Evil Space Mantis's page

Any can be 0. You are not forced to spend your standard action on anything else by using this ability.

I would probably make the guns cook off on round 3 of the effect (since heat metal has a kind of unique damage/round mechanic that tops out in rounds 3-5).

That is pure houserule for an interesting corner case. RAW gunpowder isn't even volatile unless its in a keg of roughly 100 shots worth of powder.

I believe you have discovered the art of novaing. If I figured this correctly, you spent 3 of your 9 non-orizon spells (assuming a wisdom between 14 and 19) for the day, one of your two daily judgements, at least one of your 5 rounds of bane, and about 330 gp in magic arrows (+1 frost arrows it looks like?).

You also have to either spend the first round of combat prepping for this using your swift on judgement in order to not waste a round of bane, or activate bane before the fight starts (and since you only get 5 rounds/30 seconds of bane per day, spending those seconds out of combat goes fast).

So you can pull this off for maybe 2 combats a day, after which your damage plummets to 1d8+4 per arrow. Depending on how much loot you get, the price of those arrows might add up pretty darn quickly too.

tl;dr: You spent all your resources to do massive damage, that's something the game copes with.

There's some other 1st level spell the Magus gets, maybe Frostbite, which is even better than Chill Touch (except maybe against undead). It does 1d6+something damage and makes the target fatigued with no save. The fatigue doesn't stack, but the debuff is gravy on top of the extra damage.

Frostbite is definitely a pretty potent spell, but remember that it deals non-lethal cold damage. On the other hand, that also makes it great for taking captives...

On the original topic, as has previously been covered, any time you cast a touch spell, instead of taking the free touch attack as normal, you can instead swing your weapon using Spellstrike and make the attack that way instead.

You CAN make your normal attacks and then cast a touch spell using Spell Combat and take a Spellstrike with your weapon, in that order, in the same turn. Using Spellstrike actually considers the weapon attack as part of casting the spell, not as a separate attack action.

"Instead of the free melee touch attack normally allowed to deliver the spell, a magus can make one free melee attack with his weapon (at his highest base attack bonus) as part of casting this spell."

Emphasis mine, of course.

I think a bard will do what you want, check out the archetypes for bard to flavor it in a way you like. Magician could be a good choice to go for something a bit more caster support.

I second the suggestion for seeing if you like the Bard or any of its archetypes. You can build a bard to be mostly be healing and buffing, but you can also have an offensive spell or two on hand for when you get in to a tight spot.

A slightly off-topic question, but whats the drive to keep the power level down? Is it a setting/style thing for the campaign? Or do you have some mechanically poor players and so are trying to keep the PCs more even in power?

If it is the second one, I'd recommend having you, or someone else who is good with the mechanics, help the mechanically weaker players build stronger characters. You don't have to go all out and fully optimize them or anything, but there is nothing wrong with helping people learn what armors or weapons work well, or how to have a balanced selection of spells, or even how to use their class abilities in cool ways.

Of course, if it is a play-style thing, if everyone is having fun then you are playing it right.

Pretty sure you can only give a +3 at range to a skill or ability check, as that is what the cloistered cleric's ability specifically calls out as being the only checks that benefit from the ability.

You could of course still aid an adjacent ally for +3 to attack or AC as a swift action though, which is pretty excellent in and of itself.

Also, +3 to a skill check as a swift action at range is still a quite powerful ability actually, even if it isn't as good as +3 to attack or AC. Good for those times when somebody really needs that Escape Artist to get out of a grapple, or that Acrobatics through an opponent to get in to flank.

Party composition makes more than a bit of difference at lower levels as well. Almost had a brand new party of 5 level 2 characters all die from a CR 5 fight not two weeks ago. (Which I admit was supposed to be tough, but in a fun set piece kind of way, not a completely murder the PCs kind of way...)

Problem was, they were a Monk, a Bard, 2 Sorcerers, and a bow focused Ranger.

At low levels especially Clerics and Fighters/Barbarians make a big difference in small parties. Conversely, a Bard in a 3 man party is going to have a hard time pulling his weight.

If they have gone for the 'classic' character classes: Fighter, Cleric, and either a rogue or wizard; you can probably treat them as APL 1. If they have taken some of the more diverse classes, like Bards and Monks, or non-standard versions of normal classes, like a negative energy Cleric, or a concept Sorcerer/Oracle with a non-combat focused spell list, I would treat em as APL 1/2. Those classes tend to catch up, but they start just a little weak compared to most of the rest.

Don't confuse dual wielding (the status) with two weapon fighting (the feat).

You can always wield two weapons (assuming you have enough hands for using them both at the same time, of course)... taking a -6/-10 penalty (or -4/-8 if holding a ligt weapon in the off-hand). So, in your example, the BAB 6 character would go from +6/+1 to +0/-5 (primary) / -4 (secondary)... or to +2/-3 (p) / -2 (s), if the off hand has a light weapon.

All the Feat Two weapon fighting does is to alleviate the penalty from -6/-10 to -4/-4 (2 less is the off-hand weapon is light)

This is pretty much all wrong.

You only take the two weapon fighting penalties if you attack with both weapons as a full attack action. You can hold two weapons and choose to only use one of them each turn at no penalty.

Remember that shields count as weapons, and you sure as hell don't take an attack penalty for fighting sword and board.

Also remember that Pathfinder characters are all effectively ambidextrous, so you never take off-hand penalties if you only make attacks with one weapon during the round. You can also swap which hand you designate as your primary and off-hand each round if you are two-weapon fighting (although this really only works if you are fighting with two light weapons, since you do take some pretty hefty penalties for fighting with a one-handed weapon in your off hand).

And, I am sad to say, there is no easy way to 'split' your iterative attack pattern between two weapons... a character with a flaming and a shocking dagger and a +12/+7/+2 attack pattern can either use the +12/+7/+2 routine for either of the blades, or opt for a +8/+3/-2 with one weapon and a single +4 with the other (+10/+5/+0 and +10 if using TWF). Any attempt at +12(flaming)/+7(shocking)/+2(flaming) or the like would require special class features or Feats.

This... I am less sure about.

The language is not clear that you take TWF penalties if you only make attacks with a combination of weapons that are granted by your BAB and not by taking the optional TWF extra attack(s).

The reason this is a bit tricky is that trips and disarms can be used in place of an iterative attack roll but do not have to be made with the weapon at no penalty. So it seems like in this case you can make an unarmed attack in addition to weapon attacks (which would normally be TWF) but that doesn't count as TWF since you are sticking to attacks granted by your BAB and not taking extra swings.

Also, Wat, did you include all the bonuses to Chompsky's attack? He is flanking and we've got bardic music up!

Unfortunately, I am pretty sure you only get the empowered bonus once.

Both abilities basically count your healing spells as being empowered. Metamagic effects can't be placed on the same spell twice, so its not empowered twice, its just empowered.

I would feel better about this if the wordings of these abilities were more consistent though. I can see someone attempting to rules-lawyer that the Healer's Blessing adds another +50% on to the empowered healing spell cast by a Faith Healing Holy Vindicator since it says 'as if they were empowered' and not simply 'is automatically empowered.'

The ring of the ram is an ornate ring forged of hard metal, usually iron or an iron alloy. It has the head of a ram as its device. The wearer can command the ring to give forth a ram-like force, manifested by a vaguely discernible shape that resembles the head of a ram or a goat. This force strikes a single target, dealing 1d6 points of damage if 1 charge is expended, 2d6 points if 2 charges are used, or 3d6 points if 3 charges (the maximum) are used. Treat this as a ranged attack with a 50-foot maximum range and no penalties for distance.

It calls the effect a force, several times, but otherwise doesn't explicitly state that it deals force damage or is a [force] type effect. Technically, I think its actually untyped damage by RAW, which would be halved against incorporeal creatures but bypasses all resistances, immunities, and DR.

RAI treating it as a force effect and therefore dealing full damage to incorporeal creatures also makes sense.

Both untyped and force damage effects are quite powerful, so if this is your own table I would pick one and stick with it. If its for society play, maybe someone else can shed some light on it.

Some of the positioning arguments are interesting too, but with hero points in play it can really be as simple as walking up to the BBEG, touching him twice, and having your friend finish him off. This could be especially problematic if you allow Heroic Fortune, a 2nd level spell which grants a temporary hero point. The spell is likely overpowered all on its own though, at least when combined with option of spending a hero point to get an extra standard action. It isn't as bad as White Raven Tactics from 3.5, but it still seems like a bit much to me.

Using a SLA counts as your 1 spell cast per round unless you use Quicken SLA, so you can't use hero points to get 2 touches in one round anyway.

To my knowledge, just like a normal touch spell, a touch (sp) allows you to "cast" before you're 5 feet next to the guy, avoiding the AoO. Also, the quickened one won't provoke due to being quickened. Not that it matters much, because casting defensively is so easy with what must be an equivalent level 1 spell like (given that you get it at level 1).

Yep, you can take the 5 foot step with a SLA. But again, this means you have to start at 5 foot stepping range, or move and cast defensively. Also, DC 17 isn't a trivial check at low levels. Its not immense or anything either, but its still a ~40% fail rate at first level.

All you need is one round on a given enemy. The person who moves after you in initiative can coup de grace. They could even delay to wait for you to sleep the enemy, that way they definitely go right after you. No HD limit, no will save, and the enemy is helpless and ready to be offed by the next person in initiative.

Depending on the vagaries of the initiative dice rolls you might not have an ally who can delay until after your action, or you might end up all having to delay until the end of the round. That might be in your best interest in this case anyway though, considering you want things close to you without having to take actions with this tactic.

They won't get a chance, since you'll wait to use the ability until you have someone ready to coup de grace.

Again, making this positional. If you have to spend round 1 setting up three characters to land a combo on round 2, I'm really not that bothered by the power. 3 PCs focusing on one opponent for 2 rounds would kill most threats anyway.

The coup de gracer can use a reach weapon, or for maximum range can use a scorpion whip two-handed to coup de grace from a starting position 20 feet away. At level 1 with 20 STR and power attack, a character could coup de grace for 2D4+20 with the whip, as it can optionally be held in two hands. 2D4+26 if it's a barbarian. That DC 32 or higher is still an outright death for enemies who don't roll a 20 on their save, even several levels higher.

Not disagreeing with you here. If the coup de grace lands, it is always going to be devastating. What I think your example does point out is that to maximize the usefulness of this combo you need a third character purpose built to take advantage of this domain ability.

Half-elf clerics will have the easiest go of this, as they can simply take arcane training as an alternate racial feature and use a wand or scroll of true strike before the big battle, essentially making it impossible to defend against the sleep effect.

Truestrike has to be used before the end of your next combat round, so you are either gonna have to do this in combat, or get your positioning absolutely perfect the round after you knock in the door. Course wasting a scroll of truestrike every now and again won't break the bank either.

Also, a big thing I forgot to mention in the previous post: flying creatures. Admittedly only an issue up until a certain level threshold, but before 5th at least, and probably more like 7th or 8th, they will completely shut down your sleep touch attack plan.

Your actual real biggest problem is the humble 5-foot wide hallway. Only way I see of making it work there is to start with one 'toucher' adjacent to an opponent, touch, move action away, second toucher has to move action/5 foot step in, touch, and then you have to have a reach weapon equipped person deliver the coup de grace.

Also, it isn't going to break a campaign. Here is a list of the races/types/subtypes immune to sleep: elves, half-elves, constructs, dragons, elementals, inevitables, oozes, plants, undead, and swarms. SR is going to add an extra level of protection for almost all devils, daemons, demons, and other big hostile outsiders.

I think you might be overestimating the power of the ability.

There are several limits on its efficacy:

1) Spell-like Abilities provoke attacks of opportunity. Its a very easy rule to overlook, but this means that a Cleric using this ability has to risk getting smacked or make a concentration check and lose his action.

2) Its got a relatively low number of uses per day, 6-7 uses at low levels, up to maybe 10-12 by the time you can can get Quicken SLA. It takes two daily uses to put someone to sleep, and even then it only lasts for 1 round. Thats only 3-6 rounds of sleeping one opponent per day.

3) Sleep is also probably the easiest condition to break as any opponent can break the sleep with a standard action. And considering it took you two actions to put the person to sleep, thats really hurting your action economy.

4) I assume you want to set the opponent up for a Coup de Grace while sleeping. Depending on initiative order he might get woken up by another enemy before one of your allies can deliver the coup de grace. Also, remember that coup de grace is a full round action, so the killer has to be within a five-foot step in order to make the coup de grace. Also, the coup de grace provokes an AoO just like the SLA does.

5) If you miss one of the two needed touch attacks or blow a concentration check, you've only staggered your opponent for the round (Not that staggered isn't a pretty good condition to put on someone) so your carefully orchestrated coup de grace is wasted.

In order to kill opponents using this power you need three characters at lower levels, or two at level 10+ (assuming you are allowed to take quicken SLA). At least one of these characters needs to be within a five foot step of the target at the start of the round, and all of these characters will be at some point need to be adjacent to the opponent and taking actions that provoke attacks of opportunity.

So in the end that means three characters spending their full rounds to kill one opponent. Unless you are fighting single or perhaps paired opponents, this tactic isn't really that effective. Certainly not enough that it needs houseruling, unless I have missed something?

1. Am I correct in thinking that if the Magus were to try casting Shocking Grasp with Spell Combat before attacking on the second round, that would discharge the final Frostbite effect?

2. Finally, only slightly related, am I correct in remembering that if no other movement is done, a 5-foot step may be taken in between attacks during a full attack? Thus allowing a Magus to, for example, cast Burning Hands using Spell Combat, then step up and make his weapon attack?
(Edit: numbers added for ease of reference)

1. Yep. Just remember you can always choose to either attack or cast first. So you could make an attack to use up the last frostbite charge, then cast the shocking grasp and get in another attack.

2. Also yes. It does call out that unlike normal full attacks you may only 5 foot step in between casting the spell and making all the weapon attacks or vice versa, not in between weapon attacks like you normally could.

Eh, its only a useful tactic from 1st to 4th level, and its only really viable at 3rd and 4th level. Even then you are forcing the arcane caster to burn one of his highest level spell slots just so you can see a little bit further for half a day. Or spend 150gp per 3 hours on a scroll, or 300gp per 3 hours on a potion. Thats 5 to 10% of the characters wealth, each!

If somebody wants to spend those kind of resources to get around the disability they picked for themselves, why not let them?

RAW... its tricky.

The subject gains the ability to see 60 feet even in total darkness. Darkvision is black and white only but otherwise like normal sight.

Darkvision can be made permanent with a permanency spell.

Bolded for emphasis.

I can see it argued either way. I would allow it, since its a big, big expenditure of resources, but I can understand why people would not.

Either way, its still nowhere near as serious a threat to balance as an Oracle casting arcane spells...

Background: Player took blindness as oracle, and seems to be trying to find a loophole.

Keep in mind that as an Oracle with the Clouded Vision Curse, he isn't fully blind, he is only blind past thirty feet. For most interior encounters he will be able to see to target just fine. From 5th level on, he can see out to 60 feet. Arguably, before that he can get the wizard to cast darkvision on him and see out to 60 feet.

As with all the Oracle curses, he is taking a mechanical penalty in one area to gain a mechanical advantage in others. So while he might have trouble fighting at range forever, he becomes impossible to sneak up on at later levels.

In general though, fully blinding a caster pretty much shuts them down.

Also, how is an Oracle casting sleep? Its not on their spell list, so this player might be trying to pull one over on you in a completely different fashion.

It doesn't matter how you get your +1 attack. You could just as easily take Heirloom Weapon trait and hope you never lose it.

Its not like you can only get one those feats before level 4, and both remain useful for your entire adventuring career.

In fact, I am pretty sure the fully optimized 1st level two-handed fighter picks Heirloom Weapon, Power Attack, Furious Focus, and Weapon Focus. Added together, they are effectively +3 to hit and damage with the first attack of the round, increasing to +3/+6 at level 4.

Since this build doesn't have a Weapon Focus or any other weapon specific feats in it, why not replace Cleave with Furious Focus at level 1?

Advice for balancing treasure between GMs

All good points. I didn't mean I was personally worried about this for my game, I meant it was one of the main things that went in to GM selection.

But again, all good advice for making sure the GMing seems consistent in quality!

I'm also interested in this, as I'm starting a multi-GM sandbox of my own in a month...

From the work I have put in so far, the hardest part is the prep work. We've got a big enough player base floating around here that there might be two GMs running parties through different parts of the sand-box at once, so I'm prepping a pile of material.

I will say that the one reason I both am willing to and want to do this is because we've got a core of four experienced GMs who can all keep the game fun and balanced session to session despite handing off control of the game. The only thing I would worry about is one GM handing out ridiculous loot relative to the others, ending up with a skewed Monty Haul kind of game.

But in the end, if you trust your fellow GMs and have the sandbox built, why not play in it?

A CL 18 shield of faith potion will grant a +5 deflection bonus to AC for 18 minutes. Its only a 900 gp item if the PCs manage to get it, and with that long of a duration the guardian could easily drink it before the fight. Keep in mind that this bonus overlaps and does not stack with a ring of protection, so you could possibly cut the ring from the guardians gear. Or instead replace the cost of the ring with 3 or 4 of these potions, so that the party can see one afterwards as loot. As a consumable they shouldn't be too unbalancing for the party to have a couple.

The Holy Vindicator PRC will also allow the guardian to fill his tower shield with positive energy, which provides a +4 sacred bonus to AC until he is struck. You'll only need a single level of Holy Vindicator to get this bonus.

Heres a link to the Holy Vindicator.

2) A fighter's retraining is all well and good, but what if the character is in his prestige class now, and is two levels away from the next even-numbered fighter level? Even if he takes EWP in a general odd-level slot, his WF & WS still won't work because the ordering of the feats will be wrong, and WF disqualified and hence WS also disqualified until they're in the proper order. Now imagine that his PRC has a prerequisite of WF or WS. Or that he took Weapon Focus at 1st level but his 1st-level class wasn't Fighter. He's screwed -- and in that position because what weapons the feats actually apply to isn't clear in several cases.

As far as I can tell this is a non-issue: the game does not care about the order in which you took feats as long as you qualified for them at the time. Feats that you do not qualify for at the moment simply 'turn off'. I cannot cite an example involving feat chains, but the most common example of this is Power Attack. If your Strength drops below 13 from temporary or permanent ability damage, the feat just turns off until you meet the pre-requisites again.

Depending on the PRC I can see this still causing problems, for example is if calls out 'Make X special attack with a weapon you have Weapon Focus for' then yes, since you no longer qualify for Weapon Focus, you probably can't make the attack. Still, we have hit very, very corner case territory here.

Also, while society play might track the levels at which you gained certain feats (I'm not sure, I have never played PFS), the base game doesn't force you to, so there isn't even necessarily a mechanic for adjudicating the order in which someone took all of his feats anyway.

I still think the fundamental problem is a misreading of what the Inquisitor is. An Inquisitor of a Healing deity does not spend his time going around healing the good and faithful; thats what Clerics of Healing deities do. An Inquisitor of a Healing deity goes out there and captures or kills people and destroys things which are destroying peoples health. They go after the people who do things like cause plagues or famines, or poison wells, or subvert places of healing, or defraud people by offering false cures.

Clerics (and Paladins!) of Good deities mostly do good by just doing good deeds. Inquisitors do good by rooting out and destroying evil. Obviously, Good Clerics, and especially PCs, get to do some smiting for goodness as well. But the real heavy duty killing of evil, the kind where you kill some person everyone else likes because you have uncovered his evil schemes, THAT is what an Inquisitor should be doing. Not slapping magic band-aids on people. You are a vigilante for the religion, not its poster-boy. You are John Constantine, not Dudley Do-Right.

Dang it, now I want to go play myself an Inquisitor...

Both will definitely be fun to play as well as effective. TarkXT is right in that as a sword and shield Cleric you have to use a buckler or a light shield to cast if you want to do magic with your sword out. And using the light shield can be seen as slightly cheesy by your GM depending on how they feel about it, since the action sequence to cast is pass sword to shield hand (free), cast spell with now empty sword hand (standard), pass sword from shield hand back to sword hand (free).

I worked on a base shapeshifting class that used evolution points and had an evolution pool. I haven't had a chance to play test it or anything, though.

** spoiler omitted **...

Looks interesting!

Two things jump out at me that might need a bit of looking at.

First is the class skills list. Its got more class skills than any of the Core classes, and I'm not sure why. I would consider dropping Knowledge (Nobility), (History), and (Geography) anyway, and probably Handle Animal and Ride. It just seems like this guy should *become* his mount, not need one.

Other than that, the other question is how long does the Evolve Form ability last? I think 1 minute, or even 1 minute/level is fine, but if it is meant to be an all day ability I think it starts to get a bit unbalanced at later levels. The class might need a slightly larger Evolution Pool depending on the duration of the Evolve Form ability, but that'll just take some play testing to work out.

And Saying a 7 is very low is like saying a 13 is extremly high. There the same distance from base of 10.

Except that with a point buy the real average for a PC is going to be between 12 and 14 depending on the point buy used. So yes, a 7 is quite poor in that it is 5 to 7 points below average, and a 17+ is quite good in that it is 5+ points above average. I'm not saying you should never dump stats, I certainly have done it before and even did with a character I am playing now, but its not always great. Also, two skill points per level is really, really poor. It pretty much forces you to put them in to Spellcraft and Knowledge (Religion), which means no Perception, no Diplomacy, not even a point for Heal. What can I say, I like skill points.

Base speed is pretty good to have if you can get it. Its not worth changing deity's if it doesn't fit your character concept just to get the extra movement... but if you CAN get the Travel domain you absolutely should. The exception is possibly for Dwarf Clerics as they can move 30 feet in medium and heavy armor with the Travel domain, something only higher level Fighters can do normally (that is to say, without spells).

As I am currently thinking about using build 1) ranger cleric of Erastil, and given that, I feel it may be prudent to have 12 intel and only 16 wis (adding wis at each lv stat boost), as I want a good array of support skills and not just a "good in combat" cleric.

I have a friend playing a 6th level longbow-using Cleric of Erastil at the moment, I don't think he has taken a point of damage from melee combat yet. I also don't think he took a hit in our entire last session at all (we only had 3 combats though, and one of those was a total slaughter of the NPCs thanks to some smart spell casting and good rolls) so they definitely can be pretty effective. More importantly, I know he is having a great time with it.

Question,So what do you think about the other builds? Is it possible to build a "spellcaster" cleric? Aka, is it worth getting a high starting Wis of say 18 after racial? Is such a build even viable???

One of the builds you put together yourself actually looks pretty good for a spellcasting focused Cleric.

4) Glaive wielding Support Cleric with reach attack of Shelyn
Race: Human
Domains: Love and Luck
Stats: Str 13, Dex 10, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 16(+2)= 18, Cha 14

Role: Buff heavy, while being able to stay behind melee party members and support damage with reach attacks. If foes starts targeting the cleric, will make use of the Love Domain powers to protect himself.

As a spellcasting focused Cleric you are going to be focusing on battlefield control spells, with a dash of buff magic. You also want to focus on staying the heck away from the bad guys. This build does an excellent job of staying out of trouble between the reach and the Love domain power. If I was going to go pure spellcasting, I would probably swap the Str and Dex around so they end up as

Str 10, Dex 13, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 16(+2)= 18, Cha 14

You don't want to be making attack rolls if you can possibly avoid it, instead, you want to be crippling the other guys with spells so the rest of your party can kill them quickly and easily. You probably won't get to roll many damage dice with a spellcaster Cleric, but ou can still be the one who wins fights.

Feat selection will probably be Improved Initiative and Selective Channeling at level 1. You really want to go first, or at least early in in the initiative order, as often as possible with a spell focused Cleric. This lets you cripple groups of enemies before they have a chance to act or spread out. With 5 channels a day and 14 Charisma,the ability to exclude up to two enemies from your healing burst from Selective Channeling will actually make you a pretty effective emergency healer in combat as well as a good control spellcaster.

I might consider changing out the Luck Domain for the Protection (Defense) sub-domain. Both are pretty solid spell-lists, I just like that the Defense ability is a whole party buff instead of a single target (although more powerful) buff. Thats pretty much personal choice though.

I notice that the suggested feats are all ranged combat ones. What about other feats like Extra Channeling and selective channeling? Should I get those?

Cos I see my char attacking at range, but going melee if there is a need... is that thinking to much? Should I just focus on range only?

It is very difficult to be good at more than two different things. By going with a ranged Cleric you have chosen to focus on spell casting and ranged combat. Since you can't afford to invest in Charisma, picking up Channeling feats spreads you a bit thin. Channeling is still an excellent ability for you, it will just be used more often after fights to heal the party up.

Using a shield and entering melee as a flanker/tank is still sort of viable with this class, but you simply don't have the feats to spend to be good at both melee and ranged combat.

Also keep in mind that most combats are only three or four rounds long and you will probably spend your first round casting either a buff spell on your party or a debuff/battlefield control spell on the bad guys. That means if for some reason you do have to enter melee, it'll take your second turn to drop your bow, put on the shield, and draw a weapon, and then it'll actually be your third turn before you get to charge in and smack people. Depending on how the fight is going, it might even be over before you get to make that charge.

And I go like the Law domain, but I usually go CG in alignment, can I still take the Law domain? Or should I consider taking Good instead?

As Erastil is a Lawful Good deity, your alignment MUST be LG, NG, or LN. A Cleric must always be within one step of his deity's alignment. As any of those alignments you can take the Law Domain. Good is a fine domain to take as well, I just think the Touch of Law power is slightly better than the Touch of Good power.

Sorry for all the questions, but the vast amounts of options are making me go nuts!

No problem at all! I quite enjoy playing Clerics, so I'll keep on answering questions if you keep asking em.

I'll just try and tackle option 1 for now. I would change the starting stat array to this:

Str 12, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 12, Wis 15(+2)= 17, Cha 10

Basically, drop the Con down to 12 and use those 3 points to buy up a starting Dex of 16. Drop the Cha down to 10 since it looks like you aren't intending to channel in combat with this character and instead buy up an extra point of Wisdom. You lose a little bit of HP, but you gain AC and to-hit bonus. As a back liner you shouldn't be taking too many hits.

I would also consider changing the Growth domain out for something else. The ability to enlarge yourself as a swift action is great for melee Clerics, but really hurts as a ranged/support Cleric. Also, for a support Cleric the normal Plant domains first level entangle can be a real fight ender, while enlarge person is only a good single target melee buff. Alternatively, going Law (Archon Subdomain) might be better. The spell list is situational, but the ability to let people effectively 'take 11' with a touch a few times a day can be unbelievably useful in those situations where someone keeps blowing a skill check under duress by not rolling above a 5. Erastil's domains aren't the greatest in general, but the longbow makes up for it.

Feat selection is probably going to be Point Blank Shot and Rapid Shot at level 1, Deadly Aim at level 3. At that point you should be doing pretty good ranged damage. You can also pick up Precise Shot at level 5 after that to shoot into melee, but until then you'll be better off trading arrows with enemy ranged attackers or buffing your allies than firing into melee.

Regarding your problems with the Paladin...

Well, you said the whole group is new to Pathfinder. Getting religions and alignments to work out well in play can take a bit of practice. Paladins unfortunately really crank up the level of system mastery you need to make them work.

Detect evil is especially easy to adjudicate incorrectly at lower levels. If your opponent isn't undead, an outsider (aka demon/daemon/devil), an evil Cleric or Paladin, or has six or more HD/class levels detect evil finds nothing. Chances are those highwaymen you fought wouldn't actually detect as evil the way the rules work (I'm assuming here you didn't fight 25 level 6 highwaymen as a group of level 5 characters).

Then if you really start getting in to alignments... are all highwaymen even necessarily evil? Depending on the situation you could have Neutral aligned highwaymen who were forced to choose between starving and robbing other people. Depending on who they steal from you can even start to get in to Robin Hood-esque situations where Good aligned highwaymen exist. Without detect evil and Smite Evil abilities at the table, this becomes less of an issue as Paladins are are the class most strongly tied to the actual mechanics of alignment.

And then you hit the Paladins other difficult to adjudicate class feature: the Code of Conduct. I'm betting your GM didn't actually discuss what the Paladins Code actually was going to be before you started playing. This REALLY needs to be defined, and probably written out, since they can really change how the Paladin player acts. As people have previously noted, if he is distributing the parties loot without permission, he is probably stealing and definitely acting Chaotic. He is no longer a Paladin.

On a related note, you shouldn't have to perform any atonement for when party members die. I'm assuming you did your best to save as many as you could, and so you are fine. It is much more difficult for an Inquisitor to lose his abilities. You have to specifically 1) Slip in to corruption or 2) shift your alignment too far away from your deity. The whole point of Inquisitors is that they are the worshipers of a deity that CAN do the dirty work Clerics and Paladins cannot. As such, they get a lot more slack.

Oh, and if your GM tries to shift your alignment because party members died... he needs a smack to the back of the head. Alignment is what actions you choose to take, not what dice rolls don't go in your favor. Unless you specifically chose to let someone die, not getting there in time isn't your fault and so doesn't effect your alignment.

I guess I'll start things off...

1) Don't be afraid to try and get in to the competition because you don't have a big stack of rulebooks sitting around at home. I don't actually own the Core Rulebook, the APG, or any of the Bestiaries (Although thats probably going to change soon! Bestiary 2 is just too pretty...) and I made the Top 8. D20pfsrd and PathfinderWiki are both excellent sites for SRD and Golarion related open gaming source material.

2) Get someone to proofread everything before you type it up, both for content and for simple errors. If it doesn't make sense to your friend while you are sitting in the room with them, it won't make sense to the voters when they get to see it. Having a friend or two who really know the rules inside out is also a big asset.

3) The Preview button is your friend. I probably hit it at least 10 times for each of my submissions as I went through and tweaked things. People tend to make snap judgments on sight, even when they are trying not to, so fixing that formatting error in the first paragraph is worth a few votes.

I know these aren't exactly earth-shattering revelations, but they do apply to every round of the competition. Whats the rest of the Top 32 got?

Even in the most nervewracking weeks of this contest, when my nails were bitten down to the bone and I was in danger of becoming addicted to nicotine by virtue of the many 'no, it's just for the stress!' cigarettes I found myself purchasing, I always looked forward to the point in the voting when a certain succubus would get around to doing her reviews, with her rather... different way of evaluating things. I'm sure I'm not the only one who felt that; I know other competitors felt the same, and I'm sure a good chunk of voters did as well. So I just wanted to make sure you knew that it was appreciated.

Pretty much exactly my thoughts. Reading the comments on your entry during the 'keep your mouth shut' periods of the competition could be surprisingly stressful. Even the inability to respond to positive comments could get a bit trying at times, so it was always nice when you hopped on to check on your submission to see that the succubus had stopped by. Just that one funny review could do a lot to remind you that at the end of the day the competition is, above all, a heck of a fun ride.

Plus once I knew you had hit mine up, I just had to make the rounds and check on everyone else's succubus review to see how I stacked up. Unfavorably overall I think :P

Out of curiosity, how often do you try and steal things from your players? I'm just thinking, in order for your players to be that defensive about it, your probably overusing pickpocketing as a plot/adventure device.

I know there is no wrong way to play, but even considering your players might find themselves in shady areas on occasion, pickpocketing is actually a pretty rare thing. Especially pickpocketing armed people. When was the last time someone you know got their pocket picked? The only times I can think of it happening to anyone I know it has been taken from a bag or jacket pocket that was left unattended, not one that someone was wearing.

Anyway, rules answers:

1) Yeah, pretty sure there is no pickpocketing/stealing from a Wildshaped character. Since the items are inaccessible to the caster while Wildshaped, I don't see how they could be accessible to another creature.

2) Since you can only steal small objects by RAW, if your players don't keep anything small on them, there is no legal target for a pickpocket to steal. For backpacks, I might force 2 Sleight of Hand checks to steal from a backpack, one to open it without being noticed, and then one to actually steal an item. Keep in mind its a DC 20 check just to successfully palm the item, and then a Sleight of Hand check opposed by everyone nears Perception check to not be noticed.

3)You have to be adjacent to steal, so if they are inside a wall of horses, the thief would have to do something pretty obvious to get close enough to make the Sleight of Hand check. The Sleight of Hand checks DC wouldn't go up, but the Perception check to notice that someone is now standing in the street right next to you is a DC 0 check, so the PCs are at least aware that the person is there, and violating their personal space.

And that's all she wrote for me. The disappointment at losing out is pretty much cancelled out by the feeling of relief at not having to finish off my adventure proposal in the next couple of weeks :)

Once again, I'd like to thank all the judges and the voters for letting me have this experience and for letting me share my work with you. It really is quite an incredible thing to get this level of feedback and input from the designers and players (two groups that aren't mutually exclusive!) of your favorite game on your work within the shared space that is Pathfinder.

Cody, Jerall, Sam, and Sean, best of luck moving forward. You have all consistently produced some of the best material in the competition and, from what interaction we have had on the forums, I couldn't have lost to a friendlier or more professional group of people. The Houndmaster, the Gentleman Knave, Lady Rosiline, and the Dollhouse are all pieces of work that I think really stand above the rest of the competition and make me excited to see what comes out in the next round. Don't disappoint!

I agree with pretty much what everyone else has suggested.

I really like the idea of first trying to get the whole group to give you their sheets at the start of a session for whatever reason. The 4 d20 rolls is a great idea since it puts peer pressure on him from the other players letting you see their sheets. It also means if he still refuses then his fellow players are on your side since the problem player is holding up the game by not participating.

The other big question I think is this: is this person generally a good player and just a bit overly possessive about his character sheet? Or is this just one of many disruptive things that he does?

If he is a fun player to have at the table except for the whole character sheet thing, then you just need to work out that problem. If the character sheet thing is only one of many bad habits the player has, unless he is a very close friend or you have a really hard time finding enough players, you maybe should just let him go. Its less trouble for you, and nobody in the game group wants to spend an hour every session as the GM tries to break one of the players of his bad habits.

Why do the feats give only a reduction in the percentage and not something like, "No arcane spell failure with light armor?"

Why the need of the swift action? How does this requirement to use the feat balance it?

I think I understand the need for the requirement of armor proficiencies. The two feats are meant for more Eldric Knight or Magnus characters, both of which would be closer to melee then normal arcane spell casters. Am I right in that line of reasoning?

How does all of this tie together to become "balanced?"

I'm not sure that a feat which gave no arcane spell failure in light armor would necessarily be unbalanced, but equivalent feats for medium and heavy armor probably would be unbalanced, or at least more difficult to balance properly in terms of feat/level prerequisites.

The flat % also actually allows a little bit more flexibility for PCs who take the armor training feats. By not tying the feats directly to a class of armor you allow players to also offset the fail chance of using a shield rather than armor, or if a player is willing to take the risk, wear heavy armor and still suffer some chance of arcane spell failure without suffering the full failure chance.

The swift action acts as a limit in a couple of ways.

The biggest is that it forces an armored caster who wants to use a Quickened spell to risk Arcane Spell Failure.

The other big thing to remember is that it means you have to choose whether you turn on your Arcane Armor Mastery or your Arcane Strike as a fighter/wizard hybrid. While you will usually only turn on your Arcane Strike when you choose to make melee attacks, it does mean that on rounds when you spell cast your attacks of opportunity are at a reduced damage compared to if Arcane Strike is on.

The two of these also combine and mean you can't Quickened Spell a buff and then Arcane Strike for another damage buff in the same turn.

There are also a few class abilities that rely on swift actions to activate and so force you to deal with your full Arcane Spell Failure on occasion. There aren't too many of these that are reasonable combinations though. Oracle 4/Wizard 3/Mystic Theurge X is probably the most reasonable that I can come up with which would have both armor proficiencies and a decent number of good swift action abilities. Even then you still probably come out a slightly weaker both melee combatant and spell caster than a straight Oracle of Battle (Although having both spontaneous Divine and prepared Arcane casting would make you very versatile).

Dear potential top 4 candidates,

Sean Reynolds has just posted a delightfully sadistic twist for Round 5. *link*
Yours,

Ask A RPGSupersuccubus.

<insert the usual disclaimer about CE aligned (very advanced) succubus point of view here... Oh wait... The only 'usual' about chaotic is that there is no usual.... Ah well... Que sera sera>

I don't think its sadistic at all. Assuming I am fortunate enough to advance to the next round, having a pre-determined APL to design for is one fewer design decision to make. It also puts one of my three possibilities I've been considering out of the running, which also helps narrow down exactly where I should be focusing my writing/thinking.

So for once the twist helps instead of hurts (for me, anyway)!

I piced Fury's Fall over Combat Reflexes. This will incress your Trip CMB enough where its well worth it. Cleave and Great Cleave over Combat Reflexes. Your swing arch is huge. And combinded with triping critical much better IMO.

I'm not sure why you are choosing Cleave over Combat Reflexes. For one, without Combat Reflexes, you only get 1 AoO per turn, which means whenever faced with more than one enemy, the pole arm fighter is going to be missing out on a pile of AoO's.

The two things with Cleave are:

1. You cannot Cleave as an AoO, it is a standard action only.

2. You also cannot Trip on a Cleave, as it specifies that you do damage. It also calls out that you use your attack bonus and not your CMB. So theres two things keeping you from Trip Cleaving.

You can still Tripping Strike Cleave to do damage and on a crit knock people prone, but you are talking a pretty huge feat investment for one trick that will occasionally be useful. Combat Reflexes works all the time and is useful from the moment you get it right through you adventuring career.

As for party balance, you will probably have to work with your team mates a little more than usual for a Fighter to be as effective. On the other hand, you also deliver much more battlefield control than a normal Fighter. If your party has a couple of 3/4ths BAB melee damage dealers you might actually contribute more damage than a normal fighter. That +4 bonus to attacking prone targets will let those characters really dish out the damage when they might otherwise miss. Its too bad prone doesn't make someone sneak attackable, otherwise you would be the dual-wielding Rogues best friend...

All in all, even if you are a *little* bit behind a straight fighter in damage output, it shouldn't be enough to notice a difference in the published modules.

And submitted! Thats the closest I have cut it to the submission deadline yet. Bloody map was being uncooperative there for a while!

So, I finally had my first RPG superstar themed nightmare. I submitted, went to bed, and dreamed about all sorts of things I'd left out or made mistakes in for my submission. Then I woke up and realized that all the things I had been dreaming about made no sense whatsoever. I wonder if my subconscious was trying to tell me something...

I had my first one the night before the archetypes went up for the public to view. The submission deadlines don't bug me that much, but the waiting for the judges reviews and then for the public to start commentating kills me.

Red Snow Ravine
Located in the south-eastern Irrisen hinterlands, in the foothills of the Kodar Mountains, Red Snow Ravine was, until a few years ago, simply another unnamed and unremarkable bit of wilderness. The coming of Hoarfrost Throat-Tearer(R3) has changed that. No one, other than Hoarfrost and his rage worg companions, has come back out of the depths of the ravine alive; however, a few souls who have stumbled across the entry to Hoarfrost’s lair, and have lived to tell about it, have told tales about the sights within. Central to these stories are the half-a-dozen dismembered, mutilated, and otherwise defiled corpses hanging from posts and from boughs of the evergreen trees at the entryway to the ravine; the gory drippings of which have given the ravine its name.

The tactics that have driven his reign of terror in the region have been both simple and brutally effective. Hoarfrost likes to catch unwary women or children and kidnap them, dragging them back to his lair. There, they then serve as the bait for his true prey; those brave souls who venture out to rescue the captives. Hoarfrost stalks his prey through the pine forests and frozen hills around his lair, before eventually ambushing them, killing them, and turning them into ghastly souvenirs.

The Rage Worgs’ Lair (CR 9 or 12)
==========
The ravine widens here, opening in to a small glade some fifty feet wide before closing again to a narrow path after about seventy feet. Along the eastern wall a small waterfall trickles down the rocks feeding a small, mostly frozen over, pool some thirty feet across. Along the western wall a rocky overhang provides some shelter from the elements. In happier circumstances this glade would be a beautiful natural area, but the effect is ruined by the smell of blood and rotting meat wafting from the western side of the glade.

Hoarfrost’s rage worg allies have turned the area under the rocky overhang into their den. This overhang is only 5 feet tall, and so medium and larger bipedal creatures have to squeeze in order to move or fight inside it.

The walls of the ravine are about 40 feet high in this area, and due to both their sheer faces and the slippery ice that coats them, require a DC 25 Climb check to climb. While it is possible to climb the hills around the ravine, the steep sides of the ravine make it impossible to see in to the ravine without standing right at the edge. The shifting drifts of snow at the edges of the top of the ravine make for dangerous footing, and anyone attempting to make an attack, cast a spell, or any other vigorous activity not related to keeping their footing on the dangerous surface must make a DC 20 Acrobatics check or slip and fall into the ravine.

Creatures: If the rage worgs have been alerted to the presence of intruders (most likely by their allies in Area 1) then they are actively hiding in their den, preparing to pounce. They have also alerted Hoarfrost, who stands at the back of the clearing, behind his hidden bear traps, bow in hand.

If the rage worgs have not been alerted, they are simply in their den eating or sleeping, and come charging out as soon as they detect anyone in Area 3. Once they attack, their howls alert Hoarfrost, who is in his campsite in Area 5. Hoarfrost comes running to see what the commotion is after taking 2 rounds to prepare for combat.

Tier 7-8 (CR 9):
Hoarfrost Throat-Tearer CR 7
XP 3,200
hp 78 (R3)

Rage Worg (2) CR 4
XP 1,200 each
hp 67 each (NPC Guide 39)

Tier 10-11 (CR 12):
[b]Hoarfrost Throat-Tearer CR 7
XP 3,200
hp 78 (R3)

Vicious Rage Worg (4) CR 7
Worg barbarian 5
CE Medium magical beast
Init +3; Senses Darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision, scent; Perception +11
===== Defense =====
AC 15, touch 11, flat-footed 12; (+2 armor, +3 Dex, +2 natural, –2 rage)
hp 101 (9 HD; 4d10+5d12+47)
Fort +13, Ref +8, Will +6
Defensive Abilities improved uncanny dodge, rage powers (superstition), trap sense +1, uncanny dodge
===== Offense =====
Spd 40 ft.
Melee bite +17 (1d6+21 plus trip)
Special Attacks rage (15 rounds/day), rage powers (no escape)
===== Tactics =====
During Combat As soon as combat begins, the worgs activate their rage ability. They then attempt to pair off against opponents, flanking and tripping them, then using power attack on any that are prone.
Morale Vicious rage worgs fight to the death.
Base Statistics When not raging, the worg’s statistics are AC 17, touch 13, flat-footed 14; hp 83; Fort +10, Will +3; Melee bite +15 (1d6+18 plus trip); Str 22, Con 17; CMB +12, CMD 28 (32 vs. trip); Skills Climb +10, Swim +10.
===== Statistics =====
Str 26, Dex 17, Con 21, Int 8, Wis 14, Cha 8
Base Atk +9; CMB +17; CMD 30 (34 vs. trip)
Feats Endurance, Furious Focus, Intimidating Prowess, Power Attack, Step Up
Skills Climb +12, Intimidate +13, Perception +11, Stealth +12, Survival+10, Swim +12
Languages Goblin, Hallit
SQ fast movement
Gear masterwork leather barding

Hazard: The icy pond on the eastern side of the ravine presents two possible hazards to the party. If anyone attempts to charge or run on any of the icy spaces they must succeed at a DC 15 Acrobatics check or fall prone in the first icy space they move through. Additionally, the ice in Area A is strong enough to support any number of medium creatures, but a larger then medium creature on the ice will break through the ice in their space(s) and fall in to the frigid water beneath. The ice in Area B is thinner, and instead breaks if any medium or larger creature enters the space. While the water is no more than three feet deep at any point, any creature in the water must make a DC 14 Fortitude save when they fall in, and at the beginning of any round they are still in the water, or become fatigued for 1 minute. For each round a creature remains in the water, the DC of this save goes up by 2. Climbing out of the water requires a DC 10 Climb check due to the slippery conditions.

Trap: At the 4 spaces marked with X’s, Hoarfrost has carefully hidden and anchored a bear trap. Hoarfrost and all of the rage worgs are aware of the locations of the bear traps and will attempt to lure opponents into them if possible.

Bear Trap CR 1 (4)
Type mechanical; Perception DC 15; Disable Device DC 20

Effects
Trigger location; Reset manual
Effect Atk +10 melee (2d6+3); sharp jaws spring shut around the creature's ankle and hold the creature immobile; the creature can escape with a DC 20 Disable Device check, DC 22 Escape Artist check, or DC 26 Strength check

Development: If Hoarfrost was not previously alerted by activity at the entrance to the ravine, he arrives on his initiative count in the third round of combat in Area 2. He usually takes a moment to assess the battle at that point, preferring to stay back behind his bear traps and fire his bow or throw his javelin of lightning at any likely targets. However, he does not hesitate to begin raging and wade in to melee if any opponents come within 20 feet. If forced to retreat, Hoarfrost hopes to use the time his bear traps can buy him to slow down his adversaries long enough to arm his trap in Area 4 and then drink his 3 potions of cure light wounds before making a stand in Area 5.

And my turn for a dumb question!

I just want to double check that the NPC Guide counts as a valid source for short-form stat blocks. I'm guessing it counts as "Published content from Paizo's Pathfinder campaign setting"? I don't see why it wouldn't, but it looks like most of the other books got called out by name, hence the trepidation.

John Bennett wrote:

I'd vote for whoever makes their maps out of Legos!

Will there still be votes left over for the rogue-like ASCII maps?

######
....@+
######

I used to basically do this while GMing. Didn't have a battlemat or mini's, but we did have a big whiteboard and markers. The only issue was I couldn't draw (and still can't) so I was reduced to just labeling everything as a letter. In particularly epic fights big monsters got their whole names written on the board. The players knew that stuff had hit the fan when I started writing something up on the board and got to D-R-A-and was still writing.

More on topic, I plan on getting some serious assistance from map making software for this round. Everything still starts as a sketch on notebook or graph paper though, depending on both what level of detail I am trying to work out and if I can find any graph paper. Seriously, graph paper acts like socks in the dryer for me, it always seems to just disappear into the ether when I'm not looking.

I wondered why that pizza I ordered in during the Superbowl was delivered by a guy wrapped in black who vanished in a puff of smoke. Huh.

And I notice that Ethan gets away with just being from 'Ireland'.

The Emerald Isle: Free of snakes, wolves, and, apparently, ninja.

I'm living in Maynooth, County Kildare, if people want to post it up.

Pretty nice place actually, its a college town about 20 minutes outside of Dublin. Its on the train line, the old side of campus has some really nice 18th and 19th century architecture, and there is a ruined castle in the middle of town. The castle actually got the top blown off of it during a siege in the 16th century. Red hot cannonball hit the powder magazine in the keep. Must've been some pretty amazing fireworks.

Hey look, the servers are back!

Thank you everyone for your feedback and support! I look forward to responding to your comments after voting has ended.

Are younstacking concentration because you are wearing heavy or medium armor? I don't believe the magus has a concentration check if in light armor.

You have to make a concentration check to use the Spell Combat ability in melee and not provoke an attack of opportunity from any opponents who threaten you. This means the Magus tends to make a LOT of concentration checks, since Spell Combat is something you want to use almost every turn you can.

Also, I think you are confusing Arcane Spell Failure checks from armor with concentration checks. The spell failure check is a d100 percentile roll that a Wizard or Sorcerer has to make while wearing ANY armor, and a Magus has to make while wearing anything heavier than light armor before 7th level.

If you are a 1st level Magus in scale mail(medium armor) trying to use Spell Combat, you have to make two checks. The first is a d20+Int Mod+Caster level+concentration bonus(if you have one) Concentration check against DC 15+(2x Spell level) to cast defensively. If you fail this check, the spell fizzles. If you succeed on this check, you then need to make an Arcane Spell Failure check and roll a 26 or higher on a d100(scale mail has a 25% arcane spell failure chance) to cast the spell successfully. If you roll a 25 or lower, your armor interferes with the motions of the spell casting and again, the spell fizzles. Arcane Spell failure only effects spells with Somatic components, but that is virtually all of them.

Basically, you want your concentration check bonus to be high enough spells rarely fizzle and you probably want to avoid Arcane Spell Failure chance all together, since you really don't want to have to roll twice just to get off each spell.

Yes, but what about gods whose favored weapon is ranged? Pity the poor exalted archer of Erastil.

Unfortunately, Ethan, I did not vote for you in the end; you came in 9th in my tally. But you seem to have other voters in your court, so good luck and I hope you stick around!

Sorry for taking a couple days to get back to you.

I considered this, but then decided for balance reasons to force empowered strikes to be melee attacks. Being able to deal untyped damage at a range of 100+ feet at 1st level just seemed way too good. The archetype was already potentially slightly unbalanced at first level, although I think it evens out with a standard Cleric pretty quickly and might even lag behind in overall strength by around level 15 or so.

I really wanted the archetypes flavor and mechanics to suggest a front line melee type fighter. I did test out a couple Dex-based Cayden Caillean worshiping rapier wielders though. While only fair fighters at 1st level, by 5th they seemed just as good as STR based Iomedae worshiping longsword users. Mechanically, the strongest low level build without a doubt, was a STR-based Gorum worshipper with a greatsword + Ferocity subdomain. Buffed, it could deal something like 4d6+7 damage at first level (16 STR + Greatsword + Enlarge Person + Empowered Strike + Ferocious Strike). Still, by 5th level, while still a powerful build, the Gorumite was being pretty handily outfought by a decently built fighter.

I have a thought that gets around the multiple misfire/multiple critical nonsense. Instead of rolling multiple attacks to represent the iterative attacks, how about being able to apply more damage (up to the number of iterative attacks) by beating the AC by multiples of 5. For example, a 11th level gunslinger rolling 28 vs AC 22 would be treated as getting 2 attacks through, while that same gunslinger then rolling a 38 vs AC 22 would get 3 (by having 3 attacks and beating the AC by 10 or more. This would make criticals devastating (since 1 roll governs all criticals), and it feels to the player like making a single shot.

This... is a really interesting idea.

I'm gonna have to think about the math just a little, as criticals have the potential to be super instant death for anything on the receiving end and 1's kind of waste your action in a way even worse than a normal 1.

Like I said, I am going to have to think about it a bit, but it is a really straightforward idea for a mechanic.

Evil Space Mantis wrote:

Thats not quite legal. Since concentration isn't a skill any more, there is no Skill Focus for it.

Noted & talked to my GM, we didn't see it that way.

Patryn of Elvenshae wrote:

Also, I don't think you can pick a bonded item with the familiar arcana; that just gets you a familiar, not the "Arcane Bond" ability of the Wizard class (which lets you pick a familiar or a bonded item).

Also noted & talked to my GM about that point. For him he doesn't mind the bonded object.

He jokingly pointed out all the trouble it would be to use the "deliver touch spell" ability of the familiar with the magus "spell combat" ability.

Just saying, those are both technically houserules. I don't think they are particularly game-changing or anything though :)

And submitted!

Looks like I am close enough to the last one in this time around. I choose to blame my timezone for my tardyness(if 4 hours before the deadline can be considered late :P).

Good luck everybody, can't wait to see what people have come up with!

Drayden D’Arteros, Prince of Knives
Portrait: 13
Description: Drayden D’Arteros, while Andoren by birth, left his homeland as a young man for the looser morals and more lucrative opportunities offered by the Shackles. By day, Drayden appears to be a prosperous merchant in his forties. By night, in his guise as the Prince of Knives, he runs, and occasionally participates in, all manner of illegal bloodsport. His loyal hound Koba remains at his side both day and night.

Motivations/Goals: While he remains in control in most situations, Drayden’s unhealthy obsession with bloodsport is slowly taking more and more control of his actions. His hat of disguise has so far let him engage in his bloody pursuits by night without his identity being discovered, but it seems inevitable that someone will discover his passion for violence.

Schemes/Plots/Adventure Hooks:
- Andoren abolitionists have caught wind of the plight of the slaves used in Drayden’s illegal death matches and seek assistance in shutting his operation down.
- Word has trickled through the underground of the Shackles of a very special match coming up in the pit fights, one involving an abducted Pathfinder.

Drayden D’Arteros CR 6
Male human cavalier(hound master) 3/fighter(knife fighter) 4
NE Medium humanoid (human)
Init +5; Senses Perception +3
===== Defense =====
AC 20, touch 13, flat-footed 17; (+5 armor, +3 Dex, +2 shield)
hp 57 (7d10+18);
Fort +8, Ref +5, Will +2
Defensive Abilities parrying defence
===== Offense =====
Spd 30 ft.
Melee +1 dagger +12/+7 (1d4+8/19-20), and mwk dagger +12/+7 (1d4+5/19-20)
Ranged mwk dagger+13 (1d4+7/19-20)
Special Attacks challenge 1/day, pack tactics, tactician 1/day
===== Tactics =====
During Combat Drayden likes to start combat by using Dazzling Display to demoralize his foes. He then attempts to move in to flank with his hound Koba, maximizing the benefits of his pack tactics. He also mixes dirty tricks in to his attack routines, especially when facing multiple foes.
Morale Drayden will generally attempt to flee when outnumbered or reduced to 28 hit points or less, however, he will fly in to a rage if Koba is killed and will try to kill Koba’s slayer even if it costs him his life.
===== Statistics =====
Str 18, Dex 17, Con 14, Int 14, Wis 10, Cha 14
Base Atk +7; CMB +11; CMD 24
Feats Boon Companion, Combat Expertise(B), Dazzling Display(B), Improved Dirty Trick, Improved Two-Weapon Fighting, Precise Strike(B), Two-Weapon Fighting(B), Weapon Focus (Dagger), Weapon Specialization (Dagger)(B)
Skills Bluff +12, Diplomacy +12, Disguise +2(+12 with the hat of disguise), Handle Animal +12, Intimidate +12, Perception +3, Profession (merchant) +10, Sense Motive +8, Sleight of Hand +6 (+8 to conceal weapons)
Languages Common, Aquan, Goblin;
SQ braggart, knife expert, never caught unarmed, order(cockatrice), quicker than the eye, war hound
Combat Gear +1 chain shirt, +1 dagger, masterwork dagger (2), hat of disguise
===== Special Abilities =====
Knife Expert(Ex) Drayden gains a +1 bonus on all attack and damage rolls, and to CMB and CMD on disarm and sunder checks with daggers.
Never Caught Unarmed(Ex) Drayden gains a +2 bonus to all Sleight of Hand checks to conceal a weapon.
Pack Tactics(Ex) When Drayden and Koba are flanking the same creature, the Drayden’s flanking bonus on attack rolls increases to +4.
Parrying Defense(Ex) Drayden gains a +2 shield bonus to his AC when he is using a dagger in his off-hand, or has his off-hand free.
Quicker Than the Eye(Ex) Drayden gains a +2 bonus to initiative checks.
War Hound(Ex) Drayden is accompanied at virtually all times by his loyal war hound Koba. Koba is treated as a 7th level druid’s wolf animal companion.