Gauthok's page

There are a ton of spells that need clearer rules. Simulacrum and Magic Jar are two big offenders in my book.

Exactly that.

It's ok that characters have different strengths and weaknesses. But lowering a stat to raise other should be a compromise. "i'll have less hit points, because I want to be nimble". If charisma gives you exactly nothing (or nothing meaningful), then that's not "trading" charisma for Strength. That's having free strength.

1000 times this. Having a stat that is mostly useless is never a good idea. Either make it useful or get rid of it. 6 stats isn't sacred.

Btw, I don't count Oradin builds with Scion of War or other such shenanigans as "making it useful". That's just selectively breaking Charisma in the other direction, using the patches that were tried.

Terquem wrote:

In my opinion, the only way to eliminate "dump stats" at all is to eliminate the ability for players to "choose" ability scores.

Roll up stats, build the best character you can think of for those stats, play that character, and if and when that character dies, roll up a new one.

From a fellow who has been playing for a while now, I just want to say that the game, as it is played, is very different from the one I played many years ago, and a fundamental component of that difference is that characters today are, in fact, "created" and there was a time when they were not. They were "rolled-up" and that, as I see it, is a very different thing indeed.

Yeap, and when we didnt like what we got, the character ran face first into every buzzsaw. Good times indeed. Choosing? No respect I tell ya.

Yep, totally. As I said in the AD&D thread, during those days I actively looked for games other than AD&D, because it kinda sucked. After 3.0 I didn't really look back, the game had improved so much. Let's not go back to the dark times.

I agree with the general trend here. Leave in SoS/SoD effects, but give them some way to have an effect no matter what.

I like the idea of "half dex damage on a save, full on fail, petrified on critical".

Though I do wonder if removing ability score damage/drain might not be a better thing overall. It it just difficult in play to recalculate everything on the fly, and frequently people miss something. Fine when using tools like Herolab but annoying on paper.

Having the spell instead be "-2 on AC and attacks on save, -5 on fail, petrify on crit" might be smoother to play

I do think there is a need to do something with ability scores. Having such disparity between them and having them cost the same is a problem.

I think Con doesn't really need much fixing, as HP has always been critical and will probably remain critical.

Int and Wis seem okay-ish too. Primary stats for a lot of casters, plus useful in saves or lots of skills. I don't see huge problems here.

Dex seems to be too important. I think if Dex to damage remains (and it should), Str to AC should become a thing. That would probably balance them enough that now you get your nimble, lightly armored combat acrobats and your hulking, greataxe smash tanks, and both work just fine.

Cha needs help. Either get rid of it or make it more universally useful. And don't try to fix it by letting certain builds use it for everything (I've got my eye on you, Oradin).

My preference would be very little.

I've played since AD&D, and back in those days, I played a ton of other games. I essentially kept looking for a better game everywhere, and kept playing AD&D because friends did.

Once 3.0 dawned, I played it almost exclusively. Continued that with 3.5 and PF.

The more AD&D is in there, the less I will likely care for it.

Where does it say that breaking the jar returns you to your normal size?

I agree, the intent is that you imprison the subject. I'm just looking at the mechanics and thinking that isn't quite how they end up working out.

I do think you could probably use Minimus to keep your normal body from needing to eat or breathe and from aging. Since the target is a creature, might have some work arounds needed, like having contingent Magic Jar on yourself then casting the Binding. I think that would do it. And again, you can always set a condition on the Binding, like "my soul returns to my body" that will just end it if something ends up happening to your possessed body.

Can you cast spells while under the effects of the Minimus Containment version of Binding? I assume RAI is no, but the Metamorphosis version is explicit that you can't, and Minimus Containment isn't. If the jar used for Minimus is left without a lid, could you get out?

Binding

My thought was to use Minimus Containment to protect my real body while I used Spirit Jars to keep myself in another body "permanently". I initially figured I could set "my soul returns" as the condition that ends the binding. But maybe I don't need a condition if I can cast spells, just say Minimus.

Using Kinetic blade and Quickened Ride the Blast, you can pounce and then full attack.

It is by far the best way to get multiple attacks on a kineticist, and makes their nova damage one of the best in the game.

Take "True Name", boss around a Planetar. I'd pay four feats for that alone.

+1

True Name is the only one really worth taking for most builds, which is too bad. Still, if you can VMC Wizard with a Fighter and get flight at will and a Planetar buddy, you're doing pretty good.

I'd just make the guy a half-dragon, and say that was the extent of the power of Wish.

From the half dragon entry:

"Half-dragons are only rarely the result of dragons mating with other creatures—most are the result of strange magical experiments."

“Half-dragon is an inherited or acquired template that can be added to any living, corporeal creature"

bolding mine.

This is definitely a "get your GM approval" sort of thing, because some games are fine with these shenanigans, and others aren't.

If your game is, try casting Anthropomorphic Animal on a Great White Whale, then using Parasitic Soul to kill him and permanently steal his body. Then a hat of Alter Self to take your normal form when you want.

Tippyverse was, as I recall, originally constructed according to RAW based on 3.5 - in that rule set, there are a set number of casters of an arbitrarily high level in the cities. Since that is, by default RAW; the mages are presumed to be there.

Good point. RAW dictates their existence in that case. Though I thought it didn't call out classes, just levels. Never really bothered with that in 3.5 anyways, so I'm sure my memory is fuzzy.

What's more; although a caster can do these things, they don't necessarily need or want to - high level casters are not monoliths of "I want to control everything" - instead, they can rely on other, "lesser" people to follow up on the paths they don't want to bother following up on - either arcane or divine.

Again true, but I do wonder about the whole "sociopaths are the ones to seek power thing". Are the high level casters really all likely to work together well? And the difference in ability between a well built 20th level caster and several mediocre built 15th level casters is a lot more than the CR of them would suggest. I'd think cities would be a lot less stable than the Tippyverse suggests.

Another point about "non-monolithic" casters. The Tippyverse says that you might have casters start out in the wastelands, but of course they'll emigrate to the cities at some point. After all, no one has ever shown any loyalty to their homeland or people. /s

What I've never heard explained is how a Tippyverse gets its arbitrary number of high level casters.

Following the RAW as "strictly" as it supposedly does, all of these people stay in their cities, essentially never doing more than activating some traps and trading. You can't gain significant experience that way.

I also have to wonder why anyone is banding together at all. A 20th level immortal wizard has no need of any humans. He can make his city populated with simulacrums, intelligent undead, or whatever he wants to keep him company, if he wants any company. He can do all of the item creation he needs personally, so I really don't get how these cities ever form.

I think that if this sort of stuff were to happen, you'd basically get a setting similar to any other, except the high level casters don't exist, because once they get strong enough, they go off and do their own thing.

Oops, forgot something and can't edit.

Finally convinced my wife to give Pathfinder a try, and she's going to be making Amelia Peabody. Since she's new, she'll probably be a straight Archaeologist Bard or Investigator. I don't want Emerson to be either so that I can give her a role to shine in.

Looking to get some input on making Radcliffe Emerson from the Amelia Peabody mysteries for play in the Mummy's Mask AP.

Kinda torn right now between multiclassed Archaeologist Bard/Urban Barbarian and straight up Evoker Wizard.

He needs to be focuses on Osirionology, and should ideally be both smart and strong. I think "smart" could be accomplished with high skills instead of just high INT though. "Strong" could be accomplished by not dumping STR and taking the "Knowledge is Power" Arcane Discovery.

Figure 25 pt buy, as we generally roll stats with generous terms.
Might have more than standard feats available, but not certain.

You can use pretty much anything with a Blade of the Sword Saint

Let's you flurry at Str x1.5

I agree that talking to the DM, retraining, or bringing in new chars sounds like good options. Probably in order from best to good.

Another option, if none of those work, is to simply use your char. You are in a city, being asked to go out into the countryside and fight opponents you can't fight? Charm some guards or mercs into helping you fight. That way, you can make use of your current chars strengths to aid you in battles you wouldn't be good at. That's what an enchanter is all about, right? Getting others to fight your battles for you?

I did say "if you want to take them all".

And I was wrong, because I failed to take into account the level delay. That is just too harsh for most games.

Mostly, I see VMC Sorcerer bloodlines as great for classes that need to dump CHA but would love to pick up those extra powers, and have the feats to burn.

So, some Fighter and Monk builds.

I guess here's what it comes down to in my opinion. These are a grab bag of tricks, not really giving you the feel of a multiclassed character. Whether or not you want a specific bag of tricks will depend entirely on your build.

Gauthok,

look up how "Timeless" works. Time still passes normally, but the effects are negated for you.

Of course if you leave your demiplane time immediately catches up with you.

Yes. So you walk around on the normal Prime Material, and don't spend all of your time there. You get caught off-guard somehow, and so you use Emergency Force Sphere to block whatever attacks were coming your way, Plane Shift to your Timeless plane, then Gate back in with 5 or 10 rounds of buffs on. Not one second has passed on the Prime, so you didn't abandon your allies or really leave the fight.

I doubt you'll notice 1 minutes worth of hunger or aging.

The multiples for hiding Clones are to have secure locations where the Clones won't rot. Nothing in that spell says you have to be on the same plane to go to your clone.

Ah, good call. Eldritch Heritage still lets you get them quite a bit sooner. So, if you're not crazy MAD, you can probably justify the CHA to get them.

I just like the possibility of getting free Str boost and a crazy good damage boost on a Sohei.

If you absolutely must go first, you could always take Diviner VMC on a Sohei. Too bad you can't take Sohei as a VMC. Pretty sure that'd be a popular one for every caster ever.

Not much more to add to this, other than I don't know if anyone has commented yet that Sorcerer VMC is pretty much straight up superior to the Eldritch Heritage line, assuming you planned to take them all.

I'm going to see if I can get my Sohei Monk to add in VMC Sorcerer (orc). I had really wanted those abilities already, but it's so hard to justify the CHA on a Monk.

I frequently do this, and I find I just need to play the enemies smart, and maybe give them max hp to help encounters last a bit.

That is an awesome archetype I hadn't noticed before. Unfortunately, Arcane Enlightenment doesn't work, as pointed out, but I think I might try to get it with a similar house rule. We rotate GMing, so it typically makes sense for us to allow "rule of cool" stuff for each other.

Also, if you don't want to just stay there all the time, use it in place of Time Stop for classes that can't access the spell.

Caught off guard, you just Plane Shift there, buff up, and Gate back to lay the smack down. If you use Reach Spell, you could Plane Shift your whole party, maybe. Not sure how a touch spell converts to close range and still gets multiple targets.

Have multiple timeless demiplanes to keep Clones on.

Convince your DM to just let you have Time Stop and the Immortality discovery even though they're not normally available to your class, just to keep things from getting too insane. :P

Oh, my GM is going to allow it. We've already talked about it a bit.

The char will be a half-elf with a desire to prove himself to "his people" (elves). I plan to have Ancient Lorekeeper and take Simulacrum, and pull shenanigans like having several sims of myself that go around guiding young adventuring parties, esp of elves.

That way, I am both Gandalf the Grey (sim) and Gandalf the White (astral). :)

Such a timely thread! We're about to start Kingmaker, and I am making an Oracle with designs on being the king.

I planned to use Creater Greater Demiplane to make myself a timeless plane, and then use Astral Projection to project back to the material and be an eternal king.

By the rules if yo u awken him he stops being an animal and is no longer valid for the Animal companion.

Which is why I said I'd use Leadership and take him as a cohort.

Once it stops being an animal companion it stops getting all the bonuses from being an animal companion.

This is the thing I was looking for. Gamewise, yes those bonuses are for an animal companion, but why would he suddenly lose a lot of Str/Dex and Nat armor? That's the part I'm struggling with, and I don't see any rules support either way.

I also agree about the base animal companions thing. They're statted very differently from the animals they're based on, which makes the whole thing more confusing.

How exactly does it work? Does it retain the stats it had as an animal companion, or does it revert to an awakened version of its animal type?

I've got a Sylvan sorcerer with an Ape companion, and I would like to awaken it at some point, and use Leadership to keep him on as my cohort.

If I wait until 16th level and have Robes of Arcane Heritage and Boon Companion, would he have the stats of a 20th level AC? Or upon awakening, does he become a basic awakened dire ape, since he's no longer a class feature?

There's a thread out there on this, please go and hit FAQ so we can get an answer sooner. Because yeah, the rules as currently written don't work.

Mounted Combat thread

Normal: You may fight with a weapon in both your primary and off-hand at a -6 and a -10 penalty respectively. (baseline ability)

TWF: You may fight with a weapon in both your primary and off-hand at a -4 penalty to each respectively. (-2 and -6 reduction in each penalty)

MWF: You may fight with a weapon in your primary and off-hands at a -4 penalty to each respectively. (-2 to primary and -6 each offhand reduction)

I see direct correlation and balanced mechanics. Am I missing something?

The only thing that's "missing" really, is Imp & Greater MWF, but there's a caveat in the feat that allows you to sub it in 1-for-1 swap, so one could logically assume you could progress in the feat chain for the extra iterative attacks normally.

Also of note: Imp & Greater MWF were Epic Feats in 3.5. So, there is a precedent that they shouldn't be available in normal levels.

You could also look at synthesist summoner, and just go straight summoner. Bipedal eidolon with four arms.

The rules don't even support monsters wielding 2 two-handed weapons though, so your GM will have to make some up for you. And by "don't support" I mean "talk about in any way" not "say it is badwrongfun".

Depends.

Are you talking Rogue, or some other class?

You can always go the Shatter Defenses route. Pretty feat intensive, but you force your opponent to be flat-footed as long as you can intimidate them.

You need:
Weapon Focus
> Dazzling Display
>> Shatter Defenses
Power Attack
> Cornugan Smash

for this trick. And it doesn't allow you to dump STR.

I'm not aware of any natural attack specific tricks for SA.

I'd love to see stuff like Heroism make it on the list. A bonus to hit and Acrobatics, so maybe I could actually fulfill the mobile skirmisher role?

Some sort of pounce like ability would be pretty sweet too, but I see quinggong as sort of a monk "patch" that lets you trade off the less useful abilities to fix your monk.

T-rex has that too, and he's stronger.

But yes, Pandas are the stealth killer. "oh, look, it's a cuddly pan...ARGH!! IT'S EATING MY FACE!!"

If you're gonna pump charasima might as well go eldritch heritage.

Definitely. Any martial type likes the Orc bloodline. You'll need to pick up the Optimistic Gambler trait to use it on yourself, and then pick up Quicken SLA eventually.

Not to make this tougher, but I like the Allosaurus. 3 attacks, eventually gets pounce and grab. Pretty good stats too, and is fast like the hippo.

I think the hippo is fun, but T-rex is mechanically better. So that I think is your choice between those two: mechanics or flavor.

Based on the evidence given so far, I'd expect the group is probably around 12-13.

Most of the high schoolers I gamed with back in the day weren't acting like this.

Even then, it's kinda meh. My party captured several dire bears in RotRL, and they don't bring them with. Not really needed.

If you could get a Blade of the Sword-Saint as a light hammer instead of a katana, that would do it.

Edit: thanks, btw. I was looking at making a fighter/sohei, and I overlooked martial versatility. Would let me use unarmed feats like Dragon Ferocity with anything in the Monk weapon group.

Not that I'm aware of, and I've been looking for them.

I'd love to see things like Mind Blank get added as high level powers. Totally makes sense too, what with the Zen "empty mind" concept.

If you're gestalt, then a half-elf Monk/Sorcerer with Paragon Surge. Use Sohei to be able to use more weapons, and Empyreal to use WIS instead of CHA for casting.

Faq'd. The rules should just work.

"battle cattle" is just what people were calling bison. You can buy a war trained bison for 75 gp, and they're ridiculously powerful for 1st level characters.

I'm personally a bit upset that the best mounted warrior in the game is the barbarian. There's lots of historical, literary, and pop culture precedent for mounted warriors ramming a lance through an opponent before drawing a sword and leaping off their mount (something you can no longer do in a single round), but remarkably less precedent for a guy getting so angry he stabs someone 4 times with a lance while charging.

Total aside, but in "Le Morte d'Arthur", it frequently talks about knights becoming enraged and "doubling their blows". Enough so that I would expect every Arthurian knight had some Barbarian levels, if you statted them out in Pathfinder.

I think it would be fine to mix point buy and rolled stats, if you had the caveat that people had to roll all of their stats with everyone watching.

Some people don't like point buy, and that's fine.

Some people don't like rolling stats, and that's also fine.

You could also make arrays available. It really doesn't matter, as long as everyone is having fun.

We've done games where you could choose to roll or choose a point buy. Works fine when you all get along and trust your fellow players.

If you do not get along, and do not trust your fellow players, no amount of rules based fixes is going to help your game. Find new people to play with.

You have no full caster. Go with that.

@fictionfan: Wow, strawman much?

I don't think anyone said "I allow any skill to be used for any skill test". Just "I don't require only one skill to be used for tests where it would make sense to allow others".

Example: I would allow Profession: Mason to be used for many but not all Knowledge: Architecture checks, but increase the DC by 5. I would not allow Perception, or more ludicrous skills like Profession: Shepherd.

Some APs require skill checks like Knowledge: Geography, when sensibly Knowledge: Local for the region should at least give you a chance at it. That's what I'm talking about.

Oh, I hate that. I always allow alternate skill uses. Typically at a +5 DC if it's not the right skill, but still. I want people to take skills that make sense for their character.

I think the point is, they have a language that pretty much anyone can learn to speak, ergo, they can learn to speak Common, etc. As long as you can speak a language you know while in that form, there's no reason you couldn't cast verbal spells.

About the huge horses, I think if that were true, a lot of people would be using enlarge on themselves, then casting mount. Since the mount came in when you were large, it'd be huge right, and stay that way until the spell wore off. So, you'd expect to see a lot of casters using huge horses as a better version of summon monster for the early levels.