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Hey everyone, I know this is way down the list, but I figured I'd bring it up anyways. The Orc (pg. 222) is missing the (orc) subtype. I only discovered it because I'm trying to make some effects work in Fantasy Grounds for the Dwarven Hatred trait, and it doesn't recognize an attack against an Orc, because the Orc entry is missing the (orc) subtype. I looked to see if FG properly entered the Orc, and it is verbatim with the Bestiary—missing subtype and all.
Have you even played a session yet to see if your complaints have any actual merit, or are you just complaining to complain? You are whining about there being ability caps at level one, but not considering the context of all of the other rules for which those caps are put in place. Will your character really be so completely weak as you are want to imply? You don’t know. You haven’t played. Furthermore, this is a play test. The developers need a baseline, and therefore put boundaries in place to help them collect data. Dial it back a bit.
The more I read and the more I think about and express for what I want in a game, the more it becomes obvious to me that my tastes in gaming won’t be met by a new edition of Pathfinder. Rather, the campaigns I want to run would be perfectly suited to use AD&D or some other similar OSR game as the engine.
This is absolutely the correct thread for me to be in, as it is a thread about monster creation rules. And just because I say something different than the echo chamber, that doesn’t mean that I don’t deserve to be heard. If you don’t like a dissenting opinion, that is very literally your problem, not mine. But I think there is a misunderstanding on what my wants for monster creation are, so let me clarify. A 20th Level Wizard BBEG should absolutely be built using the PC creation rules, because it is a wizard—though that doesn’t preclude the GM from giving that BBEG additional abilities on top of the standard wizard stuff. But there is no reason why an orc should be given feats and class levels. Orc warrior with a feat? Why? If I want to make an orc stronger, now I have to give them more levels, and figure out feats, and other abilities? Why? It’s an unnecessary headache, especially when trying to do it on the fly so that out of a group of 10 orcs, the one stronger leader orc I’ve got to increase its level and figure out feats, blah blah. No. Tie combat ability/saving throws/XP to the number and type of HD that a creature has. Want to make orc #10 the group commander? Give it 3 HD. Boom. Done. Want it to also be a spell casting orc? Give it the spell casting monster ability, and then add the XP bonus for that ability to the total XP. But I’m 99% certain Paizo isn’t going in this direction so it’s a pipe dream. I should probably write my own RPG rules.
No. 100 times no. As a GM I’m done with Pathfinder because dealing with all the stupid details with feats and skills and class abilities and blah blah blah that I need to do just to scale different monsters is fatiguing. Simplify the monsters so they can be easily run on the fly would be a win. Monsters following the same rules as player characters is good in theory, but in actual practice isn’t.
1) We need a treasure table. Treasure value based on CR doesn’t cut it, especially when GMing on the fly. We need the ability to roll up potential treasure items when we generate an encounter. 2) GP for XP. 3) Creature HD tied to creature size; creature combat/XP based on HD. Easily make a creature stronger by merely increasing HD, which in turn is reflected by XP reward. Creature special abilities have associated XP bonus, and creatures can be modified/advanced by giving them different special abilities. For example: there is a group of attacking goblins, which are normally 1d6 HD. Instead of having all of them be the same, one can be made the group commander by giving it 3d6 HD and the ability to make two attacks in a round—and the XP associated with this special goblin is easily determined by looking up how much 3d6 gives and adding the XP bonus for the extra attack. 4) Generally, make things easier for the GM to run the game on the fly. 5) Character creation takes minutes, not hours. 6) Make rolling for stats relevant again by making the ability score modifiers non-linear. Rolling for ability scores is a core, fundamental element of creating a character. But, the bell-curve of the die rolls lose their importance when the modifiers are linear, thus leaving everyone to choose point-buy so they “don’t feel like they’re being left behind. 7) Treasure tables, quick character creation, fast and clear GM monster adjudication.
Simplification isn’t a bad thing either, especially from the perspective of the GM.
The stat blocks as written don't include the TWF penalties. TWD isn't included because because it has to be "activated" instead of always on. Yes, the +4 is from the mate armor. In short, stat blocks are assumed to include those magic effects, feats, and abilities that are always active and don't require the NPC to activate the effect. Those effects that aren't "permanent" are not included because the authors don't know if you're going to use them or not.
CotCT has Easter eggs that tie it to RotRL (the storylines are not related, but there are some characters and references that have ties). Then you can run Second Darkness, which too has ties. Then once you run those, you can run Shattered Star which is a direct sequel to all three.
Spoiler: Name of PC: Mudder Fokker Goblinkicker Race/Class: Dwarf/ Ranger 10 Chapter/Part: Fortress of the Stone Giants/Raid on Sandpoint Catalyst: +1 Dwarven Bane Heavy Pick to the face. Story: The battle started well and coordinated, but as other giant attacks and the dragon began to occur, the party's tactics started to unravel and the group began to split. With the dragon being driven off and having enough giant and dire bear casualties, the attack was foiled, and Teraktinus began to retreat. Muddier, having already taken some lumps in earlier fights, maneuvered to intercept—only to come around the corner of a building to be facing head on with the retreating giant. The giant, in a frustrated rage, charged the dwarf. The dwarf, enlarged by a spell, made an AoO with his Lucerne hammer, doing a respectable amount of damage. The giant rolled a crit threat, then confirmed the crit, with his +1 dwarf bane heavy pick, which left the dwarf with negative thirty-something-I-don't-care-you're-dead hit points. Fun times.
Didn't there use to be a rule that you could cast a spell directly from a spellbook but it erased the page like casting it from a scroll? Or was that just a houserule my group used back in AD&D? Unearthed Arcana, I believe. I think there might have been something about a percentile chance to wipe every page clean if casting this way.
The rules already tell us that rays function like ranged weapon attacks. Ranged weapon attacks suffer in-melee penalties. Rays, therefore, suffer in-melee penalties. You can use the Precise Shot and Point Blank Shot feats for rays. Acid Splash functions like rays, smells like rays, feels like rays, and tastes like rays. Why wouldn't the rules that apply to rays not apply to Acid Splash? If there are no rules that specifically state that Acid Splash doesn't work that way, there is no reason to assume that it doesn't.
Rays are specifically called out as being used as a ranged weapon in the Magic chapter, so those types of spells do get the penalty as well as gain benefit of the feat. Acid Splash isn't a ray, but rather a missile. Regardless of that, mechanically the spell operates in exactly the same way that any ray spell does: you have to succeed on a ranged touch attack to hit your target. Acid splash is affected by the same limitations that ray spells are: you can fire into the darkness or at an invisible creature in the hopes that you hit something, you don't have to see the creature that you're trying to hit, intervening objects or creatures can block line of sight or provide cover. Although it is not specifically mentioned that ray spells get penalized for allies in melee combat, we know that they do because the rules say that they work just like ranged weapons. Regarding Acid Splash (and other spells like it), if it works like a ray in every way, and there isn't a rule to call it out as an exception, why wouldn't it be penalized for an ally in combat or gain the benefit of Precise Shot? We all know that the authors can't provide every little minute detail or example in the rules because otherwise the size of the book would swell to an even more unreasonable size. This example falls into that category.
It's assumed that you are only using one hand to wield a lance while mounted as you can also utilize a shield in this situation.
Assuming STR 20, mounted, and no other feats or modifiers, your damage would be: Normal: 1d8+7Charge: 2d8+14 Normal Critical: 3d8+21 Charging Critical: 4d8+28
Hello! It's been a while since I've been perusing the website, and decided to take a look at the FAQ and see what updates have occurred since I last visited. I do know that those entries that are less than a month old have a red hot-link. The problem I am having is that there are numerous updates that are new to me, but are older than a month, so looking at the hot-links doesn't clue me in to which ones are new. Would it be possible to add the date of inclusion at the end of the hot-link title in addition to dating the entry? That way, I can scan the list of hot-links for dates that I might have missed rather than scrolling through the entire page. Thanks!
So what made Aroden so special that his death ended prophecy through the entire universe? I know, and agree with, the meta reason (prophecy is lazy storytelling), but what's the in-setting reason?No; not even close. Aroden didn't even rival Desna or Sarenrae or Abadar or Gorum or most of the others for power. Among humanity on the nations of the shores of the Inner Sea his faith was very influential, but the further you got from the Inner Sea, the less influence he had. And remember, most of the other core 20 are worshiped on many other planets as well. Aroden, not so much. Regarding Aroden, one question I haven't seen asked yet is why no plans to answer why/how he died?
The question I would ask is if you were in a city, could you change the appearance of your clothes to blend in with the crowd? I would think that most people would agree that that would be a reasonable thing to do. I do not think it is outside the realm of reason to be able to change the appearance of your clothes to help you blend in with your surrounding terrain. I would think a +2 to stealth would be appropriate. YMMV.
Instead of a percentage chance to find the lair, I suggest something a little more modern by instead listing a skill and a DC to find the lair. Perhaps different or multiple skills can apply. I don't think allowing perception to find everything is the best solution, unless they want to spend a long time looking everywhere. You know in the first hobbit film where they know the troll lair must be close? They knew the trolls would not venture far from it. A Knowledge monster check maybe? For another monster, they might know it likes to make its lair near a water source or at a higher elevation. Knowledge geography or history might reveal other info, but all dependent upon the specific creature. A very reasonable suggestion. May I direct you to this blog post to provide more context as to my end goal.
Thanks for the responses. I probably should have clarified that my intent for these tables is for a sandbox hexcrawl, so the randomness is part of it. Each entry would have a % chance to detects its tracks as well as a % chance to find its lair, if applicable. So an encounter won't always result in combat. It's too bad Paizo doesn't include the frequency with creature entries to help weight the tables.
if you look at a light horse it only has hoof attacks too with the docile. So combat training helps ponies and light horses but not heavy horses since they have a bite. This is not correct. Being combat trained removes the docile special quality. Being combat trained does not make hooves primary attacks. Hooves are secondary attacks. A horse would use its hooves as primary attacks if it were not for the docile quality, because its hooves is the only type of attack that it has. The heavy horse's hooves are always secondary attacks, because it has two types of attacks, regardless if it is combat trained or not.
How do you all go about populating your random encounter tables? Do you tend to flip through the Bestiary and find those monsters you think are cool? Do you look for those that fit a specific theme? If you have multiple areas of similar terrain, do you make different tables for each area, or do you make one list to cover them all?
Yes, I've been going back through 1e and 2e stuff. I never actually played 1e, and was fairly young playing 2e, and after reading through it, I realized that I didn't play it correctly—not that there is actually a right or wrong way to play, we just didn't bother reading the books. Now that I've gone back and actually read through them, it is much more clear now, and I realize how good those rules systems actually were, even with some of the more aggravating nuances. I was going to use 5e with my new campaign, but I think I've finally settled on using 1e as the vehicle to tell my story.
Fortunately, in this instance, RAW and RAI agree that one cannot get the sneak attack bonus to ranged attacks.Wrong on both accounts, not only is it harder to dodge ranged flanking than melee, but there is no wording to differentiate the two. I mean, you keep on keepin' on with your house rule. It's not my place to tell you how you should run your home games.
Reflecting back upon your time playing 1st Ed. AD&D, did you adhere to the rules for demi-human class and level limits?Absolutely not. Hated level limits, and they were one of my favorite things to see go away, finally, in 3rd edition. Thanks for the insight!
Reflecting back upon your time playing 1st Ed. AD&D, did you adhere to the rules for demi-human class and level limits?Absolutely not. Hated level limits, and they were one of my favorite things to see go away, finally, in 3rd edition. Did you keep the racial class restrictions (dwarves can't be magic users, etc.)? Did you give humans anything extra to make them more attractive to play?
So you admit that the developers likely side with his position, and yet you still argue that he is wrong. That makes absolutely no sense. I honestly think that at this point you're arguing purely for the sake of arguing.
This problem stems from GMs allowing the player(s) to "ready" an action as a way to cheat the initiative rules.I'd argue that pacing is equally important as a reason for why the rules aren't too specific. If there are bad guys in the room with a hostage and they're trying to persuade the PCs to surrender without a fight, or if the players are exploring and suspect they're being stalked by an invisible enemy, then forcing everyone into initiative order due to some RAW-mandated specification can really kill the pace. That's why you don't roll for initiative until the combat starts. I mean, really, this whole thread is trying to make a mountain out of a molehill.
Not only that, to some players it'd imply combat. Which is awkward if there's a chance for a noncombat solution, and that's the point of the hurried negotiations. If the pirate captain is roaring and lowering his pistol to attack, the non-combat solution has already failed.
This problem stems from GMs allowing the player(s) to "ready" an action as a way to cheat the initiative rules. Just because a player declared that their archer was readying his bow to shoot the goblin if it draws a sword/takes a step/picks it's nose/whatever, doesn't mean that that player can automatically shoot the goblin before it completes its desired task. That is literally what the initiative roll determines: who gets to go first?
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