MerlinCross's page

I don't quite get how this spell works. I basically have to build up to 4 forms? And can this form be built from anything, any mix and match of abilities that's possible(if so wow that sounds game breaking) but at the same time confusing? Like I just want to turn into a laser wolf, is that even still possible? I want to turn a threat into a toad, is that still a thing I can do or is that something that requires me to 'build toad, give bonuses" and possibly actually make the enemy stronger?

And while I'm at it, why does Polymorph 1 exist when it doesn't let you basically do anything? All the actual abilities and power ups are only allowed to be picked up from level 2 casting onward.

I keep looking at this as it might be a fun thing to do with my Biohacker but I'm going "How does this work, how does one build, why can't I just say I turn into a bug bear, get +4 to stats and be done with it?".

I'm sorry, this is probably really simple when understood and finally built out but I'm not a fan of pick and choose on abilities/spells like this. More so when I have to basically remake my character sheet a few times over or have shifting note cards per level.

Just confused and annoyed that the ruleset isn't "Fire and forget" but at the same time feels very limited and forcing into meta combos if that's how it works.

I don't think the wealth aspect is that significant unless huge amounts of trade goods are involved and then the risk of a loss of cargo comes into play. The treasure that would normally be granted by defeating a creature instead becomes the profit secured by not losing the cargo.

Not to mention the social doors that might open up when she and thus the PCs float into port with a bunch of freshly pinched wine.

But you're the one running the game an you get to decide what that particular tribe of Girtablilu are like. Sure, the bestiary says what they're typically like, but that doesn't mean ALL of them are.

Also, are the characters aware of what the Girtablilu are like or are the players using meta knowledge?
Sure, the players being aware of it is fine and maybe it's not worth telling them to not metagame, but this is a chance for you to show that not all NPCs of any one race are the exact same as all of the others.
Let this tribe of Girtablilu be the way you want them to be and maybe they'll be willing to explain to the characters why they're different from the rest of their race.
Or treat the bestiary entry as what the general population believe of a race and have it be wrong.

While true, the issue they were having was the disconnect between the Girtablilu in the book, and the ones in the AP. See this wouldn't be that much of a problem.

Save for the Maftets being right there, and basically being race shifted Girtablilu, doing the job they SHOULD be doing according to the bestiary.

It makes the player's metaknowledge break down even more when you have these two mashed up next to each other.

And while I am the one running the game, I can't think of a good answer beyond "WELL The AP said so" which to me feels like a massive cop out but I really can't think of anything else right now. I really hate handwaving things away without an actual reason.

Maybe I can do something with some of the NPCs in the desert with them...

Unless she is mainly acting as a fence for the other PCs, I am not sure how you reconcile their approaches. And even then she would have to put some distance between herself and the other PCs to do it -- at which point she puts herself at the mercy of pirate hunters and competing pirates.

Thus far the team hasn't been really big on raiding anything and everything and the two pirate vessels they have shacked, she's kinda taken over the loot that wasn't 100% lootalbe/usable. LIke the gang gets all the swords and weapons and those get vendored off but she tends to take the more bulk goods.

Put a different way, at this point they're kinda pirates who pirate the pirates and she's the friendly merchant that they travel with.

The easy solution is 1d10% gross profit on each transaction.

A more in depth solution would involve modelling supply and demand at a coarse level, say +/- 1d20% base price. That could be further enriched with a form of social combat from Ultimate Intrigue to add +/- 1d10% to the base price depending on the victor.

Expeditious Retreat's Silk Road has hundreds of trade goods as well as volumes and masses for each.

I'm rolling around with the idea of percentage dice as mark ups, depending on the demand for each island(I actually have note cards drawn up).

Social Combat.... I can look into that.

Oh god maaaaaaaaaaaath.

I'm running a Skull and Shackles game and have a group of pirates on the high seas. The issue is one of them isn't a pirate..., she's a merchant. And it's both interesting and adorable to see her play the trading mini game from port to port but...

I have no idea how to run this. Trade goods are listed but not all of them, lumber for example doesn't seem to have a price tag. And I'm quite unsure how to run/ask for skill checks(Diplomacy or Apprisal?)

The other issue is I'd rather not let her spiral out of control on money generation but at the same time I'm looking at economy(Yes we can poke fun at it elsewhere) of the given prices and going "Wait how'd you make money off this anyway". This is also the player that will loot the ENTIRE monster if they can, not just the treasure(We're talking bones, meat, scales, etc)

Currently I'm looking through the Isles of the Shackles book to see what each island might demand and raising the prices accordingly for trade goods but if people have experience in this type of player, let me know.

FYI, we play digitally so most the trades are done out of game on Discord so this isn't a huge problem of taking up time mid session.

MerlinCross wrote:

Kinda worried how to do a frontal assualt on the Sphinx. Most my team is kinda squishy so unsure how to let them in without murdering them.

They already snuck in once to save an NPC(custom placed) but a full on attack is worrying me

Hopefully they come up with the idea of disguising themselves as cultists and can bluff their way in?

Right now they're trying to see if they can get the Girtablilu on their side but that has led into a problem with my players.

Their understanding of Girtablilu comes from the monster books, something I haven't really felt the need to stamp down on thus far. In the beastiary they're basically described as Ruin guardians, religiously active, and holders of lost faiths.

The Girtablilu are mercenaries. Honorable yes but more considered with honor, reputation, coin, and a good fight. This caused a massive disconnect with my players last night to the point I lost about half an hour to it and there's NOTHING in the book that could explain why they are this way. I finally had to put my foot down about that with "GM explaination trumps other entries cause I can control that" but they still seem kinda hung up on that fact mainly cause the Girtablilu feel like they could have easily been slotted in for the Maftets(2 ruin living guardian races really?).

So I'm unsure just how to explain/hand wave this in a more believable manner than "GM says so" as I dislike outright playing that card. I've mentioned to the players the Girtablilu are very big on contracts and the like so maybe I can work with that?

Kinda worried how to do a frontal assualt on the Sphinx. Most my team is kinda squishy so unsure how to let them in without murdering them.

They already snuck in once to save an NPC(custom placed) but a full on attack is worrying me

Now I want to stress this isn't a "How do I beat this guy" but more a thought problem I had.

Player built a very good disarm/trip Monk. There's a number of ways to beat this but I like making foils for characters, kinda the inverse/rival of them depending on how the story goes. This character would use Quick Draw line of feats(Quick Draw, Stow, Sheath) or magic items to basically swing and put his weapon away in one round.

Is this effective? No of course not but I thought it would be fun.

Just..., how does Disarm work with this? Slight of hand could allow him to pick off the weapon when the rival isn't holding it but how would Disarm work for this? As kooky/bad as this is from an idea, I'd rather not get into a rules debate of if you can disarm an unarmed foe.

So I'm semi struggling on this but it's not a terribly needed answer(I low ball stuff anyway).

So as I understand it with automatic progression there's NO special gear? At least non with +1s or 2s.

Put a different way, I want to drop a 'Sniping' enchanted weapon.

Do I just give them the cash in this system?
Is it enchanted as Sniping only when they have 4 points to put into the weapon?
Does the bad guy even get sniping?

I like Auto Progression a lot because it frees up the required stat items but I'm struggling to figure out what to give them that isn't just Wonderous items that doesn't go into the bag or consumables.

According to google, Improved Demoralize originated in an AP (Signal of Screams, Heart of Night). Has it made it into any actual books?

If not, I can see the writers of the COM not considering AP feats when balancing frightening injection. Don’t know how many GMs allow feats from APs nowadays (you can find the full wording online easily enough so don’t have to own it), but it could be a factor if you have a “books only” type GM.

In my online play experience, people just seem to pick and play with anything they find online with the expectation that it's in the rules, so it must be selectable.

That's a whole other discussion that leads inevitability to Blood Money though.

Thematically I like this but mechanically(Paizo you always do good work but also botch at the end like this).

Frightening Injection - When you successfully inject a creature with a substance (including a biohacker’s biohack) using a weapon that has the injection special property, you can attempt an Intimidate check to demoralize that creature as a move action before the end of your turn. A creature can be affected by this ability only once per day.

It's nice, it's cool, it fits with 'mad space doctor' vibe.

Why would you ever take this.

1) Biohacker has no need for CHA and thus would have a lower Intimidate score than someone else.
2) It works with Injection weapons only, thus limiting it's usefulness to other classes as they can operate better weaponry.
3) A once per day per target restriction. Meaning you have to move on to the next target if you fail or vs a solo target, it's a dead feat.
4) Demoralize is range 30, and the feat doesn't at least as RaW remove that. So you're more than likely having to stay up close to a target rather than using a rifle to stay safer.
5) And all of the above could be debated and argued over if it's a good skill or not; if Improved Demoralize didn't exist.

I love little fun feats like this that really help flesh a character out, but it's truly TRULY hard to argue taking it when Improved Demoralize does the job but better without having to make an attack roll and be limited to once per day per target.

Paizo has a history of making really good thematic feats but then just making them garbage. Why does this feat exist?

As someone that's getting into Starfinder in the next few days and someone that HATED the Playtest and still can't find enjoyment in PF2; this is gonna be interesting.

I see bits and pieces in Starfinder that looked to be testbeds/test case for PF2 and disliked them after the idea was fully fleshed out.

So it's gonna be weird going back and playing the Test case that tries to move forward and still stumbles with it's 3.5 roots.

I was thinking Soldier to take advantage of Pistol Dancer fighting style

Friends are trying to drag me into a Starfinder game. Thinking about going former 'space cop' or something. Idea is either double pistols, or maybe long rifles. Or just pistol and shield since they added those in.

Though a question occurs. You don't seem to get more attacks when duel wielding anymore it seems, so what's the point of going double pistol?

Best I could come up with was having more than one elemental property as Starfinder seems to be big on resistances.

Thanks for this, I got a couple ideas of what to do/how to run this.

I just found this to be a rather interesting idea and the fact the player is so hyped for this has hyped me too, as this is something I've always had cooking in the back of my head.

@avr - That sounds like a nice way to do it. I'm actually giving it class Levels in Caviler, think there's an archetype combo to let it ride an undead horse and still use a gun. have to double check.

@artofregicide - Oh thanks that makes it a lot easier.

I have a player in my game that's playing basically a hunter/merchant from another world/land/region.

One of their gimmicks is to strip a monster of any... useable parts. Skin for Leather, meat for cooking, bones/scales/tusks for other purposes.

Which I love, I was a fan of Monster Hunter but I have no idea how to actually rule this or use this other than giving them more home made rations(Which is good given that they have a large company following them) and maybe some extra gold.

That's the easiest but also cop out bland way to handle it. ANy ideas/tips/resources to look into?

I'm thinking about having a long range assassin go after the team and given that it's an undead focused game, I was thinking about using a Pale Stranger to keep with the feel. Just one question

While pistols normally consume bullets and black powder when fired, a pale stranger’s pistols supernaturally reload the instant it fires them, allowing the undead to make multiple attacks in a round with the weapons.

I figured if I re-flavored it's powers to a Rifle/musket instead, could I make it reload the rifle just as fast?

It's a monster and homebrew at this pint but I figured I should get a second opinion about this.

Something was brought up to me before my game petered out. After Lamm the PCs can very much go "Right we're done, we're out of this stinking city".

Thoughts on how to make the PCs connect more with the city and feel like trying to save it as opposed to going through the motions because "This is an adventure path"?

We play that much, too. Probably 30 sessions into MM, many of which are 8-9 hours in duration. Just got to the last part of book 4 (which is pretty big). Same with GS, though we only play 4 or 5 hours at a time.

Ech, my own group is only in book 3 and about halfway through after playing for maybe a year.

But my group only plays once a week for about 3-4 hours, play online and through text.

Speaking of!

Typh Lante - Human Sorcerer (Solar Blood). Arcane expert, curious but also the most level headed of the group. Specializes in blowing stuff up/putting it on fire. Is along for the ride but also looking for his dead beat dad that almost killed him along with struggling with the burden of his family/powers.

Hemetre - Human Cleric (Blossoming Light Archetype). History and Religion buff, party healer and face. She's the one that holds the Mask currently and is the one that kinda leads the party when talking with new people/church officials. Has a huge family that each worship an Orisian god of old and hopes to bring them back to a more accepted state. Dislikes grave robbers stealing her culture which is why she signed up, to help protect those and stop people from misusing the past.

Dorne - Half Orc Fighter (Drill Sargent). The muscle of the group and the most cynic/blunt. Doesn't care for a lot of the rules and run around, prefers to just have the problem in sword range. He's not "Smash" personality but he realizes what he's good at and prefers to deal with that rather than all the 'pageantry' when it comes to social interaction. He came to find out lost fighting styles after his family passed down myths and legends about how one of their ancestors was trained in these sandy lands.

Harwa Glyphkeeper - Dwarf Kineticist (Psammokinetic). Pahmet dwarf who grew up to serve the Pharoah as a scout, messenger, and problem solver. Not directly but she works for a group that's semi "CIA" for him. She showed up during the uprising of the undead in Wati(Book 2) and has been on the team sense. Stoic in her duties but has a cheerful side that is starting to come out, she serves the team as ranged scout with some local knowledge checks and semi history buff. Follows the group due to her new orders but also her own sense of doing what's right.

Pyrotechnic Eruption has this little tag line on it(The spell just basically setting down a flaming geyser under a target that follows them).

Anyone attempting to touch the target takes damage, using the same amount of dice as the last time the target attempted a save (Reflex half). A creature can take the place of the target by bull rushing or grappling it and switching places. The new creature then automatically takes the current round’s damage with no saving throw and can begin to attempt Reflex saves starting on its next turn.

So because a player asked me, what does "Touch" mean? His main concern is that can he put it on a target but end up having his friend, who is melee, catch fire after attacking the guy?

Myself I'm a bit unsure. I'd say yes but at the same time with a Reach Weapon I'd say no. Advise here?

How updated is this?

As I've come across older PDFs on friends machines and books that for example, have GPL instead of CMD along with other odd quirks.

Basically is it worth picking it up vs updating any older versions?

It's not so much he's completely out of resources, in fact he still has a base to call home.

It's more he's in a very dangerous spot after the starting events offscreen of the AP.

Put a different way, Harrigan is bleeding but will live and be able to come back strong enough to even try to earn a seat at the pirate lords later on(Book 3 I believe).

But he is bleeding and you know what sharks do when they smell blood.

There's a module floating around that has the PCs raid a sunken ship and ends with a large octopus attacking them. I've seen people use that to show how tough Harrigan is to players.

MerlinCross wrote:

Sorry for the grave dig but with the arrival of Pathfinder 2, is publishing stuff for PF1 going to go through any changes?

Everything you could do before can still be done.

Thanks. I always had ideas on the backburner but never got around to actually seeing them past the idea/homebrew stage.

But now I might actually try to put the work into seeing them become something more but wasn't sure if Paizo was going to say.., ramp down on third party publishing.

Sorry for the grave dig but with the arrival of Pathfinder 2, is publishing stuff for PF1 going to go through any changes?

It's not just Traveler's Any Tool I'm worried about.

There's a LOT of interesting stuff deep in PF1's gear catalouge that I wonder if they will make the jump or not on account of the stronger skills and the lowering of just outright +s.

Yeah yeah, CLW wands all day err day; didn't care. My PF1 side healer used a feat or two along side Bloodblocks to get the job one.

Now this isn't me harshing on PF2(For once), I just don't know how they're going to translate some of these items over. Even nerfing them might not be enough(0r too much to make them actually usable outside of loot drops).

Though hmm, rather than just raw numbers maybe some of these items can bump up the Proficiency during use? Or maybe throw in a reroll? I dunno, there's hopefully something they can do.

We pretty much had this same discussion regarding grenades in Starfinder. I think the consensus was that they're best off as loot as no one will buy or craft them.

Only Grenade that looks useful is the one Soldiers can make as that's at least 'reusable' and you can splice some effects to it later I think.

But is this just wands being king again or are staffs also up there too? Playtest looked to try to improve staffs but I haven't really checked that section too much.

[I can only speak for myself, but the math and attempts to break the system are precisely why I'm here. At some point, I am going to gather up all my toys, write up my houserules, and not come back for a while. That doesn't mean we do math when making player choices. It just means I want the game designed to maximize choice with minimum punishment for "roleplaying" choices. I'm sure the game designers would tell you that requires some math. The simplest way to put it might be: You don't come to the forums to roleplay.

You're right. We don't come to the forums to roleplay.

But at the rate it seems on the forums, I question if most people here wouldn't be happier with a skirmish war game instead. Or one of those board games that simulate a tabletop game.

I make choices based off some math. The community seems more than willing to just take the accepted answer because of math going into the decimals.

And if a person is that willing to give up their own choices, I can only question what sort of actual in character agency they'll have, never mind their player one. They've already given that one up.

So wait, how do you run Udjebet? She uses her ring to cast basically Alter Self okay that makes sense but then...,

Does she keep her gaze attack in her 'human form' then?

MerlinCross wrote:

The Sceaduinar, Sekuer this is CR7? Really? Okay yeah the PCs don't have to fight the damn thing but really?

I'm looking over the stats of this thing and it's a beast at for it's level. Sure by book it says it doesn't use Harm till it's half dead, but that's 90 damage, 45 if they make their save. That's going to flatten most people in my group if they don't save.

Add to it, that one of my damage dealers is Melee(Oh hello Anti Life Shell) and I have a really brutal fight for them, maybe a bit too much.

Thoughts?

The fact it has slay living doesn't help any either. I can't really give much context unfortunately. My group had access to faerie fire and an archer fighter with Clustered Shots and crit on the first attack. It got one round with the barbarian who had an adamantine morningstar, which he threw at it. The poor creature didn't even get to to a point to even think about using harm, let alone its other abilities.

I mean yeah but Slay the living I think is said to be used at half HP?

My team actually didn't explore that place so I have a Sceaduinar running around. Maybe link up with the Cult.

I'm interested in ideas for the High Prestess of Thoth myself.

My game's leader/soul of the group is a Priestss of Ma'at and linked up with Ma'at and Thoth's worshippers.

I'm trying to figure out a good way of expanding on the beef between them and the Nethys church. Right now I'm going with the fact Thoth's group is big about spreading knowledge, regardless of what happens afterward.

I had this concern too. I'm still not certain if it's an issue or not, but it's a possible one. Mostly because class feats are pulling double duty for customization and class abilities.

Thankfully, I'm pretty sure it was confirmed that the GMG will include class feats at every level as an official optional rule. Yeah, you can house rule it now, but sometimes having it printed is what helps convince a GM to allow it. My main concern with a class feat every level is that it will kind of encourage everyone to multiclass all the time, because you'll often find it where you've taken all the good looking class feats, so you might as well multiclass. As more class feats are released though, this will probably become less of an issue, but the ease of multiclassing will make it very attractive. Whether that's a pro or con depends on the individual. I personally want a sweet spot of multiclassing being very doable, but not so easy that it's the default for everyone to have multiple multiclass dedications.

That's kinda debatable and probably more based on Build.

A Feat each level more than likely just means 2 feats from each Rung. And I can't picture there not being at least 2 winners each Feat Level Rung. Double backing for a weaker feat at a higher level seems a bad move unless you're using it to unlock something else later on.

Meanwhile people who have a good build picked out can multiclass a lot easier and probably get close to the old hybrid classes.

In PF2, the action cost for debuffing is much less: characters can do a debuff instead of taking a third attack at -10 or for free with a crit.

If a third strike at -10 is universally a better choice than inflicting Frightened on an enemy then that's a damning criticism of the system. I suspect that isn't actually true, though.

You Can. Will you want to is left to be mathed out. Especially later on when new splat books come out and there might be ways to over come that -10.

I mean for the sake of all the PF gods, we have people mathing out DPR already, to decimal points.

It's why I hang my head at times when talking about PF1. It's not Agency or the choice, it's the Math that makes people do stuff. And far too often it seems. Did it make sense to take this trait for my character? NO but it gives me the Math I wanted. Story be sod off, I need Fey Foundling on Paladin. We'd be here all day if I kept giving examples but I think people get it.

I might not like the changes but right now might actually be the best time to try PF2 as the math isn't figure out just yet. Or maybe it is but it hasn't been broadcast to the wider community just yet.

I would argue that this sort of thing generally works against a monster more than it does players when the number of players is greater than the number of monsters. If one strong monster uses an action to skitter away from the melee fighters then the monster has more or less used 1/3 of its "side's" actions just to reduce the number of attacks the melee characters can make; recall that a certain percentage of the party are going to be ranged casters or ranged fighters so the monster's action spent re-positioning isn't going to reduce damage from those guys. There are also plenty of ways to get power attack and barbarians can pick up No Escape at level 2 to similarly bypass an enemy's chance of escape.

Hit and run tactics maybe work a little better with many weak enemies but that is why god made burning hands.

[Maybe. But when you are fighting giant rats and skeletons it doesn't seem in character for the enemy to do that. Also, in most cases the monsters are outnumbered which limits that tactic's effectiveness for them.

Against 1 big target sure. And against Several targets yeah AoE still exists.

4 PCs vs 4 Bandits or even like 4-6 goblins I've just seen it turn into a running battle. And not an actual epic running battle the kind you'd seen in movies or fiction. More like Tom chasing Jerry. So then my own groups see this cartoonish running fight or the martials standing in place to screen the Ranged, usually in a corridor to the point we're back where PF1 put us.

That's funny once. Having it happen all the time is annoying.

Besides, where are we in the multi swing math?

Temperans wrote:

(Classes didn't have so much bias for combat roles before, but meh some people will talk about all this bad feat taxes and math fixes, while applauding feat taxes and math fixes)

* btw I'm talking in general not necessarily about people in this thread.

Depended on the class, and depended on what era you're talking about. Things would open up quite a bit as time went on but in the initial launch of PF1 it basically was "Clerics and Druids can build for whatever the f!*~ they want, martials stand still and attack".

Compare the debuff potential of a Core Fighter in PF1 vs. that of a Core Fighter in PF2 and you'll see what I mean.

Why do we care about debuffs if the math shows just doing as much damage as possible is usually the way to go?

You can do debuff fighter in both systems. Both systems(and community) will say you're probably not playing it right but you CAN do it.

Always gotta go for the big numbers, that's what we've been taught and told.

"Mobility equals Resiliency"

This works both ways though. There's no reason the DM can't also have the enemies do hit and run tactics. So it can become this slog of trying to chase them down or pin them in long enough to get killing blows.

I'm far more in favor of a system like this. What Grognard is doing is literally just setting someone up for failure if they decide they don't want this character to be charismatic - again, it's the same thing as forcing the Barbarian to attempt to disable some of the traps. I don't know the details of Shadowrun's system but the theory of making it easier for characters who fit into the situation to negotiate is sound.

Well actually it's a change for the computer games and not in the tabletop system it seems. Weird. And the Etiquette's in game unlock more dialogue options or different skill checks.

But I like the idea that each person/character has their own insights or manners when it comes to speaking to certain groups. Someone skilled at making deals with the nobility might find it hard to deal with the street gangs. An Academic styled character can easily talk to others about science, magic, occult topics but throw them in room full of Socialites or Military minded and they might flummox a bit.

I'm not a fan of the new background system but I think that might be the key way to easily slide such an idea into PF2. Sure someone that can craft masterwork/legendary weapons after adventuring for awhile can convince a Smith, but someone with the Background: Blacksmith has been around long enough to know more of the dangers, pick up on the more subtle tells and can tell the odd metalworking joke that other smiths actually get.

It's not a perfect system probably, and I haven't really tested it in a numbers way but it's something I'm keeping in mind a little bit in my own games.

I've always questioned "Dump stats". I'm the guy that at least likes to keep everything at 10-12 so I don't get a negative. I never saw going lower as a 'good thing' unless it was for spell casters and even then, there's ways to get more spell slots/recharge them. Also the danger of taking Stat damage early but that's gone last I saw(There's no stat damage just debuffs. Can you die if your stat hits 0 by debuff?)

As someone who plays charisma characters a frankly unreasonable amount of the time, this behavior annoys the hell out of me. It feels like being deliberately robbed of my investment in diplomacy because the GM wants to punish the dwarf. You wouldn't force someone who didn't invest in Thievery to pick half of the locks.

No but the CHA character everywhere or at least IN character might not have the mannerisms to be fully trusted.

A Bard might be able to win over the Thieves guild but a Rogue or someone that is more criminal/underground might have a better idea or way of getting them to talk cause they are "One of us".

It's why I'm slowly testing out Etiquette from Shadowrun in my games. Well the Shadowrun Returns series. Basically different mannerisms or talking/culture points that help with discussing.

Yeah your Dwarf might not have CHA to talk to the big merchant lord but he'd have say Etiquette Miner or Streets and be able to talk with the lower classes just fine, as an example.

While having a strong CHA build is fine, just make sure to let others talk and not just be for combat.

When 3ed d&d came out, it was so all around better than ad&d2 that we switched immediately and never looked back. When pathfinder 1 happened, it was basically just some good updates to the 3e system and we switched immediately again. Now with pathfinder 2, it's something different. It looks to be a good game, but it's not a straight upgrade, it's just different. As someone whose been playing for a long time now it's just... I don't see any good reason to change editions.

For new players, I'd definitely recommend pf2. For casual players too, or those who have not played a lot of pf1. However, I've been GMing games in basically the same rule set for the past 19 years and am very comfortable with its idiosyncrasies. I can run a better game using pf1 over pf2 because I understand the old tools and not the new ones. The new toolbox just doesn't do enough better or quicker to warrant the change for me, but if you are buying a set of tools for the first time, I definitely recommend the new ones.

This is a stance I can actually get behind. I don't even think PF2 is a 'bad game' but it does nothing that says "Play me" to the point of not only switching systems but switching over to that(If I'm jumpping systems, I'm detouring to Shadowrun first).

For newer players, yeah I'd say give PF2 a shot but at the same time I don't see what makes PF2 really stand out from DnD 5E. Now that's not to say it's a clone of it but some things do remind me of DnD 5 that I don't like. Example; Some classes having to pick a certain focus after X level feels a lot like DnD 5E's "You're level 3, pick your actual build" idea. I didn't like that there, I don't like it here.

But I honestly can't say if it'll be better or not. It's certainly a different flavor and it might appeal more to new players and vets. Not me but hey, hope it works out well enough for Paizo to keep the lights on.

I'm more interested in how this works with plot. But this is also running with old info.

Does a summon still take an action from the summoner to do anything? If so, how does one portray the evil court mage that has a few Fiends summoned to do evil plots? If he has enough summoned by RAW he shouldn't be able to do anything and just stand in place. Or just be locked in his room all day.

That said, Planar Binding might still be around?

Yeah no I wasn't expecting instant rules on how to revert back in the first couple APs. Unless said APs are retreads/repeats, like Rise of the Runelords 2.0. Just a little "Hey here's what to do to update it" or something like that.

But again unless it's retreads I don't expect to see rules on how to convert back till later.

I get that you guys want to keep working. I even get you guys want to move on. And I wish you luck.

I just hope your new game doesn't get broken and answered in a year or two.

Suggestions on how to port new AP into the old system.

That aside;

Ramifications on the larger setting could be good, as I think most of us who have run more than one AP like to reference that. I did Iron Gods and Wrath of the Rightous afterward and made a new order of knights/paladins to go with the PCs based off Tech found in Iron Gods.

Or maybe find ways to link the AP from one book to another. Now of course this would be a giant task if you do it for all the APs but maybe link them based on Region or style? It doesn't even need to be the same characters, maybe the retainers of the PCs are sent to deal with an issue near by, but if you're going to link them based of PCs(And their levels) maybe give a broad suggested stat bonus to give monsters? I don't know.

Like if you completed Skull and Shackles, your next character for say, Serpent's Skull or Ruins of Azlant was a retainer/helper of your old PC and gets a small Pirate bonus?

Something to help flesh out where they're from or at least what "Completed" AP they are from. You don't even need to beat the AP but can now go "Okay this AP was completed and here's the fallout" in an easier way.

I think Reign of Winter mentioned a Module that might have been played before the AP and goes "So here's what's up if that happened" or something. More of that be interesting to see.

Even with the explanation I'm with Cyouni and Arachnofiend here. If a game developing optimization paths and preferred builds as it develops is what constitutes a failure... then the vast majority of products that exist or will ever exist are automatically failures.

That seems like a poor metric.

Optimization paths and preferred builds - okay.

Community and dev expectation that they are the absolutely only way to play the game - bad.

I'm tired of being told I need a barrel of happy sticks. I'm tired of being told I'm bad if I select a tier 1 and struggle. I'm tired that everyone rolls their eyes if I pick Rogue or a class-race that isn't optimal.

I'm tired that everyone seems to expect everyone to min max. Even the devs at this point.

And if PF2 shapes up the same way, then yes, I'll consider it a failure.

I disagree with that too. We absolutely want better builds than others. We want people who explore and theorycraft to find synergies that are hidden (and then of course make guides/posts/videos about it). If there wasn’t room to get superior (and by that also inferior) builds in PF2 then the game would imo be a failure. What they do need to do to succeed though is have the gap be narrower. Too often in PF1 one character would overshadow the table and make them useless. There was a hug gap between optimized and incorrectly built, but the bigger problem was the huge gap between optimized and averagely built.

I don't mind when people do that but I mind when people fully accept it as "The only way to play".

PF2 is a failure to me if it sells itself on all this 'customization' and "oh these are viable" only for the community to throw out 75% of it and keep playing with the same builds again and again regardless of if it fits the character or not.

I don't want to pick Fighter in PF2 and instantly have the community and even Devs expect "Oh he's going Two hander cause that's the only way to play that class at this point". I don't want to pick Wizard and the answer be "Oh pick X, Y, and Z" and have the community AND GAME tell me I'm bad if I don't.

Also; "We want better builds than others". Yeah. That's how the arms race begins.

MerlinCross wrote:

It's fresh. It's new. It's shiny.

It needs time for the new paint to wear off and the community to solve the math problems. Then we'll see if it's a better game or not.

Because I see the term "Tier list" adopted by the community at large, AGAIN in PF2, and a general expected mathed out "you must be X strong" come up AGAIN in the community and official books; it will in my opinion have failed.

I think the requirement for being "you must be X strong" is pretty hard to not meet.

For example, you'd pretty much have to be a fighter with 14 or lower Str and Dex at level 1. Even then, you'd still probably be pretty tolerable thanks to fighter bonuses, so you also would have to avoid putting stat bonuses in either as you got higher level.

And at that point, let's be real - you're intentionally shooting yourself in the foot.

Or be a wizard focusing on attack spells with a 14 Int. Even then, Magic Missile is still functional, and theoretically you'd be able to do some damage with a weapon because your stat boosts went elsewhere.

Between you and Arachnofiend I feel like I need to expand.

You build a Fighter. It's expected you go with These Feats during level ups or even this Dedication. Because the community expects it as it does the most, and thus the devs also start to work with that being the 'standard'.

You pick up a wizard, it's fully expected you take these spells. You go shopping, it's clearly time to pick up X item or you're shooting yourself in the foot. Why would you not do Y because it's mathed out to be the best? You must build "Z way" or you're not playing it right.

This is what I want to see avoided. All the math solved, all the choices discarded for the most standard and board reaching options.

The actual rules are still brand new so no one has had time to actively sit down and solve them and even then a splat book or two might mess that math up.

But that math will be solved again. It's just how much that actually settles into the standard community that I'm waiting to see.

It's still Paizo. Every possible way to build a character will exist eventually.

Possible and usable are 2 different things in the community.

It's fresh. It's new. It's shiny.

It needs time for the new paint to wear off and the community to solve the math problems. Then we'll see if it's a better game or not.

Because I see the term "Tier list" adopted by the community at large, AGAIN in PF2, and a general expected mathed out "you must be X strong" come up AGAIN in the community and official books; it will in my opinion have failed.

Yeah talk to your DM about it. I'd probably allow Knowledge Engineering to function as a pseudo "Heal check"

I see Paizo have finally got a 'caster cleric' (Cloistered Cleric) in the latest tweaking of cleric in PF2

And to think it only took 11 years of people telling them on forums, homebrews and 3PP versions for them to get the message...lol

Isn't Caster Cleric the default of Cleric? Yeah they can support or smash face but Cleric being high on the tier list isn't due to martial power. On that note;

Loved: All the numbers. All the odd ways you could find to boost stuff or cover weaknesses. There was a lot of odd items and feats you could find if you dug deep.

Wanted: Better Animal Companion support. I'm not asking it to be on the level of Summoner's pet but bring them up at least so it's worth taking cause most were gimmick builds or abused some rule.

Hated: The expected 'solved' math and tier list that both the community and even the devs seemed to follow. Which is probably going to happen again in a few years but what can you do?

Will miss: Alchemist. I don't like the new walking supply shed they made it.

Continuing my obsession with the brawler class and it's archetypes;

-Snake Bite Striker-
Snake Feint (Ex): At 3rd level, a snakebite striker who uses a standard action to move can combine that move with a feint. If she is able to feint as a move action (such as from having the Improved Feint feat), she can combine a move action to move with her feint. At 11th level, once per round she can declare her square and one adjacent square as the origin of her attacks until her next turn (allowing her to use one or both squares to determine whether she or allies are flanking an opponent). At 15th level, she counts an additional adjacent square for this purpose. This ability replaces maneuver training gained at 3rd and 7th levels.

Okay so the first part is kinda okay. You can move and Feint but I don't understand the second part when you have something like Improved Feint. Unless it means you can Feint then move?

But it's the level 11 ability that concerns me. There doesn't seem to be an action to do it, you just can. So does this mean you can do this without Feinting? Also, what happens if you move, does the flanking space still stay there?