Garulo's page

I like to give bonus feats (or feat adjacent abilities like relic powers) as adventure awards. So, I prefer to GM without Free Archetype otherwise it gets to be just a little too much.

I hope the players have the choice as to what feat they take otherwise the GM is asying "I think your character should be tweaked the way that I want it to look"

so uh, is there anything that actually prevents you from reloading underwater normally?

I can't even find anything that says you can't use Blackpowder underwater, although you can obviously inference it from the presence of that item linked up thread.

RAW gunpowder works underwater and in airless environments. Those special feats are just useless flavour feats :) (And don't tell me to use common physics sense since that doesn't apply to other cases)

Garulo wrote:

The Raven Black wrote:

Note that, in my PFS experience, I rarely played beyond level 6. So, you only enjoy Striking for half your career. And by the time you can get it, you will soon be able to invest in a second one if need be.

And that is only if you play an empty-handed Drifter. IIRC, 1-handed melee weapon + 1-handed gun Drifter is quite feasible.

It is very very uncommon to play anything in PFS2 past 7-8 and even above L6 is normally only your main so it is pretty much the norm that striking only comes into play at the end of the character lifespan

Luckily where we play we have a dedicated group of players so that really isn't an issue. I already have 2 PFS characters that are level 7+

You have a dedicated gaming group that plays pfs style? Hmmm ... I think I see the disconnect.

As an aside, there are only something like 10-12 scenarios which could be potentially higher than level 6 which means in normal PFS play it is very hard to find at the right time for your character. Also there are only 2 scenarios that go above L8 (ofc you could play APs and say that you are playing PFS to level 20)

Note that, in my PFS experience, I rarely played beyond level 6. So, you only enjoy Striking for half your career. And by the time you can get it, you will soon be able to invest in a second one if need be.

And that is only if you play an empty-handed Drifter. IIRC, 1-handed melee weapon + 1-handed gun Drifter is quite feasible.

It is very very uncommon to play anything in PFS2 past 7-8 and even above L6 is normally only your main so it is pretty much the norm that striking only comes into play at the end of the character lifespan

385 posts and we still do not have consensus.

In PFS it is pretty clear that a familiar is a rock (since they have to play by explicit RAW rules).
Home games - familiar can be anything since the GM decides what they can do.

The rules seem to say that GMs can improvise activities and that is cited as one side as "the rules" while the other side says that this is "too vague"

This argument will never end

Garulo wrote:

So we have 330 odd posts about a major class feature/feat choice that people can not agree on how it works. And we are told that there are worse undefined, vague important game mechanics. Wow - and people are ok with Paizo not offering up any type of answers

All that proves is that people like to argue. The answers are already in the book for people willing to see them.

Not really - the people are saying that the answers do not exist in the book. If the answer is "use your own judgement or interpolate" then that is not an answer as to how it works, it is a work around for an undefined rule/mechanic.

So we have 330 odd posts about a major class feature/feat choice that people can not agree on how it works. And we are told that there are worse undefined, vague important game mechanics. Wow - and people are ok with Paizo not offering up any type of answers

... There isn't anything inherently wrong with a familiar as an item. If you made an item that did everything a familiar can do and priced it so any 1st level character could buy it, I think you'd find a LOT of PC's would be quite satisfied with it. ...

You hit the nail on the head. But instead of "satisfying," I think most people would think that if you could get a familiar for gold, it would be reasonable (scaling costs to add abilities and maybe gate as a class FEATURE).

If you are trying to build a characters, you have to think in terms of resource budgets. You get 10ish class feats over the life of a PC (disregard that the overwhelmingly vast majority of campaigns end before around level 12 or so and also racial selections change it) and 5 ancestry feats. While we talk about L1/L2 feats being low power (with obvious exceptions), feat resources are still hard capped. Money is not. If I have a L12 wizard (which is probably at the end of most campaigns), a hundred (or even 1,000) gold means a lot less than a class feat. Especially in PFS which is strictly RAW

VampByDay wrote:

GM OfAnything wrote:

Do you have a GM that can resolve this for you?

Talking about PFS. You are right, though, good call for home games.

For PFS, you definitely get the bump to expert at level 5, and won't get to level 13 for a couple years now. Luckily, retraining is easy.

Agreed - You won't get past level 9 or so for at least a couple of years

I'm hoping for the ability to turn into mist, myself. I mean I know we can do that now but I would hope it would be more effective as a class feat rather than a spell.

I'm wondering if you are going to have to lug a coffin around everywhere you go.

That is the key question. The dhampir has can have the abilities of the vampire if they take a spell casting class. If the vampire archetype just basically allows you to take the dhampir feats as class feats, I am a little underwhelmed (especially if you use dedication feats to get spellcasting which allows for gaseous form at 12th level). Maybe they will have a unique spell of "coffin trick" where it combines rope trick with a coffin?

But no matter, I have been convinced that this archetype will blow the dhampir ancestry out of the coffin (or maybe it only works with that ancestry). I look forward to creating my immortal, unbreathing/uneating/undrinking master of the undead who can control any and all undead using focus spell

1) yes

2) by that logic what’s the point of having Orcs and Elves since we have the Heritages for Halves? Lots of points actually.

I stand corrected. It will be an awesome vampire with great abilities. Since the elf has iconic features such as speed increase and access to unique feats which support the fantasy vision of elves, I am sure that there are iconic features of vampires that dhampirs are missing so that it will be rolled into archetype and its feats ... (help me out by telling me what is missing)

<edit> Ah, things like not needing to eat or drink. Immortality, Ability to create permanent servants. Ok, that will be cool and definitely not in dhampir camp (I think it was due to balance issues)

It would be surprising if they did since they basically gave a dhampir ancestry the ability to have a vampires abilities. What would want to have in a vampire that is not in/available to the half-vampire?

Reactions are not inherently disrupting. See Attack of Opportunity for example [cr142].

... If your attack is a critical hit and the trigger was a manipulate action, you disrupt that action...

This indicates that it is only disruptive in some circumstances. Niether contingency or wall of air say they are disruptive, so they aren't. The strike completes, and the shuriken returns to the hand. Future attacks however would be affected as arrows, bolts, or other objects of similar size cannot pass through.

So the example in the book is incorrect. Since the Leap action is a move action and does not have the manipulate trait, then it can not be disrupted. In fact, no movement can ever be disrupted by an AoO

Garulo wrote:

No, contingency allows a spell to occur as a reaction to an event. If they had fired an arrow it would have triggered the wind wall also (designed so the creature had time to do things without being peppered with arrows). The fact that a returning weapon was used was just the way it was. So no it was not a custom ability unless using a spell is a custom ability

My point is that there are three options to run a reaction that interacts with a projectile weapon like this.

1) The reaction happens first and the ranged attack is unsuccessful.
2) The reaction happens after. The ranged attack is successful, but subsequent attacks are blocked.
3) The reaction happens in some strange in-between time where the attack connects and the wall is brought up in that exact instant.

If the thrown weapon triggered a reaction of type 1, then the weapon would be blocked by the wall, but would successfully fly back to the thrower.

If the thrown weapon triggered a reaction of type 2, then the attack would be successful, the weapon would fly back to the thrower, and then the wall would come up.

So only option 3 actually prevents the returning rune on the thrown weapon from putting the weapon back into the hands of the thrower. Why would you run the reaction in that fashion?

Because that is the way the rules and example in the CRB work? Take the example of the transfer of items in the CRB. Option #1 (transfer doesn't take place), Option #2 (transfer takes place), Option #3 (item drops). The example shows option #3 occurs. Now every rule can adjudicated differently but it is unclear why Option #1 or Option #2 would be more likely than the example. You could also do an AoO on movement, trip example. Option #1 (trip occurs after all movement), Option #2 (trip stops any movement at all), Option #3 (Trip occurs in the middle of movement). I believe you mentioned option #3 occuring in another thread. Edit Or the ability to deflect arrows. The rules specifically show the interrupt happening during the action (not Option #1 attack never happened, or Option #2 attack hit, but it was Option #3, during the flight of the arrow, it was deflected

Garulo wrote:

That is why I quoted "disrupting" action/reaction which actually occurs during the other turn.

Well, sure. But this looks like a custom reaction ability for this particular enemy. So why are you deliberately ruling the effect to work in this order? Specifically to punish a player for having a returning thrown weapon?

No, contingency allows a spell to occur as a reaction to an event. If they had fired an arrow it would have triggered the wind wall also (designed so the creature had time to do things without being peppered with arrows). The fact that a returning weapon was used was just the way it was. So no it was not a custom ability unless using a spell is a custom ability

Garulo wrote:

Unfortunately, the rules specifically state that the weapon "Flies back." Not appears back, not teleports back. Played a game where the bad guy was in a dead end cave at the end of a tunnel and had a disrupting action that when hit by a ranged attack, a wind wall appeared blocking the tunnel. By the rules the disrupting action stopped the returning weapon since the interrupt prevents completion of the action.

People should be free to reflavor the mechanics of things. It makes the game more interesting.

And generally reactions happen after the action that caused them. So even a flying returning weapon could fly back to the thrower before the wall of wind comes up. It is part of the Ranged Attack activity even if it isn't part of the Strike action.

That is why I quoted "disrupting" action/reaction which actually occurs during the other turn.

"Various abilities and conditions, such as an Attack of Opportunity, can disrupt an action. When an action is disrupted, you still use the actions or reactions you committed and you still expend any costs, but the action’s effects don’t occur. ... The GM decides what effects a disruption causes beyond simply negating the effects that would have occurred from the disrupted action. For instance, a Leap disrupted midway wouldn’t transport you back to the start of your jump, and a disrupted item hand off might cause the item to fall to the ground instead of staying in the hand of the creature who was trying to give it away." (p462 CRB). Thus, the loss of items in the transfer would imply that it occurs in the middle of the other person's action. SO for example if you move or do a ranged attack, you would normally lose the move or the attack.

Garulo wrote:

Tender Tendrils wrote:

Garulo wrote:

I always liked the wuxia movies where the trainee is punching sand to build up their fists or muy thai with bamboo beating of shins. Now we have shuriken training with repeated stabs into the hand with a returning shuriken :) (yes, I know it comes back into the hand held not grabbed)

Friendly reminder that despite Returning saying "the item flies back into your hand" there isn't really anything stopping you from describing the weapon as teleporting back into your hand, or dissolving and an identical replacement weapon materializing in your hand, or my favourite, swapping the thrown weapon with the same weapon from an alternate timeline/universe where you didn't throw the weapon.

Unfortunately, the rules specifically state that the weapon "Flies back." Not appears back, not teleports back. Played a game where the bad guy was in a dead end cave at the end of a tunnel and had a disrupting action that when hit by a ranged attack, a wind wall appeared blocking the tunnel. By the rules the disrupting action stopped the returning weapon since the interrupt prevents completion of the action.

Nah, RAW it's no longer part of a strike when flying back so wall of wind does nothing. Wall of Wind also refers to "ammunition", which is a specific type of item. Shuriken are not ammunition.

Wall of wind includes the "...objects of similar size" after the ammunition is quite reasonably interpreted as includes shuriken due to their size since the spell include Javelins as a size which only has a -2 (given shuriken much smaller it would stop it completely). If it meant ONLY specific ammunition then it would not reference javelins explicitly.

Garulo wrote:

I always liked the wuxia movies where the trainee is punching sand to build up their fists or muy thai with bamboo beating of shins. Now we have shuriken training with repeated stabs into the hand with a returning shuriken :) (yes, I know it comes back into the hand held not grabbed)

Friendly reminder that despite Returning saying "the item flies back into your hand" there isn't really anything stopping you from describing the weapon as teleporting back into your hand, or dissolving and an identical replacement weapon materializing in your hand, or my favourite, swapping the thrown weapon with the same weapon from an alternate timeline/universe where you didn't throw the weapon.

Unfortunately, the rules specifically state that the weapon "Flies back." Not appears back, not teleports back. Played a game where the bad guy was in a dead end cave at the end of a tunnel and had a disrupting action that when hit by a ranged attack, a wind wall appeared blocking the tunnel. By the rules the disrupting action stopped the returning weapon since the interrupt prevents completion of the action.

I always liked the wuxia movies where the trainee is punching sand to build up their fists or muy thai with bamboo beating of shins. Now we have shuriken training with repeated stabs into the hand with a returning shuriken :) (yes, I know it comes back into the hand held not grabbed)

Always was disappointed that I could not make a magical ring crafter which was the basis of their magic by the rules and have it be anything other than a waste of feats. Not dominating Sauron type but ring mage type

Garulo wrote:

That is what I understood. However, what was throwing me was the poster who said that in PFS (where there are no restrictions on town level etc) they were earning up to double the money by going crafting. I thought I must have been missing something obvious. This is where it looked like you needed specialty crafting, impeccable crafting, magic crafting, alchemical crafting, and master+ level

Oh, well if we're talking about pfs, then the simple answer is job availability rather than item availability. By default you can find jobs up to your character level minus 2, but you can craft things up to your character level. Some abilities change the math a bit, but those are the default assumptions for pfs iirc

Yes - but there are a few boons which allow jobs at your level which was what I had questioned the double income.

That is what I understood. However, what was throwing me was the poster who said that in PFS (where there are no restrictions on town level etc) they were earning up to double the money by going crafting. I thought I must have been missing something obvious. This is where it looked like you needed specialty crafting, impeccable crafting, magic crafting, alchemical crafting, and master+ level

Garulo wrote:

Deriven Firelion wrote:

No real advantage to mechanical crafting if your DM allows buying what you want when you want to or allows you to earn income at an equal level as needed.

But crafting can be nice if the DM is following the rules for maximum level for tasks or items in a given town as crafting allows you to exceed these levels.

It is also fairly good for low level crafting as you can easily roll a critical success for low level items and produce them quickly for half the price.

If all you're doing is making a magic sword every once in a while, crafting not worth it. If you want to cheaply produce scrolls or wands for additional spell uses, it can be a worthwhile investment.

Critical success provides for 1/2 price? I thought a critical success only means you craft at level +1 in terms of income dayrate?

No. It is just an automatic success for the highest possible reduction in cost, so you can produce items faster and save half the cost doing so. If you're a lvl 17 crafter getting an auto success to count as crafting at lvl 18 for cost and producing lvl 8 items or something, you can make them real fast for half cost. Or half real cost since every day spent crafting after the initial amount reduces the amount the item costs by that days equivalent earnings roll which would be like earning income for a lvl 18 skill.

Ah - so instead of half cost, it is the differential between the two levels which you get for the investment of 3 skill feats and 2 skill increases as opposed to 1 skill feat and no skill increases. Assuming PFS, that means the value of the 2 extra skill feats and 2 skill increases is actually quite little which is actually reasonably in line with what I have heard a lot of players say in PFS

No real advantage to mechanical crafting if your DM allows buying what you want when you want to or allows you to earn income at an equal level as needed.

But crafting can be nice if the DM is following the rules for maximum level for tasks or items in a given town as crafting allows you to exceed these levels.

It is also fairly good for low level crafting as you can easily roll a critical success for low level items and produce them quickly for half the price.

If all you're doing is making a magic sword every once in a while, crafting not worth it. If you want to cheaply produce scrolls or wands for additional spell uses, it can be a worthwhile investment.

Critical success provides for 1/2 price? I thought a critical success only means you craft at level +1 in terms of income dayrate?

Watery Soup wrote:

Captain Morgan wrote:

There's really too many variables to say what the optimal way to make/save money during downtime is.

People always say that but it's not really true. It all fits on one Excel sheet. For any set of assumptions, an answer exists.

In PFS, Crafting is on par with Earn Income at Level-2. It's probably borderline unbalanced with Field Commissioned, Impeccable Crafter, and the EA boon.

Most of my PFS2e characters earn very little during downtime. I was hoping to do an inventor up as soon as it is sanctioned. Can you explain how one might optimize crafting in PFS2e? What is the EA boon from (I've played 95+% scenarios, just the way boons are now implemented I don't even bother reading/finding out what they are because its more book keeping hassle then its worth to use the outdated IT interface in the org play section to add them to PCs.

The boon is the Crafters Workshop (I believe) which is a huge benefit since you start reducing costs after 1 day.

And this is assuming that the downtime is less than 8 days and that the crafting character doesn't have expert proficiency (needed for crafting magical items BTW). Because if the crafter has expert proficiency and you don't have expert in your Lore skill (why would a min-max'er do that anyway), then at 8 days the increased value per day of 4 days of extra crafting equals the income earned by 8 days of trained labor.

I have found that the additional lore feat has been chosen by the vast majority of PFS characters I have met. Since skill feats are a hard meh for the vast majority of the players I have met, this gives them the autoscaling earn income skill for a single feat.

Crafting requires specialty crafter/impeccable crafter only applies to a subset of items (e.g. artistry for jewelry) and you need to take Magical crafter. Thus, you need 3 of the meh skill feats and use 2 skill increase (to get to Master which is required for L9+ items). This is probably reasonable but more of an investment

Garulo wrote:

Ahh - you get the massive wealth equivalent items in common alchemical items that you stash (after you spend the time/money to get the formulas). Of course, there are common boons which allow you to do earn income at your level or so and thus you get the same amount but in cash. Easy way to do that especially since a large number of people take the extra lore skill feat for that purpose

Well, even if they are not that rare, they are not common. And even with such a boon, the crafter can gain more. The thing to realize is that you gain the equivalent of a task of your level but you roll for the difficulty of the item you are making. So, if like me you produce a lot of alchemical items to complement your daily allocation, and choose lower level items, you roll low difficulty and earn at your level. So lots of critical successes.

Another interesting thing with crafting is when you Craft big items. You only need one success (or better, one critical success) for the whole duration. If you craft an item for an entire level (which is the case for my soon to be Inventor and her Composite Longbow), you only need one success and you're set for 30 days of gain. Unlike Earn Income where you roll every 8 days and if you roll high you only get 8 days of work out of it and have to roll again afterwards.

Another advantage of the Alchemist is that Formulas are basically free, because I need them in my Formula Book anyway.
Also, because crafters gain more, going Commissioned Agent is a good idea. But overall, you gain more with Crafting, if you make it properly.

Yes, I see that if all you ever want is to craft a bunch of low level alchemical items for your stash and your play style uses these items all the time, you can gain a nominally higher "value." Of course if you do not want to spend all of your earn income on those low level alchemical items (maybe you want to get a low level magic item) then you are actually worse off given the 4 days of prep work required for each item batch.

Garulo wrote:

SuperBidi wrote:

Garulo wrote:

SuperBidi wrote:

Crafting is all about availability of items and downtime activities. If both are readily available, then it's pointless. Otherwise, it may be useful. In some campaigns (survival type ones) it is central.

As an example, in PFS, crafters make roughly twice more money than non crafters.

Really? Not been the case as far as I have been able to see. You might want to review how it is handled in PFS

My Alchemist crafts since day one and she gain wonderful amounts of money, sometimes getting as high as 20% extra money when I crit succeed.

So, yes, twice is when you don't try to optimize it.

WOuld you care to share since I have never seen it and I used to play PFS2 quite a bit. I assume you are referring to the PFS2 since this is the PF2 boards. Especially interested in seeing your getting the double money since day one (crit succeeding on a your level task is quite a feat). Especially since you have to sell your items you craft for 1/2 price

Ho no, you misunderstood me, I craft items for myself, so I don't sell them.

Ahh - you get the massive wealth equivalent items in common alchemical items that you stash (after you spend the time/money to get the formulas). Of course, there are common boons which allow you to do earn income at your level or so and thus you get the same amount but in cash. Easy way to do that especially since a large number of people take the extra lore skill feat for that purpose

Garulo wrote:

SuperBidi wrote:

Crafting is all about availability of items and downtime activities. If both are readily available, then it's pointless. Otherwise, it may be useful. In some campaigns (survival type ones) it is central.

As an example, in PFS, crafters make roughly twice more money than non crafters.

Really? Not been the case as far as I have been able to see. You might want to review how it is handled in PFS

My Alchemist crafts since day one and she gain wonderful amounts of money, sometimes getting as high as 20% extra money when I crit succeed.

So, yes, twice is when you don't try to optimize it.

WOuld you care to share since I have never seen it and I used to play PFS2 quite a bit. I assume you are referring to the PFS2 since this is the PF2 boards. Especially interested in seeing your getting the double money since day one (crit succeeding on a your level task is quite a feat). Especially since you have to sell your items you craft for 1/2 price

Crafting is all about availability of items and downtime activities. If both are readily available, then it's pointless. Otherwise, it may be useful. In some campaigns (survival type ones) it is central.

As an example, in PFS, crafters make roughly twice more money than non crafters.

Really? Not been the case as far as I have been able to see. You might want to review how it is handled in PFS

I would not call the advice to adapt the modules elitist. But that advice is beyond what beginner GMs can handle. The GM has to recognize when an encounter challenges a weak spot in the party, making it more challenging than the numbers say. The GM has to have the confidence that they can rewrite the encounter to be more suitable for their party than the encounter as written. And...

PF2 has a reputation that it is an easier game to GM AND to play. It is stated that the tight math and vanilla flavoured feats make it impossible to create broken classes and allow cross class balance.

PF2 Ease of GMing for an experienced GM with a lot of experience knowing which monster abilities require which player abilities: Yes, it it definitely checks that box

PF2 Player forgiveness: Yes, given the feats, it makes it so no matter what feats (or no feats for that matter) a PC chooses they will have a perfectly fine character. You can take a sword and board fighter and they will function about the same as every other sword and board regardless of feats (they can do all the different and varied tactics with the same success chance)

PF2 Entry slope: This is a problem. You can play the beginner box, etc but that will not get the GM (or the characters) to the point where they recognize an potential TPK. The GM has to have a lot of experience with the monsters and the classes to begin to understand.

PF2 Challenge system: If you take every party level and every monster, sure it works pretty well (as do most other RPGs). However, there are issues at the lower level with ability "cliffs" where a monster higher than that cliff (ex. level 4 has abilities that are outrageously tough for a Level 2 party). However a level 9 monster might not have a similar cliff over a level 7 party since the party has had the resources and experience to build up a force multiplier toolkit. This is indeed a system issue. One probably best handled by something like "below 5th level, do not introduce monsters with greater than a single level higher" or "below a certain level provide the party with a set of items which fill the holes in the party" EDIT of course this requires a very well versed GM which becomes a catch -22

PF Society: They encourage new GMs and require all scenarios and APs to be run exactly as written so they have to be out of the box ready

Garulo wrote:

And thus it has been spoken - There are no problems with AP design or the CR system, there is only astronomically bad die rolls or horrendous tactics. Of course while there has been ample discussion that many monsters have cliff scalability (relatively normal challenge at level but become virtual tpk machines at lvl+2 due to abilities), it is expected that all GMs will know this and immediately compensate for it (it is part of the game assumptions after all)

Unironically, yes? Early APs had rough edges (which has been discussed to death), and encounter building is very spot on. Level + 2 monsters tend to be quite powerful because a single one represents a "moderate or severe threat boss" with early levels edging towards severe just because of the lack of options available to those characters. Something the Core Rulebook outright states is...

Core Rulebook page 488 wrote:

These (Severe) encounters are most appropriate for important moments in your story, such as confronting a final boss. Bad luck, poor tactics, or a lack of resources due to prior encounters can easily turn a severe-threat encounter against the characters, and a wise group keeps the option to disengage open.

And I think it is very much a part of the game assumption for GMs to be the arbiter of the game, yes. So, yes, thank you for the good post that summed up the thread quite well!

Correct, this game assumes you have a well-versed GM at all times. APs should not be viewed as an "out of the box" adventure that beginning GMs run. They are story ideas and nothing more. That is the problem with Society play since it assumes that all scenarios and APs are out of the box ready

As we showed it is not a system or writers' problem though.

And thus it has been spoken - There are no problems with AP design or the CR system, there is only astronomically bad die rolls or horrendous tactics. Of course while there has been ample discussion that many monsters have cliff scalability (relatively normal challenge at level but become virtual tpk machines at lvl+2 due to abilities), it is expected that all GMs will know this and immediately compensate for it (it is part of the game assumptions after all)

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

Ascalaphus wrote:

Yeah I agree with Vamp, creature level just doesn't tell the whole story. Some monsters scale much more harshly to lower level parties than others.

Or just for different player comps / approaches. Casters with AoE, alchemists and anyone with bombs will absolutely thrash it. When I ran it I had a party of 3 level 2 casters beat it handily (cosmos oracle, companion druid, maestro bard). Recalled knowledge on wasp behaviours, went back to town to get some tools, kept distance and whittled their numbers down without letting it become a melee fight. I mean, not heroic... but fighting a swarm of wasps is more of an extermination situation anyway rather than high fantasy heroics.

The wasp issue really sounds like a mixture of general system inexperience and potentially a lack of a session zero between the GM and players to set the expectation of what sort of game they want to run/play in.

As written though:
- The party should know about the wasps before going in
- The party should immediately see the wasp nest before entering, either from one of the many windows or just from opening the door.
- The wasps only ** spoiler omitted **

And really, a party that runs in to attack a massive hive and doesn't do so with planning / recall knowledge checks... ooof. Some groups like the gungho playstyle, but as I mentioned before, it is important that the GM knows you want that style and agrees before playing.

Now the ** spoiler omitted ** in AoA that is brutal if played remotely tactically (and there isn't text telling a gm not to). But that unlike this has the threat hidden, is a +4 creature and even turns the terrain against the PCs with cliffs blocking exits. Couple that with AoO, huge size, resistances to everything and persistent damage.

Oh and the grikkitog from another book, in an enclosed space randomly where it is essentially impossible to kill if played to its abilities. Another random encounter the PCs have zero ability to

...

You have to expect the blinders about that on this forum. There are no problems with either the system or the adventure paths, there is just either astronomically bad die rolls or horrendous lack of tactics.

Dual Studies explicitly states that you and the Eidolon are practicing skills on your own apart from each other. You each get to pick different skills and each of you advance to Expert at 7th level in those separate skills.

The line about not sharing means that for these particular skills there is NO linkage in any form between the summoner and eidolon. This is done explicitly to exempt the skills from the usual sharing of skill proficiencies that exists. The Eidolon gets NO benefit from the summoners skill ranks in that particular skill (and vv)

Okay, let's dial it back around.

There's a finite number of choices that you can make in this game. Granted. Choices accumulate as you go up in levels, meaning that higher-level characters are going to tend to show more gameplay differences than lower-level characters. Granted. On the combat side, at first level, roughly speaking, the average non-caster class is probably only going to see about 10 builds per class that are meaningfully distinct from each other from a tactical standpoint -

Not seeing you having 10 different builds per class that play SIGNIFICANTLY different due to the skill/ancestry feat choices. Take your human sword and board fighter who will spend 90% of their time "raise shield, move attack (be it strike, trip, etc). You will have maybe 4 meaningfully different fighter builds based upon your class feat choice. Also not seeing the "billions" of significantly different class builds from just the CRB.

Also the billions of choices do not "... change(s) things all that much."

Garulo wrote:

Remember that 2e is about the play NOT the character. They have designed it so that your character and their gear is secondary/tertiary to the actual play (your decisions during the game). If you like building characters and kitting out your PC, then 1e is probably better for your desires

That's simply not true. PF2 has far tighter balance math, which makes the game of it quite a lot cleaner. I had little interest in building or kitting out for PF1, because it all just devolves to broken combos, and I got plenty of that in my dalliances with 3.x. PF2 is doesn't have that problem.

If you like "building characters and kitting out your PC" as an exercise in "what weird and extreme thing can I break the system with today", then yeah - PF1 will give you that. For those of us who like our games balanced, though....

So yes - the character-build game here is good (much better than 5e) and we want to help it become better. That's not a wrong or bad thing to want.

Nah - this is a tactical board game where you can make a plethora of characters that have very little difference within a class until the higher levels. Of course, you are correct that one character may have a +12 in a skill vs others having +11 and given the "tight math" that makes the characters completely different.

Now that we have a good selection of these, how do we feel about this system?

I'm personally rather split, tending towards a negative response. A lot of them are cool and inherently tell a story, but the majority of them are just as frustratingly impotent. Not everything is an Oathbow, where with a minor increase in price at worst, you can build an objectively better weapon from your existing one by just filling the rune slots. There are a couple Holy Avengers, Celestial Armours, Flame Tongues and Rowan Rifles out there, though not many.

My other gripe is their inherently limited lifespan (unless they are like level 17+), because their effects and most importantly their DCs don't scale, meaning within about 4 levels at best, you are basically required to take the cool ancient sword you found not too long ago, which has served you well until now, and sell it to the next merchant. It makes a lot of sense that they work this way, I just don't like it.

Maybe I just care about optimization a bit too much? Thoughts?

Remember that 2e is about the play NOT the character. They have designed it so that your character and their gear is secondary/tertiary to the actual play (your decisions during the game). If you like building characters and kitting out your PC, then 1e is probably better for your desires

Really speaking Animal Companions should be able to grab an edge - but thats a common sense argument only. The rules clearly stop it.

Some animal companions do have reactions. For example the Vulture has Feast on the Fallen. Its pretty clear that that is supposed to work, or it is very useless. So you would assume that a reasonable GM is going to allow it to do so. Which means allowing it to use this reaction out of its masters turn.

Then there are things like Summon Deific Herald which as one of its variants grants a champion's Retributive Strike reaction. In this case because its not specifically tied to an animal companions or minions, I wouldn't let them get it. But GMs are just going to differ on that.

It is clear from the rules that feast of the fallen can ONLY happen on your turn when you are the one downing another creature.

Is there any discussion or possibility that Society will move towards Free archetype (maybe with restrictions)? I have heard that this is a very popular mode of play and it might increase interest in society play. Of course, if society play is already doing fantastic and growing by leaps and bounds then that is another story

Assurance working out that well (Especially in a main skill) probably is an outlier. If you're a higher level character than the rest of the party, you may end up with it working out, but generally Assurance, by not including attribute bonuses, Item bonuses, and the like guarantees a result that matches up with DCs you would expect of tasks slightly below your level, so if you're a level 4 character in a scenario that decided a standard level 4 challenge DC was appropriate, it would only guarantee failure.

The only real use I have found with Assurance in practical terms is to guarantee a successful AID check or a Medicine check (since those are set to unchanging numbers).

The problem I run into more is that characters are boringly similar until much higher level (compared to PF1). I understand the desire to stretch out the life of a character to L20 but the problem is that while you CAN create conceptually different characters based upon the same chassis at lets say level 4 (2 1/2 months of PFS play on average), the practical differences in play between the two PCs is minimal (given the need to move most rounds/frighten becoming immune etc). This means that scenarios that are hard for any characters will aslso be hard for almost every other character. Perhaps adding the Free Archetype to PFS would be useful

Garulo wrote:

HumbleGamer wrote:

Ravingdork wrote:

HumbleGamer wrote:

I never heard of anybody allowing either familiars or companions to take exploration activities, until now.

I'd probably allow AC to take the "follow the expert" action though, if required ( group trying to past next to a group of guards, for example ).

ACs and other minions have some limited use in combat I suppose, but if familiars are so prohibited, what's the point of ever having one? Can't do anything in combat. Can't do anything out of combat. Waste of a feat/class ability at that point if you ask me.

Since it's something you can easily achieve with a dedication ( witch ), a class feat ( different classes ) or ancestry feat ( different ancestries ), I would not give them more power.

I mean, while it's true that familiars are not the best deal, it's also true they are cheap.

Having a familiar to have and extra infused batch of reagents or and extra focus spell per day ( or even using them to deliver touch spells ) seems enough for me. Eventually, they can pass you items ( scrolls or potions ).

If a class really invests in familiar the same as they do with an AC ( from 4 to 6 class feats out of 10 ), they'd be able to summon potent familiars ( feary drake, imp, etc... ) or eventually get more master abilities ( in that case, sharing them with the familiar master archetype would be really good to give every party member something extra ).

Cheap? It would take 1 of the few class feats or 1 of the even fewer ancestry feats. I am sure that you are willing to give up double strike (or another "useless' feat) to get it. The witch dedication is even worse since it uses a class feat AND locks you into a subpar set of archetype feats. Even for these forums, which are composed of the most fervent rose-colored glass fanatics, that is a stretch

That's mostly because you are looking at feats as something meant to increase the character power rather than customize it.

I see...

If I understand your point of view. All feats are just icing on the cake of a PC. Feats do not "increase" the power of a character, rather they just "customize" it. That does help the free archetype question since giving characters free archetypes will not increase their power.

Seriously, the point was that getting a familiar is not "cheap" since it takes away from a limited resource. Not a discussion of value, rather a statement that getting a familiar is not cheap

Ravingdork wrote:

HumbleGamer wrote:

I never heard of anybody allowing either familiars or companions to take exploration activities, until now.

I'd probably allow AC to take the "follow the expert" action though, if required ( group trying to past next to a group of guards, for example ).

ACs and other minions have some limited use in combat I suppose, but if familiars are so prohibited, what's the point of ever having one? Can't do anything in combat. Can't do anything out of combat. Waste of a feat/class ability at that point if you ask me.

Since it's something you can easily achieve with a dedication ( witch ), a class feat ( different classes ) or ancestry feat ( different ancestries ), I would not give them more power.

I mean, while it's true that familiars are not the best deal, it's also true they are cheap.

Having a familiar to have and extra infused batch of reagents or and extra focus spell per day ( or even using them to deliver touch spells ) seems enough for me. Eventually, they can pass you items ( scrolls or potions ).

If a class really invests in familiar the same as they do with an AC ( from 4 to 6 class feats out of 10 ), they'd be able to summon potent familiars ( feary drake, imp, etc... ) or eventually get more master abilities ( in that case, sharing them with the familiar master archetype would be really good to give every party member something extra ).

Cheap? It would take 1 of the few class feats or 1 of the even fewer ancestry feats. I am sure that you are willing to give up double strike (or another "useless' feat) to get it. The witch dedication is even worse since it uses a class feat AND locks you into a subpar set of archetype feats. Even for these forums, which are composed of the most fervent rose-colored glass fanatics, that is a stretch

So large amount of variant rules? Bummer, hopefully the variant section is actually small since otherwise it will kill my groups guttering interest flame

The point of most posters is that FA is not a game-breaking increase in power for a party of 4. They point out that all FA allows for is some diversification and redundancy (e.g. an optimized party already will debuff and buff for every combat so having every party member instead of 1 or 2 be able to do it is NOT an increase in effective power). Specializing a striker so increasing the odds of your ONE reaction strike proccing sounds great until you realize that the increase is negligible (if you proc if the npc strikes, the few times you will proc when it moves and does not strike is minimal EDIT - going from 85% to 87% is not game breaking). I am reminded of a youtuber called Shadversity