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The necromancer's athame let's a necromancer swap any prepared necromancy spell for another necromancy spell he knows of the same level or lower. My question is, can the swapped spell include a metamagic?

For example, let's say I have magic jar prepared, a 5th level spell. Could I exchange that for a bestow curse with the reach metamagic (which raises the spell level of bestow curse from 4th to 5th)?

The Final Revelation of the Heavens Mystery states that if you die "you are reborn 3 days later in the form of a star child, who matures over the course of 7 days (treat as the reincarnate spell)." But how does this happen? Does some random woman somewhere in the world immaculately conceive a baby and give birth to it a week later? Does a stork from heaven come and drop off the baby to the party? What, if anything, happens to your old body?

What is your favorite Oracle Mystery, and why?

I would probably have to say mine is Wind. The bonus spell list is pretty good (and includes the best spell ever - control winds). I also love the revelations, which include several very useful and powerful abilities, from invisibily to 90 ft. perfect manueverability flight.

Does the Air Bubble spell protect against posion gases and the like? What about the cloudkill spell?

Could I summon spiders, scorpions or centipedes with summon minor monsters and then cast giant vermin on them to make them enormous?

The rules for the Oracle's curse state that it "cannot be removed or dispelled without the aid of a deity." The miracle spell states that "you don't so much cast a miracle as request one. You state what you would like to happen and request that your deity (or the power you pray to for spells) intercede."

So can a miracle spell be used to get rid of an Oracle's curse? If so, what happens? Would the oracle lose the entire curse (including its beneficial effects) or just the negative part of the curse?

The miracle spell also states that "in any event, a request that is out of line with the deity's (or alignment's) nature is refused." Since it was the gods (or other divine forces) that cursed oracles to begin with, would lifting their cuse be something they'd refuse to do?

If a miracle spell wouldn't do the trick, what about wish? Wish is considered to be equivalent in power to divine intervention, as far as I recall. Would this fall under the "remove injuries and afflictions" function of that spell, or would it be one of the potentially dangerous "greater effects" that you can attempt with that spell?

The Haunted curse says that "any item you drop lands 10 feet away from you in a random direction." So let's say I have a metamagic rod, and I put a strap on it, which I then attach to my belt. Wouldn't it simply fall to my side when I drop it, rather than land 10 feet away?

While I like most of the changes that Pathfinder made to 3.5, I must admit that I was disappointed that they didn't eliminate what is, IMO, one of the worst elements of the magic system, the Hit Die limit on certain spells. Cause Fear, Sleep, and several other spells have a limit on how many HD they can affect, meaning that these spells eventually become completely useless. I think this is an absolutely terrible mechanic. A spell should never become useless! Worse, in some cases this is used to justify a spell being quite overpowered (Sleep, I'm looking at YOU), with the rationale that it's okay for it to be overpowered from level 1 to 4 because after level 5 it's useless. This is just terrible game design.

And looking at Cause Fear, for example, why is the 5 HD limit even needed? It affects a single target and only lasts for 1d4 rounds. I can't imagine this spell being overpowered even if you could attempt to use it on a level 20 monster. This is even worse for its successor spell, Scare, since it is only useful for a whopping 2 levels before becoming ineffective (or only 1 level for a sorcerer). Fear, thankfully, doesn't have this problem. Granted, it's a 4th level spell, but it also affects a large area and inflicts a worse degree of fear than Cause Fear and Scare do. These spells really would be just fine with their HD limit removed.

So, would it really kill the game to remove the HD limit on these spells? Naturally, a couple of them would need to be adjusted to balance this change, like Sleep and Deep Slumber, though most of these spells would probably not need to be changed in any other way. Pathfinder did change one spell that became useless at higher levels in 3rd edition - Dispel Magic, and I welcomed that change. They really should have gone all the way and made sure that every spell has some relevance no matter what level you are.

Is it just me, or is the sands of time spell (from UM) extremely underpowered? It's a level 3 spell and all it does is advance a target to the next age category. All that does is give it a -1 penalty to its physical ability scores (or worsens an older target's ability score penalty from age by 1). Alternatively, you can do 3d6 + 1/level damage to a construct, object or undead creature.

That seems to me to be a very weak effect for a level 3 single target spell, especially when it requires a touch. Neither the debuff nor the damage are impressive at all. Compare this to 2nd level touch spells like touch of idiocy or ghoul touch, for example. Those spells have much nastier effects and are a full level lower.

Am I missing something, or is this spell just really weak?

If an Oracle with the Lame curse casts freedom of movement on himself, does he move at normal speed?

So I was building a sorcerer and decided to make one with the stormborn bloodline. I was thinking to myself, you know, electricity isn't anything like fire, which has a reputation for practically every monster and its cousin being resistant or immune to it. But looking through the Pathfinder Bestiary, boy was I ever wrong about that!

Here's a list of all of the monster types in the Pathfinder Bestiary that are flat-out immune to electricity: Archons (all types), Assassin Vine, Azatas (all types), Behir, Demons (all types), Blue Dragon, Bronze Dragon, Froghemoth, Gelatinous Cube, Genie (Shaitan), Giant (Storm), Golems (all types), Lich, Ochre Jelly, Roper, Shambling Mound, Shocker Lizard, Vegepygmy and Will-o-wisp.

As for which creatures are merely resistant to electricity, rather than totally immune, the list is much shorter: Aasimar, Angels (all types), Electric eel, Half-Celestial, Half-Fiend, Intellect Devourer, Shoggoth, Tiefling, Vampire and Xorn.

As I'm reading the "immune electricity" on most of these monsters, I'm thinking to myself "WHY?" Okay, I get why a shocker lizard or blue dragon is immune to electricity, but ALL demons, Archons and Azatas? The hell? The one that really stumped me was the shambling mound. It's a freaking walking clump of wood and vegetable matter, and it's immune to lightning? Bwuh? The electricity immunity on half of these monsters makes no sense to me.

It seems to me that most of these monsters are immune to electricity "just because." Maybe they just thought it would be too much fun to actually play a sorcerer that can, you know, actually hurt things with his spells *cough* sarcasm *cough.* I can see certain creatures being resistant to the various elements, even the occasional immunity, for the sake of adding a strategic element to the game, but this is ridiculous!

I'm curious about the Abudnant Revelations feat (and likewise the ring of revelations). The feat says: "Choose one of your revelations that has a number of uses per day. You gain 1 additional use per day of that revelation." Simlarly, the Ring of Revelation says: "If the oracle already has that revelation and the revelation gives an ability with a limited number of uses per day, the oracle can use that ability one additional time per day."

How does this work with revelations like Bone Armor? Does an 8th level Oracle that takes the feat Abundant Revelation (Bone Armor) get an extra 8 hours per day of his bone armor? Would he get an additional 8 hours per day (for a total of 24 hours per day) of Bone Armor if he wore a Bone Armor Ring of Revelation?

If a dual-cursed Oracle uses the Oracle's Burden spell on an enemy, does it suffer the drawbacks of both curses?

It seems that alot of people here hate damage-dealing spells. Yes, I've read Treantmonk's guide and am familiar with the typical arguments against it. The thing is, is it really that bad?

Yeah, Haste is a great spell and, depending on how many fighter-types you have in your group, it can, over its duration, contribute more damage than Fireball. Yes, fireball does fire damage and has a saving throw. But your fighter can also miss on his attacks and enemies can have DR that he's not able to circumvent. Fireball also hits a ton of enemies at once, while it may take several rounds for the fighter types of deal as much damage to as many enemies thanks to haste.

And yes, summoning is great. No argument there. But once you've summoned a monster and hasted your party, then what? Does your wizard just sit there and pick his nose? That's when, it seems to me, you should start blasting, because the sooner your enemies die, the less damage your party takes. Sure, he can do other things too, like use enchantment or other debuff spells, or use other tactics as best fits his character. Nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with blasting either.

Yeah, things like black tentacles and sleet storm can be great "control" spells, but they also aren't party friendly. You hasted your fighter, but now he has to pull out a bow and start shooting the enemies because they're in your crowd control zone of doom that he doesn't dare enter. That's counter productive. I'm not saying that spells like Black Tentacles suck, on the contrary, they can be devastating when used appropriately. I'm just saying that they aren't always superior to blasting spells. Things often appear much better on paper than they are in practice.

Has anyone tried out an Oracle with the Time mystery yet? It looks quite promising. It gets Perception and UMD as class skills, which is very nice. Perception is the most-used skill in the game, and UMD coupled with the Oracle's high Cha should allow you to use any item you want. You could even get arcane spell scrolls and then make them Permanent since you get Permanency as one of your bonus spells.

Contingency looks like another very powerful option. It's good enough for an arcane caster, but a divine caster can use it with things like Heal or Breath of Life. Memory Lapse could be useful in roleplaying situations. I'm not sure why they get Disintegrate, but I can certainly think of worse spells to get. Temporal Stasis is a crappy spell, but Time Stop more than makes up for it. Again, this spell is arguably even better for a divine caster than an arcanist. 1d4 rounds of free time to heal, buff and summon? Yes!

The revelations look pretty nice too. Rolling for intiative 3 times and taking whatever result you want? Wow. Haste/Slow a few times a day? Yummy. Re-rolling bad rolls, teleporting out of grapples, taking an enemy out of the fight for several rounds, all of these are really nice powers. And at level 20, you get to become immortal.

So if I am understanding this correctly, the only way I can have a familiar as a sorcerer is to have the Arcane Bloodline? Seriously? Is there at least a feat or something I can take to get a familiar as a different bloodline? I don't understand why I can't play an Infernalist sorcerer with a pet imp. :(

Am I correct in my understanding that this ability offers no saving throw to reduce or negate its effects?

Ever since 3rd edition came out, I've always wondered why casters don't get bonus 0th level spells per day from a high ability score. Why? And why did Pathfinder continue this tradition? Is there really any good reason not to give bonus cantrips? Would it really break the game if a person could prepare 6 or 7 0th level spells per day?

The way it is now, Sorcerers have an unfair advantage over Wizards. Sorcerers can know 9 cantrips, while Wizards can only ever prepare 4 cantrips at a time (5 for a specialist). At no other spell level is there such a huge disparity between the number of spells a wizard can prepare at a time and the number of spells a sorcerer knows.

Under the Oracle's "Spells" entry there is no mention of them being restricted from casting spells of opposing alignments, as the Cleric and Druid are. Is this intentional?

On a similar note, can Oracles lose their divine spells and powers for misbehavior the way a Cleric or Druid can, or is their power theirs to do with as they will?

I think the Magus Reflection Arcana is too powerful. It's better than counterspelling even with the Improved Counterspell and Parry Spell feats!

First of all, you can counter a spell with any spell of the same level. Even the Improved Counterspelling feat isn't that versatile, with that feat you have to spend a higher level spell and it has to be of the same school as the spell being countered.

Second, it not only cancels it, it reflects it back at the caster, basically giving the magus a free Parry Spell feat.

Third, and most important of all, the Magus doesn't have to ready an action to counter the incoming spell! It's an immediate action for him! And since there is no daily limit to this ability (other than expending spell slots), the Magus can unleash this power far too often to be balanced, IMO.

Granted, the magus can "only" counter spells up to 6th level. But so what? As someone who frequently plays spellcasters I can tell you that even at high level, I use 6th level and lower spells very often.

I suggest either limiting it to one us per day, like most of the other arcana abilities, or require the Magus to ready an action to counter incoming spells, like all other spellcasters must do to counterspell.

One thing I noticed about the Magus spells is that the only touch attack spell they get is Shocking Grasp. When they have a class ability to utilize touch spells, it's not very useful when they only have one such spell on their entire spell list! Why not add Chill Touch, Bestow Curse, Vampiric Touch, Touch of Fatigue, etc. to their spell list? Come to think of it, I don't see even a sigle Necromancy spell on their list. Is there a reason for this?

Actually, the more I think about it, would it really unbalance anything if they just had access to the entire Sor/Wiz spell list of 0th to 6th level? They still have to pay money and find the spells to add them to their spellbooks, and I can't really see any reason why having a larger selection of spells to choose from would unbalance them. They'll still be far behind Wizards in spellcasting due to having a much slower spell progression and missing out on 7th to 9th level spells entirely.

I noticed that the Summoner can't have his eidolon summoned and use a summon monster spell at the same time. This is baffling to me. Why not? A druid can have his animal companion and still use Summon Nature's Ally, and Druids get 9th level spells! Wizards and Clerics get 9th level spells, and they can have a horde of undead and summoned monsters at the same time. I just don't understand why it's okay for those classes to have multiple minions but not the class that's dedicated to summoning and gives up a large chunk of spells for that ability.

I think the new alchemist class is pretty interesting, and I've been considering playing one, but something about them really bothers me - the daily limit on their bombs, which is their main attack. Why was putting a (level + Int mod) limit of bombs per day really necessary? Our group is level 12, so the alchemist bombs would be doing 5d6 + Int mod damage. That looks impressive at a glance, but it really isn't. Our barbarian and arcane archer can do far more damage than that, and there's no daily limit on how many times a Barbarian can swing his sword or an archer can shoot his bow!

The alchemist bomb damage is only a little bit more than the warlock's eldritch blast (same damage, the alchemist just adds his Int bonus), and that class was far from overpowered being able to use its EB at-will. Our warlock regularly had by far the lowest damage per round of any character in the group. I can understand why the developers would want to err on the conservative side, but did the playtesting really suggest that the bombs would be overpowered if they didn't have a daily limit? Considering my groups extensive experience with warlocks, I find it hard to understand why a daily limit on alchemist bombs was considered necessary.

Last night our group ran up against a horned devil. Our party is all 11-12th level, and we were having great difficulty fighting this thing. Most of our sorcerer's spells and my wizard's failed to get through its high SR and saves. We didn't even bother trying to nuke the thing with blasts, since we assumed that, as a powerful devil, it would be highly resistant if not immune to most elements. Nobody in the group has a holy weapon, so our fighter types barely even scratched it with its DR.

So then I get the idea to summon a Celestial Dire Tiger. Looking at the celestial template, i notice it has the Smite Evil ability. Cool, I thought, maybe that would allow it to get through the devil's DR and deal some decent damage before dying. Well, then we look at the Smite Evil rules and ... wow. The Dire Tiger adds +28 damage (twice its HD) to EVERY attack because the creature is a devil AND completely ignores its DR. So I roll the attacks, and 3 claws (our bard was kind enough to hold action and caste haste on my summon as soon as it appeared), a bite, and 2 rake attacks hit. I end up doing over 200 points of damage to the devil, killing it.

Our entire group was speachless. We read and reread the smite evil rules to be sure we were doing it correctly. I mean, there's just no way this could be right. If we understand it correctly, it's such a horrendously overpowered and cheesy ability I feel dirty for even using it. One summon with one special attack shouldn't make an encounter go from perilous for a 6 person party to easy as pie, should it?

Tell me we're reading Smite Evil wrong. Please. I've been pretty impressed with the relatively well balanced changes to Pathfinder so far, but this new Smite Evil is just... insane.

What are your favorite creatures to use animate dead on?

My personal favorite is the nightmare steed skeleton. Since it flew magically while alive, it retains that ability in death, and has an impressive fly speed of 90. Further, unlike a living mount, it never tires or needs to be fed.

The Archmage prestige class never made it into Pathfinder (and I'm glad for that), but I do miss some of the special abilities it offered, so I've remade them as feats. Let me know what you think.

Arcane Fire
You can channel stored spell energy into arcane fire, manifesting as a bolt of pure magical energy.
Prerequisites: Skill Focus (Spellcraft), ability to cast 5th level arcane spells
Benefit: You can expend a prepared spell (or unused spell slot) of 1st level or higher to shoot a bolt of arcane fire as a standard action. This is a ranged touch attack with long range (400 ft. + 40 ft./arcane caster level). The bolt deals 1d6 damage per level of the spell or spell slot expended to power it, plus your Intelligence or Charisma modifier, whichever ability governs your spellcasting. This is a supernatural ability, so spell resistance does not apply.

Arcane Reach
You can use your touch spells at a distance.
Prerequisites: Skill Focus (Spellcraft), ability to cast 7th level arcane spells
Benefit:You can use arcane spells with a range of touch on targets at up to short range (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 arcane caster levels). You must make a ranged touch attack to hit an unwilling target. Using this ability increases the spell's casting time. If the spell normally requires a standard action, its casting time is increased to a full-round action, and a spell with a longer casting time takes an extra full-round action to cast.

Mastery of Counterspelling
You can turn hostile magic back against its source.
Prerequisites: Improved Counterspell, Skill Focus (Spellcraft), ability to cast 7th level arcane spells
Benefit: When you counterspell a spell, you can turn it back against the caster as if it were fully affected by a spell turning spell. If the spell cannot be affected by spell turning, then it is merely counterspelled.

Mastery of Elements
You can substitute one element for another.
Prerequisites: Spell Focus in two schools of magic, ability to cast 8th level arcane spells
Benefit: You can alter an arcane spell when cast so that it utilizes a different element from the one it normally uses. This ability can only alter a spell with the acid, cold, electricity, fire or sonic descriptor. You decide whether to alter the spell's energy type and choose the new energy type when you begin casting. Using this ability increases the spell's casting time. If the spell normally requires a standard action, its casting time is increased to a full-round action, and a spell with a longer casting time takes an extra full-round action to cast.

Mastery of Shaping
You can unleash area spells without harming your allies.
Prerequisites: Spell focus in two schools of magic, ability to cast 6th level arcane spells
Benefit: You can alter arcane area and effect spells that utilize one of the following shapes: burst, blast, cylinder, emanation or spread. The alteration consists of creating spaces within the spell's area that are not subject to the spell. The minimum dimension for these spaces is a 5-foot cube. Furthermore, any shapable arcane spells have a minimum dimension of 5 feet instead of 10 feet. Using this ability increases the spell's casting time. If the spell normally requires a standard action, its casting time is increased to a full-round action, and a spell with a longer casting time takes an extra full-round action to cast.

Spell Power
Your favored spells are paticularly potent.
Prerequisites: Spell Focus, ability to cast 5th level arcane spells
Benefit: Choose a school of magic for which you have taken the Spell Focus feat. You gain a +1 bonus to your effective caster level for spells of that school (for level dependent variables such as damage or range, and caster level checks only).
Special: You can take this feat more than once. Its benefits do not stack. Each time you take this feat, its benefits apply to another school of magic for which you have taken Spell Focus.

A few comments:
You'll notice that, unlike the old prestige class, these abilties do not require the permanent sacrifice of spell slots. This was deliberate. I always hated that, especially since the Heirophant got similar abilities at no cost. These abilities cost feats and have fairly steep requirements - that should be enough. Also, some of them aren't as powerful as they used to be.

In the other thread people mentioned what Improved Familiar they like. But what is your favorite familar assuming you don't take that feat and have just a normal critter?

My favorite is probably the rat. It grants a +2 bonus to fortitude saves which helps make one of the wizard's weak points a strength. It's also an excellent scout and spy. It can climb and swim, squeeze through extremely tiny holes, chew through just about anything, and, best of all, nobody is going to think anything about a rat running around in a dungeon. They're everywhere! So most enemies will go "oh, it's just a rat" while an owl, weasel or some other animal is going to raise suspicion if it's noticed most of the time.

Do attacks made with telekinesis count as "direct" attacks for the purpose of breaking invisibility? One could argue that an object hurled with that spell is as much an indirect attack as a summoned monster or mage's sword spell. Thoughts?

We're starting up a new campaign with level 11 characters. It says that we get 82,000g to buy our items. My question is, if I have item creation feats and the required level and spells to make an item, can I buy it at half price? I couldn't find anything in the book either way.

Our group just started playing Pathfinder a few weeks ago and we noticed that Staffs are no longer extremely overpriced wands. You can actually recharge them now, something I've wanted to see for ages! I might actually buy a staff now, imagine that. ;)

I like the Alchemist, but the class definitely needs some beefing up. Right now it is really weak compared to other classes, especially spellcasters.

Bombs: These should be at-will. There's no limit to how many times a day a Rogue can Sneak Attack, there should be no limit to how many times an Alchemist can use his primary attack. It's really no more powerful than the Warlock class. In fact, due to its very short range, splash attack which indiscriminately hits allies who are in melee with the target, etc, it's actually much weaker. A special ability that allows them to exclude a target from the splash damage of their bombs would also be nice. Giving them the equivalent of the Far Shot feat with thier bombs would also help alot.

Extracts: I have a number of issues with the way extracts work. First, you should absolutely not need a discovery to share these with others. No other "spellcaster" in the game is completely unable to cast his spells on other people! Even if they had the ability to do so, they still have a number of huge disadvantages compared even with the Bard. Since they can only make spells in extract form, you have to hand them to the target and the target must then spend another action drinking it to gain any benefit. This makes "casting" them on others during combat a major chore. Really, the only way to effectively share them would be to create and pass them out beforehand. Also, you can't ever have a multi-target effect with these. I'm fine with these drawbacks, but really, the inability to even pass them out to others without spending a discovery (of which you get so, so few) just kills the class.

Extracts and Oils: I strongly recommend that alchemists be able to make extracts that are oils, not just potions. This would expand their spell list to include things like Magic Item and Make Whole. Adding some of the transmuting effects like Transmute Mud to Rock to their "spell" list would likewise make them more fun and versatile. Their "spell" list right now is way too small, a fraction of the size of Bards'. Alchemists in legends were certainly involved in experimenting with objects, compounds and transmutations, not just potions people drink.

Cantrip Extracts: I think they should have the ability to use at-will cantrips like every other caster. These don't even need to be extracts, per se, they could be simple rotes that the alchemist learned that form the basis of their enchantments and imbuing techniques. Spells like resistance, detect magic, light, mending, and so forth would go a long way to making the class more fun.

Mutagens: This is probably the weirdest feature of the class. I think it would be best to just make these buff "spells" that are on the Alchemist's Extract Formulae list. The Charisma damage for drinking them is rubbish. There's no good reason for that drawback. Clerics, Wizards, etc don't suffer any negative effects for casting buffs on themselves (or others), why should alchemists?

Poisons: I think poisons should be part of the alchemist class, but the way they work now, it just doesn't feel quite right. Their poison use features encourage them to play more like assassins. I think they should get the ability to make poisons in bomb form, as long as the poison doesn't use the ingestion vector.

Discoveries: The Alchemsist just doesn't get enough of these. I strongly recommend giving them one discovery for every 2 levels. Even then, they'll never be able to compete with the versatility and firepower of a wizard, but at least they won't be so extremely limited in their options.

Alchemical Items: They should be able to use their own save DC calculation when using things like tanglefoot bags, so that these items retain some use at higher levels for them.

Magical Items: I really would like the Alchemist to be able to treat their class levels as caster levels for the purpose of item creation feats. Brew Potion, in particular, is something they should get for free! Likewise, I think they should be able to spend extract daily uses to recharge staffs. You could also give them the option to use the Use Magic Device skill to substitute for spells they don't have on their list. I realize they're alchemsist not enchanters, but they should at least be as capable in that regard as spellcasters are, IMHO. When it comes to Brewing Potions, they should be unrivaled. I'd suggest allowing them to make potions of any level, not just 3rd level and less.

Has anyone seen or made some character sheets for animal companions, familiars, summons, etc?