Flame Effigy's page

I am definitely in for this.

Dotting.

And as soon as I look through my options, I will pm you with my choice, taig.

Winning something caught me off guard.

Sure thing. I'm interested.

A very, very special snowflake.

I don't know about physical fire, but acid would work for energy earth, wouldn't it?
Or something

Tons more archetypes and talents can never hurt, and I hoooonestly would have rather have seen Kineticist Adventures than Occult Adventures.

Yeah....no.

These contradictory stances devalue your feedback because it seems to me that there is no pleasing you and you won't explain why 4-class in one is BS. Since this is a discussion thread, I want to know why you feel that way.

Other classes are one class in one, because they're a class with a clear theme and concept. They have (mostly) many class features, their abilities (mostly) build on one another, and their features can be traded away and customized with archetypes, or doubled up on with feats.

The Vigilante is four "classes" in one. Each class is a watered down version of an existing class, you only get "Vigilante" abilities every other level, you have to spend your talents that you only get every other level to even become the watered down class in the first place, your abilities don't build on one another (Most of the abilities don't scale. If you want vII then you have to spend another one of your limited talents on it.).
The four classes in one means that the "base" doesn't really benefit from any version, the class is constantly pulling in different directions...really why aren't the four different specializations just archetypes?
If they were archetypes you could actually make a functional base class.

Imagine the Stalker as a base class. You get your skill points, you get to sneak around, you get to FEEL like a vigilante. Then you overlay the Warlock on it, or the Avenger, or the Zealot. You build on yourself rather than having to start from the ground up and being horrifically delayed.

Some of the most frequent comments were that the specializations should be combined or that there should be a shared pool of talents between all the specializations, and that there needed to be a feat to gain extra talents.

You're playing a vanilla fighter/caster/inquisitor///commoner multiclass with extra skill points.

Renown also doesn't scale for some asinine reason. You have to spend your social persona talents on each passing level. There weren't enough enough persona talents to choose from in the playtest, so there was zero reason to give us the false choice.

False choices false choices false choices, that's the class in a nutshell.

Sure if you build one high level it might look okay, since you're getting everything at once, but playing one and having to level up only to see "Well...I kind of HAVE to do this. Boy, sure would be nice to just play the class I'm emulating and get real class features" is extremely disheartening.

Also, I know this is a discussion thread for you to learn opinions, but have you read through the playtest threads? They give a lot of the info that's been posted here.

Actually plan out a Warlock and see what you'll have at each level and what talents you'll have left to spend on "cool things" after going through yout talent taxes. Then pull up another 3/4 caster (like a magus) and see how they compare. Remember, every other class can use a feat to get more of its class features /except/ the vigilante.
You'll see why it isn't as solid as you think.

You're effectively playing a 3/4 caster with no class features until high level.

If you delay your talent taxes, well then you're basically way behind for little to no benefit.

Because we didn't get enough material to playtest and only the Stalker had relevant developer feedback.

A Lawful Good on a party can be just as disruptive as a Chaotic Neutral.

Hell, two Lawful Goods on the same team who have conflicting ideas of "Lawful Good" can be the worst of all.

If one of the Lawful Goods thinks that KILL EVERYONE WHO PINGS AS EVIL PURGE THEM and the other is Lawful Good he might think "Yeah no" and they'll fight about it.

If one of the Lawful Goods thinks that KILL EVERYONE WHO PINGS AS EVIL PURGE THEM and the other is Chaotic Neutral he might think "This guy is going to get himself killed, draw attention to us, and ruin our plans" and they'll fight about it.

If one of the Lawful Goods thinks that "Follow the law, don't eat puppies, and we won't have problems" and the other is Chaotic Neutral, unless he has no sense of self preservation, no motives, and no goals, he'll say "Yeah okay. I should probably not annoy you since we're both on the same side, and as a Chaotic Neutral, I'm looking out for myself and my own interests. If we fight I won't be able to get X. I'll play be your rules because it helps me."

If you're playing an insane sowacky lel character, don't even put an alignment on your sheet. Just write "Insane".

The entire book to be kineticist focused.

But really, I'd love love love a mesmerist archetype that trades out its tricks for witch Hexes. That'd be literally my favorite clss ever. (along with spell list edits, etc etc.)

You don't.

"But I have a wizard who spent 500 years preparing for yada yada yada, infinite buffs something something something"

Yeah, Lucifer's been doing the same thing far longer than you, along with having an entire plane at his fingertips. You don't.

There's 0 way you'd ever just wind up in a square room with him alone on one side and your party on the other.

Final thoughts on the Warlock, since that was my favorite class.

What I liked:
The "core" of it, honestly.
By core, I mean the 3/4 BaB Sixth Level caster thing with spammable bolts it has going on. I like the shadow themed talents, the battle armor is awesome, educated defense is great. On a whole, it really fits a lot of mental concepts.

What I don't like:
The execution doesn't always fit, though. I liked the core, but that's all the class feels like sometimes, a core.
If you make the class how it's "meant" to be made, you're basically vanilla caster with no flex room. The Arcane Training takes up all your Talents, and if you also want Armor Training then there goes anything you had left.
The bolts were also severely weakened between playtest 1 and 2.
I know that it's only half the class, and that the social persona must also be taken into account (Since you basically alternate between vigilante levels and social persona levels), but the social persona only grants so much, making you feel like a weak multiclass between a purely social character and a caster, and as most of us know, multiclassing with casters really hurts the caster.
The Warlock doesn't have much wiggle room. If you have a chance between taking Arcane Training or not, there should be other options for you to take, but as is, it's a false choice. You either take it, or you take it because there's nothing much else. The rest don't stand on their own, they only serve to enhance the 6th Level casting, but since the 6th Level casting takes up so many of your talents, they don't get to shine.

What I would change:
Instead of having Arcane Training II-VI all being separate talents, group them together.
Arcane Training II+III, Arcane Training IV-V, and Arcane Training VI+ an added bonus of some sort. Perhaps an upgraded form of Signature Spell?
That way, if you really want the class to have to buy its class feature, it at least is less painful and opens up more options.

Introduce Bomb Training II+. Bombs are an interesting direction for the Warlock to take, but as they are right now, there's really no reason to take them, since you'd be going away from Arcane Training. As I said before, Arcane Training shouldn't be the only option for the Warlock. This would give you the option of ignoring Arcane Training for something else that is also viable. This would also open up more character concepts. (Even though I don't know why Bomb Training would be with Warlock, but that's a different matter entirely.)

Return the Warlock's bolt damage back to what it was in the first playtest.

Just throw out Vengeance Strike. I know it's a capstone ability and most people won't ever reach it, but it just feels like a flop. I don't really have a suggestion for what to replace it with, sorry.

Stunning Apperance is split up with its two upgrades, Frightening and Stunning. Maybe combine them all into one scaling ability and then give another small bonus at 11 and 17? Maybe a bonus combat feat could work.

I don't like the spellbook. Familiars should be available as an alternate to spellbooks without the need of a talent. Maybe something like:
A Warlock begins play with either a Spellbook, Familiar, or Bound object from which he gains his power.

Debuffing options!
A vigilante sneaking through the shadows, using his magic to cripple the enemy before coming in to strike them down is something I'm sure a few people would like to play as. The Wizard/Sorc spell list gives you plenty of debuff, but what about talents that also grant buff abilities?
Such as a talent that can debuff an enemy when they're hit by a bolt?
A talent/archetype that gives the Warlock the Witch's spell list instead of the Wizard/Sorcerer (the way the zealot can get alternate spell lists) and gives the Warlock a small number of certain hexes (maybe 1 every three levels) would be cool.
The magus has the 3/4 BAB 6th Level Wizard/Sorcerer gimmick going on, with the added bonus of blackblade/kensei/arcane pool options, magus talents, extra feats, while the Warlock gets bolts and maybe a few other things, while being forced to use his class features to unlock what he's supposed to be doing in the first place. (again, if other directions are made available for the warlock, taking Arcane Specialization might not feel like such a forced choice.)
Witch/Hex options just seem like something that could thematically fit while filling in a niche.

There really needs to be an Extra Talent feat if the Warlock is going to be forced to give up his talents to do what he's being forced to do anyway, even if you can just take the extra talent feat once.

With having the option of taking talents OTHER than Arcane Training, you could do something like Battle Armor, Bombs, and Bolts (With buffs) and create an entirely different character concept than somehow who took all the Arcane Training.

And lastly, scaling AC without the need for Armor. How about something like Canny Defense/Monk's Wisdom to AC (But not with Wisdom.)

---

Final thoughts on the class as a whole:
I love the idea of switching between a regular person who gains bonuses on regular skill checks and a superhuman warlock who can use his powers.

But there weren't enough social talents to choose from in the playtest, so you might as well have just been given a specific social talent every other level instead of getting to choose, because choosing was largely pointless. Unfortunately, that's what a lot of the choices of this class feel like, pointless. You either take the obvious thing and play a character who's lost half the talents doing what they were supposed to, or you pick things that look cool and interesting, and lose access to the thing you should be able to do in the first place. It'd be like if the Barbarian had to give up Rage Talents to learn how to Rage, and had to continue to give up Rage Talents to get his Rage to scale. And also couldn't take Extra Rage Power as a feat. And 3/4 of the Rage Powers weren't available to him.
Yeah, that's a silly example, but the hyperbole is just to show how the class feels sometimes when looking at the choices.

I do understand that there will be many more talents in the finalized version, and that we were only seeing a small portion, but the portion we were allowed to see just wasn't enough and it left a bad taste in a lot of people's mouths.

I really do love the concept of this class, even though most of what I said about it seems negative.

As a standard action, taken as part of your move

Pause

Or, as part of a charge.

There. Fixed?

I'm ready for 2.0

If by 2.0 you mean a republication of the core rulebook that's basically identical but is entirely rewritten with clear and consistent language (and probably renaming of certain actions/other terms so that they don't share a name with something else), includes information from other books so that those ones don't need to be rewritten, and maybe an adjustment on what spells belong to which school.

They're not bipolar, they're not insane, they don't have multiple personality disorder, they don't have schizophrenia.

It also isn't as much of an issue as people think. You're looking for a solution to a problem you yourself are causing.

Or:

Combine Avenge and Stalker, add more Warlock stuff, and just delete Zealot.

I really like this class, especially the Warlock and Avenger paths for the Vigilante, but I'd like if there was a way to mix-and-match the paths a little, instead of being stuck on one.

If you somehow can make a construct, attach it as the head.

Akata was it! Thank you very much for helping me find it quickly.

Keep a notebook out during the game to write down details your players learn of, things they do, and ideas they give you.
This way you don't have to wonder "Did they meet this guy yet? Do they know him by name?" and you can have a little checklist of the previous session to start quicker week-by-week.

Split it into two parties, and then when half the people inevitably drop out, combine the remaining people into a single group.