Falkos's page

Soldier and Primary target.

Assuming that you can make an Strike with an Area weapon, seems intended. Is extra ammo consumed? Area weapons expending so many extra charges would make them near worthless with needing to reload practically every round. See Singing coil and Starfall pistol

I read it as the primary target attack is part of the AoE itself but reasonable minds could disagree

Can you Primary Target with a thrown grenade? Grenade Launcher?

Boon for Gill Hook, uncommon weapon

"Any one" means you must choose any one specific lore. Not just lore as a whole subcategory. So you can't use "Lore" you would have to choose "Warfare Lore" You can certainly tie in two specific Lores together.

I don't think your interpretation is correct. However, for the sake of argument if you couldn't, just tie in Loremaster Lore to Arcana or Occultism and take your normal skill increases in the chosen skill. I'm guessing most would do this anyway as wanting Loremaster skill to increase later on is important and at 15 there is always Grand Unified Theory which is amazing and requires Legendary Arcana anyway. You'd end up 95% of the way there, just with fewer critical successes on the rerolls and would be less interesting. You would still never crit fail on the initial roll once you get Unmistakable Lore and thus and would always get your reroll if you failed. Everything else works as stated.

Honestly, it would probably even be more optimal in the long run as if you fail an Arcana knowledge check you would have the backup with Loremaster because it goes in both directions. Arcana checks would be made much more often then an Underworld Lore (or whatever Lore) check.

There is always the Pocket Library spell as well which could bridge the gap on the important rolls early on before level 5 and Unmistakable Lore.

The scope of the updates to the Advanced Class Guide have put a solid dent in several character concepts. So I figured it might be cathartic to have a place to remember those characters who will either have to drastically be altered to the point that they might as well be different characters or who might not be played again due to the changes.

So step up one and all to the podium and eulogize those brave heroes smote in the prime of their lives by The Hammer of Er-ra'ta.

Favian Aldori was a promising kensai magus and student of the Aldori dueling school, who's career was cut short due to a sudden inability to mix his spellcasting with the slashing grace of his swordplay.

With Slashing Grace no longer working with Spell Combat, the character would either have to take 3 levels or rogue or wait until he had enough fame to buy an agile weapon in order to have the same effectiveness with his blade as he used to have right at level 1. Sure there is always the rapier/fencing grace route or the dervish dance, but the character is Favian Aldori, so the character isn't the same if he can't use an Aldori dueling sword any longer.

Or do what I did with my kensai magus, before the ACG came out. Take 1 level in the Aldori Swordlord Prestige class. It fits the flavor and is actually a pretty good level to take.

To Mark especially:

For the Bolt Ace, Any chance for clarification if Sharp Shoot deed is supposed to NOT work with Dealt Aim feat?

This seems to be an oversight, especially now with the Signiture Deed feat change to Sharp Shoot.

Not to derail the thread...

As another player in the game, The GM didn't even so much as "allow" it, more "allowed it to occur", but it was also mildly the fault of the player. There was an in game random effect that could occur, and you could set the level of randomness. He had set the randomness to the highest level, (which by the way is something that completely made sense for his character to do, with his alignment axis in chaotic and in the situation that presented itself). His stat could just as easily have -doubled- rather then reduced to 1.

Other examples that happened was my character turned very dragonish. My character later lost -every- piece of equipment to a different effect. Currently walking around with nothing. Both occurred due to choices made, and some random effects. I could have earned a bunch of wealth... but instead lost all my gear. At least stuff can be replaced... while stats are a harder thing to fix. No restoration spell will work.

It is a crazy place, run by an 'old school' GM that does often enjoy throwing out the rulebook from time to time and include things you will never find in any source-book. Bad things can happen. Opened mindedness and rolling with things are key to the campaign, something I try to remind myself often while playing. Looking forward to see what happens next. I say this for the people thinking that the GM was "out for blood". This was definitely not the case.

The original poster is one of the finest role-players I have the pleasure of knowing. If anyone can pull it off, I know he can. Pretty sure I could not. Working on restoring him will be a thing that we will look out to be able to do in the future.

Mithral Chain shirt or Mithral Kikko armor can be a great investment on a Kensai Magus. Just need to put up with the 10% spell failure. Can go a long way to making you a "tank" though, especially if enchanted. Cast spells without S components don't have a failure chance at all. Some will be what you want to do -anyway- as a tank, such as blur and displacement, dimension door in front or away. True strike to hit those though targets.

If you are looking to be truly tanky, the Aldori Dueling Sword with the dueling mastery feat can be quite good. Gives +init and +2 shield bonus... Something a kensai has a tough time acquiring. Slashing grace works well here too.

Example Feats:
Human
[Kensai] - Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Aldori Dueling Sword)
[Kensai] - Weapon Focus (Aldori Dueling Sword)
[Human] - Weapon Finesse
[1st] - Slashing Grace (Aldori Dueling Sword)
[3rd] - Dodge
[5 Magus bonus] - Quickdraw
[5th] - Aldori Dueling Mastery

I would definitely go Inspired Blade, then take Combat Trick: Fencing Grace as your first ninja trick. It will be much more effective and balanced than TWF.

I don't think i can argue with this. As much as i want do want TWF, i feel like i am trying to cram a square peg into a round hole. While i think that i could get it to fit with enough force, i think the concept is just smoother with an inspired blade, focusing on a rapier. Extra AC with a buckler isn't too shabby either.

if i wasn't doing the whole tail thing, twf would work. But i think i am just trying to combine too many character concepts on a single template

This would be the most powerful thing a magus could do with their arcana. I'd rule your level would be 0.

And I have a kensai bladebound magus as my main character. I'd say "no" but flagging for FAQ