both PCs have the ability to say "I can do this, but I can also do many other things with my round instead" so I'm not necessarily seeing the animist as more flexible here. The ability to do a bit of standard casting and standard striking in the same combat is cool no doubt, but it's not leading to bigger numbers overall (an observation which is true for Summoner too).

*I'm assuming the "one top rank spell used per encounter" concept, and assuming the caster doesn't use their 1a for some other damaging effect. I'm also not counting class effects like sorcerous potency, because they vary by class and I'm sticking with 'generic caster' for this example. But all those things make the comparison worse for the animist.

I should point out that balance matters most in semi-optimised groups, not maximally-optimised groups.

This may be true, but semi-optimised groups by definition are not attempting to maximize dpr; they are at least somewhat valuing role play scenes and non-combat build/capability. So if you drop in an animist player who is trying to maximmize dpr, then of course they will outshine some of the others in combat. But that isn't an animist class issue, that is a player playstyle issue.

Paizo isn't going to outthink a dozen Derivens who play more games of PF2e in a month than the entire company can afford to do in a year, but they can (and need to) present a balanced case for the average 'I finished an AP in 1 year' group.

If you are comparing a L9+ animist maximized for longer combats, against a bunch of other PCs who fall into the 'balanced case for the average', then of course the animist is going to come out looking strong. If you want to talk average team, then you need to talk average animist. Which is not "always takes Liturgist + Elf + Elf step and then uses Earth's Bile + Darkened Forest Form, games always played at L9+, combats are always higher difficulty allowing tactics that take 2-3 rounds to set up to shine."

I dont see it as a systemic problem if we as players can dream up specific scenarios in which one class shines. Those are certainly out there (for many classes!). What matters for balance is class capabilities across a wide range of encounters, a wide range of builds, a wide range of levels, etc..

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So, I know they're introduced in the composition spells and hex spells sections of bard and witch, which are focus spells, and they're described in the focus spells section of the spells chapter of the book, but they're not called "focus cantrips" anywhere I could find. I feel like calling them that instead of what they're called in the books has the potential to cause more confusion and delay rather than relieve it. Just sayin'

Summoner also has link cantrips.

Yes it gose befor the other effects of the impulse but that is not what is in question. The Infusion happens befor you make a blast. It states if you take any action other then a blast the combination is lost. So there completely separate.

It sounds like you already have a conclusion in mind, and Paizo rarely gives answers, so I would just play it the way you've chosen in that case.

I doubt it will unbalance the game. We are talking about 5 points extra damage at L17. Also because kineticists have many ways to do higher damage for 2 actions. For example, at L6 your 'double bumped' 2d10 EB is doing 15 average damage to one target while using those two actions for blazing wave would average 22-23 to multiple.

Unofficially, I would lean towards "no" because the rules for impulse junction say "This happens before the other effects of the impulse, unless noted otherwise."

So in my mind, the order of operations is:
1. You select a 2a fire EB.
2. The junction increases the die size to d8 (this happens before any other effects).
3. As a free action you use Two Element Infusion to mix it with metal. This gives you 'best of both', so best of 30' or 60' and best of d8 or d8. Half the damage will be fire, the other half p or s.

To get to d10s you'd have to switch the order of steps 2 and 3, but then the impulse junction is going after everything else instead of before it.

Whether you think it's worth it is entirely up to you.

Most other forms of Fear-giving spells and abilities target only one enemy and give them a save. This one targets every enemy within 30', no save. It's also one action, whereas most spells (including the comparable focus spell Spiral of Horrors) are two. Being a one action cantrip, it doesn't need to be sustained because recasting it every round is exactly the same action cost as sustaining it would be.

Eh? I know only one AV game and it's a diabloid. Are you sure you know what you are talking about? Needless to say a diabloid is ... not helpful for testing TTRPG rules.

Unless of course there's a secret second AV game based on an actual PF2 game system and I didn't hear about it.

They've made at least two posts about it on the community blog page. Last one was October 20th, see "Tabletop to Hack and Slash - Level Design in BKOM’s Pathfinder: Abomination Vaults". And Happy Halloween!

Teridax why not try it yourself?

We live in an AI world now. Use prompt engineering to get ChatGPT to read all of the 2E part of AoN, plus whatever ttrpg sources you think are good examples of the modular design you want, then tell it to create a basic rules framework for a PF3E. You could probably get a first draft in the time it took you to write your last post. Three, four, five tweaks and iterations later, and you could conceivably have the mechanics of 3PP 3E system written in days. The company looks at 3PPs, so that could be a much better way to influence them than forum posts - "Paizo, bring me a rock" is nowhere near as compelling as "Paizo, here is a cool rock, what do you think?"

I think the confusion comes from my native language, when they translated

Quote:

A prepared spellcaster can heighten a spell by preparing it in a higher-rank slot than its normal spell rank, while a spontaneous spellcaster can heighten a spell by casting it using a higher-rank spell slot, so long as they know the spell at that rank (see Heightened Spontaneous Spells below).

the "they know the spell at that rank" can be understood in the plural and concerns both types of spellcaster.

Ah I see. Yes the "they know..." in that sentence refers to the Sorcerer only. The prepared caster just needs the spell in their spell book, and they can prepare it at any rank they want.

It is acceptable to trade stories of that crazy time when your pet wriggled out of it's leash and went wild on the appetizer table...just don't share that your pet is a human child.

Thank you for all your replies, yes I made a mistake in talking about sorcerers who are spontaneous spellcasters.

Enjoy playing your caster!

Wizard: puts Breath Fire as a R1 spell into their spellbook. During daily preparation, can prepare it as R1, and/or a R2, and/or a R3, etc... It is cast at exactly and only the rank(s) it is prepared at. The next day, redo your preparation choices any way you want.

Sorcerer, not a signature spell: adds Breath Fire to their repertoire as a R1 spell. May only cast it as a R1 spell. If they also want to cast it as a R3 spell, they need to add it to their repertoire a second time, as a separate R3 spell. Can only rearrange their repertoire with downtime or on leveling.

Sorcerer, signature spell: adds Breath Fire to their repertoire once, at any rank. May cast it at any rank.

This only applies when those weapons are being wielded by beings of roughly similar size and anatomy in one-on-one conditions. There's a reason combat sports have weight classes. You're not going to put a 4'9" person of slight build up against a 6'5" monster and expect anything like a fair fight.

OT but...neither kendo nor fencing has weight classes. They will indeed pit 4'9" folk against 6'5" folk. Similar to many other sports, being taller is generally advantageous because of reach and lever action, however it is not as important as it is in, say, basketball, and mass/height is definitely not anywhere near as important as it is in boxing, wrestling, or mma. The advantage of greater reach and greater strength allowing you to move the weapon faster is somewhat offset by a smaller person's lesser momentum allowing them to change direction quicker. It's still very good to be tall, but it doesn't determine the outcome as much as you might think. And almost nobody would want a heavier weapon, because those are harder to move around.

The history/evolution of the rapier also kinda shows how the "m" in p=mv and E=1/2mv^2 isn't all that important. Over time, they got thinner, lighter, and longer. Reach was very important and so a person's size did matter, but weapon mass was not. Most of the killing power was due to the point piercing something vital, not the energy of impact.

The entire point is that TTRPGs genuinely have a harder time finding a second (or third, or fourth) person to double check things than video games, because you can't do things like 'run the program until it crashes' or 'boot up a dummy 3hr play session microfocused on this one issue for every possible issue' because TTRPGs are run by people and not machines.

I agree...with an interesting new caveat looking into the future.

Paizo is working on a video game version of AV. If they go full on-line, with data collection and rapid update pushes the way many mmorpgs function, then they could very well get a fully empirical, 'big data' driven evaluation of current class and feat balance against one of their hallmark APs...and they could test run system changes in the electronic environment before committing to them on the very much slower pen and paper cycle. Is the video game going to be designed to collect such data from users? I don't know. If it is, will the pen and paper devs use the data provided for updates to the tabletop 2E system, or will the video game just be a separate product evolving on it's own? I don't know. But the possibility of big data collection from thousands (tens of thousands?) of hours of play of the PF2E system in AV offers some tantalizing opportunities for future updates.

...and so would I like to see innovations in 3e that seem really out there now, and would have been unthinkable seven years ago. In the context of this thread, this means even more modular design that takes the elements we have now and compartmentalizes them a bit more to make it easier to fine-tune the tone of the adventure, the party's desired level of character complexity, and when the GM wants characters to progress, whether by going up a power level, gaining a new ability, or adjusting their powers.

The alignment of SF with PF says to me that Paizo is all in on the 2e system for at least 5-8 more years. If Paizo had a 3E in mind, they would've leapfrogged the new SF edition into it, with the idea of aligning PF to the new system in a few years.

I'm also skeptical they have any interest in going away from the traditional d20 class and level 'with changes' framework. Particularly with folks leaving D&D for PF2E, being "the better d20 class and level system" seems to be their sweet spot. Competing with the many smaller nontraditional games for a piece of the modular (like What's Old Is New) or tiered all-feat (like Cypher) system pie...I just don't see it in the cards.

But it's not either-or. Nothing stops Paizo from developing an entirely different game system as another production line, and they could do that at any time. But IF the company looked at your ideas and IF they decided 'great idea, let's do that', then I would expect it to be that entirely different production line - different setting, different classes, different everything. The idea of incorporating such changes into PF2E in any reasonable time frame...I think if you want that, you'll have to 3PP it yourself. Maybe the first baby step is writing up a Golarion Setting book for one of the systems that more resembles what you're looking for. That way you get the modular or all feat system you like, with the setting you like, fast.

Having said that negative stuff, I like many of your ideas. In the abstract, they are cool and certainly other systems have shown they can work. In concrete...well, you aren't there yet. Hard to judge success and quality when you're in the pre-v0 phase.

All that being said, I think some concessions could be made (and would argue some already have in Giant Instinct for Barbarian) so as to show kindness to the people who want to play the game and for whom this is a problem. You don't need fundamental, underlying changes, but could introduce a handful of weapons that are specifically for differently-sized creatures that have mechanical uniqueness to them in that way.

No matter how many bespoke weapons you add, its probably not going to silence the folks who want to size up and size down as an option. Paizo gives them a large greatsword? Oh but what if I want a large greatpick?

For that reason, I'd offer a template instead. Fortunately, we already have one and there's really very little need for Paizo to make it official because it is derived from Paizo's own rules. For a character using a weapon one step larger than normal, +2 damage and Clumsy 1. That's what Enlarge does, and that's basically what giant bar gets over other bars. There is no need to spend ink on a page-sized table of exactly the same weapons but one sized up, and there is no need to select just a few to offer to players; that one sentence does them all.

Yeah, if the Balor taunted them and told them "if you kill me, it'll kill you too" then the players actions were at least somewhat reasonable.

Villain monologues, protagonists use that monologue against them is a pretty solid trope in action adventures. I'm down with both what the GM had the Balor do and how the PCs responded.

Its rather clear that only spontanious casters needs to learn spells at the rank they want to cast it. Prepared casters can prepare spells of any rank in any slot higher than its rank.

No disagreement, but a caveat to expand Vlad's understanding: spontaneous casters will get some number of Signature Spells as a class feat. Spells designated 'signature' need only appear in the repertoire once, then they can be cast at any rank. The signature spell text varies slightly by class but here's the gist of it from the Oracle entry:

"You don’t need to learn heightened versions of signature spells separately; instead, you can heighten these spells freely. If you’ve learned a signature spell at a higher rank than its minimum, you can also cast all its lower-rank versions without learning those separately".

Mark the Wise and Powerful wrote:

I just recommend to the PF2e game designers to create an option to play it the way PF1e players are used to -- to formally define and recognize it as another option to have weapon size affect damage to help give PF2e a sense of legitimacy in the minds of the PF1e player and allow us to also feel we are playing a legitimate and accepted PF2e game -- just more in line with what we're used to.

Respectfully, this strikes me as an unrealistic ask.

A long way back, related to a completely different thread, the idea of a 'big book of variants' came up. This one could easily fit in a book like that, especially since it would only take up a couple paragraphs.

However I agree there's no realistic expectation such a thing will be produced by Paizo at all, and certainly not soon. So anyone like the OP who might be (1) actively desiring to start in on PF2E but (2) needs weapon size differences, should really consider a DIY fix here. It's probably the only viable way to get the 1+2 combo at their table within the next few years.

Though I would suggest alternatively that they 'try it straight up' for a couple sessions. The lack may not bother them as much as they think it will, and if it still does, well the table can always institute a house rule at that point.

If someone wants to play a pixie with a greatsword because its funny to them only for you as a GM to tell them "well, since you are tiny you actually can't deal more than a d4 of damage with your greatsword" its just bad.

It's not even that great from a realist/simulationist perspective. As I said, bullets are tiny and do plenty of damage. A pixie just needs to get their tiny greatsword moving fast enough and...boom. Nor is high arm speed even beyond the pale; mantis shrimp punch as fast as a .22 caliber bullet moves. So if someone absolutely needs a physics explanation why pixies do d8 with their teeny battle axes, they swing it fast. Just beware the pixie swinging a mantis shrimp at you lol.

Anyway, bottom line for me is every player and group has different things that jar them out of suspension of disbelief. If this is OP's, my best advice to them is "continue to play PF1" or "homebrew fix it, doing so is really easy and multiple respondents offered suggestions as to how."